258 LITERATURE OF GNOSTIC WISDOM
it brings image, message, and metaphysical tinkering together in short, ac-
complished pieces as in this baptismal catechism:
God is a dyer.
Good dyes, true dyes, dissolve into things
dyed in them.
So too for things god has dyed.
His dyes are imperishable because of their colors.
What god dips he dips in water.
Only at the end are some themes developed at length.
The Gospel of Philip contains a gnostic exegesis of some New Testament
passages; deals with Valentinian notions of life, death, and resurrection, and
flesh and spirit; and centers on one side of Christian tradition, the sacraments.
The sacraments include baptism, chrism (a form of anointing with olive oil),
the eucharist, redemption, and the bridal chamber. Originally Adam and Eve
were joined as an androgynous figure, the text points out. Problems of sexual-
ity and other sicknesses came about when this union was broken. With
Christ's aid, the reunion takes place in the bridal chamber. This reunion is a
precursor to the later union when the spirit returns to the heavenly realm. The
notion of a chaste union in the bed, when one is clothed in protective light of
the spirit, goes through many poems:
The rulers do not see you
who wear the perfect light,
and they cannot seize you.
You put on the light
in the mystery of union.
Other themes concern free men and virgins, slaves, defiled women, animals in
human form, conversion, and agriculture. As in the canonical gospels, the
parable themes embrace sowing, reaping, and the seasons. Nonetheless, gno-
sis is always apparent, as are other favored gnostic ideas of light and darkness,
names of earthly and heavenly things, the word, the mischief of the rulers (ar-
chons), and reversal of traditional ideas about resurrection and even "my fa-
ther" in the Lord's Prayer. With a heterodoxy of view typical of gnostic
reinterpretations of Christianity, the text frequently surprises, as in lines such
as "god is a man-eater" or "Jesus came to crucify the world."
