IN THE WORDS OF JESUS–Part 147

YES, HE is Talking to YOU! (continued)

Love is the Fulfilling of the Law

In our discussion of the Parable of the Ten Virgins from the last post we never dealt with the lamps, or the torches, which, of course, represent Light. This is the wonder of the parables of the Master; even when we believe that we have discovered the meaning, we can still find more teaching in His words that we did not see before. So then, today we will deal with the lamps and the lamps that failed because they ran out of oil and then continue on into some of the other sayings of the Master on Light. Some of these sayings are listed as parables and we will address these mingled in with other gospel references to Light so that we can get the full import of the Master’s use of the word and its meanings.

The use of the lamp in the parable from yesterday goes thus: “….Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us of your oil; for our lamps are gone out” (Matthew 25:7-8). Remember our interpretation from yesterday, that the ten were all pure as virgins and likened to the Kingdom which is within them while they are also in the Kingdom. These ten, at the outset of the story are the same; they all have the Light. But five of them are not prepared and the other five are, they are vigilant. The unprepared five have let their Light go out, and this should be seen clearly as the Light of the Soul, of the Christ Within which pours into the conscious personality of those who heed the call; they had the Light and they let it go out. Now this is saying the same thing that we said yesterday but we have the added help here in the idea of Light. We said in the end yesterday that is that there is no help for those who fall away from their place with their Souls; we cannot get Light from another. We can only go back to the source, the Christ Within and we must do so our own and we must do so before the time is come that the bridegroom appears; before the door is closed on this lifetime.

So that we do understand the relevance of Light in the gospels, let us review some of the verses that speak of the Light as being Christ and as being brought by Christ into this world of men. We should remember here that for us individually the Christ is represented as the Christ Within and this is our Light and this brings the Light into our conscious lives.

• Speaking of the birth of the Christ, the prophet declares the the coming of the Light and of the Christ; we read: “That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, The land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles; The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up” (Matthew 4:14-16). Now in the Gospel of Luke this same saying by Esaias is spoken about by the father of John the Baptist at his circumcision (Luke 1:79) and this is not a conflict for are they not both Light to the world? At the circumcision of the Master Jesus there is also a man of God “and the Holy Ghost was upon him“. This Simeon says of Jesus “A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel” (Luke 2: 25, 32).
• Above they tell us that Light has come into the world and this the Apostle John confirms in the Prologue to his gospel saying of the Master: “In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light. That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world (John 1:4-9).
• Jesus also declares to us that that He is and that we are in the same nature as Light. Of Himself He says: “I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life” (John 8:12) and again “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5) which sayings we may think reflect on the person of Jesus only. Vincent helps us here by telling us that the words “as long” are: more correctly, whensoever. Rev., when. Whether in my incarnation, or before my incarnation, or after it. Compare John 1.4, 10⁴. Vincent provides the scriptural support for his statement and paints the idea of Light as we should understand it and as it is portrayed in our posts. This we will cover a bit further on. The Master tells us also that as He is Light, as noted above, that we too are Light. We see this from this reference: “Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid” (Matthew 5:14) which is not a saying limited to His disciples as this is spoken to the multitudes early in the Sermon on the Mount. Our Spirit, that part of the nature of man, the True man, is Light as well. We should remember always the basic understanding that we have of the relation between our nature and the nature of the Christ; looking from the perspective of man we have the testimony of John saying: “because as he is, so are we in this world” (1 John 4:17) and this is as man in form given life by his Spirit that is functioning through his Soul, the Christ Within.

We should have from the above an idea of the relative importance of Light in relation to Life and to Spirit. Light is also used in a parabolic sense by the Master in many of His teachings. I say parabolic because though we may understand the meaning of it there are many who do not yet and there were many in His time with us that did not understand as well. The True Light can be seen as our Spirit and this from the sayings of John relating the two. Our Spirit, our True Self, gives Life to this form and, as John says above “In him was life; and the life was the light of men” thereby equating for us the ideas of Life and Light. Of course we should not understand Light here in our normal terms but as an expression of Spiritual Life, as an aspect of God. Hereby we have another saying from the Master in His teaching, and likely in parable, which follows directly from His proclamation that we are the Light of the World. He goes on saying: “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). What does this mean? That we should be bright and witty or that we should let that Light which we are flow through our consciousness and we be seen by men; that they see our spiritual nature and the good works that this nature must perforce produce.

