Monthly Archives: August 2013

ON LOVE; PART CCCLIX

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GoodWill IS Love in Action

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The Gospel of Thomas

These are the hidden words that the living Jesus spoke. And Didymos Judas Thomas wrote them down.

(11) Jesus says: “This heaven will pass away, and the (heaven) above it will pass away. And the dead are not alive, and the living will not die. In the days when you consumed what was dead, you made it alive. When you are in the light, what will you do? On the day when you were one, you became two. But when you become two, what will you do?“

(12) The disciples said to Jesus: “We know that you will depart from us. Who (then) will rule [lit., ‘be great’] over us?”  Jesus said to them: “No matter where you came from, you should go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being“

(13) Jesus said to his disciples: “Compare me, and tell me whom I am like.” Simon Peter said to him: “You are like a just messenger.” Matthew said to him: “You are like an (especially) wise philosopher.” Thomas said to him: “Teacher, my mouth will not bear at all to say whom you are like.”  Jesus said: “I am not your teacher. For you have drunk, you have become intoxicated at the bubbling spring that I have measured out.” And he took him, (and) withdrew, (and) he said three words to him.  But when Thomas came back to his companions, they asked him: “What did Jesus say to you?”  Thomas said to them: “If I tell you one of the words he said to me, you will pick up stones and throw them at me, and fire will come out of the stones (and) burn you up.”

We ended the last post with the tenth saying which is one that can be and is confusing to many and this because of the attempts to tie it to the idea of fire as in hell and burning lakes, another much misunderstood concept of doctrine. We introduced two concepts here that should be pondered regarding fire; first that it IS the Master who came among us to “baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire” (Luke 3:16). It is in the idea of immersion in the ways of God that is the signification of the baptism, that we can perhaps find the greater understanding of the Master’s other words saying “I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I , if it be already kindled?” (Luke 12:49), as it is here, in this baptism, that the kindling begins, that the man who IS immersed IS keeping His words and IS expressing that fire, that Love and Power of the Soul, through his own Life in form as IS the Master Himself. This idea of being “already kindled” is our second point and this saying, as we read it, IS NOT telling us anything but IS posing the rhetorical question….what will I do if the fire is burning brightly? His whole point of coming among us IS to set the world ablaze with the Love and the Power of the Christ and, through man, the Christ Within. We should also make note here of that saying from the Old Testament, which is refreshed for us by the writer of the Book of Hebrews saying “For our God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:29). This is written as it were the very Nature of God and, if we can see this and that other saying about His Nature that tells us that “God is Love” (1 John 4:8, 16) together, we can make clearer this link between fire and Love.

At first glance this eleventh saying appears dark and incomprehensible and, from a doctrinal perspective, this is quite True as there are not any like sayings in the four accepted gospels that are rightly understood and this mostly because of the doctrinal perspective and a lacking in the Truer understanding of the words used. What is meant here by heaven and what are the dead and the alive and, as we saw two posts back, what is the meaning of eat or consume as it is stated in this rendering? is it always to devour flesh as in the minds of those who render it as eat? or is this the True translation? We of course have different ideas on most of these things than does the doctrinal approach that deems this body to be the Life which has a lingering Soul Life rather than our view that it IS the Soul that IS the True Life which takes form and lives in the Earth and, there is no need to correctly understand nor accept the concept of rebirth or reincarnation to understand the idea of the True man who IS made “in the image of God“, the Same God that the Master speaks of when He tells us that “God is a spirit” (John 4:24).

In reviewing some of the commentaries on this it IS apparent to us that the writers rely upon church doctrines that are based upon their own interpretation of  the accepted gospels and that more than a few approached their commentaries with a preconception that these are Gnostic texts that are attempting to put Gnostic beliefs into the mainstream by pretending that they are the Master’s words. While this is our opinion only, it is sure that none take the deeper look here that we do but, at the same time, none that we KNOW take the deeper look at the accepted gospels either. Some of the commentaries on this eleventh saying are:

