Gospel of Thomas coda 6

Gospel of Thomas, coda 6

“His disciples questioned Jesus, ‘Should we fast?  In what way should we pray?  Should we give to charity?  From which foods should we abstain?’  Jesus responded, ‘Do not lie.  If there is something you hate, do not do it, for everything is revealed beneath heaven.  Nothing hidden will fail to be displayed.  Nothing covered will remain undisclosed.’”

In coda 14a Jesus will answer these questions directly.  Here, Jesus does not.   What is Jesus doing?  He is answering more important questions, perhaps questions his disciples aren’t keen to ask.  The answers to these questions seem obvious to the reader and the disciples probably knew the answers to what they asked in part.  Religious people, Jews of Jesus’ day, and religious people of many faiths fast, pray, give to charity, and many abstain from certain foods.  So they were looking for guidance about their religious obligations.  But Jesus instructs his disciples on more important matters.  Lying is destructive to self and others.  Trust is the foundation upon which relationships are built upon, including relationships with God, self, family, friends, and in business.  How much easier life would be if everyone was truthful! But likely, Jesus’ disciples from time to time lied.   How difficult it is to be truthful all the time!  Even the smallest lie tears away at the integrity of the fabric of our lives.  On one level one can even begin to believe one’s own lies.  What deception!  On another, at the deepest level, one knows that one is lying, and God knows that one is lying, and one is separate from self, others that are lied to, and to God.   In this sense, lying is a sin.

Stevan Davies says that “do not do what you hate” is a version of the golden rule, “Do to others what you would have them do to you.  He says, if spelt out completely, the statement would read, “Do not do to others what you would hate to have done to you.”  But perhaps Jesus is telling his disciples to not violate their consciences.  Children don’t necessarily know that they are doing wrong when they do it.  Their parents and guardians provide for them in the form of teaching, discipline, guidance, and example their moral code which they internalize and integrate into their lives in the formation of their conscience.  And the well bred adult has an internalized moral compass that we may call heart or conscience by which he decides how to think and behave.  The well bred adult knows what is right and wrong.  How many times to we say when we see an adult do wrong, “he should know better,” or “when is he going to grow up?”  To do wrong, to violate one’s conscience, to do what one hates or should hate, what causes hurt or harm to self, other people, other creatures, or the planet is a violation of conscience and a violation of truth.  It involves denial of the truth and worse, ignorance of the truth.

And there are consequences for doing what one hates, just like with lies.  Harm is done.  You can deny or ignore the truth all you want, but the consequences are the same.  It’s not that there is this God somebody somewhere that is going to reward or punish.  The judgment and its aftermath are a natural consequence of our actions including our thoughts and attitudes.   And this true for us as individuals, families, organizations, governments, and nations.  

If we lie or if we do what we hate we will pay the consequences for those behaviors.  No amount of fasting, prayer, charitable giving, and abstaining from foods that are forbidden is going to save us if we lie to ourselves and others or we do what we hate to ourselves, others, and the natural world.  There is no hiding from what we have done.  Jesus said in the New Testament, speaking of his disciples, that his disciples would be known by their fruit.  If you produce bad fruit in your life, likely you haven’t been the disciple you could have been.   You can dress up as a model fruit tree, but what kind of fruit tree if you don’t produce fruit.  An unproductive one!