hidden revelation Gospel of Mary

**Chapter 5 — Mary Magdalene and the Hidden Teaching**

Chapter 5 of the text presents a striking moment in which Mary Magdalene appears as the disciple entrusted with knowledge not yet understood by the others. The scene unfolds after the Savior’s departure, when confusion and uncertainty remain among the disciples. In this setting Peter addresses Mary directly, acknowledging both her closeness to the Savior and her possession of teachings unknown to the others.

The text begins:

> 5. Peter said to Mary, Sister we know that the Savior loved you more than the rest of woman.

> 6. Tell us the words of the Savior which you remember which you know, but we do not, nor have we heard them.

> 7. Mary answered and said, What is hidden from you I will proclaim to you.

Peter’s words reveal two important elements. First, Mary held a special position among the followers even before the resurrection appearances. Second, Peter expects Mary to possess hidden instruction — teachings privately communicated and not yet shared with the group. His request is not confrontational but respectful; he addresses her as “Sister,” acknowledging both kinship and authority.

The statement that the Savior loved Mary more than the other women echoes a well-known saying preserved in another early Christian text, the *Gospel of Philip*. That work similarly presents Mary Magdalene as uniquely close to the Savior, not as a romantic partner, but as one able to perceive teachings that others struggled to understand.

The relevant passage reads:

> Wisdom, who is called barren, is the mother of the angels.

> The companion of the [savior] is Mary of Magdala. The [savior loved] her more than [all] the disciples, [and he] kissed her often on her [mouth].

> The other [disciples] [64]…said to him, “Why do you love her more than all of us?”

> The savior answered and said to them, “Why do I not love you like her? If a blind person and one who can see are both in darkness, they are the same. When the light comes, one who can see will see the light, and the blind person will stay in darkness.”

This explanation reframes favoritism as perception rather than preference. The Savior’s response suggests that Mary’s closeness results from understanding. When light appears, those capable of seeing recognize it; those unable remain in darkness even though the light is present to all. The distinction lies not in privilege but in perception.

Returning to Chapter 5, Peter’s appeal continues:

> 5 Peter said to Mary, "Sister, we know that the Savior loved you more than all other women.

This recognition establishes Mary as a legitimate bearer of memory and insight. The disciples acknowledge her authority because she retained teachings others did not grasp.

Peter then asks explicitly:

> 6 Tell us the words of the Savior that you remember, the things which you know that we don't because we haven't heard them."

> 7 Mary responded, "I will teach you about what is hidden from you." And she began to speak these words to them.

Mary does not hesitate. She agrees to share what has remained concealed. The emphasis on hidden knowledge reflects a common theme in early Christian mystical traditions: revelation unfolds progressively. Understanding comes to those prepared to receive it.

Mary’s role becomes that of teacher. She now transmits insight rather than merely recalling events. What follows is her account of a vision in which she encounters the Savior after his departure:

> 8. And she began to speak to them these words: I, she said, I saw the Lord in a vision and I said to Him, Lord I saw you today in a vision. He answered and said to me,

The vision introduces a mode of communication distinct from ordinary physical encounters. It is an experience of insight or perception beyond normal sensory experience. The Savior’s first response affirms Mary’s steadiness:

> 9. Blessed are you that you did not waver at the sight of Me. For where the mind is there is the treasure.

The emphasis here falls on the mind. Stability of mind allows recognition. The treasure is not located in physical possessions or external authority but in awareness itself. Where attention and understanding are directed, value appears.

Mary then raises a profound question concerning perception:

> 10. I said to Him, Lord, how does he who sees the vision see it, through the soul or through the spirit?

Her question seeks clarification about human perception. What faculty receives revelation? Is vision perceived through the animating principle, or through spiritual capacity?

The Savior answers:

> 11. The Savior answered and said, He does not see through the soul nor through the spirit, but the mind that is between the two that is what sees the vision and it is [...]

Unfortunately, much of the manuscript that follows is lost:

> (pages 11 - 14 are missing from the manuscript)

Yet even in fragmentary form, the message is clear. The mind occupies a mediating position between bodily life and spiritual awareness. Vision arises not simply from emotion or mystical abstraction, but from awakened understanding. Perception requires integration of inner faculties through awareness.

This teaching explains why Mary could receive instruction others missed. Her capacity lay not in status but in perception. She remained steady and attentive, allowing insight to form.

Chapter 5 therefore portrays Mary Magdalene not merely as a favored disciple but as a transmitter of understanding. Peter’s request acknowledges that some teachings remained hidden until the disciples were ready to hear them. Mary becomes the bridge between hidden revelation and communal understanding.

