The Gnostic Gospels (Modern Library 100 Best Nonfiction Books)

NOTES

INTRODUCTION

1. J. M. Robinson, Introduction, in The Nag Hammadi Library (New York, 1977), 21–22. Hereafter cited as NHL.

2. Ibid., 22.

3. Gospel of Thomas 32.10–11, in NHL 118.

4. Ibid., 45.29–33, in NHL 126.

5. Gospel of Philip 63.32–64.5, in NHL 138.

6. Apocryphon of John 1.2–3, in NHL 99.

7. Gospel of the Egyptians 40.12–13, in NHL 195.

8. See discussion by W. Schneemelcher in E. Hennecke, W. Schneemelcher, New Testament Apocrypha (transl, from Neutestamentliche Apocryphen), (Philadelphia, 1963), I, 97–113. Hereafter cited as NT APOCRYPHA. J. A. Fitzmyer, “The Oxyrhynchus Logoi of Jesus and the Coptic Gospel According to Thomas,” in Essays on the Semitic Background of the New Testament (Missoula, 1974), 355–433.

9. Robinson, Introduction, in NHL 13–18.

10. Irenaeus, Libros Quinque Adversus Haereses 3.11.9. Hereafter cited as AH.

11. M. Malanine, H.-Ch. Puech, G. Quispel, W. Till, R. McL. Wilson, Evangelium Veritatis (Zürich and Stuttgart, 1961), Introduction.

12. H. Koester, Introduction to the Gospel of Thomas, NHL 117.

13. Testimony of Truth 45:23–48:18, in NHL 411–412.

14. Thunder, Perfect Mind 13:16–14:15, in NHL 271–272.

15. Irenaeus, AH Praefatio.

16. Irenaeus, AH 3.11.9.

17. H. M. Schenke, Die Herkunft des sogennanten Evangelium Veritatis (Berlin, 1958; Göttingen, 1959).

18. Hippolytus, Refutationis Omnium Haeresium 1. Hereafter cited as REF.

19. See F. Wisse, “Gnosticism and Early Monasticism in Egypt,” in Gnosis: Festschrift für Hans Jonas (Göttingen, 1978), 431–440.

20. Theodotus, cited in Clemens Alexandrinus, Excerpta ex Theodoto 78.2. Hereafter cited as EXCERPTA.

21. Hippolytus, REF 8.15.1–2. Emphasis added.

22. Gospel of Thomas 35.4–7 and 50.28–30, conflated, in NHL 119 and 129.

23. E. Conze, “Buddhism and Gnosis,” in Le Origini dello Gnosticismo: Colloquio di Messina 13–18 Aprile 1966 (Leiden, 1967), 665.

24. Hippolytus, REF 1.24.

25. Conze, “Buddhism and Gnosis,” 665–666.

26. One scholar who, even before the Nag Hammadi find, did suspect such diversity is W. Bauer, whose book, Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum, first appeared in 1934. It was translated and published in English as Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity (Philadelphia, 1971).

27. See, for example, Bauer, Orthodoxy and Heresy, 111–240.

28. See discussion by H.-Ch. Puech, in NT APOCRYPHA 259 f.

29. Ibid., 250 f.

30. Ibid., 244.

31. H. Jonas, Journal of Religion (1961) 262, cited in J. M. Robinson, “The Jung Codex: The Rise and Fall of a Monopoly,” in Religious Studies Review 3.1 (January 1977), 29.

32. For a more complete account of the events briefly sketched here, see Robinson, “The Jung Codex,” 17–30.

33. La bourse égyptienne (June 10, 1949), cited in Robinson, “The Jung Codex,” 20.

34. G. Quispel, Jung—een mens voor deze tijd (Rotterdam, 1975), 85.

35. Robinson, “The Jung Codex,” 24 f.

36. E. Pagels, The Johannine Gospel in Gnostic Exegesis (Nashville, 1973); The Gnostic Paul: Gnostic Exegesis of the Pauline Letters (Philadelphia, 1975).

37. E. Pagels, with H. Koester, “Report on the Dialogue of the Savior” (CG III.5), in R. McL. Wilson, Nag Hammadi and Gnosis (Leiden, 1978), 66–74.

38. G. Garitte, Le Muséon (1960), 214, cited in Robinson, “The Jung Codex,” 29.

39. Tertullian, Adversus Valentinianos 7.

40. A. von Harnack, History of Dogma, trans, from 3rd German ed. (New York, 1961), I.4, 228.

41. Ibid., 229.

42. A. D. Nock, Early Gentile Christianity and Its Hellenistic Background, 2nd ed. (New York, 1964), xvi.

43. W. Bousset, Kyrios Christos (1st ed., Göttingen, 1913; 2nd ed., 1921; English trans., 1970), 245.

44. R. Reitzenstein, Poimandres: Studien zur griechisch-ägyptischen und frühchristlichen Literatur (Leipzig, 1904; repr. Darmstadt, 1966), 81. See also Das iranische Erlösungmysterium (Leipzig, 1921).