• Funk and Hoover write: “A number of themes in this complex led the Fellows to conclude that these sayings derive from a form of Christianity exhibiting mild gnostic tendencies. This appears to be the form of Christianity Thomas espoused. The speculative cosmology in 11:1 has parallels in other gnostic texts. The obscure statements regarding life and death in 11:2-3a seem typical of Thomas (Thom 4:1; 58; 101:3; 7; 60), as does the theme of light (11:3b; compare with 24:3; 50:1; 61:5; 83:1-2). 11:4 may refer to a common gnostic idea that humanity has fallen from an original, perfect state of undifferentiated unity (22:4-7). All these considerations suggest that the Thomas tradition is the origin of this complex rather than Jesus.” (The Five Gospels, p. 479). This capitalized word Fellows presumably means a group of ‘scholars’ that worked on or reviewed these sayings; for us the use of this word is sort of an oxymoron as there are no ‘scholars’ who can rightly perceive these words from Thomas nor any sacred writing if such review is done through eyes that are otherwise fixed in doctrine and the preconceived ideas and traditions of the past. We are offering opinion albeit what we believe as a reasoned opinion based in our view of Life from a compilation of many philosophies and religions which ALL likely have some part of the Truth. It is to you, the reader to decide that this IS or IS NOT Truth or a Truth as this is better put. We do not KNOW much about the Gnostic philosophy as this has been kept from us in its original forms and the remnants today have likely suffered, as have most ALL religious philosophies, from the establishing of doctrinal precepts around them. From our perspective the can not be a ‘scholar’ in these mysteries of the Kingdom and of the Life of man by any who IS NOT a disciple and this the Master tells us as He told His disciples over 2000 years ago, “Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see , and hearing they might not understand” (Luke 8:10). And in this context it is amazing how bold men can be to deem themselves disciples, men who are not keeping His words beginning with the Great Commandments on Love, their expression of this to ALL men and their strong teaching of this High Ideal as presented in the Sermon on the Mount; and ending in His many words on just what a disciple IS. In open minded respect, which is a factor of Love for ALL men, can we see here the possibility that the Gnostic traditions ARE the True traditions and that the early Christian Church Fathers were stronger in number and were able to dilute the Truth to the popular doctrines that are more acceptable to a people that does not Truly want to change from their ways in the world? Here, in commentary on this particularly obscure saying, Funk and Hoover say naught.
• Robert M. Grant and David Noel Freedman write: “The third part of the saying describes the condition of the Gnostic believer. Those who were formerly divided have been united; they have worked together (Saying 59); they are at peace (49); they have become one (103). Unfortunately, it looks as if becoming ‘two’ were regarded as the believer’s goal. Perhaps it would be best to hold that the present unity of the believers represents their goal, and – in spite of the parallelism of the saying – that the becoming ‘two’ is something they should avoid. Jesus is not a divider (Saying 72), except in the sense that he divides families into Gnostics and non-Gnostics (Saying 16).” (The Secret Sayings of Jesus, p. 130). Here Mr. Grant and Mr. Freedman offer us pure speculation and opinion and it is apparent to us that their sense of doctrinal Christianity and their preconceived rejection of the Gospel of Thomas have greatly influenced their writings.
• F. F. Bruce writes: “The first part of the saying reminds us of Matthew 24.35 (cf. Matthew 5.18; Luke 16.17): ‘Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away’ – but it is not a close parallel. As for eating dead things, this probably means that when the flesh of dead animals is eaten by human beings it becomes part of a living body (cf. Saying 7). [A similar Naassene saying is quoted by Hippolytus, Refutation v.8.32.] The eating of flesh was probably discouraged, as making it more difficult to attain the light of immortality; the views of a vegetarian Syrian sect called the Encratites may have influenced the tradition in this and some other regards. The words about being one and becoming two refer to the dividing of man into male and female (cf. Saying 4). If sex was to be transcended in the life to come, it was felt best that it should play no part in the present life (this may be a further Encratite trait).” (Jesus and Christian Origins Outside the New Testament, p. 117). Mr. Bruce here references the Encratites who are a second century sect of Christians, apart from the Gnostics but aligned with them in the writings of the Early Church Fathers. We see in this our own opinion and our reality which IS that these Church Fathers counted as heresy most ALL that did not agree with their own views of God and Christ and that these Fathers had amassed enough power and strength in the fledgling Church so that their saying that a thing was heretical made it so. Here again we have a commentary with no substance against this particular saying.
• Jean Doresse writes: “The first part of this paragraph is quoted and commented on by the Philosophumena (V, 8, 31). According to this work, the Naassenes explained it as follows: ‘If you have eaten dead things and made them living things, what then will you do when you eat living things? These living things are rational beings, intelligences, men – pearls which the great Being without form has cast into the work of here below!'” (The Secret Books of the Egyptian Gnostics, p. 371). We should note here that the source of these ideas IS the Philosophumena which is written by one of these same Church Fathers as a compendium of sorts containing what these Early Fathers deemed to be the heretical beliefs of others. This work is also known as The Refutation of All Heresies and it is thought to have been written by Hippolytus of Rome who is a Saint in the Catholic and Orthodox churches.

