According to the book of Colossians

Welcome back to Gnostic Insights. This week we’re going to continue this study of Colossians in the New Testament as translated by David Bentley Hart. I keep promising some practical advice out of Colossians, and now we’re going to hit it here in chapter 3. It says,

If therefore you were raised together with the Anointed, seek the things above where the Anointed is sitting at God’s right hand. Set your mind on the things above, not the things on earth. For you have died, and your life has been hidden with the Anointed in God. When the Anointed our life is made manifest, then you too will be made manifest, along with him, in glory.

Now, you can interpret this in the Gnostic manner that we’ve been discussing here. The anointed is the Christ, and he is the Third Order of Powers. Jesus was the Third Order of Powers incarnate.

That is, the Fullness of God in its perfection manifested on the earth. All of us have the Fullness of God, but none of us have the perfection, because we have our karma that we bring in, and our bodies break down, and we are fighting the never-ending war against the demiurge and death. But the Christ, or the Anointed, when he came to the earth, he came to bring us the imprint of the perfection of the Fullness.

We 2nd Order Powers are poised between the Deficiency and the Fullness, besieged by the Demirurgic material from below and enlightened by the power from above. The Christ bridges the Deficiency and brings redemption to all Second Order Powers.

And we can take on that perfection of the Fullness of God when we ask for the Christ, or the Anointed, to anoint us, you see? And that replaces the Third Order of Powers in all of its perfection over on top of our Second Order Powers, which are fallen because they are bonded to the material plane. But we can raise our vibrations, is how New Agers like to speak of it, we can raise our self back up to the Fullness of God only through the perfection of the Anointed. That’s the perfection of the Anointed’s job on our behalf.

He’s like the correcting algorithm to our corrupted code. So, if therefore you were raised together with the Anointed, that is, once you have accepted the Anointed bringing you the Third Order of Powers, and you have asked them to help you and to cleanse your Second Order Powers, to bring them the perfection of the Anointed, then we are to seek the perfection above. Our focus is to be above, because we come from above, and we will return to above.

You see, it helps us to shift our mindset from being stuck down here—I’ve got a short life, and then I die. That isn’t it. We refocus then on above and the perfection of the Fullness of God, because we now once again can perceive that perfection of God, once we allow the Anointed to correct our fallen egos, you see? And when it says that we have died and our life has been hidden with the Anointed and God, our fallen nature—our Second Order Powers that have become corrupted—they are put away. They are displaced by the Third Order power, the perfection of the Anointed, and its nesting fractals.

And we nest into Christ, and we nest up on into the Father that way. Otherwise, we’re not nesting up into the fractals of the Fullness of God. We’re lost and wandering around in the fallen world, which is the province of the demiurge, and it’s not a pleasant place to be. Going on to verse 5,

So mortify those bodily members that are on earth.

Mortifying means put to death to kill those bodily members that are on earth, but it’s not talking about your body. It’s not saying that you should chop off your hand or your private parts. These are what the bodily members are that should be mortified—it says

whoring, (which is sexual promiscuity), impurity, passion, (and by that it means overwhelming emotions, being a slave to your emotions), mortify malign desire, (that is, you shouldn’t wish for bad things to happen. You shouldn’t wish for bad things to happen to other people), and acquisitiveness, which is a form of idolatry.

And acquisitiveness, my gosh, that’s our consumer culture. The purpose of commercials, the purpose of advertisements, is to inspire acquisitiveness in us, which is a form of idolatry, because we worship the exercise equipment. We worship the vacation to the best spot. We worship that kind of food. That’s what idolatry is. Verse 6 says,

On account of which things, God’s indignation is coming.

So God doesn’t like those things it’s saying. On the virtue versus vice ledger, those things fall on the vice side. And once again, that is sexual promiscuity,

Impurity,

and it doesn’t specify impurity in what, but it wants us to be pure. It wants us to be reflecting that purity of the Third Order Powers, reflecting the Fullness of God, reflecting the purity of virtuous living and virtuous thought.

Passion,

that is overwhelming emotions. Don’t be caught and brought down by emotions that boil up, because those emotions are being triggered by archons. Those emotions are being triggered by the demiurge. They want you to feel bad. They want you to feel hopeless. That is their door into your soul, is through passions. So we’re supposed to put those passions away.

Malign desire,

we want to get rid of that. Don’t wish for the bad. And this acquisitiveness, always having to have more, better. Verse 7 says,

and in which things you used to walk back then when you lived by them, but now you must put it all away. Indignation, animosity, malice, blasphemy, obscene speech from your mouth.

