Didymus: History & Conspiracy

 

          By Matthew Thomas Farrell

 

 

This page contains the curious history of the Gospel’s discovery, and an alternative explanation of why Thomas was suppressed from Scripture.  A more expanded (and rambling) version of this article exists, enlarging upon topics such as the historical apostle Thomas, Gnostic influence, the formation of the Canon, and general nitpickings there-of. 

 

Readers are encouraged to draw their own conclusions.

 

 

 

Quick tour:

 

  • precedent

    (Thomas wasn’t the only authentic Gospel cut from the Canon)

 

 

 

...and now, a bit of history...

 

Discovery in the desert

 

December 1945; upper Egypt (near Nag Hammadi)

 

One morning, Muhammad ’Ali al-Samman and his brother Khalifah saddled up their camels and rode off for a near-by mountain called Djebel el-Tarif.  The journey would take them several hours, so during the trip they talked.  Mostly, their discussions focused on a man who lived in a near-by village.  His name was Ahmad Hawara.

The two brothers were plotting his murder.

Back in May, Ahmad had killed Muhammad ’Ali’s father, the latest victim of an ongoing blood feud.  Muhammad ’Ali wished to avenge his dad’s death, and bandied ideas with Khalifah on how best to achieve this ghoulish goal.  At his side he had a mattock, which his mother advised him to keep sharp, should they happen to find the monster who made her a widow.  For now, however, he intended to use it to dig sabakh, a soft nitrogen-rich soil that is good natural fertilizer.

They reached Djebel el-Tarif, an imposing mound with over one hundred and fifty caves, and chose a suitable place to hobble their camels.  Muhammad ’Ali began to dig around a boulder, and to his surprise encountered something solid buried in the ground.  Quickly, he unearthed a large clay pot, caked with ages of earth.  The top, he saw, was sealed on with bitumen.

Muhammad ’Ali pondered this a moment, extremely uneasy.  After all, just to the north on another side of el-Tarif was an old graveyard.  Officials who served the pharaohs of the Sixth Dynasty with distinction were interred there.  He considered the jar before him, mattock in hand.  To him, there was the very real possibility that it might contain a djinn, and breaking it open would release it.  Muhammad ’Ali had no desire to free (and then confront) an evil spirit.  But of course, it might also contain gold.  He weighed his options, and greed conquered superstition.  Hefting his mattock, he smashed open the top.

A shower of tiny golden flakes rose up on crests of stale air, to be carried away by the wind.  Leaning over, Muhammad ’Ali looked inside.  He found it held, not gold or spirits, but thirteen leather-bound books, filled with crumbling, yellowed pages that flaked off and blew away as he pulled the tomes out to examine them.  The pages were cracked and brittle, and filled with an elegant calligraphy totally lost on his illiteracy.

He had no idea what they were, but was certain of one thing: these books were ancient.

Which meant that they were valuable.  Antiques dealers in Cairo just loved these things, and paid good money for them.  So, wrapping them in his tunic, he returned home and put them on a bed of straw right next to the stove.  

Muhammad ’Ali’s mother was pleased: not only had her son brought fertilizer for their crops, he apparently found some kindling as well.

Her joy became even greater a month later when she learned that Ahmad was near by.  She urged her sons to go seek vengeance, and then tossed another codex on the fire to brew up a cup of tea.  Muhammad ’Ali and his six brothers carried out their mission with a zeal that would have made mama proud.  In fact, they attacked Ahmad while he was asleep, and “...hacked off his limbs bit by bit, ripped out his heart, and devoured it among them, as the ultimate act of blood revenge.”[1]

Unfortunately for them, the person they had chosen to kill was the son of the local sheriff.  Alas, Ahmad was not very popular, and the villagers (who had eagerly shown Muhammad ’Ali where Ahmad was) suddenly suffered acute amnesia regarding the whole affair.  During the investigation, Muhammad ’Ali learned that the authorities were going to search his house for evidence.  He decided it prudent to sequester the books, until he could eventually get to Cairo to sell them.  So he gave several to friends for safe-keeping, including a Coptic priest, knowing that a priest’s house would not likely be searched.  The priest agreed to keep it for him, and put it aside without looking at it.