In ALL of these words above there is little or nothing regarding what these words might mean and this perhaps because they are too obscure to comment upon. For us however we can see some reality in these words and can see them as well as a part of the teachings of the Master that are not unlike others from the accepted New Testament according to our own understanding of Life and the Kingdom and the Greater Truth of God. Let us break this down a bit for our discussion:

• “This heaven will pass away, and the (heaven) above it will pass away“. We should note here that the second word heaven is not a part of the text and that this word heaven has many meanings in the Greek including, as Strong’s tells us: sky, air, firmament, any area above the earth; heaven(s), the place of sun, moon and stars; heaven, in which god dwells. “The third heaven” may be a Jewish technical term for God’s dwelling place; “heaven” in some contexts is a euphemism for “God”³. Now we KNOW that the Apostle Matthew uses this word heaven in regard to the place of God as he says Kingdom of Heaven in many places; Matthew is however the only one to do so. This being said, we can look at heaven as a place beyond but, since it is synonymous with God in this sense, can we not also see how this Kingdom is within as we note in the Master’s words that we again discussed recently: “the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). Now we should add to this that if the Kingdom IS Truly within, it then is the abode of the God Within and the Christ Within, it is not possible that it is this heaven will pass away here nor in the words from Matthew’s Gospel saying “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away” (Matthew 24:35). Now doctrine does not see this in this way; many regard this as Matthew’s Heaven, some with an eschatological view, some relate much of these phrases to the sacking of Jerusalem and yet others are silent; there IS no True understanding of these words without a corresponding idea of just what Jesus means by heaven. In the context of the saying from Thomas’ Gospel we should note, aside from the translators’ reliance on doctrine and the accepted gospels, that the context is different, as it IS NOT related to His words, and that in the interlinear version of Thomas’, the word heaven is rendered as sky and, using a feminine context translates as “this sky will pass away and she who is above her will pass away” and there is no critical stop between these words and the next phrase on the dead as there is in our version above. Are we speaking of sky? or the heaven as Matthew sees it? And, what is there that is above this heaven? Let us try here to combine this with the next saying as is done in the interlinear version and view these words together.
• “This heaven will pass away, and the (heaven) above it will pass away. And the dead are not alive, and the living will not die“. Despite the Master’s telling us clearly that His words are parabolic as we cite above and as is written in all of the Gospels including the Gospel of John where Jesus also tells His disciples that He speaks to them in this same way as well, a thought which should further compound the uncertainty of His words for us yet today. We read in Matthew’s Gospel similar to what we have above in Luke as the Master says to His disciples: “Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given…..Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand” (Matthew 13:11, 13) and we should understand here that the them is the ordinary man, the man who IS NOT a disciple and this idea of given should be readily understood that is by that High Office of disciple and the spiritual focus that this affords that the revelations of Truth are given. Matthew himself comments on Jesus way of teaching saying: “All these things spake Jesus unto the multitude in parables; and without a parable spake he not unto them” (Matthew 13:34) which words we see as opinion or better as how it seems to him and not as fact as there IS much in the Master’s words that is clear as day. And we should note the words from John’s Gospel as well as Jesus tells them alone that: “These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you plainly of the Father” (John 16:25). Here we have John’s choice of words and we note that both the Greek parabole and paroimia are rendered as both parable and proverb. Our point here is of course that we should not look to the words themselves for the meanings; neither of heaven nor dead nor alive as ALL of these have a different meaning, a deeper and more spiritual meaning, in the context of this parabolic saying.
  We should try to see here that the idea of heaven and earth in Matthew and the thought of heaven and what is above heaven in Thomas are relative terms that are likely intended to express that idea that everything will eventually pass away, disappear, and we can see this and take this from both the individual perspective: that ALL that we see and KNOW will be gone; or from the more universal perspective: that ALL that is apparent to man in this world and above will be gone. Both are likely True as in the eternity of God we can as scientists offer a beginning of the Universe and in so doing there must have been an end and we must remember and understand that ALL of the physical matter is but the vehicle for the manifestation of Spirit, the Truth of God and the True man. What then of these words on death and dying? these ARE simple and straightforward when viewed in the reality of Life in this world, in this Universe; It IS the Spirit and the Soul of man that IS Life and from the perspective of the Master and the writings of His apostles it is Life in this world that is focused in this world the is the Truth of death; here the Spirit IS dead, he CAN NOT function in this state of focus. Can we see how this can work into the Master’s words that “the dead are not alive” and can we see how the following words work out in the same way and in agreement with the accepted gospels from the view that the living are those who are the disciples of the Lord, those who have come to realize the eternal Life and the Kingdom…..that it IS these that “will not die“? And this IS NOT the physical death which we must ALL endure but the spiritual death that had previously overtaken us and that consumes the world of men who focus their lives in the self and the self in the world.

