Be Passers By

"He (Jesus) repeatedly refuses to be drawn into theoretical discussions regarding the relationship of spirit and body, the exact time of his reappearance on earth, the necessity of following the commandments instituted by Moses, or even the exact character of his messianic role. Instead, he most often reminds his listeners of the harm done by their anxieties, their dogmatic fixations, and their attachments to earthly things as well as their psychological foibles. In quiet a few instances, he seems to be saying: Don't be weighed down by obsessive concerns for your material welfare or even for your moral character. Proceed on your journey from limitation and attachments to the greater life that awaits you. It matters little if you are circumcised or not, or what diet you observe. It matters less whether you think I am Elijah returned or a philosopher, or a mere carpenters' son. What matters is whether you make sincere efforts to know yourselves and thus be prepared for liberating gnosis. His message is well-characterized by the shortest saying in this gospel: "Be passers by" saying 42 of the Gospel according to Thomas."

The Gnostic sayings of Jesus also shed light on his rather unusual method of teaching. Unlike most teachers, he appears to impart more than ideas, to do more than exhort along conventional and religious lines. He addresses his teaching not to the thinking minds and the emotions of people as much as to their incipient intuitive gnosis. His words are not so much intended to inform as to stimulate latent creative and imaginative facilities. This Jesus also emerges in these sayings is a Jesus quite different from the traditional meek and mild man of sorrows. This Jesus uses metaphors and myths, cryptic mystical adages and explicitly Gnostic parables, to induce extraordinary states of consciousness in his followers."



Excepted from "Gnosticism - New Light on the Ancient Tradition of Knowing" by Stephen A. Hoeller