{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_35735/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_35735","id":"gutenberg_35735","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35735","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Gnosticism","Jesus Christ -- Crucifixion"],"text":"</pre>\n\n\n\nProduced by Bryan Ness and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was\nproduced from scanned images of public domain material\nfrom the Google Print project.)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE GNOSTIC CRUCIFIXION\n\n\n\n\nWORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR\n\n                                      _Net._\n\n  THRICE GREATEST HERMES (3 vols.)      30/-\n\n  FRAGMENTS OF A FAITH FORGOTTEN        10/6\n\n  DID JESUS LIVE 100 B.C.?               9/-\n\n  THE WORLD-MYSTERY                      5/-\n\n  THE GOSPEL AND THE GOSPELS             4/6\n\n  APOLLONIUS OF TYANA                    3/6\n\n  THE UPANISHADS (2 vols.)               3/-\n\n  PLOTINUS                               1/-\n\n\n\n\n  ECHOES FROM THE GNOSIS\n\n  BY G. R. S. MEAD\n\n  VOL. VII.\n\n\n  THE GNOSTIC CRUCIFIXION\n\n\n  THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY\n  LONDON AND BENARES\n  1907\n\n\n  PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN\n\n\n\n\nECHOES FROM THE GNOSIS.\n\n\nUnder this general title is now being published a series of small volumes,\ndrawn from, or based upon, the mystic, theosophic and gnostic writings of\nthe ancients, so as to make more easily audible for the ever-widening\ncircle of those who love such things, some echoes of the mystic\nexperiences and initiatory lore of their spiritual ancestry. There are\nmany who love the life of the spirit, and who long for the light of\ngnostic illumination, but who are not sufficiently equipped to study the\nwritings of the ancients at first hand, or to follow unaided the labours\nof scholars. These little volumes are therefore intended to serve as\nintroduction to the study of the more difficult literature of the subject;\nand it is hoped that at the same time they may become for some, who have,\nas yet, not even heard of the Gnosis, stepping-stones to higher things.\n\nG. R. S. M.\n\n\n\n\nTHE GNOSTIC CRUCIFIXION\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n                             PAGE\n\n  PREFACE                       9\n\n  THE VISION OF THE CROSS      12\n\n  COMMENTS                     20\n\n  POSTCRIPT                    69\n\n\nTEXTS\n\nBonnet (M.), _Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha_ (Leipzig, 1898).\n\nJames (M. R.), _Apocrypha Anecdota, T. & S._, v. i. (Cambridge, 1897).\n\n\n_F._ = _Fragments of a Faith Forgotten_, 2nd. ed. (London, 1906).\n\n_H._ = _Thrice Greatest Hermes_ (London, 1906).\n\n\n\n\nECHOES FROM THE GNOSIS\n\n\n  VOL. I.   THE GNOSIS OF THE MIND.\n  VOL. II.  THE HYMNS OF HERMES.\n  VOL. III. THE VISION OF ARID\u00c6US.\n  VOL. IV.  THE HYMN OF JESUS.\n  VOL. V.   THE MYSTERIES OF MITHRA.\n  VOL. VI.  A MITHRIAC RITUAL.\n  VOL. VII. THE GNOSTIC CRUCIFIXION.\n\n\nSOME PROPOSED SUBJECTS FOR FORTHCOMING VOLUMES\n\n  THE CHALD\u00c6AN ORACLES.\n  THE HYMN OF THE PRODIGAL.\n  SOME ORPHIC FRAGMENTS.\n\n\n\n\nTHE GNOSTIC CRUCIFIXION.\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nThe Gnostic Mystery of the Crucifixion is most clearly set forth in the\nnew-found fragments of _The Acts of John_, and follows immediately on the\nSacred Dance and Ritual of Initiation which we endeavoured to elucidate in\nVol. IV. of these little books, in treating of _The Hymn of Jesus_.\n\nThe reader is, therefore, referred to the \"Preamble\" of that volume for a\nshort introduction concerning the nature of the Gnostic Acts in general\nand of the Leucian _Acts of John_ in particular. I would, however, add a\npoint of interest bearing on the date which was forgotten, though I have\nfrequently remarked upon it when lecturing on the subject.\n\nThe strongest proof that we have in our fragment very early material is\nfound in the text itself, when it relates the following simple form of the\nmiracle of the loaves.\n\n\"Now if at any time He were invited by one of the Pharisees and went to\nthe bidding, we used to go with Him. And before each was set a single loaf\nby the host; and of them He Himself also received one. Then He would give\nthanks and divide His loaf among us; and from this little each had enough,\nand our own loaves were saved whole, so that those who bade Him were\namazed.\"\n\nIf the marvellous narratives of the feeding of the five thousand had been\nalready in circulation, it is incredible that this simple story, which we\nmay so easily believe, should have been invented. Of what use, when the\nminds of the hearers had been strung to the pitch of faith which had\nalready accepted the feeding of the five thousand as an actual physical\noccurrence, would it have been to invent comparatively so small a wonder?\nOn the other hand, it is easy to believe that from similar simple stories\nof the power of the Master, which were first of all circulated in the\ninner circles, the popular narratives of the multitude-feeding miracles\ncould be developed. We, therefore, conclude, with every probability, that\nwe have here an indication of material of very early date.\n\nNevertheless when we come to the Mystery of the Crucifixion as set forth\nin our fragment, we are not entitled to argue that the popular history was\ndeveloped from it in a similar fashion. The problem it raises is of\nanother order, and to it we will return when the reader has been put in\npossession of the narrative, as translated from Bonnet's text. John is\nsupposed to be the narrator.\n\n(The Arabic figures and the Roman figures in square brackets refer\nrespectively to Bonnet's and James' texts. I have added the side figures\nfor convenience of reference in the comments.)\n\n\n\n\nTHE VISION OF THE CROSS.\n\n\n1. [97 (xii.)] And having danced these things with us, Beloved, the Lord\nwent out. And we, as though beside ourselves, or wakened out of sleep,\nfled each our several ways.\n\n2. I, however, though I saw the beginning of His passion could not stay to\nthe end, but fled unto the Mount of Olives weeping over that which had\nbefallen.\n\n3. And when He was hung on the tree of the cross, at the sixth hour of the\nday darkness came over the whole earth.\n\nAnd my Lord stood in the midst of the Cave, and filled it with light, and\nsaid:\n\n4. \"John, to the multitude below, in Jerusalem, I am being crucified, and\npierced with spears and reeds, and vinegar and gall is being given Me to\ndrink. To thee now I speak, and give ear to what I say. 'Twas I who put it\nin thy heart to ascend this Mount, that thou mightest hear what disciple\nshould learn from Master, and man from God.\"\n\n5. [98 (xiii.)] And having thus spoken, He showed me a Cross of Light set\nup, and round the Cross a vast multitude, and therein one form and a\nsimilar appearance, and in the Cross another multitude not having one\nform.\n\n6. And I beheld the Lord Himself above the Cross. He had, however, no\nshape, but only as it were a voice--not, however, this voice to which we\nare accustomed, but one of its own kind and beneficent and truly of God,\nsaying unto me:\n\n7. \"John, one there needs must be to hear those things, from Me; for I\nlong for one who will hear.\n\n8. \"This Cross of Light is called by Me for your sakes sometimes Word\n(Logos), sometimes Mind, sometimes Jesus, sometimes Christ, sometimes\nDoor, sometimes Way, sometimes Bread, sometimes Seed, sometimes\nResurrection, sometimes Son, sometimes Father, sometimes Spirit, sometimes\nLife, sometimes Truth, sometimes Faith, sometimes Grace.\n\n9. \"Now those things [it is called] as towards men; but as to what it is\nin truth, itself in its own meaning to itself, and declared unto Us, [it\nis] the defining (or delimitation) of all things, both the firm necessity\nof things fixed from things unstable, and the 'harmony' of Wisdom.\n\n10. \"And as it is Wisdom in 'harmony,' there are those on the Right and\nthose on the Left--powers, authorities, principalities, and d\u00e6mons,\nenergies, threats, powers of wrath, slanderings--and the Lower Root from\nwhich hath come forth the things in genesis.\n\n11 [99]. \"This, then, is the Cross which by the Word (Logos) hath been the\nmeans of 'cross-beaming' all things--at the same time separating off the\nthings that proceed from genesis and those below it [from those above],\nand also compacting them all into one.\n\n12. \"But this is not the cross of wood which thou shalt see when thou\ndescendest hence; nor am I he that is upon the cross--[I] whom now thou\nseest not, but only hearest a voice.\n\n13. \"I was held [to be] what I am not, not being what I was to many\nothers; nay, they will call Me something else, abject and not worthy of\nMe. As, then, the Place of Rest is neither seen nor spoken of, much more\nshall I, the Lord of it, be neither seen [nor spoken of].