I am going through some – perhaps all? – of the verses from the beautiful Gospel of Thomas to share what comes up for me. I may also give a commentary or response from a few different viewpoints to make it more interesting. The Gospel of Thomas is thought to be older than the four gospels in the New Testament and may be a source for these.
3b. When you know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will understand that you are children of the living Father. But if you do not know yourselves, then you live in poverty, and you are the poverty.”
I will explore this as Big Mind, Big Heart, and Lila – the play of consciousness or the divine.
Big Heart
Know yourself as me and you know that you not only are love but your whole world and all of your experiences are love. You see behind the surface appearances and the labels human puts on whatever is happening.
If you don’t know yourself as me, you are still me. Nothing has changed except your noticing. And you will feel you live in poverty. You will long for what you are and what you think you don’t have. You may not “have” it but you are it. You already are it.
Big Mind
Know yourself as me and you know what you are. You will understand that as a human being you are a child of me. You and all your experiences happen within and as me.
If you don’t know this, you will live in poverty. You take yourself as fundamentally a separate being subject of birth, loss, death, and whatever else.
Lila
I temporarily and locally forget myself and take myself to fundamentally be a human being. In this, I feel small, limited, temporary, and although my experiences are rich and varied I experience it as a kind of poverty.
I feel that something is missing. I may long for it and seek it. I may first seek it in the wider world. And then perhaps as what I am.
When I notice myself again I know what I am and I understand that this human being is a metaphorical child of me.
You may see me as the divine and the play of the divine as all of existence. You may see me as consciousness and the play of consciousness. It the same.
Initial draft…..
When we know ourselves as Big Mind, we know ourselves as what we are. We understand that as a human being, we are a child of Big Mind. We happen within and as Big Mind.
If we do not know ourselves as Big Mind, we are only a human being in the world and at the mercy of the world. No matter our worldly riches, we live in poverty and are poverty.
…
BM
When you know yourself as me, you know yourself as what you are. You will understand that as human beings you are children of me. You happen within and as me. Everything – every single experience you have – is a child of me.
If you don’t notice this, you are no less a child of me. But you live in poverty since you’ll take yourself as a separate being in an unpredictable world.