Okay, let’s look at those. “But now you must put all of that away. Indignation…” Boy, I bet a lot of you are like me. I used to be full of what’s called righteous indignation. I would be so upset. My passions would be riled up by becoming indignant at the injustice of it all, at injustice being done to another person, or cruelty to animals, or eating meat, or whatever the indignation is, the poor of the world. I’d become indignant over it. But it was righteous indignation, I thought, and so it was okay. But then I realized, and this was many years ago before I even discovered the Gnostic Gospels, that righteous indignation isn’t any good either, because it’s a form of passion, and it’s a negative emotion. And this negativity is what we’re trying to get rid of.

We do not belong in the world of negativity. Once we accept the Anointed and allow the Third Order of Powers into our soul, then we can put away that sort of negative indignation, because indignation belongs to the Father, it says. God’s indignation is coming. So we leave it up to him. “Judgment is mine, saith the Lord.” That’s a common quote. And it says we must put away indignation.

Animosity,

that is a negative stance against other people, or a negative stance against certain institutions. Animosity, just pushing it away in negative way. Animosity means bitter hostility. There’s no room for bitterness in someone who’s walking with the Anointed. Or open enmity, acts of hatred. Hatred is bad in all of its forms. And just because you believe that the object of your hatred deserves it, well they may. But it’s not our job to judge them, and it’s not our job to experience animosity towards them. Ultimately, they will be reckoned with. Ultimately, there is a judgment. No one gets away with anything, sooner or later. But it’s not our job to have hostility and hatred. So a hostile feeling or act, or not to be mean of spirit. Malice, that’s plotting against someone.

Blasphemy,

blasphemy actually refers to rejection of the Holy Spirit. It’s considered the only sin that’s unforgivable, although we as Gnostics believe that all sins are ultimately forgivable. But as long as you blaspheme the Holy Spirit and push the Holy Spirit away, you’re not allowing the forgiveness to come to you. And so that’s why blasphemy is a bad idea.

And, obscene speech from your mouth.

I’m a veteran, and in the service there was a lot of curse words and a lot of cussing. And it was hard to come home on leave and be around my parents, because every other word out of my mouth had become some sort of obscene speech, or so it seemed. So stop the habit of using obscene speech. It’s a bad habit, and it puts us on the wrong side of the vice and virtue ledger.

Going on to verse 9,

Do not lie to one another, having shed the old man along with all of his practices, and having donned the new man, who is renewed in full knowledge according to the image of the one creating him.

So that is describing what happens to you when you invite the Anointed to cleanse your Second Order pleroma. We invite the Third Order pleroma to overlay it and to bring us that cleansing. When the Third Order Power, that is, the Anointed, comes in to take up residence in your soul, it displaces your egoic way of being with the Anointed’s way of being, which is upward, onward and upward, focusing on above, which is living on the virtue side of the ledger. That is what it means to put on the new man, who is renewed in full knowledge. And that’s what we’re doing here at Gnostic Insights. Gnosis, gnostic, means knowledge, and it’s according to the image of the One creating him. So the gnosis comes from above. It’s not book learning. It’s not university learning. It’s the knowledge that comes directly from above. And then it says in verse 11,

where there is no Greek and Judean, no circumcised or those with foreskin, no barbarian, Scythian, slave or free man. Rather, the Anointed is all things and is in all.

Now, I believe that this goes directly against the diversity, equity and inclusion, DEI, that’s such a focus nowadays. It’s a false focus. The DEI agenda is not really meant to make everyone equal. In the end, it winds up privileging those in power, because it brings everyone down to the level of the slave, basically. So this passage says there are no differences among people. It doesn’t matter if you’re black or white or brown. It doesn’t matter if you’re an immigrant or a native. It doesn’t matter if you’re a European, an Asian or a Western American. None of that matters, because we are all one in the Anointed. And that is the true DEI. That is the true diversity, equity and inclusion that can only come through Christ.

And this is one of the reasons why totalitarian governments are anti-religion. They don’t want you to think that religion brings equanimity, brings equality, brings inclusion. They want you to think just the opposite, that only the government can do that for you, when in fact that is an inversion, that is a demiurgic lie. You can only find the kind of diversity, equity and inclusion that comes from above. That is where it comes from. It’s part of the Simple Golden Rule.

It’s been a while since we talked about the Simple Golden Rule. That is that we reach out to others and hold hands, metaphorically, to work together on a shared project that none of us could do alone. And we do it for the betterment of all. That is not a government program. That is the golden rule that comes to us down from the Aeons. That’s the way the Fullness of God operates, working together on a shared project for the betterment of all, with love, with assistance, and with knowledge or gnosis.

The Simple Golden Rule

That’s the simple golden rule. And there are old episodes devoted to the simple golden rule. I’ll put a link here in the transcript if you want to go back and listen to that in depth.

