the finding of life

Jesus said: Blessed is one who has labored and found life. Saying 58, The Gospel of Thomas.

Born out of the amniotic sac of the first birth, we take on the clothing or life of the human societal world, a world of customs and laws and imagery. Now we need a birthing labor of our own. We have not yet found life. It is all around us and I do not speak of just the "natural" world.

We must emerge from the human amniotic sac in which we are enfolded, this cultural conditioning and limitation of vision, this ignore-ance. This emerging is called labor because like an unborn chick we have to peck at our shell. When we persevere, we find life outside the egg of consciousness we solidified around ourselves so long ago.

The world rocks on but it is no longer rocking us. We are, as Jesus says, blessed.

one master

Jesus said: Nor can a servant serve two masters, as he will respect one and despise the other. Saying 47b, The Gospel of Thomas.

Many spiritual paths exist, leading to the same Opening. Each path has a master of that path, one who has proven the validity of the path through his/her very being, through action, word, and presence. One can be aware of all paths and learn from them, but to follow more than one master of a path diffuses the one-pointedness that is essential for merging with the master. One sets one's whole heart on one master, becomes attuned to and identical with that master's wisdom and compassion.

ditching our lives

Jesus said: If a blind person leads another blind person, both of them will fall into a ditch. Saying 34, The Gospel of Thomas.

Thought and imagery are fine. They naturally arise. They also naturally disappear. When we do not let them disappear, we are blind, stuck in obscuration. We cannot see the vast openness that we are and in which we dwell. We lead ourselves into a ditch. It may be a most comfortable ditch, an old familiar ditch, but it is a ditch nonetheless.

Trapped in images of the past, old thoughts suck our energy. Caught in movies of the immediate and distant future, we ditch ourselves and are not here. Sitting in the present moment(um) entranced, we sit snug within our ditch.  The part of me that leads and the part of me that follows are sunk, caught in a time-space warp of our own making.

PHAT! We break clear. Awake. Aware.

the born and the Unborn

Jesus said: When you see someone not born from a woman, prostrate yourselves and worship him; he is your Father. Saying 15, The Gospel of Thomas.

The surface part of ourselves, the part that makes contact with the world and in some sense IS the world, is the aspect of ourselves "born from a woman." This is the character, the personality we are, the persona that builds, that accretes, since physical birth. This is the froth on the wave of the ocean.

We can look inside and see "someone not born of a woman," the energetic and energizing flow of the Wellspring Itself. This is our Source, our Father. The woman-born flat-lines (prostrates itself) at such sight. The woman-born (born of water, the amniotic fluid) gives way to the spirit-born, the life force born.

One is born again. Both births are essential, of the Essence. One is the Unborn borning.

a teaching moment

A man said to him: Talk to my brothers so that they will divide my father's property with me. Jesus replied: Man, who made me a divider? He turned to his disciples and asked them: Really, am I a divider? Saying 72, The Gospel of Thomas

This saying has been interpreted as Jesus being somewhat sarcastic, not so much from his reply to the man wanting Jesus's persuasive power to work in his behalf, but from his remark to his disciples, as if this is an inside joke and Jesus and his disciples can laugh together, leaving the questioner shut out and embarrassed. I do not see this as consistent with Jesus's way of being.

My intuition is that one or more of the disciples had been approached by the man seeking resolution of this domestic dispute, did not know what to say to him, and told him to ask Jesus for help. Jesus's reply (Man, who made me a divider?) shows that Jesus was immediately aware of the inadequacy of understanding of his disciples, his students.

This dialogue is not between Jesus and the man who felt wronged, but between Jesus and his disciples. First he wonders aloud who made him a divider, which may have set off some nervousness amongst those who did. Jesus taught unification, not division ("If one is unified one will be filled with light, but if one is divided one will be filled with darkness.").

Then Jesus focuses full attention on his disciples (those who accepted his discipline)with a strong and true teaching question, the best kind of question, one they have to answer themselves. "Really, am I a divider?"

The very question itself shows that Jesus was not trying to make fun of the man by dividing him from the disciples as an ignorant man not in the know with the "in" crowd. The question was designed to get the disciples to think and to understand.

the chicken or the egg

Jesus said: If the flesh came into being because of spirit, that is a marvel, but if spirit came into being because of the body, that is a marvel of marvels. Yet I marvel at how this great wealth has come to dwell in this poverty. Saying 29, The Gospel of Thomas.

Which came first, the mind or the body? Which produces the other? We continue to make that a controversy today. The biomechanics say there is no mind without the body. When the body goes, the mind goes. The more sane biomechanics say they don't know, that this "no body = no mind" position is a point of view within the bounds and limitations of the biomechanical thought system.

