Advent 12: ANCIENT GIFTS, ADVENT GIFTS

  The Gospel of Thomas

 

His disciples said to him, "When will God's kingdom come?"

"It will not come by watching for it.  It will not be said, 'Look, here!' or 'Look, there!'  Rather, the God's kingdom is spread out upon the earth, and people don't see it."

Anyone who is a traditional church goer may be understandably surprised when when first told about The Gospel of Thomas.  After all, the Bible includes only four gospels--Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.  I certainly recall being startled twenty-four years ago when I first learned about Thomas at seminary.    

The first fragments of The Gospel of Thomas were discovered in the late 1800's by a British team excavating the remains of an ancient trash heap in Egypt.  At that point the archeaologists simply labeled the fragments "The Sayings of Jesus," for clearly that's what they were.  It wasn't until the 1945 discoveries at Nag Hammadi (also in Egypt) were published that it was realized the Coptic Gospel of Thomas found there corresponded to those "Sayings of Jesus" fragments discovered half a century earlier. 

In terms of dating the gospel, it is widely agreed that Thomas probably assumed its present form by 100 CE, although an earlier edition may have originated as early as 50-60 CE.  This is comparable to the biblical gospels, which were written in the same time frame:  Mark, the earliest, most likely before 70 AD; Matthew and Luke in the last third of the first century; John toward the close of the first century.  

As new material has been gathered scholars have come to realize that the origins of Christianity were much more diverse than was previously supposed. The victorious "orthodox" voices drowned out their less successful competitors, but with the discoveries of so many ancient manuscripts we are recovering key pieces of our religious story.  

In 367 AD Bishop Athanasius of Alexandria and his colleagues finalized the list of books that would be accepted into the canon of the New Testament;  the Nag Hammadi text of The Gospel of Thomas was not chosen. But the monks from one of the many monasteries founded by St. Pachomius in that region--perhaps from Chenoboskion, only a couple of miles from the discovery site--apparently could not bring themselves to destroy their sacred texts.  As the Rev. Cynthia Bourgeault writes:

...the monks simply entrusted them to an urn in the desert.

There they sat for more than 1500 years, rather like a time capsule,

awaiting a more propitious season in the life of the Church

when hearts would once again be open to receiving their wisdom.

Perhaps the time has come. 

Thomas Speaks....

The text at the beginning of this post is from the Gospel of Thomas (Logion 113). 

Although you might have thought it was this very familiar passage from the Gospel of Luke :

The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed.  People are not going to be able to say, "Look, here it is!" or "Over there!"  For in fact, God's kingdom is among you.   

(17:20, 21)

Whichever variation of this well-known saying of Jesus speaks most clearly to you, his two main points remain the same:

God's presence is here and now and all around.

And mostly we don't notice it.

The contemplative season of Advent offers a corrective to our chronic not noticing.

 

Today may our eyes and ears and hearts and minds be opened wide to God's presence,

within and all around. 

And may we carry that blessed corrective into all the days beyond....