Sermon 2 --The Gospel of Philip --1

^{Sermon #2 --The Gospel of Philip --1}

^{Call to Worship:}

Mathew 13:10-16:

^“10 And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?”

¹¹ He answered and said to them, “Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 

¹² For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. 

¹³ Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.

Last week we introduced The Gospel of Philip with these words from Wikipedia:

“Although it may seem similar to the Gospel of Thomas, scholars are divided as to whether it is a single discourse or a collection of Valentinian sayings. . . . . Many of the sayings are identifiably Gnostic, and often appear quite mysterious and enigmatic.”

Whether we will discover a unifying thread in Philip remains to be seen, but certainly the first eight verses are one unit: they are concerned with displaying an overview of a cosmographical hierarchy involving definitions of proselyte as opposed to a Son of God, (a Man of Truth), and deploring the perishable over the imperishable. This theme is carried on and developed over the next twenty-six verses.

Last week we also suggested that the probable inspiration for The Gospel of Philip in Valentinianism, placed it within the pedagogical jurisdiction of the Apostle Paul; thus, even if he did not write it himself, the influence he had on his many students must have shaped much of the material. We also suggested that in some of the Gnostic scriptures, the less dogmatic, the more mystical side of Paul is given voice, through him directly or through his students. We further suggested that this mysticism may be the very reason the Church Fathers, of the 325 Nicean Council, rejected certain texts, from various sources, which read a lot like the Gospel of Philip. Finally, last week, it was suggested that the image of the sacred bridal chamber was going to play a pervasive role in the over-arching concept of the author. Specific mention of the “Bridal Chamber” is not made until fairly late in the book, but its mention, in its proper place, is the crowning rational image of the book.

Thus, having prepared the stage, let us begin at the beginning with the first few verses of scripture. The remarkable thing about this opening is it gives a complex description of a cosmic hierarchical structure which has been of some interest to us here at the Basin Bible Church. The author here introduces an hierarchical cosmographic model consisting of two distinct levels of consciousness, the lower being born of earth the other being born of heaven. The model is metaphorically represented by several different symbolic pairs, the first earthbound, the second heavenly: 

1. as proselyte vs Man of Truth, 

2. as slave vs Son, 

3. as perishable vs the imperishable,

4. as pagan vs those who have accepted the Truth,

5. as winter planting vs summer harvesting

and including my own extension to the list of declensions,

6. as those who are spoken to in parables, vs those who are

told the whole truth, and finally

7. as the saved vs the sanctified.

We will find these pairings of intense interest as we explore the complexities and significance of this cosmographic model. This exploration will yield a template for all analogous positive/negative pairings, from Slave vs Son to Planting vs Reaping.

So here is the opening of The Gospel of Philip:

“1. A Hebrew makes a Hebrew, and such a person is

called a proselyte. But a proselyte does not make a proselyte.”

[Sidebar: This confusing opening states: Hebrews may go around converting other people to be Hebrews, but such a convert does not then go around converting more other people to be Hebrews—only people who were originally Hebrews can do that; the reason why is revealed a few lines down the page—we’ll get to that presently. Some commentaries indicate that this is a slam against the inconstant Romans, but I believe another implication here is kind of like the idea of Xerox copies—each succeeding generation is less faithful to the original. Hence,

“Those Who came from the Truth are as They were initially.

And They beget other Men of Truth. The latter

need only to be born (in It).”

Thus, those born of the spirit may give birth to others born of the spirit, but this event is not on the same energy level as the process of creating a proselyte, a person defined by a mundane national or social identity, and his adoption of specific allegiances to a social entity, like the Hebrews or the Samaritans, or the Romans; to be born of the spirit is an event of a higher vibrational intensity than any such terrestrial identifications. Those born of the spirit give birth to others born of the spirit by leading them to the Abode of God-the-Father, the entrance into which constitutes a “birth”. 

Isenburg, an enlightened translator of Philip has made this comment about the opening:

“We know from the central argument of this ‘Sermon on the Mirrored Bridal Chamber’ that the author is trying to convince those under Roman influence of the efficacy of the sacrament of the Bridal Chamber.  The author makes in the first paragraph an argument key to winning his case that the Romans are like proselytes in not adhering to their Samaritan-Sethian-Hebraic roots.  This is replayed in the slave-son analogy of paragraph 2, the gentile slight of paragraph 3 and the father-mother reference there as well.  The Romans are just proselytes or beginners in not going on to the sacrament of the Bridal Chamber.”

This is all quite significant when we consider the implication of this passage, that there is a celestial hierarchy consisting of different levels of soul evolution-- the different levels arranging themselves into an harmoniously balanced cosmic choir. I believe this bears upon the idea that all are one, but all are unique. As we continue through The Gospel of Philip, our position in the cosmic choir will concern us more and more.

Going on with Philip:

“2. A slave can hope only to become free. A slave cannot

      expect to inherit the estate of the master.

Yet a Son is not only a Son, but also a Co-owner of His

Father’s estate.”

The difference between a slave and a son is here equivalent to the difference between a proselyte and one born of the Truth. A slave achieves an elevation in rank by becoming free, but the son achieves an elevation in rank by virtue of a pre-existing transcendental relationship to the Father. This sketch of the cosmic hierarchical structure in not unrelated to the idea of the parable, by virtue of its two-level structure. In Matthew 13:10-16 we read:

^“10 And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?”

