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Gnosticism (Biblical Studies)

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  1. Introduction
  2.  
  3. The term “Gnosticism” can be utilized broadly, to characterize any religious movement based on an internal, individualized recognition (“Gnosis”) of one’s divine inner “spark” that links an individual with a higher divine force. In this sense, moments of “Gnosticism” have emerged at various historical periods. In a more narrow sense, however, most scholars of Gnosticism presently consider it a phenomenon that peaked in the 2nd century of the Common Era in the Roman Empire and that characterized one side of a division in the formative early Christian movement. Beyond that, there is currently no consensus concerning what “Gnosticism” was, how we might define its parameters, and whether it is correct to identify it as an ancient religious mentality at all. European scholarship—with significant academic centers studying Gnosticism in Scandinavia, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy—tends to be more positivist, employing the term “Gnosticism” or “Gnosis” without apparent apprehension. In the United States, many scholars have been more reticent about employing the term, often placing it within quotation marks to signal a profound discomfort with a term that reifies a field of study largely invented in the early modern period. However, attempts to replace the term “Gnosticism” with something more accurate have so far not produced satisfactory results. A second issue in the field has been the question of primary sources. Up to the mid-20th century, studies of Gnosticism were hampered by the paucity of original texts from “Gnostics” themselves. The greatest source for reconstructing Gnosticism was the work of their opponents, Christian heresiologists. In 1945, however, the global study of Gnosticism was set on a new path by the discovery of a set of twelve 4th-century codices near Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt. These texts, known as the Nag Hammadi Library or the Nag Hammadi Codices, contained approximately fifty-two documents, some of which were previously known, and some of which had until that point, been entirely lost. Although not all of the Nag Hammadi documents are “Gnostic” as such, many of them were ascribed to Gnostic authors in our extant heresiological writings. The translation and study of the Nag Hammadi documents has dominated scholarship since that time, largely replacing any attention to the work of Christian heresiologists. A concerted effort has been made at international collaboration and the expeditious production of critical translations of the codices, producing impressive results. However, the scholarship that has been produced remains largely highly specialized and technical, making teaching Gnosticism at the undergraduate level more challenging.
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  5. Introductory Works
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  7. The books here all present overviews of Gnosticism as a historical phenomenon for a general educated audience of nonspecialists. Because they are targeted to a nonspecialist audience, these introductory works generally aim for brevity and clarity rather than nuance and sophistication. Roukema 1999, Harris 1999, and Logan 2006 are all brief general introductions directed at readers from a Christian background and thus give a corrective, sympathetic interpretation of Gnosticism to that which traditional Christian theologically oriented sources have offered. Markschies 2003 is brief and lays out an introduction that draws deeply on ancient Christian anti-Gnostic sources, albeit read and presented sympathetically here. More comprehensive in scope is Meyer 2005, which specifically contextualizes the Nag Hammadi writings both in the ancient world and in terms of their significance to modern scholarship. Meyer’s clear and exciting writing appeals to a broad readership and is perfect for the undergraduate classroom. Pagels 1979 was for many years the classic introduction to Gnosticism and has been literally life changing for many readers who went on to study the texts in more depth; it reads very well, but is now becoming methodologically dated. All these works are acceptable for undergraduates, although the field so far lacks anything that resembles an undergraduate textbook, with the exception of Pearson 2007.
  8.  
  9. Harris, J. Glyndwr. Gnosticism: Beliefs and Practices. Brighton, UK: Sussex Academic, 1999.
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  11. Harris casts a wider net than most in this brief book, considering as “Gnostics” the Bogomils, Cathars, Manichaeans, Mandaeans, and modern figures from Goethe to Jung.
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  13. Logan, A. H. B. The Gnostics: Identifying an Early Christian Cult. London and New York: T&T Clark, 2006.
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  15. Logan’s generally accessible volume focuses on what we can (and cannot) know about Gnostics rather than Gnosticism, based on an examination of Patristic, Neoplatonic, and even material evidence. Includes some diagrams and photographs.
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  17. Markschies, Christoph. Gnosis: An Introduction. Translated by J. Bowden. London and New York: T&T Clark, 2003.
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  19. Translated from German, Markschies offers a succinct (145 pages) introduction to Gnosticism but tends to repeat categories first introduced in ancient heresiological literature, producing an overview of Gnosticism that requires further nuancing.
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  21. Meyer, Marvin. The Gnostic Discoveries: The Impact of the Nag Hammadi Library. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005.
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  23. An accessible overview of the Nag Hammadi find, with essays on specific aspects of Nag Hammadi texts and their significance. Includes an appendix with selections of Nag Hammadi texts in the author’s English translation.
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  25. Pagels, Elaine. The Gnostic Gospels. New York: Random House, 1979.
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  27. An award-winning classic study of Gnosticism that situates the movement within 2nd-century debates on the nature of what it meant to be fully and properly Christian. Although it is still worth reading, the book is now showing its age, and some of its key theoretical stances no longer hold.
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  29. Pearson, Birger. Ancient Gnosticism: Traditions and Literature. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
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  31. The closest thing in the field to a textbook, Pearson based this book on his undergraduate classes on Gnosticism at the University of California at Santa Barbara. The book offers clear and informative summaries of a large range of Gnostic texts, including Manichaean sources; it does not supply a great deal of analysis but works well alongside the primary sources themselves.
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  33. Roukema, Riemer. Gnosis and Faith in Early Christianity: An Introduction to Gnosticism. Translated by J. Bowden. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 1999.
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  35. Both an introduction to Gnosticism and a theory of its origins, this English translation of the Dutch original might be interesting to more advanced students, particularly those intrigued by the connections between Gnosticism and Platonist philosophy in the ancient world.
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  37. General Overviews
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  39. The discovery of the Nag Hammadi Library in 1945 divided general overviews of Gnosticism into those produced before the landmark discovery and those produced after, when more source materials came to light. So significant was this discovery for causing scholars to rethink Gnosticism that to some degree scholarship produced prior to 1945 has become inaccurate, dated, and of only marginal use in the 21st century. For this reason, this bibliography lists only one important general overview of Gnosticism published prior to 1945 (Jonas 2001). All works listed here are better suited to graduate students than undergraduates, although undergraduates often do well with Williams 1996 and can certainly follow Rudolph 1983. The studies in this section also engage more recent terminological debates over the usefulness of the term “Gnosticism.” Whereas the earlier classic studies of Jonas 2001 and Rudolph 1983 reify Gnosticism as a viable historical phenomenon that can be studied and known, Williams 1996 and King 2003 have led the charge to see the term as a second-order descriptive category that ultimately lacks even heuristic value. They argue that what is called Gnosticism lacks dogmatic coherence and, in fact, developed as a terminological concept in the early modern period rather than in Antiquity. They therefore explicitly refute the work of Jonas 2001, claiming that there was never a “Gnostic Religion” or “Classic Gnosticism.” Instead, these studies suggest considering the full complexity of religious movements in the Roman Empire, as different types of Christianity emerged during its formative first centuries. These later studies therefore emphasize not just the complexity of early Christianity, but its divisiveness, adaptability, contrasting ideological stances, and varied claims of what it meant to be “Christian” in a religiously complex empire. See also Filoramo 1990 and Layton 1995.
  40.  
  41. Filoramo, Giovanni. A History of Gnosticism. Translated by Anthony Alcock. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1990.
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  43. Filoramo (University of Turin) is a major proponent of the History of Religions school that views Gnosticism as a 2nd-century phenomenon that develops as an alternative to paganism and Christianity. The book offers a clear but comprehensive survey of Gnosticism as it has been broadly construed.
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  45. Jonas, Hans. The Gnostic Religion: The Message of the Alien God and the Beginnings of Christianity. Boston: Beacon, 2001.
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  47. A classic study from a prominent German Jewish philosopher. Translated and abridged from Jonas’s original two-volume work, Die Gnosis (1934) Jonas’s study under Husserl and Heidegger made him sensitive to what he considered Gnostic existentialism, a perspective dismissed in more recent scholarship. He remains an important source for pre-1945 formulations of Gnosticism.
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  49. King, Karen L. What Is Gnosticism? Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 2003.
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  51. Another important revisionist study, King explores the origins of the term “Gnosticism” in early modern scholarship and its lack of applicability to ancient Christian groups. The book is confusingly titled, which may disappoint readers seeking to learn what Gnosticism is; it spends much time on the origins of the term “Gnosticism” and on the nature of related terms such as “orthodoxy” and “heresy.” Advanced students have the most to gain by reading this book.
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  53. Layton, Bentley. “Prolegomenon to the Study of Gnosticism.” In The Social World of the First Christians: Essays in Honor of Wayne A. Meeks. Edited by L. Michael White and O. Larry Yarbrough, 334–350. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995.
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  55. Layton, a luminary in the field, offers a no-nonsense assessment of the use and abuse of the term “Gnosticism” for nonspecialist but informed readers.
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  57. Marjanen, Antti, ed. Was There a Gnostic Religion? Publications of the Finnish Exegetical Society 87. Helsinki: Finnish Exegetical Society, 2005.
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  59. Engages the methodological divide between those who envision Gnosticism as an ancient movement and those who reject the term as inaccurate. The author is sympathetic to the perspectives of Williams 1996 and King 2003. This small volume is useful but often difficult to locate in the United States.
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  61. Rudolph, Kurt. Gnosis: The Nature and History of Gnosticism. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983.
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  63. From the History of Religions school. Rudolph excelled in a broad view of Gnosticism, which he saw as pre-Christian and Eastern in origin and developing into Manichaeism and Mandaean religion. The book has some interesting illustrations, photos of ancient art, and line drawings. Because of its breadth and clarity of exposition, it works well in the classroom, but no longer represents an up-to-date “state of the field” study.
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  65. Williams, Michael Allen. Rethinking “Gnosticism”: An Argument for Dismantling a Dubious Category. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996.
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  67. A groundbreaking work that significantly shifted academic assumptions on the nature of Gnosticism. The author calls for the abolition of the blanket term “Gnosticism” based on the diversity of various “Gnostic” and “heretical” groups in Antiquity. Good for intermediate-level students, who can be captivated by the depth and care of the author’s argument and deployment of examples. Includes many helpful tables and graphs.
