ON LOVE; PART CDLVI
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•Α
GoodWill IS Love in Action
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•Α
The Gospel of Thomas
These are the hidden words that the living Jesus spoke. And Didymos Judas Thomas wrote them down.
(82) Jesus says: “The person who is near me is near the fire. And the person who is far from me is far from the kingdom.“
(83) Jesus says: “The images are visible to humanity, but the light within them is hidden in the image. {} The light of the Father will reveal itself, but his image is hidden by his light.”
(84) Jesus says: “When you see your likeness you are full of joy. But when you see your likenesses that came into existence before you – they neither die nor become manifest – how much will you bear?“
(85) Jesus says: “Adam came from a great power and a great wealth. But he did not become worthy of you. For if he had been worthy, (then) [he would] not [have tasted] death.“
(86) Jesus says: “[Foxes have] their holes and birds have their nest. But the son of man has no place to lay his head down (and) to rest.“
(87) Jesus says: “Wretched is the body that depends on a body. And wretched is the soul that depends on these two.“
(88) Jesus says: “The messengers and the prophets are coming to you, and they will give you what belongs to you. And you, in turn, give to them what you have in your hands (and) say to yourselves: ‘When will they come (and) take what belongs to them?’”
We left off in the last essay with some words from the Apostle Paul regarding sin and death so that we could relate these ideas from the eighty fifth saying were the ideas of “he-would-have-tasted” or “have experienced” death are used. We should note here that these particular words are missing from the Coptic manuscript and have been inserted by the translators and this likely in accordance with the words of the Master from the accepted gospels, words that ARE NOT understood in their real context and ARE misunderstood by most. In the context that we find in the synoptic gospels, the Master is telling His disciples and them in that day that they will not “taste of death” until, as Luke frames this, “they see the kingdom of God“. Attributing this to the idea that some will not die before the Master’s return or the actual coming to Earth of the Kingdom of God is of course nonsensical and this saying is usually taken as it is reflected in Mark and Matthew; we repeat these here along with the different context from the Apostle John’s Gospel:
- “Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom” (Matthew 16:28).
- “And he said unto them, Verily I say unto you, That there be some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death, till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power” (Mark 9:1).
- “But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:27).
- “Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death. Then said the Jews unto him, Now we know that thou hast a devil. Abraham is dead, and the prophets; and thou sayest, If a man keep my saying, he shall never taste of death… Jesus answered….Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad” (John 8:51-52, 54, 56).
We should try to see that the idea behind the words offered in the synoptic versions ALL mean the same thing and that this saying IS most clear in Luke’s rendering. Here we can understand that to “see the kingdom of God“, to see “the kingdom of God come with power” and to “see the Son of man coming in his kingdom” ALL refer to the realization by a man in the world of His essential divinity as accomplished by keeping His word. In these sayings there is the idea presented that some of these WILL accomplish this before the death of the body. This however IS NOT the reality of death as it is discussed in Thomas’ Gospel above, nor in the ideas that we left off with from Paul in the last post, nor in the Master’s words according to John above. In order to rightly understand our sayings from the synoptic gospels one must understand the reality of the Kingdom, that “the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17-21) which should be taken to say as well that the Kingdom of God IS HERE AND NOW and can be realized by doing what the Master has instructed us to do. And we should try to understand that the Kingdom is realized by degree and this degree is in direct proportion to the striving of the man, in direct proportion to his focus upon the things of God.
John’s version of this idea is totally different except in the sense that the Kingdom IS the realization of the man who keeps His word. Here the idea is the more obscure one that is offered by Paul in his sayings, that death and sin are the of the same cause which IS focus upon the things of the world instead of the things of God. To keep His word in their fullness is to be the disciple and to be accounted worthy of the Kingdom and it IS in this state of being in the world that one WILL NOT see death….that death that IS caused by such sin. It is in this context that we should see the ideas presented by the saying from Thomas’ Gospel, that Adam or even mankind would not have tasted death or experienced death as that separation from the divine self which happens by way of the focus of the Life of the man on the self and the self in the world. This IS what Adam does, being made a living Soul in the world he fixes his attention upon this new way of Life and, as we have previously discussed, this happening IS a part of the overall Great and Awesome Plan of God. Adam is in the Earth, in a human animal body, and for the first time finds himself thinking and feeling through that body. This thinking and this feeling IS the personality formed by this combination of flesh and the Soul and this combined with the appetites and the desires of the body nature itself, puts the man at the brink of what we should see here as sin, as focus upon the self to the exclusion of that divine part.