\n\n14. [100 (xiv.)] \"Now the multitude of one appearance round the Cross is\nthe Lower Nature. And as to those whom thou seest in the Cross, if they\nhave not also one form, [it is because] the whole Race (or every Limb) of\nHim who descended hath not yet been gathered together.\n\n15. \"But when the Upper Nature, yea, the Race that is coming unto Me, in\nobedience to My Voice, is taken up, then thou who now hearkenest to Me,\nshalt become it, and it shall no longer be what it is now, but above them\nas I am now.\n\n16. \"For so long as thou callest not thyself Mine, I am not what I am. But\nif thou hearkenest unto Me, hearing, thou, too, shalt be as I [am], and I\nshall be what I was, when thou [art] as I am with Myself; for from this\nthou art.\n\n17. \"Pay no attention, then, to the many, and them that are without the\nmystery think little of; for know that I am wholly with the Father and the\nFather with Me.\n\n18. [101 (xv.)] \"Nothing, then, of the things which they will say of Me\nhave I suffered; nay that Passion as well which I showed unto thee and the\nrest, by dancing [it], I will that it be called a mystery.\n\n19. \"What thou art, thou seest; this did I show unto thee. But what I am,\nthis I alone know, [and] none else.\n\n20. \"What, then, is Mine suffer Me to keep; but what is thine see thou\nthrough Me. To see Me as I really am I said is not possible, but only what\nthou art able to recognise, as being kin [to Me] (or of the same Race).\n\n21. \"Thou hearest that I suffered; yet I did not suffer: that I suffered\nnot; yet I did suffer: that I was pierced; yet was I not smitten: that I\nwas hanged; yet I was not hanged: that blood flowed from me; yet it did\nnot flow: and in a word the things they say about Me I had not, and the\nthings they do not say those I suffered. Now what they are I will riddle\nfor thee; for I know that thou wilt understand.\n\n22. \"Understand, therefore, in Me, the slaying of a Word (Logos), the\npiercing of a Word, the blood of a Word, the wounding of a Word, the\nhanging of a Word, the passion of a Word, the nailing (or putting\ntogether) of a Word, the death of a Word.\n\n23. \"And thus I speak separating off the man. First, then, understand the\nWord, then shalt thou understand the Lord, and in the third place [only]\nthe man and what he suffered.\"\n\n24. [102 (xvi.)] And having said these things to me, and others which I\nknow not how to say as He Himself would have it, He was taken up, no one\nof the multitude beholding Him.\n\n25. And when I descended I laughed at them all, when they told Me what\nthey did concerning Him, firmly possessed in myself of this [truth] only,\nthat the Lord contrived all things symbolically, and according to [His]\ndispensation for the conversion and salvation of man.\n\n\n\n\nCOMMENTS.\n\n\nThe translation is frequently a matter of difficulty, for the text has\nbeen copied in a most careless and unintelligent fashion, so that the\ningenuity of the editors has often been taxed to the utmost and has not\ninfrequently completely broken down. It is of course quite natural that\northodox scribes should blunder when transcribing Gnostic documents, owing\nto their ignorance of the subject and their strangeness to the ideas; but\nthis particular copyist is at times quite barbarous, and as the subject is\ndeeply mystical and deals with the unexpected, the reconstruction of the\noriginal reading is a matter of great difficulty. With a number of\npassages I am still unsatisfied, though I hope they are somewhat nearer\nthe spirit of the original than other reconstructions which have been\nattempted.\n\nIt is always a matter of difficulty for the rigidly objective mind to\nunderstand the point of view of the Gnostic scripture-writers. One thing,\nhowever, is certain: they lived in times when the rigid orthodoxy of the\ncanon was not yet established. They were in the closest touch with the\nliving tradition of scripture-writing, and they knew the manner of it.\n\nThe probability is that paragraphs 1-3 are from the pen of the redactor or\ncompiler of the _Acts_, and that the narrative, beginning with the words\n\"And my Lord stood in the midst of the Cave,\" is incorporated from prior\nmaterial--a mystic vision or apocalypse circulated in the inner circles.\n\nThe compiler knows the general Gospel-story, and seems prepared to admit\nits historical basis; at the same time he knows well that the story\ncirculated among the people is but the outer veil of the mystery, and so\nhe hands on what we may well believe was but one of many visions of the\nmystic crucifixion.\n\nThe gentle contempt of those who had entered into the mystery, for those\nunknowing ones who would fain limit the crucifixion to one brief historic\nevent, is brought out strongly, and savours, though mildly, of the\nbitterness of the struggle between the two great forces of the inner and\nspiritualizing and the outer and materializing traditions.\n\n1. The disciples flee after beholding the inner mystery of the Passion and\nAt-one-ment as set forth in the initiating drama of the Mystic Dance which\nformed the subject of our fourth volume.\n\n2. Yet even John the Beloved, in spite of this initiation, cannot yet bear\nthe thought that his Master did actually suffer historically as a\nmalefactor on the physical cross. In his distress he flees unto the Mount\nof Olives, above Jerusalem.\n\nBut to the Gnostic the Mount of Olives was no physical hill, though it was\na mount in the physical, and Jerusalem no physical city, though a city in\nthe physical. The Mount, however it might be distinguished locally, was\nthe Height of Contemplation, and the bringing into activity of a certain\ninner consciousness; even as Jerusalem here was the Jerusalem below, the\nphysical consciousness.\n\n3. The sentence \"when He was hung on the tree of the Cross\" contains a\ngreat puzzle. The word for \"tree\" in the original is _batos_; this may\nmean the \"bush\" or \"tree\" of the cross. But the Cross for the Gnostics was\na living symbol. It was not only the cross of dead wood, or the dead trunk\nof a tree lopped of its branches--a symbol of Osiris in death; it was also\nthe Tree of Life, and was equated with the \"Fiery Bush\" out of which the\nAngel of God spake to Moses--that is the Tree of Fiery Life, in the\nParadise of man's inner nature, whence the Word of God expresses itself to\none who is worthy to hear. And this Tree of Life was also, as the Cross,\nthe Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil; indeed, both are but one Tree, for\nthe fruit of the Tree of Life is the knowledge of good and evil, the cross\nof the opposites.\n\nBut seeing that the word _batos_ in Greek had also another meaning, the\nGnostics, by their method of mystical word-play, based on the power of\nsound, brought this further meaning into use for the expansion of the\nidea. The difference of accentuation and of gender (though the reading of\nthe Septuagint is masculine and not feminine as is usual with _batos_ in\nthe sense of bush or tree) presented no difficulty to the word-alchemy of\nthese allegorists.\n\nHippolytus, in his _Refutation of all Heretics_, attempts to summarize a\nsystem of the Christianized Gnosis which is assigned to the Docet\u00e6; and\nDocetism is precisely the chief characteristic of our _Acts of John_, as\nwe have already pointed out in Vol. IV. In this unsympathetic summary\nthere is a passage which throws some light on our puzzle. It would, of\ncourse, require a detailed analysis of our h\u00e6resiologist's \"refutation\" of\nthe Docetic system to make the passage to which we refer (_op. cit._,\nviii., 9) fully comprehensible; but as this would be too lengthy an\nundertaking for these short comments, we must content ourselves with a\nbald statement.\n\nThe pure spiritual emanations or ideas or intelligences of the Light\ndescend into the lowest Darkness of matter. For the moulding of vehicles\nor bodies for them it is necessary to call in the aid of the God of Fire,\nthe creative or rather formative Power, who is \"Living Fire begotten of\nLight.\"\n\nHippolytus summarizes, doubtless imperfectly, from the Docetic document\nthat lay before him, as follows:\n\n\"Moses refers to this God as the Fiery God who spake from the _Batos_,\nthat is to say, from the Dark Air; for _Batos_ is all the Air subjected to\nDarkness.\"\n\nThat is, presumably, the material Air, Air of the Darkness, as compared\nwith the spiritual Air or Air of the Light. The Docetic writer, Hippolytus\nsays, explained the use of the term as follows:\n\n\"Moses called it _Batos_, because, in their passing from Above, Below, all\nthe Ideas of the Light [that is, the Light-sparks or spirits of men] used\nthe Air as their means of passage (_batos_).