goatguy-too

Brian . Thanks for the feedback. When you post a bunch of stuff quickly it feels like you're just dumping it in a black hole. Jeff, I am glad you brought it around and back to Christ. Since Jesus said that he was the Truth, then He is the interpretation of these sayings, and anyone who finds Christ will not experience death. Right there in front of me and I missed it on the first pass.

Yeah, I know that GOT is in Greek. Augustine and Constantine both worked to rid the church of everything Hebrew. Augustine claimed that the Septuagint (a Greek translation of the original Hebrew Old Testament) was more reliable than the original. It is likely that the author of Thomas was attempting to preserve the method of interpretation of the Jewish Christians. The author propbably spoke Greek natively and took notes (in Greek) on how to read the OT. Over in the other GOT thread I explain the context in which I read the GOT. The method I use to read the New Testament (which is also in Greek) is to understand it the way a Hebrew would have with the Old Testament in mind and in context.. Though many could speak Greek, they would still think in Hebrew. We may wish to point out that GOT isn't English either. Yet that does not deter us from attempting to bridge the language gaps and understand what it means. The early Greek church struggled to understand the Hebrew context of the Old Testament, and there are likely more commentaries or notes written in Greek about the Hebrew text.

Sill Only because Jesus said we must become klike little children, and that God's wisdom is foolishness to the world.

... timed out...

As a riddle: dissention/betrayal is רמה remah which is identical to רמה cast down and רמה high place. is a pun which says that the high place will be cast down to earh. The kingdom of God will be on earth. The next part plays with the hieroglyphic metaphors of the letters. The metaphor of each letter can be expressed many ways, such as the shin can be fire, the Holy Spirit, the word not returning void,, etc (Great conversation for another thread). The aleph represents the separation of the waters, division, etc.. depending on its position it can also mean reconciliation. ש - fire ו - sword א - war The word שוא means desolation. So when the kingdom of God comes to earth, the earth will be destroyed. Many take the Biblical verses taht are similar to this as literal, but there is an aspect that when one is ruled by the spirit, the flesh no longer has control. It is made desolate. Then there are only two houses that have five in them: בית~שן Bethshan or house of ease and בית־אל Bethel or House of God. The context makes it Bethel. Three (Beth) are against two (El), the house is against God, and God is against the house. It is said that we were at war with God, and then Christ took our sin upon himself and represented us as his 'house'or family. The time of the cross is when the Father left the Son and he cried out "Why have you forsaken me?" Just a childish riddle..The same method is used by John is John 1.1: Ïn the beginning was the word". He shows us how the game is played with Gen 1.1: בראשית ברא אלהים In the begining God. ברא bara is 'the word which creates' it is normally just translated 'created' but since God created by his word, it becomes either 'created by his word' or 'the word which created'. Look and see that ברא is in בראשית as the first three letters. In the beginning was the bara, the word. Bara is next to Elohim so John says, "The word was with God". It describes God as the creator so John says, "THe word was God". In fact bara has bar in it which is 'son'. The son was in the begining, was the creator, was with God, was God. Elohim has some puns: Alo khoom, LChaim, Lechem, meaning not dark (Light), Life, Bread. And John uses these puns in his theology. John plays the same game in 1Jo 5:7 For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. Heaven is שמים : The hieroglyphics of the three consonants are the Spirit (fire), Father (declared a covenant in heaven) and the Son (fulfilled the covenant on earth. The gematria = 3 as well. The word earth is ארץ which is the water (aleph as the division of the waters), the word (rosh which is a revelation) and the tzadik which is the blood (The son who is Holy and Love descending to the grave). Silly riddles? yep. But systemic to the nature of Biblical prophecy and sensus plenior. Thomas took notes so that he would remember how to do it. Oh, and they stand as one... "The Father and I are one".

