Mysticism & Gospel of Thomas – No. 55 – Self-Realization

Verse - Self-Realization

Jesus said, "If anyone does not hate his father and mother, he cannot be my disciple. And anyone who does not hate his brothers and sisters and does not bear the cross as I do will not be worthy of me." (At this point there is actually an Egyptian ankh [ancient Egyptian cross] in the original text! This means that the Christian cross was not meant here!)

Comment

It says that whoever turns outwards instead of inwards for the sake of external ties and interrupts or breaks the connection with the divine Father within, remains distant from himself - his innermost self, Christ within him - and does not achieve unity. Since he seeks his support and salvation externally, he loses his inner support and salvation from within.

Whoever finds his life externally will lose it. Because everything external is transitory; but whoever loses his life for the sake of Myself, whoever lets go of external ties for the sake of inner unity, will find it, namely eternal life, life from the fullness of the Kingdom of God. This is the deeper meaning of all the admonitions to self-knowledge as the preliminary stage to knowing God and becoming one, which we also encounter in other words of Christ, such as in the rediscovered word - here as a happy promise: Whoever knows himself will find.

For when you know yourselves, you will know that you are sons of the Father, the Perfect One. You will recognize Him in you. With this, Jesus repeats the instruction of the awakened of earlier times: "Know thyself!" - because self-reflection and self-knowledge is the beginning of all knowledge of God. And at the same time expands it to the higher demand of self-realization, the realization of being a child of God and of being one with the Eternal: "Be thyself!"

The Question of all Questions

But that means: ask yourself again and again the question of all questions, which leads to the summit of all solutions and redemption: "Who am I?" - until the answer is found and the certainty awakens in you of who you are - not according to your external form and personality, the mask, but according to your innermost nature and being: a bearer of light, a child of God and heir to all the perfection of the Kingdom of God, in which the risen Christ says "I am". Awakened to the I am, you know about the God within you, of whom Christ proclaims:

You will recognize him in you. All paths of truth point inwards, to the core of our being, which is God. All paths lead to the light that is within. All high paths lead to the bliss of the universal security that is within. For within is above.