\"\n\nIn other words _Batos_, as Air, was the link between Light and Darkness,\nwhich Darkness was regarded as essentially a flowing or Watery chaos. The\nBatos was the Way Down and the Way Up of souls.\n\nWe are not, however, to suppose that the origin of this idea was the text\nof _Exodus_. By no means; the idea came first, indeed was fundamental with\nthe Gnosis; the mystic exegesis of the \"burning bush\" passage was an\nexercise in ingenuity. For the Gnosis, the that which at once separated\nand united the Light and the Darkness was the Cross. The Angel of God\nspeaking to Moses out of the Fiery Batos was for the Christian Gnostics\none of the most striking apocalypses of ancient Jewish scripture; and it\nwas primarily one of the chief functions of the Gnosis to throw light on\nthe under-meaning. This the Docetic exegete does in his own fashion, using\nthe reading of the Greek Targum or Translation of the Seventy, in this\nwise: \"_Batos?_ _Batos_ does not mean 'bush' really, but 'medium of\ntransmission,'\" It is by means of this that the Word of God comes unto\nus--namely, by the mystery of the uniter-separator in one, which was\ncalled by many names.\n\nFor instance, in setting forth the Sophia-mythus, or Wisdom-story, or\nmystery of cosmogenesis, of the Valentinian school, Hippolytus (_op.\ncit._, vi. 3), treats of the Cross as the final mystery of all. With\noriginal documents before him, he writes:\n\n\"Now it is called Boundary, because it bounds off the Deficiency from the\nFullness [so as to make it] exterior to it; it is called Partaker because\nit partakes of the Deficiency as well; and it is called Cross (or Stock)\nbecause it hath been fixed immovably and unchangeably, so that nothing of\nthe Deficiency should be able to approach the eternities within the\nFullness.\"\n\nHere it is useless to tie oneself to the physical symbol of a cross. The\nStauros (Cross) in its true self is a living idea, a reality or\nroot-principle. It is the principle of separation and limit, dividing\nentity from non-entity, being from non-being, perfection from\nimperfection, fullness or sufficiency from deficiency or\ninsufficiency--Light from Darkness. It is the that which causes all\nopposites. At the same time it shares in all opposites, for it is the\nimmediate emanation of the Father Himself, and therefore unites while\nseparating. It is, therefore, the principle of participation or sharing\nin, sharing in both the Fullness and the Deficiency. Finally, it is the\nStock or Pillar as that which \"has stood, stands and will stand\"--the\nprinciple of immobility, as the energy of the Father in His aspect of the\nsupreme Individuality that changes not, because he is Lord of the\never-changing.\n\nThat such a master-idea is difficult to grasp goes without saying; it was\nconfessedly the supreme mystery. From it the mind, the formal mind of man,\n\"falls back unable to grasp it\"; for it is precisely this personal mind\nthat creates duality, and insinuates itself between cause and effect. The\nspiritual Mind alone can embrace the opposites.\n\nBut to return to our text. \"When He was hung on the _batos_ of the\nCross\"--when He had reached the state of balance, was in the mystic\ncentre--then at the sixth hour, that is mid-day, when there was greatest\nlight, there was also greatest darkness.\n\nAnd then when the Lord, the Higher Self of the man, was balanced and\njustified, the man, the disciple, became conscious, in the cave of his\nheart--that is to say, in his inmost substantial nature--of the Presence\nof Light.\n\n4. Thereon follow the illumination and the explanation of the familiar\ndrama of appearance taught to those \"without the mystery.\"\n\n\"The multitude below in Jerusalem\" is the lower nature of the man, his\nunillumined mind. \"Jerusalem Below\" is set over against \"Jerusalem Above,\"\nthe City of God. Jerusalem Below is that nature in him that is still\nunordered and unpurified; while Jerusalem Above is that ordered and\npurified portion of his substance that can respond to the immediate\nshining of the Light, which further orders it according to the Ordering of\nHeaven.\n\nAnd yet the drama below is real enough; there are ever crucifixion and\npiercing and the drinking of vinegar and gall, before the triumphant\nChrist is born. It is by such means that His Body is conformed; it is the\nmystery of the transformation of what we call evil into good. The Body of\nthe Christ is perfected by the absorption of the impersonal evil of the\nworld, which He transmutes into blessing.\n\n\"'Twas I who put it in thy heart to ascend this Mount.\" I am thy Self, thy\ntrue God; 'twas I energizing in thee who enabled thee to rise to the\nheight of contemplation, where thou canst \"hear what disciple should learn\nfrom Master and man from God.\" The man has now reached the stage of Hearer\nin the Spiritual Mysteries.\n\n5. There then follows the vision of the great Cross of Light, fixed firm,\nand stretching from earth to heaven. Round its foot on earth is a vast\nmultitude of all the nations of the world; they resemble one another in\nthat they are configured according to the Darkness, their \"Spark burns\nlow.\" On the Cross, or in it, for doubtless the seer saw within as well as\nwithout, was another multitude of various grades of light, being formed\ninto some marvellous Image like unto the Divine, but not yet completed--as\nit might be the Rose on the Cross, in the famous symbol of the\nRosicrucians.\n\n6. And above the Cross, lost in the dazzling brilliancy of the Fullness,\nJohn beheld the Lord; he _beheld_ but could not _see_, because of the\nGreat Light, as we are told in another great vision of the Master in the\n_Pistis Sophia_. He can hear only a Voice. But this Voice is no voice of\nman, but one \"truly of God\"--a Bath-kol or \"Heavenly Voice,\" as the Rabbis\ncalled it--a Voice of sweetest reasonableness, using no words, but of a\nhigher order of utterance, that can make the man speak to himself in his\nown language, using his own terms.\n\n7. The sentence \"I long for one who will hear,\" is instinct with the\nyearning of the Divine Love, the eagerness to bestow, the longing to speak\nif only there be one to hear.\n\n8. There then follows a list of synonyms of the Cross, every one of which\nshows that the Cross, if a symbol, must be taken to denote the\nmaster-symbol of all symbols. It is the key to the chief nomenclature of\nthe Gnosis and the greatest terms of the Gospel. These terms, it is\nstated, are used by the Wisdom \"for your sakes,\" that is, to bring home in\nmany ways to the hearts of men the intuition of the mystery.\n\nAs is explained later on in the text, the mystery of the Cross is the\nmystery of the Word, the Spiritual Man, or Great Man, the Divine\nIndividuality. Therefore is it called Word or Reason, Mind, Jesus and\nChrist. Son and Father; for Jesus is the Christ, both as human and divine,\nthe two natures uniting in one in the Cross; and the Son is the Father in\na still more divine meaning of the mystery; for both Son and Cross are of\nthe Father alone, they are Himself manifesting Himself to Himself. The\nwhole is the mystery of Atman or the Self.\n\nThe Door is the Door of the Two in One, the state of equilibrium of the\nopposites which opens out into the all-embracing consciousness and\nunderstanding of all oppositions.\n\nThe Cross is the Way on which there is no travelling, for it perpetually\nenters into itself; it is the true Meth-od, not so much in the sense of\nthe Way-between or the Medium or Mediator, as in the sense of the Means of\nGnosis.\n\nIt is also called Seed because it is the mystery of the power of growth\nand development; it is self-initiative.\n\nAnd if the Cross be Son and Father in separation and union, or as\nsimultaneously Cause and Result, it is likewise Spirit or Atman, and\ntherefore Life.\n\nIt is also Truth or the Perpetual Paradox, distinguishing and uniting in\nitself all pros and cons, and all analysis and synthesis in simultaneous\noperation.\n\nTherefore also is it called Faith, because it is the that which is stable\nand unchanging amid perpetual change. Faith in its true mystic meaning\nseems to denote the power of withdrawing the personal consciousness from\nbetween the pairs of opposites, where these appear external and other than\noneself, and embracing the opposites within the greater consciousness,\nwhen they are within oneself and appear as natural processes in the great\neconomy.\n\nFaith is of the contemplative mind; it embraces, it includes. It is\ntherefore of the Great Mother, as the life and substance of the Cross; so\nalso is it of Grace, elsewhere called Wisdom.\n\nFinally, the Cross regarded from this point of view is called Bread, the\nsubstance of Life.\n\nIn a remarkable paper in _The Theosophical Review_, Nov., 1907, E. R.\nInnes speaks of a vision of a great drama of those Powers beyond the\nmind-spheres, which in the Indian scriptures are called Food and\nEater--that is to say, the mystical union between the Not-self and the\nSelf.