ON LOVE; PART XDXXXIX
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.
(68) Jesus says: “Blessed are you when(ever) they hate you (and) persecute you. But they (themselves) will find no place there where they have persecuted you.“
(69) Jesus says: “Blessed are those who have been persecuted in their heart. They are the ones who have truly come to know the Father. Blessed are those who suffer from hunger so that the belly of the one who wishes (it) will be satisfied.“
(70) Jesus says: “If you bring it into being within you, (then) that which you have will save you. If you do not have it within you, (then) that which you do not have within you [will] kill you.“
(71) Jesus says: “I will [destroy this] house, and no one will be able to build it [again].“
(72) A [person said] to him: “Tell my brothers that they have to divide my father’s possessions with me.” He said to him: “Man, who has made me a divider?” He turned to his disciples (and) said to them: “I am not a divider, am I?“
(73) Jesus says: “The harvest is plentiful, but there are few workers. But beg the Lord that he may send workers into the harvest.“
(74) He said: “Lord, there are many around the well, but there is nothing in the <well>.“
(75) Jesus says: “Many are standing before the door, but it is the solitary ones who will enter the wedding hall.“
In the last essay we discussed our ideas on the sixty eighth saying from the Gospel of Thomas which we related a part of to the similar ideas presented as Beatitudes by Matthew and Luke in the accepted gospels. We were able to expand on our ideas of the nature of persecution which we should understand in the terms that the Apostle Luke gives us as the Master’s words saying: “men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil” (Luke 6:22). We can read these words in place of the Master’s words according to the Apostle Matthew which which reflect the idea behind this behavior of others; that the follower of the Lord IS “persecuted for righteousness’ sake” (Matthew 5:10); here these words from Luke can explain the idea from Matthew and here Matthew goes on in his next thought to offer some explanation from the Master as well saying: “men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely” (Matthew 5:11). There is nothing in these ideas about physical harm, this is persecution as we are intended to understand it; and we should understand that we ARE NOT discounting the martyrdom of many including apostles and disciples and the Master Himself, but we seek to point out here that martyrdom IS NOT the direct result of persecution as it is defined above; martyrdom IS the result of the hatred and the reproach that ARE alos a part of persecution. And we should take the Master’s words here from Matthew as the greater Truth, that this persecution IS NOT because of the way that one may believe, it IS NOT because of the group that one may align himself with, it IS because of one’s Life of righteousness; ALL else is but hatred and prejudice against others and this IS NOT the central subject of this Beatitude.
It IS one’s living a Life of righteousness that causes others to look at him askance; it IS following the words of the Master instead of the ways of the world that causes others to be uncomfortable in one’s presence; it IS letting one’s Light shine before men that causes others to see him as greater that himself. Of course this IS NOT ALL men who react this way, it is only the man who is so focused in his own sense of worth that he CAN NOT easily allow others to usurp his sense of superiority, a sense that is only in this man’s own mind and perhaps others of his ilk. And we should understand here that this too works out in the world by degree and that there ARE leaders and there ARE followers in what can be considered as acts of aggression against the righteous man; acts that take on the tone and the substance of the Master’s words in Luke’s Gospel above. This is the sense that we try to take from the second part of our saying by the Master according to Thomas for which we are using the Doresse’s rendering as it IS the only one in our view that makes any kind of sense and which can be seen in the words presented by the Interlinear Version as well. We read these as:
- Jesus says: “Blessed are you when you are hated and persecuted; but they will not find a position in that place to which they shall pursue you!” (Doresse).
- Said-JS63 this: “You(pl) (are) ( )-blessed-ones when they-should-hate-yourselves &-( )-persecute-you(pl), and they-will-fall not upon-anywhere in-the-place where-they-persecuted you(pl) down in-him” (Interlinear Version).
