I have already written about the Gospel of Thomas and referenced the writings of the Quaker computer scientist and theologian, Hugh McGregor Ross, who made his own study of this gospel and produced a translation from the Coptic of the Sayings of Jesus discovered in an earthenware jar in 1945 - see these earlier blogposts:
https://robdonovan.blogspot.com/2024/08/fruits-of-marazion-quaker-library-10.html
https://robdonovan.blogspot.com/2024/09/fruits-of-marazion-quaker-library-11.html
https://robdonovan.blogspot.com/2024/01/fruits-of-marazion-quaker-library-hugh.html
In this blogpost, I explore the insights in 'Spirituality in the Gospel of Thomas' by Hugh McGregor Ross (1998/2010). I believe that these sayings of Jesus examined by McGregor Ross are profoundly important for all of us. George Fox never knew the gospel of Thomas but our Quaker founder was tuned in to the wavelength of these sayings of Jesus, memorized by Thomas his disciple and then most likely written down by a scribe as Thomas dictated. We as Quakers, following the inspired teaching of George Fox, believe that the Light is in all of us; we do not need priests and churches to guide and shelter us. We find the Spirit inside us. We listen in silence together and our souls are awakened to the deep Truth that is the heart of our humanity.
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| Front cover, showing a 6th century icon of Jesus in the monastery church of St Catherine, Mount Sinai |
Read the sayings of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas and you will find that such Quaker spirituality is wonderfully akin to the spirituality revealed by Jesus according to Thomas. But be prepared to reassess the orthodox understanding of the teachings of Jesus that we have grown up with. To varying degrees, we have all been shaped by the teachings of the church and the accepted canon of Christian revelation in the New Testament - and not all of this orthodoxy is necessarily as true and certain as it may once have seemed. I am reminded that George Bernard Shaw, the atheist playwright, remarked that Paul's teachings were 'a monstrous imposition upon Jesus' and fundamentally distorted the original message and purpose of Jesus. Hugh McGregor Ross, more kindly, remarks that 'Paul never met Jesus in person to have his abundant ahamkara burnt up' - but Thomas had had that advantage.
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| The connection between Thomas and India is referenced in this AI piece below: Evidence for St. Thomas's arrival in India comes from ancient Christian traditions, including texts like the Acts of Thomas and writings of early church fathers like Ephrem the Syrian, and local folklore in India such as the Thomma Parvam and Ramban Pattu. While direct archaeological proof is lacking, supporting factors include the presence of well-established Christian communities by the 6th century in India and the potential historical connection through the Indo-Parthian Kingdom. |
Few of us will be familiar with the concept of ahamkara. I certainly was not. Yet it is vital in understanding the spiritual significance of the teachings of Jesus which point to the necessity of quenching ahamkara. No European language has a word for this concept so McGregor Ross has borrowed this Eastern word - ahamkara, meaning the dominance of the body, and of the mind and
its emotions - to show how our 'little self' veils the 'Real Self' which is always there to find. We are born free of ahamkara - which is why in logion 4 Jesus says "The man old in days will not hesitate to ask a little child of seven days about the Place of Life, and he will live..." - but with the passage of time ahamkara becomes dominant.Our spiritual journey should be centred on ridding ourselves of the luggage of ahamkara. In logion 58 we read "Happy is the man who has toiled to quench ahamkara'. In logion 42, Jesus says, "Become your Real Self, as ahamkara passes away." In the Coptic original, logion 42 comprises only two words: the Coptic for 'to become' and the rarely used Greek word 'to pass by' or to 'pass away'. McGregor Ross suggests that since in Aramaic, Jesus' mother tongue, many words carry a cluster of meanings, related often at a subtle level, this saying may have served as a spiritual mantra given by Jesus as a teacher to his disciples to help them focus through repetition on what is essential. The meaning is thus: 'Become your Real Self, while passing by the unimportant matters that have become dominant and need quenching.' McGregor Ross provides a telling exercise called The Contrasting Pairs in which the reader is invited to match the life-enhancing experiences which belong to the Real Self with the negative experiences associated with the 'little self', such as: depression, suffering, hatred, anger, harshness, selfishness, envy, greed, indifference, evil, fear, corruption, pride at al. (see pp.148-158).
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| Hugh McGregor Ross (1917-2014), aged 88 |
We should be so grateful to scholars such as Hugh McGregor Ross who immerse themselves in the issues of language in order to understand the original intended meanings. Metanoia is a Greek word with two parts: the meta- part means to transform; the -noia part is more subtle and means the Knowing at the very centre of our being. Jesus uses the word once only in the Gospel of Thomas: in logion 28 where he concludes by saying that "When they shake off their wine, then they will transform their Knowing." However, the word is very important for Jesus; he uses it many times in the ancient Greek versions of the other gospels of the Bible. Unfortunately - indeed McGregor Ross is inclined to call it a calamity - the word metanoia as used by Jesus in the Bible has been mistranslated as 'to repent'. As a consequence, the whole thrust of Christianity as a religion has been shifted to the idea of Jesus as the Saviour who saves us from our sins, offering us salvation from death, as long as we become whole through repentance. Such an emphasis is a corruption of the original meaning of metanoia which is about the transformation of our Knowing.
McGregor Ross explores (pp.162-167) the similarity between the sayings of Jesus and the Indian spiritual tradition which by the time of Jesus was already two thousand years old. He raises the possibility that Jesus in his early manhood could have travelled to India following the well-established trading routes between the Middle East and India. There are non-Christian references to such a connection. If this was the case it would explain why there has been such a creative disturbance in Jesus' Jewish spirituality. His radical awareness of ahamkara and the need to quench it is distinctive of Indian spirituality - and entirely alien, as McGregor Ross points out, to the Hebraic background of Jesus' youth.
The three opening sayings in the Gospel of Thomas comprise a summary of the teachings that follow. Here are the first two:
Logion 1 - And he said: He who finds the inner meaning of these logia will find life independent of death.
Logion 2 - Jesus said: Let him who seeks not cease from seeking until he finds; and when he finds, he will be disturbed, and when he is disturbed he will marvel and he shall reign over the All.
I do hope you choose to follow through on this exploration of the teachings of Jesus as recorded by Thomas. Hugh McGregor Ross serves as an admirable guide.
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| A face of Jesus - forensically-imagined image of a typical Palestinian Jew in the 1st century AD |
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