The impure spirits take male and female forms. The masculine spirits unite with the souls in feminine forms. The feminine spirits mate with souls who inhabit the male form. None can be free from these forms unless they receive a power which is both masculine and feminine. This is what happens in the bridal chamber when man and woman are wed. When immature women see a man sitting alone, they naturally go flirt with him and distract him. Likewise, when immature men see a pretty woman sitting alone, they hunger for her and seduce her until she allows herself to be taken. But, if they see a man and woman seated together, the woman do not chase after the man, and the men do not chase after the woman. Because when the image of God in us [which is both masculine and feminine] is joined, no one dares to molest the man or the woman separately. (The Gospel of Philip, vs. 61)
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Philip’s Gospel speaks often of the union of the male and the female as the symbolic Oneness of the Divine Spirit. In the Genesis story, God creates Humanity in God’s own image. This “Adam” contains both male and female beings and is not separated until later when God observes that “it is not good for a man to be alone.” But the companion God finds for man is already within him. “Eve” is taken from inside Adam. The Oneness of Adam – which was reflective of the Oneness of God – contains both male and female. When the male and the female come together in the Bridal Chamber, this original Oneness is restored, both spiritually and physically.
To elaborate on this concept, Philip’s Gospel explains how the masculine spirits desire to unite with feminine spirits, and vice versa. But none can escape this division of forms “unless they receive a power which is both masculine and feminine.” This is the Divine Oneness of God who is neither male nor female, but both at once.
Simply put, what sets Humanity free from this feeling of lack is the merging and union of the Male/Female.
This is not to suggest that Humanity is Heterosexually coded. The metaphor of Male/Female can easily be exchanged for the analogy of Human/Divine or Flesh/Spirit. There is no need to press the metaphor into an exclusively Male/Female example. What is essentially being communicated is the idea that Humanity is incomplete without the reunification of the Flesh and the Spirit – All Flesh and All Spirit – into the Eternal Wholeness of Shared Humanity and Shared Divinity.
We are not at rest until we are resting in the reality of our Oneness with the Divine and with one another.
The Bridal Chamber is only one metaphor for this idea; it is not the only metaphor, nor is it necessarily the best one. It is, however, the one that Philip and other Valentinian Christians gravitate towards most often. Perhaps because this is the metaphor used by the Apostle Paul in Ephesians to describe the union of Christ and the Church, and the one used by John in the book of Revelation, where “the Bride of Christ” (the Church) is wed to the Groom (Christ).
Nevertheless, the point is that all Humanity is incomplete as long as we remain “unwed” from one another and from Christ. We must become “one flesh” with Christ, and with each other, if we are ever to break free from this illusion of separation and division from the Divine and to return to our original state of Oneness.
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