The Core of Ego
Open Review
In this chapter, Tolle wants to expand on his theories that the ego is holding us back from being truly great beings of truth and pureness. In that statement alone, I can agree. Holding on to resentment and grievances, as Tolle suggests, can corrupt your life and change it forever and not in a positive way! There is a lot of truth to this and even in Christianity, we are taught to forgive each other and to turn the other cheek. Tolle talks a lot about “the truth” in this chapter and how it is obscured and hidden by the rules and regulations that is placed on our lives. He is really pointing a cold finger towards any organized religion. I did find it funny that he talks about how each side of a battle claim to have the truth and that is the ego talking…yet he wrote a book about his version of the truth and why others are wrong in their thoughts. I found this a bit dagger to the heart on his case.
Biblical Review
I started this chapter with very little excitement. The last chapter was tough to muddle through for me and this chapter started off much the same with very little fact other than what Tolle tells us is the truth; solely based on his opinions. He does throw out a quote from Jesus on page 61 which is a little off the mark. The quote is from Luke 6:41, which reads:
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?
Tolle tries to turn this into an “egoic compulsive habit” and that is what Jesus was trying to warn against. That is not really true. In a continuing pattern that I am seeing, Tolle likes you use part of the bible to spin in his direction, but does not like to include the whole passage that usually reveals where Tolle has made a slight of hand with the Bible’s true meaning of the passage. Here is the full verse:
41″Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 42How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
Jesus clearly does not say “let go of your ego!” No He is talking about being a hypocrite and saying that you need to remedy yourself in God’s eyes before you worry about others. Not exactly what Tolle led us to believe…
Then the religious talk dies down a bit to later resurface with another Jesus misquote of:
Jesus’ teaching to “Forgive your enemies” is essentially about the undoing of one of the main egoic structures in the human mind
Page 66
Actually, that is not it at all! This is complete and utter junk! Jesus was referring to the hatred between the people of His day and this can definitely be placed on the world today. It has nothing to do with your ego but the forgiving of others just as God forgives us. If you look to the apostle’s creed for reference you can clearly see that Jesus is not telling us to “search within and release your ego”, but to pray for the relationship to be returned to the right state by praying for those who have done you wrong and asking that God forgive them and at the same time yourself as well.
9″This, then, is how you should pray:
” ‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
10your kingdom come,
your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
11Give us today our daily bread.
12Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.[a]‘ 14For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.
Matthew 6:9-15
Does that sound like what Tolle is referring to when he used this quote from Jesus? It doesn’t to me.
Starting on page 69, my book now bleeds yellow highlighter. As I read, I highlight the things I would like to come back to, reflect on, and research more. From pages 69 to 72, my book is bright yellow. It is here that Tolle opens a full on assault against any organized religion and the teachings of Jesus Christ and his divinity. So here we go!
Tolle tells us that the history of Christianity is “a prime example of how the belief that you are in sole possession of the truth, that is to say right, can corrupt your actions and behavior to the point of insanity.” He is referring to the inquisition where Christian’s tortured thousands of people or the Salem witch trials where people were burned alive. When religions go bad? Perhaps. Shining spot in Christian history, nope. But he then compares it to Pol Pot who ordered 1 million people killed that included everyone that wore glasses. The reason, well Tolle give us that, because Pol Pot believes that glasses made you part of an educated class and are repressing the people. So according to this comparison, Christians are nothing more than ignorant prejudice people who walk around killing anything that we don’t agree with. I admit there have been times, but to compare that to Christianity today is just foolish.
He then makes a huge jump to attack the bible completely, stating that the “truth” for Christians is, and let me quote this for the proper effect, “A story you had to believe in; which means, a bundle of thoughts.” So the beliefs of Christianity and the Bible are nothing more than a story or someone’s thoughts. I have to ask why you quote it so much in your very own book if it is nothing more than a worthless story?
He then tells us that the Catholics are correct when they said that relativism, or the belief that there is no absolute truth that guides mankind, is one of the evils of or time. But that, and again I quote so you can see his exact words, “you won’t find absolute truth if you look where it cannot be found: in doctrines, ideologies, sets of rules, or stories.” Wait, so first he called the Bible nothing more than a story, and now he has pushed it further by saying that there is no truth in doctrine or stories; so Tolle has clearly just stated that the Bible is nothing more than a story and has no truth in it at all.
He then follows with two more statements to try to persuade you away from true Christianity: “All religions are equally false and equally true, depending how you use them.” and “If you believe only in your religion is the Truth, you are using it in the service of your ego.” The first statement is clearly meant to buy into his theory that all religions support his enlightenment. This to me really resounds to why he feels that he can quote any religious work and use the parts that fit with his thoughts and toss the ones that don’t. He clearly states that you can use religions how you see fit; which he is doing masterfully so far. The second statement is aimed to make you feel guilty and doubt yourself and your religion. Let me translate this into what Tolle is really saying: “If you actually believe what you believe then you are only trying to build your ego up and as I have said, the ego is bad. So stop believing what you believe and believe what I am telling you.”
Tolle then says that all religious teachings are just “signposts” left behind by awakened humans. This flies right in the face of Jesus’ divinity by calling Him an “awakened human”. He then continues to pull us away from God and Jesus by stating that the truth is inseparable from whom we are and that we are the truth. If we look elsewhere we will only be lied to. What he is saying is that we are the super beings of truth and that Jesus, God, or any other deity figure is incorrect. Tolle also uses the phrase “I AM” to refer to his belief of inner light. He calls this ‘I Am-ness’. This is actually a sacred name for God; so he is replacing God with his theory of empowerment. Tolle goes as far as to quote Jesus with “I am the way and the truth and the life.” to try to point to this “I AM-ness”. Again Tolle leaves off the last part of the statement so that it will fit his views. As most Christians can finish this verse for themselves: “No No one comes to the Father except through me.” This clearly shows that Jesus is not talking about some inner light that we can achieve ourselves.
Later, on page 78, Eckhart goes back to making us the ones in control over bringing the “Presence” into the world instead of God or Jesus. Tolle would have us worship ourselves. He then uses Jesus statement of “Deny thyself” to mean deny your ego. Again this is only half of the message. Jesus was talking about how the people believed in pleasing themselves and not following the word of God.
Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
Matthew 6:24
It is quite clear to me, in this chapter, that this book has nothing to do with Christianity and the actual word of God other than a few misquotes and is really starting to pull the reader, by the use of the familiar Bible quotes, away from God.
