goatguy-too

From Matthew: This saying of Thomas is suggestive that Thomas wrote before Matthew did. Matthew felt compelled to explain the riddle in greater detail. Here are the hints: Herbs (also a symbol of Christ) were made for man to eat: (Ge 1:29, Ge 3:18) Jesus was the ''least'' among the seed of the woman because he came to serve us all. The greatest thing man can eat is the body of Christ, and so he is the greatest herb. The cross is the tree of life. Those who live in the spirit (the sky) find shelter in the cross.

God walking counted as a tree God walking in the garden is interpreted to be a tree in the riddle. Here are the hints: The fruit of the tree is the Lord's, therefore the Lord is a tree. This riddle is confirmed by the second verse, that a tree is known by it's fruit.

Eve as a type of Christ This one is difficult to see if you cannot divorce yourself from the literal meaning. Here are the hints to the riddle: The female represents those who do not see clearly. Jesus in the flesh has put off omniscience (Php 2:6-8). As a result , in the flesh he is female compared with Adam representing the Son, who was not deceived. Twelve year old Manasseh represents Christ as a child. His name means forgetfulness or giving bread. The passage indicates that when Jesus would return to Jerusalem after his visit at age 12, he would know that he was God. Eve took of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil hoping to become a peer to God. Jesus recognized that he really was a peer to God. Eve came from the rib of Adam. The word מצלעתיו rib comes from the root צלע meaning limping. The hieroglyphics of the first and last letter are similar: Holiness and grace descend from heaven. The first hits the Messiah point (in the lower right corner) where the revelation of God meets the flesh in the square text template. The other does not. The Son who knew he would be the Messiah became the son who did not know he was the Messiah and had to learn it from the hidden scripture. The center letter represents a shared heart. Eve was the flesh of Adam as a symbol of Christ being the flesh of the Son.

Adam as a symbol of Christ Adam was the first son of God in the flesh (Lu 3:38). Jesus was the Son of God in the spirit before the incarnation

The tree of life as a symbol of Christ The tree of life also points to the cross of Christ. In the garden Adam could eat of it all that he wished until he violated God's holiness (see Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil above). Intimacy with God is not possible if he is not acknowledged to be God. Jesus said that the bread represented his body which was given for us on the cross, and the wine represented his blood. The blood represents life (Le 17:11) Since his blood was poured out on the cross, the cross is a tree of life, in symbols, as well at the means to life for all who believe. Just as the Tree of Life was offered and given freely, so is the Life offered through the cross. The doctrine of salvation by faith alone is first taught in Genesis, although the term 'salvation' is probably not properly understood by most who use it.

The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil There must be an understanding of good and evil before the tree can be understood. The symbols of darkness and light represent Love and Holiness (not evil and good as so many would claim). The Trinity lived in darkness before God said "Let there be light". His nature of Love is expressed in joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance. His nature of Holiness is expressed in law, justice, and separation. Though he was holy before creation, there was no way to express it since the Trinity existed in perfect Love. There was nothing to be separate from. Holiness was hidden in his name. Elohim has a pun, a lo khoom, meaning 'not dark'. The light was hidden. As soon as he had created, he was different from his creation and could declare his holiness in the declaration, "Let there be light". We have a problem understanding God as being Holy, and being Love since we cannot comprehend those attributes being mixed up. If we see a criminal get mercy rather than punishment, we say that there is no justice. If we are the criminal and get justice, we say there is no mercy. The solution to this was that God revealed himself through symbols of holiness, and symbols of love, and then bringing all the symbols together on the cross of Christ. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was nothing more than a symbol of God's holiness. It was the only thing in all creation withheld from newly created Adam for the purpose of expressing the idea of holiness. No matter how intimate the relationship between man and God was, man would never become God. God must be acknowledged as God in order for the relationship to exist. By eating the fruit of the tree in defiance of God's command, Adam made the claim that he was peer to God. The creation thought himself equal to the creator. When man does what is right in his own eyes, he is declaring that he is God; the one who defines good and evil. The nature of evil This is illustrated in a very offensive riddle. If Larry decides to do something because he thinks it is good, and Joe decides to do the very same thing because God says it is good, have they both done a good thing? The answer is "no." Larry has determined that he is capable of defining good, something which is already defined by the nature and character of God. He has declared that he is a peer to God. This is the essence of evil. When we decide what is good and evil for ourselves we declare that we are a god. Often, we go beyond that and judge God saying that he is incompetent or even evil in the way he runs his universe and we declare that we are greater than God. The mere act of living, without considering what God says; going about our business instinctively is the very same original sin. This is why God says, God placed himself in the same circumstances through his incarnation. Jesus said: Joh 5:19 Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise. Joh 5:30 I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me. Intimacy with God cannot exist without a proper acknowledgement of who he is. Adam could eat of the Tree of Life all he wanted as long as he acknowledged God as God. But when he ate of the forbidden tree, he was denied the Tree of Life. God confirmed this lesson in the results. Since Adam did not learn that God was Holy/separate, he was separated even more by expulsion from the garden. He would be in discord with God, other men, himself and his environment. The cross of Jesus is the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and our test is the same as that of Adam. We acknowledge that Jesus is God, that God is God, or we choose to declare that we are gods.

