Stages of Spiritual Awakening (Gospel of Thomas)

This is the third episode on the Gospel of Thomas, and I am looking at the second saying in the gospel. But as I mentioned in the last episode, this may actually be the first one spoken by Jesus. The previous saying may have been written by Thomas or the editor of the Gospel of Thomas. 

If this is the first saying spoken by Jesus, then it has greater significance. It sets the stage for all the other teachings. In this saying Jesus is teaching about six stages of spiritual awakening. I say stages, but I could just as easily use the words dimensions or aspects. But I have opted for the word stages because Jesus seems to be saying that one follows the other naturally. 

Jesus said, "Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find. When they find, they will be disturbed. When they are disturbed, they will marvel, and will reign over all. And after they have reigned they will rest." 

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Transcript

This is the third episode on the Gospel of Thomas and I am looking at the second saying in the gospel. But as I mentioned in the last episode, this may actually be the first one spoken by Jesus. The previous saying may have been written by Thomas or the editor of the Gospel of Thomas. 

If this is the first saying spoken by Jesus, then it has greater significance. It sets the stage for all the other teachings. In this saying Jesus is teaching about six stages of spiritual awakening. I say stages, but I could just as easily use the words dimensions or aspects. But I have opted for the word stages because Jesus seems to be saying that one follows the other naturally. 

Classic Indian thought has four stages of life. Psychiatrist Kubler Ross famously explained five stages of grief. Theologian James Fowler talks about six stages of faith, to which he added a prequel – Stage 0, making seven in all. Jesus says in the Gospel of Thomas that there are six stages of awakening. Jesus said, "Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find. When they find, they will be disturbed. When they are disturbed, they will marvel, and will reign over all. And after they have reigned they will rest."

The first stage is Seeking. This tends to be the longest stage by far. Jesus says: “Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find.” This is an aspect of the spiritual life that I have emphasized a lot over the years. Persistence and perseverance are important in seeking. Jesus speaking of this in the canonical gospels. “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.” It is best translated, “Keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking.” Jesus told parables about persistence. 

If there is any secret or key to the spiritual life, this is it. One has to be willing to put the spiritual search above everything else. Jesus told people that if they were to be his disciples they had to deny themselves. This is true in many aspects of life. 

My wife and I watch the television show Shark Tank about entrepreneurs. Even though I do not like the materialism advocated by the show, I appreciate the persistence, perseverance and self-sacrifice of the entrepreneurs. If Americans cared as much about spiritual success as they do material success, we would have as many saints as billionaires. We need to be spiritual entrepreneurs in many ways. That is a whole episode in itself! 

The second stage is finding.  Jesus says, “Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find.” It is important to realize that there is finding. Some people become discouraged, and think that they will never find. They settle into a lifetime of seeking but never finding. They are perpetual students. Those who believe in reincarnation might settle for enlightenment in a future lifetime. There is no need to settle! Jesus says, “Seek and you will find.” This is reason for hope and faith, which are important in the spiritual search.

The third stage is being disturbed. "Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find. When they find, they will be disturbed.” Other translations say they will be troubled or dismayed. Spiritual awakening is not what we think it is. It is disturbing. You don’t read about that much in the retreat brochures, do you? When we find, we will be disturbed by what we find. 

People buy into the myth that spiritual awakening is the end all and be all. That it will be the solution to all the problems of life. It is not. In some ways it is just the beginning of troubles. Do you think Jesus’ problems ended at his awakening at his baptism? Jesus said, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person's enemies will be those of his own household.” 

Spiritual liberation is not endless Kumbaya around the campfire. It is not living the rest of your earthly life with a placid grin on your face, lost in bliss. Jesus told people that if they were to be his disciples they had to take their cross and follow him. There is a reason that the symbol of the Way of Jesus is a cross. 

Many people begin the spiritual search in order to end their psychological suffering and spiritual angst. The good news is that spiritual awakening does that. It is the end of that type of suffering. No more fear of death. No more anxiety about Ultimate Truth and God and salvation. The search is over. That is a great relief. The worldly and personal issues that caused so much suffering are no longer the big deal that we thought they were.  It is the cessation of this type of suffering, as the Buddha said.

