Greco-Christian stream·Pistis Sophia·First Book — Post-Resurrection Discourses·Chapter 8
Of his own incarnation through Mary
Sabaōth, the Good, who is in the region of the Right · I have just said unto you
Source context
- Theme
- Post-resurrection manifestation of Christ's light-body and the disciples' encounter with unveiled divine radiance
- Soul-faculty
- Consciousness Soul
Steiner
not engaged in the GA corpus
Cross-tradition
- Neoplatonism (Plotinus, Enneads)The soul's encounter with the One as luminous source — stripping away material veils to behold divine intellect — shows cross-tradition congruence with the disciples' bewilderment before Christ's unveiled radiance.
- Merkabah mysticismThe heavenly-chariot tradition's descent of divine glory (kavod) into perceptible form displays cross-tradition congruence with the Pistis Sophia's staging of Christ's light-body as a bounded theophany accessible to prepared initiates.
- Vedanta (Taittiriya Upanishad, kosha doctrine)The progressive sheaths (kosha) concealing and revealing the Atman show cross-tradition congruence with the Gnostic motif of successive light-veils removed to disclose the innermost divine reality.
Chapter 8
CHAPTER 8
Of his own incarnation through Mary.And Jesus continued again in the discourse and said: "It came to pass then thereafter, that at the command of the First Mystery I looked down on the world of mankind and found Mary, who is called 'my mother' according to the body of matter. I spake with her in the type of Gabriēl, and when she had turned herself to the height towards me, I cast thence into her the first power which I had received from Barbēlō--that is the body which I have borne in the height. And instead of the soul I cast into her the power which I |14. have received from the great Sabaōth, the Good, who is in the region of the Right.
"And the twelve powers of the twelve saviours
More concerning the light-powers in the disciples.of the Treasury of the Light which I had received from the twelve ministers of the Midst, I cast into the sphere of the rulers. And the decans of the rulers and their servitors thought that they were souls of the rulers; and the servitors brought them, they bound them into the body of your mothers. And when your time was completed, ye were born in the world without souls of the rulers in you. And ye have received your portion out of the power which the last Helper hath breathed into the Mixture, that [power] which is blended with all the invisibles and all rulers and all æons,--in a word, which is blended with the world of destruction which is the Mixture. This [power], which from the beginning I brought out of myself, I have cast into the First Commandment, and the First Commandment cast a portion thereof into the great Light, and the great Light cast a portion of that which it had received, into the five Helpers, and the last Helper took a portion of that which it received, and cast it into the Mixture. And [this portion] is in all who are in the Mixture, |15. as I have just said unto you."
Why they should rejoice that he time of his investiture had come.This then Jesus said to his disciples on the Mount of Olives. Jesus continued again in the discourse with his disciples [and said]: "Rejoice and exult and add joy to your joy, for the times are completed for me to put on my Vesture, which hath been prepared for me from the beginning, which I left behind in the last mystery until the time of its completion. Now the time of its completion is the time when I shall be commanded through the First Mystery to discourse with you from the beginning of the Truth to the
completion thereof, and from the interiors of the interiors [to the exteriors of the exteriors], for the world will be saved through you. Rejoice then and exult, for ye are blessed before all men who are on the earth. It is ye who will save the whole world."