¹¹ He answered and said to them, “Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 

¹² For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. 

¹³ Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.

¹⁴ And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says:

‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, 

And seeing you will see and not perceive; 

¹⁵ For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing,

And their eyes they have closed,

Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears,

Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn,

So that I should heal them.’

¹⁶ But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; 

¹⁷ for assuredly, I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.”

Remember that Jesus said to His disciples, “to them I speak in parables, but to you I speak the truth.” This is because once you have heard the truth you become responsible for the truth, and not everybody is ready to take on such a heavy responsibility. Thus, the author of The Gospel of Phillip is warning us that the knowledge of a proselyte or a slave is lower than the knowledge of a Man of Truth, or a Son. Furthermore, a slave may ascend to a Sonship, but a Son may not descend to the level of a slave without doing irredeemable damage to his soul. This is a paradox we will discuss later.

The concept of being born into the family of God bears on certain of our ideas of predestination, because the Son, co-essential to the Father and co-owner of His property, is related to the Father by a blood connection forged OUTSIDE time; and yet it is stated that Sons of God can lead others to become Sons of God. Thus, by reversing time, a Son of God may transform a proselyte into a Son from the beginning of always. 

Isenburg makes this comment:

“The slave seeks only to be free, but he does not hope to acquire the estate of his master. But the son is not only a son but lays claim to the inheritance of the father. Those who are heirs to the dead are themselves dead, and they inherit the dead. Those who are heirs to what is living are alive, and they are heirs to both what is living and the dead. The dead are heirs to nothing. For how can he who is dead inherit? If he who is dead inherits what is living he will not die, but he who is dead will live even more.

(What do you mean ‘heirs to what is living?’)

The idea of the slave plays off the sense of being a slave or servant of Christ which is the crucified Christ rather than the living Christ referenced in the Gospel of Thomas as ‘the Living Jesus’.  The slaves are ‘dead’ in comparison to those of the Bridal Chamber and later on we will find the word ‘slave’ being used in reference to be a slave of the body and of sexuality.”

Now, let us dwell for a moment on the mention of BLOOD. 

“Yet a Son is not only a Son, but also a Co-owner of His

Father’s estate.”

The term “church family” is not a designation to be taken lightly. According to these texts, Sons of God are of the Family of God; so what family member is not related to all his other family members except by BLOOD? 

In Hebrews 2: 11-18 we read:

“11 Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. 

12 He says, "I will declare your name to my brothers; in the presence of the congregation I will sing your praises." 

[Sidebar: Later on the author(s) of Philip will revisit the idea of “brother”.]

In Hebrews 9:11-14 we read:  

“11 When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, that is to say, not a part of this creation. 

12 He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption. 

13 The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. 

14 How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!” 

You will remember that Rudolf Steiner was crucial to my coming to understand the significance of the blood. His lecture, The Etherisation of the Blood, Basle, October 1, 1911, goes very deeply into the actual mechanics of divine identity being transmitted through the blood. I have read this before, but it bears repeating:

“Just as in the region of the human heart the blood is continually being transformed into etheric substance, a similar process takes place in the Macrocosm. We understand this when we turn our minds to the Mystery of Golgotha — to the moment when the blood flowed from the wounds of Jesus Christ.

This blood must not be regarded simply as chemical substance, but by reason of all that has been said concerning the nature of Jesus of Nazareth it must be recognised as something altogether unique. When it flowed from His wounds, a substance was imparted to our Earth, which in uniting with it, constituted an Event of the greatest possible significance for all future ages of the Earth's evolution — and it could take place only once. What came of this blood in the ages that followed? Nothing different from what otherwise takes place in the heart of man. In the course of Earth evolution this blood passes through a process of “etherisation.” And just as our human blood streams upwards from the heart as ether, so since the Mystery of Golgotha the etherised blood of Christ Jesus has been present in the ether of the earth. The etheric body of the Earth is permeated by the blood — now transformed — which flowed on Golgotha. This is supremely important. If what has thus come to pass through Christ Jesus had not taken place, man's condition on the Earth could only have been as previously described. But since the Mystery of Golgotha it has always been possible for the etheric blood of Christ to flow together with the streamings from below upward, from heart to head.

Because the etherised blood of Jesus of Nazareth is present in the etheric body of the Earth, it accompanies the etherised human blood streaming upwards from the heart to the brain, so that not only those streams of which I spoke earlier meet in man, but the human blood-stream unites with the blood-stream of Christ Jesus. A union of these two streams can, however, come about only if a person is able to unfold true understanding of what is contained in the Christ Impulse. Otherwise there can be no union; the two streams then mutually repel each other, thrust each other away. In every epoch of Earth evolution understanding must be acquired in the form suitable for that epoch. At the time when Christ Jesus lived on Earth, preceding events were rightly understood by those who came to His forerunner, John, and were baptised by him according to the rite described in the Gospels. They received baptism in order that their sin, that is to say, the karma of their previous lives — karma which had come to an end — might be changed; and in order that they might realise that the most powerful Impulse in Earth evolution was about to descend into a physical body. But the evolution of humanity progresses and in our present age what matters is that people should recognise the need for the knowledge contained in Spiritual Science and be able so to fire the streams flowing from heart to brain that this knowledge can be understood.”

