Gospel of Thomas 14

A place to discuss the higher self, chakras, meditation, spiritual healing, and other methods of healing.

Moderator: Moderators

survivor
Posts: 288
Joined: Fri Feb 17, 2006 5:32 am
Location: melbourne, Australia

Re: Gospel of Thomas 14

Post: # 5949Post survivor »

Zark wrote:Yes, I remember readin this long ago.. and I was troubled by it then.
TGOT:14. Jesus said to them, "If you fast, you will bring sin upon yourselves, and if you pray, you will be condemned, and if you give to charity, you will harm your spirits.
When you go into any region and walk about in the countryside, when people take you in, eat what they serve you and heal the sick among them.
After all, what goes into your mouth will not defile you; rather, it's what comes out of your mouth that will defile you.".

TGOT:27. "If you do not fast from the world, you will not find the (Father's) kingdom. If you do not observe the sabbath as a sabbath you will not see the Father."
..still confused?
TGOT:104. They said to Jesus, "Come, let us pray today, and let us fast."
Jesus said, "What sin have I committed, or how have I been undone? Rather, when the groom leaves the bridal suite, then let people fast and pray."
TGOT=The Gospel Of Thomas


If you would like to post a reply to No:27 or No:104 in their own individual right, then, it's probably best that you start a new thread.
survivor
Posts: 288
Joined: Fri Feb 17, 2006 5:32 am
Location: melbourne, Australia

Post: # 5950Post survivor »

Robanan wrote:I believe that helping is one thing and giving charity is another... i.e. you can give money as charity or clothes or anything at all; that simply doesn't mean you have helped the person. In the case that everybody "explicitly" know that a nation is dying of famine the church couldn't at least do something to help?
In this day and age, giving to charity is basically giving to an organization, that then, passes on material aid to 'those in need'.

My personal belief is that, if you want to be charitable, then give formally and directly to 'those in need' and avoid giving to organizations.

.."charity begins at home" and "clean up your own back yard first"
User avatar
Zark
Posts: 478
Joined: Wed Apr 07, 2004 12:21 am
Contact:

Re: Gospel of Thomas 14

Post: # 5991Post Zark »

survivor wrote:[...]
TGOT:27. "If you do not fast from the world, you will not find the (Father's) kingdom. If you do not observe the sabbath as a sabbath you will not see the Father."

..still confused?
TGOT:104. They said to Jesus, "Come, let us pray today, and let us fast."
Jesus said, "What sin have I committed, or how have I been undone? Rather, when the groom leaves the bridal suite, then let people fast and pray."
TGOT=The Gospel Of Thomas
Survivor, thanks for the relevant quotes :-)

TGOT:14 "If you fast, you will bring sin upon yourselves, and if you pray, you will be condemned, and if you give to charity, you will harm your spirits."

TGOT:14 not only contradicts itself (by that I mean it contradicts verses from TGOT) but also contradicts what Jesus taught, what Jesus did and what he asked his apostles to do.

== fasting ==
* Jesus fasted for forty days in the desert. That is what I would call a tacit endorsement of fasting.
* According to TGOT 24 Jesus said "If you do not fast from the world, you will not find the (Father's) kingdom." and according to TGOT 104 "when the groom leaves the bridal suite, then let people fast and pray". If fasting is going to bring sin upon you why would Jesus say "then let people fast and pray"?

== prayer ==
* Jesus prayed to his Father. eg: He prayed to spare him from the bitter cup of crucifixion.
* Jesus taught people to pray. eg: "The lord's prayer" in the Book of Matthew.

== charity ==
* Jesus taught people to give to charity. eg: The Gospel of the Nazoreans, Mark 10:17-25, Matthew 19:16-30... In Mark 10:17-25 it says: "Jesus, beholding him, loved him and said to him, One thing you lack. Go, sell whatever you have and give it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven"
* Jesus taught his apostles to be charitable to others. eg: "heal their sick among you". (Being charitable means to be generous and help those who are in need .. to help those who are less well off than ourselves.. in other words, it is part of the way in which we treat others with loving kindness)
* Jesus taught his apostles to accept charity from others - eg: TGOT 14 "when people take you in, eat what they serve you".

.. and also Thiaoouba Prophecy pg 146 which urges charitable behaviour. In regards to the Pope it says: "he could make do with much less, and use what money is available to help countries suffering from famine"
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be. -- Douglas Adams
User avatar
Zark
Posts: 478
Joined: Wed Apr 07, 2004 12:21 am
Contact:

Post: # 5995Post Zark »

Vesko wrote:And why does the second part seem unconnected? Are the two parts simply disjointed fragments, which the scribe or the translator has merged by mistake?
That is quite possible. The people who wrote these ancient texts used little or no punctuation. Same with the spaces between words. As far as I know spaces and punctaution were not used at all.
Translators and printers of Ancient Greek are always guessing about punctuation.

