Complete Thomas Commentary Part II (Logion 0-55)

[Leucius Charinus]

... and the lion of logion 7 MUST be a symbol of freedom, as no one can yoke a lion.

Another way of interpreting this is via the Platonic analogy of the tripart psyche of man:

No, because nothing in Thomas points to that. If you think it does, please do present a compelling case

I've already done that.
Here: viewtopic.php?p=139663#p139663

I find this author's case quite compelling.
Gospel of Thomas Logion 7 Unravelled - An Intertextual Approach to a locus vexatus
by Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta

https://www.academia.edu/15050427/Gospe ... us_vexatus

p.130

Socrates' memorable simile of the many-headed beast, the lion and man was relatively well-known in Late Antiquity, [60] as the testimony of Philo, Alcinous, Eusebius, and Plotinus clearly shows. [61] It is so much so that even the Nag Hammadi codices include a Coptic version of the alleged hypotext of logion 7, namely the section of the Platonic Republic (588-89) analyzed above, demonstrating the interest that it created in Gnostic circles. This Coptic version introduces such important changes into its source that it can be considered the work of a redactor rather than a translator, who appears to have simply used the Platonic text as an excuse for his own Gnostic redaction. [62]


Interestingly, in spite of initially referring to the three constituents of the human soul, the Coptic free version tends to distinguish two parts within man, namely an animal-like and a reasonable part [63] ("For the image of the lion is one thing and the image of the man another [64]), and to present the relationship between them as a conflict, just as the Gospel of Thomas does: [65]

But what is profitable for him (sci!. the man) is this: that he cast down every image of the evil beast and trample them along with the images of the lion. But the man is in weakness in this regard. And all the things are weak. As a result he is drawn to the place where he spends time with them ... And with strife they devour each other among themselves.

Footnotes:

60 According to Dillon, Middle Platonists, 302-3, Plato's passage might even have influenced the popular division between "wild" and "tame" passions in the first century B.C.E., as shown by the testimony of Philo, QG 2.57.

61 On Philo of Alexandria, see previous note; for Alcinous, Didask. 186.15-29 with John Dillon, Alcinolls: The Handbook of Platonism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), 196-97; for Plotinus, Enn. 1.1.7, 14-21; Eusebius, Praep. ev. 11.46.2-6.

62 Tito Orlandi, "La traduzione copta di Platone, Resp. IX, 588b-589b: Problemi critici ed esegetici," Atti della Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei: Rendiconti: Classe di Scienze morali, storiche efilologiche 32 (1977): 54.

63 Plato, Resp. 588a-589b (NHC VI,5) 51.11-23: "Then is it not profitable for him who speaks justly?" "And if he does these things and speaks in them, within the man they take hold firmly. Therefore especially he strives to take care of them and he nourishes them just like the farmer nourishes his produce daily. And the wild beasts keep it from growing."

64 Plato, Resp. 588a-589b (NHC VI,5) 49.34--35.

65 Plato, Resp. 588a-589b (NHC VI,5) 50.24--30.

[mlinssen]

... and the lion of logion 7 MUST be a symbol of freedom, as no one can yoke a lion.

Another way of interpreting this is via the Platonic analogy of the tripart psyche of man:

No, because nothing in Thomas points to that. If you think it does, please do present a compelling case

I've already done that.
Here: viewtopic.php?p=139663#p139663

I find this author's case quite compelling.
Gospel of Thomas Logion 7 Unravelled - An Intertextual Approach to a locus vexatus
by Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta

https://www.academia.edu/15050427/Gospe ... us_vexatus

p.130

Socrates' memorable simile of the many-headed beast, the lion and man was relatively well-known in Late Antiquity, [60] as the testimony of Philo, Alcinous, Eusebius, and Plotinus clearly shows. [61] It is so much so that even the Nag Hammadi codices include a Coptic version of the alleged hypotext of logion 7, namely the section of the Platonic Republic (588-89) analyzed above, demonstrating the interest that it created in Gnostic circles. This Coptic version introduces such important changes into its source that it can be considered the work of a redactor rather than a translator, who appears to have simply used the Platonic text as an excuse for his own Gnostic redaction. [62]