Coptic priests can marry, and this priest’s brother-in-law happened to be visiting.  He saw Muhammad ’Ali’s codex, suspected its value, and promptly stole it.  He took it to an antiques dealer in Cairo, who bought it for £250.  Most, if not all, of Muhammad ’Ali’s “friends” did likewise over the next year as the homicide investigation dragged on.  This eventually attracted the attention of the Department of Antiques, who began to acquire them in curiosity.

Still, several of the codices made a successful exodus from Egypt.  One was purchased by the Carl Jung Foundation and presented to the psychologist himself on his eightieth birthday.  The CJF made the first serious attempt to translate the work, which turned out to be an anthology containing titles such as The Prayer of the Apostle Paul, The Apocryphon (i.e.: “Secret Book”) of James, The Gospel of Truth, and a Treatise on the Resurrection.  Unfortunately, numerous pages were missing, making any sort of translation at that point difficult at best.

In an effort to solve this, Professor Giles Quispel investigated the history of the codex and flew to the Coptic Museum in Cairo where the surviving texts had eventually been acquired.  It turned out that they did have most of the missing pages from what is now known as the Jung Codex, and they agreed to give him photographs of the missing pages, plus several of the other texts as well.  Hurrying back to his hotel room, Quispel began deciphering the ancient manuscripts.

His curiosity quickly turned to astonishment when the very first thing he read was:

 

These are the secret words which the living Jesus spoke,

and which the twin, Judas Thomas, wrote down.

 

After nearly two millennia, The Gospel of Thomas had finally been found.


 

Peshar haddabar

 

prosdramwn de o FilippoV hkousen autou anaginwskontoV Hsaian ton profhthn, kai eipen, Ara ge ginwskeiV a anaginwskeiV; o de eipen, PwV gar an dunaimhn ean mh tiV odhghsei me;

 

AxeiV   e:l-la

 

So Philip ran up to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?”  And he said, “How can I, unless someone guides me?”

 

Acts 8:30-31

 

 

The Gospel of Thomas contained in Muhammad ’Ali’s Codex is not a biography or a Passion romance in the fashion of other Gospels, but functions more as an extended sermon.  As its incipit states, it is a collection of over one hundred “secret sayings of the living Jesus.”  About half of the sayings have direct parallels to sayings recorded in the Canonical gospels, and much of the other half can be linked theologically to the rest of the New Testament.  Perhaps as important, most saying in Thomas have either a direct or allusional reference point somewhere in the Old Testament.

 

It could be argued that to deny the authenticity of Thomas is to deny the authenticity of the entire Bible.  

 

Or it could be argued that Thomas is merely a redundant rehash with subversive filler.

 

For every five scholars who argue Thomas is authentic, another five argue otherwise. All ten offer convincing “evidence” that frequently contradicts the “evidence” of the other nine.  Thankfully, the answer(s) must ultimately be decided by the individual reader, who hopefully will say afterward, “I agree because...” or “I don’t agree because...”

 

It can also be argued that it was this very thought-provoking procedure that was the real reason Thomas was suppressed and never entered the “official” Canon.

 

Context check

 

The existence of the Gospel of Thomas has been known to scholars since the origins of Christianity, but no (known) copies have survived any of the puritanical purges.  The work is mentioned by the early Church fathers, and (not surprisingly) almost always in a negative context.

 

 

 

 

 

In December 1905, diggings at Oxyrhynchus (now Behnesa, in middle Egypt) unearthed over a thousand fragments of unidentified Greek Biblical script dating from the first two centuries.  Included was an account of Jesus visiting the Temple and arguing with a Pharisee named Levi (OP 840), an extrended narrative of Jesus’ dinner at Matthew Levi’s (OP 1224), and, on OP 654:

 

                                    These are the words which<...

                                    Jesus spoke, the living, a<nd..

                                    (who) also (is called) Thomas, and he said<...

                                    these words<...

                                    will he not taste.

