A Comparison of the New Age Movement and Christian Theology

(Originally printed in the Fall 2009 Issue of the MCOI Journal)

Writing a comparison of the New Age Movement (NAM) and Christian theology is challenging, since NAM is so nebulous and diverse. NAM’s roots go as far back as the Garden of Eden, with the old lie, “… you will be like God …” (Gen 3:5 ¹ ), and it has borrowed from many other philosophies and religions throughout the years-Transcendentalism, Spiritualism, New Thought/Mind Science, Eastern Religions, Native American Religions, and Transpersonal Psychology to name just a few. ² Despite NAM’s ever-changing faces, I will attempt to compare it with Christian theology, although we will be more apt to find their many glaring contrasts.

History Of Nam

The term “New Age” became popular in the 1980s after the publication of Marilyn Ferguson’s bestseller The Aquarian Conspiracy. After exploring biofeedback and Transcendental Meditation in the late 1960s, she became fascinated with the brain-mind relationship. Her bestseller established her as a spokesperson for NAM, and her vision of a paradigm shift in society, caused by multitudes who had experienced “inner transformation,” spread across the world.³ Transformational “tools” ran the gamut from meditation and astrology to crystals and healings.

A prevailing New Thought belief in a coming world teacher/ messiah led Annie Besant and C.W. Leadbeater to promote Indian guru Krishnamurti as the messiah; but Krishnamurti wisely rejected this “call” in 1929. The cause was picked up by Theosophist* Alice Bailey and her student Benjamin CrÃ¨me, who in 1982 ran American newspaper ads predicting the appearance of Lord Maitreya, “the ‘christ.’ ” This is a chilling reminder of Jesus’ prophecy in Matthew 24:24 (“For false Christs and false prophets will appear …”). Perhaps only more chilling was New Ager Shirley MacLaine’s 1987 appearance on national TV, “out on a limb” and shouting from a mountaintop, “I am God!” ⁴

Current Scene

NAM continues to thrive today through such vehicles as Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret, Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth, some aspects of Holistic Health, and Quantum Metaphysics. And perhaps most tragic of all, NAM even infiltrated some evangelical Christian churches. From meditation and visualization techniques to prosperity teaching and “creating your own reality,” NAM continues to promise breakthrough; but too often, it leads to breakdown-especially in a person’s relationship with God.

Although NAM has no established leadership, codified teachings, or identifiable membership, there are some commonly held beliefs and practices throughout the movement⁵:

1) The Ultimate Reality is God. God is All, All is God (pantheism**). God is impersonal but conscious Energy, Life Force. All is One, One is All.

2) Humanity is an extension of the Ultimate Reality/ God. Mankind’s true self is divine. Man is one with God. Man is God.

3) Humanity’s problem is ignorance of the truth that “All is One, and that man is divine.” (In some Eastern religions the world is seen as illusion/Maya.)

4) The solution to humanity’s problems is to awaken to know the truth that “All is One, and that man is divine.” The goal is called self-realization, Christ-consciousness, enlightenment, cosmic consciousness, etc. Practices that lead to this knowledge/awareness include meditation, yoga, chanting, affirmations, visualization, energy balancing, drumming, Sufi dancing, etc. If people do not reach the goal in one lifetime, they are reincarnated in later lives; their good and bad karma (moral consequences for actions) follows them as reaping follows sowing. A coming world leader will help mankind toward the goal. Jesus was one of many “Enlightened Ones/avatars” who came in the past. “Higher knowledge” is often “channeled” from disembodied spirits through mediums.

5) Humanity is poised between two ages (the Piscean Age of rationality and the Aquarian Age of spirituality), and there is about to be a paradigm shift-a quantum leap forward-to where mankind reaches its full potential and ultimately transcends the illusion of separateness from Ultimate Reality/God.

The worldwide fascination with the New Age promises of power and transcendence can point to a source beyond the natural world. As the Bible says, it was Satan himself who was the first to try to “… make myself like the Most High” (Is. 14:12-15). His prideful attempt to usurp the divine Throne led to his expulsion from Heaven. And today, in jealously and rage, he tries to steal as many as he can from their path toward God (John 10:10).

Who Speaks For Nam?