So Adam comes from that Great Power and Richness which we can simply call God and which is representative of the beginning of man’s journey through Life in form in this world and, while we do not KNOW the purpose or the True Goal from a divine perspective, we do KNOW that we ARE here, we ARE Souls and we ARE living Life in form. In the idea that follows in Thomas, the idea of worthy, we should try to see the reality of the use of this word as the Master shows us in the Apostle Matthew’s words as He says: “He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me” (Matthew 10:37-38). Here this idea of worthy is equivalent to being His disciple as Luke frames this and which we understand as being accounted worthy of His Kingdom and here we should be able to see that underlying idea that if the Soul that IS Adam and the Souls that ARE mankind were able to retain this sense of worthy, this sense of divinity, that they, that we, would not have devolved into this world of sin and death.
Looking at the ideas presented in the Interlinear which we see as the more literal version as compared with our others that are generally reformatted into English and doctrinal sense, we should see two other points of interest. First is the idea regarding worthy, that the Master says that it IS “worthy of-you” that Adam DID NOT “come-to-be“. Here is this obscure idea the only reality can come to us from the sense that the Master IS speaking to His disciples and that this worthiness is in relation to such; that had Adam “come-to-be” as a disciple, that he would have been worthy. Note again the Interlinear phrasing of this:
“Has-Adam come-into-being out of-a-great power and-a-great rich-ness, and did-not-he-come-to-be ()worthy of-you(pl), >(for) had-they! deserving (—) (been), he-would-have-tasted not (the)Death“
The second point is the use of the words “had-they! deserving” in Interlinear version; this is rendered as “if he had been worthy” or as some other singular idea in the other translations and this likely in their view of Adam as the man ONLY. Again we must add here that we ARE NOT learned in the Coptic language and that our research is only in comparison of words as we can see them and, having said this, we see this idea in the Coptic language as they; the structure of they and of he is distinctively different. Can we see the import of this as it affects our understanding of this saying as well as of the whole of this part of the creative story and this journey of man through time and space. The simplicity of this saying is clearly that Adam as the man or as mankind came into being through the agency of God, of the Kingdom of God of which men as Souls are part and parcel. That this man or men devolved into Life in form, they did not retain their own divine view of Life and fell from being worthy; their focus became the self and the self in the world and not the Kingdom and the things of God. Then, the Master tells us that if they had not devolved and had remained worthy, or had “come-to-be” worthy as men in the world, that they would not be in this death that IS sin, this death that IS focus upon the things of the flesh. Here the picture is drawn between the disciple and the man in the world; that the disciple IS worthy and is no longer dead in sin and that Adam did not come to achieve this same in his own Lifetime and, again, we should see this as the individual and the corporate as this IS the plight of ALL.
Our next saying, the eighty sixth, is one that does have a similar saying by the Master in the accepted gospels where we find the Master speaking with those who say that they would follow Him and be His disciples; we read:
- “And a certain scribe came , and said unto him, Master, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest. And Jesus saith unto him, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head” (Matthew 8:19-20).
- “And it came to pass , that, as they went in the way, a certain man said unto him, Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest. And Jesus said unto him, Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head” (Luke 9:57-58).
- “Jesus says: [Foxes have] their holes and birds have their nest. But the son of man has no place to lay his head down (and) to rest.” (Thomas 86).
We should note that there is extensive reconstruction here in this saying as the bracketed parts are merely assumed to be what the manuscript says and in our version above from Patterson and Robinson there is more certainty given to some words than there is in other translations where the entire idea of foxes and their holes is bracketed as missing. Here it is apparent that the translators relied upon the synoptic verses to render this saying from Thomas’ Gospel as the remainder does more or less agree and we can assume here that they are right as this does fit with the Master’s sentiment, His warning and His caution that following Him will not be an easy thing, that they have NO place. As usual the context is missing from Thomas’ version but we should assume the same idea is prompting the Master’s remarks; here we should see the True meaning of the Master’s injunction that we “take no thought” (Matthew 6:25) as we can see here that He does not as well. The comments on this saying include:
- Marvin Meyer quotes Plutarch’s Life of Tiberius Gracchus 9.4-5 on the homeless soldiers of Italy: “The wild animals that range over Italy have a cave, and there is a lair for each of them to enter, but those who fight and die for Italy have a share in the air and the light and nothing else, but, having no house or abode, they wander about with wives and children.” (The Gospel of Thomas: The Hidden Sayings of Jesus, p. 101).
