Apocalypticism or Prophecy and the Problem of Polyvalence: Lessons from the Gospel of Thomas

Abstract

1 Early landmark essays include Gilles Quispel, Gospel of Thomas and the New Tes tament, VC 11 (1957): 189-207; James M. Robinson, LOGOI SOPHON: Zur Gattung der Spruchquelle, in Zeit und Geschichte: Dankesgabe an Rudolf Bultmann zum 80. Geburtstag (ed. Erich Dinkier; Tiibingen: Mohr, 1964), 77-96; revised Eng. trans. LOGOI SOPHON: On the Gat tung of Q, in Robinson and Helmut Koester, Trajectories through Early Christianity (Philadel phia: Fortress, 1971), 71-113; Helmut Koester, GNOMAIDIAPHOROI: The Origin and Nature of Diversification in the History of Christianity, HTR 58 (1965): 279-318; reprinted in Robinson and Koester, Trajectories, 114-57; idem, One Jesus and Four Primitive Gospels, HTR 61 (1968): 203-47; reprinted in Robinson and Koester, Trajectories, 158-204. Later attempts to integrate Thomas Thomas into the discussion of Christian origins include Stephen J. Patterson, The Gospel of Thomas and and Jesus (FF: Reference Series; Sonoma, CA: Polebridge, 1993); John Dominic Crossan, The Birth of Christianity:of Christianity: Discovering What Happened in the Years Immediately after the Execution of Jesus (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998); and Risto Uro, Thomas: Seeking the Historical Con text text of the Gospel of Thomas (London/New York: TT Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 381-92; idem, Alternate Beginnings—Different Ends: Eusebius, Thomas, and the Construction of Christian origins, in Religious Propaganda and Missionary Competition in the New Testament World:World: Essays Honoring Dieter Georgi (ed. Lukas Bormann et al.; NovTSup 74; Leiden: Brill, 1994), 501-25; and Stephen J. Patterson, Gospel of Thomas and Christian Beginnings, in Thoma sine sine Traditions in Antiquity: The Social and Cultural World of the Gospel of Thomas (ed. Jon Ma. Asgeirsson et al.; Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies 59; Leiden: Brill, 2006), 1-18. Also see the several essays in this last-cited volume and in Das Thomasevangelium: Entstehung Rezeption Theologie (ed. Jorg Frey et al.; BZNW 157; Berlin/New York: de Gruyter, 2008).