Visitor Comments
Questions about fasting relate to the body; Jesus points the way to the truth that those who worship God must do so in truth and in spirit.
- John
The specific questions were ignored as irrelevant, not the important thing to know. The thing to realize is that you are engaged in a continuing dialogue with God (and never not in the presence of God) in which every act of your life is in effect a prayer to God. In return, God is continually speaking to you, revealing all that you really need to know. Learn to see and hear this.
- active-mystic
From these words, we can see that the disciples are asking for methods, just as the Pharisees of that time who follow rules only for the sake of the rules, no heart, no love. Action that does not follow one's true heart is lying.
- laijon
I like that Jesus is stating things in a much more simple manner than many would like to believe he is here. The questions asked of him are very specific in nature, not unlike many of the same specific things people pray for or about. Saying 6 helps to remind the world that such things are constant and never ending. Praying for example does not end just because you say amen. Our life is a constant prayer, or a communication with God if you will. Meaning that, just because we aren't openly speaking with him, nothing about us is out of his realm. In a way I'd like to think that part of what Jesus has said here is that the specific things in life that we no doubt "worry" ourselves with, need not be so specific and complexing at all. The simple truth of it all is that everything eventually ends up where it started...the heaven that is in you and all around you.
- digger
If one follows a path dictated by others, you will be lying and doing what you hate. The "divine" is aware of you anyway.
- Rodney
Again we being told to do whatever our hearts tell us is right. Evil and sin come from not listening to or rebelling against that little voice of conscience that is our gift. Jesus was telling them, Hey do what you feel is right--trust yourself that you are doing good, and you will not be surprised that it's also what God wants for you. There are no rituals that can make you a good person, only good intended actions and thoughts.
- Holly
Whether this was transposed with 14 or not, the meaning is the same either way. Old rules and "laws" are meaningingless. As long as you are true to yourself and God, you will not do evil. If this verse is accurate, the way he utterly ignores their specific questions suggests a very broad rejection of ALL the meticulous old laws.
- Jay
It won't do you any good to lie, Heaven promises to expose you...So tell the truth and take your licks, better here than there. And you know all those things you say you hate, i.e. greed, injustice, liars, cheats and thieves, well you better make sure you are not any of those things because Heaven promises you judgment "by your own words" i.e. I've found to my regret that I'm guilty of gossiping, complaining and murmuring even though I am constantly stating how much I 'hate' these things. Heaven is just and by what measure I judged will I be judged. And all the praying and fasting and giving in the world won't prevent judgment.
- Deby
What of fasting? Prayer? Tzidakah? Diet? How shall we know what is right?
Jesus said, "If you can perceive all of these things, the Universe and the Universal can perceive more and deeper than any can know, so don't lie, don't do what you know doesn't seem right. All that is hidden will be revealed before the Universe and the truth therein, and you will have to answer for it, like it or not."
- StarChaser
This verse seems to parallel the story where Jesus tells his disciples that all food is good to eat--the message is that evil comes from within, as does good.
- Dinwar
In this statement, Christ tells us the walk, and to get walking. Be careful that devotional activities don't hinder your work in the real world.
- Zooie
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Scholarly Quotes
Funk and Hoover write: "The answers Jesus is represented as giving in 6:2-6 appear to be unrelated to the questions about fasting, praying, and giving posed by the disciples in v. 1. Jesus does answer these three questions directly in 14:1-3. The discrepancy between Thom 6:1 and 2-6 has led some scholars to speculate that the texts of Thomas 6 and 14 have somehow been confused." (The Five Gospels, p. 476)
Fitzmyer reconstructs the lines appended to saying six in the Greek fragment as follows: "[Ha]ppy is [he who does not do these things. For all] will be mani[fest before the Father who] is [in heaven.]" Fitzmyer writes: "Is this part of the same saying? If so, then we have a different ending in the Greek that is not found in the Coptic. J. Doresse (Thomas, p. 91) treats this as part of a distinct saying. He has in his favour the fact that makarios is preserved in the Coptic of the following saying. But it would then seem that we must either shorten our restoration of l. 39 and the beginning of l. 40 or suppose that the usual introduciton, 'Jesus says', has been omitted. Neither seems possible. Moreover, the letters that remain on the following lines do not seem to agree with any possible reconstruction of the Greek of the following Coptic saying. For an attempt to reconstruct it as a separate saying, see M. Marcovich, JTS 20 (1969) 66-7." (Essays on the Semitic Background of the New Testament, p. 387) Other scholars consider this part of P. Oxy. 654 simply to represent the saying concerning the lion who is fortunate to be eaten by man.
Gerd Ludemann writes: "The disciples' question is about fasting, prayer, almsgiving and the food laws. The first three also appear in the regulations about piety in Matt. 6.1-18 (cf. Tobit 12.8) and are discussed once again later (Thomas 14; cf. 104). In the present verse the question about food completes the sphere of the Jewish law." (Jesus After 2000 Years, p. 593)
Jean Doresse writes: "'nothing hidden will fail to be revealed' no doubt refers to hidden virtues such as those mentioned by Jesus: they are preferable to ostentatious practices of piety, and will one day be made public." (The Secret Books of the Egyptian Gnostics, p. 371)
Jack Finegan writes: "The reply of Jesus in Line 19, 'and what you hate, do not do,' is evidently derived from Tob 4:15, 'And what you hate, do not do to any one,' with omission of the words, 'to any one,' which reduces the saying from a form of the 'Golden Rule' to a self-centered saying." (Hidden Records of the Life of Jesus, p. 247)
F. F. Bruce writes: "In this and other sayings (cf. Sayings 14, 27, 104) it is insisted that true fasting is abstinence from evil words and actions, not from indifferent things like food. The negative form of the golden rule, 'Do not [to others] what is hateful to yourselves', appears repeatedly in early Jewish ethics, e.g. Tobit 4.15 ('What you hate, do not to any one') and Hillel's words in TB Shabbath 31a ('What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow; this is the whole law; everything else is commentary')." (Jesus and Christian Origins Outside the New Testament, p. 115)
J. D. Crossan writes: "This somewhat truncated version of the rule's negative formulation ['do not do what you hate', compared to Mt 7:12, Lk 6:31, Did 1:2b] has the following context. 'His disciples questioned Him and said to Him, "Do you want us to fast? How shall we pray? Shall we give alms? What diet shall we observe?" Jesus said, "Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate, for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain without being uncovered.'" (In Fragments, p. 52)
J. D. Crossan writes: "The text is found not only in the Coptic translation of Thomas, but also among the Oxyrhynchus Papyri fragments of the Greek Thomas in Oxy P 654. The badly mutilated Greek text has been restored from the Coptic version as follows: [ha mis]eite me poiet[e] or '[what] you [ha]te do not do' (Hofius: 41; see also Fitzmyer, 1974:385; Marcovich: 65). The Coptic version is a close translation of that sequence: 'that which you hate, do not do' (with Wilson, 1973:511; rather than Guillaumont, 1959:5; or Lambdin: 118). Thus the sequence here is as in Tob. 4:15, ho miseis, medeni poieses, although the former is plural 'you' while this latter is singular 'you.' Those differences are dictated primarily by context. It is, of course, quite unlikely that Thomas is in any way quoting directly from Tobit (Menard, 1975:87). But his negative version says: What you hate (done to you) do not do (to others)." (In Fragments, pp. 52-53)
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