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The Gospel of Thomas: Secret Text from God? ... The Gospel of Thomas is one of these texts. The Gospel of Thomas is a collection of Jesus sayings that some scholars trace to the first century. Although it contains some significant differences, the Gospel of Thomas strongly parallels the Christian Gospels in many ways.
The Gospel of Thomas was found as a part of the Nag Hammadi Library in 1945, around the time of the more famous discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. ... What they found instead was the thirteen books of the Nag Hammadi Library, including the complete Gospel of Thomas (xii). There had been references to this Gospel and fragments had been found, but now there was indisputable proof (Meyer 6).
The Gospel of Thomas was clearly real. ... The Gospel of Thomas is very controversial in some of its teachings. Many of the quotes from the Gospel of Thomas aren’t found in scripture and some are even considered heretical. One main reason for the discredit of the Gospel of Thomas is that is has been branded as “Gnostic” (Miller).
The Gospel of Thomas is generally referred to as a “Gnostic” gospel. ... Some of Jesus’ quotes in the Gospel of Thomas have what some scholars interpret to be Gnostic connotations and therefore they refer to it as a Gnostic Gospel (Robinson 117). ... This bias is primarily because Thomas was found written in Coptic (Egyptian written in the Greek alphabet) among other Gnostic writings (Miller). However, there exist many parts of Thomas written in Greek that are from an earlier time than Gnosticism, so the Gospel cannot be traditionally Gnostic (Meyer 6) Authority Glenn Miller states:
What is the great "theological argument" against this Gospel? ... I understand there is a good deal, I estimate 40%, of the Gospel that is clearly Gnostic, but does that discredit a valuable (in my mind) resource of early Christianity?
Elaine Pagels, an authority on the subject and renowned author, says in one of her writings that the Gospel of John is also rather Gnostic in its interpretation and could arguably be a Gnostic Gospel (143).
Approximate Word count = 1657
Approximate Pages = 6.6
(250 words per page double spaced)
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