Life After Death_ A History of the Afterlife in Western Religion - Alan Segal [286]
His disciples said, “When will you become revealed to us and when shall we see you?” Jesus said, “When you disrobe without being ashamed and take up your garments and place them under your feet like little children and tread on them, then [you will see] the Son of the Living One, and you will not be afraid. (Logion 37)
When you see your likeness, you rejoice. But when you see your images which came into being before you, and which neither die nor become manifest, how much you will have to bear! (Logion 84)
Like all Thomasine Logia, they at first seem very strange until they are read in context with the rest of the document; they are meant to be read together and puzzled out. These Logia seem to imply a baptismal ceremony that is symbolic of removing the fleshly aspect of life entirely. The purpose of this removal is to shed one’s body as children shed their clothes before a bath, evidently an image of innocence but also a symbol of rebirth and rejuvenation. The scene of shedding the body is accompanied by a heavenly ascent and preparation for a vision of the Savior, who will reveal Himself at the moment that the individual members of the group are worthy by their purity and discernment.
What social situation would account for this unusual and puzzling document? The community that valued this document was Egyptian, since the language of the document is Coptic, but the original language is likely to have been Greek, so there was a wider audience as well. It has been characterized as “Encratite” (ascetic, Jewish-Christian, and monastic) practically since the document was found. The document itself says its followers are monachai, monks.
April D. deConick has profitably compared the religiosity in The Gospel of Thomas with Jewish mysticism as it advocates and prepares for a spiritual vision of the highest manifestation of God.27 She makes a convincing case that Hermetic, Neoplatonic, and Jewish mystical communities had quite similar spiritual goals. This particular Gospel was valued by a highly ascetic community, probably of cenobitic monks. (They lived apart as hermits but they came together for meals and other rituals.) They were Christians but their Christianity was noticably lacking in Messianism. Their apocalypticism had been vitiated by the strength of the mystic vision that they sought. Why wait for the end of the world when visions give access to the Savior immediately?
They also were determined to do away with any material understanding of Jesus as Savior, viewing his resurrected form as entirely spiritual, essentially as a “very important soul” who ascended to the heaven and beckons to others to follow him (though they did not use that terminology). And their goal was to immortalize their beings by understanding the revelation offered them. They too seemed to feel that sexuality could be transcended in their attainment of divine or angelic status. Their language for attaining divine status was strikingly male-centered:
Simon Peter said to them, “Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life.” Jesus said, “I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Logion 114)
Presumably the saying was set in this community’s equivalent to the Johannine resurrection story (e.g. John 20). There, Mary did not recognize Jesus at first. Simon Peter sought to have her taken away but Jesus spoke to her and she recognized the Savior after all. Logion 114 seems to have the same incident in mind. Evidently, the community symbolized transcending