ON LOVE; PART XDIII
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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.
(40) Jesus says: “A grapevine was planted outside (the vineyard) of the Father. And since it is not supported, it will be pulled up by its roots (and) will perish.“
(41) Jesus says: “Whoever has (something) in his hand, (something more) will be given to him. And whoever has nothing, even the little he has will be taken from him.“
(42) Jesus says: “Become passers-by.“
(43) His disciples said to him: “Who are you to say this to us?”….”Do you not realized from what I say to you who I am? But you have become like the Jews! They love the tree, (but) they hate its fruit. Or they love the fruit, (but) they hate the tree.”
(44) Jesus says: “Whoever blasphemes against the Father, it will be forgiven him. And whoever blasphemes against the Son, it will be forgiven him. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him, neither on earth nor in heaven.“
(45) Jesus says: “Grapes are not harvested from thorns, nor are figs picked from thistles, for they do not produce fruit. A good person brings forth good from his treasure. A bad person brings (forth) evil from the bad treasure that is in his heart, and (in fact) he speaks evil. For out of the abundance of the heart he brings forth evil.“14
In the last essay we discussed the end part of the forty third saying and then looked at the forth fourth. In the forty third we noted that there is a similarity in the questioning by the disciples of the Master as in the accepted gospels albeit the wording from Thomas Gospel seems harsher than would be expected when a disciple is speaking to the Master and this because the disciple is willingly following the Master. In this we opted for the rendering from the Interlinear which, being more of a word for word translation, says: “you are who that you speak these (things) to us?” from which Doresse gives us “Who art thou, who tellest us these things?“. However, when we relate the Master’s answer to other sayings from the accepted gospels we find that there is at times some adversity but, seeing that the Twelve are present and that the Apostle Thomas does call these questioners disciples, we maintain that it is likely the less confrontational approach that is True. We noted as well that there is an apparently broad range in the idea of what IS a disciple between the Master’s steadfast criteria and the common understanding which we can see most clearly in the example we used from John’s Gospel and which may play a part in these ideas from Thomas as we can not see a place where the Master would speak to the Twelve in the manner in which we see in this saying.
Using the model from John’s recollection of the Master speaking to many disciples and to the Jews about eating His flesh and drinking His blood, sayings about which John tells us that the reaction was that: “From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him” (John 6:66); we tried to see a similar idea in relation to the words of the Master according to Thomas. Here, while we do not KNOW what was said, we can assume that it was significant and that this saying caused the question and the Master’s answer which is at first “By the things that I tell you, do you not recognise who I am?” (Doresse rendering). Here we looked at our example from John where the questioners are those who had seen the miracles and heard the sayings and we should this assume here as well which brings us to the Master’s conclusion about the fruit and the tree where we again use the Interlinear Version as it does not add the conjunctions as do the other translations: “rather, you, have come to be like those Judeans, for they love the tree, they hate his fruit, and, they love the fruit, they hate the tree“. We paraphrased this as ‘you can believe in me and what I say when you are partaking of the miracles; witnessing healing and perhaps being healed, and eating of the bread that was created for your pleasure but when I tell you these Truths that are contrary to your doctrinal beliefs, you CAN NOT accept them’. We then said that He is saying that some Love the things He does but not who He is while others the contrary as a question but looking at this without the added conjunctions, the better idea is that they do both, seemingly at the same time, accepting what suits them and rejecting what does not even though they DO understand the Truth of the source. This IS much the same as doctrine treats His words.
On the next saying we saw the relationship to those similar in the accepted gospels and we discount any of the differences that the commentators cite here regarding the words used by Thomas and the addition of the Father in this equation render this as the synoptic versions as they do seem to cover ALL blasphemy. This aside, the whole of this is difficult to understand and this difficulty is based mostly in the fact that there is no True understanding of just what or who the Holy Ghost or the Holy Spirit is. In our understanding here there is but ONE God and that God is not split up into separate by equal parts as some believe. This ONE God can be seen by the man in the world according to His Aspects or better the potency of those Aspects as we have in our chart below. We should note that an important part of the teaching of the Master that is missed by doctrine is the hidden idea of ‘as above, so below’ or, in our English that the Holy Trinity has its counter parts in Man, in the True Man, the Soul. Here we should see the Kingdom Within which includes the God Within, the Christ Within and the Holy Spirit Within, all of which can be seen in the Master’s words and most especially those from the Gospel of John where we read again:
- “At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you” (John 14:20). Here we have the Christ Within as realized by the man whose focus IS upon God.
