Yeshua bar Josef healed the sick, restored sight to the blind, and performed other miracles. He also taught that people should develop their own relationship with God, independent of religions and religious leaders. His name’s pronunciation changed over time until it evolved into the pronunciation we use today, Jesus. People are revisiting Yeshua’s teachings with the realization that he was not a god who insisted that people worship him. Instead, he revealed messages that will make a difference for humanity if we hear and learn from them. In this series of videos, Dr. R. Craig Hogan presents Yeshua’s profound teachings, as written in the Gospel of Thomas, which have been borne out by what we are learning today from communication with people in the afterlife about the nature of this life and the next.
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The Gospel of Thomas, found at Nag Hammadi in Egypt and likely written in the late first or early second century, is considered the most significant ancient text from the site. It presents a collection of 114 sayings spoken by Yeshua. It contains no miracles, no Christmas story, and most notably, not a word about his being a god who was crucified and resurrected. The gospel is attributed to the Gnostics, groups of people with varied beliefs whose core belief was that Yeshua came to bring knowledge, or gnosis, to humanity that will free us from the self-imposed prison of the physical realm that deceives us into being discontent, self-seeking, selfish, and separated from others.
Yeshua tells his disciples the profound Gnostic truth that within each of us is the divine “light” that is our true nature when all the Earth-realm facades are stripped away. As long as we do not realize this divine nature, we remain trapped in the material world that seduces us into ignorant beliefs about life and the afterlife. We live with needless anxiety about life and a wholly unjustified fear of the death of the body. In this series of videos, I explain the meanings of the sayings with a 21st century understanding of the nature of reality, the life after this life, and our spiritual nature.
Explanations of sayings 61 through 70 from the Gospel of Thomas are in this video. Links to the videos with the other 104 teachings are in the YouTube of this video at https://youtu.be/AqfCg5rCUCk
Saying 61: Yeshua said, “Two will rest on a bed: the one will die, and the other will live.”
Salome said, “Who are you, man, that you … have come up on my couch and eaten from my table?” Yeshua said to her, “I am he who exists from the undivided. I was given some of the things of my father.” Salome said, “I am your disciple.”
“Therefore I say, if he is destroyed, he will be filled with light, but if he is divided, he will be filled with darkness.”
The message in short: A primary goal in this life is for us to realize that we are one with each other, so we should live in love, peace, and joy together.
Explanation of the saying: The saying is in a dialogue that carries forth the themes of oneness and division. In the first part, two people are resting on a bed, both healthy. One’s body dies, separating or dividing them. Most of us have no foreknowledge of when this natural division will occur. We cannot predict that someone will pass into the afterlife when two people are healthy and resting together. The second part carries that division into Salome’s question. As with the two lying on a bed, Yeshua is reclining on the couch with Salome. She asks him who he is, confirming that she feels he is separate from her; they are divided. She is put off because he is a stranger performing intimate activities with her: reclining on the couch and eating from her table. Yeshua responds that he is the undivided one who is bringing the teaching from God the Father that we are not separate from one another. Salome responds that she is Yeshua’s disciple, showing she has lost the sense of division between them. Yeshua concludes with the point of the parable. When Salome’s feeling of separateness is dissolved, she is filled with light. When we feel we are separate from one another, we are divided and, therefore, we are filled with darkness. A primary goal in this life is for us to realize that we are one with each other, so we should live in love, peace, and joy together.
Saying 62: Yeshua said, “It is to those who are worthy of my mysteries that I tell my mysteries. Do not let your left know what your right is doing.”
The message in short: The disciples are to give people who do not currently understand the truths about this life and the next the portion of the truth they can accept without rejecting all of it because they are put off by the whole truth.
Explanation of the saying:
Yeshua is explaining the truths about the disciples’ relationships to one another and to him. While he is reported to have given special teachings to them in private, most of his teachings are very public. Those who hear his teachings and learn from them are worthy of them. People who reject them are not worthy of them, but it is because of their freely chosen state of mind that rejects the teaching. He ends with “Do not let your left know what your right is doing.” Some have suggested “hand” is implied, so the saying would be “Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,” but “hand” is not necessary for the teaching. Yeshua is saying his disciples are to continue in open dialogue with one another about these truths. That is the right. But they are to be cautious about how much to reveal to those who are not yet ready to receive all his teachings. They are the left. The disciples are to give them the portion of the truth they can accept without rejecting all of it because they are put off by the whole truth.
Saying 63: Yeshua said, “There was a rich man who had much money. He said, ‘I shall put my money to use so that I may sow, reap, plant, and fill my storehouse with produce, with the result that I shall lack nothing.’ Such were his intentions, but that same night he died. Let him who has ears hear.”
The message in short: Love, relationships, and lessons we have learned carry on into the next life. They are the fruits of our development in Earth School that do not die when the body dies.
