The New Age worldview is a partially Westernized adaptation of Eastern pantheistic monism.¹ What is not marketable in authentic Eastern monism is recast in terms of Western pop psychology and capital borrowed from Theism and other worldview streams present here.² To wit, rather than seeking to subsume the self into the infinite-impersonal, ultimate Brahmin or Nirvana as Eastern monisms would require, the New Age worldview elevates the self to the position of the ultimate, while otherwise attempting to maintaining the monistic metaphysic. The sundry putatively ultimate, unified, divine selves that seem to populate reality are hindered not by inborn sin, but by ignorance of their god-like capabilities; Shirley McLaine said of the New Age anthropology, “You are unlimited; you just don’t realize it!”³ New Agers are ethical relativists who ultimately deny that distinctions between good and evil exist.⁴ Moreover, they attempt to harmonize all religions by claiming that all are valid paths to be utilized by various seekers in their quest to experience oneness with God, making liberal modification to key religious tenets in the process. They deny the uniqueness of Christ and the necessity of his death on the cross, viewing him instead as “a great Master or Teacher or Adept or Guru.”⁵ They look forward to the imminent dawn of a new era of higher human consciousness, solving the political, military, economic, and cultural problems that plague us today.⁶

In contrast, Christianity posits an infinite-personal, eternal God as ultimate reality.⁷ Created in God’s image and likeness, human beings bear an alien dignity that stands in stark contrast to the depredations of their fallen condition which they continuously realize as cosmic rebels against God’s just rule. To restore human beings to fellowship with himself after their transgression of his absolute moral claims on them, Good took on a human nature in the person of Jesus Christ, lived a life of perfect obedience to his own Law, and gave up his life as a substitutionary sacrifice for the sins of his people. He rose from the dead in the prototypical form which all redeemed people will take when he returns to consummate his perfect rule over all creation.

Two substantial critiques of New Age thought present themselves. First is the well-known logical failure of monism as a viable answer to the one-and-many problem: if all is one, then why do distinct selves and objects exist? It is normally answered that distinction is illusory, but if this is so, then who is having the illusion? The reality of individual, personal minds seems incontrovertible. Second is the New Age insistence on the essential unity of all religions. Only the most superficial examination of Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Buddhism would claim that they agree on their key tenets; indeed, it is only in superficial matters that some of them agree. Even more interestingly, the typical New Age claim is not merely that all religions agree, but that they all agree with New Age thought, particularly in their supposed orientation towards the goal of discovering oneness with an impersonal God. Shades of Eastern pantheistic monism are somehow found in the monotheistic religions that have shaped the West for centuries. This theory of the unity of religions–a reasonably robust apologetic for New Age thought if true–fails utterly.

This is not a comprehensive critique of New Age thought, but monism and the unity of all religions are sufficiently central elements of the worldview that their successful critique should pave the way for positive apologetics in support of the truth of Christianity.

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¹James Sire, The Universe Next Door, 4th ed. (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004), 162.
²Ibid, 178-179.
³Douglas Groothuis, Confronting the New Age (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 25
⁴Ibid, 114.
⁵Ibid, 119.
⁶Sire, 166-167.
⁷Ibid, 26-29.

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• Posted by Tim on Monday, December 20, 2004 at 7:59:23 am PST
• Category: Theology
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