The nature of the riddle (double entendre) is the confusion of cause and effect.. The reader misinterprets it. In order to find the secrets hidden in the scripture one must ask God (Mt 7:7, Lu 11:9) which God answers by opening the eyes to understanding (Jas 1:5). The act of acknowledging God as God and asking him for wisdom is the position of one who has life from God. So the one who finds the hidden wisdom has found it because of his life-giving relationship with God. If one misreads it and believes that by the act of searching the scriptures he will find life, he is motivated to read God's word. (Joh 5:39) But he will not find the interpretation without asking God for it. It is the relationship with God which gives life, not the act of looking for or finding hidden interpretations. So in the end, not all people who have life will find the hidden interpretations, but all people who find the hidden interpretations already have life. The same confusion applies to the interpreation of faith vs. works. It is intentional on God's part that there should be confusion. Those who misunderstand that works produces salvation will do good works and attempt to avoid bad works. This makes the world a better place. Those who correctly understand that all good works that we do are produced by God in us, still do good works. The double entendre is intentional. This saying of Thomas is mirrored in the Bible: Lost in translation is that in this verse תחיה which is translated 'life' actually is the form 'is keeping alive' which supports the interpretation given to Thomas. Those who have life get wisdom which 'keeps them alive' since they will never die. (Joh 11:26). Thomas included his riddle in the list to remind himself of the nature of this kind of riddle in scripture.

Some rules for sensus plenior: (I use the term 'shadow' based on Heb 10:1 and others) Since God has said that not a jot or tittle will pass away (Mt 5:18), until one knows why each jot and tittle is there, a complete understanding has not been derived. (This keeps us humble) Since man shall live “..by every word” (De 8:3, Mt 4:4, Lu 4:4), a doctrine is not sound until it sums up and includes all that God has said about it. (This keeps us searching) Since every word concerning life and death must be established by two or three witnesses (De 17:6, De 19:15, Mt 18:16, 2Co 13:1, 1 Ti 5:19, Heb 10:28), every shadow must have at least two supporting scripture witnesses. This means we cannot define a shadow (metaphor) with a single verse. (This keeps us rigorous in methodology) Since God’s word is established forever (Ps 119:89, 1 Pe 1:25, Is 40:8) , a shadow means the same thing everywhere is it used. So, since a donkey is a shadow of a prophet, everywhere there is a donkey, it is a shadow of a prophet. This rule alone makes the shadows humanly impossible to fabricate as it requires the interlocking of a double entendre found in all the scriptures. (This keeps us in awe) The riddle of Samson (Jud 14) tells us Christ is the answer to all the riddles. If the shadow doesn’t look like Christ, it isn’t a good shadow. (This keeps us focused) And since we are to "let God be true, but every man a liar”, outside references are not required to solve the riddles and see the shadows. (This keeps us devoted) These rules constrain any proposed hidden meaning so severely, that it makes the discernment of the solution to the riddles of sensus plenior verifiable, and self-correcting. An example is that of 'leaven'. Some say that leaven represents sin, but since Jesus said that the Kingdom of God was like leaven (Mt 13:33) it just doesn't work. But the disciples understood it to represent 'teaching' (Mt 16:12) which works everywhere that leaven is used in scripture, and then sheds light on the nature of the kingdom of heaven. (It is teaching). Ok it is in that context that I first read GOT. So I'll take them one at a time.

Ok.. reformatted... new interface for me... I have not had an indent before, and I now see the confusion of the quote. New tricks for old dogs... They are paraphrases of the story of Jesus and that of Acts 12 stated in a way to make the parallels more obvious. A detailed verse by verse account is possible but is tedious to read.

I'm sorry that I did not state it more clearly. I am presenting the Gospel of Thomas as notes that someone, probably named Thomas, took while learning to read sensus plenior. I present it in that fashion because I don't believe that all old texts should be scripture, even though they may have value. Also it is presented in that fashion because I do not believe that GOT is Gnostic, and hope to demonstrate that it's value is in showing that the methods of sensus plenior taught by the apostles in the NT are contained in the GOT. So it is extra-biblical evidence that the NT authors used the same methods when they interpreted the OT in 'novel' ways, as some theologians would say.

