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The true words of Thomas - Interactive Coptic-English translation

Year: 2023
Type: article
Abstract: Almost 75 years ago the gospel of Thomas (Thomas) was recovered among the manuscripts of Nag Hammadi. The first photographic edition was published in 1956, and its first critical analysis appeared in 1958 (Johannes Leipoldt, 'Das Evangelium nach Thomas'). Thousands of attempts have been made to interpret it: some placing it in a Biblical context, some in a Gnostic context, and some even in Buddhist and Zen contexts One major issue has been the question of dependency between Thomas and the canonical gospels: was one party (partially) dependent on the other, or did they draw from a third source? There are dozens of parallels, but each of those gets applied differently, largely depending on the context they're in: Thomas, or the canonicals. No one has been able to readily discern the main character of Thomas, ⲓ̅ⲥ̅, as the Jesus (likewise spelled ⲓ̅ⲥ̅ in the earliest manuscripts of the first few centuries) in the canonical gospels, or vice versa There are many examples of how people have bent over backwards to try and make a case for both Thomas's and the canonical central characters, ⲓ̅ⲥ̅ and Jesus, being identical: they simply aren't. Indeed, there are similarities between the ⲓ̅ⲥ̅ of Thomas and the Jesus of the canonicals, but at best all we can say is: it is as if they were twins who got separated at birth; as if one grew up in the East in, say, a rich environment and the other in the West in, say, a poor environment So please, erase your mind, delete your programming, and read the story about ⲓ̅ⲥ̅ as the text tells it. Because this translation lets the reader verify every single word via a simple mouse-click, and demonstrates that all other translations (save for the one by Detlev Koepke) have been harmonised with the Christian gosples and thus falsified
DOI: 10.17613/ddb4r-sqb59
Language: English
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7089765909
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