Gospels In Conflict: John and Thomas - Part 16

[Guest guest]

Dear All,

 

We concluded Part 15 with the following:

 

(p.67) " But to anyone who claims, as Thomas does, that we are (or may become)

like Jesus, John emphatically says 'no': Jesus is unique or, as John loves to

call him, 'monogenes'-- " only begotten " or " one of a kind " [129]--for he insists

that God has only 'one' son, and he is different from you and me. Though John

goes further than the other three New Testament evangelists in saying that Jesus

is not only a man raised to exalted status ( " messiah, " " son of God, " or " son of

man " ) but God himself in human form, and though he presumably agrees that human

beings 'are' made in God's image, as Genesis 1:26 teaches, he argues that

humankind has no innate capacity to know God. What John's gospel does--and has

succeeded ever after in persuading the majority of Christians to do--is claim

that only by believing in Jesus can we find divine truth. "

 

Beyond Belief (The Secret Gospel of Thomas), Chapter 2, p. 67.

 

Note:

 

[129] I am grateful to my colleague Alexander Nehamas for pointing out that this

Greek term strongly connotes singularity, a usage that goes back as far as

Parmenides' description of what he called being (to on).

 

Here now, is Part 16.

 

Enjoy,

 

violet

 

 

 

Gospels In Conflict: John and Thomas - Part 16

 

(p.68) Because this claim is John's primary concern, his Jesus does not offer

ethical and apocalyptic teachings as he does in Mark, Matthew, and Luke; he

delivers no " sermon on the mount, " no parables teaching how to act, no

predictions of the end of time. Instead, in John's gospel--and only in this

gospel--Jesus continually proclaims his divine identity, speaking in what New

Testament scholars call the " I am " sayings: " I am the way; I am the truth; I am

the light; I am the vine; I am the water of life " --all metaphors for the divine

source that alone fulfills our deepest needs. What John's Jesus 'does' require

of his disciples is that they believe: " You believe in God; believe also in me. "

[130] Then, speaking intimately to those who believe, he urges them to " love one

another as I have loved you. " [131] Jesus tells them that this strong sense of

mutual support will sustain believers as together they face hatred and

persecution from outsiders. [132]

 

Now we can see how John's message contrasts with that of Thomas. Thomas's Jesus

directs each disciple to discover the light within ( " within a person of light

there is light " ); [133] but John's Jesus declares instead that " I am the light

of the world " and that " whoever does not come to me walks in darkness. " [134] In

Thomas, Jesus reveals to the disciples that " you are from the kingdom, and to it

you shall return " and teaches them to say for themselves that " we come from the

light " ; but John's Jesus speaks as the only one who comes " from above " and so

has rightful priority over everyone else: " 'You are from below; I am from

above...The one who comes from above is above all'. " [135] Only Jesus is from

God, and he alone offers access to God. John never tires of repeating that one

must believe in Jesus, follow Jesus, obey Jesus, and confess him alone as God's

'only' son. (P.69) We are not his " twin, " much less (even potentially) his

equal; we must follow him, believe in him, and revere him as God in person: thus

John's Jesus declares that " 'you will die in your sins, unless you believe that

I am he'. " [136]

 

We are so different from Jesus, John says, that he is our only hope of

salvation. Were Jesus like ourselves, he could not save and deliver a human race

that is " dying in sin. " What gives John hope is his conviction that Jesus

descended into the world as an atonement sacrifice to save us from sin and from

eternal damnation, and then rose--bodily--from the dead. As John tells it, the

story of Jesus' baptism reaches its climax not, as in Mark, when Jesus announces

the coming of God's kingdom, but when John the Baptist announces that Jesus has

come: " Behold--the lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! " [137]

 

To draw near to God we must be " born again, of water and the spirit "

[138]--reborn through faith in Jesus. The spiritual life received in baptism

requires supernatural nourishment; so, John's Jesus declares,

 

unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life

in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will

raise them up on the last day, for my flesh is true food, and my blood is true

drink. [139]

 

Jesus offers access to eternal life, shared when those who believe join together

to participate in the sacred meal of bread and wine that celebrates Jesus' death

and resurrection.

 

Mark, Matthew, and Luke mention Thomas only as one of " the twelve. " (P.70) John

singles him out as " the doubter " --the one who failed to understand who Jesus is,

or what he is saying, and rejected the testimony of the other disciples. John

then tells how the risen Jesus personally appeared to Thomas in order to rebuke

him, and brought him to his knees. From this we might conclude, as most

Christians have for nearly two millennia, that Thomas was a particularly obtuse

and faithless disciple--though many of John's Christian contemporaries revered

Thomas as an extraordinary apostle, entrusted with Jesus' " secret words. " The

scholar Gregory Riley suggests that John portrays Thomas this way for the

practical--and polemical--purpose of deprecating Thomas Christians and their

teaching. [140] According to John, Jesus praises those " who have not seen, and

yet believed " without demanding proof, and rebukes Thomas as " faithless " because

he seeks to verify the truth from his own experience.

 

Beyond Belief (The Secret Gospel of Thomas)

Chapter 2, p. 68-70

Elaine Pagels

Vintage Books, New York, U.S.A

ISBN: 0-375-70316-0

 

Notes:

 

[130] John 14:1.

 

[131] John 15:12.

 

[132] John 15:12-24.

 

[133] Gospel of Thomas 22, in NHL 121.

 

[134] John 8:12.

 

[135] John 8:23.

 

[136] John 8:24.

 

[137] John 1:29.

 

[138] John 3:5.

 

[139] John 6:53-55.

 

[140] In his remarkable monograph 'Resurrection Reconsidered'.