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  69. Reference Works
  70.  
  71. The weight of recent reference scholarship has been concentrated on the Nag Hammadi Library. The discovery of this new cache of texts in 1945 has produced a substantial corpus of often highly technical writings that have generated concordances, dictionaries, and bibliographies, although not enough time has elapsed since the discovery for many such reference works to have been produced. Still, reference sources exist in English, French, German, and for advanced students, in Coptic.
  72.  
  73. Dictionaries
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  75. Because of the difficulty of Nag Hammadi texts and their high percentage of specialized vocabulary, a guide to them has been necessary but only appeared sixty years after the discovery of the texts. Hanegraaff, et al. 2005, representing a very broad collective effort from hundreds of scholars, is available in an electronic format edited by Jean-Pierre Brach, dated to 2006. The single-authored Smith 2009 is much less ambitious but no less helpful.
  76.  
  77. Hanegraaff, Wouter, Antoine Faivre, Roelof van den Broek, and Jean-Pierre Brach, eds. Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism. 2 vols. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2005.
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  79. Very comprehensive, with all Gnostic and Western Esoteric traditions covered from late Antiquity to present. Also available online to subscribers. Includes an index of movements and groups, as well as an index of people.
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  81. Smith, Andrew Philip. A Dictionary of Gnosticism. Wheaton, IL: Quest, 2009.
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  83. This paperback interprets “Gnosticism” widely, but also helpfully defines numerous technical terms in the Nag Hammadi and other ancient writings.
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  85. Concordances and Bibliographies
  86.  
  87. Concordances are limited to the Nag Hammadi codices rather than all Gnostic manuscripts and writings. There is, as yet, no English-Coptic, English-Greek, or English Concordance exists for the entire corpus of Gnostic writings. Note, however, that brief, codex-specific concordances, word registers, and indices are included with each critical edition of the Nag Hammadi Library in English, at the back of each volume. Bibliographies have been produced periodically by the scholar David Scholer. They cover scholarship on Gnosticism comprehensively dating back to 1948. Only the most recent, Scholer 2009, is included here. The University of Laval in Canada has an outstanding research institute devoted to the study of Gnosticism and Nag Hammadi, and has since 1992 produced mostly soft-cover reference materials such as Charron, et al. 1992– to accompany their French-Coptic critical editions. The German, Berlin-based Arbeitskreis has also produced critical editions and a concordance for Nag Hammadi (Siegert 1982).
  88.  
  89. Charron, Régine, Pierre Chérix, and Wolf-Peter Funk. Concordances des textes de Nag Hammadi. 7 vols. Bibliotheque Copte de Nag Hammadi, Section “Concordances.” Quebec: Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 1992–.
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  91. A complete Coptic concordance of the Nag Hammadi codices. Each codex has its own concordance volume. The project is not yet complete, with seven volumes produced to date. Concordances for Codex II, IV, and V have not yet been completed.
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  93. Scholer, David M., ed. Nag Hammadi Bibliography, 1995–2006. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2009.
  94. DOI: 10.1163/ej.9789004172401.i-262Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  95. For work dating back to 1948, Scholer has compiled comprehensive bibliographies of all monographs, articles, dissertations, and book reviews in the field of Nag Hammadi. This is the most recent volume. Brill offers limited online access to these bibliographic collections, which are current to 2006.
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  97. Siegert, Folker, ed. Nag Hammadi Register: Wörterbuch zur Erfassung der Begriffe in den koptisch-gnostischen Schriften von Nag Hammadi. Tübingen, Germany: Mohr, 1982.
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  99. This German-Coptic index to the Nag Hammadi texts includes bibliographical references and indices. The Coptic is transliterated in the body of the text.
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  101. Other Reference Works
  102.  
  103. In general, Gnosticism lacks a wealth of reliable, academic reference sources. Evans, et al. 1993 is helpful for those who want to track down Bible citations in various Nag Hammadi texts. Of use primarily to advanced scholars is Robinson 1972, which clearly reproduces the manuscript pages of each of the Nag Hammadi codices in a series of black-and-white plates, for students who wish to see the manuscript for themselves to check against modern transcriptions. Some of the same work can also be accomplished by consulting the online Nag Hammadi Archive at Claremont Colleges Digital Library. For less advanced students or undergraduates, a few Internet sites offer useful reference functions and full texts of primary sources online, albeit in older translations. The most accessible online text archive is at the Gnostic Society Library, which contains a large number of sacred texts, some very modern. This site belongs to a modern Gnostic religious community and thus contains both academic and nonacademic materials.
  104.  
  105. Evans, Craig A., Robert L. Webb, and Richard A. Wiebe, eds. Nag Hammadi Texts and the Bible: A Synopsis and Index. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1993.
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  107. This volume moves through all the Nag Hammadi documents in English using Robinson 1988 (cited under Single-Volume Compilations), noting biblical parallels and quotations.
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  109. Gnostic Society Library.
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  111. All the Nag Hammadi documents and most other extant ancient Gnostic writings are available at this online archive, although some of the translations are very old. The site also offers a useful search engine for finding specific English terms in the entire archive.
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  113. Nag Hammadi Archive at Claremont Colleges Digital Library.
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  115. A fully searchable database of hundreds of photographs of the Coptic Gnostic Project (responsible for translating the Nag Hammadi documents), archaeological surveys of Nag Hammadi and the nearby Gebel al-Tarif, and full-page scans of manuscript folia. Users can zoom in to high-resolution images.
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  117. Robinson, James M., ed. The Facsimile Edition of the Nag Hammadi Codices: Introduction. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1972.
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  119. Each Nag Hammadi codex is reproduced in black-and-white full-sized plates in its own volume, with no translation or transcription. The volume series is essential for serious students of Coptic and Coptology. Published under the auspices of the Department of Antiquities of the Arab Republic of Egypt, in conjunction with the United Nations Education, Scientific, and Cultural Organization.
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  121. Modern Critical Editions
  122.  
  123. Critical editions of Gnostic writings, particularly the Nag Hammadi texts, exist in English, French, and German, reflecting the international nature of scholarship. All these editions feature the Coptic text, facing-page translations, annotations, and generally limited commentary and notes. The accessibility of the French and German editions depends upon individual holdings in large or outstanding research libraries. The French volumes, however, are released in paperback and thus relatively inexpensive and available. Their careful, thorough, and thoughtful scholarship makes them indispensable for serious students. The English critical editions, published as the Coptic Gnostic Library series, were released in 2000 in brief, paperback versions that are less costly and therefore more widely accessible.
  124.  
  125. Multi-Volume Series
  126.  
  127. The English-language critical editions (Robinson 1978– and Robinson 2000) are organized by codex or manuscript. The French language critical editions produced by the Bibliothèque Copte de Nag Hammadi (BCNH) project at the Université Laval in Quebec, Canada (Funk, et al. 1977–), are published as individual texts and thus feature more extensive commentary and notes, making them indispensable for serious students. The project is still ongoing.
  128.  
  129. Funk, Wolf-Peter, Louis Painchaud, and Paul-Hubert Poirier, eds. Bibliothèque Copte de Nag Hammadi. 35 vols. Section “Textes.” Quebec: Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 1977–.
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  131. This team based at the Université Laval in Quebec represents the only French-language initiative to provide critical translations of all the Nag Hammadi writings. Each volume concentrates on a single text, in French-Coptic facing page, with extensive notes and indices. Full texts in French translation only available online.
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  133. Robinson, James M., ed. The Coptic Gnostic Library. 13 vols. Nag Hammadi Studies. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1978–.
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  135. Organized by Nag Hammadi codex, these critical editions include Coptic text with facing page English and Greek loanwords in Coptic rendered in Greek. Where relevant, Greek fragments are also included as appendices. Each codex has a separate introduction. Each individual text has its own editor, a lengthy introduction, and notes.
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  137. Robinson, James M., ed. The Coptic Gnostic Library: A Complete Edition of the Nag Hammadi Codices. 5 vols. Leiden, The Netherlands, and Boston: Brill, 2000.
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  139. This is a condensed, soft-cover edition of the Coptic/English critical editions originally released in thirteen hardcover volumes (Robinson 1978–).
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  141. Single-Volume Critical Editions
  142.  
  143. A few Gnostic manuscripts that were discovered before the Nag Hammadi codices had their own single-volume critical editions (Schmidt and McDermott 1978a and Schmidt and McDermott 1978b). The Codex Tchacos, which came to light in the 1980s, was in a private collection and first published under the auspices of the National Geographic Society; it too has an English/French critical edition (Kasser and Wurst 2007) that does not fall under the aegis of the Coptic Gnostic Project, which was originally convened to publish the Nag Hammadi Library and has long held a publishing agreement with Brill in the Netherlands. Brill continues to publish the Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies series (formerly the Nag Hammadi Studies series) of multi-volume and single-volume English-Coptic editions of most Gnostic manuscripts. Brankaer and Bethge 2007 provides an outstanding German critical edition of the Codex Tchacos.
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  145. Brankaer, Johanna, and Hans-Gerbhard Bethge, eds. Codex Tchacos: Texte und Analysen. Berlin and New York: de Gruyter, 2007.
  146. DOI: 10.1515/9783110946079Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  147. The documents in the Codex Tchacos are presented in Coptic, in parallel columns with the corresponding portions of the same documents in the Nag Hammadi codices. With German facing page translations, introductions, notes, and critical essays (also in German).
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  149. Kasser, Rodolphe, and Gregor Wurst, eds. The Gospel of Judas: Together with the Letter of Peter to Philip, James, and a Book of Allogenes from the Codex Tchacos. Introductions, translations, and notes by Rodolphe Kasser, Marvin Meyer, Gregor Wurst, and François Gaudard. Washington, DC: National Geographic Society, 2007.
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  151. French and English critical translations of the recently discovered writings from the Codex Tchacos, with Coptic facing-page text and useful color plates of the original papyrus.
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  153. Schmidt, Carl, ed., and Violet McDermott, trans. Pistis Sophia. Nag Hammadi Studies 9. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1978a.
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  155. The only academic English-language translation of this undated revelatory writing from the Askew Codex, the longest “Gnostic” treatise. Includes the original Coptic text.