The first sentence is the answer to the riddle. Christ is the only one who pre-existed his incarnation. Another key to this riddle comes from Matthew. Partucularly take note of the last word. The five trees in the garden of Eden are all symbols of Christ: 1. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil - a literal tree 2. The tree of life - a literal tree 3. Adam - a man like a tree 4. Eve - a man like a tree 5. God in the garden - though not a man, he was 'walking'. Since the explanation of each may take a bit, I'll split them in their own posts. Summer קיץ comes from the root קוץ meaning summer, grieved, thorn. Winter חרף also means reproach. Leaf also means branch. And branch is used for tribe. The five trees are all Christ. He is undisturbed (unmoving in his determination to face the cross) through grieving and reproach. And who does not lose his branches, or tribes... those who belong to him are secure.

Jesus is the alpha and omega (Re 1:8), the beginning and the end. Seek him, find him and you won't experience death.

see my comments in the other GOT thread. http://thetaobums.com/topic/31789-gospel-of-thomas/page-10#entry491057 http://thetaobums.com/topic/31789-gospel-of-thomas/page-10#entry491377

This is God himself :

I heard a radio pastor mock the Gospel of Thomas using this saying. But he does not understand that it is the genre of riddle. Rather than see how it isn't true literally, you ask "How is it true in the language of riddle?" They key to understanding this riddle is the word "you". If you do any of the things in the riddle apart from Christ you will be condemned. This is original sin. When you do something that you think is right, you are not acknowledging that God is God, and have made him a peer to you with the claim that you can determine right and wrong for yourself. The second half is the same as quoted in scripture.

Jesus said that he came to serve as the least among men (Joh 13:14) as he washed their feet. Wine is a symbol of the living word of God. Thomas has himself become a well-spring of living water. The one thing he told them was that if he shared the word, the others would ask questions of him (throw stones-little words of God), the Spirit woulkd attend the preaching of the word, and they will alll become like the burnt offering which represents total devotion of the Son to the Father.

James in Hebrew is Jacob meaning usurper. Jesus is the usurping second son, the second man, or second Adam who got the inheritance that the first Adam (Ishamel, Esau) lost. Since Jesus will never leave us, we are still to turn to him to be our leader. The Righteous Usurping Second Son. It is for Jesus that heaven and earth came into being. (Heb 2:10)

In Genesis 1:1 there were two heavens created. (שמים is a dual form of heaven). The thrid heaven is the presence of God. The two created heavens will pass away. Jesus said that those who are alive in him will never die. Thiose who do not accept him are dead already. Light represents Holiness. The answer is that the righteous ones (those pronounced righteous by grace) live by faith. On the day when you recognized that you were one... just flesh, just a goat, you became two, your spirit came alive and you became flesh and spirit; sheep and goat. But when you become two is in the future, so it is a different kind of two from the first one. This is death when you become body and spirit divided. The answer is to be absent from the body is to be with the Lord. (2Co 5:8)

Jesus sent the Spirit into the world (Joh 14:16) and he will never leave us (Mt 28:20, Heb 13:5) until the end of the world. (Re 20:9)

From Thomas From Luke Since Jesus interpreted the saying in Luke, it behooves us to explain why we dare offer another interpretation of Luke while we offer one of Thomas as well. The prophecies connect riddles [dark sayings] with parables. Sensus plenior says that here are two meanings for every text. Though Jesus interpreted the parable for the disciples, he did not interpret the riddle. Things we need to know from other riddles: The seed is always Jesus as the seed of the woman (Ge 3:15) and the Word of life (Joh 1.1) Four things must map to the four voices of God (Prophet, Priest, King and Judge) Voice of the King The word for road פשט also means to emerge,or spoil, or strip, raid in the Bible. Rabbis use the term to describe the simple, literal meaning of the Torah (However the Torah is all the revelation of God, not just the written word). The hieroglyphic meaning is "The beginning of a marriage (joined in flesh and spirit) with fruitfulness at the heart". God's first revelation to man was in the garden, where a man and woman were married and commanded to be fruitful. There was a simple message (Don't eat the fruit) the violation of which, spoiled the garden. Adam found out he had no clothes (stripped) , etc. Feet represent living (as in he walked...) Adam's life trampled the word of God as Luke mentions. Birds are those who live in the spirit (air) and eating is ingesting the word. Only the angels understood God's word at this juncture. Voice of the judge The rock is the rock in the wilderness which produced water. It is a manifestation of Christ among the Hebrews. (1Co 10:4 ) The seed spoke to Israel in the desert, but there was no water (The people murmured against Moses) The word did not take root in the soil (earthly Israel) and they died in the desert as a judgement against their unbelief. (1Co 10:5) Voice of the prophet Jesus said that thorns represented the cares of the world. But it was his care for the world which strangled (or hanged) חנק him on the tree, in accordance with prophecy. Voice of the priest The priest is the one who rectifies things and makes fruitfulness possible. When the Word; Christ, took root in the hearts of men he became fruitful. Luke's 100 is the church, 60 is the testimony of God in heaven and on earth, and 120 says that in the new heaven and earth there will still be a testimony of God.

