The Gnostic Discoveries: The Impact of the Nag Hammadi Library

by Marvin W. Meyer

This book opens the with the story of the discovery of the ancient codices at Nag Hammadi in Egypt. Muhammad Ali, the fellahin, discovered the sealed jar, he feared that it might contain a jinni, or spirit, but also had heard of hidden treasures in such jars. Greed overcame his fears. When he smashed open the jar, gold seemed to float into the air. To his disappointment, they were papyrus fragments, not gold, but for scholars around the world, it was invaluable.

Meyer discusses the pre-Christian forms of wisdom that went on to influence what Christians believe today. In addition, some Nag Hammadi texts are attributed to Valentinus, a man who almost became Pope, & whose rejection changed the church in significant ways. Text by text, Meyer traces the history & impact of this great find, right up to our current beliefs & popular cultural fascination with this officially suppressed secret knowledge about Jesus & his followers.

Genres: Religion, History, Nonfiction, Gnosticism, Spirituality, Christianity

256 pages, Hardcover

First published November 8, 2005

About the author

Marvin Meyer is a scholar of religion and a tenured professor at Chapman University, in Orange, California.

He is the Griset Professor of Bible and Christian Studies at Chapman University and Director of the Albert Schweitzer Institute. He is also Director of the Coptic Magical Texts Project of the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity. Dr. Meyer is the author of numerous books and articles on Greco-Roman and Christian religions in antiquity and late antiquity, and on Albert Schweitzer's ethic of reverence for life. He has been interviewed on television programs that have aired on ABC, BBC, CNN, PBS, A&E, the Discovery Channel, the History Channel, and the National Geographic Channel.

Professor Meyer is best known for his translations of the texts of documents associated with the ancient mystery religions, early Christian magic, and Gnostic texts, of which the most notable have been the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Judas. He is regarded as an authority on Gnosticism and has published many books on the subject.

Meyer died of melanoma on August 16, 2012.

Reviews

[Jayson · Rating 1 out of 5]

(C) 60% | Unsatisfactory
Notes: A dull as dishwater, dry as dust academic text, it delivers the thinnest of overviews and presumes subject familiarity.

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of the Nag Hammadi documents contained cosmology far beyond my understanding, but I was able to pick up some general, intriguing themes. The Gospel of Thomas is a collection of Jesus's sayings, basically "Jesus says . . .." The book promises that whoever follows the wisdom of the sayings "shall not taste death." This is substantially different than the Synoptic Gospels, which were written around the same time, that claim if you believe in Jesus as the son of God, then you'll have everlasting life. The Gospel of Thomas portrays Jesus as a wisdom teacher, not a divine being. In fact, no titles of divinity are used to refer to Jesus, such as Lord or Messiah. Were these two competing views of Jesus and the Synoptic Gospels won out? Theologians aren't sure yet.

The Gospel of Mary from the Library helped create some of the Da Vinci Code hullaballoo. The gospel reveals Mary as the most-beloved disciple of Jesus, instead of John as we're led to believe by the Gospel of John. Her authority is based on her wisdom and spiritual understanding. By the end of the Gospel, Andrew and Peter are already complaining about a woman having such a powerful position. Guess it was a foregone conclusion that she'd be written into a minor role in the Bible.

Another tidbit I picked up is that gnostics, who believed you were saved by developing the divine wisdom innate in all humans, thought divine wisdom could come from revealers of any religion. The Nag Hammadi Library has revelations from Jewish, Greek and Christian figures all bound together. No wonder the Catholic Church though they were heretics!

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gnosticism is a school of thought within ancient Christianity that rejected the centrality of Jesus' crucifiction and the authority of the Catholic Church, instead focusing on the importance of direct mystical experience with God and the cultivation of the Christ-figure within the individual. As such, the ancient Church declared the Gnostics heretics, and rounded up most of the Gnostic holy texts (including the Gospels of Thomas, Mary, and Judas), and destroyed them. In 1945 a group of ancient Gnostic texts were found outside the town of Nag Hammadi in central Egypt; this book is an overview of those texts and their contents.