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  157. Schmidt, Carl, ed., and Violet McDermott, trans. The Books of Jeu and the Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1978b.
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  159. Produced by the same two scholars that worked on the Pistis Sophia (Schmidt and McDermott 1978a), this is an English-Coptic critical edition of the three Gnostic revelatory documents in the Bruce Codex discovered in 1769. This edition includes renderings of the original manuscript’s cosmological line drawings and magical symbols.
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  161. Single Text Editions
  162.  
  163. Certain Gnostic writings discovered and translated prior to the Nag Hammadi finds in 1945 have warranted their own critical editions. The works in these sections are single texts found embedded in other collections. Casey 1934 presents a Greek/English edition of an important Valentinian writer, Theodotos, whose work is known only from brief excerpts of Clement of Alexandria. The Berlin Codex’s Gospel of Mary is the subject of King 2003. The Askew Codex’s Pistis Sophia (actually also the sole text in the codex, thus also listed immediately above this section under Single-Volume Critical Editions), one of our longest Gnostic tractates from Antiquity, is translated as Schmidt and McDermott 1978. The most recent Gnostic manuscript, the Codex Tchacos, is the sole source for the Gospel of Judas, which has been translated a number of times in critical editions, the most notable being Jenott 2011, Gathercole 2007, and King and Pagels 2007 for their accessibility and readability, although Jenott 2011 is, unlike Gathercole 2007 and King and Pagels 2007, written for the guild.
  164.  
  165. Casey, R. P., ed. The Excerpta ex Theodoto of Clement of Alexandria. London: Christophers, 1934.
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  167. Difficult to find, this Greek edition with English facing page of Clement of Alexandria’s extracts from the writings of the Valentinian theologian Theodotus is an important pre-Nag Hammadi witness for Valentinianism.
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  169. Gathercole, Simon. The Gospel of Judas: Rewriting Early Christianity. Oxford and London: Oxford University Press, 2007.
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  171. Another independent translation by a scholar of the New Testament at Cambridge University. Includes notes and introductory chapters. Very engagingly written for nonspecialists.
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  173. Jenott, Lance. The Gospel of Judas: Coptic Text, Translation, and Historical Interpretation of “the Betrayer’s Gospel.” Tübingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck, 2011.
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  175. Based on a Princeton University doctoral dissertation, this volume may be difficult to find in university or college libraries but represents the most thorough edition and commentary on the Gospel of Judas. The book is evenhanded, but too detailed for undergraduate use.
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  177. King, Karen L. The Gospel of Mary of Magdala: Jesus and the First Woman Apostle. Santa Rosa, CA: Polebridge, 2003.
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  179. The Gospel of Mary exists in two separate incomplete versions, Greek and Coptic. King unpacks this fragmentary and frustrating text, contextualizing it within early Christian communities vying for apostolic authority. Contains translations and photographic plates of the manuscript folia.
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  181. King, Karen L., and Elaine Pagels. Reading Judas: The Gospel of Judas and the Shaping of Christianity. New York: Viking, 2007.
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  183. A translation of the Gospel of Judas, with commentary, notes, and four chapters of analysis. Written accessibly for nonspecialists. The translation is occasionally very different from that provided in Kasser and Wurst 2007 (cited under Single-Volume Critical Editions).
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  185. Schmidt, Carl, ed., and Violet McDermott, trans. Pistis Sophia. Nag Hammadi Studies 9. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1978.
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  187. The only academic English-language translation of this undated revelatory writing from the Askew Codex, the longest “Gnostic” treatise. Includes the original Coptic text.
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  189. Nag Hammadi
  190.  
  191. A few scholars have published stand-alone translations of specific Nag Hammadi texts, in certain cases with Coptic text included. The advantage to these translations is their extensive annotations and commentaries. In certain cases the translations have been controversial, since they may depart from those made in multi-volume series and single-volume compilations. Readers are advised to consult various translations and editions side by side to note points of difference. The following single text editions are both reliable and significantly advance our knowledge of the source texts. Note that the Gospel of Thomas—present in a single copy at Nag Hammadi, in Codex I—is the most-studied text, with critical, stand-alone editions such as DeConick 2005, Meyer 1992, and Patterson 1998. After this, the important Apocryphon of John—present in multiple manuscripts—is the subject of two significant critical stand-alone editions: King 2009 designed for a broad audience, and the more academic Wisse and Waldstein 1995. Worthy of note is Taussig, et al. 2010, the sole stand-alone translation of the captivating revelatory “poem,” “Thunder: Perfect Mind.”
  192.  
  193. DeConick, April. The Original Gospel of Thomas in Translation. New York and London: T&T Clark, 2005.
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  195. Begun as an appendix to her study Recovering the Original Gospel of Thomas: A History of the Gospel and Its Growth (New York: T&T Clark, 2005), this book contains the original Coptic version from Codex II of Nag Hammadi, the Greek fragments, the author’s English translations, and extensive commentaries. Includes an appendix with verbal similarities between the Gospel of Thomas and the Synoptics.
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  197. King, Karen L. The Secret Revelation of John. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2009.
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  199. King’s edition of an important Gnostic work ordinarily known as the Apocryphon of John works deftly to combine the four extant versions of the source text. The author specializes in a fresh, politically oriented interpretation of the Apocryphon of John, making this essential reading for anyone interested in Gnosticism.
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  201. Meyer, Marvin. The Gospel of Thomas: The Hidden Sayings of Jesus. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1992.
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  203. Includes a reading of the Gospel by Harold Bloom. Coptic with English facing-page translations. For nonspecialists, with a distinct New Age flavor.
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  205. Patterson, Stephen, ed. The Fifth Gospel: The Gospel of Thomas Comes of Age. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 1998.
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  207. Includes a new English translation by Hans-Gebhard Bethge and an essay by James M. Robinson, as well as some framing chapters. Patterson spearheads the movement that sees the Gospel of Thomas as a 1st-century text that influenced the canonical Gospels.
  208. Find this resource:
  209. Taussig, Hal, Jared Calaway, Maia Kotrosits, Celene Lillie, and Justin Lasser. ‘The Thunder: Perfect Mind’: A New Translation and Introduction. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
  210. DOI: 10.1057/9780230114777Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  211. A controversial new translation of this revelatory poem from Nag Hammadi, spearheaded by Hal Taussig of Union Theological Seminary and a team of graduate students. The text uses graphic modern language to render Coptic terms and includes various essays that tend to be highly theoretical, even jargon filled.
  212. Find this resource:
  213. Wisse, Frederik, and Michael Waldstein, eds. The Apocryphon of John: Synopsis of Nag Hammadi Codices II,1, III,1, and IV,1 with BG 8502,2. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1995.
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  215. Part of the Coptic Gnostic Library project, this volume unusually translates only a single text. The Apocryphon of John was present in three versions from Nag Hammadi and one from the Berlin Codex and thus merited special attention. Includes Coptic-English text, with the four redactions in parallel columns plus additional comparanda at the back.
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  217. Modern Translations
  218.  
  219. English-language readers have excellent options for studying Gnostic writings, particularly the Nag Hammadi library. It is recommended for students to compare English translations of specific texts, which can vary considerably according to the degree to which a translator has filled in missing material from the original papyri. For this reason, too, early English translations tend to be less reliable than later translations, which benefit from textual restoration. Modern translations also exist in German and French. All the books here omit the original Coptic texts; for these, see Modern Critical Editions.
  220.  
  221. Multi-Volume Series
  222.  
  223. All the English editions of the Gnostic writings exist either in multi-volume critical editions with the Coptic text included, or in a single-volume compilation. The sole multi-volume translation of the Nag Hammadi library in a modern language is Schenke, et al. 2001.
  224.  
  225. Schenke, Hans-Martin, Hans-Gebhard Bethge, and Ursula Ulrike Kaiser, eds. Nag Hammadi Deutsch. Eingeleitet und übersetzt von Mitgliedern des Berliner Arbeitskreises für koptisch-gnostische Schriften. 2 vols. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2001.
  226. DOI: 10.1515/9783110875782Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  227. The Berliner Arbeitskreis, led by the late Hans-Martin Schenke, was the team responsible for generating the German critical editions of Nag Hammadi texts. Various authors have contributed to this two-volume German translation of all the Nag Hammadi writings.
  228. Find this resource:
  229. Single-Volume Compilations
  230.  
  231. English speakers have access to three excellent compilations: Layton 1995, Meyer 2007, and Robinson 1988. Robinson’s volume exists in several editions, the first from 1977; it is the most commonly used and cited source for Nag Hammadi writings, including the ones commonly found on the Internet. Modern translations are also found in French, such as Mahé and Poirier 2007. Many scholars now prefer Meyer 2007 because it incorporates the insights of thirty years of scholarship. Layton 1995 stands alone as the sole edition to have a single translator; it also incorporates a variety of Gnostic writings, moving beyond Nag Hammadi documents. All three work well in the classroom, either together or in isolation. The translations in Meyer 2007 sometimes differ radically from those in Robinson 1988 and, to a lesser degree, Layton 1995.
  232.  
  233. Layton, Bentley. The Gnostic Scriptures: A New Translation with Annotations and Introductions. New York: Doubleday, 1995.
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  235. All translations are the author’s own, making it the only English-language edition of these ancient texts that is single-authored. The collection is idiosyncratic rather than comprehensive, featuring a combination of heresiological material (e.g., selections from Irenaeus of Lyons’s Against Heresies) and primary source texts, generally from Nag Hammadi, but indispensable for classroom use since it is pitched just right for undergraduates and offers very helpful introductions and annotations.
  236. Find this resource:
  237. Mahé, Jean-Pierre, and Paul-Hubert Poirier, eds. Écrits gnostiques: La bibliothèque de Nag Hammadi. Quebec: Gaillimard, 2007.
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  239. A recent, almost pocket-sized edition of the Nag Hammadi writings plus translated Oxyrhynchus fragments in French. Includes an extensive index.
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  241. Meyer, Marvin, ed. The Nag Hammadi Scriptures. New York: HarperOne, 2007.
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  243. The most recent compilation of English translations of Nag Hammadi, by a top-notch collection of international scholars. Translations are first rate and usually more reliable than Robinson’s earlier edition. Each text is given a lengthy and generally helpful introduction. Additional explanatory essays on various aspects of Gnosticism round out this volume.