 

In 1952 it was established that Papyrus 1 and 655 were also were fragments of Thomas.  Notably, the handwriting on Papyrus 1 differs from the other two, strongly suggesting at two copies of Thomas were “trashed.”

Not counting these three vague fragments, the copy found among Muhammad ’Ali’s collective codices is the only version of Thomas we currently have.

The books found by Muhammad ’Ali are known collectively as the Nag Hammadi Library.  The Gospel According to Thomas is the second work of the second Codex  (NHC II,2) page 32 line 10 to page 51 line 28 (between The Apocryphon of John and The Gospel of Philip.)  Dating the paper they were written on, the actual Codices were written and buried around 450, but obviously the Thomas was originally written several centuries earlier.

The NHL was composed in Coptic, an Egyptian language that uses characters of the Greek alphabet.  Scholars are in general agreement that Thomas was originally written, like all the Canonical works, in Greek.

Going from Greek to Coptic is tricky.  The best example of this is NHC VI,5 which contains an excerpt from Plato’s Republic (588a-589b).  When first translated, VI,5 was not recognized for what it was, in part because the flowing language of Plato does not transmit well into the much clumsier Coptic.  However, careful paralleling of the original Platonic text and its Coptic translation show it to be more than just a bad translation.  The work has to do the human soul, and the parts of VI,5 that deviate the most have almost no relation to what Plato meant.  It has been demonstrated that portions of VI,5 have been altered to fit a specific theology, in this case Gnosticism.

A similar problem exists with the Nag Hammadi edition of Thomas.  Comparisons of the Coptic text with the excerpts from Oxyrhynchus show that it has undergone some change.  This is not only in the language and imagery, but of the eighteen passages preserved from Oxyrhynchus, two of them are noticeably different, and several unique.  Scholars are not wholly convinced that the Greek Oxyrhynchus Fragments are the Gospel’s original form, but even if they are, it is clear that Coptic Thomas has suffered from at least one revision.

In studying texts for tampering, one thing to look for is what both writers and scholars call an This is where text changes abruptly in voice or intent.  Some are easy to spot, some are pretty slick.  Of course, seam-hunting isn’t a monopoly of Biblical scholars (or novelists with too much time on their hands)—it’s a game anyone can play!

The very nature of Thomas makes seam-hunting a trying task.  All too easily, a spurious saying could be added: all that’s required is a “Jesus said” prefix and you’re in.  Likewise, saying some wag scribe found distasteful could be deleted or altered and no one would know—especially if all other copies had been burned by fun-loving Inquisitors.

But perhaps most telling, the order of the sayings in the Coptic version does not always agree with the order of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri.

 

In short, the Coptic Gospel of Thomas is a corrupt text.  

 

Unfortunately, that’s all we’ve got to draw our conclusions from.  We must immediately wonder, was Thomas banned because of subsequent corruption, or was even the legitimate original also frowned upon?

Although the Gospel of Thomas has clear origins in the New Testament, it also—in its Coptic form—bears distinct gnostic overtones.  The crucial question, of course, is how much is authentic, and how much is the result of later gnosticising.  Weeding out the filler is a lot like eating puffer fish: you have to extract a tasty nugget surrounded by deadly poison.  This question will probably never be satisfactorily answered, unless an earlier, uncorrupted edition is discovered.

These current corruptions within Coptic Thomas have two side effects: suspicion and frustration.  We must be suspicious of how closely Coptic Thomas mirrors its Greek original, and we are frustrated because there is currently no way of knowing without an earlier, more immaculate copy.

This makes determining the authorship, place, and time of composition of “autograph” copy extremely difficult.  The incipit of Thomas specifically identifies the author is “Dydimus Judas Thomas.”  This is the form of the apostle Thomas’s name favored by Syrian Manicheans.  There is evidence to support that one of the redactions—if not the actual writing itself—occurred in Syria.  The church father Cyril, naturally, denies that the author was the apostle, but a Syrian disciple of Mani also called Thomas.  The Manicheans were known to have used the text, and parts of it do have Manichean leanings.[2]  But again, almost all of Thomas has direct relation to the New (and Old!) Testament.

