Glastonbury Tor Archway,
View of
Avalon, England
Divine wisdom, illusive to the worldly wise, is often best understood by those outside the mainstream. It is understood by those who have "ears to hear and eyes to see," those who can hear with an open heart, sing through a free soul and see with a clear spiritual vision.
The world runs on ego-power which is a more structured, mechanistic software system than the intuitive heart. It may also be that the marginalized are often less capable and less successful in life in the "left brain." So, while they are often the poor and the hungry, sick and aged, they are also free from the world's system for many reasons. As worldly castaways, they are often open channels for the Divine essence that is there for all of us.
This eternal and ancient message has been offered to humankind from the beginning of recorded history. It is also repeated throughout Judeo-Christian- Muslim scriptures. That wisdom - ineffable, spiritual and often wordless - is received by those who have "ears to hear and eyes to see." It is a unique "knowing" or gnosis. It is the knowledge given to humankind through the Holy Spirit. It has always been there and will always be there. it transcends everything - religion, ethnic, racial or gender differences.
It is timely and wonderfully good news for inter-faith peace agendas and especially for Christians, Jews and Muslims - all of whom are too quick to the draw to fight for their own unique brand of God - that this phrase resonates through all their scriptures, even pre-dating Isaiah (circa 700 BC).
In Isaiah 64:4:
"Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him."
In Mary Magdalene's Gospel,* in which she writes about the mystical teachings of Jesus, after each teaching she quotes Him as saying: "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."
The ancient call to understand divine mysteries is a call to the divine encounter itself. Hearing and seeing are other words for an experiential encounter. It is not simply learned through books - seen and heard of - rather it is actually seen and heard. To those who don't see and understand, they need to learn through parables so they can understand what it is they are seeking.
This ancient refrain is also heard in the Prayer of the Apostle Paul in the Nag Hammadi:
It is in the Gospel of Mani (found in the Turfan fragment)
"I will give you what you have not seen with your eyes, nor heard with your ears nor grasped with your hand."It is in I Corinthians 2:9
It is in the Qu'ran and Hadith Qudsi (37-40):
"I have prepared for My righteous servants what no eye has seen and no ear has heard, nor has it occurred to the human heart.
How and where and when all these great and wonderful prophets, apostles and disciples have come by this unique divine phrase, remains a mystery. But, it seems clear that it points to something ineffable and powerful and worth repeating,
Having an authentic encounter, drawing away from the great illusions of our current world and drawing near to the divine within, that inner realm of peace and power and love and creativity, that is eternal and opens into dimensions of time and space rambling on forever, is what I would describe as "feminine spirituality." While this is not womankind's exclusive realm, it seems the inner path of salvation is more often experienced by women, whereas the external tangible realm of the outer world is the domain of men.
Unfortunately, due to a lack of understanding then, the masculine principle has subdued and silenced that feminine spirituality for centuries, laying down the law rather than unleashing the power in the heart. I truly believe that Jesus' teachings were directed toward balancing the two by restoring the feminine spirituality of inwardly directed mystical and experiential relationship for all people, equally, with the power of the Spirit. He also redefined what masculine power would look like when that mystical love within flowed outwardly to enable a man to love his enemy, feel compassion for the sick, poor, aged and lonely and find a non-violent means to solve differences.
Today, to empower women is to empower everyone and unleash a global compassion that would instantly put an end to unbridled selfish greed and the hatred, violence and prejudice born out of spiritual ignorance - spiritual blindness and deafness - that has riddled the earth with fear, war and cowardice.
Realizing the extreme marginalization of women - in His time and still in ours - it seems logical that Jesus would have left His ministry in the hands of a woman, especially a woman who so clearly understood the mystical path espoused in the Gnostic scriptures (as seen and heard in the Nag Hammadi.)
Evidence of this is simply in the fact that the Gnostic monks had to hide the Nag Hammadi in the desert for 1600 years and that the beautiful, yet heretic, Gospel of Mani was found in shattered fragments as far away as China. One wonders what else may be found buried in the desert or hidden in a wall having remained silent for centuries?
For now, though, while the earth still silently harbors those ancient secrets, we can throw away our religious differences, put down our weapons, our hatred, our fear and our prejudice and open our minds, our understanding and hear and see with our inner eye into a realm beyond this one, a realm of eternal life. When we find God, the divine encounter, nothing here would ever interest us enough to kill a brother or a sister, ever again. Anyone who feels they must fight for God, for their religion, does not know God.
*Photo: Erna Gilbertson
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