On the natural level, the New Age continues to have its outspoken proponents. One notable example is the ever-prevalent Oprah Winfrey, who has been watched on TV by millions for more than 20 years. It was Oprah who introduced and popularized such infamous New Age gurus as: Marianne Williamson (teacher of the spiritually channeled A Course in Miracles), Neale Donald Walsch (author of the heretical Conversations with God), Gary Zukav (Dancing Wu Li Masters, which unveiled Quantum Metaphysics), Deepak Chopra (Quantum Healing, based on Transcendental Meditation), Rhonda Byrne, and Eckhart Tolle. Oprah’s choice of Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret as one of her Book Club selections catapulted “creating your own reality” to the world stage. And her 2008 online Eckhart Tolle course continues to indoctrinate hundreds of thousands of students into the deceptions of the New Age.⁶

Oprah’s fascination with and passion for New Age teachings could earn her the title “High Priestess of NAM,” but Christians should pray for her. Her misunderstanding of God’s nature (by misunderstanding His divinely protective jealousy as human selfishness) led her to reject the God of her evangelical Christian upbringing, and she has taken multitudes of her followers with her.⁷

Common Threads

A brief overview of some New Age writings reveals their common heretical threads:

Think, speak, and act as the God you are.⁸

“Salvation” is merely accepting one’s “true” identity as one essence with God. Therefore, we need nothing from God because each person’s true nature is God.⁹

The Secret is the law of attraction! Everything that’s coming into your life you are attracting … by virtue of the images you’re holding in your mind. … the law of attraction is the most powerful law in the Universe. … You are the most powerful magnet in the Universe! … Like Aladdin’s Genie, the law of attraction grants our every command.¹⁰)

And the lies continue:

We are the creators of the Universe. So there’s no limit, really to human potential. … You are eternal energy. … You hold everything in your consciousness. … You are God in a physical body.¹¹

Christ is your God-essence or the Self … The “second coming” of Christ is a transformation of human consciousness … not the arrival of some man or woman. … Never personalize Christ.¹²

The word God is limiting not only because of thousands of years of misperception and misuse, but also because it implies an entity other than you. God is Being itself, not a being. There is no subject-object relationship here, no duality, no you and God. God-realization is the most natural thing there is.¹³

Quantum Connection

Amazingly, both Rhonda Byrne and Eckhart Tolle, as well as many other New Agers, look to Quantum Physics for justification of their beliefs:

>Quantum physicists tell us that the entire universe emerged from thought! You create your life through your thoughts and the law of attraction … When you become aware of this great law, then you become aware of how incredibly powerful you are …¹⁴

The amazing work and discoveries of the quantum physicists over the last eighty years has brought us to a greater understanding of the unfathomable power of the human mind to create.¹⁵

Quantum mechanics confirms it. Quantum cosmology confirms it. That the Universe essentially emerges from thought and all of this matter around us is just precipitate thought. Ultimately we are the source of the Universe …¹⁶)

The image of a “quantum leap” is used by Tolle to represent humanity’s entrance into the New Age:

… we are connected, rather than separate, from all of life, … At core, this new world view involves seeing yourself, others, and all of life, not through the eyes of our small, earthly self that lives in time. But rather through the eyes of the soul, our Being, the True Self. One by one, people are jumping to this higher orbit. … Your cooperation is an essential part of it. However you look at it, it is a quantum leap in the evolution of consciousness, as well as our only chance of survival as a race.¹⁷

Comparing these endless heretical statements with what the Bible states will reveal astounding contrasts (which I will address later), but even the secular world would counter these New Age claims to omnipotence. While it is true that Quantum Physics reveals a seemingly paradoxical world-where energy can take the mutually exclusive forms of particles and/or waves depending on the observer’s choice of experiment-and some experiments seem to show that our world is “non local” (meaning far-away objects can affect nearby objects instantaneously, thereby breaking the “speed limit” of light and suggesting an underlying connection between all parts of the universe), there is no agreement among physicists as to what this evidence means.

For example, there are no less than eight interpretations of this evidence presented in Nick Herbert’s Quantum Reality: Beyond the New Physics, including such diverse and mutually exclusive notions as:

1) There is no deep reality.

2) Reality is created by observation.

3) Reality is undivided wholeness.

4) Reality consists of a steadily increasing number of parallel universes.

5) The world is made of ordinary objects.

6) Consciousness creates reality.

As Herbert sums it up:

One of the best-kept secrets of science is that physicists have lost their grip on reality.¹⁸

If there is no consensus among such brilliant theorists regarding the conclusions drawn from the evidence available, how can New Agers selectively use these physicists’ “interpretations” to prove anything?