Thus, Steiner declares that all Christians are members of one family by virtue of a common ability “to unfold true understanding of what is contained in the Christ Impulse”, and by virtue of the etherised blood of Jesus which we have taken into ourselves and made our own.

Philip’s hierarchical model of Slave to Son will play an integral role in an upcoming discussion, but at this point the author leaves that subject in order to go on and reiterate ideas that are more familiar to us from other writings of Paul. 

“3. There are those who inherit the perishable. They

belong to the perishable, and thus they inherit the perishable.

Those Who inherit the Imperishable are imperishable.

They become owners of both the Imperishable and the

perishable.”

You will note a close similarity of this passage to large sections of text we pondered in Hebrews. For instance in Hebrews 12:22-27, we encounter the opposition of the Earthly to the Heavenly, and the opposition of that which can be shaken to that which cannot be shaken:

Hebrews 12:22-27

^“22 But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,

²³ To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,

²⁴ And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel.

²⁵ See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven:

²⁶ Whose voice then shook the earth: but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.

²⁷ And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.” 

And, of course the discussion of the perishable vs the imperishable bears a remarkable resemblance to this seminal verse from Corinthians:

1 Corinthians 15:54-57 

“When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

You will recall the C.S. Lewis quote: 

“Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither.”

Back to Phillip:

“People of the perishable inherit (really) nothing. Because

what can a perishable man inherit?

If the one who leaves the body inherits the True Life,

it means that such One is not dead but will live.”

4. A pagan does not die because this person has not

(really) lived. So, there is no point in speaking about a pagan’s death.

But those who have accepted the Truth begin to live,

and there is a danger of dying for them because they live.”

[Sidebar: Repeat: 

“A pagan does not die because this person has not (really) lived.”; 

Thus, one who has not been born of spirit cannot die of the spirit, but one born of the spirit may lose the anointing. Indeed, the unforgivable sin is more a danger to the initiate than the uninitiated.

This is also why Jesus could say, “Forgive them for they know not what they do.” The pagan, who is not born of the spirit, has no concept of spirit, so he cannot commit the unforgivable sin. Thomas Aquinas points out that many sins are committed in ignorance, so the sinner is not held accountable. 

This idea of the innocent sinner is a real brain twister: it is the idea that, at the lower levels, slaves are only capable of imagining a certain kind of future, while on the other hand, those initiated into the higher levels can imagine something more; the Son can imagine being One with the father, but the slave cannot. Thus the entirety of creation exists on different levels all at once, each with a different quality. Some of the people Jesus taught were unable to hear the word of God except in parables, because they were only capable of imagining a certain thing, whereas the disciples could imagine a higher thing because their starting point was higher to begin with. 

In the last analysis, I don’t think the higher TRUTH Jesus gave His disciples was any more the WHOLE Truth than the Parables He told to the people were the WHOLE TRUTH—because belief and understanding must always fail in this physical dimension, incarcerated as they both are in the prison of WORDS. This also has to do with the idea that those who have get more, and those who have not, will have taken away from them even what they had.

Does writing for the PEOPLE, ministering to the PEOPLE always involve a compromise? Did Jesus really come to save EVERYONE? Is an appropriate level of literacy of TRUTHFUL STATEMENTS, necessary to adequately express universals, even possible when expressed in language of the lowest class? Or will the best TRUTH be a TRUTH that can be TRUE for the Aristocrats and the Commoners at the same time? What difference does it make what you BELIEVE, REALLY? Is there such a thing as an innocent sinner?

In C.S. Lewis’ Scewtape Letters we read:

“Let us therefore think rather how to use, than how to enjoy, this European war. For it has certain tendencies inherent in it which are, in themselves, by no means in our favour. We may hope for a good deal of cruelty and unchastity. But, if we are not careful, we shall see thousands turning in this tribulation to the Enemy, while tens of thousands who do not go so far as that will nevertheless have their attention diverted from themselves to values and causes which they believe to be higher than the self. I know that the Enemy disapproves many of these causes. But that is where He is so unfair. He often makes prizes of humans who have given their lives for causes He thinks bad on the monstrously sophistical ground that the humans thought them good and were following the best they knew.”

From a not unrelated perspective we read the confession of the soldier of Tash in The Last Battle:

“Then I fell at his feet and thought, Surely this is the hour of death, for the Lion (who is worthy of all honour) will know that I have served Tash all my days and not him. Nevertheless, it is better to see the Lion and die than to be Tisroc of the world and live and not to have seen him. But the Glorious One bent down his golden head and touched my forehead with his tongue and said, Son, thou art welcome. But I said, Alas Lord, I am no son of thine but the servant of Tash. He answered, Child, all the service thou hast done to Tash, I account as service done to me. Then by reasons of my great desire for wisdom and understanding, I overcame my fear and questioned the Glorious One and said, Lord, is it then true, as the Ape said, that thou and Tash are one? The Lion growled so that the earth shook (but his wrath was not against me) and said, It is false. Not because he and I are one, but because we are opposites, I take to me the services which thou hast done to him. For I and he are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him. Therefore if any man swear by Tash and keep his oath for the oath’s sake, it is by me that he has truly sworn, though he know it not, and it is I who reward him. And if any man do a cruelty in my name, then, though he says the name Aslan, it is Tash whom he serves and by Tash his deed is accepted. Dost thou understand, Child? I said, Lord, though knowest how much I understand. But I said also (for the truth constrained me), Yet I have been seeking Tash all my days. Beloved, said the Glorious One, unless thy desire had been for me thou wouldst not have sought so long and so truly. For all find what they truly seek.” 