Like the canonical Gospels, the question of authorship will probably never be resolved.  If you would like my opinion, however, I think the Gospel of Thomas is no less authentic than the four Canonical gospels.  Remember: we do not for certain who wrote those, either.   The Synoptics were originally anonymous, and decisions of authorship came about in the second century based on legend and (especially with Luke, extremely suspect) exegesis.  The Apostle Matthew was determined to have written the Gospel of Matthew solely because 9:9 differs from Mark 2:14/Luke 5:27.  The authorship attestation of John 21:20-25 is missing (along with most of Chapter 8) from its earliest sources.  Until we have better evidence, we simply do not know for sure who wrote any of these.  With precedent and criteria like that, I nominate Thomas for canonization.  I also admit that’s just my opinion, and if I’m wrong, mea culpa.  For what it’s worth, though, I suspect that in its original form, The Gospel of Thomas probably was written (or contributed to) by somebody who actually had heard these sayings when they were said, quite possibly the apostle Thomas himself.

Besides, the important question is not whether Thomas actually wrote Thomas, but whether Jesus actually said what Thomas claims.

Which again brings us back to the question, why was Thomas not included in the Bible?  Was textual corruption and misuse/misinterpretation so bad that by the time the Canon was reached its accepted form Thomas was deemed un-salvageable?  Or were there deeper, darker motives?

 

 

      A necessary but relevant digression into the formation of the Canon

 

 

 

The Bible from which Thomas was excluded did not fall out of the sky a complete book.  The process of selection and status gradually evolved, and even the Bible itself tells us that what we currently have is not the full picture or story.  Things were left out that should have been included, and vice-versa.  Sometimes books and letters show up out of nowhere to be granted status, such as the accidental discovery of Deuteronomy while cleaning out the Temple in 621BC (2nd Kings 23:8).  More often, though, things are lost.  Paul tells the Colossians (4:16) “After this letter has been read to you, see that it is also read in the church of the Laodiceans and that you in turn read the letter from Laodicea.”  A universally-acknowledged Letter to Laodicaea forgery has been circulating for centuries, but the Pauline-penned original is no longer extant.  There are other examples.  1st Corinthians 5:9 mentions a previous, now lost letter written to the community.  Jude alludes to the non-canonical Enoch and the Testament of Moses.  Enoch was lost until it was discovered in 1773 by an explorer among Ethiopian jews; Enoch was also among the Dead Sea Scrolls.  Nor are these the only thing to fall out of the Old Testament: consider the Book of Jashar (see Joshua 10:12-13), The Book of the Wars of Yahweh (mentioned in Numbers 21:14), and the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel and Judah (1st Kings 14:19, etc.)

Of course, back when they were actually written, these now-lost books were still circulating, but they weren’t the only selections available.  It is undeniable that there was a flood of written material in the first few centuries, of which Thomas was a product.  Some of that flood was legit, some was spurious, but all of it was subjective.  So was the process by which they were selected or spurned.

In the third century, an important gnostic named Marcion reached a conclusion: the God of the Old Testament is not the God of the New.  The God of the Old Testament was the demiurge who created the (evil) world.  For instance, in 2nd Samuel 24:1, God told David to take a census of his people, but in 1st Chronicles 21:1 the very same census was inspired by Satan; therefore God and Satan are one in the same, and thus not to be worshipped.  Jesus was the Redeemer, but Marcion’s interpretation of him was different than the “Catholic Line.”  Since matter was evil, he had no interest in the historical Jesus.  In the choice between The Man and The Message, Marcion unequivocally chose The Message.  To him, the only works of import were the Pauline letters, which, for the most part, only deal with the significance of the resurrection.  Marcion composed a list of works he considered authoritative.  In it, he completely threw out the Old Testament and all contemporary works on Jesus (i.e.: Matthew, Mark, John et al), and only kept the Pauline epistles and an edited version of Luke.  Marcion omitted Thomas; it is unknown if he ever saw it or what he would have thought.  Marcion also claimed to have secret teachings from Paul himself.  A number of tracts in the NHL purport to be either by or about Paul, though I do not know if any of these were among the ones Marcion claimed to have.

