The Body Never Lies
“Every nature, every modeled form, every creature, exists in and with each other.” –The Gospel of Mary
The majority of people I have met while leading workshops or retreats about Mary’s gospel over the past decade were not aware that she had one. And most have learned either through popular culture or more formal Christian or Catholic services that Mary Magdalene was known as the “penitent prostitute.”
So much of what we could have known about Mary Magdalene has been lost, destroyed, or remains buried. This is where the importance of the body comes in. Because the body never lies.
The external proof of who Mary Magdalene might have been is in fragments. The first six pages of Mary’s gospel is missing. What we have of her gospel starts on page seven.
There are also four missing pages in the middle of her gospel at a very critical point when Christ is about to reveal to Mary how we can receive a vision, or experience directly, or know from the Greek word gnosis, what is true and real and right for us from within.
The first passage then that we do have of Mary’s gospel is this jaw-dropping, heart-stopping passage about how we are all inextricably inter-connected: “Every nature, every modeled form, every creature, exists in and with each other.” (Mary 2:2)
Here’s why this first passage is so radical – it turns our entire idea of power on its head.
Let’s imagine that for the majority of us our ideas of the divine and what it means to be human exist along a vertical line starting up here with god (I’m pointing to my finger tips) and then angels (if you believe in them) are maybe here (I’m pointing to my palm) saints and people in exceptional positions of authority and power are somewhere below them (I’m pointing to just below the wrist) and then the rest of humanity would be here (I’m pointing to my mid-arm) and then the animals and creatures on this earth and the earth itself, food, rocks, minerals all exist below that on this vertical line of existence (I’ve reached the elbow.)
This piece of scripture means that we are all inter-connected, from the animals to the angels, from the gold that gives currency its worth to the earth itself that nourishes seeds into food that sustains us.
Existence cannot be ranked according to a hierarchy, a vertical line that suggests what is above is more significant and that what is below is less worthy.
This is the form of power structure the ego sees and assigns to the world. Mary’s gospel, from this first passage, is suggesting a very different way of seeing the world and every living being it contains. Mary’s gospel says we exist in and with each other. Inter-connected. Inter-dependent.
There is no hierarchy then to the spiritual world. Love renders us all equal. (My arm is slowly falling down until it’s straight, until my finger's tips are at level with my elbow.)
Our worth does not come from any status we can reach, or material wealth we can acquire, or any external power the ego has identified with that’s external to us.
Mary’s gospel names for us seven powers that the ego will be compelled by, which is a part of what it means to be human. These seven powers blind us from the ultimate power that rests within us. And we each have to do the hard, discerning work of learning to know, as in from direct experience, when we are neck-deep in the ego. So that we can become increasingly aware of the choice we’re presented with in every moment: move from the ego, or move from love. See with the limiting egoic-sight, or see with the spiritual eye of the heart.
The practice revealed in Mary’s gospel is one that demands embodiment. We have to be fully present in the body to experience directly what we already know, what we truly believe in, and what we want most for ourselves and each other. We have to return fully to the body to know the ultimate power that renders us all equal, the power that teaches us every nature, every modeled form, every creature exists in and with each other.
With only more love,
M.