But the ego does not completely disappear, and the ego is trouble. Big trouble. I was reading Ralph Waldo Emerson’s famous essay on Self-Reliance the other day, and he calls the ego the giant. He writes, “My giant goes with me wherever I go.” As long as we are incarnated with a body, the ego is along for the ride causing problems. The ego does not wake up. We wake up from the ego to see that we are not the ego. 

The ego does not like awakening. When you awake to what you really are, the ego freaks out. It knows it is no longer in control. It never was, but at least it was under the illusion that it was! It is disturbed, troubled and dismayed by spiritual awakening. "When they find, they will be disturbed.” Awakening is the end of life as we know it, as the personal self know it. That is disorienting. 

It is like Neo waking up from the Matrix. When you take the red pill there is no going back. That can be disturbing. Remember in the movie there was this one guy named Cypher who wanted to go back in? He was disturbed when he saw what he had signed up for. Liberation from illusion is disturbing. 

The fourth stage is Marveling. “When they are disturbed, they will marvel.” When one sees Reality, it is disturbing, but it is also marvelous. In the Bible all divine encounters come with both fear and fascination. Rudolf Otto called this Mysterium tremendum et fascinans. That is Latin meaning "a mystery that is both tremendous and fascinating." It is both terrifying and compelling.  In the words of Jesus, it is both disturbing and marvelous. It cannot be put into words, so I will not even try.

The fifth stage is Reigning over all. “When they are disturbed, they will marvel, and will reign over all.” Other translations say, “and he will rule over the All,” or “rule over all,” or “reign over everything.” To use Christian language, along with the cross comes a crown. Jesus talks about ruling in the Kingdom of God in the canonical gospels as well. What in heaven’s name does he mean?

If does not mean we become a spiritual elite, with disciples at our feet fawning over us. That is what the ego wants. Jesus made it abundantly clear that his way of reigning over all was serving all, taking the lowest place, and being the servant of all. Famously James and John – and their mom – wanted to sit on either side of Jesus in his kingdom. They misunderstood the Kingdom of God, and Jesus had to explain them what they were signing up for.

The Gospel story says, “And when the ten heard it, they were greatly displeased with the two brothers. But Jesus called them to Himself and said, ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant.’”

Reigning over all means that one awakens to discover that we are one with the Ruler of the Universe. We are one God. One with Christ who is Lord of Lords and King of kings. But this Kingdom is not a theistic monarchial type of rule. 

The term Kingdom of God is misleading. It is better translated Realm of the Divine, or Spiritual Realm. The only ruling going on is the way that the Tao that rules the universe. The Tao rules like water taking the lowest path. It is the way that natural laws rule the universe. That is how the Logos reigns. We discover that we are the universe, one with the divine Logos that indwells and guides the universe.

Now we come to the Sixth stage of Awakening. Jesus says, “When they are disturbed, they will marvel, and will reign over all. And after they have reigned, they will rest." Another translation says, “And when he finds, he will be astonished, and being astonished, he will reign and reigning, he will rest.” 

This last part about rest is sometimes put in brackets or parentheses in many translations because it is not found in the Coptic version of  the gospel found in the Nag Hammadi Library. But it is found in a Greek fragment of the Gospel of Thomas, which is earlier. It is also quoted by Clement of Alexandria around 200 AD, which is earlier still. So it is likely that this line is part of the original saying of Jesus. 

This saying tells us that full awakening is fulfilled with resting in divine awareness. Jesus calls it abiding in the Father. Spiritual awakening is a process. It was a process for Jesus. It began at his baptism, but then continued with forty days in the wilderness. That was troubling and disturbing stage. But he emerged from the wilderness – physically and spiritually - victorious. And from then on, he abided in his Christ consciousness. We follow that pattern. 

This last stage is full integration of nondual awareness into normal life. The other stages happen relatively quickly once they begin. For Jesus it was about forty days. Although that should be taken as symbolic and not literal. But it was not forty weeks or months or years. But the abiding in the Divine, walking in the Spirit, unfolds during the rest of your life. This is the promised Sabbath rest. It continues throughout earthly life and after death in eternal rest.

 "Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find. When they find, they will be disturbed. When they are disturbed, they will marvel, and will reign over all. And after they have reigned they will rest." Those are the six stages of spiritual awakening.