Stephen J. Patterson

Ten seminal essays on the Gospel of Thomas from a scholar whose work has been at the center of the Thomas debate for more than two decades.

Essays on the Fifth Gospel

The Gospel of Thomas and Christian Origins

For most Christian believers, what is truly remarkable and important about Jesus is not his life, but his resurrection from the dead. They may believe that Jesus' death is significant not as the end of Jesus' life, but as the first half of the saving event that comprises the Christian gospel: the death and resurrection of Jesus. For Christians, this great divine cosmic event, around which all of human history pivots, is what saves us from our sins. Apart from this, the death of Jesus would simply be the meaningless end to an interesting but insignificant life. In this lively and provocative work, Patterson reconstructs early Christian assessments of Jesus' significance and also questions basic assumptions about modern interpretations of Jesus' death. He emphasizes the importance of Jesus' life in relation to his death and resurrection. And he challenges individualistic notions of how Jesus' death relates to Christian ethics.

Rethinking the Death and Life of Jesus

Beyond the Passion

This book is the result of the author's involvement with the Jesus Seminar. The premise is that the quest for the historical Jesus has always been closely related to the Christian search for God, and that this is both good and necessary, provided that one properly understands the relationship between history and theology and does not confuse the two.Patterson develops s theology that might properly be called a "Jesus Theology" and it is here that his contribution to the discussions of and about Jesus makes it a most distinctive contribution.

The Historical Jesus and the Search for Meaning

The God of Jesus

Hans-Gebhard Bethge

James M. Robinson

In December 1945, at the base of cliffs that run along the Nile River near the modern-day town of Nag Hammadi, an Egyptian farmer discovered a sealed jar containing thirteen ancient Coptic codices. This discovery represented arguably the most significant manuscript discovery of the twentieth century for the study of the New Testament and Christian origins. Of all the texts found none has been more important than the Gospel of Thomas for our understanding of early Christianity. This classic book presents the best text and the best translation of Thomas in user-friendly form. Additional chapters provide a general introduction to the Gospel of Thomas and tell the fascinating story of that discovery itself by one who was directly involved in bringing this new Gospel to light. An annotated list "for further reading" completes the volume. This new edition features updated material which takes account of recent research on the gospel of Thomas. The translation has been refined at points, and the bibliographical material updated.

The Gospel of Thomas Comes of Age

The Fifth Gospel (New Edition)

Long before the followers of Jesus declared him to be the Son of God, Jesus taught his followers that they too were the children of God. This ancient creed, now all but forgotten, is recorded still within the folds of a letter of Paul the Apostle. Paul did not create this creed, nor did he fully embrace it, but he quoted it and thus preserved it for a time when it might become important once again. This ancient creed said nothing about God or Christ or salvation. Its claims were about the whole human race: there is no race, there is no class, there is no gender. This is the story of that first, forgotten creed, and the world of its begetting, a world in which foreigners were feared, slaves were human chattel, and men questioned whether women were really human after all. Into this world the followers of Jesus proclaimed: "You are all children of God. There is no Jew or Greek, no slave or free, no male and female, for you are all one." Where did this remarkable statement of human solidarity come from, and what, finally, happened to it? How did Christianity become a Gentile religion that despised Jews, condoned slavery as the will of God, and championed patriarchy? Christian theologians would one day argue about the nature of Christ, the being of God, and the mechanics of salvation. But before this, in the days when Jesus was still fresh in the memory of those who knew him, the argument was a different one: how can human beings overcome the ways by which we divide ourselves one from another? Is solidarity possible beyond race, class, and gender?

Stephen J. Patterson

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