A different list was composed shortly thereafter by his contemporary, Valentinus, which combined New Testament selections with other works—many of which were found at Nag Hammadi.  Indeed, several works from the codices have a distinctly Valentinian flavor, and there is something to be said for the hypothesis that the Gospel of Philip and Gospel of Truth were redacted—if not actually composed—by Valentinus himself.   Again, no indication Valentinus knew Thomas, though I suspect he would have appreciated the metaphysical challenges presented by the text.

The Catholic response was fairly fast and far from feeble.  Bishop Irenaeus of Lyons countered with a list of his own of what the authoritative works should be.  In response to the Valentinians (who used too many texts) and the Marcionites (who didn’t use enough) he drafted an index of what the “authoritative” teachings were.  He ‘okayed’ the Old Testament (grudgingly, from my understanding) and for a New testament declared that there were only four authentic gospels.

Irenaeus’s logic for four gospels was that there were four compass points, four oceans, and four corners of the world; therefore it was Divinely decreed that there must be four gospels.

 

Whew.

 

It cannot be stressed enough that personal preference played as much a part in his selection as did mathematical coincidence: the list was more a reflection of his own beliefs than Christianity as a whole.  Irenaeus urged that these works—and only these works—were to be read to the illiterate laity.  Also, any doctrinal decision could only be discussed within the framework of texts on the approved list.  This list inspired subsequent church fathers to compose similar lists of “good” and “bad” material.  It is from such lists that we have our earliest testimonies to the existence of the Gospel of Thomas. 

These lists were not always uniform, and it was not until relatively late (i.e.: sixth century) that the catalogs developed continuity.  On many of the early indexes, only the Synoptic gospels were cited as “laity-approved”—John was often ignored or classified as heretical.  Also frequently omitted (and condemned as heretical concoctions) were the epistles of James, Jude, 2nd  Peter, 2nd and 3rd  John, and the Apocalypse of John (aka Revelation) which itself was not fully accepted until the tenth century.  Conversely held as authentic and acceptable were the Gospel of Peter, Epistle of Barnabus, The Shepherd of Hermas, the Acts of Paul, the Revelation of Peter, and the Teachings (didixai) of the Apostles.   However, these were later excised from the authoritative lists when evidence became overwhelming that they were spurious. 

The process of Canonization was not the overnight miracle that “they” want you to think, but was a brutal and protracted battle between conflicting opinions and ideologies.  Even today it is not set in stone.  The Catholic (but not Judaic or Protestant) acceptance of Old Testament Deuterocanonics like Tobit, Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon, etc. are probably the most obvious example.  The idea of a “closed Canon” is rejected by many Christians, such as the Mormons, whose Book of Mormon and Doctrines & Covenants are treated with equally scriptural status.  Ethiopian Christians  have an Old Testament of 36 books (including Enoch and Josippon’s medieval history of the Jews) plus a New Testament of 35 books.  Many, though not all, Seventh Day Adventists unofficially place commentaries by 7DA pioneer Mary Ellen White on the Inspired pedestal.

The divergence and disagreement on what the accepted teachings should be was even more acute back in the first formative centuries of Christianity.  Admittedly, there was a lot of Biblical material to choose from, and not all of it was authentic or accurate.  Much of the material was fraudulent propaganda for a specific sect or viewpoint, and there was a lot of it from early on.  Luke prefaced his gospel with a snide snipe at “those who have taken it at hand” to pen false teachings and tales of Jesus.  Paul himself warns that there are forgeries afloat even during his own active ministry: in his Second Thessalonian Epistle (2:2) Paul mentions “letters” (plural!) “purporting to be from us” that are leading the community astray.  This is an interesting admission in and of itself, and to combat the problem Paul calls attention in 3:17 to something unique to his letters: he them.