As we tried to explain in the last post, this idea here of position takes the overall meaning away from the physical idea of place and while this may be seen as place it can also be seen in the more psychic way of one’s relative position in thought or feeling about what another may represent or may say. It is in this idea that we find some resolution to these otherwise obscure words. Here, relating this to what we are saying above, we can see the idea that others position on the Truth of God may be different, as was the Jews’ general ideas were against the teachings of the Master, and especially His sense of righteousness. The Master’s message here in Thomas words then can be seen as an affirmation that those Jews will not find their position to be tenable regardless of how they may pursue it….it IS the Master’s teaching that will endure. We can find no other feasible interpretation of these words from the Master that we are given by Thomas and we should be able to see this same idea in the combined words of this Beatitude according to Matthew and Luke. The opposition will oppose the righteous man at every turn, they will “hate you, and….they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil“; “men shall revile you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely“. ALL these things will they do but they “will not find a position” that is above that righteousness regardless of how “they shall pursue you“.
Our next saying is another Beatitude and here we have one that appears to be a combination of several of the Master’s thoughts as they are presented for us in the Gospel of Matthew. Here again we have a saying that can mean different things based in the rendering as we see below:
- Jesus said: “Blessed are those who have been persecuted in their heart; these are they who have known the Father in truth. Blessed are the hungry, for the belly of him who desires will be filled” (Blatz).
- Jesus said, “Blessed are those who have been persecuted in their hearts. It is they who have truly come to be acquainted with the father. Blessed are they who hunger for the belly of the needy to be satisfied” (Layton).
- Jesus says: “Blessed are those who are persecuted in their hearts. They are those who have known (?) the Father in truth! Blessed are those who are hungry, because they will satisfy their bellies to <their> content!” (Doresse).
- Jesus said, “Blessed are they who have been persecuted within themselves. It is they who have truly come to know the Father. Blessed are the hungry, for the belly of him who desires will be filled” (Lambdin).
- Jesus says: “Blessed are those who have been persecuted in their heart. They are the ones who have truly come to know the Father. Blessed are those who suffer from hunger so that the belly of the one who wishes (it) will be satisfied” (Patterson and Robinson).
- Jesus said, “Congratulations to those who have been persecuted in their hearts: they are the ones who have truly come to know the Father.Congratulations to those who go hungry, so the stomach of the one in want may be filled” (Patterson and Meyer).
- Said-JS64 (this) “( )-blessed-ones are these they-have-persecuted them down in-their-mind; those-who-are-there, they-have-known-the-father (truly). >(among)-blessed-ones (are) those-who-are-hungry, so they-may-satisfy the-belly of-he-who-desires” (Interlinear Version).
While the Interlinear is rendered as mind in the first part of this saying, the reality here should be seen as heart and should be understood as we generally understand it; as the consciousness of the man in the world, that part that does follow the ways of the world or the Ways of God depending upon the focus, the treasure, or better, what is seen as important.
The commentary on this saying includes:
- Marvin Meyer writes: “In Who Is the Rich Man? 25, Clement of Alexandria asserts that ‘the most difficult persecution is from within,’ from pleasures and passions: ‘The one being persecuted cannot escape it, for he carries the enemy around within himself everywhere.'” (The Gospel of Thomas: The Hidden Sayings of Jesus, p. 96).
- Robert M. Grant and David Noel Freedman write: “Like Saying 69 [68], this one is based on gospel Beatitudes. From the blessing on those who are persecuted (Matthew 5:10), Thomas turns to add materials taken from Matthew 5:8: ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God’; for him the vision of God is equivalent to knowing ‘the Father in truth’ (knowing and worshiping the Father in truth, John 4:22-23). Then he goes back to Matthew 5:6 (hungering for righteousness, being filled), though with the parallel verse in Luke (6:21) he omits ‘for righteousness.'” (The Secret Sayings of Jesus, p. 174).
- R. McL. Wilson writes: “In both cases [68 and 69] Grant and Freedman see only development from our Gospels; if they are right it is interesting, in view of the Naassene tendency to reversal of order, to note that we have in logion 69 elements from Matthew v. 10, 8 and 6 in that sequence. Bartsch sees in logion 68 a type of expansion which has already begun in Matthew, and notes further development in 1 Peter iv. 14-16. Quispel, however, finds parallels in the Clementines and in Polycarp, which may point to a common tradition, but these must be closely scrutinized.” (Studies in the Gospel of Thomas, p. 81).
