Walk forth, those persecuted for justice’s sake! Yes, the kingdom of heaven is theirs!
Walk forth, when they insult and persecute you, accusing you of all sorts of crimes because of me. Be in joy and lightness, because your reward is great in heaven. Indeed, this is how the prophets who came before you were persecuted.
Yeshua is not saying “Blessed are you, unhappy victims, be happy in your martyrdom.” He is saying “Do not let yourself be stopped by persecution, slander, and all sorts of violence. Use these as a challenge and opportunity for growing in consciousness and in love. Discover within yourself the same patience (passion) that I found when faced by my adversaries. This is truly your opportunity to live the greatest of exercises, which is love of one’s enemies.” You will then discover within yourself that “terrifying force of humble love,” which is able to “forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Thus you continue to teach your enemies not only with your words, but with your acts.
Walk forth, and announce the gospel of the Kingdom. It is through the very power and simplicity of your becoming that you announce the Kingdom that is to come. You bear witness that it is possible to live in surrender to another kind of consciousness and a different mind, and that a new being lives within you. You will live no more in the thrall of the empire of your past, your unconscious, or your social surroundings. Your acts will be determined by the most intimate part of your being, that place where nothing is forced, where it is Spirit that inspires you—that Spirit of whom “none can say whence It cometh, nor where It goeth” (Jn 3:8), though ontologically (in the language of Yeshua and Mary’s time) it comes from the Father and returns to the Father. It is the conscious Breath that comes from the unnamable space where inspiration originates, and expiration returns—that space without boundaries, which we are sometimes fortunate enough to taste when silence reigns within us.
Walk forth, and announce the good news of knowledge and teachings that will be needed for this transformation in which human beings can finally begin to become fully human. Keep on walking on this road, where you become both more human and more divine. May each day bring you a little less under the sway of the fears, inhibitions, and lies that are certainly the heritage of your individual and collective past, yet in which (consciously or unconsciously) you still indulge in the present. And may each day bring you more and more surrender to freedom and love. For these are fruits of your most beautiful dreams and of the purest desire that—consciously or unconsciously, but consciously above all, so as to savor it fully—you can ever experience in the present.
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1 “Impose no law
2 other than that which I have witnessed.
3 Do not add more laws to those given in the Torah,
4 lest you become bound by them.”
Michel Tardieu offers the following with regard to this warning about rules or laws (horos):
There is no horos other than that of the “gospel of the Kingdom” implied in the previous passage—and that is not a written horos. This is a rhetoric directed against the ecclesiastical decree of a canon of only four legitimate gospels.58 The gospel of the Kingdom is declared as the only new law, thus opposing any attempts to imitate the lawgiver, i.e., Moses, considered to be the author of the Torah by Church authority.
Here we have an echo of the resistance of certain early Christian circles to the ecclesiastical decision to limit the canon of its own scriptures (the New Testament) and to recognize the Jewish Bible as the Old Testament.
The invocation of the Kingdom implies an inward kind of rule, a gospel that arises from inner revelation and not from some outer authority’s decision (law, testament). . . . 59
These reflections of an eminent Dominican scholar pose no problem for us so far. But we cannot accept his subsequent interpretation of this passage as an example of anti-Semitism—or more precisely, an anti-Judaism that would be even more radical than that which already exists in the New Testament,60 and as a polemic against the decision of ecclesiastical authority to honor the Torah along with its own scriptures. Tardieu claims that this passage of the Gospel of Mary would make it impossible for the flock [sic] to obey the Mosaic law.
Is this sort of interpretation really necessary? Does it not simply add to the multitude of misunderstandings that have set Christians against Jews ever since the time of Paul of Tarsus?61 Yeshua clearly said: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.”62 And he even declares that the Torah be respected in its smallest details.
This is what compels us to stick to the simple and literal meaning of this text: You are not to add more laws to those already given by the lawgiver, i.e., the author of the Torah.
Saint Francis of Assisi, when asked by his brothers to lay down laws for them, answered: “Do not add anything to the gospel, for we have no other rule than the gospel. Do not add to it, do not make other rules. Your rule is the gospel and he who incarnates it. Follow him, walk with him.” And Saint Ignatius of Antioch said: “My law archives are simply the Christ.”
The Law is not just a collection of precepts and commandments, it is an incarnation and a way of living.
“Impose no law
other than that which I have witnessed.”
This law is that of love and freedom, of which Yeshua is the act and the flesh, and which he has witnessed with his words, his deeds, his patience, and his forgiveness.
“Be yourselves also the witnesses of love in flesh and bone; even more, be incarnations of him,” said Elizabeth of the Trinity. Be creative subjects who speak and love in the midst of “inanimate” objects, thus rendering unto them their true names and souls.
