First Falsehood: All is One and One is All
During this study we will alternatively look at pagan falsehood and the next reading will directly deal with the Biblical truth.
1st Falsehood – All is One and One is All
In 1998, a woman representing the Natural Law party ran for Secretary of State in California. Government, she believes, is the “reflection of collective consciousness, and needs a unifying principle … of harmony, positivity and wholeness, in which no one can go wrong, and everyone is spontaneously right.” To attain this wholeness, she proposes a program of “education to develop higher states of consciousness.”
You can see that pagan monism is not just a theory. Such spirituality is already a part of national politics. Because paganism relates to this world, and not the Creator of it, religious paganism must take on political form, as the Bible indicates (Rev. 17). This unifying principle of wholeness is another form of monism and reveals why monism loves the symbolism of inclusive circles.
In the Disney movie, Lion King, everything in the universe is a part of a mass of energy. There is no Creator: the circle of life swallows up God. Many non-Christian faiths use circles as a means of expressing this all-is-one philosophy. Hinduism, goddess worship, New Age/Toaist physics, witchcraft, and the Parliament of the World’s Religions all show universal unity with circles. This circular, all-is-one notion inspires deep ecology and the worship of bewitching, encircling Mother Earth.
A young adult novel that I saw years ago echoes this Mother Earth-oneness spirituality. Says the spiritual guide to the young hero:
It is the same for all things, small circles of individual life and spirit within the big circle which is the pattern of all life, all spirit … We must remember the circle that holds all things.
A similar notion appears in the movie Star Wars. Obi-wan Kenobi, the Jedi warrior, explains to young Luke Skywalker; in language like that of a pagan priest or priestess:
When Luke abandons himself to his intuitions, he is able, in harmony with the Force, to pilot a complex flying machine in a pinpoint bombing of the headquarters of the Evil Empire. If you believe that, I have some oceanside property to sell you in Northeast Arkansas!
Some who claim to be Christians argue that our thinking is too linear. The goddess or Mother Earth should be (in their minds) restored to Christianity. Because Mother Earth is everything, we shouldn’t see things as opposites, but as different sides of the same thing. Could we bring an end to the conflict be changing the way we think? So in Star Wars the dark side of the Force is not evil, but just the other side, like the Yin and the Yang of Taoism. George Lucas, director of Star Wars, explicitly said that he made it to introduce Buddhism to the West. These are spiritual ideas, but are they true spirituality?
By considering God and His creation as part of the same circle, monism leads to a confusion not only about who (or what!) God is, but also about the identity of human beings, and their place in the world.
Questions to promote thought.
Where does monism (one-ism) show up in school, in the workplace, and in public life?
Think of the movies you have seen, such as Lion King, or Pocahontas. What is the relationship between the earth and the people who live in it? Think of other movies with the same theme.
In what ways do you see earth-worship growing? What is the difference between worshipping the earth and caring for it? (see Rom. 1:25; Isa. 51:6; Lev. 25: 23; 2nd Chron. 36: 20-21)
How is God made a part of creation in the non-Christian religions you know?
In what ways is monism unbiblical? (see Job 28: 12-28; Gen. 1:1; Ex. 20: 3-4; Isa. 55: 8-9)