- Funk and Hoover write: “There were probably at least four beatitudes in Jesus’ repertoire (poor, hungry, weeping, persecuted: Luke 6:20-22). The formulation of the fourth in Q, which has been preserved here in Thomas in slightly different forms (Thom 68, 69:1), has been influenced by the persecution of the members of the Christian community after Jesus’ death. In both its Thomean versions, the saying has been modified to suit the perspectives of Thomas. Scholars have not determined what ‘and no place will be found, wherever you have been persecuted’ means, and so cannot determine whether it could have originated with Jesus. The term ‘place,’ however, appears elsewhere in Thomas with special significance (for example, Thom 4:1; 24:1; 60:6; and 64:12, where Jesus is made to say, ‘Buyers and merchants will not enter the places of my Father’). The wording in 69:1 is clearly Thomean, since knowing the Father is the goal of Christians for Thomas.” (The Five Gospels, p. 512).
- Gerd Ludemann writes: “The statement about persecution in the heart is unclear; perhaps the Coptic translator has mistranslated the text ‘Blessed are the persecuted who are of a pure heart’ (cf. Matt 5.8). Thomas has here introduced the key word ‘persecute’ from Logion 68. The second part of v. 1 certainly comes from him since to attain the ‘knowledge of the Father’ is one of the goals of Thomas (cf. 50.2-3).” (Jesus After 2000 Years, p. 625).
We should note here that two of these commentaries mention that to KNOW the Father IS Thomas’ goal; they seem to say this while they miss the reality that to KNOW the Father is to KNOW God and this IS the goal of ALL men; these comments seem to call this Thomas’ goal so as to show that this IS Thomas’ idea and not the Master’s. That this saying is intended as a Beatitude is evident and here we should remember that both the recollection and the understanding as well as his style have contributed to the Apostle Thomas’ way giving us the Master’s words and that this same IS True of the other writers of the synoptic gospels. This IS in our understanding a more valid idea than we find in the rather arbitrary and illusive theories of yet another version called Q from which both Matthew and Luke have derived some of their materials. Here in this saying there is a rather obscure beginning from the perspective if being persecuted and we should see that in the prior saying ALL of the ideas attributed to persecution are such that they DO effect the heart of the man who IS persecuted and this IS True whether or not the man lets these outside forces against him Truly bother him. He does feel them and he KNOWS of them and he KNOWS the Master’s words about them as he IS the disciple, the righteous man; these KNOW in their hearts these realities: “when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil“ AND “when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely“. If this then IS True, this next idea from Thomas must have a different import and we do have a glimpse of this in another of the commentaries above. Marvin Meyer, quoting Clement of Alexandria, one of the acknowledged Church Fathers, tell us this reality that we may not have seen without this commentary: ‘the most difficult persecution is from within‘. Now we may not agree that this is the most difficult but in the reality of our journey upon the Path to the Kingdom and to the Father, this IS a very significant force; it IS our own Inner reaction that keeps us upon the Path and that allows us to keep His words as a man can easily fall back into the ways of the world.
This IS the view that we will take regarding the first part of this saying, that it IS in the aspirant’s and the disciples heart, in his consciousness, that the whole of one’s salvation is worked out in any given Lifetime and, especially early on in one’s journey, this persecution from within is a viable force to contend with. This can be seen as that constant conversation that a man will have with himself, a conversation that we generally just allude to, a conversation which is between his sense of the Good, the Beautiful and the True, the things of God, and the ways of the world and the self in the world. Sometimes it can seem that at every turn there is a decision to make and for some this can take on the nature of one’s own persecution which we should see here as the lower forces revolting against the higher. This is aside from that major decision of Repentance and should be seen as those lessor decisions that is based in the duality in which the aspirant and the disciple may find himself. In this we can see this sense of persecution that we do not readily find in the words from Matthew and Luke but which are likely included in these same sayings as the source of the persecution IS NOT addressed. Here in what we see above as Clement’s words we have this idea that comes as that this persecution from within IS the personalities desire to continue in the ‘pleasures and passions‘ and here we can easily see his point that ‘The one being persecuted cannot escape it, for he carries the enemy around within himself everywhere’. The Apostle Paul writes much concerning this dynamic as well as he tells us about the struggle between the carnal and the spiritual self.