- “Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you” (John 14:17). Here we have the Holy Spirit Within and again we must understand that the realization of this comes to the man in the world when his focus is upon the things of God thereby producing the activity of the Christ Within in the Life of the man in the world; this activity IS the Holy Spirit.
- “Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him” (John 14:23). Here in similar fashion we find the Father Within, God Within, who is realized by the man whose focus IS upon the things of God which focus is painted here in the fullness of keeping His words.
It is from this perspective that these words regarding this blasphemy against the Holy Spirit should be taken and while this saying yet remains difficult, we do have here the added benefit of a better understanding; that the Holy Spirit IS the action of God in the world. We must be careful here as to what one may ascribe to the Holy Spirit as the natural actions of the physical realm and the limited free will of man play a large role; both of these and more must be seen as beyond the scope of the spiritual action of God. Earthquakes and storms, fires and other catastrophes ARE NOT motivated by God nor is the way that the individual man is involved in these events. Similarly the divine nature IS NOT involved with the motivations of men against other men nor in the accidents and mishaps that can come upon any individual and these things the Master tries to make clear as He tell us:
“There were present at that season some that told him of the Galilaeans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:1-5).
We have discussed these words in previous posts from a different perspectives and we post here our comments from those essays:
- Speaking generally regarding the idea of sin: Other than telling them to repent their own sins, He makes no explanation as to the fate of the innocent with the guilty if there were any guilty there at all. How does this leave us but to surmise that He is saying that these kind of things happen and not to sinners only but you should be sinless in any event. He does not say it is Gods Will but leaves us to know that accidents and killings do happen to the innocent and the only lesson in these incidents is that we should be at all times prepared.
- Speaking of the ideas presented by doctrine and commentary: One then paints the idea of the slain Galilaeans and those killed by the fallen tower as examples of the death of sinners who, while not “ sinners above all“, were subject to the Judgment of God. John Gill says here: “God’s judgments are a great deep, and not to be fathomed by us, nor is it to be easily known, when any thing befalls persons in a way of judgment; there is nothing comes by chance, but every thing by the wise disposal of divine providence, to answer some end or another” (John Gill’s Exposition of the Bible)8, relegating the deaths of these men to divine judgment. This concept is not in the words of Christ. Gill goes on to say that the idea of “ye shall all like wise perish” is in reference to the Fall of Jerusalem which occurs many years later. Again, is this in the words of the Master? or is this idea in the words of men trying to reconcile Jesus sayings to some reality.
- Finally from the perspective of the Master’s words that man should Repent: In these words there is much to be misunderstood by the man who views Life as this Life in the world; for the man in the world who is in or near the tower when it falls there is likely no escape but for the man who is cautioned by his own Soul to stay away and who recognizes this prompting can escape and this can be see as the result of the Repentance to which the Master refers. It IS the repentant man who is focused upon the Soul and the things of God and who will recognize the prompting but, it IS still in the way of the man in the world to heed that prompting. And we can go a bit further here, to the man who brings with him into incarnation some degree of spiritual collateral and who has some potential usefulness according to the Plan; can we see an instance where he may be dozing while driving and heading toward a wall or a tree only to be suddenly awakened just in time to avert catastrophe? Can we relate these things to our own experience and to the experience of those that we may hear about in the news?
These past ideas are varied but ALL share the common thought that there IS NO divine action in these things that happen in the world of men; free will and happenstance govern much and in regard to the more natural catastrophes, we must regard these as the natural action of our planet and whatever extra terrestrial forces may play upon it. None of this is by divine plan but it is rather the simple working out of the forces of nature much as one will find occurring within his own physical body’s natural functions. In these ideas we should be able to understand that the physical planet and the things that happen thereon are not subject to the Will of God as God does not focus upon this state of being and in this IS ever our lesson, that we should not focus upon our own physical state of being either.
How then does this effect or current saying which speaks not about these things but about the idea of blasphemy against the Spirit of God? First, we find that there IS NO relationship between the Activity of God as the Holy Spirit and the happenings, both good and bad, in and of the Earth as a physical entity. Second, we find that those who see the Life of man as his Life in the world only are inclined to think that Divine Providence is the rule of Life in the world and this even though there IS NO rhyme nor reason to so much of this and this idea alone should suffice to remove God from this equation. Further than this we CAN NOT reliably go as the whole of this idea leaves us wondering as to what the Master Truly means. Understanding that the Truth of the Holy Spirit is the activity of God in His creation and that this activity has naught to do with the actual physical happenings on this Earth are helpful only in understanding this Aspect of the Nature of God. Here we should try to see that just as the activity of the Christ Within effects the Life of an individual man creating the presence of the Spirit in the world through that man’s Life, so the same may be True by the corporate view of this same effect; that the more that there are men expressing this Spirit, the more the Holy Spirit of God is active in the Earth.