So we know that there was a lot of spurious literature scattered among more authentic tracts, and the great debate over the good, the bad, and the banned began.  Obviously, and as we have seen, various Bishops and Teachers selected works that they agreed with, and these selections were the by-product or a larger war over ideas.

History is a chronicle of conflict that is written by the winners.  In the first few centuries, there were a number of conflicts over which direction the church would take.  The earliest was Paul vs. James.  Paul won, so it’s no surprise his writing dominates the New Testament and that he is portrayed by others like Luke and Acts so flatteringly.  But within a century, at least one generation removed from the living Jesus, the next great challenge arose with the groundswell of gnostic thought threatening the still-entrenching Roman shift of the “orthodox” church.  Back in that day, what was “dogma” wasn’t universally agreed upon.  We know now that the Roman Catholics won this war, so it is their viewpoint—and lists of what was an accepted Canon of gospels—that would come to dominate the theological landscape.

With hindsight, we need a brief reminder of a simple, blunt fact: after the gnostic confrontation and until the Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church was the overwhelmingly dominant force in Christianity.  Back in the beginnings of Christianity, things were much more murky; there was still no established grain to go against, and to a very real extent the path of “mainstream” Christianity was up for grabs.  From the Catholic Church’s view, they were fighting for their lives and their beliefs.  The rigid, entrenched mentality of Catholic Orthodoxy must be taken into account.  Schisms, dissensions, and new ideas were crushed by spiritual death (excommunication) or physical (inquisition/crusade.)  Dogma by definition is not to be challenged; it is inflexible to change.  The Church needed to control what information was made available to the public about Jesus.  It was from this Roman Catholic Church that the ultimate lists of approved and heretical texts issued from.

We know that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John met their standards, but why not Thomas?  So what, then, were the criteria for getting the nod or the toss, and why did Thomas flunk?

We are “authoritatively” told by these same Church fathers that Thomas is essentially a gnostic “Protocols of Zion”: basically a bad forgery with a subversive intent spread for destructive misinformation.

 

But that’s just what They want you to think.

 

 Admittedly, our only surviving copy of Thomas is pretty heavily seasoned with gnositic thought.  Obviously, the main problem with Thomas is the gnosticised corruption: how much of it was added, and how much is “genuine Jesus”?  I believe that even if you took out the gnostic elements, Thomas would still have been held back from the masses.  So why was there such an axe to grind against gnosticism in general and Thomas in specific?

Until Muhammad ’Ali’s discovery, all that was known of the Gnostics (and Thomas) was what was written by certain church fathers in works condemning them.  This is on par with Joseph Goebbells describing Jews or Rush Limbaugh describing Democrats.

With the discovery of the Nag Hammadi Library, the gnostics were finally able to present their thoughts in their own words.  Reading the NHL, it quickly becomes apparent why gnosticism was censured (and censored.)  However, in many cases, it can be proven that the censures had no clue as to the true nature of what they were censuring.

So what about gnosticism was so scary that they felt threatened enough to suppress it and the Thomasine materials expressing it?  

Gnosticism is ultimately a religion of redemption, with the emphasis of getting your divine spark out of the Earthly prison and back to God where it belongs.  This came through knowledge.  This knowledge was called “Gnosis” (gnwsewV, Greek for the same word.)  Indeed, Clement of Alexandria, of whom we shall learn more at the end of this exciting commentary, used the term “gnostic” to describe anyone who had penetrated deeper into the mysteries of truth than the average believer.[3]  There are differences between gnostic schools as to what this knowledge was: often it was simple awareness of your fallen state, other systems included secret passwords that must be known to enter Beyond.  With some notable exceptions, such as followers of Mani and Simon Magus, Gnostics almost universally heralded Jesus Christ as the bringer of this Knowledge.  Just as the Jews awaited a Messiah, the Gnostics awaited a Redeemer.  Jesus was both.  Thomas portrays Jesus this way, especially if one delves heavily into metaphor and lateral speculation.  

It was how the Gnostics interpreted their Redeemer’s actions and teachings—and in fact, the whole of what was becoming Bible—that the Church Fathers found fault with.