Thus, we must be tempted to conclude that ignorance is an adequate defense against Hellfire, as long as the proselyte remains a proselyte—a beginner. Once the light has illumined the soul and Sonship is achieved, there is no going back.

Going on to the 4th Verse of Philip, Isenburg comments:

“A Gentile does not die, for he has never lived in order that he may die. He who has believed in the truth has found life, and this one is in danger of dying, for he is alive.”

Thus with a birth comes the possibility of death by what would amount to a denial of the experience of the Bridal Chamber.”

Mark 3:22-30 states:

“And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, ‘He has Beelzebub,’ and, ‘By the ruler of the demons He casts out demons.’ …‘Assuredly, I [Jesus] say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation;’ because they said, ‘He has an unclean spirit’”

In this verse, it is asserted that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is unforgivable. Why should this sin be any more irreconcilable than any other sin? Perhaps it has to do with the idea that a Son of God who has turned away from God has committed an act that cannot be undone, initiated an inertia that cannot be reversed. We have agreed that acts of pride (the root of all sins) take tremendous will power—the act of rebellion performed by Satan must have consisted of a gargantuan act of will—such that the quantum leap away from the Center of the Universe sufficient to deny the sanctity of the Holy Spirit had to be an irreversible ejaculation of negative energy. We want to believe in an all-loving, all-forgiving God, but we also must believe in a universe that makes sense; and an act of Holy Rejection such as is required to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit (this must be in deed not in word, to be sure) must be classed as an un-undoable act. Again, the slave who knows no better cannot blaspheme against the Holy Spirit because he does not know the Holy Spirit—a Son of God who turns away from God must be held accountable for his actions, and must be aware, in advance, of the gravity of his negative act.

We first encounter the idea of the unforgivable sin in Hebrews 6:4-6:

“4 It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, 

5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age, 

6 if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.”

And again in Hebrews 10:26-31:

“26 If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 

27 but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. 

28 Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 

29 How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? 

30 For we know him who said, "It is mine to avenge; I will repay," and again, "The Lord will judge his people." 

31 It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” 

There is food for contradiction here because in one place it says that the penitent who backslides into sin is unredeemable, and yet here in Hebrews 10:1-2 it says:

“10 The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. ² Otherwise, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins.” 

Which Henry’s Commentary explains like this:

“Could they have satisfied the demands of justice, and made reconciliation for iniquity,—could they have purified and pacified conscience,—then they had ceased, as being no further necessary, since the offerers would have had no more sin lying upon their consciences. But this was not the case; after one day of atonement was over, the sinner would fall again into one fault or another, and so there would be need of another day of atonement, and of one every year, besides the daily ministrations. Whereas now, under the gospel, the atonement is perfect, and not to be repeated; and the sinner, once pardoned, is ever pardoned as to his state, and only needs to renew his repentance and faith, that he may have a comfortable sense of a continued pardon.”

So how can the sinner, so pardoned, ever fall out of grace with the Father? We encounter this type of contradiction whenever we try to understand the cosmic machine in the terms of the human concept of justice. Clearly the new law has loopholes built into it which blur the lines of Karmic clarity into swatches of question marks. The questions are answered through faith, a faith that legitimately allows us to dismiss certain logical contradictions as trivial; faith gives us the license to believe and yet not understand. 

All this talk of higher and lower spiritual levels reminds me of some of the Nazarene dogma I learned as a boy: in the Nazarene church, (and many other fundamentalist denominations, I think) you have to make two public trips to the altar. The first trip is to get “saved”—I believe this trip would be analogous to freeing the slave, or becoming a proselyte. The second trip is to get “sanctified”; this trip is nail down your entry into the Abode of God-the-Father. The idea is that when you first get “saved” you can “backslide”, slip back to your worldly ways, but when you get “sanctified” you cannot backslide ever again. Of course, when a newly sanctified Christian eventually backslid into sin anyway, it was explained they weren’t really sanctified after all—very neat. Nevertheless, the mystery of conversion must never be trivialized, and the possibility of eternal damnation must not be rejected just because God is Good—we must also remember that God is Just, and as above so below, you get what you pay for.

Going back to Phillip:

“5. Since the day of Christ’s incarnation, the prosperity

came, the cities revived, the death moved away.

6. When we were Hebrews, each of us had only a

mother. But since we became Christians, we have both

the Father and mother.”

Isenburg translates:

“Since Christ came, the world has been created, the cities adorned, the dead carried out. When we were Hebrews, we were orphans and had only our mother, but when we became Christians, we had both father and mother.  

(What do you mean ‘A Gentile ….has never lived?)

“The world has been created, the cities adorned, the dead carried out” can refer to the new visionary modalities Christ brought which created ecstatic, spiritual communities which buried the dead past.  To be more specific, the Bridal Chamber sacrament opened up the world in a visionary way.”