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  245. Robinson, James McCloskey, ed. The Nag Hammadi Library in English. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1988.
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  247. Includes all the Nag Hammadi writings, translated for nonspecialist readers. All texts have brief and sometimes unhelpful introductions. An essay on the modern relevance of Gnosticism concludes the volume. Note that English translations of Nag Hammadi online are digitized versions of this book, which first appeared in 1977.
  248. Find this resource:
  249. Essay Collections
  250.  
  251. Scholars of Gnosticism tend to favor publishing in essay collections rather than in journals, making these volumes essential reading for developing a sophisticated, nuanced understanding of Gnosticism. Many essay collections derive from important conferences or colloquia. The ones selected here represent moments where the study of Gnosticism was significantly advanced. Bianchi 1970 derives from the first international conference on Gnosticism. Layton 1980–1981 represents the first conference devoted to filling out the subcategories of Valentinian and Sethian Gnosticism, with contributions from top scholars. Turner and MacGuire 1997 marks the state of the field on the fiftieth anniversary of the Nag Hammadi discovery. Finally, DeConick 2009 is the first international conference on the Codex Tchacos held on American soil. All volumes feature an international array of scholars writing in English, French, German, and Italian. Recently, Gnosticism scholars have produced Festschriften to honor those retiring from the field. Bethge, et al. 2002 honors the late Hans-Martin Schenke, a seminal figure in the Berlin Arbeitskreis; the most recent addition to the list of excellent Festschriften is Bull, et al. 2012, which honors Einar Thomassen, a scholar and editor of international repute. These selective, usually thematic volumes also feature fine original contributions. The selection of Festschriften and colloquia volumes here is necessarily limited; serious students of Gnosticism should be advised that many more worthwhile essay collections exist beyond those specifically noted in this bibliography.
  252.  
  253. Bethge, Hans-Gebhard, Stephen Emmel, Karen L. King, and Imke Schletterer, eds. For the Children, Perfect Instruction: Studies in Honor of Hans-Martin Schenke on the Occasion of the Berliner Arbeitskreis für koptisch-gnostische Schriften’s Thirtieth Year. Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies 54. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2002.
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  255. Twenty-seven essays in German, English, and French. The book is divided into three sections: “Nag Hammadi Texts, Gnosticism, Gnosis, Hermeticism,” “Coptic Language and Literature,” and “New Testament and Biblical Studies.” Includes a bibliography of all Schenke’s publications.
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  257. Bianchi, Ugo, ed. Le origini dello gnosticismo: Colloquio di Messina, 13–18 Aprile 1966. Studies in the History of Religions (Supplements to Numen) 12. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1970.
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  259. A collection of essays from the first general conference on the topic of Gnosticism held in 1966 in Messina, Italy. It produced a famous definition of Gnosticism (now widely regarded as outdated) known widely as “The Messina Definition.” Articles are in English, German, French, and Italian.
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  261. Bull, Christian H., Liv Ingeborg Lied, and John D. Turner, eds. Mystery and Secrecy in the Nag Hammadi Collection and Other Ancient Literature: Ideas and Practices: Studies for Einar Thomassen at Sixty. Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies 76. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2012.
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  263. An eclectic volume with exciting contributions from many accomplished scholars, this book moves well beyond Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism to consider the themes of mystery and secrecy in areas as diverse as the Eleusinian Mysteries, Mithraism, and Manichaeism. Eighteen of the contributions are in English; five are in French.
  264. Find this resource:
  265. DeConick, April, ed. Codex Judas Papers: Proceedings of the International Congress on the Tchacos Codex Held at Rice University, Houston, Texas, March 13–16, 2008. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2009.
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  267. Shortly after the discovery of the Codex Tchacos (which contains the Gospel of Judas), DeConick convened a meeting of thirty international experts to analyze the Gospel of Judas. The results of the colloquium, published here, significantly advanced our knowledge of this confusing and fragmentary text.
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  269. Layton, Bentley, ed. Rediscovery of Gnosticism: Proceedings of the International Conference on Gnosticism at Yale, New Haven, Connecticut, March 28–31, 1978. 2 vols. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1980–1981.
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  271. The first volume of this important 1979 conference concentrates on Valentinianism; the second concentrates on Sethianism. Both contain important essays by top scholars that generated discussion, ongoing scholarship, and significant elaborations and challenges to their assessments and conclusions.
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  273. Turner, John D., and Anne MacGuire, eds. The Nag Hammadi Library after Fifty Years: Proceedings of the 1995 Society of Biblical Literature Commemoration. Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies 44. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1997.
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  275. Twenty-five learned essays on diverse aspects of Nag Hammadi studies, virtually all in English. Includes only one formal response to a selection of essays.
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  277. Historical Background
  278.  
  279. The quest for Gnosticism’s origins has continued unabated for the last century. The conviction prominent in German History of Religions scholarship of the last century—that Gnosticism was an independent religious movement that developed alongside dominant religions such as Christianity—has fallen into disfavor. Scholars debate instead whether Gnosticism derived from Judaism, as a sectarian movement that paralleled Christianity, or from Christianity as an offshoot branch. Our extant Gnostic documents betray evidence of both religious traditions, and there has been no resolution to the problem, although interpreters now lean in the direction of seeing Gnosticism as a purely Christian phenomenon.
  280.  
  281. Jewish Origins
  282.  
  283. There has been recent interest in considering the Jewish origins of Gnosticism, particularly as it apparently reflects a knowledge of esoteric Jewish traditions such as Merkavah or Hekhalot mysticism. Scholem 1960 represents perhaps the most famous scholar of Jewish mysticism’s “take” on Gnosticism, with which Gruenwald 1988 is in dialogue; Fossum 1985 combines an expertise in Jewish mysticism with a very deep understanding of Gnosticism and Gnostic texts. The consideration of the topic of “Jewish Gnosticism” by prominent scholars of Judaism (particularly Scholem 1960 and Segal 2002) has been welcome and provided fruitful new directions for study. Some studies (e.g., Mastrocinque 2005) look specifically at traditions of ancient Mediterranean magic, which often drew on “Jewish” or “Gnostic” tropes. A third area of study has been the origin of Gnostic mythological figures such as Sophia or Sabaoth from Jewish traditions (Fallon 1978, Dahl 1981).
  284.  
  285. Dahl, Nils. “The Arrogant Archon and the Lewd Sophia: Jewish Traditions in Gnostic Revolt.” In The Rediscovery of Gnosticism: Proceedings of the International Conference on Gnosticism at Yale, New Haven, Connecticut, March 28–31, 1978. Vol. 2, Sethian Gnosticism. Edited by Bentley Layton, 689–712. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1981.
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  287. Addresses the debate on whether the anti-Jewish attitudes in many Nag Hammadi documents were produced by sectarian Jews in the 1st century or Christians in later centuries by considering specifically the role(s) of the chief archon (modeled on Yahweh) and Sophia.
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  289. Fallon, Francis Timothy. The Enthronement of Sabaoth: Jewish Elements in Gnostic Creation Myths. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1978.
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  291. Originally a Harvard Divinity School dissertation. Fallon traces the theme of the archon Sabaoth’s enthronement in two Nag Hammadi documents to Jewish Merkavah traditions.
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  293. Fossum, Jarl E. The Name of God and the Angel of the Lord: Samaritan and Jewish Concepts of Intermediation and the Origin of Gnosticism. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 36. Tübingen, Germany: Mohr, 1985.
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  295. Originally a dissertation from the University of Utrecht. Fossum locates the origin of Gnosticism’s “metaphysical anti-Semitism” within Judaism itself, albeit in a more innocuous form. Very useful for advanced students seeking a nuanced argument concerning Jewish themes in Nag Hammadi texts.
  296. Find this resource:
  297. Gruenwald, Ithmar. From Apocalypticism to Gnosticism: Studies in Apocalypticism, Merkavah Mysticism and Gnosticism. Frankfurt and New York: Lang, 1988.
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  299. Thirteen essays (eight reprinted, five new). The author’s focus is on ancient mysticism and visionary ascent in Mediterranean Antiquity. He notes that Gnostics made free use of Jewish traditions, but that the influence did not work the other way around. Stops short of seeing Gnosticism as generated from Jewish mysticism.
  300. Find this resource:
  301. Mastrocinque, Attilio. From Jewish Magic to Gnosticism. Studien und Texte zur Antike und Christentum 24. Tübingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck, 2005.
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  303. Connects Jewish magical amulets and spells to Gnosticism because of their occasional shared vocabulary. Most scholars see no direct connection between the two, but this is representative of one European school of thought.
  304. Find this resource:
  305. Scholem, Gershom Gerhard. Jewish Gnosticism, Merkabah Mysticism, and Talmudic Tradition. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1960.
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  307. This famous scholar of Judaism understands Jewish Gnosticism as a form of Jewish mysticism based on the practice of divine ascent. Later Christian Gnosticism drew from the earlier Jewish Gnosticism.
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  309. Segal, Alan F. Two Powers in Heaven: Early Rabbinic Reports about Christianity and Gnosticism. Boston: Brill, 2002.
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  311. The author looks to rabbinical materials concerning the existence of a lower, secondary demiurgical figure (Metatron) to delve into the origins of the Gnostic Demiurge. This book works well for undergraduate and graduate students and offers an excellent introduction to rabbinics and Gnosticism, particularly on the topics of cosmology and apocalyptic.
  312. Find this resource:
  313. Christian Origins
  314.  
  315. The chief proponent of the idea that Gnosticism originated from within Christianity rather than independently alongside it has been the French scholar Simone Pétrement (Petrement 1990). Her perspective has been instrumental to many modern scholars of Gnosticism, particularly Pagels 1972 and Pagels 1989. Luttikhuizen 2006 argues against earlier theories (e.g., Dahl 1981, cited under Jewish Origins) that see the anti-Judaism of Nag Hammadi writings as deriving from Jewish sectarianism.
  316.  
  317. Luttikhuizen, Gerard P. Gnostic Revisions of Genesis Stories and Early Jesus Traditions. Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies 58. Boston and Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2006.
