The Gnostic Gospels

While it is true that there were a number of other writings that attempted to set themselves up as Scripture, e.g. The Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Philip, the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, they were not taken seriously by early Christians because:

• They were considered heresy because they disagreed with the teachings of Jesus.
• Their authorship could not be traced either to Jesus’ disciples or to someone who knew either Jesus/His disciples personally.
  

The “Gnostic Gospels” were never considered genuine and Constantine never attempted to eradicate them. They just weren’t recognized as authoritative either by the eastern or western church. Lack of recognition is not the same as suppression.

It's true that the Bible did not arrive as a "fax from heaven," as Brown writes. The New Testament canon in its current form was first formally attested in 367. Nevertheless, church leaders applied important standards when compiling the Bible. Authors of accepted writings needed to have walked and talked with Jesus, or at least with his leading disciples. Their teaching could not contradict what other apostles had written, and their documents must have been accepted by the entire church, from Jerusalem to Rome. Church leaders considered earlier letters and reports more credible than later documents. Finally, they prayed and trusted the Holy Spirit to guide their decisions.

The so-called Gnostic gospels, many discovered just last century, did not meet these criteria. As far as the Gnostic Gospels go, one does not have to read them for long to discover that they are irreconcilable with the New Testament Gospels. This is an important point, because if the historical evidence supports the New Testament Gospels, the Gnostic Gospels are thereby proven to be false and doctrinally unreliable.

Consider the following:

1. The Gnostic Gospels portray Jesus as commanding the disciples to keep his teaching secret, but the New Testament Jesus commissioned the disciples to share the good news with the whole world.

The Gospel of Thomas begins with these words:
"These are the secret sayings which the living Jesus spoke..."

The Apocryphon of John, another Gnostic document, contains a sober warning by Jesus of a curse that would fall on any who share his secret teaching with outsiders:
"Cursed be everyone who will exchange these things for a gift, or for food, or for drink, or for clothing, or for any other such things."

Jesus also allegedly commanded John to put written records of his secret teachings in "a safe place."

It was quite common among Gnostics to be protective of the gnosis, or secret teaching. Nag Hammadi analyst John Dart comments:

"The 'curse' of Jesus in The Apocryphon of John, put into Jesus' mouth by Gnostic authors, followed a time-honored practice of mystic groups warning their members that such sacred scriptures should not fall into the wrong hands. For historians, much more interesting was the advice to put the writings in a safe place. In the case of the Gnostic papyri, the place, wherever it was, had been 'safe' for centuries [until 1947]."

Such a secretive attitude, however, is completely unlike the Jesus of the New Testament Gospels. In what is traditionally called "The Great Commission," Jesus commanded the disciples:

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit..." ~ Matthew 28:19 ~

Before He ascended into heaven following His resurrection, Jesus said to the disciples:

"You will receive power
when the Holy Spirit comes on you;
and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem,
and in all Judea and Samaria,
and to the ends of the earth"

~ Acts 1:8 ~

Clearly, the New Testament Jesus wanted people everywhere to hear the good news of salvation.

2. The teachings of Jesus in the New Testament Gospels are utterly incompatible with Gnosticism.

The Gnostics taught:

(1) The existence of both a transcendent God and a lower God (the Creator-Demiurge), whom Gnostics equated with Yahweh of the Old Testament
(2) Spirit is good but matter is evil
(3) Man's spirit is imprisoned in the material body but will escape this imprisonment at death
(4) There is no physical resurrection of the body.

The New Testament Jesus taught none of these ideas.

Contrary to Gnostic teachings, scholar Gary Habermas tells us that "Jesus does not refer to Yahweh as less than the supreme Creator and God of the universe. Neither does he speak of the physical body as a necessary evil which imprisons the soul. With regard to eternal life, Jesus taught the [physical] resurrection of the body, not the [mere] immortality of the soul."

3. The Gnostic Gospels offer us a redemption through gnosis, whereas New Testament redemption is based wholly on faith in Christ.

The truth of The Gospel of Truth (for the Gnostic) is the knowledge that he is "a being from above." This "gospel" assures us that "whosoever has knowledge understands from whence he has come and whither he goes." The Teachings of Silvanus, another Gnostic document, portrays Jesus as teaching salvation by enlightenment: "Bring in your guide and your teacher. The mind is the guide, but reason is the teacher. They will bring you out of destruction and dangers .... Enlighten your mind .... Light the lamp within you."

Contrary to this, redemption in the New Testament is a free gift for those who believe in Jesus:

"For God so loved the world
that he gave his one and only Son,
that whoever believes in him
shall not perish but have eternal life."

~ John 3:16 ~

"Everyone who looks to the Son
and believes in him shall have eternal life,
and I will raise him up at the last day..."

~ John 6:40b ~

"I tell you the truth,
he who believes has everlasting life"

~ John 6:47 ~

"I am the resurrection and the life.
He who believes in me will live, even though he dies"

~ John 11:25 ~

4. The Gnostic Gospels portray Jesus as a "Gnostic Revealer" and not as Christ the Savior and Redeemer.

In the New Testament, when Jesus asked Peter, "Who do you say I am?" (Matt. 16:15), Peter rightly responded, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (v. 16).

