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In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus tells disciples to say they came from the light. Origen records a similar answer used to pass heavenly rulers, suggesting that Jesus' instructions could prepare disciples for a journey back to their divine home.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Gospel of Thomas 50
Nag Hammadi
49 Jesus said, “Blessed are the solitary and elect, for you will find the kingdom. For you have come from it, and to it you will return.” 50 Jesus said, “If they say to you, ‘Where did you come from?’ say to them, ‘We came from the light, from the place where the light came into being by itself, established itself, and appeared in their image.’ If they say to you, ‘Is it you?’ say, ‘We are its children, and we are the elect of the living Father.’ If they ask you, ‘What is the sign of your Father in you?’ say to them, ‘It is movement and repose.’” 51 His disciples said to him, “When will the repose of the dead come about, and when will the new world come?” He said to them, “What you look forward to has already come, but you do not recognize it.”
Origen, Contra Celsum 6.31
Against Celsus
Early Christian
Moreover, if any one would wish to become acquainted with the artifices of those sorcerers, through which they desire to lead men away by their teaching (as if they possessed the knowledge of certain secret rites), but are not at all successful in so doing, let him listen to the instruction which they receive after passing through what is termed the fence of wickedness, — gates which are subjected to the world of ruling spirits. (The following, then, is the manner in which they proceed): I salute the one-formed king, the bond of blindness, complete oblivion, the first power, preserved by the spirit of providence and by wisdom, from whom I am sent forth pure, being already part of the light of the son and of the father: grace be with me; yea, O father, let it be with me. They say also that the beginnings of the Ogdoad are derived from this.
Date: 248 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
“... (4) This is Jesus’ preparation of the disciples for their post mortem heavenly ascent. This is probably the setting in many of the principal parallels elsewhere, e.g. in the Gospel of Mary, Epiphanius’ Gospel of Philip, the apolutrosis ritual described by Irenaeus and Epiphanius as well as in the First Apocalypse of James, Pistis Sophia, 2 Jeu and the Ophite diagramme as reported by Origen. This is thus the preparation which ensures that the reader ‘will not taste death’ (GTh 1). [...] 50.1 Say to them, “We have come from the light.” The kingdom from which the elect come in GTh 49 is identified here as ‘the light’, the pre-existent paradisal reality. Compare a similar element in Origen’s account of the Ophite diagramme (C. Cels. 6.31): ‘From you I am sent pure, already part of the light of the Son and the Father’ (φωτὸς ἤδη μέρος υἱοῦ καὶ πατρός). ...”
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