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  319. Essays in the first half of the book argue against the Jewish origins of Gnostic texts and situates them within circles of Christian intellectuals interested in combining Genesis exegesis with Hellenistic Greek philosophy. The second half considers treatments of Jesus in Nag Hammadi writings.
  320. Find this resource:
  321. Pagels, Elaine. “The Valentinian Claim to Esoteric Exegesis of Romans as Basis for Anthropological Theory.” Vigiliae Christianae 26 (1972): 241–258.
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  323. Pagels explores how Valentinians read Paul to develop their “Gnostic anthropology”: the threefold division into sarkic, psychic, and pneumatic humans, drawing on the language of 1 Corinthians.
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  325. Pagels, Elaine. The Johannine Gospel in Gnostic Exegesis: Heracleon’s Commentary on John. Atlanta: Scholars, 1989.
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  327. A study of various exegetical strategies of different Gnostic writers as they approached the Gospel of John. Focuses on the Valentinian teacher Heracleon’s exegesis of John—the first work of Christian exegesis of New Testament scripture ever produced, now extant only in fragments.
  328. Find this resource:
  329. Petrement, Simone. A Separate God: The Christian Origins of Gnosticism. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1990.
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  331. An important but underutilized study, translated from the French. The author traces back the origins of Gnosticism to sectarian Christian groups that produced creative exegeses of scripture, particularly the Pauline corpus and Gospel of John. Pétrement’s thesis has influenced the work of many scholars of Gnosticism, including Pagels 1972 and Pagels 1989.
  332. Find this resource:
  333. New Testament
  334.  
  335. A number of Gnostic texts, particularly within the Nag Hammadi corpus, utilize material from the New Testament. Among the most “popular” of the NT writings are the Pauline epistles and the Gospel of John, which often are invoked more in spirit than in letter. However, various Nag Hammadi writings directly cite NT passages, from the Pauline corpus to the gospels and other writings such as Hebrews. Thus a careful study of Nag Hammadi reveals the nature and status of the Christian writings in the 2nd century before their eventual consolidation into the canon. Studies of Gnosticism and the New Testament tend to focus on the Nag Hammadi documents’ use of exegesis and scriptural citation (Painchaud 1996). Other studies (e.g., Franzmann 1996) consider Nag Hammadi depictions of Jesus more directly, including Jesus-sayings that are attested only in writings such as the Gospel of Thomas or the Gospel of Philip. In this genre, Tuckett 1986 is perhaps the most technical. Pagels 1989 looks to Gnostic interpretations and exegesis of the Gospel of John specifically, making it a good resource for the little-known Valentinian author Heracleon, the first Christian to produce an exegesis of a work that would become canonical. Finally, the work of George MacRae should be commended for its clarity and accessibility; of his many writings, two of the most useful are MacRae 1978 and MacRae 1987. See also Perkins 1993.
  336.  
  337. Franzmann, Majella. Jesus in the Nag Hammadi Writings. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996.
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  339. Works thematically rather than text by text, and addresses important basic questions such as “What is a Gospel?” and “Do the Nag Hammadi Texts belong in the Apocrypha?”
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  341. MacRae, George W. “Nag Hammadi and the New Testament.” In Gnosis: Festschrift für Hans Jonas. Edited by B. Aland, 144–157. Göttingen, Germany: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1978.
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  343. Assesses the impact of the Nag Hammadi discovery on the field of Gnosticism and the New Testament. The author sees Gnosticism as a Hellenistic Jewish movement that acted as a rival to Christianity. The essay is important as an early attempt to redescribe Gnosticism based on new material, although MacRae’s conclusions no longer hold.
  344. Find this resource:
  345. MacRae, George W. Studies in the New Testament and Gnosticism. Wilmington, DE: Glazier, 1987.
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  347. A collection of MacRae’s essays on the New Testament by his former students. A beloved professor at Harvard, MacRae was the first to attempt to understand Nag Hammadi’s relevance to New Testament studies.
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  349. Pagels, Elaine. The Johannine Gospel in Gnostic Exegesis: Heracleon’s Commentary on John. Atlanta: Scholars, 1989.
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  351. A study of various exegetical strategies of different Gnostic writers as they approached the Gospel of John. Focuses on the Valentinian teacher Heracleon’s exegesis of John—the first work of Christian exegesis of New Testament scripture ever produced, now extant only in fragments.
  352. Find this resource:
  353. Painchaud, Louis. “The Use of Scripture in Gnostic Literature.” Journal of Early Christian Studies 4 (1996): 129–147.
  354. DOI: 10.1353/earl.1996.0020Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  355. Examines the role not only of direct citation to scripture (New Testament and Hebrew Bible) but also of allusions, which he argues is just as important to understanding the hermeneutic principles of Gnosticism.
  356. Find this resource:
  357. Perkins, Pheme. Gnosticism and the New Testament. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993.
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  359. A professor of both Gnosticism and New Testament/Christian theology at Boston College, Perkins is perhaps the most adept of scholars with such “dual” training and interests in presenting her ideas for specialists and nonspecialists alike. This brief volume is suitable for undergraduates and graduate students and moves thematically through topics such as “Jesus as Redeemer Figure” and “Jesus as Word.”
  360. Find this resource:
  361. Tuckett, Christopher. Nag Hammadi and the Gospel Tradition: Synoptic Tradition in the Nag Hammadi Library. Edited by John Riches. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1986.
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  363. Very comprehensive. Useful for the student who is looking for a thorough investigation into the use of synoptic materials in Nag Hammadi. The author argues that all uses in the Nag Hammadi documents draw from written gospels in circulation rather than from earlier synoptic traditions, thus at odds with many Gnostic scholars of the Gospel of Thomas, including Patterson and Davies.
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  365. Heresiology and the Early Church
  366.  
  367. The writings of 2nd- to 5th-century Christian heresiologists—most notably Irenaeus of Lyons, Hippolytus of Rome, and Epiphanius of Salamis—form an important corpus of documents revealing much about politics in formative Christianity.
  368.  
  369. Heresiological Works
  370.  
  371. Heresiological works are widely available in English translation. The student is most likely to encounter them in the Ante-Nicene Fathers series, much of which is scanned and available online at various sites. However, these English translations, now in the public domain, are frequently outdated and should be treated cautiously; the volumes here are more reliable critical translations for serious students. Critical translations guide students through expert translations of difficult texts but require advanced language skills to be useful; Marcovich 1986 contains only the Greek text, but is the edition most often cited and consulted by specialists. Rousseau and Doutreleau 1965–1982 forms part of the outstanding Sources chrétiennes series of early Christian text critical editions, which also translates many other heresiological sources. Williams 1987–1994 in the Nag Hammadi Studies series fills a much-needed lacuna in a full English critical translation of Epiphanius’s Panarion.
  372.  
  373. Marcovich, Miroslav, ed. Hippolytus of Rome: Refutatio omnium haeresium. New York and Berlin: de Gruyter, 1986.
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  375. The best critical edition of Hippolytus’s important work, Against All Heresies. Text in Greek only.
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  377. Rousseau, Adelin, and L. Doutreleau, eds. Irenée: Contre les hérésies. 5 vols. Sources chrétiennes 100. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1965–1982.
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  379. The most authoritative critical editions of Irenaeus of Lyons’s important heresiological text, Against Heresies. French, Latin, and Greek texts in five volumes.
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  381. Williams, Frank. The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis. Nag Hammadi Studies 35. 2 vols. Leiden, The Netherlands, and New York: Brill, 1987–1994.
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  383. A new, complete edition of this important heresiological work translated from the original Greek.
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  385. Studies
  386.  
  387. Older (i.e., pre-1945) scholarship on church history that did not have the benefit of drawing on more original Gnostic source material has been excluded from this bibliography, with the exception of Bauer 1971 that remains at the center of scholarly controversy concerning the genealogy of Christian orthodoxy. Still at issue is the question of whether orthodoxy developed in response to a multiplicity of Christianities in the 2nd century as the Church “closed ranks” following the Council of Nicaea (Koschorke 1978), or whether orthodoxy always existed as a dominant and perhaps even populist movement in nascent Christianity (Edwards 2009, here against Bauer 1971, and in conversation with Brakke 2010 and Lyman 1993). Marjanen and Luomanen 2005 is the sole book to focus on both heretical movements and individual “heretics” in a series of relatively short, useful studies that are balanced in their approach and accessibly written.
  388.  
  389. Bauer, Walter. Orthodoxy and Heresy in the Early Church. Translated by a team from the Philadelphia Seminar on Christian Origins and edited by Robert A. Kraft and Gerhard Krodel. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971.
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  391. Originally published as Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum (Tübingen, Germany: Mohr, 1934). The origin of the “Bauer Hypothesis,” which is unfortunately differently construed among various contemporary scholars of Christianity. Bauer sees the original orthodoxy in the Roman Church of the 1st and 2nd centuries, which was at times less popular than alternative, “heretical” teachers.
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  393. Brakke, David. The Gnostics: Myth, Ritual, and Diversity in Early Christianity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010.
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  395. A careful study that acknowledges the flaws inherent in the term “Gnosticism,” but that presents Sethian Gnostics as intellectuals in serious engagement with Christian tradition. In implicit dialogue with Edwards 2009.
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  397. Edwards, M. J. Catholicity and Heresy in the Early Church. Farnham, UK, and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2009.
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  399. An important new formulation of the terms “orthodoxy” and “heresy,” by an esteemed church historian. The first chapter discusses “Gnostics” and their contribution to the development of Catholic doctrine, and nuances Bauer 1971.
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  401. Koschorke, Klaus. Die Polemik der Gnostiker gegen das Kirchliche Christentum: Under besonderer Berücksichtigung der Nag-Hammadi-Traktate Apokalypse des Petrus (NHC VIII,3) und Testimonium veritatis (NHC IX,3). Nag Hammadi Studies 12. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1978.
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  403. Demonstrates that polemics in early Christianity were not solely produced by self-proclaimed members of a nascent orthodoxy; so-called Gnostics engaged in them as well. This book draws on two often-neglected Nag Hammadi texts, the Apocalypse of Peter and the Testimony of Truth, and their polemical rhetoric.
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  405. Lyman, Rebecca. Christology and Cosmology: Models of Divine Activity in Origen, Eusebius, and Athanasius. Oxford and New York: Clarendon, 1993.