\n\nIn the _Chhandogyopanishad_, for instance, we read of one who had\npassed into the heaven-world possessing a knowledge of the identity of the\nSelf and Not-self. The transformations of his vehicles that thus occur in\nthe inner states or worlds become as it were processes of natural\ndigestion in his Great Body, for we read:\n\n\"Having what food he wills, what form he wills, this song he singing sits:\n\n  \"'O wonder, wonder, wonder!\n  Food I; food I; food I!\n  Food-eater I; food-eater I; food-eater I!'\"\n\n(See my _World-Mystery_, 2nd ed., p. 179.)\n\nOur author in similar fashion writes of a soul watching the processes of\nits own substance in the heaven-world.\n\n\"She watched the interaction of those two great currents of the One Great\nLife-Force--the Life-Force as Supporter, the Life-Force as Sustainer. She\nwatched the great transfiguration of the crossing over of the\nsurface-forms as life met life in perfect mystic union. As the currents\ncrossed the forms changed, but without loss of life or consciousness. The\nPowers crossed and recrossed; and with each appearance of that sacred\nsymbol there was further expansion and intensification of the Life-Force.\nAt each piercing or insinuation of the one into the other, that which had\nbeen two became one, yet there still remained the two. She watched the\ngreat mystery of that Cross on which the Heavenly Man dies in order to\nlive again.\n\n\"In heaven you do not demolish forms in order to sustain life, you daily\ninsinuate yourself into all the forms you meet, and thus by supplying them\nwith food, the food of your own greater life, you become each separate\nobject, and gain in power and expansiveness. Thus in heaven by sacrifice\ndo you grow and live, and slowly become the world. Thus in heaven do you\ngive life to others in order to live yourself; thus do the many rebecome\nthe One. The Great Mystery of the Bread of Life which must be partaken of\nby all before the Day of Triumph was acted out before her eyes.\"\n\nAnd it might be added that as heaven is a state and not a place, the\nmystery can be consummated on earth, and that this is the true sacrifice\nof the Christ and the Way to become a Christ.\n\n9. Ideas of this or a similar order may be held not rashly to underlie the\nwords of our text. The Cross of Life may well be called the Harmony--or\narticulation, or joining-together--of Wisdom, for it is by means of Wisdom\nthat all the contraries are joined together, and this Articulation\nconstitutes the \"firm necessity\" of Fate, which was also called in the\nGnostic schools the Harmony. And if it is a Cross of Life, it is also a\nCross of Light, for Life and Light are the eternally united twin-natures,\nfemale and male, of the Logos, the Good. Life is Passion and Light is\nUnderstanding. The Logos divides Himself to experience and know Himself.\n\n10. All opposites unite in Wisdom as a ground; she is the pure substance\nin which all the powers play. It is only when the Cross is regarded as a\nseparator, that it may be said to have a right and a left, with good\nforces on the one hand and evil on the other. The forces are in reality in\nthemselves the same forces; it is the personality of the man (represented\nby the upright of the Cross), which refers all things to its incomplete\nself, that regards them as good and evil.\n\nThis personality is rooted in the Lower Root or lower nature, and\nstretches upward towards the Above.\n\nBut in reality there are roots above and branches below, or roots below\nand branches above, of the trunk of this Tree of Life and Light. Though\nthe nomenclature is somewhat different, I cannot refrain from quoting a\nstriking passage from a Gnostic scripture to give the reader some idea of\nthe lofty region of thought to which the Gnosis accustomed its disciples.\n\nIt is taken from _The Great Announcement_, a document ascribed by\nHippolytus to the very beginning of the Christianized Gnosis. Strong\nefforts have been made to question this ascription, and to prove the\ndocument to be of a later date, but I think I have established a high\nprobability that it may be even a pre-Christian writing (see _H._, i.\n184).\n\nThe text is to be found in Hippolytus' _Refutation of all Heresies_ (vi.,\n18):\n\n\"To you, therefore, I say what I say and write what I write. And the\nwriting is this:\n\n\"Of the universal \u00c6ons (Eternities) there are two Branchings, without\nbeginning or end, from one Root, which is the Power unseeable,\nincomprehensible Silence.\n\n\"Of these Branchings one is manifested from Above--the Great Power, Mind\nof the universals, ordering all things, male; and the other from\nBelow--Great Thought, female, generating all things.\n\n\"Thence partnering one another they pair (lit. have union--_syzyg\u00eda_), and\nbring into manifestation the Middle Distance, incomprehensible Air without\nbeginning or end.\n\n\"In this is that Father, who supports and nourishes the things which have\nbeginning and end.\n\n\"This is He who has stood, stands and shall stand--a male-female Power in\naccordance with the transcendent Boundless Power, which hath neither\nbeginning nor end, subsisting in onlyness.\n\n\"It was by emanating from this Power (_sci._, Incomprehensible Silence)\nthat Thought-in-onlyness became two.\n\n\"Yet was He, (the Supernal Father) one; for having her (_sci._ Thought) in\nHimself He was alone [that is, all-one, or only, that is one-ly]. He was\nnot, however, [in this state] 'first,' although transcendent; it was only\nin manifesting Himself from Himself that He became 'second' [that is to\nsay, as He who stands]. Nay, He was not even called 'Father' till Thought\nnamed Him 'Father.'\n\n\"As, therefore, Himself pro-ducing Himself by means of Himself, He\nmanifested to Himself His own Thought; so also His Thought on manifesting\ndid not make [Him], but beholding Him, she concealed the Father, that is\nthe Power, in Herself, and is [thus] male-female, Power and Thought.\n\n\"Thence is it that they partner one another (for Power in no way differs\nfrom Thought) and yet are one. From the things Above is discovered Power,\nand from those Below Thought.\n\n\"So is it, too, with that which is manifested from them; namely, that\nthough it (_sci._ the Middle Distance, Incomprehensible Air) is one, it is\nfound to be two, male-female, having the female in itself.\n\n\"Thus is Mind in Thought--inseparable from one another, which though one\nare yet found to be two.\"\n\nI believe that our Vision of the Cross sets forth in living symbol\nprecisely what is explained above in more \"abstract\" terms. It would,\nhowever, be a mistake to make abstractions of these sublime ideas; they\nmust be realized as fullnesses, as transcendent realities. The Air, the\nBatos, the Middle Distance, is the manifestation, or thinking-manifest, of\nthe Divine to Itself, the true meaning of _ma-ya_. (See the\nTrismegistic Sermon, \"Though Unmanifest God is most Manifest,\" and the\ncommentary, _H._, ii., 99-109).\n\n11. I have translated the term [Greek: diapexamenos] by \"cross-beaming,\"\nfor [Greek: diapegion] is a \"cross-beam\"; and I would refer the reader to\nthe famous myth of Plato known as \"The Vision of Er,\" where the same idea\nis set forth when we read:\n\n\"There they saw the extremities of the Boundaries of the Heaven, extended\nin the midst of the Light; for this Light was the final Boundary of\nHeaven--_somewhat like the undergirdings of ships_--and thus confined its\nwhole revolution.\" (See _H._, i., 440.)\n\nThis \"cross-beaming\" or operation of the Cross is the mode of the\nenergizing of the Logos. It is the simultaneous separating and joining of\nthe generable and the ingenerable, the two modes of the Self-generable; it\nis the link between personal and impersonal, bound and free, finite and\ninfinite. It is the instrument of creation, male-female in one.\n\n12. There is little surprise, therefore, in learning that this mystery is\nnot the \"cross of wood\" which the disciple will see and has seen in the\npictures framed by his lower mind, when reading the historicized narrative\nof the mystery-drama or hearing the great story. Nor is it to be imagined\nthat the Lord could be hung upon such a cross of wood, seeing that He is\ncrucified in all men--He whom even the disciple in contemplation cannot\nsee as He is, but can only hear the Wisdom of His Voice.\n\n13. \"I was held to be what I am not.\" As to what the many say concerning\nthe mystery, they speak as the many vain and contradictory opinions. Nay,\neven those who believed in Him have not understood; they have been content\nwith a poor and unworthy conception of the mystery.