As we have said previously in discussing these verses regarding this unforgivable sin of blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, we must be missing something or there is a in this word blasphemy additional meaning in the Master’s usage that we DO NOT KNOW. Additionally we should add here that from the perspective of the Soul, there is nothing that a man can do in a life in form in the world that IS unforgivable; ALL things are reconcilable as this IS the very purpose of karma. Finally, in the literal meaning of this saying many millions are guilty.
The next saying from Thomas’ Gospel is another that has some similar ideas in the accepted gospels but not in the form that we find in Thomas. Here in one saying is what is spread across several in Matthew and which is found all together in Luke:
- From Thomas we read: “Grapes are not harvested from thorns, nor are figs picked from thistles, for they do not produce fruit. A good person brings forth good from his treasure. A bad person brings (forth) evil from the bad treasure that is in his heart, and (in fact) he speaks evil. For out of the abundance of the heart he brings forth evil” (Thomas 45).
- From Luke: “For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh” (Luke 6:43-45).
- From Matthew this is in two locations:
- “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them” (Matthew 7:15-20).
- “Either make the tree good, and his fruit good; or else make the tree corrupt, and his fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by his fruit. O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things” (Matthew 12:33-35).
The contexts of these words in Luke and Matthew are not the same; in Luke this saying is a general part of the Sermon on the Mount while in Matthew the first saying is in regard to false prophets and the latter follows immediately upon Matthew version of the forty forth saying that we discuss above. Thomas as usual writes these words without context and in their form we can likely see his effort to keep these thoughts together. In this we can see that Thomas KNOWS the words and the relative importance of the sayings and while his presentation is not as smooth, the same messages come across. Let us look at some of the commentary on this saying:
- Robert M. Grant and David Noel Freedman write: “From the fruits mentioned in Saying 44, Thomas goes on to give other sayings on the same subject, beginning with Matthew 7:16 then continuing with its parallel Luke 6:44-45. Luke 6:45 is parallel to Matthew 12:35, which also puts the saying about “treasure” in the context of “saying things”; but the saying in Thomas can be explained simply on a combination of Matthew 7:16-19 with Luke 6:44-45. The Gnostic is presumably the one who brings forth good things.” (The Secret Sayings of Jesus, p. 157).
- Gerd Ludemann writes: “Verses 1-3 have a close parallel in Luke 6.44b-45b and in Matt. 7.16b; 12.35; 12.34b. The sequence grapes/figs agrees with Matt. 7.16b against Luke 6.44b (figs/grapes). Verse 4 recalls Luke 6.45c. As this part of the verse derives from Lukan redaction, the same thing may be presumed for the whole Thomas logion, which is to be designated a mixed quotation.” (Jesus After 2000 Years, p. 612).
There is nothing for our use here in these commentaries and we should note here that there IS a strong synergy between the idea of fruit, what is produced in the world that is of spiritual value, and the idea of treasure or the value of those things that one attends to in his heart, his consciousness.
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.
We repeat here a Quote of the Day that we spent much time with over the course of our essays. In this affirmation we find the Truth of discipleship as we have been ever been expressing and here we can relate our themes of the last few days; “take no thought” for the things of the world and that we approach the Kingdom and discipleship in the nature of the little child, in humbleness, meekness, unashamed in any way and unassuming. The message that this imparts for us today IS that it IS the Soul that is at work in the world of men as it expresses to some degree the purpose, power and the will through Life in this world. These words are from a meditation offered to his students by our Tibetan brother and in which we find greater understanding of the message of the Master. This IS Truly the way of the disciple.
My Soul has purpose, power and will; these three are needed on the Way of Liberation.
My Soul must foster love among the sons of men; this is its major purpose.
I, therefore, will to love and tread the Way of Love.
All that hinders and obstructs the showing of the Light must disappear before the purposes of the Soul.
My will is one with the great Will of God; that Holy Will requires that all men serve.
And unto the purposes of the Plan I lend my little will.
Let the peace of God rule in your hearts!
- 8 Bible commentaries on BibleStudyTools.com
- 14 The Gospel of Thomas; Translated by Stephen J. Patterson and James M. Robinson; http://gnosis.org/