45. M. Friedländer, Der vorchristliche jüdische Gnosticismus (Göttingen, 1898; 2nd ed., 1972).

46. H. Jonas, Gnosis und spätantiker Geist, I: Die mythologische Gnosis (Göttingen, 1st ed., 1934; 2nd ed., 1964).

47. H. Jonas, The Gnostic Religion (Boston, 1st ed., 1958; 2nd ed., 1963).

48. Ibid., 320–340.

49. W. Bauer, Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity (trans, from 2nd ed., Philadelphia, 1971), xxii.

50. H. E. W. Turner, The Pattern of Christian Truth: A Study in the Relations Between Orthodoxy and Heresy in the Early Church (London, 1954).

51. C. H. Roberts, Manuscript, Society, and Belief in Early Christian Egypt (London, 1979).

52. A. Guillaumont, H.-Ch. Puech, G. Quispel, W. Till, Y. ‘Abd al Masih, The Gospel According to Thomas: Coptic Text Established and Translated (Leiden/New York, 1959).

53. The Facsimile Edition of the Nag Hanmiadi Codices, Codices I–XIII (Leiden, 1972). For discussion, see J. M. Robinson, “The Facsimile Edition of the Nag Hammadi Codices,” in Occasional Papers of the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity, 4 (Claremont, 1972).

54. C. Colpe, Die religionsgeschichtliche Schule: Darstellung und Kritik ihres Bildes von gnostischen Erlösermythus (Göttingen, 1961).

55. R. M. Grant, Gnosticism and Early Christianity, 2nd ed. (New York, 1966), 27 ff.

56. G. Quispel, Gnosis als Weltreligion (Leiden, 1951).

57. H. Jonas, “Delimitation of the gnostic phenomenon—typological and historical,” in Le Origini dello Gnosticismo (Leiden, 1967), 90–108.

58. E. R. Dodds, Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety (Cambridge, 1965), 69–101.

59. G. G. Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, Merkabah Mysticism, and Talmudic Tradition (New York, 1st ed., 1960; 2nd ed., 1965).

60. A. D. Nock, Essays on Religion and the Ancient World, ed. Z. Stewart (Cambridge, 1972), II, “Gnosticism,” 940 ff.

61. Cf. A. H. Armstrong, “Gnosis and Greek Philosophy,” in Gnosis: Festschrift für Hans Jonas (Göttingen, 1978), 87–124.

62. B. Layton, Treatise on Resurrection: Editing, Translation, Commentary (Missoula, 1979); “Vision and Revision: A Gnostic View of Resurrection,” in Proceedings: Quebec Colloquium on the Texts of Nag Hanmiadi (Quebec, 1979).

63. See, for example, H. Attridge, “Exegetical Problems in the Tripartite Tractate,” prepared for the SBL meetings in New Orleans, 1978, and his edition of Codex I from Nag Hammadi, to be published in Nag Hammadi Studies (Leiden, 1980).

64. M. Smith, Clement of Alexandria and a Secret Gospel of Mark (Cambridge, 1973); Jesus the Magician (San Francisco, 1978).

65. J. M. Robinson, H. Koester, Trajectories Through Early Christianity (Philadelphia, 1971): see especially Robinson, “Logoi Sophon: On the Gattung of Q,” 71–113; Koester, “One Jesus and Four Primitive Gospels,” 158–204.

66. M. Tardieu, Trois mythes gnostiques: Adam, Eros et les animaux dans un écrit de Nag Hammadi (Paris, 1974).

67. L. Schottroff, Der Glaubende und die feindliche Welt (Neukirchener, 1970).

68. P. Perkins, The Gnostic Dialogue (New York, 1979).

69. P. Perkins, “Deceiving the Deity: Self-Transcendence and the Numinous in Gnosticism,” in Proceedings of the Tenth Annual Institute for Philosophy and Religion (Boston, 1981).

70. G. MacRae, “Sleep and Awakening in Gnostic Texts,” in Le Origini dello Gnosticismo, 496–510.

71. G. MacRae, “The Jewish Background of the Gnostic Sophia Myth,” Novum Testamentum 12 (1970), 97 ff.

72. For a recent example, see G. MacRae, “Nag Hammadi and the New Testament,” in Gnosis: Festschrift für Hans Jonas, 144–157.

73. See, for example, B. A. Pearson, “Jewish Haggadic Traditions in the Testimony of Truth from Nag Hammadi (CGIX, 3),” in Ex Orbe Religionum: Studia Geo Widengren (Leiden, 1972), 457–470; “Biblical Exegesis in Gnostic Literature,” in Armenian and Biblical Studies, ed. M. E. Stone (Jerusalem, 1975), 70–80; “The Figure of Melchizedek,” in Proceedings of the XIIth International Congress of the International Association for the History of Religions (Leiden, 1975), 200–208.

74. D. M. Scholer, Nag Hammadi Bibliography (Leiden, 1971).

75. Apocalypse of Peter 76.27–30, in NHL 342. In quotations from this text, I am following the translations of J. Brashler, The Coptic Apocalypse of Peter: A Genre Analysis and Interpretation (Claremont, 1977).