“Love one another as I have loved you” ( Jn 15:12). There is no other law. The problem is to live this; to become the witnessing lived by the Teacher; to love family, friends, enemies, men and women as he loved them; to love the Source of all that lives and breathes, as he did. The as in this verse from John is not the as of comparison. It does not invite us to imitate, which would only result in caricature. Rather, it is telling us to allow this law of life to be—it is already within us, like the sap that runs in the tree, helping it to hold firm as well as to bend to the winds.
The Teacher is not some external image that we should try to resemble. He is a principle of life, freedom, and love that is meant to overflow within us. We are to allow his in-formation (in the original, not the modern sense of the word) to make us anew. And we are to allow his teachings to work in us so as to bring about the union of divinity and humanity of which he is the witness.
This does not detract from the pedagogical value of the Torah. The role of external law is one of setting limits, and the ancients often played with the words horos and nomos, “law” and “limit.” Human beings need limits in order to find their form. Children who receive no limits to desire from their parents will have great difficulties in finding and recognizing themselves. And experienced parents can testify that children are actually demanding to be shown limits when they indulge in extreme behavior.
The problem lies in how to give limits that do not confine, distort, or even mutilate the growth and development of a human being. We need both security and freedom for our growth. Some people primarily lack the former, and are bereft of the principles, limits, and grounding they need in order to live with assurance and confidence. Others lack the latter, and remain imprisoned by principles that stifle and block them from living fully.
The Gospel of Mary reminds us that the greatest law is that of love, the love of which Yeshua was the witness. To love, however, is not to be a slave of the law; it is to go beyond the law by fulfilling it. We are not to add more to the law in order accomplish this. Here the Teacher reveals himself as both a Jewish radical and as something quite beyond any such cultural category or label: a fully human being.
“Do not add more laws to those given in the Torah . . .”
It was Moses who gave us
the essence of the Torah. If this was indeed the same Moshe who was “the humblest man on the face of the earth,”63 then who are we to add to the laws given through him? The laws are to be lived, not simply followed, and this requires a thou canst rather than a thou shalt. It is we who have edited and altered the Torah—the teaching that was intended to sustain and free us—and made it into a mere legal code that captures and imprisons us.
Great teachings must always be renewed and reinterpreted so that their essence is still communicated, so that it remains the sap of a living tree. This was the work of the Teacher, who both transmitted and incarnated the Torah—the only work that a messiah, in the true sense of the word, need accomplish. Now, it is we who must accomplish, like him, the Kingdom where his Peace, his Spirit, and the spirit of Anthropos and YHWH reign supreme in ourselves.
I AM YHWH, the Presence
who brought you out of Egypt,
the land of servitude. 64
I AM is the liberating Presence in each of us, the hidden heart beyond our mechanisms and our addictions. Nothing need be added to this.
You are free to have no other gods before Me. 65
There is no reality other than Reality. There is no absolute, other than the Absolute. You are free to neither relativize the Absolute, nor “absolutize”the relative. This is the real meaning of idolatry: adoring the creature in the place of the Creator, and created realities rather than the uncreated Reality. There is nothing to be added to this.
You can refrain from making an idol in the form of anything in heaven above, on the earth below, or in the waters. You need not bow down to these gods, nor serve them, for it is only I who AM. You need not make visible images of the Invisible. You can let the Invisible be invisible, the Transcendent be transcendent, the Intangible be intangible, and the Unnamable be nameless. You can let YHWH, That Which Is, be what It is, in yourself. There is nothing to be added to this.
You can refrain from vain utterance of the Name of That Which Is, Was, and Approaches—YHWH, I AM.
You may live in wonder and adoration in the presence of the Name of the One who has all names, and whom no name can name. You may allow the One who Is to take whatever name It so pleases within yourself, without this Name becoming your possession or your power; for no name can define or circumscribe It. There is nothing to be added to this.
You may honor the day of the Shabbat, and make it a holy day.
You may rest66 from all your doing, working, and producing. Human beings are not only made for work, but also for repose—that holy repose that is fully savored after good work, not only on the Sabbath, but every day.
On the day of the Sabbath, all human beings become equal, for there are no more employers and employees. This law is intended to free us from the bounds of another law, that of dominator and dominated. On the Sabbath, there are no more professors and students, no more lords and serfs. There are only the children of God, sons and daughters of the One Light.
You have the right to “be seated in the presence of the One who Is” (another possible meaning of the word Shabbat ), and to rejoice with your spouse and children, your friends, sisters, and brothers in this Presence. You may honor this day as special, to help keep alive your memory of the essential, and to let go of the worries and contingencies that oppress you. You may openly avow your freedom from the powers, possessions, and knowledge of the world.
Your treasure is the rediscovery of this peace, this pleasure of simply being who you are, a participant in the bliss of Being itself. On the day of Shabbat, you may let go of your ordinary identity of this one or that one, rich or poor, happy or unhappy, in good health or bad health. You may be I AM. There is nothing to be added to this.
You may honor your father and your mother.