It must be remembered that Jesus brought a new perspective to World Religion. A not insignificant contribution was the way He integrated the Hebrew concept of the Father God with the polytheistic concept of the Mother God. As we have seen, many of the religions of the surrounding regions relied heavily on polytheism, with abounding plethoras of Gods associated with every human activity imaginable, from coronations, to marriage, to dish-washing and fish-gutting. In these religions the Mother God was a central figure in the pagan cosmography. Thus, Jesus took the Jewish idea of a Father God one step further, by claiming Sonship. 

[There is a joke in Philip some distance down the text where the idea of a virgin impregnated by a virgin is made fun of. It is not a trivial issue to confront.] 

One aspect of the Father God is that He has a PERSONALITY—a focus in the Christ Consciousness—a spiritual modality that cannot be mistaken for any other quality than MALE. I do not know how I know this, but my sense of the the cosmic personality is that there are varying shades of light and dark in the spiritual universe which correspond to qualities of gender. In C.S. Lewis’ Perelandra the spirits of Mars and Venus stand side by side, each a radiant archetypal representation of gender, Mars/male, Venus/female.

In the commentary on Philip we read the following statement:

“In the Judaic tradition, God was called Father. And Jesus

suggested to His followers that they call only God — Father, not the earthly parent.

Philip says that the true followers of Christ now have the

True Father.”

This reference to the True Father will play a part in the Gnostic doctrine that the author(s) of Philip are constructing. In the meantime, let us consider the world of opposites and ask ourselves what is from Heaven and what is not.

Let us pray: Jesus, we always shrink before the magnanimous roar of Heavenly Truth in our puny terrestrial ears, but we trust that your gentle hands will bring us safely into that abode where all are brothers in love and light. Amen.

Sermon 1—The Gospel of Philip Intro

Sermon #1—The Gospel of Philip Intro

After I finished my 11-part review of Hebrews, and had inserted, into the mix, my sermons on Pride, Music, and Death, I was casting around for some new sermon series to get into; thus, I came back to something I had been peripherally interested in several years ago, when I was looking into the Gnostic Gospels, found among the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1945. The Gospel of Philip was one of the Gnostic works that had attracted me when I first started listening to audio recordings of all these ancient texts, and when I rediscovered the book, recently, I found that there was much to ponder that was an extension of the thinking, on a variety of subjects, I had already been doing.

One of the things that attracts me to the Gnostic gospels is the fact that they are more or less unedited, straight from the horse’s mouth—that is to say, they are unedited by the people who edited the first accepted scriptures and compiled the first version of the BIBLE. Remember that the sacred scriptures, endorsed by the Council of Nicea (325 C.E.), were chosen three hundred years after Jesus’ earthly career, and there can be no doubt that not only the texts they chose, and the texts they didn’t choose, but also the texts they chose to censor, contained material that was more native to the era of its composition (1^st century C.E.) than were the white bread versions finally decided upon by the Holy Fathers of Nicea (325 C.E.). By this I mean that, by 325, the mystical, pantheistic mysteries of much of the Gnostic material had become anachronistic to the minds of the more politico-materialistic church leaders of the Nicean Council. We know that in 325 they edited out a lot of material that was dogmatically offensive to them, then--material that would probably not be considered dogmatically offensive to us now. 

As short-sightedly declusive as this may seem to us today, from our modern-day perspective, the Church Fathers of antiquity must be forgiven for these omissions, because they were struggling--struggling against each other and against the clock, to reach a clearly expressed consensus on a wide range of doctrinal issues, not because there was necessarily any virtue in everyone agreeing with everybody else on every single dogmatic point, but merely because, without a unanimous consensus, speedily arrived at, the Emperor Constantine was not going to agree to endorse the Christian Church as the legitimate “State Religion” of Rome. Under such political pressure it is understandable that the Church Fathers decided that anything paradoxical, of a highly abstract nature, or anything that might promote superstitious attitudes in the minds of the PEOPLE, HAD to be expunged for the good of the Church at large.

Thus, because a large body of ancient material was censored out, (not to mention, as yet undiscovered), much of the material emerging in the late 19^th and early 20th centuries, that we now refer to, generically, as “New Age”, may be actually regarded as of quite ancient origin, since many of the New Age concepts, perspectives, and idiomatic expressions that appear in Blavatsky, Steiner, Cayce, Prophet, Roberts, Underhill, and the rest of the so-called “New Age” crowd, are mirror reflections of material, and LANGUAGE that appears in the Gnostic Gospels. Now, the questionable authority of newly discovered ANCIENT scriptures is a turn-off to most puritanical thinkers, but to my mind, it is precisely the ancient aspect of this material that argues convincingly, to me, in favor of the AGELESS TRUTH of it—in other words, if it were true THEN, perhaps it is true NOW, and forever. 

Anyway, today we will only be able to a quick survey of the main topics explored in The Gospel of Philip. First, we have this abbreviated summary from:

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE BIBLE 

“Gospel of Philip. According to the Pistis Sophia, Philip was one of three disciples charged with the task of writing the words and works of Jesus. Two gospels under his name are known, the first only from a reference by Epiphanius (Heresies XXVI. 13. 2-3), who quotes from it a passage about the ascent of the soul. The second, quite independent, is a Coptic text from the Nag Hammadi library that shows affinities with the later forms of Valentinian Gnosticism and may go back to the last quarter of the 2nd cent. or the beginning of the third. It is not a gospel in the ordinary sense, but a collection of sayings and meditations loosely linked together and constantly returning to a number of favorite themes: Adam and Paradise, creation and begetting, the names of Jesus, etc. Notable features are its use of New Testament material and its references to Gnostic sacraments. The author is familiar with the New Testament books, but uses echoes and allusions woven into his own writing rather than extended quotation and exegesis. The sacraments appear to be five in number: Baptism, Chrism, Eucharist, Apolutrosis and Bridal Chamber.”

