Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #43107 in Books
• Published on: 2005-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 240 pages

Synopsis
One text in the cache of codices and manuscripts discovered in Nag Hammadi, The Gospel Of Thomas, unlike the canonical gospels, does not contain a narrative recording Christ's life and prophecies. Instead it is a collection of his teachings: in fact, what he actually said. These 114 logia, or sayings, were collected by Judas Didymus Thomas, whom some claim to be Jesus's closest disciple. No sooner was this gospel uncovered from the sands of Upper Egypt than scholars and theologians began to bury it anew in a host of conflicting interpretations and polemics. While some say it is a hodgepodge from the canonical gospels, for others it is the source text from which all the gospel writers drew their material and inspiration. In this new translation of The Gospel Of Thomas, Jean-Yves Leloup shows that the Jesus recorded by the "infinitely sceptical and infinitely believing" Thomas has much in common with Gnostics of non-dualistic schools. Like them, Jesus preaches the coming of a new man, the genesis of the man of knowledge. In this gospel, Jesus describes a journey from limited to unlimited consciousness.

The Jesus of Thomas invites us to drink deeply from the well of knowledge that lies within, not so that we may become good Christians but so we may attain the self-knowledge that will make each of us, too, a Christ.

Customer Reviews

what a corker
I puchased this gospel some time ago, it astonished and amazed me that a truth of such magnitude could have been dismissed by the early church fathers. This gosple is wonderful and very revealing to say the least, i have read it three times now and still use it as a point of refrence in my study, leloup's translation is easy reading and very logical giving a clear understanding of this ancient text. It is great to have a chance to read this gosple and gain insight into the writings of other Apostles rather than the better known canonical four. If you do anything before you die read this gospel!!! recorded to be just under 2000 years old, but oh my well worth the wait. Very enjoyable read.

Meditations on the logia
Although Leloup regards Thomas as "gnostic", though not in a dualistic sense, he invites us to read Thomas alongside the canonical gospels to see another facet of Yeshua (as he somewhat pedantically calls Jesus). This comes as a refeshing change to those who will either reject Thomas totally or regard it as completely undermining the authenticity of the canonical gospels.

After the introduction comes the complete Coptic text with opposing translation. The Coptic text contains editing marks (lacunae, corrections, reconstructions from the Oxyrhynchus papyri etc.) without any explanation, and has presumably just been lifted from some more scholarly source. The translation is somewhat loose and makes certain changes to the manuscript text without comment (for example in the logion of the lion eating the man and vice versa, the meaning has been modified for what is presumed to be a scribal error).

Following this Leloup provides not a commentary as such but more like a meditation around each logion in turn. In each meditation he may bring in other sources, from Tanakh and New Testmament, patristic writings, mediaeval mystics, other gnostic sources, even other religions - Leloup is clearly quite erudite. (Sometimes one wonders whether Leloup might be of the "all religions are equally valid" school of thought. I tried to find out more info about Leloup and his "Institute of Other Civilization Studies" without success. His photo on the back cover with thick bushy beard makes him look every bit the self-styled holy man.)

This is certainly worth having for anyone interested in the Gospel of Thomas, though perhaps should not be the only translation/commentary to get. I would recommend reading it alongside others.