The connection with the *Gospel of Philip* reinforces this interpretation. Love is equated with recognition and perception. The Savior’s closeness to Mary reflects her capacity to perceive the light when it appeared. Others, though present, remained in darkness until understanding grew.

Thus the narrative emphasizes knowledge, awakening, and perception rather than hierarchy. Authority emerges through insight. Teaching flows from those who see clearly to those still learning.

Mary’s willingness to share what she has received demonstrates the movement from private revelation to communal instruction. What was hidden becomes spoken. What was known only to one becomes available to all willing to listen.

Even though parts of the manuscript are missing, Chapter 5 preserves a powerful scene: disciples seeking understanding, Mary serving as interpreter of revelation, and the Savior teaching that true vision arises through the awakened mind.

The chapter therefore stands as a testament to the importance of perception, memory, and teaching within early Christian communities. It reminds readers that understanding often appears first to those prepared to perceive it, and only later becomes shared knowledge for the wider community.

chapter 5

5) Peter said to Mary, Sister we know that the Savior loved you more than the rest of woman.

6) Tell us the words of the Savior which you remember which you know, but we do not, nor have we heard them.

7) Mary answered and said, What is hidden from you I will proclaim to you.

It seems from the words of Peter that Mary played a special role even before the resurrection and Peter now asks Mary for a hidden revelation

5  Peter said to Mary, "Sister, we know that the Savior loved you more than all other women. 

the statement that the Messiah loved Mary more than than the rest of woman seems to link it to the saying in the Gospel of Philip that he loved her more than all other disciple

The Gospel of Philip Wisdom and Mary of Magdala

Wisdom, who is called barren, is the mother of the angels.
The companion of the [savior] is Mary of Magdala. The [savior loved] her more than [all] the disciples, [and he] kissed her often on her [mouth].
The other [disciples] [64]…said to him, “Why do you love her more than all of us?”
The savior answered and said to them, “Why do I not love you like her? If a blind person and one who can see are both in darkness, they are the same. When the light comes, one who can see will see the light, and the blind person will stay in darkness.”

6 Tell us the words of the Savior that you remember, the things which you know that we don't because we haven't heard them."

7  Mary responded, "I will teach you about what is hidden from you." And she began to speak these words to them.

Mary now declares her willingness to impart this special teaching too 

The Seed of the Father

The Seed of the Father: Word, Seed, and the Birth of Knowledge

Early Gnostic Christian writings describe humanity not as possessing an immortal soul trapped in matter, but as existing first as thought and seed within the Father. Existence begins not as fully formed beings but as potential—like seed hidden in fertile ground—awaiting manifestation through knowledge, teaching, and awakening. The divine “Word” in this understanding is not merely speech but wisdom, instruction, and gnosis, the knowledge through which human beings come to know both their origin and their destiny.

The Tripartite Tractate expresses this seed-like origin clearly:

“They were forever in thought, for the Father was like a thought and a place for them… That is, they were with the Father; they did not exist for themselves. Rather, they only had existence in the manner of a seed, so that it has been discovered that they existed like a fetus. Like the word he begot them, subsisting spermatically, and the ones whom he was to beget had not yet come into being from him… sowed a thought like a spermatic seed.”

Here existence is described as embryonic. Humanity first exists in the Father as thought, intention, and seed. Only later does this seed unfold into conscious existence. The text insists that beings did not yet know themselves or the depth from which they came:

“The depth knew them, but they were unable to know the depth in which they were; nor was it possible for them to know themselves.”

Ignorance is therefore not moral failure but immaturity. Like a fetus, humanity existed but had not yet awakened. Knowledge is birth. Gnosis is maturation.

This understanding removes the idea of an immortal soul descending from heaven into flesh. Instead, life develops through seed, growth, and awakening. The seed contains possibility, not pre-formed immortality.

The same tractate continues:

“And just as the admirations of the silences are eternal generations and they are mental offspring, so too the dispositions of the word are spiritual emanations… seeds and thoughts of his offspring.”

Seed, thought, and word are inseparable. The Word produces seed; seed produces offspring; offspring come to consciousness through knowledge.

The second-century teacher Theodotus explains how this seed operates within humanity:

“Wisdom… put forth a receptacle of flesh for the Logos, the spiritual seed; clad in it the Saviour descended… he deposits the whole spiritual seed, that is, the elect.”

Here flesh is not evil but a receptacle, a vessel within which seed grows. Salvation is not escape from matter but the awakening of what has been planted within humanity.