On the existence of sensus plenior: The scriptures (Old Testament) speak of Christ. He revealed the hidden meaning to the disciples on the road to Emmaus, and Paul and the disciples primariliy taught from the Old Testament to show that Jesus was the long-awaited Messiah. Luke mimicked sensus plenior in Acts 12 when he used the story of Jesus as an outline to tell the account of Peter miraculously getting out of prison. Here is the story of Christ that Luke hides in the account of Peter: Jesus was vexed by Herod as a child when he fled to Egypt. He was arrested before Passover, hung between two prisoners, poked in the side, held by three barriers (2 days in death and the stone), the stone opened itself, saw Mary first who ran to tell the disciples and was told she was crazy, and after Jesus finished visiting his disciples, he went to another place. Here is Luke's account of Peter: The church (known as the body of Christ) was vexed by Herod, Peter was arrested before Pasover, chained between two guards, poked in the side, held by three barriers (two sets of guards and the gate), the gate opened itself, he went to see Mary, the woman ran to tell the disciples who said she was crazy, and after Peter was finished visiting the disciples, he went to another place. There are many more parallels when we get into the details. I say that Luke mimicked sensus plenior because he was obviously taught to read sensus plenior in the Old Testament and had to be aware of it in his own writing. There is also a major difference between his writing and that of the Old Testament. In the Old Testament every verse of every chapter of every book participates in prophecy of Christ. Though the same MAY be true of Luke, I can only find it occassionally, like intentional references to it in the OT. I find that Thomas gives hints to help flush out the sensus plenior of the OT. Next: the rules which are derived by using the same methods of interpretation which reveal sensus plenior (or which are used to interpret OT prophecy). Hafta do something nasty now... go to work ;-)

Hi guys, sorry for joining so late. I just stumbled on the forum and the topic. I have actually been studying the methods of the Gospel of Thomas for about 15 years, though I did not read the GOT until about five years ago. I had learned the methods from a rabbi, and from the writings of the apostles. When I did read GOT, I recognized it as possibly being notes from someone who had studied under the apostles and learned to read "the mystery which has been hidden from the beginning". If you wish, I think I can contribute "something completely different" concerning GOT. You may not agree, and that's OK, but thought you might like to see an alternate meaning. An example of a Biblical riddle is the parable of the mustard seed. Skeptics point out that it is not the smallest seed. But it is a riddle. Jesus, the seed of the woman, was the smallest seed because he was the least of all men, serving them all. The seed grew into the largest herb. In Genesis, the grass was given to animals to eat, the herbs were given to man to eat. The greatest thing that man can eat is the body of Christ... the bread of communion. Then it grew into the greatest tree, which is of course, the cross. The answers to all the riddles are within the Bible itself. The thing that clued me in that GOT was the same genre was the one where it is said that Mary must become a man. You haven't gotten there yet, so I won't spoil it. But it is part of the solution to the riddle in Jeremiah that says all men will become pregnant. Would you prefer I pick up here and go back to the first ones, or start a thread specifically on GOT as riddle?

Hello, I am from Utah. I'm an old fart who hikes with goats. I have a google alert for the Gospel of Thomas so your site caught my attention with the GOT thread. Normally I don't join forums where it is discussed because usually there is more argument than observation of different viewpoints. You guys seem to generally keep thing polite. If you wish, I believe I can contribute to a conversation on the matter. I believe I can show evidence that the GOT is someones notes, perhaps from the teaching of one of the apostles, on how to read the esoteric meaning of the Bible. Although the author was less skilled than the apostles, he uses the same methods of hiding what he says in riddle. And he shares some keys on how to solve the riddles'; the hidden wisdom of the apostles. There may be some who do not wish to hear that it might support Christianity, and it isn't my purpose to argue with them or convince them of doctrine. Merely to propose a plausible view of the GOT with evidence to support that view. Christians generally do not wish to hear it since they have convinced themselves that Got is Gnostic. I believe that if it is Gnostic, it is Gnostic only in the sense that Clement of Alexandria claimed to be ture Gnostic. Other than this one thread it is doubtful that I could contribute much to your other interests of specific natures, but don't mind piping in on more general topics. Thanks, GG