This is a fun one. Jesus always fed fish with bread. He said the bread was his body, which was given for us. He also said, that man does not live by bread alone... but by every word which proceeds from the mouth of God. So fish represent "every word which proceeds from the mouth of God." The small fish are cast back in favorof the single big fish. The greatest commandment is to love. All the others are wrapped up in it. This is the same parable as the man who sold all to buy the single pearl.

Jesus is the Lion of Judah We consume Christ when we eat the bread of communion, he abides in us. Cursed is the man who is judged by Christ..

The second half has two sayings which are parallel. When there are two things like this it says that it applies to the flesh and the spirit. Lying is done in the flesh, and hypocrisy is done in the spirit.

This note is a reminder that what is plain in the New Testament is hidden in the Old. As someone has said, The New Testament is Christ revealed, the Old Christ concealed.

The man old in days is the Ancient of days. The small child is Jesus who was the “smallest seed” or the “least of men” because he served them all. Genesis 1 is a table of contents to the rest of the Bible, which is split into six portions representing six days. The man (Christ) obtained his bride (the church) on day six covered by the New Testament. The conversation takes place on the seventh day. The “place of life” takes a bit of explaining. Before the creation there was nothing but God. There was no place, since there is nothing bigger than God to contain him. When he created, he opened a void within himself in which to place all of the heavens and the earth. (The earth was void…) This is where it gets fun. In heaven שמים ש is the Spirit, מ is the Father, and ם is the Son. See the yud י in there? It’s not required to make the word heaven but it represents the first speck of the void created. It contains everything that was made. We are made of tiny voids within God. We are made of nothing. This is the way it works. The smallest particle that exists, maybe something like a Plank particle is a void in the “substance” of God. The voids are gathered together into larger stable clusters. So imagine a film negative in 3-d. Everything you think is black is white. In the universe what you think is a void is what is the substance of God (He’s what’s left when you remove everything else). And what you think is solid are really voids within him. All of the properties of physics are redefined as properties of the geometry surrounding the voids. When the geometry creates tension is a charged particle, when the geometry creates compression, it is the opposite charge. The two will attract in order to reduce stresses in the surrounding substance. Gravity is really a push away from the substance in lower energy levels which tends to cluster the voids as though they were attracted to each other. All the properties of physics are explained by the geometry of the substance, and a unified field theory is derived from the analysis. The 'place of life'is the existence within the void... the place within himself that God made room for us...actually 'many rooms'. When the Son became incarnate, his existence moved from being the substance to being the voids that made up his body. So what could God-the-Father learn from God-the-Son? The stuff that the Son learned. Heb 5:8 Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered; After having the conversation, the Son remains in the flesh (“he lives”) “married to the flesh” so to speak. The Son will be pre-eminent among the many, who were the expressions of God before creation, and they will all be one again. (The Son was separated on the cross). As odd as it sounds when stated this way, it is what most Christians believe. There is a physical resurrection where we live with Christ physically forever.