Jesus directly addressed this issue. He regards each of these two understandings (and a third one, which he initiates) as marvelous, as causing one to gasp in wonder. If the body came into being because of mind, that is astonishing (a marvel). If the mind came into being because of body, that is even more astonishing (a marvel of marvels). So far, Jesus has not taken a position (unless one substitutes "incredulous" for "astonishing").

With the word "Yet" comes a third viewpoint or understanding. Jesus says that one can marvel from the adoption of the first two positions, but what he marvels at is outside these two divisive statements which war against each other. He is more interested in HOW it happens -- "how this great wealth has come to dwell in this poverty."

What is "this great wealth?" It is certainly not the ratio-nal syllogistic mind based upon duality, wonderful as it is. "This great wealth" is the Life Force itself, that great stream of being which produces all. It expresses Itself in this poverty, this "clay," this earth matter that walks around, that flies, that creeps, that crawls.

What is more astonishing than the chicken-egg, mind-body controversy and viewpoints is that we and all that exist are embodyings of the Life Force Itself. When we truly grasp that, we are transformed. Our consciousness shifts into a more marvelous realm.

hidden and revealed

Jesus said: The images are revealed to people. The light within them is hidden in the image of the Father's light. He will be revealed. His image is hidden in his light. Saying 83, The Gospel of Thomas.

Four words stand out here. Revealed. Hidden. Revealed. Hidden. Think of a light blinking on and off. This is the nature of the images, the powerful symbols that show us the essence of life, of being.

Revelation comes. We think we've got it. Like Peter at the Transfiguration, we want to build an altar there, a church, a society, a form. We want to stop. No. Something is hidden within the revelation. Something more. Something deeper. We press on with no clinging.

Ah! Revealed! We understand more. We see the image of the Father's light, our Source's light within the first revelation. He is in there somewhere. Hidden.

We catch a glimpse! Revealed! Our soul is thrilled. The glimpse gives way abruptly to the darkness of greater light. We begin to understand. We stop looking out there. He is in here looking out. He is the light within. We have him cornered now.

Blink! He is inside. He is outside. He is neither inside nor outside. He is both inside and outside. Inside and outside are one and the same.

Only light remains.

worthy

Jesus said: Adam came into being from enormous power and wealth, but he was never worthy of you, for had he been worthy of you he would not have died. Saying 85, The Gospel of Thomas.

Jesus is telling us of our worth. Worthy to whom?

Worthy to ourselves in realizing who we are, not just suckling babes crawling on a planet seeking what we may devour, not just unique creations arising from the Ground of Existence and then, after a few short years, dissolving, but manifestations of our Father, our Source, who through our mutual love are immortal.

Worthy to God, our Father and our Mother, the Wellspring of which we are the offspring. We are loved and when we love in return a circuit is completed that is never broken.

nowhere for the tiger to land its claws

Jesus said: Blessed is one who knows where (or when) bandits are going to attack, so that he can prepare, assemble his forces, and arm himself before the bandits enter. Saying 103, The Gospel of Thomas

Spiritual intelligence is essential for spiritual transformation and is a radiant and deep awareness that creates a coherent interflow amongst our other realms of intelligence (kinesthetic, musical, logico-mathematical, linguistic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, visual-spatial). "Blessed is one who knows," who has spiritual intelligence.

The Buddha has identified the bandits as three forces we use against ourselves: greed (wanting what we do not have), hostility (not wanting what we do have), and stupor (a self-induced state of ignore-ance). Jesus says we are blessed when we know where and when these bandits are going to attack. They will attack (we will attack ourselves with them) when and where we are most vulnerable: when we are fatigued, when we are down-hearted, when we are out of step with our spiritual path.

These are the times when we must counter our spiritual inertia and prepare for battle. The bandits are already at our door. It doesn't take much spiritual energy to defeat them. They can be blown away with a single breath.

As the Old Dude says in the Tao Te Ching, when we are in tune with our spiritual awareness, when we are spiritually intelligent: "There is nowhere for the rhinoceros to pitch its horn; there is nowhere for the tiger to land its claws; there is nowhere for the weapon to lodge its blade. Why is this so? Because there are no fatal spots on us."

one of those

Jesus said: Be one of those who pass by. Saying 42, The Gospel of Thomas.

Do not become entangled. Block no orifices with residue. Move on. Go straight ahead. No tumbling around in the dryer of your mind. No lint collection. Step in and meet and greet whatever comes and send it on its way. Stop trying to fix the world. Simply be you. Keep moving. No velcro mind. All images are chimera. Keep breathing. Ex-hell. Be one of those who pass by.