Interestingly, in spite of initially referring to the three constituents of the human soul, the Coptic free version tends to distinguish two parts within man, namely an animal-like and a reasonable part [63] ("For the image of the lion is one thing and the image of the man another [64]), and to present the relationship between them as a conflict, just as the Gospel of Thomas does: [65]

But what is profitable for him (sci!. the man) is this: that he cast down every image of the evil beast and trample them along with the images of the lion. But the man is in weakness in this regard. And all the things are weak. As a result he is drawn to the place where he spends time with them ... And with strife they devour each other among themselves.

Footnotes:

60 According to Dillon, Middle Platonists, 302-3, Plato's passage might even have influenced the popular division between "wild" and "tame" passions in the first century B.C.E., as shown by the testimony of Philo, QG 2.57.

61 On Philo of Alexandria, see previous note; for Alcinous, Didask. 186.15-29 with John Dillon, Alcinolls: The Handbook of Platonism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), 196-97; for Plotinus, Enn. 1.1.7, 14-21; Eusebius, Praep. ev. 11.46.2-6.

62 Tito Orlandi, "La traduzione copta di Platone, Resp. IX, 588b-589b: Problemi critici ed esegetici," Atti della Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei: Rendiconti: Classe di Scienze morali, storiche efilologiche 32 (1977): 54.

63 Plato, Resp. 588a-589b (NHC VI,5) 51.11-23: "Then is it not profitable for him who speaks justly?" "And if he does these things and speaks in them, within the man they take hold firmly. Therefore especially he strives to take care of them and he nourishes them just like the farmer nourishes his produce daily. And the wild beasts keep it from growing."

64 Plato, Resp. 588a-589b (NHC VI,5) 49.34--35.

65 Plato, Resp. 588a-589b (NHC VI,5) 50.24--30.

I know Lautaro, he succeeded Luttinkhuizen. Exchanged messages with both.
What they do is what everyone does: they ramble on about whatever they want to chatter about, but they utterly fail to link that to even a single word in Thomas

And you do the same

All you people do is to link your pet project to your interpretation of Thomas - without establishing the relevant links and arguments between that interpretation and the very text of Thomas itself

[Leucius Charinus]

All you people do is to link your pet project to your interpretation of Thomas - without establishing the relevant links and arguments between that interpretation and the very text of Thomas itself

That's not accurate. You yourself (p.53) "think that Thomas got his inspiration here from Philo; 'Every good man is free', book 33, chapter VI, 40. And you provide a supporting argument. OTOH others think that Thomas got his inspiration from Plato's Republic and in support of this cite this and the Plato extract in the NHL.

I think there is little doubt that your transcription is far more meticulous that any earlier transcriptions. However once you move from processes of transcription and translation to the process of interpretation things can become extremely complex and thus the outcomes of interpretation become far more hypothetical and uncertain. Surely you can grant that.

[mlinssen]

All you people do is to link your pet project to your interpretation of Thomas - without establishing the relevant links and arguments between that interpretation and the very text of Thomas itself

That's not accurate. You yourself (p.53) "think that Thomas got his inspiration here from Philo; 'Every good man is free', book 33, chapter VI, 40. And you provide a supporting argument. OTOH others think that Thomas got his inspiration from Plato's Republic and in support of this cite this and the Plato extract in the NHL.

I think there is little doubt that your transcription is far more meticulous that any earlier transcriptions. However once you move from processes of transcription and translation to the process of interpretation things can become extremely complex and thus the outcomes of interpretation become far more hypothetical and uncertain. Surely you can grant that.