What is the mystery of the face of a clock? The nature of a mystery is that the mystery must be visible, but not seen, or audible yet not heard. In the metaphor of the body: head - authority ears - "sheep hear his voice" being drawn without understanding eyes - understanding hands = work shoulder - purpose of the work foot/walk - life thigh - will Men who were deaf, blind and lame were made to hear, see and walk. In the context of the riddle, the mystery, though right in front of them, was not seen, nor was anyone curious about it because they did not even recognize it as a mystery. Usually the eyes, ears and feet are clustered because we hear the Father, see the Son and the Holy Ghost gives life. Because eyes and ears are clustered with hands, the riddle is speaking about men in the flesh. There is a Christian dualism as taught by Paul and Jesus. As an individual I am both a sheep and a goat. the sheep represents the spiritual side, and the goat represents the flesh, or instinctive side. The kingdom of God was never seen, nor heard, and no hand was used to make it. Carnal man never considered the spiritual things. Jesus opened their eyes to the spiritual realities. It is said that the Ninevites did not know their right hand from their left. Think about goats on the left and sheep on the right hand of Christ.... the Ninevites did not discern flesh from spirit. Paul taught that we had an old man and a new man. The meaning is simply he is revealing the mystery which has been hidden in plain site... giving them the keys to the kingdom. Having said that... in Hebrew hieroglyphics, the blank page represents God, since we are not permitted to make a graven image. The yod י represents something like the Big Bang. It is like the first thought that God had to create. Every other letter is drawn by starting with a yod. Every word is made up of letters and everything which was created was created by God speaking words. Symbolically we interpret that everything that was created came from the mind of God. Each letter represents a massive metaphor of about 1/28 of everything in existence. As two letters join, they form a sub-root which is a metaphor for the intersection and combination of the two letters. Add another letter and you get a Hebrew root word which is the intersection and combination of all three letters. Longer words are built the same way. Though there are 22 proper letters, there are 28 hieroglyphic letters. There are 5 final forms that are the same sound as the five associated proper letters, but their shape changes when found at the end of a word. And there is one letter that is never used in creating words, so it is never pronounced. So everything that can be seen, heard, or thought of is contained in the 28 hieroglyphics. By the way, there are four voices of God (prophet, priest, king and judge) and the number 7 represents completeness. 4x7 = 28. The complete revelation of God is contained in the 28 glyphs. But the meaning of all 2-letter subroots are not known. This means that there is a lot of stuff that God has said, made and thought of that we aren't aware of yet. And should we get cocky and think we can discover them, there is one letter which is never used to make words, which indicates that totally half of what God knows is beyond our reach to even comprehend. The 28th symbol is a four-legged shin. It looks like a W ith four legs. The prophets could get a glimpse of its metaphor, but were forbidden to speak of it. The misunderstanding of it is the antithesis of all other revelation which when appropriated by the carnal mind creates all evil. The meaning of the symbol itself is not evil but presents too great of a temptation for the carnal mind to resist. Misunderstanding it is the origin of original sin, the Pandora Box myth, etc. But the symbol itself is the origin of the folklore of the unspeakable name of God. The word Yahweh has been used as a substitute for the unspeakable name, But there is no admonition against saying it. The 28th symbol is unspeakable because it is not used to make any words. Jewish tradition says that when Messiah returns he will reveal the meaning of all the unknown sub-roots. The Christian equivalent is that Jesus did reveal the mystery. And through his revelation the metaphor for each letter is known, including that of the 28th letter. And new words can be formed which express ideas which have never been thought or spoken by men. 1Co 2:9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. 1Co 2:10 But God hath revealed [them] unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. 1Co 2:11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. 1Co 2:12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. 1Co 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

This has just a small riddle, most of it is straight forward concerning the process of 'enlightenment' When you seek you will find. The second usage of the word 'find' invokes the phonetic pun and riddle. 'Find' is מצא matsa, and it sounds like מצה matseh which is unleavened bread. Unleavened bread is bread that has no leaven or teaching. Bread is the body... Jesus said "This is my body", and unleavened bread is one owho has put away old teaching and is ready for new teaching. When you have found the truth, you put away the old things you thought you knew and begin again. When you find, you are confronted with your sin and sin nature which makes you 'troubled'. The second usage of troubled invokes the second meaning of the word troubled חמר which is wine and which represents grace. One becomes astonished at the grace which covers his sin. The word for rule משל is also the word for 'to speak in a proverb'. When one is truly astonished he will speak in a proverb (the language of the wisdom of God) of "the all"which is God. We do not rule over God, we speak his wisdom. One of the hints for interpretation that Thomas is recording is that when something is repeated twice, it has two meanings

Cool, happy to hear what you have to say. From the perspective of sensus plenior, #3 cannot be understood until the Kingdom of Heaven is understood. This is a cool riddle: As seen before, the Kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which we saw was 'teaching'. The Kingdom of heaven is teaching. It starts small and spreads. 'Jerusalem' means 'teaching of peace' and the New Jerusalem, which is equated with the Kingdom of heaven, is 'the new teaching of peace'. When Jesus started teaching with the sermon on the mount, he said, "You have heard it said, .... but I say...". He introduced the new teaching of peace. Peter said, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God", and Jesus said that no man had taught him that but that the Father had shown it to him. He continued saying that he would give him the keys to the kingdom... the keys to teaching... and he started to show him the places in the scriptures that said he must die and be raised from the dead. The pictures of the cross in the Old Testament are the keys to the kingdom of heaven or the keys to the new teaching of peace. So where is the kingdom? It is within you if you understand and live the new teaching of peace. If you do not have the new teaching of peace, you are in great desolation and poverty.

Absolute statements? "Truth is relative "Knowing what the truth is , is to understand the relative" If everything is relative, can anything be said or can we only ask questions?