[Sidebar: The term “Valentinian” appears several times in this discussion, so it is important for us to know what Valentinianism is. From the Gnostic Society Library:

“The term “Valentinian” refers to Valentinus, one of the most influential Gnostic Christian teachers of the second century A.D. He founded a movement which spread throughout Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Despite persecution by the Catholic Church, the Valentinian school endured for over 600 years. Valentinus' influence persists even today. 

Valentinus was a second century Christian mystic and poet. He is sometimes referred to as a "Gnostic" because of the importance that mystical knowledge (gnosis) plays in his thought. Valentinus was born in Phrebonis in upper Egypt about 100 AD and educated in nearby Alexandria. There he became a disciple of the Christian teacher Theudas who had been a disciple of Saint Paul. He claimed that Theudas taught him secret wisdom that Paul had taught privately to his inner circle. 

Like many early Christian mystics, Valentinus claimed that that he had a vision of the risen Christ. Following his vision, he began his career as a Christian teacher at Alexandria around 120AD. His esoteric theology quickly attracted a large following in Egypt and Syria. In 136 AD, he went to Rome after stopping briefly in Cyprus. At Rome he quickly rose to prominence and was widely respected for his eloquence. He was so well regarded in the Roman church that in 143 AD he was a candidate for the office of bishop. It seems likely he refused the position. He continued to teach in Rome for at least ten more years.” 

It is important to emphasize the point that Valentinus is purported to have been a student of the Apostle Paul. Remember that Priscilla, one of the leading candidates for possibly having written Hebrews, was also said to have been a student of Paul, and also spent time in Rome. Thus the elegant, colorful writing that adorns the pages of The Gospel of Philip is not unlike the style in which much of Hebrews is written. In short, the ideas of the Apostle Paul are not only available to us through his letters alone, but also through the writings of his students, in the exact way the teachings of Jesus are available to us through the words of His disciples. 

One tempting conclusion it is possible to arrive at from all this is this: maybe the Church Fathers of Nicea endorsed some words of Paul of a certain clear, dogmatic, and doctrinal character, meanwhile deleting words of Paul that might lean in a slightly less dogmatic direction. They also chose to attribute to Paul words that were absolutely NOT his, possibly because they WANTED those words to be by Paul; it was like labeling the scriptures with a brand name—“With a name like PAUL it’s GOT to be good!” On the other hand, arguments over the authority of authorship are really not even in the spirit of the time—a time in which anonymity was the rule rather than the exception, and authors freely mixed the wisdom of the ages regardless of the specific source of it. 

Now that we know about Valentinus, we can go back to some overviews of the book. Two short summaries of The Gospel of Philip appear on the Early Christian Writing page:

“Wesley W. Isenberg writes (The Nag Hammadi Library in English, p. 141):

“Because of the contents, the eccentric arrangement, and the literary types exhibited, it is likely that The Gospel of Philip is a collection of excerpts mainly from a Christian Gnostic sacramental catechesis. It explains the significance of sacramental rites of initiation, the meaning of sacred names, especially names of Jesus, and provides paraenesis for the life of the initiated. It interprets Biblical passages, particularly from the book of Genesis, makes use of typology, both historical and sacramental, and, as catechists do, argues on the basis of analogy and parable. In these and other ways The Gospel of Philip resembles the orthodox catechisms from the second through fourth centuries.”

Bentley Layton writes (The Gnostic Scriptures, p. 325):

“The work called The Gospel According to Philip is a Valentinian anthology containing some one hundred short excerpts taken from various other works. None of the sources of these excerpts have been identified, and apparently they do not survive. To judge from their style and contents, they were sermons, treatises, or philosophical epistles (typical Valentinian genres), as well as collected aphorisms or short dialogues with comments. Only some of the sources can definitely be identified as Valentinian. Because of their brevity and the lack of context it is difficult to assign any of them to particular schools of Valentinian theology. On the other hand, nothing indicates that all come from one and the same branch of the Valentinian church. It is possible that some of the excerpts are by Valentinus himself. Others, however, refer to etymologies in Syriac, the Semitic language (a dialect of Aramaic) used in Edessa and western Mesopotamia; these must be the work of a Valentinian theologian of the East, writing in a bilingual milieu such as Edessa (see Map 5). Probably the language of composition of all the excerpts was Greek.

The longer Wikipedia summary of the Gospel of Phillip begins thus:

“The Gospel of Philip is one of the Gnostic Gospels, a text of New Testament apocrypha, dated to around the 3rd century but lost in modern times until an Egyptian man rediscovered it by accident, buried in a cave near Nag Hammadi, in 1945.

The text is not related to the canonical gospels and is not accepted as canonical by the Christian church. Although it may seem similar to the Gospel of Thomas, scholars are divided as to whether it is a single discourse or a collection of Valentinian sayings.” 