We can see in this seemingly constant conversation the realities of persecution as defined above as the personality comes to hate the spiritual tendencies and fight them at every turn as the man tries to shut out the ideas of the higher calling in which we can see the Master’s idea of this separation and isolation of the personality from the Soul by the ever harder attempts of the man to maintain focus upon the ‘pleasures and passions‘. Not ALL will experience these ALL but most ALL will experience some of this inner conflict as if it was not for this conflict, most ALL men would find too easy a time in achieving their spiritual reality. Can we see the additional ideas of reproach and even the idea of the personality speaking ill if his own Inner prompting as to shut it out? And so here this Beatitude tells us that the man IS blessed who has experienced this Inner conflict and who has endured and seen through the persecution so that its effect is but a temporary looking away. Here we should be able to see that in feeling this conflict and overcoming it a man is brought to the threshold of discipleship and then for him this saying from the Master becomes his Truth. “It is they who have truly come to know the Father” (Lambdin).
This next part has no apparent relationship to this first part which we see as about this Inner conflict of man and it is here in this second part that the variants of translation play the more significant role. While we will put our ideas on this part off until the next essay, we can look here at the relationship between the ideas of hungry and of desires or wishes and we should try to see these ideas in both the positive and the negative ways that they can effect a man. The negative can be seen in relation to those lower psychic tendencies that cause a man to want ALL things to satisfy the lower urges to pleasure and satisfaction; hunger for the things of the world. The positive idea can be seen in Matthew’s rendering of the Master’s thought saying: “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled” (Matthew 5:6). Luke shortens this saying and leaves us in the similar view that we have in Thomas; Luke simply tells us: “Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled” (Luke 6:21).
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.
As the Lord’s Prayer is given to us by the Christ for our use 2000 years ago, the Great Invocation, according to esoteric sources, was give from Him as well and whether we believe that this IS True or not we should look at this prayer as containing the same selfless invocative style as does the Lord’s Prayer and then any that are modeled after their style. We again encourage ALL to read and reread this Great Invocation and our comments as in these words can be found keys to our spiritual reality.
From the point of Light within the Mind of God
Let light stream forth into the minds of men.
Let Light descend on Earth.
From the point of Love within the Heart of God
Let love stream forth into the hearts of men.
May Christ return to Earth.
From the centre where the Will of God is known
Let purpose guide the little wills of men–
The purpose which the Masters know and serve.
From the centre which we call the race of men
Let the Plan of Love and Light work out
And may it seal the door where evil dwells.
This prayer is a part of our Prayers and Meditations section and there is much information about it there and in our discussion of it in the Quote of the Day section of In the Words of Jesus parts 128-132
The above Invocation or Prayer does not belong to any person or group but to all Humanity. The beauty and the strength of this Invocation lies in its simplicity, and in its expression of certain central truths which all men, innately and normally, accept—the truth of the existence of a basic Intelligence to Whom we vaguely give the name of God; the truth that behind all outer seeming, the motivating power of the universe is Love; the truth that a great Individuality came to earth, called by Christians, the Christ, and embodied that love so that we could understand; the truth that both love and intelligence are effects of what is called the Will of God; and finally the self-evident truth that only through humanity itself can the Divine Plan work out.
Like the Lord’s Prayer, this invocation is a World Prayer which is as all that a prayer is intended to be. It is a prayer for the uplifting of the Human Family out of the mire of materialism and selfishness. The Lord’s Prayer asks nothing for the individual praying it but asks that its benefits be for US and for WE which is why it was given by the Christ as a prayer and as a model over 2000 years ago. This invocation is also attributed to the Christ who, as He promised, has never left us; He, through channels that we do not readily understand, has Himself instructed His disciples to distribute this prayer and to encourage its use as a world prayer and as an aid in preparing the world for His return.
The first three stanzas of this prayer should be understood as reflecting the effective potencies of the Trinity which is God and which, when brought down to an individual level, the Trinity which is Man. His Will, His Love and His Light we should seen as the Potent Powers of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
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/