Theodotus continues:

“We admit that the elect seed is both a spark kindled by the Logos and a pupil of the eye and a grain of mustard seed and leaven which unites in faith the genera which appear to be divided.”

The spark is not an immortal soul. It is seed, something planted, capable of growth or failure depending on conditions. A spark must be fed or it goes out; a seed must grow or it dies. Nothing here suggests inherent immortality. Instead, life must develop.

Another fragment explains:

“The followers of Valentinus maintain that when the animal body was fashioned a male seed was implanted by the Logos… And this worked as leaven, uniting what seemed to have been divided, soul and flesh…”

Human beings are therefore not spirits imprisoned in bodies. Soul and flesh belong together. The seed functions like leaven, uniting elements into living humanity.

Adam’s sleep is described as forgetfulness:

“Adam's sleep was the soul's forgetting…”

Ignorance is sleep; awakening is remembrance through knowledge. Salvation is remembering origin and purpose.

This seed imagery is not unique to Gnostic writings. Philo of Alexandria, writing in the first century, describes the divine Word as spermatic and creative:

“The invisible, spermatic, technical, and divine Word… opens the womb of all these things… whether of the mind… speech… senses… or of the body…”

For Philo, the Word is not abstract theology. It is creative principle, the technical intelligence that generates life, mind, speech, and perception. Everything begins in seed form.

He continues:

“The beginning of a plant is the seed, and the end is the fruit…”

The process is natural, developmental. Seed becomes fruit through growth. Humanity likewise develops through knowledge and experience.

Genesis itself speaks in these terms:

“Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.”

Bodies reproduce bodies. Life continues through seed. Humanity is described as trees whose seed produces further life:

“And he will certainly become like a tree planted by streams of water, That gives its own fruit in its season.”

Seed imagery therefore connects physical generation with spiritual understanding. Bodies reproduce bodies, but teachings reproduce knowledge. Wisdom spreads like seed.

The New Testament echoes this imagery:

“For YOU have been given a new birth, not by corruptible, but by incorruptible seed… through the word of the living and enduring…”

And again:

“Everyone who has been born from God does not carry on sin, because His seed remains in such one…”

The Greek terms clarify this:

“σπορά… seed… a sowing… origin.”
“σπέρμα… something sown, i.e. seed (including the male ‘sperm’); by implication, offspring.”

Birth through the Word is not mystical transformation of an immortal soul. It is instruction, teaching, and knowledge reshaping life. The Word—wisdom, gnosis—plants new understanding that changes conduct.

Thus the “word of God” is teaching, wisdom, and knowledge that generates new life. It is seed planted through instruction, awakening consciousness and altering behavior.

The Tripartite Tractate again clarifies:

“In order that they might know what exists for them, he graciously granted the initial form… he gave them the name ‘Father’ by means of a voice proclaiming…”

Recognition of the Father comes through voice—communication, teaching. Name gives identity; identity produces understanding. Knowledge creates relationship.

The fatherhood concept operates through human experience. Earthly fathers allow humanity to understand the heavenly archetype. Through familial relationships, people comprehend origin and belonging. Teaching transforms biological relationship into spiritual understanding.

The fetus analogy continues:

“They existed like a fetus…”

A fetus exists before knowing its parent. Similarly, humanity exists before understanding origin. Life precedes knowledge; knowledge brings awareness.

Biblical language continues the seed metaphor:

“Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.”

Belief is birth through teaching. Knowledge produces transformation.

Paul describes presence through spirit:

“Though I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit.”

And again:

“The spirits of just men made perfect.”

This does not require immortal souls traveling beyond space. Rather, shared teaching and knowledge create unity across distance and generations. Minds shaped by the same wisdom participate in the same spiritual reality.

Knowledge transcends space and time because teaching continues through memory and community. Wisdom binds generations.

Therefore, salvation is not escape from matter but awakening within life. Human beings are seed-bearing creatures whose development depends on knowledge and teaching.

No immortal soul descends from heaven. Instead, life grows through planted seed. Wisdom cultivates this seed, producing maturity. Without growth, seed remains dormant or perishes.

The spark spoken of in Valentinian teaching is seed potential, not eternal essence. It must be nourished through understanding. Knowledge acts as water and light.

Gnostic Christianity therefore sees the human journey as awakening from forgetfulness. Sleep gives way to awareness. Ignorance gives way to knowledge.

The Father plants seed through the Word—teachings, wisdom, gnosis. Humanity grows toward understanding. Knowledge transforms behavior, creating unity between flesh and understanding rather than conflict.