Explanation of the saying:
Yeshua explains that we have complex lives, with interactions, activities, sentiments, and norms that form our daily routines. The rich man engages in work and life activities using his wealth to prepare for a prosperous future. He feels confident that because of his effort, he will lack nothing. He has it all covered. What he doesn’t realize is that all of it can be taken away in an instant when his body dies. All that wealth and all those possessions are meaningless. Yeshua’s message is that we must invest in what will live on after the body dies: our capacity to show love and compassion, the relationships we have developed, and our feeling of oneness with all others. Love, relationships, and lessons we have learned carry on into the next life. They are the fruits of our development in Earth School that can never die.
Saying 64: Yeshua said, “A man had received visitors. And when he had prepared the dinner, he sent his servant to invite the guests.
He went to the first one and said to him, ‘My master invites you.’ He said, ‘I have claims against some merchants. They are coming to me this evening. I must go and give them my orders. I ask to be excused from the dinner.’
He went to another and said to him, ‘My master has invited you.’ He said to him, ‘I have just bought a house and am required for the day. I shall not have any spare time.’
He went to another and said to him, ‘My master invites you.’ He said to him, ‘My friend is going to get married, and I am to prepare the banquet. I shall not be able to come. I ask to be excused from the dinner.’
He went to another and said to him, ‘My master invites you.’ He said to him, ‘I have just bought a farm, and I am on my way to collect the rent. I shall not be able to come. I ask to be excused.’
The servant returned and said to his master, ‘Those whom you invited to the dinner have asked to be excused.’ The master said to his servant, ‘Go outside to the streets and bring back those whom you happen to meet, so that they may dine.’ Businessmen and merchants will not enter the places of my father.”
The message in short: We should be living happy lives, without fear of the end of this life. This life is a banquet set before us. We just have to accept the truth that we are eternal beings having a physical experience and enjoy all of life’s sumptuous offerings.
Explanation of the saying:
Yeshua’s message is plain. We have the truth about this life and the next. Most people will find some excuse not to hear and understand it. Those clinging to religious beliefs will dismiss it as the work of the devil or incompatible with their sacred scriptures. Those whose religion is their narrow view of what they believe science allows as truth will dismiss what we know to be true as primitive superstition and naïve ignorance. Many with no belief system will remain ignorant of what we know to be true because it requires receiving the information and thinking through its implications. Those who reject what we are saying about this life and the next will not become enlightened. Yeshua suggests to the disciples that they not focus on any of these groups who will not accept the truth. Instead, they should continue to expose all people to the truth, without regard for their belief systems. Those who come in to dine at this banquet will enjoy the love, peace, and joy that is freely available to them there. We should be living happy lives, without fear of the end of this life. The banquet is set before us. We just have to accept and enjoy it.
Saying 65: He said, “There was a good man who owned a vineyard. He leased it to tenant farmers so that they might work it and he might collect the produce from them. He sent his servant so that the tenants might give him the produce of the vineyard. They seized his servant and beat him, all but killing him. The servant went back and told his master. The master said, ‘Perhaps he did not recognize them.’ He sent another servant. The tenants beat this one as well. Then the owner sent his son and said, ‘Perhaps they will show respect to my son.’ Because the tenants knew that it was he who was the heir to the vineyard, they seized him and killed him. Let him who has ears hear.”
The message in short: The message we are giving to humanity will be rejected by many. People may seem to accept parts of the message in isolation, but when presented with the whole truth, many will kill it by rejecting it. The truth is, we continue to live whole and healthy in the next life after we leave our Earth bodies here.
Explanation of the saying:
Yeshua often refers to truths we have come to realize about this life and the next. We are in Earth School to learn lessons, grow in love and compassion, and enjoy life. We own nothing in this life. We are tenant farmers. When we leave, we will take nothing with us except the mental and spiritual person we have become. The rent is a metaphor for our acceptance of these truths given to us by the messengers such as Yeshua. The messengers with this truth are often rejected, some with hostility. Many people accept the truth that consciousness is the basis of reality, but reject the truth that we continue to live on after the body dies. Others accept that we continue to live after this life, but believe people become disembodied wisps of consciousness. Still others believe we will not continue our individual lives in the next life, but instead will merge with the ground of all being and lose our personal identity. None of these fragments of belief has the whole truth. And because people have only fragments of truth, they kill or reject the whole message that we are eternal selves apart from the body who continue to live on after the body dies. And at times, the analogy of the son’s being killed becomes physically real. People have acted with hostility toward individuals who speak these truths, even to the point of killing them.
Saying 66: Yeshua said, “Show me the stone which the builders have rejected. That one is the cornerstone.”
The message in short: The truths we have been given about this life and the next are rejected by many. But those truths are the cornerstone of our lives on Earth.
Explanation of the saying:
The cornerstone of a building is also called the foundation stone or setting stone. It is the first stone to be placed and becomes the reference for all other stones in the entire structure. Over time, that stone became a ceremonial stone, with a dedication or other inscription on it, showing its central position in the foundation. Yeshua is saying humanity today is rejecting these truths about this life and the next that are the foundations for understanding life. What he is teaching is the cornerstone of truth for humanity. We are eternal beings, one with each other, having a physical experience that will end when we go on to the next life. Everything else in our lives has relevance only insofar as it is based on this central truth.