Depending on your point of view, one of the beauties or one of the problems with the Bible is that, by carefully picking and choosing your passages, you can get anything you want out of it.  For instance, Martin Luther wholeheartedly embraced (to put it mildly) Paul’s letter to the Romans, which emphasized justification by faith, but completely ignored James’s emphasis of good works (Luther called it “a right strawy epistle” and said it had no place in the Bible.)  Likewise, by performing esegesis (as opposed to exegesis), it is possible to make Jesus into anything you want.  Using passages from the canonical gospels, scholars, theologians, and lay alike have “proven” that Jesus was a pharisee, an essene, a revolutionary zealot intent on overthrowing Roman occupation, a Kabbalist mystic, a Marxist, a supply-side Republican, and even a Taoist.  {and, of course, others have also found passages to repudiate every assertion} Likewise, Gnostics, using the very canonical gospels themselves, interpreted Jesus as one of their own.

Scholars continue to debate the effects of Gnosticism on “mainstream” Christianity, and on the canonic gospels themselves.  The gnostic concept of a divine spirit trapped in weak, imperfect flesh can be found in Matthew 26:41 (= Mark 14:38) and especially Romans 8:3-9.  John 1:1 has been demonstrably traced to a Judeo-gnostic hymn that predates Christianity.  Indeed, Elaine Pagels published gnostic exegeses of both John and the authentic Pauline letters, convincingly showing that they are more at home in Gnostic thought than Orthodox—or at least open to much wider interpretation than Church leaders wished.

So it seems a bit weak to point the finger at Gnosticism for being the scapegoat in the blame against Thomas’s authenticity; there is enough gnosticism to go around in the canon that it is unfair to single out Thomas.

In other words, the “official story” that Thomas is to be ignored because it is “Gnostic propaganda” seems to me an over-exaggerated, convenient cover story by Church Fathers to keep inquisitors away from Thomas, lest they find out what Jesus might have really said.  

The real challenge for the reader of Thomas, specifically stated in its introduction, is to find the true meaning of each saying.  Thomas is mostly oriented towards helping the reader find The Kingdom on his or her own.  This, I believe, was perceived to be its true danger: the Gospel of Thomas encourages the reader to think for himself!  This is further hampered by the fact that conceivably there are no “universally correct” interpretations: undoubtedly each reader will draw unique conclusions to some passages.  Where I might draw one meaning out of saying, and my solution might be correct for me, you might draw a completely different message that would only work for you.  And neither of us would be wrong.  Since both gnosticism and Thomas stress an individual relationship, this means that there are individual answers.  

Orthodoxy has always insisted on having a monopoly of Biblical interpretation, so clearly Thomas presents a problem for them—especially since parts of it are seemingly irreconcilable with fixed, inertialess orthodox doctrine.  

Throughout the text, Jesus offers the reader numerous ways to attain the Kingdom.  This makes redemption a personal thing for the reader, and seemingly bypasses the need for a priest or an organized hierarchy.  Why do you need a priest to guide you, when the Keys to the Kingdom are written on the parchment before you, and all you need do is ponder their meaning.  Thomas is a direct undermining of that establishment, and posed a potential danger to their authority and even necessity.

From an orthodox standpoint, The Gospel According of Thomas would was too dangerously thought-provoking, and would have to go.

 

Sound paranoid or far-fetched?

 

Then this point, I think it’s time for a related digression with...

 

...another a bit of history

 

Discovery in the desert, part 2

 

In 1958, Professor Morton Smith of Columbia University was visiting a Greek Orthodox monastery near Jerusalem.  In the last, unprinted pages of the works of Ignatius of Antioch (1646) he found a handwritten entry.  It was an excerpt of a letter from Clement  of Alexandria to someone named Theodore.  From context, Theodore had written to Clement seeking advice concerning a gnostic sect called the Carpocratians.  Apparently they had obtained—and were using—a new (or altered) version of Mark.  Theodore was asking for advice on how to deal with the problem, hence the letter.