- Robert M. Grant and David Noel Freedman write: “Something has been lost at the beginning, but this saying is nothing but a repetition of the gospel statement about the Son of Man and his life of detachment from the world (Mathew 8:20; Luke 9:58). What is characteristic of the Son of Man must also be characteristic of his disciples, who are ‘sons of men’ (Saying 103). The place of ‘rest’ (Thomas adds ‘to rest’ to the saying; cf., Sayings 51, 52, and 90) is not on earth but within.” (The Secret Sayings of Jesus, p. 182).
- Funk and Hoover write: “As in Q, the version in Thomas employs the phrase ‘son of Adam.’ In addition to its well-known technical sense, it can also mean simply ‘human being.’ Since Thomas probably does not empty that phrase in its technical, apocalyptic sense, the translators of the Scholars Version have rendered it simply as ‘human beings’ (the plural form makes it refer unambiguously to persons rather than to the heavenly figure of Daniel 7, who will come on the clouds at the end of time to pass judgment on the world). If Jesus is referring to himself in this saying, as some scholars think, it suggests that Jesus is homeless – a wanderer, without permanent address, without fixed domicile. Jesus thus ranks himself even below the animals, much less below settled, civilized human beings. In Q, Jesus makes this saying a warning to potential followers. In Thomas, the saying has been modified in a very subtle way to refer to the gnostic notion of salvation, which was summed up in the term ‘rest.’ Compare saying 51, where the disciples ask Jesus when the dead will achieve ‘rest.’ The Greek fragment of Thomas 2 states that the ultimate goal of the gnostic is to find ‘rest.'” (The Five Gospels, p. 519).
- J. D. Crossan writes: “The first version [Thomas 86], however, retains the earlier format of a Jesus saying without any dialogue framework. It also retains, more significantly, a saying in which ‘son of man’ is neither titular nor circumlocutionary. It does not mean Jesus but the generic or indefinite ‘human being.’ We can be relatively sure on this point because, while the Gospel of Thomas is, as we saw earlier, emphatically anti-apocaylyptic, that apocalypticism did not contain the theme of Jesus as the Son of Man, else that Gospel would surely have avoided or glossed this present saying. In other words, Gospel of Thomas 86 uses ‘son of man’ for ‘human being’ without any fear of apocalyptic misunderstanding, just as Gospel of Thomas 106 uses the plural ‘sons of man’ for ‘human beings’ (Koester 1989a:43). The saying in Gospel of Thomas 86 asserts, and it is an assertion capable of diverse interpretations, that the human being, unlike the animal or the bird, has no fixed abode on earth. I leave aside, by the way, that terminal ‘and rest,’ which is, in the light of other sayings on rest and repose such as Gospel of Thomas 2, 50, 51, 60, a major theological theme within the redaction of that Gospel (Vielhauer). Apart from that final gloss, the saying goes back to Jesus, although, as just mentioned, its meaning will demand much further context for final interpretation. But its existence means that the Sayings Gospel Q had at least one traditional unit in which Jesus spoke of ‘the son of man’ and that, in conjunction with the other traditional theme of Jesus as apocalyptic judge from Daniel 7:13, facilitated the creation of Jesus speaking of himself as the apocalyptic Son of Man.” (The Historical Jesus, p. 256).
From our perspective there is much unnecessary confusion in these comments above and in those that we did not post as well. Too much is made of the use of the term “son of man” and the idea that this IS NOT a term used by Thomas. We should note that the whole idea of the son of man as this term is used in the gospels is rather obscure and it IS NOT ever explained; we however do see this as the Master’s reference to Himself as the man in the world and, while we are ALL sons of men, we should note that as He uses this idea He means to point out His Life as such, a man in the world, AS A SOUL EXPRESSING LIFE THROUGH FORM. In this view we can see this saying as though He is speaking of Himself as in the alternative this whole saying is rather senseless; to assume that he means human being is but an assumption and is as unfounded as Thomas lack of use of this term “son of man” and the idea that the human being, unlike the animal or the bird, has no fixed abode on earth has no basis in reality. Mr. Meyer’s observation may be valid from the perspective of the Roman soldier but this is not the intent here in Jesus words and it is unfortunate that Thomas most always skips those ideas that can give the sayings context. Grant and Freedman as well as Funk and Hoover make note of the idea of detachment from the world and while they do not appear to comprehend this idea, it IS a notable part of this saying in ALL the gospels. The idea however that Jesus ranks himself even below the animals, much less below settled, civilized human beings is absurd and we should note here that He IS a wanderer, without permanent address, without fixed domicile according to ALL the gospel narratives and this IS of course a part of the Grand Design which we can see so clearly in the right understanding of His words and especially His saying that: “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).
