G. Quispel

Paul the convert : the apostolate and apostasy of Saul the Pharisee

An account of Pauls work in which the author argues that Pauls life can be better understood by taking his Jewishness seriously and that Jewish history can be illuminated greatly be examining Pauls writings.

Some remarks on the gospel of Thomas

The importance of the Gospel of Thomas lies in the fact that it contains an independent and very old Gospel tradition. When the author says independent, he means that some sayings of the Gospel of Thomas were not taken from our canonical Gospels Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John, but were borrowed from another source. This is the main theme which he discusses in this chapter. With this in view, he quotes one of the most important sayings of the new collection: the parable of the Sower. The Gospel of Thomas brings us into touch with the origins of two important movements within Christianity: Gnosticism and Gospel-writing. The syncretistic sayings of this collection are quoted or alluded to in the Acts of Thomas and other apocryphal acts of the apostles.Keywords: canonical Gospels; Gnosticism; Gospel of Thomas; Gospel-writing; parable of the Sower; syncretistic sayings

Female fault and fulfilment in Gnosticism

Buckley challenges scholarly, stereotypical views of females in Gnosticism, which tend either toward idealization or outright devaluation. Examining six Gnostic texts or traditions that illuminate female figures, she analyzes a variety of females within their contexts. She makes no attempt to classify Gnostic females according to simplifying formulae; rather she treats them individually, allowing them to make sense within their own contexts.Originally published in 1986.A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

Valentinus and the gnostikoi

One of the few data in the study of Gnosticism that always seemed rather certain was the hypothesis that the tmythological Gnosist as represented by the sect of the Gnostikoi of Irenaeus 1.29, the Apocryphon of John and so many other writings found near Nag Hammadi, preceded the more tphilosophical Gnosist of Valentinus and his pupils. Bentley Layton discusses critically the evidence which seems to point out that Valentinus knew the myth of the Gnostikoi. He has, however, ignored one passage which seems relevant to this problem. Irenaeus quite often mentions the Gnostikoi, mostly together with the Valentinians: according to him they are a separate sect. The chapter quotes passages which prove without any shadow of doubt that the original doctrine of Valentinus is rooted in a preceding mythological Gnosis which he hellenised and christianised. If he was not a Gnostic, he certainly was a gnostic.Keywords: Bentley Layton; Gnostikoi; Valentinus

Marcion and the Text of the New Testament

Two recent publications drew my attention to a topic upon which I published many years ago, namely, the New Testament text known to Marcion. It is quite remarkable that no comprehensive study of this topic has ever been published. Within the scope of this article, we can do no more than to offer some brief remarks and underscore some points which might otherwise remain unnoticed.

Jewish gnosis and mandaean gnosticism

The author explains that at a certain moment Jewish Gnostics in Southern Babylonia, the heirs of the Magharians, thought it good to cover themselves with the name of the Nazoraeans. Generally speaking, many parallels with Bronte are to be found in the sapiential literature of the Hebrews, both in style and in thought. It is quite clear that Bronte has been inspired by the Isis aretalogy. Nevertheless it may be a Jewish writing about Wisdom, like Siracides and the Wisdom of Solomon. The dualism of the sect, the complete demonisation of Ruha, the distinction between God as Life and Light on the one hand and the foolish demiurge on the other hand, can only be a later development. Still later the merger with the Jewish Christians took place. It was only then that Mandaeanism, as a religion at the same time ritual and gnostic, came into being.Keywords: Bronte; Jewish Gnosis; Mandaean Gnosticism

African christianity before Tertullian

The Octavius of Minucius Felix has the form of a disputatio in utramque partem with an introduction which seems to be purely traditional. The Christians of Africa before Tertullian did not believe that the soul of the believer went immediately after death to Paradise, or heaven, or to some intermediate abode, as most other Christians believed. It would seem that Minucius here is reflecting these rather archaic views of his African fellow Christians. The same may perhaps be said about the Christology of Minucius. We find it in the early centuries, and even nowadays, as an expression of the faith of the faithful. In this chapter, Minucius Felix reflects the naive modalism of African Christianity as he reflected its naive belief in the resurrection of the body. The chapter highlights that the African Christianity had a long and surprising prehistory, like Egyptian Christianity.Keywords: African Christianity; Minucius Felix; Octavius; Tertullian

Time and history in catholic christianity, especially Augustine

The New Testament conception of time is wholly naive: as in Judaism and to some extent in Parseeism, a distinction is made between the present aeon, which extends up to the second coming of Christ, and the future aeon. The early Christian sense of time was constituted by the ephapax - by proleptic eschatology and the meaning of the present for salvation - no less than by eschatology proper. The early Christian Eucharist was not only an ethic of remembrance and the motif of sacrifice but also a Messianic banquet of rejoicing, an anticipation of the Lords eschatological beraka with his disciples in the kingdom of God. There is no doubt that in theology we find ourselves on a very different level from that of liturgy or mysticism, and that the wind that blows in St. Augustine is very different from that of early Christianity. Augustine speaks of time because his adversaries asked him.Keywords: Catholic Christianity; Christian Eucharist; ephapax; Judaism; New Testament; St. Augustine

Utrecht and the conversion of Germany. Liudger and the gospel of Thomas

The Gospel of Thomas reverberates in all of the numerous versions of the Diatessaron. That is why that lost harmony of gospels which Liudger owned, the Codex Liudgerianus, is of exceptional importance. The Gospel of Thomas is a book containing 114 sayings attributed to Jesus. This chapter highlights the importance of making a reasonable case for Liudgers purchase of a Latin Diatessaron when he was in Italy. The abbey at Werden was one of the foremost abbeys of Germany and remained so until 1803, when it fell victim to the Enlightenment and the anti-Papal secularization engulfing Prussia. In the persons of Liudger and the Liudgerides, the Utrecht school has made a decisive contribution to the Christianization of northern Germany and so to the rise of a Catholic Western Europe, which continued to exist for almost a thousand years.Keywords: Codex Liudgerianus; Diatessaron; Germany; Gospel of Thomas; Jesus; Liudger; Utrecht

A general introduction to the study of the Diatessaron of Tatian

The Gospel harmony called Diatessaron or Diapente, which the Christian apologist Tatian wrote about 170 C.E. in Syriac somewhere in the Near East, welding together the four now canonical gospels with a Judaic Christian Gospel tradition, was the most widely read book after the Bible during the early Christian period and the Middle Ages. The real aim and purpose of this chapter is to bring us nearer to the words which Jesus once spoke. It was a very deviant and primitive version of the Diatessaron, which inspired the exquisitely beautiful poem which is called the Heliand (the Saviour) and describes the Life of Jesus. Most remarkable is an Islamic Gospel, which is called the Gospel of Barnabas. It is based upon a Diatessaron, which it assimilated mainly by omitting passages which were offensive to the Muslim ear, especially texts from the Gospel of John.Keywords: Diatessaron; Gospel harmony; Heliand; Islamic Gospel; Judaic Christian Gospel tradition; Tatian