In The Gospel of Thomas, however, Jesus and the disciples are portrayed in a much different light:

Jesus said to his disciples, "Compare me to someone and tell Me whom I am like." Simon Peter said to Him, "You are like a righteous angel." Matthew said to Him, "You are like a wise philosopher." Thomas said to Him, "Master, my mouth is wholly incapable of saying whom You are like." Jesus said, "I am not your master. Because you have drunk, you have become intoxicated from the bubbling spring which I have measured out." And He took him and withdrew and told him three things. When Thomas returned to his companions, they asked him, "What did Jesus say to you?" Thomas said to them, "If I tell you one of the things which he told me, you will pick up stones and throw them at me; a fire will come out of the stones and burn you up."

F. F. Bruce, a noted Bible scholar who has done significant research on the Nag Hammadi documents, detects Gnostic elements in this encounter:

"Here the answers [to Jesus' question] are attempts to depict Jesus as the Gnostic Revealer. Those who have imbibed the gnosis which he imparts (the 'bubbling spring' which he has spread abroad) are not his servants but his friends, and therefore 'Master' is an unsuitable title for them to give him."

As for the three words Jesus secretly uttered to Thomas, Bruce says these words conveyed to Thomas Jesus' hidden identity and "are probably the three secret words on which, according to the Naassenes, the existence of the world depended: Kaulakau, Saulasau, Zeesar." Jesus as a Gnostic Revealer is often portrayed as communicating secret things to one or more disciples in the Gnostic Gospels.

How unlike this is to the New Testament Jesus who openly communicated His teachings to all who would listen!

5. The Gnostic Gospels cannot properly be called gospels.

Neither The Gospel of Truth nor The Gospel of Philip, as case examples, contain an orderly account of the birth, life, deeds, death, and resurrection of Christ. Both lack Old Testament background, ethical exhortations, and end-time eschatology. Ignorance is said to be the primary culprit of man's condition, not sin. Therefore, in no sense of the word can these documents be properly referred to as gospels.

The Gospel of Thomas is another case example. F. F Bruce notes:

"No collection of sayings of Jesus can properly be called a Gospel because by its nature it has no passion narrative, and the passion narrative is the core of the essential gospel. But least of all can this collection be called a Gospel because not only does it lack a passion narrative but it includes only one saying remotely hinting at the passion." Moreover, unlike the New Testament Gospels, the content of The Gospel of Thomas is "anti- Judaistic, anti-Old Testament, anti-ritualistic and almost antimoralistic."

By contrast, the four New Testament Gospels all contain orderly accounts of the birth, life, deeds, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. They also point to the glorious "good news" of redemption in Jesus Christ, and are therefore "gospels" in the truest sense of the word.

Why do we say they are pseudo-gospels?

First of all, Thomas, Philip, Mary Magdalene, or any of the other people whose names they bear did not write them. Philip couldn’t have written his gospel unless he lived to be 250 years old or more – and so with the other writers. They are all second, third, and fourth century false pseudo-gospels. They have been thoroughly researched and examined and shown to be written several centuries after the original Gospels.

Irenaeus (130-202 AD), the Bishop of Lyons, wrote Against Heresies to refute Gnostic beliefs and other heterodox opinions. He said, “The argument of those who maintain that this world surrounding us was made by an angel or by any other kind of power, or by another god, has no basis at all, for once a person is driven away from the creator of all things and concedes that the world in which we live was made by another or through another, he has to fall into many absurd and contradictory notions…”

No evidence that Leonardo was a believer in Gnosticism per se or Dan Brown’s goddess-worshipping version of Gnosticism. But even if he were, and even if he did put clues in his art – which no reputable art critic/historian that I know of believes – so what? Leonardo lived some 14 or 15 centuries after Jesus walked this earth.

Here are more examples of Biblical errors found in The Gospel of Philip:

TGOP: Some neither desire to sin nor are able to sin.
BIBLE: For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23)

TGOP: Adam came into being from two virgins, from the Spirit and from the virgin of earth.
BIBLE: Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground… (Genesis 2:7)

TGOP: There are two trees growing in Paradise. One bears animals, the other bears men. Adam ate from the tree which bore animals. He became an animal and he brought forth animals. For this reason the children of Adam worship animals.
BIBLE: The LORD God planted a garden toward the east, in Eden; and there He placed the man whom He had formed. Out of the ground the LORD God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (Genesis 2:8-9)

TGOP: The world came about through a mistake. For he who created it wanted to create it imperishable and immortal. He fell short of attaining his desire.
BIBLE: The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. (Psalm 19:1-2)

[Note: TGOP is a late Gnostic text, which clearly contradicts the earlier biblical Gospels and was the
product of an early Christian cult which deviated greatly from the historic Church.]