New Age Medicine

Any discussion of NAM would be incomplete without some mention of New Age Medicine. Practitioners who accept the NAM/pantheistic worldview of “All is One, God is impersonal yet conscious Energy, All is spiritual Energy” often turn to healing techniques that claim to balance or otherwise manipulate this energy-variously called bioenergy, vital force, life force, universal life energy, cosmic energy, chi (acupuncture), Innate Intelligence (chiropractic), and prana (Hinduism). New Age healing methods can include such diverse practices as therapeutic touch, reflexology, crystal healing, Rolfing, chiropractic, homeopathy, acupuncture, psychic/Reiki healing, yoga, visualization, polarity therapy, iridology, etc. ¹⁹

As Christian apologist Elliot Miller points out:

Wherever it has appeared-in ancient paganism, modern occultism, or parapsychological [sic] research-this “life force” has been accompanied by altered states of consciousness, psychic phenomena, and contact with spirits. Additionally, those who are capable of perceiving, and adept at manipulating, this force invariably are shamans (e.g., witch doctors), “sensitives,” or psychics, thoroughly immersed in the pagan/occult world. … Furthermore, the energy system models used to explain these therapies … (the meridians of acupuncture, the seven chakras [psychic centers] of yoga, the auras of occultism)-are all imbedded in world views that are intrinsically pagan and antagonistic to Christianity. … and are not even remotely related to physical science. … energetic medicine … is essentially a pantheistic view and cannot be conformed to biblical theology.²⁰)

Inside The Church

And most tragic of all, even the Body of Christ has been infiltrated by the New Age. As Christian apologists Dave Hunt and Hank Hanegraaff have chronicled in their books The Seduction of Christianity and Christianity in Crisis, respectively, creative visualization, faith in one’s faith, people becoming their own “gods,” and believers “creating their own reality” have become common heresies in the local church. The phrase “… you will be like God …” (Gen 3:5) never had a more chilling “fulfillment” than when so-called Christian leaders began to train their flocks to command God, name it and claim it, confess and possess, demand rights, and see themselves as gods.

A startling example was found in the Seattle Pastor Casey Treat’s “interpretation” of Genesis 1:26, where God said, “Let Us make man in Our image …” Treat pressured his 3,000-plus congregation to repeat after him:

“I’m an exact duplicate of God!” Yell it out loud! Shout it! … When God looks in the mirror, He sees me! When I look in the mirror, I see God! … sometimes people say to me … “You just think you’re a little god!” … You got that right! “Who d’you think you are, Jesus?” Yep! ²¹

As Dave Hunt points out:

Did anyone [in the congregation] notice that Pastor Treat had taken a quantum leap from an “image” to an “exact duplicate?”²²

Unfortunately, Treat is not the only pastor who has led his flock into such heresy. Other notable examples are Word of Faith teachers Kenneth Copeland, Charles Capps, Frederick Price, Robert Tilton, Kenneth Hagin, John Avanzini, Morris Cerullo, and Benny Hinn.²³ And while it should be noted the Faith teachers have not taught the metaphysical concept of an impersonal God permeating creation (pantheism/panentheism), they still present a deification of man (“exact duplicate of God”) that is contrary to Scripture. And they preach the heretical “Word of Faith”-that through the force of “faith-filled words,” people can create their own reality.²⁴

Lest we think the Faith movement was an aberration of the past, Hank Hanegraaff has recently written Christianity in Crisis: 21st Century, chronicling the continuing distortion of Christian theology-from the Word of Faith to Prosperity preaching. Current “players” include Joel Osteen, Creflo Dollar, Rod Parsley, Joyce Meyer, John Hagee, and T.D. Jakes.²⁵ May the Holy Spirit bring gifts of discernment to God’s people to expose error and to reveal truth.

Biblical Response

After discussing the fallacies and delusions that spring from NAM, it is more than refreshing to turn to God’s Word for answers to the questions: “What is real? What is man? Who is God?” Even a child’s level of reading Scripture reveals how far NAM is from God’s revealed truth. NAM has taken their prescribed “quantum leap,” and consequently, they’ve led droves to the precipice of hell.

1) When a New Ager claims “God is All, and All is God” or “All is One, and One is All,” they can be met with the truths of Scripture that God is the Creator of all things (Gen. 1:1, John 1:1-5, Is. 45:18), and He is forever transcendent above His creation:

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Is. 55:8-9)

He is “… ‘Holy, holy, holy’ …” (Rev. 4:8), which means He is altogether set apart and different from everything and everyone else who exists, has existed, or will exist.