Finally we have the idea of rest as it is painted in these comments and here we are at a loss to explain their ideas. The word that IS rendered as rest here IS NOT that same word to which they refer in their comments; that word is, as we have spoken about in previous essays, repose. These are distinctly different words in the Coptic text and the idea here has naught to do with that repose that is referred to even as salvation. Perhaps these comments are based upon the commentators view of an English translation of the text and not the text itself as in the text we could easily find that the only other reference to this Coptic word rendered rest in the eighty sixth saying is in the sixty first saying where it is used in the context of Salome’s couch or bed with the Master saying that “There-are-two will-rest there on-a-bed“. Here we get the right idea of rest, that it IS the same idea that is presented in the synoptic gospels, that the Master “hath not where to lay his head“. Here we should see that this saying from Thomas’ Gospel is Thomas’ recollection and Thomas’ style of writing the same ideas that we see in the synoptic gospels; a caution and a warning to the man who TRULY desires to follow the Master.
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.
Today we repeat the Mantram of Unification as our Quote of the Day and we should note the very Christian ideals that are embraced by these words; not the doctrinal Christian ideals but rather the ideals annunciated in the words of the Master and of His apostles. This idea of ONENESS IS a component part of the Love that the Master teaches as He tells us that we should Love ALL and this ideal is repeated by His apostles who clarify it and expand upon it in their pronouncement that we should NOT show respect to persons that we should not prefer one above another, and this of course includes groups of persons who may differ from us in color, in nationality, in religion….in any way. We are told this by the apostles who tells us that God DOES NOT show such favor to individuals nor to groups as we read that “there is no respect of persons with God” (Romans 2:11) which IS here offered in the context that ALL are treated equally. There are several instances of this saying interweaved with the idea that we should Love our brother, our neighbor and one another as these ideas are framed and, with this stated concept of this respect, we should be able to glimpse what we have been preaching here in this blog and which is the Truer nature of this Love. We should understand that in our zeal to be among His disciples that we must pay keen attention to the totality of the Master’s words which tell us that we should “seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness” (Matthew 6:33) and it is in this reality that we should understand this idea of respect, that if this is the Way of God that it should be the way of man as well. And, if this were not clear enough, the straightforward words of the Apostle James helps us saying “if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors” (James 2:9).
This IS the greater Truth of this Mantram of Unification; that we understand the reality of our ONENESS, our essential Unity, that we Love as the Master teaches, that we allow the Inner man, the Soul, to be the controlling force in our lives; that we come to see the Truth, that we break down the walls of illusion and glamour and eliminate ALL things that separate us from the Truth and from each other. And that we Love and encourage that Universal Love which is our essential destiny by our own example and in ALL that we say and do.
Mantram of Unification
The sons of men are one and I am one with them.
I seek to love, not hate;
I seek to serve and not exact due service;
I seek to heal, not hurt.
Let pain bring due reward of light and love.
Let the Soul control the outer form, and life and all events,
And bring to light the love that underlies the happenings of the time.
Let vision come and insight.
Let the future stand revealed.
Let inner union demonstrate and outer cleavages be gone.
Let love prevail.
Let all men love.
The Mantram of Unification is a meditation and a prayer that at first affirms the unity of all men and the Brotherhood of Man based on the Fatherhood of God. The first stanza sets forth several truly Christian ideals in Unity, Love, Service and Healing. The second stanza is a invocation to the Lord and to our own Souls asking that from the pain (if there can truly be any) incurred in focusing on the Spirit and not the world will come Light and Love into our lives and that we begin to function as Souls through our conscious personalities. We ask that the spiritual control of our lives will bring to light for us the Love that underlies world events; a Love that the world oriented man will not see working out behind the scenes and also that the Love that we bring forth, individually and as a world group, can be seen by all and ultimately in all. Finally, in the last stanza we ask for those things that are needed for Love to abound. Vision and insight so that we can direct our attention properly; revelation of the future in the sense that all can see the Power of Love in the world; inner union so that we do not fall back into the world’s ways, that we faint not; and that a sense of separation, the antithesis of brotherhood, ends as we know it today. Let Love Prevail, Let All Men Love. Spiritual control of our lives will bring to light for us the Love that underlies world events; a Love that the world oriented man will not see working out behind the scenes.
Let the peace of God rule in your hearts!
- 14 The Gospel of Thomas; Translated by Stephen J. Patterson and James M. Robinson; http://gnosis.org/