Now this last saying is an explanatory saying by the Master that only appears in the Gospel of Matthew. In other gospels and at other times the Master says the same things without explanation. What does it explain? His saying that: “Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house” (Matthew 5:15). This is recorded by Luke in similar fashion but as a standalone statement following the Master’s explanation of the Parable of the Sower: “No man, when he hath lighted a candle, covereth it with a vessel, or putteth it under a bed; but setteth it on a candlestick, that they which enter in may see the light” (Luke 8:16). With His explanation of “Let your light so shine before men” we know what it says clearly but without it what message do we see?

Commentary on the Parable of the Light under the Bushel gives some light to the issue but not the Light that we see; they restrict it to the proclamation of the ‘gospel’ by the disciples and one would assume by men today as well. John Gill’s Exposition of the Bible⁸ in part says this: No man, when he hath lighted a candle Christ by this, and some proverbial sentences following, observes to his disciples, that though the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven were delivered in parables for the present, that they might not be seen and understood by some; and though he gave to them the explanation of such parables, as of the above, in a private manner; yet his intention was not, that these things should always remain a secret with them; but as they were the lights of the world, they should communicate them to others; and that that light of the Gospel, and the knowledge of the doctrines of it, which he had imparted to them, were not to be retained and concealed in their bosoms, but to be diffused and spread among others: even as no man, when he lights a candle…… While it may be here that Jesus is speaking these words only to His disciples, this is not so in other instances where He says the same.

The next instance of a similar saying occurs in a dialogue with people who followed after Him, some of which were hostile to him by their thoughts. After many sayings to the crowd about His own nature He says: “No man, when he hath lighted a candle, putteth it in a secret place, neither under a bushel, but on a candlestick, that they which come in may see the light. The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness. Take heed therefore that the light which is in thee be not darkness. If thy whole body therefore be full of light, having no part dark, the whole shall be full of light, as when the bright shining of a candle doth give thee light” (Luke 11:33-36). The first part here is the same as the two cited above. While in the first from Matthew we have some explanation from the Master regarding Light and in the second we have no explanation at all, in this one we have Jesus following the saying with a most confusing dialogue. Let us look at this and try to understand. The commentaries are varied on this with one saying that this light as the eye is the Light of the Soul while another tells us that the saying refers to the heart and a third, The Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, simply says peculiarly vivid, expressing what pure, beautiful, broad perceptions the clarity of the inward eye imparts⁸. 

What do we see here? Like many things we should not take the idea of the eye literally. Like Light this word has an expanded meaning. The word translated eye is the Greek word ophthalmos of which the lexicon says: the eye; metaph. the eyes of the mind, the faculty of knowing² N. This paints for us a clearer picture from the metaphorical perspective which is our perspective as well. Strong’s says of ophthalmos that it is the eye, the organ of sight; by extension: the faculty of mental perception and understanding³. Both of these give us the idea that we need to understand the saying of the Master.

Taking the eye then simply as the understanding we can get a clearer picture of the Masters intent. First He tells us that when we have the Light that we should let it shine, that we should not hide it; we should let all see the Light. Secondly He tells us that this Light in us as men is our understanding; this is saying in essence that the Light, our expression of Spiritual Life, is, in this personality consciousness, our understanding, our knowing. Much the same as we say about the heart being this personality consciousness, this eye is the understanding and the knowing in that consciousness. Just as the heart can be focused on God or on the world so the eye also. If our understanding of the Light is that it is from above, our whole body is full of Light; Light from above or, more practically, from within, from the Christ Within. Conversely if our understanding is limited to the world, be it plainly worldly or be it evil, we have no Light from above or within and thereby our whole body is dark. As the Master says “Take heed therefore that the light which is in thee be not darkness“, that is, of the world. We must remember here that these things, like many spiritual concepts, are all a matter of degree and we see this in the Masters words that “the light which is in thee be not darkness“; there is Light which can range from the very dim to the very bright.

This is a complex and complicated issue but simply put we should see that we have Light in that we are Spiritual Light and Life and this Light gives Life to the body and this Light resides in the Soul. The Soul in turn calls to the carnal consciousness to see this Light and to accept it as its own; the personality consciousness then can so accept fully or partially, steadily or intermittently. These are the choices that we as men in form make day by day. What Light we have from above we should let be seen and known by all; this is our responsibility and our duty to God; it is not a request that we let our Light shine, it is a commandment.

We call these sayings from Matthew and from Luke the Parable of the Light under the Bushel as they are known to some and together with the idea of the lamps of the ten virgins this will conclude our look at parables on Light for now. There is much more to be said on this subject as it is a very important part of understanding ourselves spiritually and it is a subject covered by many sayings of the Master in the Gospel of John.

Note on the Quote of the Day