\n\nThe teaching seems to be that as the Christ-story was intended to be the\nsetting-forth of an exemplar of what perfected man might be--namely, that\nthe path was fully opened for him all the way up to God--it was spiritual\nsuicide to rest content with a limited and prejudiced view. Every mould of\nthought was to be broken, every imperfect conception was to be\ntranscended, if there was to be realization.\n\nFor those who cling to the outward forms and symbols the Place of Rest is\nneither seen nor spoken of. This Place of Rest, this Home of Peace, is in\nreality the very Cross itself, the Firm Foundation, the that on which the\nwhole creation rests. And if the Place of Rest, where all things cross,\nand unite, the Mystic Centre of the whole system, which is everywhere, is\nnot seen or spoken of, \"much more shall the Lord of it be neither seen nor\nspoken of\"--He who has the power, of the Centre, who can adjust His\n\"centre of gravity\" at every moment of time, and therewith the attitude of\nthis Great Body or, if it be preferred, of his Mind, and thus be in\nperpetual balance, as the Justified and the Just One.\n\n14. The interpretation of the Vision that follows in the text may in its\nturn be interpreted from several standpoints. It may be regarded cosmicly\naccording to the _restauratio omnium_, when the whole creation becomes the\nobject of the Great Mercy, as Basilides calls it; or it may be taken\nsoteriologically as referring to the salvation or the making safe or sure\nof our humanity, or it may be referred to the perfection of the individual\nman.\n\nThe multitude of one appearance are the Earth-bound, the Hylics as the\nGnostics called them; that is, those who are immersed in things of matter,\nthe \"delights of the world.\" They are the Dead, because they are under\nthe sway of birth-and-death, the spheres of Fate. They have not yet \"risen\nfrom the Dead,\" and consciously ascended the Cross of Light and Life.\n\nThus in the preface to _The Book of the Gnoses of the Invisible God_, that\nis to say, \"The Book of the Gnosis of Jesus the Living One\"--which begins\nwith the beautiful words: \"I have loved you and longed to give you\nLife\"--we read the following Saying of the Lord:\n\n\"Jesus saith: Blessed is the man who crucifieth the world, and doth not\nlet the world crucify him.\"\n\nAnd later on the mystery is set forth in another Saying:\n\n\"Jesus saith: Blessed is the man who knoweth this Word, and hath brought\ndown the Heaven, and borne the Earth and raised it heavenwards; and he\nbecometh the Midst, for it (the Midst) is a 'nothing.'\" (_F._, 518, 519.)\n\nThose who have become spiritual, who have \"risen from the Dead,\" are born\ninto the Race of the Logos, they become kin with Him.\n\nOf this Race much has been written by the mystics of the many different\nschools of these early days.\n\nThus the Jewish Gnostic commentator of the Naassene Document writes:\n\n\"One is the Nature Below which is subject to Death; and one is the Race\nwithout a king [that is, those who are kings of themselves] which is born\nAbove\" (_H._, i., 164.).\n\nAnd the Christian Gnostic commentator refers to the \"ineffable Race of\nperfect men\" (_H._, i., 166), who are in the Logos.\n\nSuch _illuminati_ were called by one tradition of the Christianized Gnosis\nthe Race of Elxai, the Hidden Power or Holy Spirit, the Spouse of Iexai,\nthe Hidden Lord or Logos. (_H._, ii., 242; see my _Did Jesus live 100\nB.C.?_ chap. xviii.)\n\nPhilo of Alexandria tells us that \"Wisdom, who, after the fashion of a\nmother, brings forth the self-taught Race, declares that God is the Sower\nof it\" (_H._, i., 220). This is the term he applies to his beloved\nTherapeuts, adding that \"this Race is rare and found with difficulty.\"\n\nElsewhere he tells us that the angels are the \"people\" of God; but there\nis a still higher degree of union, whereby a man becomes one of the Race,\nor Kin, of God. This Race is an intimate union of all them who are \"kin to\nHim\"; they become one. For this Race \"is one, the highest one; but\n'people' is the name of many.\"\n\n\"As many, then, as have advanced in discipline and instruction, and been\nperfected therein, have their lot among this 'many.'\n\n\"But they who have passed beyond these introductory exercises, becoming\nnatural disciples of God, receiving Wisdom free from all toil, migrate to\nthis incorruptible and perfect Race, receiving a lot superior to their\nformer lives in genesis\" (_H._, i., 554.).\n\nAnd so in one of the Hymns of Thrice Greatest Hermes, after the triple\ntrisagion, the \"Hermes\" or Illuminated prays:\n\n\"And fill me with Thy Power and with this Grace of Thine, that I may give\nthe Light to those in ignorance of the Race--my Brethren and Thy Sons.\"\n(_H._, ii., 20.).\n\nPhilo calls it \"self-taught,\" just as the Buddhists speak of the Arhats as\n_asekha_; and the Trismegistic teacher writes:\n\n\"This Race, my sons, is never taught; but when He willeth it, its memory\nis restored by God.\" (_H._, ii., 221.)\n\nThe \"Elect Race\" of Valentinus is the \"Sonship\" of Basilides that\nincarnates on earth for the abolition of Death. (_F._, 303.)\n\nIn the _Pistis Sophia_ document, the Sophia, or the soul turning towards\nthe Light, first utters seven repentances, or \"turnings-of-the-mind,\" or\nrather of the whole nature. At the fourth of these, the turning-point of\nsome subcycle of the great Return, she prays that the Image of the Light\nmay not be turned or averted from her, for the time is come when \"those\nwho turn in the lowest regions\" should be regarded--\"the mystery which is\nmade the type of the Race.\" (_F._, 471.)\n\nAgain in the introduction to _The Book of the Great Logos according to the\nMystery_, the disciples beg the Master to explain the Mystery of the Word.\nJesus answers that the Life of His Father consists in their purifying\ntheir souls from all earthly stain, and making them to become the Race of\nthe Mind, so that they may be filled with understanding and by His\nteaching perfect themselves. (_F._, 528.)\n\nFinally in the marvellous _Untitled Apocalypse_ of the Bruce Codex we\nread:\n\n\"These words said the Lord of the Universe to them, and disappeared from\nthem, and hid Himself from them.\n\n\"And the Births-of-matter rejoiced that they had been remembered, and were\nglad that they had come out of the narrow and difficult place, and prayed\nto the Hidden Mystery:\n\n\"'Give us authority that we may create for ourselves \u00e6ons and worlds\naccording to Thy Word, upon which Thou didst agree with Thy servant; for\nThou alone art the changeless One, Thou alone the boundless, the\nuncontainable, self-taught, self-born Self-father; Thou alone art the\nunshakeable and unknowable; Thou alone art Silence and Love, and Source of\nall; Thou alone art virgin of matter, spotless; whose Race no man can\ntell, whose manifestation no man can comprehend.'\" (_F._, 564.)\n\nTo understand, man must pass beyond the stage of man, and self-realize\nhimself as \"kin to Him\"--the Logos.\n\nIt is, however, doubtful whether \"Race\" is the correct reading in our\ntext; but as it is the clear reading in 15 the above notes are germane to\nour study. The MS. apparently reads \"every Limb.\" This again is one of the\nmost general Gnostic mystical terms, and is taken over from the Osiric\nMysteries. The Limbs of the God are scattered abroad, and collected\ntogether again in the resurrection. The inner meaning of this graphic\nsymbolism may be gleaned from the following striking passages.\n\nIn a MS. of the Gnostic Marcus there is a description of the method of\nsymbolizing the Great Body of the Heavenly Man, whereby the twenty-four\nletters of the Greek alphabet were assigned in pairs to the twelve Limbs.\nThis Body was the symbol of the ideal economy, dispensation or ordering of\nthe universe, its planes, regions, hierarchies, and powers. (_F._, 366.)\n\nThis also is the true Body of man, the Source of all his bodies. And so we\nread the following mystery-saying in _The Gospel of Eve_:\n\n\"I stood on a lofty mountain and saw a Great Man, and another, a dwarf,\nand heard as it were a Voice of thunder, and drew nigh for to hear. And He\nspake unto me and said: 'I am thou, and thou art I; and wheresoever thou\nart, I am there, and in all am I sown (or scattered). And whencesoever\nthou willest, thou gatherest Me; and gathering Me, thou gatherest\nThyself.'\" (_F._, 439.)\n\nThis is a vision of the Great Person and little person, of the Higher Self\nand lower self. It may also be interpreted in terms of the Logos and\nhumanity; but it comes nearer home to think of it as the mystery of the\nindividual man--the scattering of the Limbs of the Great Person in the\npersonalities that have been his in many births.\n\nThis idea is brought out more clearly in a passage from _The Gospel of\nPhilip_. It is an apology or defence, as it was called, a formula to be\nused by the soul in its ascent above, as it passed through the space of\nthe Midst; and for the mystic it is a declaration of the state of a man\nwho is in his last compulsory earth-life.