While it is true that since the beginning of time, God desires relationship with mankind, He forever remains distinct from us:

They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. (Rev. 21:3b)

And even though God wondrously and miraculously transforms His people to be like Him (2 Peter 1:4, Eph. 4:24, 1 John 3:2, Rom. 8:29, Phil. 3:21, 2 Cor. 3:18), we will never become Him. When Jesus said He and His Father would be in believers (John 17:21-23), He retained the subject-object/divine-human relationship-God and us, not God is us.

An equally striking contrast can be drawn between the New Age claim that “God is impersonal but conscious Energy” and the truth of Scripture. No, God is anything but impersonal-with His fiery love that sent His Son to die for our sins, His protective jealously that guards us from idols, His grieving heart over man’s rebellion, and His plan for divinely wedded bliss with His Bride-the Church. He is the King, the Lord, the Savior, the Bridegroom, and the Shepherd. Impersonal energy could never inspire martyrs to die, nor saints to worship.

2) When claims are made that mankind’s true self is divine, man is one with God, and the ultimate claim: Man is God, there are abundant Scriptures, some of which I’ve already shared, that can be offered in response. Though God in His graciousness has condescended to relate with man, has paid the price to redeem man, and has given His sanctifying Spirit so man can become like Him, man will never be God, nor will he ever even come close to being God. There is an infinite gap between God and man, and although the Bridge of the Cross provides our union with God (John 17:23), the worship of God and the subordination of man will forever remain (Rev. 21:3, 22:3).

3) When the New Ager asserts humanity’s problem is ignorance of the alleged truth that All is One and man is divine, the biblical truth is that man’s problem is his sinful rebellion against a Holy God, including his inherent propensity toward idolatry- setting up himself, anything, or anyone else as a “god” to be worshiped. The Bible is full of examples-from mankind’s Fall in Genesis (Gen. 3) to his refusal to bow to the King of Kings in Revelation (Rev. 19:19). Romans 3:23 and 6:23a sum it up:

for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, .. For the wages of sin is death, …

Because of man’s continued rejection of God, he has become God’s enemy (Rom. 5:10), and he is doomed to eternal separation from God, in the torments of hell (John 3:18, Rev. 20:15).

In response to the claim the world is illusory, the Bible declares God’s creation is real (Gen. 1), so real, in fact, that God had to pay the ultimate price to redeem it. If all that was necessary was to awaken man to the truth of “All is One, All is God,” then Jesus wouldn’t have had to die to save mankind. It’s the ultimate insult to God to say He sent his Son to the Cross for nothing/Maya/illusion. While it is true this world is temporary (2 Cor. 4:18), it is all too real, to which any thinking/feeling human being would attest.

4) When a teacher says the solution to humanity’s problem is to awaken to know the “truth” that “All is One and man is divine,” there are abundant Scriptures to the contrary as cited previously. When Jesus told His disciples they would “… know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32), the Truth He was referring to was He, Himself. (… “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” John 14:6) It is through faith in Jesus and His sacrifice on the Cross for mankind’s sins, His burial, and His Resurrection by which mankind can be saved. (1 Cor. 15:1-4, John 3:16- 18, Rom. 5:8-11, Rom. 10:9-10.)

When New Agers (and others) look to a coming world leader/messiah, the Bible responds with the truth-Jesus Christ of Nazareth is the Savior/Messiah, and He has already come once to this world (Matt. 16:16; Mark 8:29, 14:61-62; Luke 9:20; John 20:31;Acts 5:42, 9:22, 18:28;1 John 2:22). This truth is so essential to Christian theology that 1 John 2:22 declares:

Who is the liar? It is the man who denies that Jesus is the Christ [Messiah]. Such a man is the antichrist-he denies the Father and the Son.

Hebrews 9:26-28 sums up the glorious truths:

… He [Jesus] has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of Himself. … Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; …”

This portion of Scripture also proclaims the triumphant Second Coming of the risen Christ:

… and He will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for Him.

Jesus’ identity as the One and Only Christ (Messiah) sets Him infinitely above any so-called “enlightened ones,” but the Bible goes on to present the ultimate truth: Jesus Christ is God the Son. He is both fully God and fully man.²⁶ For one to even begin to compare Him with New Age avatars and gurus borders on blasphemy to be sure.

