Gospel of Philip · 12 of 12

Conclusion: The Perfect Light of the Holy of Holies, the Bridal Chamber

1. Currently, we experience the visible things of creation.

2. We say that they are what is honorable, strong, but the concealed things are what is despised, weak.

3. It is this way with those that are manifested from the truth: They are what is weak and despised, but the concealed are what is strong and honorable.

4. However, the symbolic images of truth are made manifest as types and images.

5. By contrast, the bedroom is concealed.

6. It is the Holy inside the Holy.

7. Indeed, in the beginning, the veil concealed how God governed the creation.

8. When, however, the veil is rent, and those who belong to the inside are made manifest, this house will be forsaken [like] a desert, or instead, it will be [destroyed].

9. However, the fullness of the godhead will flee [from] these places, not into the Holies [of the] Holies, because it will not be able to mingle together with the unmingled [light] and the fullness without [lack], [but] it will come to be beneath the wings of the cross, [and beneath] its arms.

10. This ark will [be their] salvation when the deluge of water weighs down on them.

11. If some, by chance, be of the priestly tribe, they will be able to enter inside the veil together with the high priest.

12. Consequently, the veil was rent not only above, given that it would have been opened only to those who belong to what is above, nor was it rent only below, given that it would have been made manifest only to those who belong to what is below.

Insight

The veil of the temple was rent from top to bottom. Philip makes a careful point of this. If it had only torn above, the ones who could use it would have been those already above; if only below, those below would have been the only witnesses. The single unbroken motion from one side clear through to the other is the whole point. What used to separate the Holy of Holies from the ordinary world was ripped open, making the whole space continuous. The synoptic gospels mention the tearing of the veil at the crucifixion; Philip is making it a cosmological event. What you had been told was inaccessible has been made accessible. The only remaining question is whether you will walk in.Mark 15:38 and parallels; theological reading in Hebrews 10:19–22 on entering the holy place through the veil.

13. Instead, it was rent from above to below.

14. Those above have opened for us, those below, in order that we can enter into the secrets of the truth.

15. This is truly what is honorable, what is strong, yet we will enter there by means of lowly types and weaknesses.

16. They are humbled before the perfect glory.

17. There is a glory that surpasses glory.

18. There is a power that surpasses power.

19. Consequently, the perfect things were opened for us by the secrets of the truth, and the Holies of the Holies was disclosed, and the bedroom invited us inside.

20. As long as it is concealed, evil remains inactive.

21. However, it has not been removed from the presence of the offspring of the holy Spirit.

22. They are slaves to evil.

23. However, when it will be exposed, then the perfect light will pour out on everyone, and all those who dwell inside it will [obtain chrism].

24. The slaves will then be free, [and] the captives redeemed.

25. “[Every] plant [that] my Father who is in heaven has not planted [will be] uprooted.”

26. Those who have been divided will be united, [the empty] will be filled.

27. Everyone who will [enter into] the bedroom shall light their [lamp], because [it] is similar to the marriages that are [held in secret and] take place at night.

28. The fiery (light) [shines] in the night; it is put out.

29. However, the symbolic images of that marriage are performed in the day, and in the light.

30. Neither that day nor its light sets.

31. If someone becomes a son of the bridal chamber, he will obtain the light.

Insight

Philip's last word, and one of the sharpest. If someone does not obtain the light while living in this place, he cannot obtain it in the other place. This is the whole gospel's point condensed to a sentence. There is no postponement. Whatever is going to happen for you spiritually must happen here, under these exact conditions — this body, this year, this set of disappointments, this specific unresolved grief. The image that closes the gospel is strangely warm: the one who obtains the light cannot be held back or troubled, and when he leaves the world he will already have received the truth by means of the images. The sacramental images turn out not to have been stand-ins for something else. They were the truth, in the only form it could take where we could meet it.Cross-references Philip ch 3 §§17–18 and ch 10 §§3–4; closing theme echoes 'Gospel of Truth' 42; cf. Eckhart on eternal now, Sermon 2.

32. If someone does not obtain it while living in this place, he cannot obtain it in the other place.

33. He who will obtain that light will neither be seen, nor can he be held back, and no one can trouble such a person even while he lives in the world, and, furthermore, when he departs from the world, he already will have received the truth by means of the images.

34. The world has become the age (to come), because the age (to come) for him is the fullness, and this is the way it appears to him alone, not concealed in darkness and night, but concealed in a perfect day and a holy light.

The Gospel according to Philip.

Conclusion: The Perfect Light of the Holy of Holies, the Bridal Chamber

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