CAN THE PHILOSOPHY

OF RELIGIOUS SCIENCE SAVE THE SOUL?

The Church of Religious Science, also known as Science of Mind, began in 1927 through Ernest Holmes, their founder. The teachings of Religious Science draw heavily from the Gnostic/metaphysical teachings of Dr. P. P. Quimby, Mary Baker Eddy (Christian Science), Charles Filmore (Unity School of Christianity), Madame Blavatsky (Theosophy), and the transcendentalism of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Mr. Holmes blended what he perceived as the best principles of world religions, ranging from Hinduism to the occult. Even though the Bible and Jesus Christ are referred to throughout his works, neither are esteemed as superior over opposing beliefs. The Bible, as Mr. Holmes sees it, is one of several available books containing truth. It is not special. Jesus Christ, according to Holmes, does not stand out from any other “religious leader.”^[1]

Gnostic groups reinterpret the Bible and Jesus Christ. Biblical terms are redefined and spiritualized in order to develop principles that, in reality, twist and torque the true sense of what the Bible originally said.^[2] An example is that Heaven is not a place of existence to Mr. Holmes, as found in the Bible. He redefined it as a state of consciousness that is created by eliminating all negative influences. Such unfounded interpretations are commonplace among metaphysical, Gnostic, and New Age groups. We shall examine five areas of theology, as presented by Mr. Holmes.

GOD:

Ernest Holmes and Religious Science denies the biblical doctrine of the Trinity by redefining the term “Trinity.” Mr. Holmes said, “Throughout the ages, this Trinity has been taught. Every great religion and every great spiritual philosophy has taught this Trinity. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost is the Christian Trinity. It is the Thing, the Way It Works, and What It Does.”^[3]

Mr. Holmes has made the Trinity a metaphysical principle - “The Thing,” “The Way It (the thing) Works,” “and What It (the thing) Does.” This is not the Biblical doctrine of the Trinity. The Bible teaches that God exists as three distinct Persons, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, (Matt. 28:19; Isa. 48:16; Rom. 1:7; Jn. 1:1; Jn. 20:28; Acts 5:3-4).

Mr. Holmes rejects God’s personal nature; stating that God is not a personal Being who is independent of humanity. His interpretation makes God the person of every human being, succinctly stated, “God is the person in you.”^[4] Herewith Mr. Holmes denies the biblical truth that God Himself is a distinct personal Being. The Bible teaches that God spoke as a personal Being before man’s creation (Gen. 1:26), therefore it is safe to assume His person precedes humanity and is independent of the human person.

JESUS:

Mr. Holmes denies that Jesus is God. He wrote, “Jesus was a man, a human being . . . Jesus never thought of himself as different from others . . . As Jesus, the man, gave way to the Divine Idea, the human took on the Christ Spirit and became the voice of God to humanity.”^[5] Again, Holmes wrote, “ . . . Jesus never expected us to worship him either as a person or a God.”^[6]

A careful study of the New Testament reveals the opposite of what Mr. Holmes suggests. Jesus was worshipped on many occasions (Matt. 2:11, 8:3, 9:18, 15:25; Jn. 9:38; Rev. 5:14), which not only shows us that He was worthy of worship, but He accepted the worship from others. Even the angels in Heaven were commanded by the Father to worship the Son (Heb. 1:6), which would be blasphemous if He were not worthy to receive it. The reason that Jesus is worthy of worship is because He is truly God, (Matt. 1:23; Jn. 1:1, 5:18, 8:58, 10:30, 20:28; Acts 20:28; Phil. 2:6-8; Col. 2:9; Heb. 1:8; 1 Jn. 5:20; Rev. 1:8).

Gnosticism, from its beginning, has always divided “Jesus” from “the Christ.” By doing this, they make Jesus only a man and “the Christ” a spiritual principle that came upon Him. Mr. Holmes said, “Jesus - The name of a man. Distinguished from the Christ. To Holmes, the man Jesus became the embodiment of the Christ, as the human gave way to the Divine Idea of Sonship.”^[7] The Bible does not teach that Jesus is separate from the Christ. John, the Apostle, taught us that Jesus is the Christ, and anyone who denies it is a liar and anti-Christ (1 Jn. 2:22). This says much about Religious Science teachings.

THE HOLY SPIRIT:

Religious Science teaches that the Holy Spirit is the female aspect of the Trinity, which therefore denies the Holy Spirit’s true Person and Deity. Mr. Holmes wrote, “The Holy Ghost signifies the feminine aspect of the Divine Trinity. It represents the divine activity of the higher mental plane . . . [the Spirit is] the supreme Law of Cause and Effect . . . the divine creative fertility of the universal soul when impregnated by the Divine Ideas.”^[8]

Contrary to Mr. Holmes, the Bible does not teach that the Holy Spirit is an impersonal “it.” The personality of the Holy Spirit is demonstrated in several verses of Scripture (Rom. 8:26-27; Jn. 14:16-17; Acts 13:2), as well as His Deity (2 Sam. 23:3-4; Acts 5:3-4).

MAN:

Religious Science promotes the fallacy that mankind has God within him and that the human spirit is “God” dwelling in each person. According to Mr. Holmes, “As the human gives way to the Divine, in all people, they become the Christ.”^[9]

These teachings are in sharp contrast with the Bible. Man, as seen in Scripture, is a sinful creature in need so salvation. Romans 3:10 tells us that there is none righteous, not one. Being far from God, we are not God and God is not part of humanity. Hosea 11:9 says that God is holy, and not man. Numbers 23:19 speaks clearly, “God is not a man.” Psalms 50: 21 rebukes the people who think that God is like them. And, on the issue of whether we are a Christ, this is settled by Jesus in Matthew 24:5, where He said that anyone else who claims to be the Christ is a deceiver.

SALVATION:

Sin is minimized in Religious Science to represent mistakes. Salvation, therefore, is only a correction of those mistakes. Mr. Holmes states,” . . . The answer to every question is in man, because man is within Spirit, and Spirit is an Invisible Whole! The solution to every problem is within man; the healing of all disease is within man; the forgiveness of all sin is within man; the raising of the dead is within man; Heaven is within man...Each of us, then, represents the Whole.”^[10]

True Salvation, according to the Bible, is to first recognize that we are totally incapable of meeting the holiness of God because we have been separated from Him by sin (Rom. 3:10; 3:23; 6:23). The only way of salvation is through the atonement of Jesus’ shed blood for our sins, (Heb. 10:10; 1 Jn. 1:7), which is provided by God’s grace, and not by anything we have done, (Eph. 2:8-9).

THE TRUTH:

God’s desire is that we seek after His love and His kingdom (Matt. 6:24, 33). Happiness cannot be found in a series of principles or in a philosophy apart from the Bible. Happiness can only be found through a personal relationship with the True Jesus. Jesus Christ is the Way, the Truth and the Life. No man can come to the Father except through Him, (Jn. 14:6).

Jude 3 Missions

P. O. Box 1901 Orange, CA 92856

^[1] _{What Religious
Science Teaches, Holmes, p. 10.}

^[5] _{What Religious
Science Teaches, pp. 19-20.}