Smith photographed the text—which has been sequestered by the monastery and not shown to anyone else to this day.  It was not until 1973 that he published the text (from the photographs) as well as an extensive commentary on it.  Through detailed linguistic analysis and comparison with authentic Clement works, Smith concluded that the letter is genuine.  Nor is he alone in this conclusion.

The letter is long-winded, but worth reading:

 

You did well in silencing the unspeakable teachings of the Carpocratians.  For these are the “wandering stars” referred to in the prophecy, who wander from the narrow road of the commandments into a boundless abyss of the carnal and bodily sins.  For, priding themselves in knowledge [gnosis], as they say, “of the deep things of Satan,” they do not know that they are casting themselves away into “the nether world of the darkness” of falsity, and, boasting that they are free, they have become slaves of servile desires.  Such men are to be opposed in all ways and altogether.  For, even if they say something true, one who loves the truth should not, even so, agree with them.  For not all true things are truth, nor should that truth which merely seems true according to human opinions be preferred to the truth, that according to the faith.

 

Think about that for a moment!   Clement has told Theodore that if his enemies happen to be telling the truth, he should deny it in order to refute them!  Later, Clement discuss the problem of Mark’s gospel, and its ‘misuse’ by the Carpocratians.

 

As for Mark, then, during Peter’s stay in Rome he wrote an account of the Lord’s doings, not, however, declaring all of them, nor yet hinting at the secret ones, but selecting those he thought most useful for increasing the faith of those who were being instructed.  But when Peter died as a martyr, Mark came over to Alexandria, bringing both his own notes and those of Peter, from which he transferred to his former book the things suitable to whatever makes for progress toward knowledge [gnosis].  Thus he composed a more spiritual Gospel for the use of those who were being perfected.  Nevertheless, he yet did not divulge the things not to be uttered, nor did he write down the hierophantic teachings of the Lord, but to the stories already written he added yet others and, moreover, brought in certain sayings of which he knew the interpretation would, as a mystegogue, lead the hearers into the innermost sanctuary of that truth hidden by the seven veils.  Thus, in sum, he prearranged matters, neither grudgingly nor incautiously, in my opinion, and, dying, he left his composition to the church in Alexandria, where it even yet is most carefully guarded, being read only to those who are being initiated into the great mysteries.

 

But since the foul demons are always devising destruction for the race of men, Carpocrates, instructed by them and using deceitful arts, so enslaved a certain presbyter of the church in Alexandria that he got from him a copy of the secret Gospel, which he both interpreted according to his blasphemous and carnal doctrine and, moreover, polluted, mixing with the spotless and holy words utterly shameless lies.  Frorn this mixture is drawn off the teaching of the Carpocratians.

 

To them, therefore, as I said above, one must never give way, nor, when they put forward their falsifications, concede that the secret Gospel is by Mark, but should even deny it on oath.  For “not all true things are to be said to all men.”

 

Clement goes on to give two passages from the secret gospel in question, one of which is a version of John’s Lazarus story—with shades of Mark 14:51—and at least two deviations that raise embarrassing questions for entrenched dogma.  For the moment, that is not important.   What is important in this context is that Clement not only freely acknowledges that there is, in fact, a secret gospel of Mark, but that Theodore is to deny it at all costs.

If true, we have a tremendously important precedent.  Even if the Gospel of Thomas were written by the apostle Thomas himself, it would have been suppressed by the Catholic Church because it contains ideas they did not subscribe to.

Thomas’s very nature sealed its fate.

 

           


[1] J. M. Robinson, The Nag Hammadi Library in English (Harper Collins 1978) p. 23

 

[2] Mani would probably have been drawn to the Didymus/Twin motif.  “When he was twelve years old, in about 228/29 Mani had his first vision in which his heavenly “twin”, his “partner” or “companion”, appeared to him and assured him of his constant protection and help.  Later, Mani saw in this the effective revelation of the “comforter” (the Paraclete), or the Holy Spirit, who had revealed to him the mysteries of his teaching.”  —Kurt Rudolph, Gnosis (Harper Collins 1987) p 329.

 

[3] Stromata 7:1-2

 

 

 

 

 

 

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