“Sacraments, in particular the sacrament of marriage, are a major theme. As in the other gnostic texts, the Gospel of Thomas and Gospel of Mary, the Gospel of Philip defends the tradition that gives Mary Magdalene special insight into Jesus' teaching, but does not support twenty-first-century inventions concerning Mary Magdalene as Jesus' wife and mother of his offspring.

The gospel's title appears at the end of the Coptic manuscript in a colophon; the only connection with Philip the Apostle within the text is that he is the only apostle mentioned. The text proper makes no claim to be from Philip, though, similarly, the four New Testament gospels make no explicit claim of authorship. The Gospel of Philip was written between 150 AD and 350 AD, while Philip himself lived in the first century, making it extremely unlikely to be his writing. Most scholars hold a 3rd-century date of composition.

[Sidebar: Another internet source, (The Gospel of Philip

Edition and commentaries by Dr.Vladimir Antonov

Translated by Anton Teplyy, Dr.Mikhail Nikolenko and Hiero Nani) contradicts this attribution of authorship:

“The Apocryphal (i.e. not included in the New Testament) Gospel of Apostle Philip, a personal disciple of Jesus Christ, was found by archaeologists in 1945 in Egypt. It contains very important information imparted to Philip by Jesus Christ.

It concerns the highest meditative techniques that allow spiritual warriors to come to the Abode of God-the-Father, which Philip calls the Bridal Chamber. In the Gospel, two narration lines are interwoven: the line of sexual love between people and the line of the highest Love for God. The former is considered as a prototype of the latter.”

So one source says the text could not possibly have been written by Philip, and the other source says the text includes teachings of Jesus imparted to Philip personally (a structural format that appears in several of the Gnostic Gospels). However, remember that the writing tradition of this early period, (100-300 C.E.) featured elaborate quoting and paraphrasing of unattributed authors—many of these works were, in a sense, mere scholarly documentation of common knowledge of the period; this means that the Gospel of Philip may in fact be information imparted to Philip by Jesus Christ, but just not written down by Philip himself, but a by some transcriber, from a letter date, of material originally retained through oral tradition.

As I have said many times, the authorship of a text means very little to me, compared to the wisdom embedded in the text; nevertheless, it is interesting, in a nosy kind of way, to consider these questions of authorship, if for no other reason than as a test of our understanding of the context in which the text first appeared. These considerations do not inform the essence of the wisdom of the text as much as they inform us about the LANGUAGE of the text. The language tells us more or less that the voice of God speaks with a thousand tongues.

Back to the Wikipedia survey of Philip:]

“History and context

A single manuscript of the Gospel of Philip, in Coptic, was found in the Nag Hammadi library, a cache of documents that was secreted in a jar and buried in the Egyptian desert at the end of the 4th century. The text was bound in the same codex that contained the better-known Gospel of Thomas.

From the mix of aphorisms, parables, brief polemics, narrative dialogue, biblical exegesis (especially of Genesis), and dogmatic propositions, Wesley T. Isenberg, the editor and translator of the text, has attributed seventeen sayings (logia) to Jesus, nine of which Isenberg characterizes as citations and interpretations of those found in the canonical gospels. The new sayings, "identified by the formula introducing them ('he said', 'the Lord said', or 'the Saviour said') are brief and enigmatic and are best interpreted from a gnostic perspective".

Much of the Gospel of Philip is concerned with Gnostic views of the origin and nature of mankind and the sacraments of baptism, unction and marriage. The Gospel emphasizes the sacramental nature of the embrace between man and woman in the nuptial chamber, which is an archetype of spiritual unity, which entails the indissoluble nature of marriage. Many of the sayings are identifiably Gnostic, and often appear quite mysterious and enigmatic.

One possible interpretation is that the bridal chamber refers symbolically to the relationship of trust and singular devotion that should exist between God (bridegroom) and mankind (bride) – just as the marriage relationship (bedchamber) implies a devotion of husband and wife to each other that is expected to exclude all other parties. This symbolic meaning is found for example in the Parable of the Ten Virgins – (Matthew 25:1-13),

"Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom".

Another interpretation of the Gospel of Philip finds Jesus as the central focus of the text. This view is supported by the Gnostic scholar, Marvin W. Meyer. According to Meyer, it is clear that without Jesus, the rituals and mysteries mentioned in this gospel would have no context. Furthermore, according to Meyer, this text seems to follow the beliefs of the Valentinian Christian sect, a group that worshipped the Gnostic Christ, and is often linked to what is sometimes thought to be Valentinius' own text, the Gospel of Truth.

The Gospel of Philip ends with its promise:

“If anyone becomes a 'son of the bridechamber' he will receive the Light. If anyone does not receive it while he is in these places, he cannot receive it in the other place. He who receives any Light will not be seen, nor can he be held fast. No one will be able to trouble him in this way, whether he lives in the world or leaves the world. He has already received the Truth in images, and the World has become the Aeon. For the Aeon already exists for him as Pleroma, and he exists in this way. It is revealed to him alone, since it is not hidden in darkness and night but is hidden in a perfect Day and a holy Night.”

[Sidebar: This deep,deep paragraph states, 

“If anyone becomes a 'son of the bridechamber' he will receive the Light. If anyone does not receive it while he is in these places, he cannot receive it in the other place.” 