\n\n\"I have recognised myself, and gathered myself together from all sides. I\nhave sown no children for the Ruler, but have torn up his roots, and have\ngathered together my Limbs that were scattered abroad. I know Thee who\nThou art; for I am of those from Above.\" (_Ibid._)\n\nHe has sown no children to the Ruler, the Lord of Death; he has not\ncontracted any fresh debt, or created a new form of personality, into\nwhich he must again incarnate. But he has torn up the roots of Death, by\nshattering the form of egoity, and bursting the bonds of Fate. He has\ngathered together his Limbs, completed the articulation of his Perfect\nBody.\n\nThe Limbs were according to certain orderings, one of which was the\nconfiguration of the five-fold Star, the five-limbed Man. Thus in _The\nActs of Thomas_ we read:\n\n\"Come Thou who art more ancient far than the five holy Limbs--Mind,\nThought, Reflection, Thinking, Reasoning! Commune with them of later\nbirth!\" (_F._, 422.)\n\nThese five Limbs are also the five Words of the mystery of the Vesture of\nLight in the _Pistis Sophia_ (p. 16), with which the Christ is clothed in\npower on the Day of Triumph, the Great Day \"Come unto us,\" when His Limbs\nare gathered together and the Song of the Powers begins:\n\n\"Come unto us, for we are Thy Fellow-Limbs. We are all one with thee. We\nare one and the same, and Thou art one and the same.\"\n\nIn the whole document much is said of the \"sweet mysteries that are in the\nLimbs of the Ineffable,\" but it would be too long to repeat it here. It\nwill be perhaps of greater service to append a very striking passage, from\n_The Books of the Saviour_, which has been copied into the MS. of the\n_Pistis Sophia_ (pp. 253, 254):\n\n\"And they who are worthy of the Mysteries that dwell in the Ineffable,\nwhich are those that have not emanated--these are prior to the First\nMystery. To use a similitude and correspondence of speech that ye may\nunderstand, they are the Limbs of the Ineffable. And each is according to\nthe dignity of its Glory--the Head according to the dignity of the Head,\nthe Eye according to the dignity of the Eye, the Ear according to the\ndignity of the Ear, and the rest of the Limbs [in like fashion]; so that\nthe matter is plain: There are many Limbs (Members) but only one Body.\n\n\"Of this I have spoken in a plan, a correspondence and similitude, but not\nin its true form; nor have I revealed the Word in Truth, but as the\nMystery of the Ineffable.\n\n\"And all the Limbs that are in Him..., that is, they that dwell in the\nMystery of the Ineffable, and they that dwell in Him, and also the Three\nSpaces that follow according to their Mysteries--of all of these in truth\nand verity am I the Treasure; apart from which there is no Treasure\npeculiar to [this] cosmos. But there are other Words and Mysteries and\nRegions [of other worlds].\n\n\"Now, therefore, Blessed is he who hath found the Words of the Mysteries\nof the Space towards the exterior. He is a God who hath found the Words of\nthe Mysteries of the second Space, in the midst. He is a Saviour and free\nof every space who hath found the Words of the Mysteries of the third\nSpace towards the interior....\n\n\"But He, on the other hand, who hath found the Words of the Mysteries\nwhich I have set forth for you according to a similitude--namely, the\nLimbs of the Ineffable--Amen I say unto you, that man who hath found\nthe Words of those Mysteries in the Truth of God, he is the First in\nTruth, and like unto Him; for it is through these Words and Mysteries that\n[all things are made] and the universe itself stands through that First\nOne. Therefore is he who hath found the Words of these Mysteries, like\nunto the First. For it is the gnosis of the Gnosis of the Ineffable in\nwhich I have spoken with you this day.\"\n\nIt is thus seen that the means used in revealing the manner of the highest\nMysteries of the Ineffable was by the similitude of the Limbs or Members\nof the Body. It, therefore, follows, as we have already seen, that this\nsymbolism was one of the most, if not the most, fundamental in this\nGnosis. The three stages of perfectioning are those of the Saint, God and\nSaviour. But these are still stages in evolution or process, no matter how\nsublime they be. The fourth or consummation is other; it transcends\nprocess, it is ever itself with itself, embracing all processes and all\npowers simultaneously. But we must not be tempted to comment on this\ninstructive passage, for there is quite enough material in it to develop\ninto a small treatise in itself. For an admirable intuition of the Mystery\nof the Limbs of the Ineffable, and the meaning of the words \"the Head is\naccording to the dignity of the Head,\" etc., the reader is referred to the\nbeautiful passage in _The Untitled Apocalypse_ of the Bruce Codex, quoted\nin the comments on _The Hymn of Jesus_ (pp. 54, 55).\n\nThe Gnostic seers lost themselves in the contemplation of the simultaneous\nsimplicity and multiplicity of these Mysteries. Thus again in the same\n_Untitled Apocalypse_ we read:\n\n\"He it is whose Limbs (Members) make a myriad of myriads of Powers, each\none of which comes from Him.\" (_F._, 547).\n\nThis graphic symbolism of the Limbs is derived from the tradition of the\nOsiric Mysteries. Many a passage could be quoted in illustration from _The\nBook of the Coming-forth by Day_, that strange and marvellous collection\nof Egyptian Rituals commonly known as the _Book of the Dead_; but perhaps\nthe under-meaning of the mystery is nowhere more clearly shown than in the\nfollowing magnificent passage from _The Litany of the Sun_, inscribed on\nthe Tombs of the Kings of ancient Thebes:\n\n\"The Kingly Osiris is an intelligent Essence. His Limbs conduct Him; His\n'Fleshes' open the way for Him. Those who are born from Him create Him.\nThey rest when they have caused the Kingly Osiris to be born.\n\n\"It is He who causes them to be born. It is He who engenders them. It is\nHe who causes them to exist. His Birth is the Birth of Ra in Amenti. He\ncauses the Kingly Osiris to be born; He causes the Birth of Himself.\"\n\n(See my _World-Mystery_, 2nd ed., p. 162.)\n\nIt requires no elaboration to show that this is precisely the same mystery\nas the secret set forth in our Vision of the Cross. The Kingly Osiris is\nAtman, the Self, the True Man, the Monad. This is the Kingly Osiris in\nhis male-female nature, self-creative. Atman is both the producer and\nproduct of evolution. In a restricted sense the above may be interpreted\nfrom the standpoint of the individuality and its series of personalities\nin incarnation.\n\n15. And now to return to the text. The Race is the Upper Nature, now\nscattered abroad in the hearts of men; it is the true Spirit of man, the\nhidden Divinity within him. It is this which re-turns, and so causes the\nman to turn or repent. It is obedient, that is audient, to the Voice of\nthe Self, the compelling Utterance of the Logos. He who not only hears,\nbut hearkens to or obeys the sweet counsels of this Great Persuasion,\nbecomes this Upper Nature consciously; and therefore it no longer is what\nit was, for it is conscious in the man, and so the man is above men of the\nlower nature.\n\n16. These mysterious sentences all set forth the state of true\nSelf-consciousness. So long as man is not conscious that he is Divine, so\nlong is the Divine in him not what it really is; the \"lower\" \"limits\" the\n\"higher.\" Union is attained by \"hearkening,\" by \"attention.\" Then it is\nthat the man becomes his Higher Self, and that Higher Self becomes in its\nturn the Self, having taken his self in separation into his Self as union.\n\n17. This \"attention\" is the straining or striving towards the One; and\ntherefore no attention must be paid to the many. The whole strife of\nwarring opinions and doubts must be reconciled, or at-oned, within the\nMystery. The thought must be allowed to dwell but little on \"those\nwithout.\" A height must be reached from which the whole human drama can be\nseen as a spectacle below and within; this height is not with regard to\nspace and place, but with respect to consciousness and realization that\nall is taking place within the man's Great Body as the operations of the\nDivine economy. They who are \"without the mystery\" are not arbitrarily\nexcluded, but are those who prefer to go forth without instead of\nreturning within.\n\n18. They who have re-turned, or turned back on themselves, and entered\ninto themselves for the realization of true Self-consciousness, alone can\nunderstand the meaning of the Great Passion, as has been so admirably set\nforth in the Mystery-Ritual of the Dance.\n\nThose who have consciousness of these spiritual verities, nay, even those\nwho have but dimly felt their greatness, will easily understand that the\nstory of the crucifixion as believed in by the masses was for the Gnostics\nbut the shadow of an eternal happening that most intimately concerned\nevery man in his inmost nature.