I find Gnosticism to be an absolutely fascinating strain within Christianity; while still being 'Christian', it's radically different from what we usually think of when we think of that religion, preaching the importance of individual experience over divine central authority, and arguing in favour of gender equality at a time when it was virtually unknown. The world would be a much different place, I think, if the Gnostics were not suppressed in ancient times.

In terms of this book, it's a fairly comprehensive introduction to not only the history of Gnosticism movements within Christianity, but to also the different strains of thought that occured within the movement. If you're already familiar with Gnosticism there isn't much here that's new, but as an introduction it's the best one I've reead.

[Carl · Rating 4 out of 5]

An overview of one of the most important archaeological finds of the 20th century: the Nag Hammadi Library, which is a collection of religious documents dating back to around 350 AD and earlier. Some of these documents provided inspiration for Dan Brown’s bestseller The Da Vinci Code.

The documents were found in 1945 near Nag Hammadi Egypt. It is thought that they were probably buried by monks from a nearby monastery who wanted to save them.

Some of the titles of the works are Gospel of Thomas, Secret Book of John, Gospel of Judas, and Gospel of Mary. They are important for biblical scholars because their contents definitely did not make it into the Christian canon. Two examples: they have Jesus kissing Mary Magdalene, causing resentment among the Apostles; the god Jehovah that created the world was a second class blundering god – the real God sent Jesus to clean up the mess.

The book covers various aspects of the Nag Hammadi Library: how the library was discovered, photos of some of the pages, samples of the texts, and brief discussions of each of the codices (books). It got a bit dry for me in spots, and it assumed knowledge of topics such as Sethian theology (which I never heard of), but the book gives a tiny intriguing glimpse into the world of early Christianity.

[Karenbike Patterson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've always been curious about what was included and not included in the Bible we use today. I have a better understanding after reading this book. If you already have done some reading about the Gnostic gospels before this, it would be helpful. However, it is still interesting reading. I know more about Seth and Sophia now. I know more about the spiritual aspects of the Gnostics. The prayers are deep and thoughtful. It seems strange that so many of these writings were composed in a time when so few people know how to write yet they had such compelling ideas and such international reach. These codices were discovered outside a monastery in Egypt and probably written by a Syrian. There are parts of these gospels that exalt women and others that condemn them. There is a large diversity of thought. It is no wonder they were excluded given the times when these decisions were made. Also, it was hard to make decisions because so many of them are fragments. Some of the pages were burned to start fires for cooking not to mention what condition they were in after being buried for so long. Luckily Egypt is dry so that must have saved many of the books. There are still discoveries being made.

[Elizabeth Sulzby · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just came back to this small book after googling back into "prehistory" and "history of writing systems." I've also read Pagels, Crossen, Ehrman on the gnostic discoveries at Nag Hammadi. In this reading, I noticed he mentions that some of the texts/scrolls aren't gnostic in origin, some from the mystery religions, some secular, etc. It's a useful reference and gives good context to some of the books that focus, say, on just one codex (usually the gospels, as in Judas, Mary, Thomas, etc.)
Another new book I got today goes through all the early religions from around 2000-1250 BCE including some of the esoteric writings/practices of present day religions. Some of the books that are based in Christianity write as if gnosticism began right around the time of Jesus's and John the Baptist's lives. The new book treats gnosticism, mystery religions, etc., as having earlier roots. I didn't find anything about Cretan/Minoan religions. The new book reminded me that Julian the Apostate was initiated into a mystery religion. ???Wasn't Augustus also???

[Susan Ferguson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting discussion of the gnostic texts. I had not fully understood what they were, but this opened my knowledge a little bit. I don't know how much belief I put in them - many of them are just fragments - but it is a new way to look at Jesus and his apostles. I have decided I will have to read more about the gnostic writings to learn more and decide how I really feel about them.

[April · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is best book outlining the discovery of the Nag Hammadi Library I've ever seen. I love Marvin Meyer's translations of the gospels as well. Awesome for those who are curious about what the gospels are and where they were discovered.

[Peter · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent book providing in the appendix quick summaries of the materials in the Nag Hammadi library. This book will be especially helpful to anyone wanting to get an overview of everything in the collection before diving into more specialized works. The chapters starts with their discovery and then offers more details about the uniqueness of the different types of philosophy covered. Worth your time off you are interested in Gnosticism, Early Christianity, and Coptic studies.