Saying 67: Yeshua said, “If one who knows the all still feels a personal deficiency, he is completely deficient.”
The message in short: If a person says they know the truth that we are eternal beings having a physical experience, but still feels self-absorbed, separate from others, and fearful of the death of the body, then that person is deficient in the truth. When people know the truth without doubt that we are eternal beings having a temporary physical experience, their conviction will result in lives filled with love, peace, and joy, without fear of the death of the body.
Explanation of the saying:
Yeshua is saying that people may claim to believe we are eternal beings having physical experience, but if they are unhappy, feeling separate from others, and full of fear of the end of this life and death of the body, then they do not yet fully have the conviction, without doubt, that we are eternal beings. Having an unsure or tentative belief that we are eternal beings is a natural stage people go through as they grow in learning that we don’t die when the body dies. We were reared in a society with primitive beliefs about this life and the next. People go to the cemetery and stare at the ground, as though the people they love were there. But they may also say they believe Grandma is looking down on us, that she is alive somewhere. They have a rudimentary understanding of our eternal nature. But their sentiments and actions betray their true fear that death is the end of life. The inkling that Grandma is alive is a natural stage in growth from the primitive, naïve beliefs about life and death inculcated by our backward society that will eventually blossom into the conviction that we will come to the end of this life, but we will never die. When people have that conviction as foundational to their beliefs about life, they have no fear death and will live in love, peace, and joy with others.
Saying 68: Yeshua said, “Blessed are you when you are hated and persecuted. Wherever you have been persecuted they will find no place.”
The message in short: People who assert the truth about our eternal nature and oneness with all others are often hated and persecuted by the ignorant and unenlightened, including religious leaders and adherents to science as a belief system. But those who do the persecuting have no truth or life in their belief systems. Eventually, their belief systems will be invalidated.
Explanation of the saying:
All of us who know the truth that we are eternal beings who continue to live after the body dies experience derision from religious adherents, materialist scientists, and others who reject the truth. They view us as cultish, naïve, and ignorant. Yeshua is providing the disciples and us comfort in the assurance that those whose narrow views cause them to persecute us for what we say have no solid ground to stand on. Eventually, they will lose their footing as their worldviews crumble when humanity learns the truth. They will have no place on which to stand.
Saying 69: Yeshua said, “Blessed are they who have been persecuted within themselves. It is they who have truly come to know the father. Blessed are the hungry, for the belly of him who desires will be filled.”
The message in short: We will live in Heaven on Earth, with no persecution, worry, or hunger, when all of humanity feels compelled to ensure everyone else’s needs are satisfied.
Explanation of the saying:
This saying echoes the beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew that explain how we can achieve true happiness. Yeshua is saying people suffering from self-inflicted worry and psychological pain will be freed from them when they come to know their nature as eternal beings who are one with God, Our Universal Intelligence. They will be especially blessed because they have come to this knowledge in the midst of their unnecessary worry and suffering. He follows with the statement that people’s needs, such as physical desires, will be satisfied when they come to know that we are one with each other and with God. People will be quick to satisfy one another’s needs. In this Heaven on Earth Yeshua often alludes to, people will take care of each other. There will be no persecution, worry, or hunger. Heaven on Earth is not a physical kingdom. It is an internal state of mind in which all people care for one another and ensure everyone’s needs are satisfied.
Saying 70: Yeshua said, “That which you have will save you if you bring it forth from yourselves. That which you do not have within you will kill you if you do not have it within you.”
The message in short: We must bring forth love, peace, and joy from within ourselves so we live in the Heaven on Earth we create together. If love is not fundamental to our nature, nothing can save us from struggles and unhappiness in life. The lack will kill us.
Explanation of the saying:
Yeshua is saying that love is our natural state of mind. The Gnostics knew that at our core is the divine spark of love that is obscured by the falsehoods we learned from childhood that make us self-absorbed and selfish. But now we can draw that spark from within ourselves to bring light to the darkness of the world. On the other hand, if we do not allow this consuming love for others that is our basic nature to emerge freely, the falsehoods we learned in childhood will lead to sentiments and actions that produce struggle, worry, separation from others, and unhappiness. In the canonical gospels of Matthew and Mark and in the Acts of the Apostles, Yeshua is reported to have said that for us to create a world filled with love, peace, and joy, people must have a metanoia, Greek for a radical change of heart and mind. When we have this change of heart and mind, we will bring forth a world of love, peace, and joy from within ourselves, so we live in the Heaven on Earth we create together.
Conclusion:
These teachings by Yeshua bar Yosef have been lost in today’s Christian church, which bases its doctrines on narrow interpretations of the four canonical gospels. The Nag Hammadi Gnostic documents teach clearly that Christians may communicate directly with the divine without the intervening control of a church. Yeshua’s mission was to show humanity the way that would lead to enjoying lives filled with love, peace, and joy. We are just now realizing this wonderful message in the Gnostic writings that was lost for 2,000 years.