  406. DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198267454.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  407. Another helpful book, beautifully written, by a church historian that helps situate Gnosticism within a wider frame of reference.
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  409. Marjanen, Antti, and Petri Luomanen, eds. A Companion to Second-Century “Heretics.” Leiden, The Netherlands, and Boston: Brill, 2005.
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  411. Contains twelve essays with detailed descriptions of “heretical” movements, some of them “Gnostic” (e.g., Sethianism, Valentinianism), some of them not (e.g., Montanism, Jewish Christianity) along with comprehensive studies of individuals considered heretics in the early Church, such as Basilides, Marcion, Tatian, and Bardaisan of Edessa. Excellent for undergraduates.
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  413. Schools
  414.  
  415. Since the 1970s, Gnosticism has been divided into various “schools”; in fact, scholars prefer to speak of “Valentinianism” and “Sethianism” rather than “Gnosticism” as a whole, finding “Gnosticism” a problematic, outdated, and inaccurate category. There does appear to be a clear distinction between “Valentinian” and “Sethian” traditions. A third “school” that is sometimes considered within Gnosticism is Thomasine, based on the affinities of certain texts (the Gospel of Thomas, the Acts of Thomas, and its Hymn of the Pearl) and their elevation of the disciple Thomas as Jesus’s spiritual “twin.” Thomasine traditions may have developed on the eastern fringes of the empire, particularly Syria, and specifically Edessa, judging from elements of Syriac language still visible in the relevant texts. However, considerable controversy exists over whether or not the Gospel of Thomas is truly a “Gnostic” text, despite its inclusion within the Nag Hammadi writings, and how much the three Thomas-based texts can truly represent a “school.”
  416.  
  417. Valentinianism
  418.  
  419. Valentinianism derives its name from an actual founder, the 2nd-century Alexandrian teacher Valentinus. Valentinus’s work is extant only in fragments, having been expurgated by the Catholic Church; Desjardins 1986 provides a sensible guide to what remains, or else the advanced student can turn to Sagnard 1947. The hallmarks of Valentinianism are generally perceived to be a close affinity with emergent “proto-orthodox” Christianity, organization of Valentinians into communities that may have worshipped alongside more “ordinary” Christians in major cities of the Roman Empire, and a streamlined cosmology based on the existence of balanced male-female pairs or “syzygies.” These arguments are addressed and refined in the extensive collection of Layton 1980. Valentinians also engaged actively in Christian scriptural exegesis, producing commentaries on the Gospel of John and other works now included in the canon of the New Testament (see Attridge 1986). Although early studies of Valentinianism (see the essays in Layton 1980) see the movement as a clearly defined ancient school of thought driven directly by the Alexandrian-educated Valentinus, Dunderberg 2008, Markschies 1992, Markschies 1997, and Thomassen 2006 undermine many assumptions about the nature of Valentinian communities. These authors also address the division of Valentinianism into Eastern and Western traditions (especially Thomassen 2006).
  420.  
  421. Attridge, Harold W. “The Gospel of Truth as an Exoteric Text.” In Nag Hammadi, Gnosticism, and Early Christianity. Edited by Charles W. Hedrick and Robert Hodgson Jr., 239–255. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1986.
  422. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  423. A short, compelling argument that the Gospel of Truth from Nag Hammadi may have been written not for Valentinians (as most scholars of Gnosticism considered it) but for outsiders as a sort of missionizing text.
  424. Find this resource:
  425. Desjardins, Michel. “The Sources for Valentinian Gnosticism: A Question of Methodology.” Vigiliae Christianae 40 (1986): 342–347.
  426. DOI: 10.1163/157007286X00176Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  427. Helpfully lays out our sources for Valentinianism within Patristic sources as well as within the Nag Hammadi documents. Useful for undergraduates.
  428. Find this resource:
  429. Dunderberg, Ismo. Beyond Gnosticism: Myth, Lifestyle, and Society in the School of Valentinus. New York: Columbia University Press, 2008.
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  431. In a series of related essays, Dunderberg seeks to separate Valentinus’s thought from that of later Valentinians. The strength of this book derives from the author’s engagement with Greco-Roman intellectual currents of the Second Sophistic.
  432. Find this resource:
  433. Layton, Bentley, ed. The Rediscovery of Gnosticism: Proceedings of the International Conference on Gnosticism at Yale, New Haven, Connecticut, March 28–31, 1978. Vol. 1, The School of Valentinus. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1980.
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  435. After four general essays on Gnosticism by academic luminaries (Henry Chadwick, Gilles Quispel, Carsten Colpe, and Harold Bloom) are twenty essays in English and French on various aspects of Valentinianism. Of these, particularly cited in later literature are the contributions of Greer, Dillon, and Corby Finney.
  436. Find this resource:
  437. Markschies, Christoph. Valentinus Gnosticus? Untersuchungen zur valentinianischen Gnosis mit einem Kommentar zu den Fragmenten Valentins. Tübingen, Germany: Mohr, 1992.
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  439. Draws only upon the patristic fragments of Valentinus to reconstruct his theology, finding it closer to Philo or Clement of Alexandria than to other “Gnostic” teachers. In this way, Markschies addresses the question of whether Valentinus was a “Gnostic” in the negative.
  440. Find this resource:
  441. Markschies, Christoph. “Valentinian Gnosticism: Toward the Anatomy of a School.” In The Nag Hammadi Library after Fifty Years: Proceedings of the 1995 Society of Biblical Literature Commemoration. Edited by John D. Turner and Anne McGuire, 401–438. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1997.
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  443. Markschies focuses on Valentinians after Valentinus, placing the Valentinian school within the broader context of other types of “schools” in the Roman Empire.
  444. Find this resource:
  445. Sagnard, François. La gnose Valentinienne et le tèmoignage de Saint Ireneè. Paris: Vrin, 1947.
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  447. The first serious study of Valentinianism, based on Irenaeus’s assessment. Sagnard’s work still has merit for his solid hermeneutical approach to the heresiologists.
  448. Find this resource:
  449. Thomassen, Einar. The Spiritual Seed: The Church of the “Valentinians.” Leiden, The Netherlands, and Boston: Brill, 2006.
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  451. A clear exposition of Valentinianism, including its division into Eastern and Western schools. Includes a biography of Valentinus and a guide to the extant fragments of Valentinus’s writings for intermediate-level students.
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  453. Sethianism
  454.  
  455. Sethian texts share complex cosmologies featuring a variety of cosmic beings, both beneficent and malevolent. They may betray Jewish elements, or manifestly Platonist elements. The seminal essay to lay out characteristics and classifications remains Schenke 1981, the most significant and accessible of the author’s many excellent books and articles. As with the case of Valentinianism, the category of “Sethian” has undergone substantial rethinking since Klijn 1977, particularly in the light of Wisse 1981; Scott 1995 follows this reassessment. Holding the line on seeing Sethianism as a significant movement in Antiquity has been Turner 1986. Brakke 2010 has added to the controversy with another revisionist move that takes aim at the rejection of “Gnosticism” as a category by presenting Sethians as the original “Gnostics.”
  456.  
  457. Brakke, David. The Gnostics: Myth, Ritual, and Diversity in Early Christianity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010.
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  459. A careful study that acknowledges the flaws inherent in the term “Gnosticism,” but which presents Sethian Gnostics as intellectuals in serious engagement with Christian tradition.
  460. Find this resource:
  461. Klijn, Albertus Frederik Johannes. Seth in Jewish, Christian, and Gnostic Literature. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1977.
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  463. The author traces the figure Seth through ancient Jewish materials before considering Christian and Gnostic materials. Thorough and useful as a focused study.
  464. Find this resource:
  465. Schenke, Hans-Martin. “The Phenomenon and Significance of Gnostic Sethianism.” In The Rediscovery of Gnosticism: Proceedings of the International Conference on Gnosticism at Yale, New Haven, Connecticut, March 28–31, 1978. Vol. 2, Sethian Gnosticism. Edited by Bentley Layton, 588–616. Studies in the History of Religions (Supplements to Numen). Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1981.
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  467. A seminal essay where the author identifies a list of Sethian writings according to criteria he establishes. This essay established the ground from which much scholarship in Sethianism has proceeded.
  468. Find this resource:
  469. Scott, Alan B. “Churches or Books? Sethian Social Organization.” Journal of Early Christian Studies 3.2 (1995): 109–122.
  470. DOI: 10.1353/earl.0.0030Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  471. Uses the work of sociologists Bainbridge and Stark to characterize Sethianism as a weak social network, based on the source document.
  472. Find this resource:
  473. Turner, John D. “Sethian Gnosticism: A Literary History.” In Nag Hammadi, Gnosticism and Early Christianity. Edited by C. W. Hedrick and R. Hodgson, 55–86. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1986.
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  475. One of the most respected authorities on Sethianism, Turner reconstructs the history of Sethianism based on ordering and analyzing their literary productions.
  476. Find this resource:
  477. Wisse, Frederik. “Stalking Those Elusive Sethians.” In The Rediscovery of Gnosticism: Proceedings of the International Conference on Gnosticism at Yale, New Haven, Connecticut, March 28–31, 1978. Vol. 2, Sethian Gnosticism. Edited by Bentley Layton, 563–576. Studies in the History of Religions (Supplements to Numen). Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1981.
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  479. A seminal essay that questions the degree to which it is possible to consider Sethianism as a religious movement or community, based on a set of characteristics evident in Sethian literature. Turner 1986 responds in the affirmative.
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  481. The Thomasine School
  482.  