That's why I insist on the traceability Pete, and you basically had one choice in responding, and that was to address my concern and mitigate it.
Instead, you have looked for a faint trace in my work with which you could try to justify the complete lack of traceability that I accused you of - in other words, you have opted for the childishly infantile route where you think you can deflect the entire accusation if only you find a way to demonstrate that the pot calls the kettle black

And lo and behold, you managed to find a very small scrap - yet in order to be able to use that you had to quote it greatly out of context:

The 'lion', ⲙⲟⲩⲉⲓ, is yet another subject that has been written about more than extensively, and its other side of the coin is ⲟⲩⲱⲙ, 'eat, bite': what does it mean, to eat a lion?
Savage, king of the wild, roaring, beast, ferocious - those are some of the usual associations.
Philo frequently speaks of a lion, Plato does, pretty much everyone really, and the tiger, the jaguar and the leopard must all be very jealous of him! Going by other Commentaries the metaphysical associations are passion, anger, "the lower emotions", and so on. Countless authors and works get cited, yet I think that Thomas got his inspiration here from Philo; 'Every good man is free', book 33, chapter VI, 40 - emphasis mine:

If selling constitutes slavery we should have to assert that a person who had bought some lions is master of the lions, whereas if the beasts do but turn menacing eyes upon him, the poor man will learn at once by experience the cruel and ferocious lordship of those whom he has purchased. Well then must we not suppose that if lions cannot, still less can the wise man be enslaved, who has in his free and unscathed soul a greater power of resistance to the yoke than any he could make with the naturally slavish body and all the vigour of its physical strength?15

Selling does constitute slavery in the eyes of Thomas, he is particularly hostile against "buyers and traders" - and as will become painfully clear, slavery is a central theme in Thomas.
Yet a lion is by definition absolutely free, even when caught and caged, and so is the wise man.
Thomas certainly disagrees with most if not all theological aspects of Philo but he agrees with some of his ideas, and it is the image of never being a slave, never been put to a yoke (logion 90), that the lion represents. Still, that leaves open the interpretation of "eating", "biting" - consuming. But that is far from the real mystery in this logion, which is in the chiastic structure of identical letters containing, yet seemingly not conveying, opposite meanings, and this time the literal text is considered (and 'said IS' is left out):

Etcetera. Do note the highlighted part that elaborates on WHY I think Philo's particular book inspired Thomas - and the fact that a small paragraph in a 500+ page book isn't a particularly fair representation of its general content, method of strategy.
So the quality of these two samples of interpretation (yours and mine) greatly differs and in order to bend mine into something similar to yours you have to leave out the essential part which just happens to be the pivotal point of my entire j'accuse towards you; and when we observe the quantity of the samples then it is evident that you managed to assume that you could apologise for all of your work by excavating and misrepresenting a part of mine that arguably represents a 1/10,000th portion of it

If you have the mental capabilities an 8-year old, just say so Pete - or rather, confirm the very consistent impression that you give on every occasion where you are asked to argument and motivate your theory, claims and assertions

Everyone I know has given up on trying to reason with you, Pete - which is very regrettable really because I can imagine what the cause of that is but also which the effects are

IIRC I already said goodbye to you - but I'm a stubborn and persistent fool just going to be proven wrong.
Please prove me wrong, just this very last and final time

[Leucius Charinus]

That's not accurate. You yourself (p.53) "think that Thomas got his inspiration here from Philo; 'Every good man is free', book 33, chapter VI, 40. And you provide a supporting argument. OTOH others think that Thomas got his inspiration from Plato's Republic and in support of this cite this and the Plato extract in the NHL

///

Etcetera. Do note the highlighted part that elaborates on WHY I think Philo's particular book inspired Thomas - and the fact that a small paragraph in a 500+ page book isn't a particularly fair representation of its general content, method of strategy.

ABOVE and HIGHLIGHTED I acknowledged up front that you provide a supporting argument and thus treaceability. And nowhere have I criticised your supporting argument. Of course you provided traceability. I am not arguing that you have not. That's why I didn't quote all your material in the section.

IDK what was in Thomas' mind when he wrote Logion 9.