gospel of Thomas 74

He said, "O Lord, there are many around the drinking trough, but there is nothing in the cistern."

When Jesus said these words, I suspect he was in a slightly awkward state. Many people had come to him, seeking guidance, wanting to listen to his words of wisdom. It happens: he's a great master, the word has got out. People are drawn to him. And they are thirsty; they want to drink; they want to drink of his wisdom.

Many around the drinking trough – they have come to him, and they are waiting. But the cistern is empty – there is no water there. Jesus is feeling empty. And there are two flavours of this emptiness. I don't know which one Jesus was feeling that day.

One is a beautiful emptiness: just an emptiness. There's nothing inside. There's not even an inside for there to be anything in. No words come. There's nothing needing to be explained. There's just a deep silence; a great spaciousness. And if the others can bask in that sort of emptiness, then their thirst will be quenched by silence, by stillness.

Jesus may have been in such a state, in which case, he was having a little joke with God, by saying these words. Jesus would have been completely happy to be silent, to be empty. But of course, he would also have known that not everyone in the crowd would have been in a space to receive that silence, to feel the stillness.

It takes a tremendous presence even to really hear silence, to allow it in – to allow one's own being to vibrate with that deep silence of existence. It's the most beautiful sound in the universe. But even to hear it, one needs to have been practising, to have been meditating, to have been letting go of so much of the noise of human life: the chatter, the inconsequential mental activity. A lot of that needs to drop away, before we can even feel such silence, before we can be touched by the stillness.

Jesus may have been in such a state. But there is another possibility: the other type of emptiness – which every teacher knows from time to time – and that is when one is not in a space to teach. It is not the same emptiness, not the same profound stillness. One has, for the moment, dropped back into being in a more human condition, inside oneself. And although one can waffle on, it's not going to help anyone. There is no nourishment in such words.

So it may have been that Jesus was having an off day. “I’m not in a space to give teachings today,” he may have been saying to God. It could have been so, in which case, better to send those thirsty people away, and ask them to return another day. There's no harm in it. Jesus too was human.

And we should always remember this: the great masters – whom we hold up to be so special – they were also human. They were like you and me: sometimes able to transmit something of the profound essence of life; and in other moments, not in a position to transmit anything; needing to return to their own aloneness, and find new resources, before continuing the teaching.