Today is the Feast of Saint Mary Magdalene, and nowhere more so than in Provence, where she is hailed as their patron saint.
Perhaps this is a propitious moment to bring to light the Gospel of Mary, found in 1896 and then included in the pantheon of Nag Hammadi texts. Mary Magdalene is considered by many scholars to be its author.
The gospel predominantly takes place after their Lord has left them. He parts with the admonition that at the "end of time" all will return to their root, to their true natures, as everything else will fall away.
As an aside, I find this interesting as today, with the radical changes in the Earth's energy, we are feeling a kind of vulnerability as we are being "laid open" and exposed with little in the external world to support us any longer. All the old gods are dying and being proven false, forcing our true natures to indeed rise to the surface, for better or for worse. A "plastered onto the heart" form of piety or belief proves itself to be shallow indeed in the face of the trials that are now upon all of us.
The apostles, including Peter, were terrified after he left, uncertain as to how to proceed with his mission. Mary Magdalene rises and calms them and then tells them of a dream she had where her Lord appeared and counselled her on the ascension of the soul and how to surpass the "demons at the gate" who will always try to thwart you as you get closer to the Divine and to the realization of your goal.
Interestingly many pages from the ensuing text are missing but with the heart of our imagination let us re-construct them once more and paraphrase what she was trying to say.
In the dream she asks Jesus how the soul "sees" and "understands" and whether it is the spirit that leads one to truth or is it through other means. His answer is oblique but implies that is is neither one nor the other but really both that assist. Certainly the truth of the divine cannot be won through the mind alone as this is the province of evil if left to its own devices without the heart and without conscience.
And love is the province of the heart.
This seeing and knowing comes through the eye of the heart in a way that filters out all detritus and does not allow the demons to hold sway. That kind of rootedness allows the spirit and the soul to find its way, as long as the meditation of the heart is always on the divine. It becomes a different way of seeing and being that belies reason alone, although we do not ignore it, and causes windows and doors of infinite possibilities to open.
Then comes a long discourse on the seven demons that we all encounter that try to thwart us on the path of our dreams and, although the pages have been lost, the answer is relatively simple and profound: that nothing, and no one, should ever come between us and the realization of our dreams and what we perceive our (divine) mission and purpose to be, although many will try. By rooting oneself in the divine and being relentless about achieving what we know in our heart to be our mission and destiny, success will follow. If one believes this, absolutely nothing is impossible. Nothing, especially now where our thoughts are being magnetized into reality in very short order, for better or for worse.
The naysayers will try to stop you because they have already given up on their dreams and they are jealous that you have the audacity to pursue yours. Ignore them. If they have embraced mediocrity and fear, which seems to be the siren call of our society, so be it. Pity them, and then continue to ascend. You will be tested and it will not be easy, but your enduring love and need to achieve your dreams will see you through if you persist, relentlessly.
Back to our story: Of course, the other apostles including Peter (especially Peter) grew angry at this and said that these were strange teachings indeed and besides, why would the Lord confer with a woman? His hotheadedness (mentioned in more than one of the Gnostic gospels) caused the Magdalene to become upset and she started to cry. It was Levy who admonished Peter by reminding him that the Lord loved Mary more than all the others and who were they to argue with her? If the Lord chose her then they should listen to what she said, he counselled, and so they departed.
It gives one pause to speculate on how much of the vision she imparted resonated with the others, especially Peter. And that how the ensuing message of these nascent teachings could have been so much more than they became if they had been internalized more, and understood.
They could have become what the message meant: that it is an internal and personal salvation (however we define the term) that is required and that nothing, no external strictures, no external organization or church, no messianic leader, can replace the knowledge that lies inside the human heart, where the divine resides sitting quietly, waiting.
Perhaps this is a propitious moment to bring to light the Gospel of Mary, found in 1896 and then included in the pantheon of Nag Hammadi texts. Mary Magdalene is considered by many scholars to be its author.
The gospel predominantly takes place after their Lord has left them. He parts with the admonition that at the "end of time" all will return to their root, to their true natures, as everything else will fall away.
As an aside, I find this interesting as today, with the radical changes in the Earth's energy, we are feeling a kind of vulnerability as we are being "laid open" and exposed with little in the external world to support us any longer. All the old gods are dying and being proven false, forcing our true natures to indeed rise to the surface, for better or for worse. A "plastered onto the heart" form of piety or belief proves itself to be shallow indeed in the face of the trials that are now upon all of us.
The apostles, including Peter, were terrified after he left, uncertain as to how to proceed with his mission. Mary Magdalene rises and calms them and then tells them of a dream she had where her Lord appeared and counselled her on the ascension of the soul and how to surpass the "demons at the gate" who will always try to thwart you as you get closer to the Divine and to the realization of your goal.
Interestingly many pages from the ensuing text are missing but with the heart of our imagination let us re-construct them once more and paraphrase what she was trying to say.
In the dream she asks Jesus how the soul "sees" and "understands" and whether it is the spirit that leads one to truth or is it through other means. His answer is oblique but implies that is is neither one nor the other but really both that assist. Certainly the truth of the divine cannot be won through the mind alone as this is the province of evil if left to its own devices without the heart and without conscience.
And love is the province of the heart.
This seeing and knowing comes through the eye of the heart in a way that filters out all detritus and does not allow the demons to hold sway. That kind of rootedness allows the spirit and the soul to find its way, as long as the meditation of the heart is always on the divine. It becomes a different way of seeing and being that belies reason alone, although we do not ignore it, and causes windows and doors of infinite possibilities to open.
Then comes a long discourse on the seven demons that we all encounter that try to thwart us on the path of our dreams and, although the pages have been lost, the answer is relatively simple and profound: that nothing, and no one, should ever come between us and the realization of our dreams and what we perceive our (divine) mission and purpose to be, although many will try. By rooting oneself in the divine and being relentless about achieving what we know in our heart to be our mission and destiny, success will follow. If one believes this, absolutely nothing is impossible. Nothing, especially now where our thoughts are being magnetized into reality in very short order, for better or for worse.
The naysayers will try to stop you because they have already given up on their dreams and they are jealous that you have the audacity to pursue yours. Ignore them. If they have embraced mediocrity and fear, which seems to be the siren call of our society, so be it. Pity them, and then continue to ascend. You will be tested and it will not be easy, but your enduring love and need to achieve your dreams will see you through if you persist, relentlessly.
Back to our story: Of course, the other apostles including Peter (especially Peter) grew angry at this and said that these were strange teachings indeed and besides, why would the Lord confer with a woman? His hotheadedness (mentioned in more than one of the Gnostic gospels) caused the Magdalene to become upset and she started to cry. It was Levy who admonished Peter by reminding him that the Lord loved Mary more than all the others and who were they to argue with her? If the Lord chose her then they should listen to what she said, he counselled, and so they departed.
It gives one pause to speculate on how much of the vision she imparted resonated with the others, especially Peter. And that how the ensuing message of these nascent teachings could have been so much more than they became if they had been internalized more, and understood.
They could have become what the message meant: that it is an internal and personal salvation (however we define the term) that is required and that nothing, no external strictures, no external organization or church, no messianic leader, can replace the knowledge that lies inside the human heart, where the divine resides sitting quietly, waiting.