  483. Our various extant writings ascribed to Jesus’ disciple Thomas—the Acts of Thomas, the Gospel of Thomas, and the Book of Thomas the Contender—have been grouped together and seen as the productions of a “school,” likely based in Syria, perhaps in Edessa, although this idea has been challenged (Poirier 1997). These three texts are as different as they are similar, thus leading scholars to generally consider the Gospel of Thomas—found in a Coptic translation among the Nag Hammadi documents as well as in various Greek fragments from Oxyrhynchus, Egypt—as a very early gospel that was at some point subjected to Gnostic redaction. Scholars have focused energy on the relationship of the GosThom to the New Testament, particularly the canonical gospels (DeConick 2005) and the Gospel of John (Dunderberg 1997). It should be noted that many scholars who specialize in the Gospel of Thomas do not consider it a Gnostic text because, they assert, it was a 1st-century text and thus too early to be properly considered “Gnostic.” Davies 1983 and Davies 1992 lead the charge of scholars who see a 1st-century origin for the Gospel; Gnosticism did not develop as a movement until the 2nd century, at which point the Gospel of Thomas already existed but was probably subjected to considerable “Gnosticizing” additions. Others, however, consider the Gospel of Thomas fully a 2nd-century text that draws on canonical materials. Collections of essays such as Asgeirsson, et al. 2006 and Uro 1998 are useful for giving a range of views within a single volume, thus representing the complexity of issues in a balanced manner. For translations of the Gospel of Thomas, see Single Text Editions.
  484.  
  485. Asgeirsson, Jon Ma, April DeConick, and Risto Uro, eds. Thomasine Traditions in Antiquity: The Social and Cultural World of the Gospel of Thomas. Leiden, The Netherlands, and Boston: Brill, 2006.
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  487. Twelve English-language contributions based on presentations to the Society of Biblical Literature’s Thomasine Traditions Group. All the writings presume that the Gospel of Thomas is a “Gnostic” text.
  488. Find this resource:
  489. Davies, Stevan. Gospel of Thomas and Christian Wisdom. New York: Seabury, 1983.
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  491. The chief proponent of the argument that the Gospel of Thomas represents very early Jesus material from the 1st century, used primarily for postbaptismal instruction.
  492. Find this resource:
  493. Davies, Stevan. “The Christology and Protology of the Gospel of Thomas.” Journal of Biblical Literature 111 (1992): 663–682.
  494. DOI: 10.2307/3267438Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  495. Davies traces significant themes through the seemingly random collection of sayings in the Gospel of Thomas to uncover a hidden message. A good essay for intermediate-level students.
  496. Find this resource:
  497. DeConick, April D. Recovering the Original Gospel of Thomas: A History of the Gospel and Its Growth. New York and London: T&T Clark, 2005.
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  499. Uses theories of orality and oral transmission to further consider the question of the origins of the Gospel of Thomas. Contains large translated sections of the Gospel, charts, and helpful indexes of references.
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  501. Dunderberg, Ismo. “John and Thomas in Conflict?” In The Nag Hammadi Library after Fifty Years: Proceedings of the 1995 Society of Biblical Literature Commemoration. Edited by John D. Turner and Anne McGuire, 361–380. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1997.
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  503. An influential essay that suggests that the Johannine Prologue and the Gospel of Thomas intentionally presented conflicting Christological claims concerning the nature of transcendence and the possibility of human spiritual transformation.
  504. Find this resource:
  505. Gathercole, Simon. The Composition of the Gospel of Thomas: Original Language and Influences. Cambridge, UK, and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
  506. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511920561Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  507. A publication that challenges the hitherto prevalent theory that the Gospel of Thomas is 1st-century, preserving traces of original composition in Aramaic. Challenges the assumptions of Davies 1983 and Davies 1992.
  508. Find this resource:
  509. Poirier, Paul-Hubert. “The Writings Ascribed to Thomas and the Thomas Tradition.” In The Nag Hammadi Library after Fifty Years: Proceedings of the 1995 Society of Biblical Literature Commemoration. Edited by John D. Turner and Anne McGuire, 295–307. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1997.
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  511. Poirier challenges those who assert that there existed a coherent Thomasine school, an idea that originated with the French scholar Henri-Charles Puech in the late 1950s and still has limited currency today.
  512. Find this resource:
  513. Uro, Risto, ed. Thomas at the Crossroads: Essays on the Gospel of Thomas. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998.
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  515. Contains the results of a research project on the Gospel of Thomas funded by the Academy of Finland, thus only Finnish scholars are represented. All write in English. The volume is even-handed, and represents fully both sides of the debate considering the dating and origins of the Gospel.
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  517. Platonism
  518.  
  519. A profitable new direction in the study of Gnosticism has been a reevaluation of the relationship between Gnosticism and later Platonism. One of the only moments where we can develop a social history of Gnostics or Gnosticism comes from Plotinus’s student Porphyry’s scathing dismissal of Gnostics infiltrating his teacher’s study circle with their idea of the cosmos as a place full of terrors. Accordingly, many scholars of late Platonism had taken Porphyry’s evaluation at face value and dismissed 3rd-century Gnosticism as late, corrupt, and saturated with an attitude of cosmic pessimism (Armstrong 1978). New scholarship—from both scholars of Gnosticism (Turner 2002) and scholars of Platonism (Wallis and Bregman 1992)—has sought to nuance Porphyry’s negative assessment and to offer in its place a more even-handed analysis of the points of contact and departure between late Platonism and 3rd-century Gnosticism. Areas for examination have focused on varying interpretations and exegeses of Plato’s works among 3rd-century intellectuals, especially in the creation of exegeses of the works of Parmenides. Many edited collections such as Mansfeld 1989 and Sinnige 1999 (collections of the authors’ own essays) and Turner and Majercik 2000 (a collection representing various scholars and a range of views) are useful for both classroom use and research.
  520.  
  521. Armstrong, H. A. “Gnosis and Greek Philosophy.” In Gnosis: Festschrift für Hans Jonas. Edited by B. Aland, 87–124. Göttingen, Germany: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1978.
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  523. The author—a prominent specialist in Neoplatonism—offers an outdated assessment of Gnosticism. Much of the scholarship in the field offers a rebuttal of this essay.
  524. Find this resource:
  525. Majercik, Ruth. “The Existence-Life-Intellect-Triad in Gnosticism and Neoplatonism.” Classical Quarterly 42 (1992): 475–488.
  526. DOI: 10.1017/S0009838800016098Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  527. A useful, if technical, discussion of a primary metaphysical triad in Sethian Gnostic texts and its relationship to Neoplatonic cosmology.
  528. Find this resource:
  529. Mansfeld, Jaap. Studies in Later Greek Philosophy and Gnosticism. London: Variorum Reprints, 1989.
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  531. A collection of seventeen of the author’s earlier essays and book reviews, primarily from 1981 to 1989 although the earliest dates to 1972. Particularly concerned with reception history: namely, the use of early Stoic fragments in Gnostic and late Antique scholarship. For advanced readers.
  532. Find this resource:
  533. Sinnige, Th. G. Six Lectures on Plotinus and Gnosticism. Dordrecht, The Netherlands, and Boston: Kluwer Academic, 1999.
  534. DOI: 10.1007/978-94-017-3006-8Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  535. Fairly dense text combined with few footnotes and only a sparse bibliography makes this a curious book but worthwhile for the author’s reassessment of Plotinus’s Enneads as directly responding to—and sometimes quoting—Gnostic texts and ideas. Reverses the attitude of Armstrong 1978.
  536. Find this resource:
  537. Turner, John D. Sethian Gnosticism and the Platonic Tradition. Bibliothéque copte de Nag Hammadi, Section “Études” 6. Louvain, Belgium: Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 2002.
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  539. Turner remains the world expert on Sethianism, with clearly developed ideas and models of analysis; he is also unusually expertly conversant with Neoplatonism. This book analyzes Allogenes, Marsanes, Zostrianos, and Three Steles of Seth as they represent or diverge from Platonist metaphysics. Essential for research.
  540. Find this resource:
  541. Turner, John D., and Ruth Majercik, eds. Gnosticism and Later Platonism: Themes, Figures, and Texts. SBL Symposiums 12. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000.
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  543. Contains ten essays from papers presented between 1993 and 1998, emphasizing points of continuity between Gnosticism and Platonism in matters of philosophy. Represents many top scholars in the field.
  544. Find this resource:
  545. Wallis, Richard T., and Jay Bregman, eds. Neoplatonism and Gnosticism. Papers presented at the Sixth International Conference of the International Society for Neoplatonic Studies, held at University of Oklahoma, 18–21 March 1984. Studies in Neoplatonism 6. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992.
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  547. Twenty-one papers in English from the Sixth International Conference of the International Society for Neoplatonic Studies, including many from key scholars in both fields. Papers aim at bridging the divide between Neoplatonism and Gnosticism.
  548. Find this resource:
  549. The Divine Feminine
  550.  
  551. Perhaps because some of the Nag Hammadi texts appear to have accorded a prominent place to a divine feminine (“Thunder, Perfect Mind”; Hypostasis of the Archons), at one point many scholars focused on the study of female characters and feminist dimensions of Gnosticism and the Nag Hammadi writings. Buckley 1986 and Good 1987 are both fine examples of works by proponents of second-wave feminism whose books are based on dissertations. A particular area of study has been the character of Sophia, a creatrix with divine powers that are variously construed in Gnostic documents as positive, negative, or ambivalent (Good 1987). A little different is Marjanen 1996, which offers an analysis of Mary Magdalene in the Nag Hammadi writings that is not explicitly feminist in method, but turns a gaze to an important female figure in Gnosticism and her relationship with Jesus. The study of Gnosticism’s “feminist” dimensions was fully articulated in a colloquium organized by Karen King in 1985 (published as King 2000), but work on the topic has largely dropped off in recent years to be replaced by more sophisticated analyses drawing on gender studies, as in King 1990 and Dunning 2009.
  552.  
  553. Buckley, Jorunn Jacobsen. Female Fault and Fulfillment. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1986.
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  555. Based on a dissertation, in which the author distills three models for the feminine in a number of Nag Hammadi texts. Moves both thematically and text by text, and includes information on Buckley’s specialization, the Mandaeans.
  556. Find this resource:
  557. Dunning, Benjamin. “What Sort of Thing Is This Luminous Woman? Rethinking Sexual Difference in On the Origin of the World.” Journal of Early Christian Studies 17.1 (2009): 55–84.
  558. DOI: 10.1353/earl.0.0248Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  559. An example of very good recent work from a student of the author of King 1990. Considers gender difference from a particularly sophisticated use of Judith Butler and other theorists.
  560. Find this resource:
  561. Good, Deirdre. Reconstructing the Tradition of Sophia in Gnostic Literature. Atlanta: Scholars, 1987.
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  563. Another published dissertation, this good short study remains the most useful study available on the topic. The author examines two texts from Nag Hammadi, Eugnostos and the Sophia of Jesus Christ, and concludes from them that Sophia was a powerful genetrix, mother, and consort to the father, not a secondary or “fallen” female figure.
