gospel of Thomas 112

Jesus said, "Woe to the flesh that depends on the soul; woe to the soul that depends on the flesh."

I like the symmetry of this saying of Jesus. There are these two aspects to our existence. Here Jesus used the words flesh and soul. We could say the physical and the spiritual; the material – the manifest, that is – and the unmanifest. There are these two aspects. And often on the spiritual journey, we hear sayings that put the spiritual above the material. But here Jesus has a complete symmetry in his statement. And I like it.

It is a great mistake for us to put the spiritual above the physical. There is a balance in life. Existence loves this: a dance between the two, with complete balance; neither one more important than the other; neither one superior, nor inferior. And so it is with the soul and the flesh. They are equal partners. It is not that the soul is important and the flesh is unimportant. No. The flesh is equally vital, equally important, of equal significance.

So, let's look a little more at the statement. But I'm going to start with the second half: woe to the soul that depends on the flesh. And here we can see that many spiritual teachers might come out with such a statement. Woe to the soul that depends on the flesh. If we have this feeling, that the flesh is essential to our soul, to our spirit, then, of course, we feel a bit troubled, because we know the flesh will die. The physical body will die, and we don't want to die. So we will feel troubled.

And of course, for many, the feeling is that the soul is eternal. It either carries on from lifetime to lifetime with reincarnations, or it continues after death into some heavenly realm. But here, that's not my feeling. My feeling is that our soul is really our spirit, made a little more personal. And that that spirit also returns to the source – is diffused, no longer exists as a separate entity in any way – when we die.

So anyway, woe to the soul that depends on the flesh. But before that, Jesus has already said, woe to the flesh that depends on the soul. Now this is a bit more unusual. A flesh that depends on the soul is woeful. And I like it. It has a radicalness to it. Jesus is saying, the flesh should be able to do fleshly things, without always being entangled with the spiritual side of life. When the flesh is hungry, it should eat. When it feels like sexual intercourse, it should enjoy sex. When it needs to sleep, it should just sleep. The flesh has its fleshly life to live. And it should be allowed to get on with it and enjoy it, without always concern for the spiritual side.

In the end, these two are not separate; the flesh and the spirit are intertwined. But we don't need to always tangle them up in our consciousness. In fact, to live life totally, we need to be completely present with whatever we are doing. When that's meditation, we should be in a state of total meditation, not worrying about the flesh, the aches and pains in the body, what we're going to eat, where we're going to find a sexual partner. When we are in meditation, all that should be set aside.

But similarly, when we are eating, when we are making love, when we are sleeping, drinking, we should be doing that totally. Not with thoughts of meditation and spirituality. No. Just live the physical in its rawness. This is my interpretation of what Jesus is saying here. And I agree with it wholeheartedly.