The Rediscovery?• In 1945 some peasants in

Upper Egypt accidentally dug into an early Christian tomb.

• In it they found a large jar containing thirteen leather-bound papyrus codices. These codices proved to contain forty eight or forty-nine separate works, mostly Coptic translations from Greek.

Who are the Gnostics

• The Gospel of Judas is typical of many Gnostic writings, with its notions that:– Salvation comes through the knowledge of one's divine origin,

– Salvation is exclusive and offered only to the elite,

– Majority of Christians are caught in error and serving the wrong God,

– Physical existence is a deities fouled mistake and needs to be transcended,

– Jesus was a teacher of esoteric truths that bear almost no resemblance to anything a first-century Jewish prophet would have taught.

Who are the Gnostics

• The Gnostics prized their secret knowledge, and taught a profound dualism between the material and spiritual worlds.

• They understood the material world, including the entire cosmos, to be a trap for the spiritual world.

• In essence, the Gnostics sought to escape the material world and to enter the spirit world.

Gnostic Teachings

• The Apophatic (means “negative”) Theology mode of thinking about God is found throughout Gnosticism, Vendantic Hinduism, Platonic and Aristotelian theology. Irenaeus alleged that a large number of Gnostic groups, were semi-maltheists believing that the god of the Old Testament was evil, and a quite different and much lesser being to the deity that had created the universe, and who was responsible for sending Jesus.

• Many Gnostic groups worshipped as heroes all the Biblical figures which had sought to discover knowledge or challenge Yahweh's authority, while demonizing those who would have been seen as heroes in a more orthodox interpretation.

Gnostic Teachings

• Such is the reversal role that we see Mary Magdalene as harlot turned choice companion of Christ in the "Gospel of Mary." Gnostics notoriously flip the canvas of good and evil in keeping with the understanding of their theology. For example, in Gnostic stories of creation the world and humankind are created by a vile god. But the good serpent comes to reveal knowledge to people so they can escape the evil creation.

• Dan Brown borrows this Gnostic Idea to make his Millions

What is it?

• This document is a compilation of about 114 sayings ascribed to Jesus.

• Approximately one-fourth of these sayings are the same as those found in the canonical Gospels.

• Of the remainder, some are very similar to those in our Gospels, but have been adapted for gnostic purposes. Others are completely gnostic in origin and form.

What the Early Church Said• In AD 367, St. Athanasius the Apostolic, urged Christians to

“cleanse the church from every defilement” and to reject “the hidden books.”

• St.Paul sharply rebuked the early Christians for giving heed to seducing doctrines that could shake a person's faith. “Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ ... If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!” (Galatians 1:7-9, NIV).

• St.Peter said, “But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them — bringing swift destruction on themselves. Many will follow their shameful ways and will bring the way of truth into disrepute.” (2 Peter 2:1-2, NIV).

Its Content: It starts:• The Gospel according to Thomas The significance of this

title is amplified in the opening words of the document: • These are the secret words which Jesus the Living One

spoke and Didymus Judas Thomas wrote down. And he said: ‘Whosoever finds the interpretation of these sayings shall never taste death.

• Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Compare me and tell me who I am like.’ Simon Peter said to him: ‘You are like a holy angel.’ Matthew said to him: ‘You are like a wise man and a philosopher.’ Thomas said to him: ‘Master, my face is quite unable to grasp who you are like, that I may express it. ‘Jesus said: ‘I am not your Master, for you have drunk; you are intoxicated with the bubbling spring which belongs to me and which I have spread abroad.’

Its Content: Magical Words

• Then he took him and drew him aside, and spoke three words to him. When Thomas came back to his companions, they asked him: ‘What did Jesus say to you?’

• Thomas answered: ‘if I tell you one of the words which he spoke to me, you will take stones and throw them at me, and a fire will come out of the stones and burn you up!

• One of the Gnostic sects, the Naassenes, believed stones to be animate beings, and held that the existence of the world depended on three secret words

• Canlacau, Saulasau, Zeesar

Its Content: Magical Words

• These words certainly convey an impression of mystery, until one realises that they are simply corruptions of the Hebrew phrases in Isaiah xxviii. 10, 13, translated ‘line upon line’, ‘precept upon precept’, and ‘here a little’! And it is probably more than a mere coincidence that Hippolytus refers to a Gospel of Thomas which he says was used by the Naassenes.

Its Content: New Sayings

• Jesus said: ‘I am the Light which shines upon all. I am the All; All has gone forth from me and All has come back to me. Split the wood, and I am there; lift the stone and you will find me there!’

• The first words of this saying, of course, remind us of various passages in the Fourth Gospel, where Jesus is presented as the Light of the world, coming into the world to provide light for every man.

Its Content: New Sayings

• It is not the Incarnate Word who speaks here in the Gospel of Thomas but something much more like the pantheistic Logos of Stoicism.

• Very similar but different to Jesus in Matthew xviii. 20 (‘For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them’); but in reality it means something quite different.