Regarding “channeled higher knowledge,” the Bible firmly condemns medium-ship and spiritism (Deut. 18:10-12). Whoever claims to communicate with disembodied spirits is a counterfeit of the true prophet who speaks for God. (2 Peter 1:21, 2 Sam. 23:2, Acts 3:18, Heb. 1:1-2) Not only that, but God’s Word clearly states:

In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son … (Heb. 1:1-2)

And regarding the belief in reincarnation, the Bible clearly states “… man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment” (Heb. 9:27). Sometimes New Agers will use the Scriptures about Elijah and John the Baptist to “prove” reincarnation, but Luke 1:17 clarifies that John the Baptist went “… on before the Lord [Jesus], in the spirit and power of Elijah,” not as Elijah. And John the Baptist confirmed this in John 1:21, when he responded to the question “… Are you Elijah? …” by saying, “… I am not. …”

5) When the New Agers claim humanity is poised between two ages, the Piscean Age of rationality and the Aquarian Age of spirituality, Christians can respond: “Yes, we are poised between two ages-the present world and the New Heaven and New Earth.” This is in contrast to what Eckhart Tolle teaches:

… heaven is not a location but refers to the inner realm of consciousness. … “A new heaven” is the emergence of a transformed state of human consciousness, and “a new earth” is its reflection in the physical realm.(italics in original)²⁷

It is ironic when New Agers claim the present world is illusory, and then go on to deny the reality of a future Heaven, too. The only “reality” for them is an elusive and impersonal “consciousness.” But the Bible is clear: The new Heaven and new Earth will be real places, where “… the dwelling of God is with men, and He will live with them …” (Rev. 21:3a, cf. Is. 65:17- 19). This truth is so precious to God that when His Word speaks of the new Jerusalem coming down out of Heaven from God, He uses the imagery of a bride beautifully dressed for her beloved husband (Rev. 21:1-2), and the “… wedding supper of the Lamb [Jesus] …” to describe it (Rev. 19:7-9). Is it any wonder the enemy of our souls would try to distort, dilute, and otherwise destroy the truth of this glorious future for God and His people? But it is true, and Scripture undeniably confirms it: “… These are the true words of God.” (Rev. 19:9b). Praise the Lord!

Setting The Captives Free

It has been difficult for me to write this comparison/contrast of the NAM and Christian theology, because I was one of the multitudes caught by the deceptions of NAM. I have been reminded of painful experiences, and the many people with whom I shared my 13-year New Age path.

It grieves me that NAM presents half-truths, and when true seekers grab onto these, they do not realize the other half is a distorted “hook” that will lead them to Hell. For example, the Bible does say Christians will be conformed to Christ’s image (Rom. 8:29), but the New Age presents the aberrant, even blasphemous, claim, “you will be a god.” The Bible does promise Jesus is coming again (Rev. 1:7), but the New Age turns this into a “watch” for a weirdo guru. The Bible does assure Christians they “… will be with the Lord forever” (1 Thes. 4:17b), but the New Age distorts this to mean “you will reach cosmic consciousness, and be one with Universal Energy.” As Romans 1:25 says:

They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator-Who is to be praised. Amen.

How tragic this is. And what a call to all true Christians to pray, reach out, and help set the captives free from the deceptions that lead to death (cf. 2 Tim. 2:24-26).

But writing this article has also stirred my heart to lavish praise and thanksgiving unto God. He has reminded me from how very far He has brought me-infinitely further than a “quantum leap:” He has brought believers from the kingdom of darkness to the Kingdom of Light (1 Peter 2:9, Col. 1:13). May the King of Kings be forever praised and worshiped for providing the glories of Eternal Life for “… whoever believes in Him …” the Good News of Jesus Christ (John 3:16). He is worthy of all our praise. And He alone is worthy.

*Theosophy= 1 : teaching about God and the world based on mystical insight 2 often capitalized : the teachings of a modern movement originating in the United States in 1875 and following chiefly Buddhist and Brahmanic theories especially of pantheistic evolution and reincarnation (Merriam-Webster online)

**Pantheism= 1 : a doctrine that equates God with the forces and laws of the universe 2 : the worship of all gods of different creeds, cults, or peoples indifferently; also : toleration of worship of all gods (as at certain periods of the Roman empire) (Merriam-Webster online)

Pam Wolski found Jesus as the Way, the Truth, and the Life after 13 years of being entrapped in Eastern and New Age practices. She was an editor for 11 years at Rand McNally, holds a B.A. in English, and has been involved in Christian ministry for 22 years, including prayer leadership, teaching women’s Bible studies, and Christian writing. She lives with her husband, Tom, in Wheeling, IL, and she teaches writing and math.

A Comparison of the New Age Movement and Christian Theology

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