We did not get far in the eleventh saying and we will close today with some words from the accepted New Testament that can show the reality of our view on this idea of death:

• “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23). Here sin is our focus upon the world and death is that state of focus. We must be careful with this word rendered as gift; this is a kindred word to that which is rendered as grace which is another much misunderstood concept. If there are gifts then there IS no truth to the concept that “God is no respecter of persons” (Acts 10:34) and from our perspective since this IS a Truth, the common concepts of gifts in doctrine must be false. We must take this word and understand it in a better context and perhaps this from the 1828 version of Webster’s Dictionary can shed some light on the thinking of the translators of old: a reward ¹. This may not be the context in which this word is offered here in Romans but it is certainly not that eternal Life is a free gift that us unearned and we KNOW that the earning is in the DOING  and in keeping the words of the Master.
• “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?” (Romans 6:16). We should understand here the idea of righteousness in the context that the Master teaches as He equates this to the Father saying: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness” (Matthew 6:33) and as He shows us that righteousness is the opposite of sin, the opposite of a man’s focus upon the things of the self and the world; He tells us this saying: “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:32).
• “And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts” (Galatians 5:24). Here is the Truth of death as presented by our sayings above.

We will continue with our thoughts in the next post.

Aspect of God	Potency	Aspect of Man	In Relation to the Great Invocation	In relation to the Christ
GOD, The Father	Will or Power	Spirit or Life	Center where the Will of God IS KNOWN	Life
Son, The Christ	Love and Wisdom	Soul or Christ Within	Heart of God	Truth
Holy Spirit	Light or Activity	Life Within	Mind of God	Way

Note on the Quote of the Day

This daily blog also has a Quote of the Day which may not be in any way related to the essay. Many of these will be from the Bible and some just prayers or meditations that may have an influence on you and are in line with the subject matter of this blog. As the quote will change daily and will not store with the post, it is repeated in this section with the book reference and comment.

Repeating a Quote of the Day from the past that has some significance in relation to what we are discussing here, that the Kingdom of God and therefore God is within us ALL. Here Lord Tennyson poetically tells us just how close God Truly IS and how it is that we touch Him

Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and Spirit with Spirit can meet

Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet.

(Alfred, Lord Tennyson 1809–1892)

From the poem The Higher Pantheism which puts forth the authors spiritual belief. Whether we agree with him or not, the quote if spiritually perfect for all of Christianity as well as any other world religion.

For us today this saying shows us the closeness of the spiritual self to the Father and then too the closeness of the spiritual self with the personality of man. We may like to think of God as something outside and above but the reality, as we have seen in so many of the sayings of the Master, is that God is with us and in us and we need only to let ourselves be drawn. And, if we can use these words from the Gospel of Thomas here we can perhaps see much: “When you come to know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will realize that you are the children of the living Father.“

Let the peace of God rule in your hearts!

• ¹ Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1828 and 1913
• ³ Strongest Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible – 2001

• ⁴ Word Studies in the New Testament; Marvin R Vincent D.D. 2nd edition, 1888

• ¹⁴ The Gospel of Thomas; Translated by Stephen J. Patterson and James M. Robinson; http://gnosis.org/