Verse 12 says,

Therefore as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved…

You know you can only be holy and beloved if you have been doing what the previous verses have suggested here in Colossians, to put off the old man. That is, set your ego aside and put on the new man, which is that restored and corrected version of yourself. It’s your best Self. You’re not being taken over by the Anointed. You’re not being taken over by Jesus.

You are being brought into the human that you were meant to be from the beginning. So,

therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, put on (Okay, now here’s the positive side of the ledger) inward compassion, honesty, humility, gentleness, and magnanimity.

So, compassion, that’s loving empathy. It means seeing how another person is feeling through their eyes, rather than what you judge them to be.

Honesty. Be honest. Delusion abounds in the land right now, honestly. The delusion comes from being dishonest, from not using your critical thinking skills, from taking liar’s words for how things work. Honesty is the best policy.

Humility, that is dethroning your ego off the throne of control and allowing your true Self, with a capital S, self. That is, that self given to you by the Anointed, that Self that is a reflection of the Fullness of God. That is how we become humble. That is what humility is. We’re to be gentle. Be gentle, kind.

And magnanimity. I looked up magnanimity, just to make sure I knew exactly what it means. And it means “the quality of being magnanimous, greatness of mind, elevation or dignity of soul. That quality or combination of qualities in character, which enables one to encounter danger and trouble with tranquility and firmness, to disdain injustice, meanness and revenge, and to act and sacrifice for noble objects.” Another definition says, “magnanimity is the virtue of being great of mind and heart. It encompasses usually a refusal to be petty, a willingness to face danger, and actions for noble purposes.”

Verse 13 says,

Upholding one another and forgiving one another, if anyone should have a complaint against anyone, just as the Lord forgave you, so you also.

That’s part of the Lord’s prayer, isn’t it? “And forgive us our shortcomings to the extent that we forgive others.” So this is one of the reasons why we cannot judge and condemn other people, because we have not been condemned. The Lord has forgiven us, particularly if you have accepted the Anointed into your soul. There’s no room for hatred. There’s no room for judgment.

Verse 14 says,

And above all of these, love, which is the bond of perfection, and let the Anointed’s peace rule in your hearts, to which you were indeed called in one body, and become thankful.

And that one body that we are called to be in, that’s the body of the Anointed. We are nested in a fractal sense up into the Anointed. He is our umbrella. He is our covering for all of our faults and sins. We nest up inside of him, and that mojo of the Christ takes it away. If we don’t nest up inside of him, we’re carrying all that burden around here in the fallen world. Verse 16 says,

Let the word of the Anointed dwell within you richly, teaching and admonishing each other in all wisdom, in psalms, hymns, spiritual songs, singing in grace within your hearts to God.

You know, songs are actually very much a part of the Fullness of God. It says in the Tripartite Tractate that the Aeons hymn to the Lord continually. That means they sing. They sing of the glory of God. Verse 17 says,

And everything you do whatsoever, in word or in deed, do all things in Lord Jesus’ name, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

See, Jesus as the Christ, he is the Anointed. He nests directly into the Son of God. He’s an extension that came down physically from the Son, and the Son is the only emanation from the Father. So when it says, “giving thanks to God the Father through him,” this is a literal translation that we nest up inside of the Christ. We nest up into the Son that way, and that nests us up fractally into the Father. Otherwise, we can’t reach him. When we’re down here lost, and when you pray to God, it’s actually the Son or the Christ that hears you. The Father is unapproachable. The Son is the only one that can approach the Father, because anyone else that would attempt to is annihilated because of the Father’s greatness. There’s too much of a power differential. Christ is like a resistor to the energy of the Father.

Now then there’s a portion of Colossians which certain harsh fundamentalist churches and many harsh religions around the world use to justify treating women as lesser beings than men, and it goes like this. Verse 18 says,

Wives, station yourselves under your husbands as is fitting in the Lord.

Now, this means be subordinate in the sense of arranging under, or being subordinate to, or being stationed under the shelter. So I take this not in that sense of being a slave to your husband, but in the sense of we’re nesting fractals. And so the family unit is nesting up, and the wife nests right inside of the husband. Because the next verse says,

Husbands, love your wives, and do not be bitter toward them.

So it’s the job of the husband to love their wives just as much as God loves us. And this takes away any being under someone’s thumb, because that’s evil. It’s a sad thing to be nested up into the fractal of a bitter, angry person who does not love the Father. That’s why it says, “Husbands, love your wives, and do not be bitter toward them.”

Children, obey your parents regarding all things, for this delights the Lord.

Once again, this is assuming that your parents are virtuous people. Paul is speaking here in Colossians to those who have been redeemed by the Christ. He’s speaking to the church, those who have accepted the Anointed.

