Gospel of John (Jn) 8.57 " You are not yet fifty years old and you have seen Abraham !" 8.58 "Jesus said to them "Truly I say to you before Abraham was born, I am"
Just after this is the wonderful Chapter 9. This is ostensibly about Jesus healing a blind man, but under the surface there are deeper resonating meanings.
First Jesus is asked why the man was born blind. His reply is not that he has sinned or his parents but that the works of God may be displayed in him.
Jesus sends him off to a Pool in Jerusalem to wash - which might have been quite some way for a man who was blind.
When he comes back seeing, there is almost a pantomine discussion between people as to whether this is the same man they had seen previously as a beggar. Some say yes some say no. This all leads to him replying (in exactly the same Greek words as Jesus just before in Chapter Eight) "I am ".
There is then a long discussion between him and the religious authorities as to how he can now see and whether Jesus who has done this is himself a sinner or not because this healing happened on the Sabbath which broke the religious laws. The religious authorities disbelieve him and send for his parents who say that he is of age he can speak for himself !
The man who is now full of confidence says "You don't know where he (Jesus) comes from yet he opened my eyes.... Not since time began (or could be translated "out of the eternal") has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind".
This resonates back to the original "fall of Adam" in the Garden of Eden.
This has been traditionally interpreted as Adam's disobedience in eating, with his wife, the apple of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which of all the food in the Garden, God had told him not to eat.
But in Advatic terms the problem lay in Adam and Eve considering themselves separate from God before they ate anything. How else could the serpent have persuaded them that somehow God was withholding something from them and that they would become God if they ate from this Tree ? The irony is huge because Good and Evil only exist as "realities" in a state separate from God.
But to return to the poetry of the story... when they ate the apple "their eyes were opened they knew they were naked". That is they had a Body Consciousness. They were ashamed and covered themselves with fig leaves and hid themselves from God.
Later God came looking for them "Where art thou ?". Adam says "I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself". God says "Who told you that you were naked ....."
Now to return to John Chapter 9.
Jesus' opening of the blind man eyes is the undoing of Adam's problems in Genesis.
See also the Gospel of Thomas Logion 37 "His disciples said; On what day wilt thou be revealed to us and on what day shall we see thee ? Jesus said : When you unclothe yourselves and are not ashamed and take your garments and lay them beneath your feet like little children and tread upon them and then shall ye see the Son of the living One, and ye shall not fear".
In John Chapter 1 (after the prologue) there is a progression of titles for Jesus.
The progression starts with the disciples referring to him as Master/Rabbi/Teacher then moves on to Christ/Messiah/Anointed One. But the progression ends with Jesus referring to himself as the Son of Man. The chapter concludes with Jesus saying "I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man".
This clearly refers to the story - again in Genesis - of Jacob's Ladder. Jacob dreams of a ladder set up on earth and reaching to heaven and the angels of God ascending and descending on it. God stood above it and said " I am the God of Abraham ....and in they seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed".
When Jacob woke up, he said "Surely the Lord is in this place and I knew it not. How awesome is this place. This is none other than the house of God and this is the gate of heaven".
So Jesus as Son of Man is the passageway from earth to heaven and for a new realisation of the earth.
See also in Luke 17.21 Jesus says "the Kingdom of God will not come with observation (of external things) nor will they say "Look here it is" or "There it is " (advaita !) for the Kingdom of God is within you".
Gospel of Thomas Logion 3 "But the Kingdom is within you and it is outside of you. When you know yourselves then shall you be known and you shall know that you are the sons of the living Father. But if you do not know yourselves, then you are in poverty and you are that poverty".
And later Logion 113 " His disciples said to him: On what day will the kingdom come ? Jesus said; "It cometh not with observation. They will not say Lo here ! or Lo there! But the kingdom of the Father is spread out upon the earth and men do not see it ".
But again to return to John Chapter 9.
The same progression of titles is here as in Chapter 1. First Rabbi, then (only as an aside) Christ, and finally on the momentous occasion when the man (the second "I am") meets again and sees for the first time Jesus.
Jesus says to him "Do you believe in the Son of Man ? " The man says " I believe Lord " and he worshipped him.
The Greek verb used here - proskunew - is terribly strong in John. It is only used for worship of God. So this is the first and only time in the Gospel that Jesus is worshipped. And by a devotee who prostrates himself before the person who has made him one with himself.
Gospel of Thomas Logion 106 " Jesus said: When you make the two one, you shall become Sons (plural) of Man (singular) and when you say: Mountain be moved, it shall be moved".
Amen.
