Beyond the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, we have found manuscripts of several other ancient documents that talk about the life and/or teachings of Jesus, and in this sense we can call them “gospels.” However, no credible scholar argues that these texts are more historically reliable than our Gospels. In fact, while our four Gospels were written in the first century, most of these additional gospels were written in the second century or later. Many of them are what we today refer to as “gnostic gospels.”
Gnosticism refers to an ancient religious worldview that combined Jewish-Christian beliefs with certain Greek philosophical beliefs. At the heart of Gnosticism is the belief that material objects (including the human body) are inherently bad, while spiritual realities (such as the human spirit or soul) are inherently good. So, the gnostic gospels are a set of ancient documents that portray Jesus and his teachings through the lens of a gnostic worldview. Some of the more well-known gnostic gospels are: the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Philip (a fourth-century Coptic translation of a late-second century Greek text), and the Gospel of Mary (probably a second-century Greek original and a fifth-century Coptic translation).
Some liberal scholars have gravitated to the gnostic gospels because they present a non-biblical Jesus who acts more like an Eastern guru than a Jewish messiah. Some feminists have portrayed the gnostic gospels as more pro-women than the biblical texts, but this is highly questionable. For example, the most famous gnostic gospel, the Gospel of Thomas, ends with this passage (verse 114):
“Simon Peter said to them, ‘Mary should leave us, for females are not worthy of life.’ But Jesus said, ‘See, I am going to make her a male so that she too might become a living spirit that resembles you males. For every female that makes herself into a male will enter the kingdom of heaven.’”
It’s hard to imagine a more anti-feminist statement than this! We never find Jesus talking in this derogatory way about women in our four Gospels. Rather, the real Jesus treats men and women as equals.
So, to sum up, while the gnostic gospels are interesting ancient documents, they don’t offer us much in terms of historically accurate information about Jesus’ life and teachings.
Recommended Resources
- The Missing Gospels: Unearthing the Truth Behind Alternative Christianities by Darrell Bock
- Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels by Craig Evans
