From: "Stevan Davies" To: crosstalk@info.harpercollins.com Date: Wed, 14 May 1997 23:00:44 +0000 Subject: re: Arnal's Gnosticism > From: hartzler@pilot.msu.edu (Hartzler-Miller) > I found some examples of "if/then" sayings in your list of "most authentic > sayings." > 2. Here is an authentic saying that fits the if/then form: > If you ask THEN it will be given to you; IF you seek, THEN you will find; > IF you knock THEN the door will be opened to you. > > This saying assumes a world where you get what you ask for. The Thomas > sayings seem to assume there is some esoteric means whereby you get what > you want in indirect ways. Interesting. This saying shows up in Thomas about four different times and ways. Of course we aren't given clue one (any source) what we might find or why to seek. So there's historical Jesus stuff that is about the same obscuritywise as the anal Thomas stuff. Actually I think you can put lots of sayings into IF THEN form, and so it's not really a solid methodology. Point with the gnostic arnal sayings is that most of them demand this formulation and that's about all they are. Seek/find sayings (as above) also demand it. > 3. Finally, there is one interesting example of the "if/then" authentic > saying referring to how to respond when someone else does something. > > IF you enter a town and are welcomed, THEN eat what is set before you and > heal the sick who are there. This is the sort of thing the arnal gnostic sayings completely lack. I know pretty clearly what "enter a town and are welcome" and "eat what is set before you...." mean. And the same for some synoptic sayings. Problem is with the 'gnostic' stuff where I (you, all the world) don't have a clue what actually is meant. This goes for the seek/find material as well. > This saying is loosely paralleled in #50 of the "gnostic strand". Steve, I > guess you omitted (#50) from your list because it is, like the saying > immediately above, responsive rather than proactive. > > 50) Jesus said, > "IF they say to you, 'Where did you come from?', THEN say > to them, 'We came from the light, the place where the light came into > being on its own accord and established [itself] and became > manifest through their image.' > IF they say to you, 'Is it you?', THEN say, 'We are its children, we are > the elect of the Living Father.' > IF they ask you, 'What is the sign of your father in you?', THEN say to > them, 'It is movement and repose.'" Yes. This is a different sort of thing, if only because we know exactly what is expected. "Say This!" But Why say it! What's it mean?! That we don't know. Sometime soon we'll have to compare this to the apocryphon of James material and see what is what. > In my view, this saying is a logical outgrowth of itinerancy experience, > assuming the person asking questions is a stranger meeting the itinerate > for the first time. As soon as an itinerate identifies his or her hometown > and biological parents, the prophetic edge is lost. Thus they answer > ordinary questions in esoteric ways. The first is a perfect ordinary question. But "Is it you?" "What is the sign of your Father in you?" aren't. Could this be some sort of translation bias? (could check Grondin's interliniar transl. from my website). Thomas translators are all the time translating things into gnostic when plain English would do just fine. Where do you come from does imply itinerancy. Bill hasn't convinced me that these folks aren't itinerants... but, hell, maybe they were scribes or whatever. Anyway, when you have "they ask" to work with, you are Damn Well better off thinking "they" are some sort of people (as ALWAYS elsewhere in Thomas) than dragging in Mystic Evil Archons to do the questioning. Again, we should get back to all this later on and (I'm looking forward to this) thereby hammering Patterson further into the ground along with Koester. > 4. A Q saying, also in the responsive mode is, "IF someone strikes you on > the cheek, THEN offer your other cheek as well. IF anyone grabs your coat, > THEN let him have your shirt as well." > > I speculate that turning the other cheek gets tiresome. It also calls into > question the optimism of the "ask and you will receive" saying. Maybe the > "esoteric", proactive strand of "if/than" sayings reflect a way of coping > with social rejection and not receiving what was directly asked for. Yeah. The trouble with making 'authentic' Jesus stuff into IF/Then versus arnal gnostic IF/Then is that the authentic stuff is clear in its meaning and the Thomas stuff isn't remotely clear. It's unclearness is its essence. The authentic stuff you quoted above makes absolutely perfect sense if we are talking about itinerants without staff or purse or whatever and so if they offer resistence they will be hammered into the ground as Patterson soon will be. So they don't resist. I don't quite see why village scribes would have been worried about that sort of thing, but maybe they were. I'd have to read Bill's dissertation to find out but he hasn't written it yet. Alas. If he is eaten by polar bears, or whatever they have up there in Toronto, then we shall never know. Bill! Don't spend further time in garbage dumps! National Geographic assures me that polar bears are thick on the ground there as Cynics in Palestinian Villages and we want you to survive. Steve Stevan Davies, Professor of Religious Studies College Misericordia The Gospel of Thomas Homepage http://www.epix.net/~miser17/Thomas.html