THEGREEKSUSUALLYRANIT
ALLTOGETHERLIKETHISAN
DMADEYOUDOALLTHEWORK.

The original transcribers use their knowledge of Greek phrasing to determine where to place punctuation marks.

quote from: http://www.gutenberg.org/howto/greek/
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be. -- Douglas Adams
User avatar
Alisima
Posts: 485
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2004 2:01 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Gospel of Thomas 14

Post: # 6028Post Alisima »

survivor wrote:
Zark wrote:Yes, I remember readin this long ago.. and I was troubled by it then.
TGOT:14. Jesus said to them, "If you fast, you will bring sin upon yourselves, and if you pray, you will be condemned, and if you give to charity, you will harm your spirits.
When you go into any region and walk about in the countryside, when people take you in, eat what they serve you and heal the sick among them.
After all, what goes into your mouth will not defile you; rather, it's what comes out of your mouth that will defile you.".
TGOT:27. "If you do not fast from the world, you will not find the (Father's) kingdom. If you do not observe the sabbath as a sabbath you will not see the Father."
In the first 'verse', or what you like to call it, Jesus used the word Fast and said that one should not and then in the second 'verse' he said that without Fasting you won't get to the Father. But look carefully! In the first verse he simply said "If you fast, you will bring sin upon yourselves." Yet in the second verse he said "If you do not fast from the world, you will not find the Father." The difference is that 'from the world' in the second verse. And really he is correct, if you don't remove your emphasis on the outer world and place it on the inner world, you will never find the Kingdom. So although in both verses he uses the word Fast, it is likely that he meant different things by them. Or he was just trying to make you mad....
Don't read my signature.
User avatar
alexH
Posts: 36
Joined: Mon Nov 26, 2007 1:52 am
Location: TO, Ontario

Post: # 9727Post alexH »

Fasting from the world means taking a break away from the world...
is that not so?
and the second part, if you do not see the sabbath as a sabbath, you will not see the Father.
I think the second statement is an explicit hint that supports the first sentence ("If you do not fast from the world, you will not find the (Father's) kingdom." A sabbath is a day, or simply put a period of time in which you take a break from doing something. Therefore, if you do not see fasting from the world as taking a break from the world (the materialistically attuned world), you will not reach the kingdom of Heaven.

For in fasting ( in terms of not eating ), you are taking a break from eating, and i think that the main idea of fasting is to stop doing something, and also to realize that you are taking a break from eating unhealthy foods to try and improve your health, and therefore improve the efficiency of the mind.

For example, there may be a person who wants to fast just because he doesn't want to have health problems, but he does not see the true reason for fasting. He may fast, and after the period (due to the lack of understanding and the true reasons behind fasting), he may simply go ahead and start disrespecting his body by eating junk again.

If any of you have read the book the TFoC, there was also a chapter that talked about the law of contrasts.

The law of contrasts is quite simple. As an example, you can only see this writing because there is sufficient contrast between the letters and the background. Since there are contrasts everywhere in the Universe, this would be considered a universal law.

Contrasts are there so that it can increase your level of understanding. One contrast, like meditation ( having no thoughts at all) and concentrating (focusing all concentration on a specific function), will help you improve your understanding and mental abilities greatly.

My point is, that you have to observe a break as a break, ( a contrast, for example meditation is a break from thoughts in the mind), then you will be able to see the Father.
If a blind man leads another, they will both fall into a pit. -Jesus Christ

The no-mind not-thinks no-thoughts about no thing.
Gautama Buddha
pattern
Posts: 12
Joined: Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:03 am

Post: # 9839Post pattern »

TGOT:14. Jesus said to them, "If you fast, you will bring sin upon yourselves, and if you pray, you will be condemned, and if you give to charity, you will harm your spirits.
When you go into any region and walk about in the countryside, when people take you in, eat what they serve you and heal the sick among them.
After all, what goes into your mouth will not defile you; rather, it's what comes out of your mouth that will defile you.".


I "interpreted" the first line as meaning that if you fast from yourself (your spiritual development and inner insight) you will bring sin upon yourselves (because you would be doomed to follow others)

The second part "and if you pray, you will be condemned" I interpreted as "if you pray to a god (which is something else than yourselves), you will be condemned

I also can interpret the same part "and if you pray, you will be condemned" as meaning "if you pray WHILE fasting from yourselves (spiritual development) you will be condemned (it will do you no good) because your doing false prayer or something like that, basically meaning you have no clue what you're doing...since your "praying" for the wrong reasons...ones that dont correspond with self-development etc.

The last part of line 1, "if you give to charity, you will harm your spirits" I can interpret as

"if you give to charity, you will feel guilty" because your not "at peace" with your inner self etc etc...


Now, if you run it all together, it kind of makes sense.... "If you fast from yourself, and pray to others, and give to charity for the wrong reasons, you're on the wrong path, once which isnt the path to "fathers kingdom"


just my looney interpretation
Post Reply