\n\n19. The outer story was centred round a dramatic crisis of death on a\nstationary cross--a dead symbol, and a symbol of death. But the inner rite\nwas one of movement and \"dancing,\" a living symbol and a symbol of life.\nThis was shown to the disciple--indeed, as we have seen, he was made in\nthe Dance to partake in it--that he might know the mystery of suffering in\na moment of Great Experience. He saw it and became it; it was shown him in\naction. He had seen sorrow and suffering, and the cause of it had been\ndimly felt; but its ceasing he did not yet know really, for the ceasing of\nsorrow could only come when he could realize sorrow and joy, suffering and\nbliss, simultaneously. And that mystery the Christ alone knows.\n\n20. Let the disciple then first see the suffering of the man through, not\nhis own, but His Master's eyes. He will first only see the mystery, grasp\nit intellectually; he will not as yet realize it. When he realizes it,\nthere will then be bliss indeed, for he will begin to become the Master\nHimself. And the Master is the conqueror of woe--not, however, in the\nsense of the annihilator of it, but as the one who rejoices in it; for he\nknows that it is the necessary concomitant of bliss, and that the more\npain he suffers in one portion of his nature, the more bliss he\nexperiences in another; the deeper the one the deeper the other, and\ntherewith the intenser becomes his whole nature. His Great Body is\nlearning to respond to greater and greater impulses or \"vibrations.\"\n\nThe consummation is that he becomes capable of experiencing joy in sorrow\nand sorrow in joy; and thus reaches to the gnosis that these are\ninseparables, and that the solution of the mystery is the power of ever\nexperiencing both simultaneously.\n\n21. It may thus to some extent become clear that what is asserted of the\nChrist in the general Gospel-story is typically true and yet is not true.\nThose who look at one side only of the living picture see in a glass\ndarkly.\n\nIf we could only realize that all the ugliness and misery and confusion of\nlife is but the underside, as it were, of a pattern woven on the Great\nLoom or embroidered by Divine Fingers! We can in our imperfect\nconsciousness see only the underside, the medley of crossing of threads,\nthe knots and finishings-off; we cannot see the pattern. Nevertheless it\nexists simultaneously with the underside. The Christ sees both sides\nsimultaneously, and understands.\n\n22. But the term that our Gnostic writer chooses with which to depict this\ngrade of being is not Christ, but Word or Reason (Logos). This Reason is\nnot the ratiocinative faculty in man which conditions him as a duality; it\nis rather more as a Divine Monad, as Pure Reason, or that which can hold\nall opposites in one. It is called Word because it is the immediate\nintelligible Utterance of God.\n\n23. This is the first mystery that man must learn to understand; then will\nhe be able to understand God as unity; and only finally will he understand\nthe greatest mystery of all--man, the personal man, the thing we each of\nus now are, God in multiplicity, and why there is suffering.\n\n24. With this the writer breaks off, knowing fully how difficult it is to\nexpress in human speech the living ideas that have come to birth in him,\nand knowing that there are still more marvellous truths of which he has\ncaught some glimpse or heard some echo, but which he feels he can in no\nway set forth in proper decency.\n\nAnd so he tells us the Lord is taken up, unseen by the multitudes. That is\nto say, presumably, no one in the state of the multiplicity of the lower\nnature can behold the vision of unity.\n\n25. When he descends from the height of contemplation, however, he\nremembers enough to enable him to laugh at the echoes of his former doubts\nand fancies and misconceptions, and to make him realize the marvellous\npower of the natural living symbolic language that underlies the words of\nthe mystery-narrative that sets forth the story of the Christ.\n\n\n\n\nPOSTCRIPT.\n\n\nThe vision itself is not so marvellous as the instruction; nevertheless it\nallows us to see that the Cross in its supernal nature is the Heavenly Man\nwith arms outstretched in blessing, showering benefits on all--the\nperpetual Self-sacrifice (_F._, 330). And in this connection we should\nremind ourselves of the following striking sentence from _The Untitled\nApocalypse_ of the Bruce Codex, an apocalypse which contains perhaps the\nmost sublime visions that have survived to us from the Gnosis:\n\n\"The Outspreading of His Hands is the manifestation of the Cross.\"\n\nAnd then follows the key of the mystery:\n\n\"The Source of the Cross is the Man [Logos] whom no man can comprehend.\"\n\n(See _Hymn of Jesus_, p. 53.)\n\nNo man can comprehend Man; the little cannot contain the Great, except\npotentially.\n\nIt was some echo of this sublime teaching that found its way into the\nna\u00efve though allegorical narrative of _The Acts of Philip_. When Philip\nwas crucified he cursed his enemies.\n\n     \"And behold suddenly the abyss was opened, and the whole of the place\n     in which the proconsul was sitting was swallowed up, and the whole of\n     the temple, and the viper which they worshipped, and great crowds,\n     and the priests of the viper, about seven thousand men, besides women\n     and children, except where the apostles were; they remained\n     unshaken.\"\n\nThis is a cataclysm in which the lower nature of the man is engulfed. The\napostles are his higher powers; the rest the opposing forces. The latter\nplunge into Hades and experience the punishments of those who crucify the\nChrist and his apostles. They are thus converted and sing their\nrepentance. Whereupon a Voice was heard saying: \"I shall be merciful to\nyou in the Cross of Light.\"\n\nPhilip is reproved by the Saviour for his unmerciful spirit.\n\n\"But I, O Philip, will not endure thee, because thou hast swallowed up the\nmen in the abyss; but behold My Spirit is in them, and I will bring them\nup from the dead; and thus they, seeing thee, shall believe in the Glory\nof Him that sent thee.\n\n\"And the Saviour having turned, stretched up His hand, and marked a Cross\nin the Air coming down from Above even unto the Abyss, and it was full of\nLight, and had its form after the likeness of a ladder. And all the\nmultitude that had gone down from the City into the Abyss came up on the\nLadder of the Cross of Light; but there remained below the proconsul and\nthe viper which these worshipped. And when the multitude had come up,\nhaving looked upon Philip hanging head downwards, they lamented with\ngreat lamentation at the lawless action which they had done.\"\n\nThe doers of the \"lawless\" deed are the same as the \"lawless Jews\" in the\n_Acts of John_--\"those who are under the law of the lawless Serpent\"; that\nis to say, those who are under the sway of Generation, as contrasted with\nthose under the law of Re-generation (see _Hymn of Jesus_, pp. 28, 47).\n\nPhilip stands for the man learning the last lesson of divine mercy. The\nProconsul and the Viper are the antitypes of the Saviour and the Serpent\nof Wisdom. The crucifixion of Philip is, however, not the same as the\ncrucifixion of the Christ; he is hanged reversed, his head to the earth\nand not towards heaven. It is a lower grade of the mysteries.\n\nConcerning the mystery of the crucifixion of the Christ we learn somewhat\nof its inner nature from the doctrines of the Docet\u00e6.\n\nHis baptism was on this wise: He washed Himself in the Jordan, that is\nthe Stream of the Logos, and after His purification in the Life-giving\nWater, He became possessed of a spiritual or perfect body, the type and\nsignature of which were in accordance with the matter of his virginity,\nthat is of virgin substance; so that when the World-ruler, or God of\ngeneration or death, condemned his own plasm, the physical body, to death,\nthat is to the Cross, the soul nourished in that physical body might strip\noff the body of flesh, and nail it to the \"tree,\" and yet triumph over the\npowers of the Ruler and not be found naked, but clothed in a robe of\nglory. Hence the saying: \"Except a man be born of Water and the Spirit he\ncannot enter into the Kingship of the Heavens; that which is born of the\nflesh is flesh.\" (_F._, p. 221).\n\nIt was because of these and such like ideas, and in the conviction that\nthe mystery of the crucifixion was to be worked out in every man, that a\nGnostic writer, following the Valentinian tradition, explains a famous\npassage in the Pauline _Letter to the Ephesians_ as follows:\n\n\"'For this cause I bow my knees to the God and Father and Lord of our Lord\nJesus Christ, that God may vouchsafe to you that Christ may dwell in your\ninner man'--that is to say, the psychic and not the bodily man--'that ye\nmay be strong to know what is the Depth'--that is, the Father of the\nuniversals--'and what is the Breadth'--that is the Cross, the Boundary of\nthe Pleroma [or Fullness]--'and what is the Greatness'--that is, the\nPleroma of the \u00e6ons [the eternities or universals, the Limbs of the\nBody of the Ineffable].