Texts in Conversation
In Mark, Jesus says of marriage that the two will become one flesh. The Gospel of Thomas has similar language about making the two one, used for male and female but also for inside and outside and for above and below.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Mark 10:8
New Testament
7 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother, 8 and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. 9 Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”
Gospel of Thomas 1:22
Nag Hammadi
21 Mary said to Jesus, “Whom are your disciples like?” He said, “They are like little children living in a field that is not theirs. When the owners of the field come, they will say, ‘Give our field back to us.’ They take off their clothes in front of them to give it back and return their field to them. For this reason I say, if the owner of a house knows that a thief is coming, he will keep watch before he comes and will not let him break into the house of his kingdom and steal his goods. So you should keep watch against the world; gird your loins with great strength so that the robbers do not find a way to come to you, for the difficulties you expect will arise. Let there be among you a man of understanding. When the crop ripened, he came quickly with his sickle in hand and reaped it. Whoever has ears to hear should hear.” 22 Jesus saw infants being suckled. He said to his disciples, “These little ones being suckled are like those who enter the kingdom.” They said to him, “Then shall we enter the kingdom as little ones?” Jesus said to them, “When you make the two one, and when you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside, and the above like the below, and when you make the male and the female one and the same—so that the male will not be male and the female not be female—when you fashion eyes in place of an eye, a hand in place of a hand, a foot in place of a foot, an image in place of an image, then you will enter [the kingdom].” 23 Jesus said, “I shall choose you, one from a thousand and two from ten thousand, and they will stand as a single one.”
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Notes and References
“... 22.4 Jesus said to them, ‘When you make the two one.’ This is central to Jesus’ mission according to Thomas (GTh 11; 72; 106, though cf. 16), where he is concerned with inculcating unity. There is some focus here on the reversal of the division of humanity into male and female, with the language resembling that of marriage (Mk 10.8; Matt. 19.5–6; cf. Gen. 2.24). The point is broader, however, because other elements are mentioned before the reference to gender in 22.5 (cf. the different context of ‘making the two one’ in Eph. 2.14–16). ...”
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