Human existence is developmental. Seed becomes fetus; fetus becomes child; child becomes adult. Likewise, ignorance becomes knowledge; knowledge becomes wisdom; wisdom becomes maturity.

The Word functions as reproductive knowledge. Teaching reproduces understanding across generations. The community becomes a living orchard of seed-bearing trees, each capable of producing further growth.

The Father remains the source. Humanity originates in divine thought but must awaken through knowledge to realize purpose. Existence begins hidden, then emerges into awareness.

Thus, the ancient writings present a coherent vision: humanity originates as seed in divine thought, grows through knowledge, and matures through wisdom. Salvation is awakening, not escape. Life is growth, not imprisonment.

The spark is the seed.
The Word is teaching and wisdom.
Birth is awakening through knowledge.

And humanity, like a tree planted by streams of water, bears fruit when nourished by understanding.

The Seed of the Father 

They were forever in thought, for the Father was like a thought and a place for them. When their generations had been established, the one who is completely in control wished to lay hold of and to bring forth that which was deficient in the [...] and he brought forth those [...] him. But since he is as he is, he is a spring, which is not diminished by the water which abundantly flows from it. While they were in the Father's thought, that is, in the hidden depth, the depth knew them, but they were unable to know the depth in which they were; nor was it possible for them to know themselves, nor for them to know anything else. That is, they were with the Father; they did not exist for themselves. Rather, they only had existence in the manner of a seed, so that it has been discovered that they existed like a fetus. Like the word he begot them, subsisting spermatically, and the ones whom he was to beget had not yet come into being from him. The one who first thought of them, the Father, - not only so that they might exist for him, but also that they might exist for themselves as well, that they might then exist in his thought as mental substance and that they might exist for themselves too, - sowed a thought like a spermatic seed. Now, in order that they might know what exists for them, he graciously granted the initial form, while in order that they might recognize who is the Father who exists for them, he gave them the name "Father" by means of a voice proclaiming to them that what exists, exists through that name, which they have by virtue of the fact that they came into being, because the exaltation, which has escaped their notice, is in the name. (The Tripartite Tractate)

And just as the admirations of the silences are eternal generations and they are mental offspring, so too the dispositions of the word are spiritual emanations. Both of them admirations and dispositions, since they belong to a word, are seeds and thoughts of his offspring, and roots which live forever, appearing to be offspring which have come forth from themselves, being minds and spiritual offspring to the glory of the Father.  (The Tripartite Tractate)

"Father," he says, "I deposit into thy hands my spirit." Wisdom, he says, put forth a receptacle of flesh for the Logos, the spiritual seed; clad in it the Saviour descended. Wherefore, at the Passion, it is Wisdom which he deposits with the Father, in order that he may receive her from the Father and not be held back here by those who have the power to deprive him. Thus, by the word already spoken of, he deposits the whole spiritual seed, that is, the elect.

We admit that the elect seed is both a spark kindled by the Logos and a pupil of the eye and a grain of mustard seed and leaven which unites in faith the genera which appear to be divided. Theodotus 

2 But the followers of Valentinus maintain that when the animal body was fashioned a male seed was implanted by the Logos in the elect soul while it was asleep and that this is an effluence of the angelic <seed>, in order that there may be no gap. And this worked as leaven, uniting what seemed to have been divided, soul and flesh, which had also been put forth sepa rately by Wisdom. And Adam's sleep was the soul's forgetting, which restrained from dissolution, . . . just as the spiritual thing which the Saviour inserted into the soul.. The seed was an effluence of the male and angelic <element>. Therefore the Saviour says, "Be saved, thou and thy souL" Theodotus 

(119) for that which openeth the womb of all these things, whether of the mind, so as to enable it to comprehend the things appreciable only by the intellect, or of the speech so as to enable it to exercise the energies of voice, or of the external senses, so as to qualify them to receive the impressions which are made upon them by their appropriate subjects, or of the body to fit it for its appropriate stationary conditions or motions, is the invisible, spermatic, technical, and divine Word, which shall most properly be dedicated to the Father. (120) And, indeed, as are the beginnings of God so likewise are the ends of God; and Moses is a witness to this, where he commands to "separate off the end, and to confess that it is due to God." The things in the world do also bear witness. How so? (121) The beginning of a plant is the seed, and the end is the fruit, each of them being the work, not of husbandry, but of nature. Again, of knowledge the beginning is nature, as has been shown, but the end can never reach mankind, for no man is perfect in any branch of study whatever; but it is a plain truth, that all excellence and perfection belong to one Being alone; we therefore are borne on, for the future, on the confines of beginning and end, learning, teaching, tilling the ground, working up everything else, as if we were really effecting something, that the creature also may seem to be doing something; (122) therefore, with a more perfect knowledge, Moses has confessed that the first-fruits and the end belong to God, speaking of the creation of the world, where he says, "In the beginning God created ..."{42}{genesis 1:1.} And again he says, "God finished the heaven and the earth."Philo of Alexandria's "Who is the Heir of Divine Things" (sections 119–122)