Fathers, do not provoke your children so that they may not be dispirited.

Slaves, obey your lords according to the flesh in regard to all things, not by affecting slavishness before people’s eyes, like someone obsequious to human beings, but in sincerity of heart, revering the Lord. Whatever you do, work from the soul as for the Lord and not for human beings, knowing that you will receive the reward of the inheritance from the Lord. You slave for the Lord, the Anointed.

Now, while modern Western nations no longer support slavery as an economic system, there are reportedly 167 nations, mostly located in Asian, African, and Middle Eastern countries, that still force an estimated 46 million people to work as slaves. According to a site called World Population Review, “Forms of modern slavery include slavery by “ownership” (“chattel” slavery), government conscription (forced military service or government labor), forced prison labor, forced migrant labor, debt bondage (slavery until debts are paid), sexual slavery, forced marriage/child marriage, child labor, and forced begging.”

And even those of us who are not subjected to slavery trudge off to work to earn the paycheck that takes care of our daily needs. The point of the passage above is that “Whatever you do, work from the soul as for the Lord and not for human beings, knowing that you will receive the reward of the inheritance from the Lord. You slave for the Lord, the Anointed.”  This is why we’re always to do our best on the job.

The passage says not to “affect slavishness.” Affect means to pretend. Like when you’re sitting at your desk at work, playing mahjong on the computer or solitaire, and then when the boss walks by or your supervisor, suddenly you kill that program and you look like you’re working. You know that’s not right.

And, we’re not working for the employer anyway. We’re working for the Lord. So we are not to act “obsequious to human beings,” which means cringing or fawning before another person, like a whipped dog. We only glorify the Lord above, even when working for employers down here below. So this is why we do our best in all things, and the better you do, the better it reflects upon the Lord. You know, she’s a really good worker. Of course, she’s a bit on the religious side. She’s got some weird ideas about God, but she’s a really good worker. Well, that’s kind of what you’d like the attitude to be about you. Then verse 25 says,

For the one acting unjustly will suffer the wrong he has done, and there is no respecting of persons.

And this has to do with either judgment before we die or judgment after we die, and there will be a judgment. No one gets away with anything. The one acting unjustly will suffer the wrong he has done, and that’s that life review at the end of our lives when we pass away. We will see all of the things that we have done in the world from everyone else’s point of view. So everyone you are cruel to now or mean to now or petty to now, you will experience their hurt. You will experience it. You’ll be in their shoes experiencing the hurt that you are doing now to them. That’s what it means. We will suffer the wrongs that we have done. So it’s best to not act in a mean, petty, cruel, bitter, judgmental way against other people now or against animals or anything. It’s best to act loving because the love we give out now, we will re-experience after we pass. The bad things we do now, we will re-experience after we pass. The meanness and the cruelty, we’ll see it from the other person’s point of view, and it will hurt to a huge extent because there won’t be any delusion or lies blinding us to what we are doing. We’ll see it with eyes wide open, and we will feel remorseful. We will feel bad about it. Imagine that.

People say, Oh, Hitler couldn’t go to heaven. Look at all the bad he did, or put any other mean person in there that you want to. Yes, they will. But first, they’re going to experience all of the suffering that they caused to everyone else. They will experience it with eyes wide open, and it will pierce their souls, and they will feel very bad about it. But it’s all self-inflicted. All of the things that we’re doing are self-inflicted, and we will judge ourselves after we pass away. In the light of truth, there will be no lying. There will be no avoiding it, and only then will you see that you need to repent. Then you will repent. Then you will feel sorry for it all, and it’ll be a hard judgment and a hard repentance. But eventually, you will repent because “every knee will bow and every tongue confess” the Lord, the Fullness, and the Father. And if not now, then later, and it’ll be a lot harder later. But we don’t have to go through that.

Do you know you don’t have to experience that at all? If you truly and sincerely repent now and ask for the Anointed to correct the faults of your soul, ask the Anointed to take away the mean spiritedness, or to take away the judgmentalism, or to take away the laziness or slothfulness, or whatever those problems are. That’s what was meant at the beginning of this chapter, to “mortify the flesh.” Not physically, not whipping yourself like some deranged ritual from the Dark Ages, but to ask to be cleansed, to present yourself, to become redeemed by the correcting algorithm of the Third Order Powers.

Onward and upward. See you next week.

This book puts all of this gnosis together in a simplified form. Gnosis is as easy as you want it to be, or as complicated as you desire. This Simple Explanation will guide you through the often confusing terms and turns of gnostic thought and theology. The glossary alone is worth having on your bookshelf. Now available in paperback, hardback, and ebook/kindle.