What the Gospel of Thomas Really Means

The Gospel of Thomas and related gnostic writings have generated a great deal of public interest in their symbolic contents.  But what do they mean?  Perhaps more importantly, what does the interest in them say about contemporary people?

For one audience, the Gospel of Thomas represents a kind of affirmation of an historical vision of the Church in the last two millennia.

That vision sees the traditional Church beating down all kinds of dynamic, prophetic strands in its membership, condemning certain books and the like, to bring everyone into line, as the story goes, with its (flawed) understanding about what the message of Jesus Christ was all about.

There is a great temptation that is difficult not to give in to today to "beat up" on anything that is traditional read: establishment, including the Church and with the use of the Gospel of Thomas and other writings.  Some find great satisfaction in kicking a sacred cow in its exposed rear in this way.

Another audience sees in the Gospel of Thomas the awakening of a wisdom that has been allowed to "sleep" for too long.  

Still another finds a mystical outlet in the gnostic writings that seems to be based, in part,  on a reaction against science and scientific reasoning.

Science seems to contain within it, the seeds, if not of its destruction, then of its self-imposed boredom.

The purpose of scientific inquiry is to explain away everything.  An unofficial motto for science could be, where there is mystery, debunk it.

Science seems to assume that if something cannot be reasoned out, then it just doesn't exist.

Unfortunately, what science tends to overlook is our capacity for different modes of thought and experience that have nothing whatever to do with scientific rationalism.

The fact is we are living in a scientifically advanced society where people are starving for spirituality, mysticism and community.

We are searching for an identity of our own that we can also share with others within defined "in-groups."

The cosmopolitan sameness of our society just doesn't cut it anymore. 

The Gospel of Thomas feeds directly into our need for these things, our need to step out of the oppressive nature of current social, intellectual, religious and cultural formality that leaves one's soul unsatisfied and frustrated.

But why the Gospel of Thomas?  

It is because that work contains two elements that go well together.  On the one hand, it contains snippets of the sayings of Christ as recorded in the four Orthodox Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

On the other hand, it intersperses these with gnostic sayings that tend to be contradicting that teaching. 

 But since we assume the Gospel of Thomas to be a coherent whole, then we are left with a "mystical" view of this document that says that either we aren't getting the "true" meaning of it or else there is someone out there or way back there who did.

In fact, the author of the Gospel of Thomas could not have foreseen the popular of his creation all those hundreds of years ago when he first put pen to parchment.

His purpose was simple.  He wanted to get people to read gnostic teachings by dressing them up with Christian sayings.  This was an old trick by many sects and cults that wanted to get some kind of legitimacy.

It didn't work since the teachings of Christ and that of the various cults just "didn't get along."  

The actual "Gospel of Thomas," as it turned out, was none other than the Gospel of Matthew which Thomas took with him to India.  Evidence has been unearthed to support this in India where Thomas addressed the Jewish community that was living there.  He had no need for a separate Gospel of his own.  What he needed was a Gospel in the language of the people he was going to preach to.  That Gospel was the Hebrew St Matthew!

Whether or not one accepts gnostic teaching is up to the individual.  Suffice it to say that it is contrary to what the Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ has always taught. 

Arguments about the Church "messing around" with the "original" doctrine of Christ are things that have been hurled at the Church by every conceivable sect and cult since time immemorial. 

There is no proof for any of them and they are all contradicted in any event by Christ Himself Who warned us about false doctrines and teachings that were to come after Him.

Having said this, however, the Church needs to understand the strivings of people who want to go "beneath the surface" and have a greater commitment to the spiritual teachings of the Church than is to be had in a "Sunday observance only" type of Christianity.

The ancient gnostics tended to give "gnosis" per se a bad name.  There is such a thing as "Christian Gnosis."

But again we cannot come to an understanding of it by a merely perfunctory observance of Christian practice.

Orthodox Christian teachings that are contained in the writings of the Fathers, the Councils and other sources are a treasure-chest of mystical wisdom and insight that inspire by their profound depth.

We need to go beyond the theory and get into the practice.  Hesychasm and the Jesus Prayer, Kenosis and other aspects of Eastern spirituality are things that require the personal attention of an adviser called an Elder or Staretz, if we are lucky enough to get one.

If we think that suffering isn't involved in such a spiritual journey, then we are sorely (no pun intended) mistaken!

It is to be hoped that attraction to literature like the Gospel of Thomas is not inspired by a desire to avoid suffering and struggle.  If we do that, then we will experience a rather rude awakening . . .

Christian Gnosis is experienced with the powers of the soul.  We cannot think our way into it.  Living an integral liturgical life in the Church, prayer, fasting, spiritual reading etc. all these bring us into that experience. 

The Gospel of Thomas is false for one further and most important reason.  The Christ it tries to portray is simply a false Christ.

It was St Thomas the Apostle who asked to see the wounds of Christ as proof positive of the reality of Christ Identity and Resurrection.

And he was right.  Whenever someone, or some book, wants to present Christ to us, let us ask to see the hands and feet of that "Christ."

If there are no marks of the nails, then we know that it isn't our Lord, God and Saviour, Jesus Christ!

As one Saint said, when we get to Heaven, Christ will put His Hands on us and we will see those wounds that won our salvation for us.  

Christian Gnosis is nothing else but a deeper way in which we may bury our minds and hearts in the Holy Wounds of Jesus Christ, the Crucified and Resurrected Lover of Humankind.

Also see: Gospel of Saint Thomas | Gospel of Saint Thomas and Fear

Dr. Alexander Roman  alex@unicorne.org