  564. Find this resource:
  565. King, Karen L. “Ridicule and Rape, Rule and Rebellion: The Hypostasis of the Archons.” In Gnosticism and the Early Christian World: In Honor of James M. Robinson. Edited by James E. Goehring, 3–24. Sonoma, CA: Polebridge, 1990.
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  567. An essay primarily on masculinity that draws on classical sources to explore the gendered language of the Hypostasis of the Archons. Can work well in the classroom and provokes conversation for the emphasis on masculinity rather than femininity.
  568. Find this resource:
  569. King, Karen L., ed. Images of the Feminine in Gnosticism. Studies in Antiquity and Christianity. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 2000.
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  571. This edition is a reprint of the original from 1988, with thirty articles by outstanding scholars. The published essays include both talks and shorter responses, producing a useful dialectic.
  572. Find this resource:
  573. Marjanen, Antti. The Woman Jesus Loved: Mary Magdalene in the Nag Hammadi Library and Related Documents. Leiden, The Netherlands, and New York: Brill, 1996.
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  575. Carefully reviews how Mary Magdalene is depicted in six Nag Hammadi texts, the Gospel of Mary, the lost Great Questions of Mary (in paraphrase and fragments from Epiphanius, Panarion) and in the Manichaean Psalm-Book. Good for undergraduates.
  576. Find this resource:
  577. The Hermetica
  578.  
  579. The Nag Hammadi codices contained a number of manifestly Hermetic writings, some of which were previously known from the Corpus Hermeticum (Asclepius; Prayer of Thanksgiving) and another that was hitherto unknown (Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth). Mahé 1978 offers a critical translation of Nag Hammadi Hermetica, along with extensive commentary. For the most accessible translation of the entire Corpus Hermeticum in English, Copenhaver 1992 remains indispensable. Given that both Gnosticism and Hermeticism were popular movements in late Antique Egypt, it is perhaps not surprising that they shared an audience—especially given the manifestly monotheistic inclinations of Hermetic philosophy. The books listed here consider both movements together as parallel movements that shared similar motivations and audiences. Fowden 1993 is unique for its focus on the shared social matrix of the two movements, which it explores in language that is eminently readable. See also Broek and Hanegraff 1998.
  580.  
  581. Broek, R. van den, and Wouter Hanegraaff, eds. Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times. SUNY Series in Western Esoteric Traditions. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998.
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  583. Fifteen essays, all in English, from European scholars. Only the first six of the essays deal with ancient “Gnosticism,” but some (multiple contributions from van den Broek and Mahé) are useful to intermediate to advanced students.
  584. Find this resource:
  585. Copenhaver, Brian P. Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin Asclepius in a New English Translation, with Notes and Introduction. Cambridge, UK, and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
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  587. An excellent modern English translation of the Corpus Hermeticum, with annotations and notes. Although the volume does not treat Gnosticism explicitly, keen students will be able to detect crossover themes. This is indispensable volume for classroom use and handy for research, although for top-level research it must be used alongside the Greek and Latin texts.
  588. Find this resource:
  589. Fowden, Garth. The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical Approach to the Late Pagan Mind. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993.
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  591. Primarily a study of the social context of the Hermetica, Fowden also takes into account Gnosticism as a parallel movement in late Antique Egypt, arguing that both arrive from the spiritual appetites of lay intellectuals.
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  593. Mahé, Jean-Pierre. Hermès en Haute-Egypte. 2 vols. Quebec: Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 1978.
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  595. A critical French-Coptic edition of the Hermetic Nag Hammadi tractates, with Greek and Latin comparanda. Includes extensive notes and commentary. These volumes are essential for specialized research.
  596. Find this resource:
  597. Manichaeism and Mandaeism
  598.  
  599. There appears to be a relationship between Gnosticism and Manichaeism, as two religious movements that originated at roughly the same period in the same part of the world. Whether or not Dualism—cosmic or otherwise—is another fundamental similarity between them depends entirely upon whether or not one characterizes Gnosticism as dualistic. The idea that Gnosticism draws upon fundamental cosmic dualism is largely outdated and unsupported; accordingly, more recent scholarship has tended to deemphasize any direct similarities or connections between Gnosticism and Manichaeism and consider the movements separately, focusing on either one or the other (e.g., BeDuhn 2000 and Deutsch 1995 for the relationship between Judaism and Mandaeism). At the same time, some scholars still emphasize conceptual continuities between the two religious movements (Böhlig in Böhlig and Markschies 2009; see also Pearson 2004). This affinity is reflected in the decision of editors to change the name of the main series for Gnosticism published under Brill from Nag Hammadi Studies to Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies. One notable volume (Klimkeit 1993) aims at looking at the spiritual trajectory of Gnosticism, broadly speaking, across the Silk Road, thus grounding it topographically as well as thematically or conceptually. Similarly, the Mandaean sects based originally in Iraq show certain affinities with Gnosticism, particularly in the nature and type of rituals performed within the communities. It must be said, however, that solid information on ancient Gnostic ritual is difficult to draw from our source documents. Therefore, more recent scholarship in Mandaeism tends, again, to consider the movement in relative isolation, without drawing specific historical inferences on its relationship to classic Gnosticism (Lupieri 2002). A different sort of study is presented in both Buckley 2002 and BeDuhn 2000, which are readable, accessible, and sure to provoke discussion in the classroom for their modern anthropological approaches.
  600.  
  601. BeDuhn, Jason. The Manichaean Body in Discipline and Ritual. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000.
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  603. A fascinating study that draws in many elements from ritual studies and anthropology. Includes photographic plates.
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  605. Böhlig, Alexander, and Christoph Markschies. Gnosis und Manichäismus. Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies 65. Boston: Brill, 2009.
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  607. Five studies, the first two from Markschies on Gnosticism, and the remaining three by Böhlig on Nag Hammadi’s significance and on the nature and origin of Manichaeism. Three essays are published elsewhere. The essays are very good, but the collection does not cohere in a meaningful way.
  608. Find this resource:
  609. Buckley, Jorunn Jacobsen. The Mandaeans: Ancient Texts and Modern People. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.
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  611. An excellent introduction, well pitched to a general educated audience, from a scholar whose dissertation was on Gnosticism but who works as one of the few specialists in the Mandaeans.
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  613. Deutsch, Nathaniel. The Gnostic Imagination: Gnosticism, Mandaeism and Merkabah Mysticism. Leiden, The Netherlands, and New York: Brill, 1995.
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  615. A response to the work of Gershom Scholem, from a University of Chicago scholar who works predominantly in Judaic Studies. For more advanced students.
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  617. Klimkeit, Hans Joachim. Gnosis on the Silk Road: Gnostic Parables, Hymns and Prayers from Central Asia. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1993.
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  619. A collection of newly translated Manichaean texts from Central Asia, with notes, indices, and explanatory material.
  620. Find this resource:
  621. Lupieri, Edmondo. The Mandaeans: The Last Gnostics. Translated by Charles Hindley. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2002.
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  623. Translated from the Italian, and wonderfully readable. An introduction for nonspecialists into the entire history and development of the Mandaean religion.
  624. Find this resource:
  625. Pearson, Birger. “The Figure of Seth in Manichaean Literature.” In Gnosticism and Christianity in Roman and Coptic Egypt. By Birger Pearson, 268–282. New York: T&T Clark, 2004.
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  627. In his typically clear style, Pearson lays out the manner in which the biblical figure Seth (and eponymous “founder” of Sethian Gnosticism) appears in a variety of Manichaean writings. Excellent for intermediate-level students.
  628. Find this resource:
  629. Nag Hammadi in the 4th-Century Egyptian Context
  630.  
  631. Since the mid-1990s, a group of Nag Hammadi scholars has focused their attentions on examining the 4th-century context of the Nag Hammadi codices, the period in which the books were copied and disseminated in Egypt. These scholars are less concerned with the original Greek versions of the separate documents within the codices themselves (and their 2nd-century origins) and more with how the documents help explain (or problematize) late Antique Egypt. There has been considerable debate over whether the books were originally found in a Pachomian monastic context (Goehring 2001), associated with other monastic figures or movements (Jenott and Pagels 2010, Kaler 2008), or produced for private Christian laypeople (Khosroyev 1995).
  632.  
  633. Goehring, James. “The Provenance of the Nag Hammadi Codices Once More.” Studia Patristica 35 (2001): 234–253.
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  635. In clear prose, the author again addresses the evidence for and against the predominant theory that the Nag Hammadi Codices originated in a Pachomian monastic context. In response to Khosroyev 1995, this is the best of Goehring’s work and summarizes his most recent position.
  636. Find this resource:
  637. Jenott, Lance, and Elaine Pagels. “Anthony’s Letters and Nag Hammadi Codex I: Sources of Religious Conflict in Fourth-Century Egypt.” Journal of Early Christian Studies 18 (2010): 557–589.
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  639. The authors resituate Codex I of the Nag Hammadi library in the context of Egyptian ecclesiastical disputes between the Alexandrian Church and powerful monastic figures. Indicates that Anthony’s letters can be read in ways that reduce the distance between Anthony and “Gnosticism.”
  640. Find this resource:
  641. Kaler, Michael. “The Prayer of the Apostle Paul in the Context of Nag Hammadi Codex I.” Journal of Early Christian Studies 16 (2008): 319–339.
  642. DOI: 10.1353/earl.0.0188Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  643. An example of a recent codicological study. The Prayer of the Apostle Paul is the first document included in Codex I, and Kaler illustrates the logic of its choice by highlighting key themes that are picked up in subsequent documents within the codex.
  644. Find this resource:
  645. Khosroyev, A. Die Bibliothek von Nag Hammadi: Einige Probleme des Christentums in Ägypten während der ersten Jahrhunderte. Arbeiten zum spätantiken und koptischen Ägypten. Altenberge, Germany: Oros Verlag, 1995.
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  647. An important but overlooked book on the private origins of the Nag Hammadi library, contra Goehring 2001. Khosroyev’s strength is his knowledge as a Coptologist and papyrologist.
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