This concept divides consciousness into higher and lower dimensions, just like the proselyte slave and the Son; it clearly distinguishes between the “bridechamber”, and “the other place”.  Furthermore, it implies that Sonship is only achieved in Heavenly realms, not in the lower terrestrial dimensions.

Going on, two terms in the preceding paragraph deserve comment, “pleroma” and “aeon”. 

Pleroma is a term we have encountered before, and will doubtless deal with again in future sermons. To review, here is the Wikipedia definition:

“Pleroma (Greek πλήρωμα) generally refers to the totality of divine powers. The word means fullness from πληρόω ("I fill") comparable to πλήρης which means "full", and is used in Christian theological contexts: both in Gnosticism generally, and by St. Paul the Apostle in Colossians 2:9 (the word is used 17 times in the New Testament). 

[Sidebar: It is interesting how many different ways “pleroma”, the totality of divine powers, is translated. These four translations of Colossians 2:9 all translate pleroma as “fullness”, and 3 out of 4 of them include the word “body”; but each definition includes connotations of other specific attributes as well:

In the King James 21st Century it says:

“For in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.”

The Amplified Bible gives practically a textbook definition of pleroma:

“For in Him all the fullness of Deity (the Godhead) dwells in bodily form [completely expressing the divine essence of God]. ‘

The Common English Bible simplifies it to:

“All the fullness of deity lives in Christ’s body.”

The Contemporary English Version simplifies it even more:

“God lives fully in Christ.”

Back to Wikipedia on “pleroma”:

“Pleroma is also used in the general Greek language and is used by the Greek Orthodox Church in this general form since the word appears in the book of Colossians. Proponents of the view that Paul was actually a Gnostic, such as Elaine Pagels of Princeton University, view the reference in Colossians as something that was to be interpreted in the Gnostic sense.”

Of the term “aeon” Wikipedia has this to say:

“In many Gnostic systems, the various emanations of God, who is also known by such names as the One, the Monad, Aion teleos (αἰών τέλεος "The Broadest Aeon"), Bythos ("depth or profundity", Greek βυθός), Proarkhe ("before the beginning", Greek προαρχή), the Arkhe ("the beginning", Greek ἀρχή), "Sophia" (wisdom), Christos (the Anointed One) are called Aeons. In the different systems these emanations are differently named, classified, and described, but the emanation theory itself is common to all forms of Gnosticism.

In the Basilidian Gnosis they are called sonships (υἱότητες huiotetes; sing.: υἱότης huiotes); according to Marcus, they are numbers and sounds; in Valentinianism they form male/female pairs called "syzygies" (Greek συζυγίαι, from σύζυγοι syzygoi).

Similarly, in the Greek Magical Papyri, the term "Aion" is often used to denote the All, or the supreme aspect of God.”

Thus, even in this short summary of the topics covered in The Gospel of Phillip, in particular the mention of the “male/female pairs”, we can see the connection between The Gospel of Phillip and Valentinianism; this conjunction indirectly connects it to the teachings of the Apostle Paul, in the exact same way that we saw the book of Hebrews to be indirectly connected to the teachings of Paul.

Back to Wikipedia on Phillip:]

“Problems concerning the text

The Gospel of Philip is a text that reveals some connections with Early Christian writings of the Gnostic traditions. It is a series of logia or pithy aphoristic utterances, most of them apparently quotations and excerpts of lost writings, without any attempt at a narrative context. The main theme concerns the value of sacraments. Scholars debate whether the original language was Syriac or Greek. Wesley W. Isenberg, the text's translator, places the date "perhaps as late as the 2nd half of the 3rd century" and places its probable origin in Syria due to its references to Syriac words and eastern baptismal practices as well as its ascetic outlook. The on-line Early Christian Writings site gives it a date ca 180 – 250. Meyer gives its date as 2nd or 3rd century.

Interpretation

The text has been interpreted by Isenberg (The Nag Hammadi Library in English, p. 141) as a Christian Gnostic sacramental catechesis. Bentley Layton identified it as a Valentinian anthology of excerpts, and Elaine Pagels and Martha Lee Turner have seen it as possessing a consistent and Valentinian theology. It is dismissed by Catholic author Ian Wilson who argues that it "has no special claim to an early date, and seems to be merely a Mills and Boon-style fantasy of a type not uncommon among Christian apocryphal literature of the 3rd and 4th centuries."

Latter-Day Saint (Mormon) scholar Richard O. Cowan sees a parallel between the "bridal chamber" that is a central theme in the Gospel and the Mormon doctrine of "the new and everlasting covenant of marriage," or "eternal marriage."

Here endeth the Wikipedia summary. 

Next week we will look at the first several verses of The Gospel of Philip. We will find that many hair-splitting distinctions are made between mundane and heavenly consciousness states, and we must then face the overwhelming complexity of the Gnostic Cosmography. In the meantime let us think about this: the words with which we express our spiritual experience may serve us or enslave us, depending on how we hear them, and integrate them into our larger undefined consciousness. The challenge of any doctrine, ancient or modern, is how its belief helps us embrace the timeless mysteries of being, and how it brings us closer to the changeless Father. Let us pray.

Jesus, thank you for the many roads to you, that all converge in the end in the ONE ROAD to you. Amen.