\" (_F._, 532).\n\nTo be closely compared with the Vision in _The Acts of John_ is the\nAddress of Andrew to the Cross in _The Acts of Andrew_. They both plainly\nbelong to the same tradition, and might indeed have been written by the\nsame hand.\n\n\"Rejoicing I come to thee, Thou Cross, the Life-giver, Cross whom I now\nknow to be mine. I know thy mystery; for thou hast been planted in the\nworld to make-fast things unstable.\n\n\"Thy head stretcheth up into heaven, that thou mayest symbol-forth the\nHeavenly Logos, the Head of all things.\n\n\"Thy middle parts are stretched forth, as it were hands to right and left,\nto put to flight the envious and hostile power of the Evil One, that thou\nmayest gather together into one them [_sci._, the Limbs] that are\nscattered abroad.\n\n\"Thy foot is set in the earth, sunk in the deep [_i.e._, abyss], that thou\nmayest draw up those that lie beneath the earth and are held fast in the\nregions beneath it, and mayest join them to those in heaven.\n\n\"O Cross, engine, most skilfully devised, of Salvation, given unto men by\nthe Highest; O Cross, invincible trophy of the Conquest of Christ o'er His\nfoes; O Cross, thou life-giving tree, roots planted on earth, fruit\ntreasured in heaven; O Cross most venerable, sweet thing and sweet name;\nO Cross most worshipful, who bearest as grapes the Master, the true vine,\nwho dost bear, too, the Thief as thy fruit, fruitage of faith through\nconfession; thou who bringest the worthy to God through the Gnosis and\nsummonest sinners home through repentance!\"\n\nA magnificent address indeed. The identification of the Master and the man\nwith the Cross and in the Cross is hardly disguised. The Cross is the Tree\nof Life and the tree of death simultaneously. \"Give up thy life that thou\nmayest live,\" says that inspired mystic treatise, _The Voice of the\nSilence_, and this is no other than the secret of the Mystery of the\nCross. The Master is hanged between two thieves, the one repentant and the\nother obdurate, the soul turned towards the Light and towards the\nDarkness, all united in the one Mystery of the Cross--the Mystery of Man.\n\nWe have seen above that Philip is hanged head downwards, but he is not\nthe most famous instance of this reversal. The best known is associated\nwith the name of Peter in the mystic romances.\n\nThus in a fragment of the Linus-collection called _The Martyrdom of\nPeter_, we learn the doctrine as set forth in a speech put into the mouth\nof Peter thus crucified:\n\n\"Fitly wast Thou alone stretched on the Cross with head on high, O Lord,\nwho hast redeemed all of the world from sin.\n\n\"I have desired to imitate Thee in Thy Passion too; yet would I not take\non myself to be hanged upright.\n\n\"For we, pure men and sinners, are born from Adam, but Thou art God of\nGod, Light of true Light, before all \u00e6ons and after them; thought worthy\nto become for men Man without strain of man, Thou has stood forth man's\nglorious Saviour--Thou ever upright, ever raised on high, eternally Above!\n\n\"We, men according to the flesh, are sons of the First Man (Adam), who\nsank his being in the earth, whose fall in human generation is shown\nforth.\n\n\"For we are brought to birth in such a way, that we do seem to be poured\ninto earth, so that the right is left, the left doth right become; in that\nour state is changed in those who are the authors of this life.\n\n\"For this world down below doth think the right what is the left--this\nworld in which Thou, Lord, hast found us like the Ninevites, and by Thy\nholy preaching hast thou rescued these about to die.\"\n\nThe \"authors of this life\" of reversal, are the \"parents\" of the \"lower\nnature\"; not our natural parents whom we are to love, but the powers of\nillusion we are to abandon. The Jonah-myth was used as a type of the\nInitiate, who after being \"three days\" in the Belly of the Fish, the Great\nLife or Animal that dwells in the Ocean or Great Water, is vomited forth\nre-generate, and so a fit vehicle for preaching with compelling words or\nacts for the benefit of those in Nineveh or the Jerusalem Below, or this\nworld.\n\nBut for those who had ears to hear there was a still further instruction\nconcerning the secret of the Mystic Cross.\n\n\"But ye, my brothers, who have the right to hear, lend me the ears of your\nheart, and understand what now must be revealed to you--the hidden mystery\nof every nature and secret source of every thing composed.\n\n\"For the First Man, whose race I represent by my position, with head\nreversed, doth symbolize the birth into destruction; for that his birth\nwas death and lacked the Life-stream.\n\n\"But of His own compassion the Power Above came down into the world, by\nmeans of corporal substance, to him who by a just decree had been cast\ndown into the earth, and hanged upon the Cross, and by the means of this\nmost holy calling [the Cross] He did restore us, and did make for us these\npresent things (which had till then remained unchanged by men's\nunrighteous error) into the Left, and those that men had taken for the\nLeft into eternal things.\n\n\"In exaltation of the Right He hath changed all the signs into their\nproper nature, considering as good those thought not good, and those men\nthought malefic most benign.\n\n\"Whence in a mystery the Lord hath said: 'If ye make not the Right like to\nthe Left, the Left like to the Right, Above as the Below, Before as the\nBehind, ye shall not know God's Kingdom.'\"\n\n(This saying is from _The Gospel according to the Egyptians_.)\n\n\"This saying have I made manifest in myself, my brothers; this is the way\nin which your eyes of flesh behold me hanging. It figures forth the Way of\nthe First Man.\n\n\"But ye, beloved, hearing these words, and, by conversion of your nature\nand changing of your life, perfecting them, even as ye have turned you\nfrom that Way of Error where ye trod, unto the most sure state of Faith,\nso keep ye running, and strive towards the Peace that calls you from\nAbove, living the holy life. For that the Way in which ye travel there is\nChrist.\n\n\"Therefore with Jesus, Christ, true God, ascend the Cross. He hath been\nmade for us the One and Only Word; whence also doth the Spirit say:\n'Christ is the Word and Voice of God.'\n\n\"The Word in truth is symbolled forth by that straight stem on which I\nhang. As for the Voice--since that voice is a thing of flesh, with\nfeatures not to be ascribed unto God's nature, the cross-piece of the\nCross is thought to figure forth that human nature which suffered the\nfault of change in the First Man, but by the help of God-and-man received\nagain its real Mind.\n\n\"Right in the centre, joining twain in one, is set the nail of\ndiscipline--conversion and repentance.\" (_F._, 446-449.)\n\nThe interpretation becomes somewhat strained towards the end. The\nreversed hanging typified the man of sex, or the man still under the sway\nof generation, separated into male and female. Such hang head-downwards in\nthe Great Womb of Nature, and all is reversed for them. Hanged upright,\nthe re-generate man contains in himself in active operation the twin\npowers in union, now used for spiritual creation, and self-perfection.\n\nAnd if it be thought that there is abandonment of any thing in this\nconsummation, then let it be known that it is only a giving up of the part\nfor the whole, the passing from the state of separation to the realization\nof inexpressible bliss; for as the inspired writer of _The Untitled\nApocalypse_ phrases it in an ecstasy of enthusiasm:\n\n\"This is the eternal Father; this the ineffable, unthinkable,\nincomprehensible, untranscendible Father. He it is in whom the All became\njoyous; it rejoiced and was joyful, and brought forth in its joy myriads\nof myriads of \u00c6ons; they were called the 'Births of Joy,' because the All\nhad joyed with the Father.\n\n\"These are the worlds from which the Cross upsprang; out of these\nincorporeal Members did the Man arise.\" (_F._, 550).\n\n\n\n\n  PRINTED BY PERCY LUND, HUMPHRIES AND CO., LTD.,\n  THE COUNTRY PRESS, BRADFORD;\n  3, AMEN CORNER, LONDON, E.C.;\n  AND 97, BRIDGE STREET, MANCHESTER.\n  14887\n\n\n\n\nTranscriber's Notes:\n\nPassages in italics are indicated by _italics_.\n\nThe original text includes Greek characters. For this text version\nthese letters have been replaced with transliterations that appear\nas [Greek: transliteration].","title":"The Gnostic Crucifixion","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":12236}