You may not love your parents—for love cannot be commanded, though it can be learned through practice. When there is too much bitterness, violence, or coldness, it serves nothing to try to force yourself to love. Yet you can still honor them in the sense of recognizing them in their humanness, whatever their flaws. Whether you like it or not, life has been given to you through them.
To honor your father and mother is also to honor the incarnate reality of your story. This story is what it is, and it is certainly not a perfect one. But if you hope to change it, you will never succeed through denying it and refusing your parents this human respect. Such denial cuts you off from the Real, and may ultimately have serious consequences for your physical and psychic health. Honor your father and mother, and if possible, allow yourself to love them. And especially love them for what they are: fragile, flawed, impermanent human beings who will someday no longer be with you. Any other kind of love risks becoming distorted into dependence or alienation.
The creative intelligence that is the source of this commandment shows real psychological understanding in choosing the word honor instead of love. As the Teacher himself later elaborated, “Whoever loves their father or their mother more than I AM is incapable of knowing I AM.”67 If we cannot detach ourselves from our family, we lose access to our true identity. Yet access to our true identity also implies an inner reconciliation with the family.
Finally, we cannot truly love the uncreated Source of our being without honoring the created origin of our physical existence. There is nothing to be added to this.
You may refrain from killing.
This does not just mean the use of arms or physical violence—it is also possible to kill through words, even through a look or a thought. With this in mind, we might ask if it really possible for us not to kill. One being’s life on this planet is always at the expense of some other form of life. We never cease to kill in order to feed ourselves, whether vegetarian or not. And sometimes, not content with the food on our plate, we indulge an appetite for psychic food by feeding on the ruined reputation of our neighbors. All sorts of strange food sticks to our plate, and our lips are stained with blood. Even more than knives or guns, these signs show the violence in our hearts and the judgment in our minds.
And yet: You may refrain from killing.
As with the other teachings, this is a process of becoming, a road that we are invited to walk upon, a process of radical transformation of our entire being. It would of course take an inspired and mighty effort to imagine a believable society that is not founded on murder, on self-assertion at the expense of someone else, and the many other forms of destruction of others in the name of survival. Doesn’t Darwin tell us that this is a law of evolution—survival of those who are the strongest and most capable of adapting to circumstances?
But which evolution? Is it the evolution of ever more neocortex cunning in service to the reptilian core of the old brain, or the evolution of the entire brain as a holistic instrument capable of peace, harmony, and the higher perception of which the Teacher speaks?
“You may refrain from killing” is an evolutionary teaching that makes technological progress a servant of the process of our humanization, instead of a mere instrument of our animal heritage. There is nothing to be added to this.
You may refrain from adultery.
The original meaning of adultery is betrayal of the Real, of lying to oneself by knowingly allowing a reflection to usurp the place of the Light itself or, in other words, idolatry.
But as human beings, we have the capacity to refrain from being slaves to our impulses, instincts, and emotions, and of our thoughts and ideas. You may choose a woman (or a man) over others; but this need not involve a sense of exclusion or rejection of others. It manifests our capacity of choice, yet a choice that includes both a certain fidelity and a certain freedom with regard to the impulses and emotions that both animate and distract us.
This commandment means above all to refrain from regarding a partner in a way that indulges our craving or makes him or her into an object or a tool at our service. Adultery exists in the very heart of even a monogamous marriage when a partner is regarded in this way. We are unfaithful to our partner when we cease to see
him or her as one who has the same birthright of freedom as ourselves. We deceive a partner when we make him or her into an object, and we deceive ourselves when we call this love.
But you may abandon this atmosphere of lies and adultery. You may love others for who they are, whether you keep your vow to them or refuse to make it. Nothing and no one can force you to stay with someone, nor force you to leave them.
“What God has joined together, let man not separate.”68 It is clear that when two beings are truly united in love, then nothing can separate them (not even marriage!). The truth of their relationship remains the truth, whether they recognize it or not and whether they live separately or together. The truth of love cannot be identified with (and thereby reduced to) the emotional state of being “in love.” It is precisely at those moments when this “in love” feeling is gone that only the truth of love can enable us to really choose love. This choice is also the real meaning of faithfulness, a transcendent demeanor that cannot be defined by rules, conditions, and time.
“What God has joined together, let man not separate”—but only if it is God who has done the joining!69 You may refrain from living in adultery by remaining faithful to that which sometimes occurs between two beings and is often called love. This invites us to discover something that is not only sacred, but ultimately far more interesting than the spectacle of our impulses, our emotional intensities—or worse, our obedience to duty.
“In the beginning, God created the Human in his image . . . Male and female were created by him.” This passage from Genesis 1:27 means, among other things, that in the heart of a conscious and loving relationship we are invited to experience a love that is not of time and the convoluted paths of our passing loves. There is nothing to be added to this.
The Gospel of Mary Magdalene Page 8