The depth knew them but they were unable to know the depth in which they were nor was it possible for them to know themselves nor for them to know anything else. that is they were with the Father they did not exist for themselves rather they only had existence in the manner of a seed so that it has been discovered that they existed like a fetus. the Tripartite Tractate

it’s good this writers clarifying what he means that he’s saying the church in Christ were more seeds of thought you can think of it that way. not so much entities if that’s the case then I can say that’s a little more agreeable to The way I think Gnostic Christians might might think of a place that you’d put this in the whole puzzle.

like the word he begat them subsisting spermaticlly. and the ones whom he was to beget had not yet come into being from him the one who first thought of them the Father not only so that they might exist for him but also that they might exist for themselves as well. That they might then exist in his thought as mental substance and that they might exist for themselves too so to thought like a spermatic seed. 1 Peter 1:23 1 John 3:9

Genesis 1:11 New International Version
Then God said, "Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds." And it was so.
When this was written in the Book of Genesis, this was referring to the bodies made by the dust of this earth, and the fruit trees are the different races of bodies, shoots, off spring, fruits. that had as the fore body, the ability to reproduce another body, remember different races are really bodies with seed that will reproduce another body like itself.

 Psa 1:3 And he will certainly become like a tree planted by streams of water,
That gives its own fruit in its season
And the foliage of which does not wither,

The Most High, our Father sees humanity as a seed bearing tree, who's seed is within it self.

1 Peter 1:23 For YOU have been given a new birth, not by corruptible, but by incorruptible [reproductive] seed (Greek spoas´; Latin., semine.), through the word of [the] living and enduring

1 John 3:9 Everyone who has been born from God does not carry on sin, because His [reproductive] seed (Greek 4690 spora) remains in such one, and he cannot practice sin, because he has been born from God.

4701. σπορά spora spor-ah’; from 4687; a sowing, i.e. (by implication) parentage: — seed. σπορά, σπορᾶς, ἡ (σπείρω, 2 perfect ἐσπορα), seed: 1 Peter 1:23 ((equivalent to a sowing, figuratively, origin, etc., from Aeschylus, Platodown))

4690. σπέρμα sperma sper’-mah; from 4687; something sown, i.e. seed (including the male "sperm"); by implication, offspring; specifically, a remnant (figuratively, as if kept over for planting): — issue, seed.

Now in order that they might know what exists for them he graciously granted the initial form. Wow in order that they might recognize who is the Father who exists for them gave them the name Father by means of a voice proclaiming to them that what exists. Exists through that name which they have by virtue of the fact that they came into being because the exultation which has escaped their notice is in the name alright.

So the concept of the idea of a Father we all have a Father rather adopt him we know that Father or not or we were in a family where we’re not adopted the idea the concept of the Father is there and that experience allows us to know God the Father in heaven. so against the same concept that Christ came to represent the Father in name and so to all the Fathers here that we have on this earth representing in name the concept of the Father. so ultimately these are archetype here’s the Father so put in a name here’s God put in the name in this case would be Christ the infant while in the form of the fetus has enough for him itself before ever seeing the one who sewed it therefore they had the sole task of searching for him

Hebrews 12:23 to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the Judge of all, to the spirits of the righteous made perfect,

Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God" (1 Jn. 5:1). Our spiritual man is what is born of God. All true believers are here spoken of as if they are their spiritual man. All true believers in Christ therefore have a spiritual man within them, which we must seek out, even imagine at times, and with which we should fellowship

Our spiritual man is not limited by the bonds of space. Thus Paul was bodily absent from Corinth, " but present in spirit" (1 Cor. 5:3), i.e. his spiritual man was present with them. It was the same with Colosse: " I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit" (Col. 2:5). When our spiritual man groans, Christ groans too in Heaven, an infinite distance away (Rom. 8:23 cp. 26). There is no time barrier, either. Thus our spiritual man is in close fellowship with " the spirits of just men made perfect" , having died many years ago (Heb. 12:23). This is the glorious unity of the Spirit; we are not just connected with all living saints, wherever they may be, but with the spiritual characters of all true saints throughout history.