Naked, Page 2

We don’t come to the next Biblical use of Naked until well into Exodus, at the time of the Chaldo-Egyptian Cultural Era. And here again we see the recapitulation during the post-Atlantean Epoch of the more primitive embryonic soul development during the Atlantean Epoch (see I-24). It is well to bear in mind the time frame of the Cultural Era in which subsequent usages of the term occur (see I-19) as perhaps having a significant bearing on their meaning. For instance, those that occur earlier in the Chaldo-Egyptian Era tend to emphasize the physical or sensate aspect of the term, as in Ex 28,42-43 and Lev 20,18-19, while the later usages seem to take on a progressively more exalted meaning in relation to the eternal Ego. Particularly in the Wisdom, Prophet and New Testament books is this so. But even the earlier usages can be seen to carry a higher meaning as well.

If one bears in mind that the “Three Bodies” are merely unpurified “Garments” to be shed (to the extent not purified during progressive earthly incarnations) as the Ego makes the journey between death and rebirth (see I-33), and that one whose “Garments” are all removed is Naked, considerable new spiritual meaning can be gathered. And in those instances where condemnation is being heaped on sinners of one variety or another who are said to have their Nakedness exposed, one can see that the converse spiritual growth can be meant, thereby giving high spiritual meaning. For instance, the failure to purify one’s lower “Three Bodies” during the course of earthly incarnation means that one is not creating the type of “Garment(s)” required for spiritual advancement. Such Nakedness is most assuredly exposed during the journey between lives (I-33). It is then as though one were attending a wedding without the necessary “Garments” (Mt 22,11-12), not having purified any of the “bodies” in earthly lives.

Of particular interest is Gen 9,22-23. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the Nakedness of Noah. This would seem to mean that Ham had a strong atavistic clairvoyance, enabling him to see the Individuality (Nakedness) of Noah whereas Shem and Japheth, looking to the future, covered this with their earthly “Garments” (astral and etheric bodies drawing further into the densifying physical so as to lose the ancient vision into the spiritual world). This was necessary for the post-Atlantean evolution.

Of immense importance is Mk 14,51-52, regarding the “Young Man” who fled Naked. With the intensity of a laser beam, all that is said above about the Ego seems to focus on this passage. While “Young Man” is to be the subject of a separate discussion in this work, we must touch preliminarily upon it here. Notably, the term “Young Man” is used sparingly in the Gospels, and in connection with only three incidents. The first has to do with the “rich young man” in Mt 19,16-22, the last with the youth of Nain whom Jesus initiated (“raised from the dead”) in Lk 7,11-17, while this one in Mark constitutes one end of a thread whose other end shows up in the empty tomb on Easter morning (Mk 16,5). In Mk 14,51-52, the “Young Man” first wore nothing but a “linen cloth” which he yielded; in Mk 16,5 he wears a “White Robe.” What a spine-tingling spectacle we are about to comprehend! The “rich young man” is Lazarus/John (see Welburn’s Gnosis [GNOS]; also “Egypt” below, under the Philo discussion; and 4 ABD 558, “Secret Gospel of Mark”), the youth of Nain the Individuality representing the highest stream of human evolution (see The Temple Legend [TL], Lect. 6; The Battle for the Soul [BATSO]; and “Widow’s Son”)—and the “Young Man” in Mark’s Gospel is the Christ Spirit itself, as will be more fully discussed elsewhere (for now see The Gospel of St. Mark [GSMk], Lect. 9). Is it not an awesome fact that while the Gospels of Mark and Luke both relate something of the “rich young man” account (see Mk 10,17-22, but especially the “Secret Gospel of Mark” discussed in GNOS, supra; Lk 18,18-30), both of them reserve the “Young Man” terminology to demonstrate some other Individuality or Spiritual Being. Thus, we have the following:

So in the synoptic Gospels we have the “Three Bodies” again demonstrated in connection with the high meaning of “Young Man.” The Gospel of John, written by one of these “Young Men,” does not employ the phrase. And only in connection with the highest of these “Young Men” is the term Naked employed, and then not for the purpose of showing that the “youth” was without the higher “Garments” but to demonstrate that he (alone) had shed, i.e., fully purified, all the lower ones, the “Three Bodies,” and was worthy to wear the paragon of all “Garments,” the “White Robe.”

Finally, let us consider the state of Jesus at the Crucifixion. Reverent modesty has tradition covering his genitalia with a cloth (cf. Ex 28,42-43). But, as foreseen in Ps 22,18, the Gospels do not accord him that; see Mt 27,27-35; Mk 15,20-24; Lk 23,34b; Jn 19,23-24; this increased the shame (Heb 12,2) that afflicted his followers (Rom 9,33; 1 Pet 2,6; cf. Is 28,16) prior to the Resurrection. One of the most powerful preachers I’ve known, in one of his most powerful sermons, spoke assuredly of Christ as having been crucified completely Naked in abject worldly shame.³

Steiner’s Christianity as Mystical Fact (CMF) shows that the Mystery of Golgotha was the performance of the ancient “Mysteries” in full view of the world; now, however, instead of the hierophant calling the candidate for initiation back from deathlike sleep to earthly life (as in the case of Lazarus and the others—see “Widow’s Son”) Jesus relied upon the Father to call him back from actual earthly death to spiritual life perceivable in the etheric (“life”) world by those whose vision he had prepared. One of the aspects of initiation in the Mysteries was Nakedness, at least symbolically. Steiner speaks of this in TL, Lect. 7, p. 81, to the effect that the candidate “ought to present himself in life as if he were appearing completely Naked in the eyes of his fellow men.” That particular lecture had to do with Masonic rights, but in that respect they partook of the ancient Mysteries.