Jesus, Pilate, and Patanjali

There is a scene in the Christian Easter narrative that has puzzled me. When Christ stands before Pilate, Pilate asks Jesus:

“Art thou a king then?”

Jesus answers:

“Thou sayest that I am a king.”

This is obviously not what Pilate is saying. A question is not a statement. It is the opposite of a statement. This part of the exchange between Pilate and Jesus often struck me as a case of bad rethoric. But there is something happening later that seems essential to understanding what is going on. When Jesus was crucified, Pilate added a sign to the cross, stating, in Hebrew, Greek and Latin:

“Jesus Of Nazareth The King Of The Jews.”

The chief Priest of the Jews asked Pilate to change the sign to say that he says that he is the king of the Jews (implying that he has made a false claim and now has to suffer for it).

Pilate refused to change what he has written, stating: “What I have written I have written.”

In other words, Pilate affirms that Jesus is king and that Pilate believes this to be true. Pilate says that Jesus is king. And hence the words of Jesus become true. Jesus lives within the whole of the event: Everything that happens, happens as it is supposed to happen. From the betrayal of Judas to the crucifixion itself, all of this is God’s will. Jesus seems aware of this throughout what happens, as exemplified by what he says to Peter when Peter tries to defend him (the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?).

Put simply, Jesus lives beyond time, and he speaks from the perspective of the future when he answers Pilate.

As Husserl has shown in relation to time experience, we retain parts of the past and anticipate the future in musical experience. One could say that this is true for many aspects of human cognition, as shown for exmaple by the idea of predictive coding.

Contemplatively one may say that time is illusory. Hegel indicates this in the Phenomenology of Spirit: 

“Es wird das Jetzt gezeigt, dieses Jetzt. Jetzt; es hat schon aufgehört zu sein, indem es gezeigt wird; das Jetzt, das ist, ist ein anderes als das gezeigte, und wir sehen, daß das Jetzt eben dieses ist, indem es ist, schon nicht mehr zu sein. Das Jetzt, wie es uns gezeigt wird, ist es ein gewesenes, und dies ist seine Wahrheit; es hat nicht die Wahrheit des Seins. Es ist also doch dies wahr, daß es gewesen ist. Aber was gewesen ist, ist in der Tat kein Wesen; es ist nicht, und um das Sein war es zu tun.”

Through contemplative practice, this conceptual truth may be realised experientially. In Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, there is a practice for transcending time:

“III.16 pariṇāma-traya-saṁyamād atītānāgata-jñānam 

When saṁyama is performed on the three transformations [of characteristics, state, and condition], knowledge of the past and the future ensues.”

This is not the place to unpack the details of this. I just wish to point out that practices exist within the traditions that enable other forms of cognitions — forms of cognition that underpin the religious narratives.

And this reminds me of Plato’s words about what one ought to do: “To become like God, so far as this is possible”. Who knows what is possible? It is the aim of contemplative science to figure this out, theoretically and empirically.