REVIEWS April D. Deconick, Recovering the Original Gospel Of

Vigiliae 844_BRecvs_231-241 5/5/06 1:50 PM Page 231

REVIEWS

April D. DeConick, Recovering the Original Gospel of Thomas. A History of the Gospel and its Growth (Library of New Testament Studies 286), London- New York: T&T Clark 2005, XVII + 287 pp., ISBN 0-567-04342-8, $ 130.

This study is a scholarly masterpiece and presents a wealth of unselfish learning. Applying modern theories on orality and social memory the authoress describes the growth of a kernel (“a speech Gospel”) into the present shape of the Gospel of Thomas. First, there was a short collection of Sayings attributed to Jesus. This originated in the primitive congregation of Jerusalem, of which James, the brother of the Lord, was the leader. It should be dated prior to 50 A.D. and was apocalyptic. This tradition has its counterpart in the Gospel quotations of the (Jewish-Christian) Pseudo- Clementine literature, the Diatessaron of the Syrian Encratite Tatian and the so-called Western Text of the New Testament. Having travelled north east to Syria along the missionary road, this same tradition was transferred to a Hellenistic milieu, amplified and adapted to a different civilisation: Apocalyptics became mysticism, eschatology became protology, the imminent Kingdom became the immanent Kingdom. All this is due to the non-event of the Second Coming. Ultimately, it is within the individual soul that God is to be sought and found. It would be false to call the Gospel of Thomas Gnostic. Rather, it is strongly ascetic and encratic, like the Acts of Thomas (ca. 220 Edessa) and the Syrian mystic from Edessa Makarios (4th century). This impressive theory is built on a subway of footnotes indicating almost all relevant secondary literature (Erik Peterson is missing). I agree with most of the views presented in this book for the following reasons. These sayings never call the Pharisees hypocrites, whereas corre- sponding passages in the synoptic Gospels relate that Jesus did so. This has an authentic ring, because, as Christopher Tucket observed (in the Proceedings of the Irish Biblical Association 26, 2003, 39), the use of the Greek noun ÍpokritÆw has always been regarded as unlikely to go back to Jesus,

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because there is no obvious Aramaic equivalent to the word with the mean- ing required. Moreover, I cannot believe that this tradition grew spontaneously and anonymously, like a beautiful ﬂower. The numerous doublets in the Gospel of Thomas presuppose two written sources. What is true for Matthew and Luke (Mark and Q), must also be true for Thomas. It must be dependent upon two written documents, a Judaic one and a Hellenistic one. The author of the later writing must have been a deep thinker and a theological mastermind. He may be compared with the author of the Fourth Gospel, who works out a Judaic theology of the Name as the essential revelation of an unseen God, to expound his message that Christ is the unique and exclusive way to the Father. Let me clarify my views. Logos 41 runs as follows: “Jesus said: ‘Whoever has in his hand, to him shall be given; and whoever does not have, from him shall be taken even the little which he has’.” The expression “in his hand” is unusual. It is not to be found in the parallel versions of the eccle- siastical Gospels nor anywhere else in this context (M. 4:25 = Mt. 13:12 and L. 8:18; Mt. 25:29 and L. 8:18 = Q). And yet it has a familiar ring. “In his hand,” Hebrew: bejado, occurs many times in the First Testament. Most relevant to this Saying is the story of Saul in search of his mules (1 Samuel 9:8). There the servant says to the future king that he has the fourth part of a silver shekel in his hand to give to the man of God. When you consult a prophet, it is always necessary to oﬀer a present. This parallel shows what this Saying of Jesus really means: it is always necessary to give alms to the needy, then God will give you even more; but if you are not willing to assist the poor, then God will take from you even the small capital which you possess. This is very much in tune with the spirit of Jesus, who blessed the poor. The other half of the doublet is transmitted by Logos 70: “If you give birth to that which is within yourselves, then will that (which you have within yourselves) save you; if you do not have that within yourselves, will that, which you do not have within you, kill you.” This is very Hellenic and Hellenistic, exactly that which you would expect in a metropolis like Alexandria ad Aegyptum. The poet Pindar says: “Be what you are by becoming conscious of yourself.” In the dialogue Meno, the Platonic Socrates elicits the whole knowledge of mathematics from the soul of an ignorant young slave. Even present day psychologists warn us that it is extremely dangerous to repress your natural inclinations: that may kill you. That is not the product of anonymous growth: it is the formulation of an insight of a wise