[Ridge Multop · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent review of the principal texts in the Nag Hammadi codices.

[Steve McMullen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative but dry

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay but superficial introduction to the Nag Hammadi texts and the so-called Berlin Gnostic Codex, which provide the text of a large number of texts pertaining to the so-called gnostic religious tendencies in antiquity (generally dualistic in nature, with some varieties heavily influenced by Christianity and others being more pagan or Jewish in affiliation). The author was a major academic in the study of gnostic texts, and what he says is generally reliable. His own bias is a clear dislike of the "orthodox" version of Christianity that developed in antiquity and gives rise to most "mainline" varieties of modern Christianity. Instead, Meyer is fond of the gibberish that passes for thought in mysticism. If that's your thing, fine, but for a rational person like me, it's a lot of mumbo-jumbo.

As for the book, it's pretty simple. It gives a *very* general introduction about the Coptic language into which the surviving gnostic texts were translated from Greek and a little story about the discovery of the texts at Nag Hammadi in Egypt in 1945. The area had had a number of monastic communities in late antiquity, and perhaps it was a decree of Bishop Athanassius against the possession of gnostic texts that led local monks to hide them in a jar, where they remained until some locals found them by accident.

The book doesn't really discuss academic arguments as such, and the closest it gets to evaluating modern interpretations comes in an introductory chapter on the study of the (then) newly discovered texts. Meyer cites with approval (without really being too clear of his own view) Karen King's view that it's hard to actually conceive of a "totality" of gnostic thought. Instead, we should talk about various "narratives" of Christianity, and Meyer apparently thinks that the gnostic texts about Christianity, which differ very markedly from the "canonical" texts accepted by the orthodox tradition, are an equally valid indication of the Christian experience. In particular, he doesn't really discuss the question of the "real" Jesus and the relationship between "him" and the texts through which we know about him, though Meyer does suggest (again without being too specific) that the so-called Gospel of Thomas may be as valid a guide to the throughs to Jesus as the traditional gospels (and the Q-source that is thought to be recoverable from the texts of Matthew and Luke). While the case is perhaps arguable for the Gospel of Thomas, it seems pretty obvious to me that the large majority of the Nag Hammadi texts are later creations in which gnostic ideas as superimposed on a pre-existing Christian tradition. While there can be no doubt that gnosticism represents a legitimate strain of religious through in antiquity, Meyer is implicitly interested in "delegitimizing" the absolute claims of orthodox Christianity in order to make way for the sort of (self-contradicotry) thought reflected in the gnostic texts. This is an argument about modern religious feeling that has little interest to me (and is not a matter of historical interpretation).

Meyer identifies five major "categories" among the gnostic texts:
a) Thomistic (i.e., revolving around the figure of Thomas),
b) Sethian (pertaining to the biblical figure of Seth and interested in the nature of the secret knowledge behind gnosticism),
c) Valentinian (going back to the teachings of Valentine, a second-cnetury figure in non-orthodox thought),
d) Hermetian (relating to the mythical pagan religious thinker/god Hermes Trismagistus), and
e) a miscellany of uncategorizable texts.
There's a chapter for each of these categories, with each concentrating on a few representative texts. There isn't all that much analysis, and a lot of quotation of whacky texts. This is probably okay as an introduction for a layperson, but I didn't find it very intellectually satisfying. At the end, there's a long appendix giving a brief summary of each text. Again, not much more than paraphrase.

So, if you want a general sense of what these texts are about and don't want to go into much depth or analysis, this book is probably okay for your purposes. Also, if you dislike traditional Christianity and prefer a more personal/mystical religious experience, then you'd probably like his "take". If, on the other hand, you want to have an intellectual analysis of the documents in their historical setting, this book may be a disappointment.

One thing that gets to me is that the translations are mostly Meyer's own, and he's the sort of translator who is willing to distort the text to suit modern sensibilities. This means that manifestly male-oriented language is "effaced" with circumlocutions like "one" instead of "he" or the generalizing plural. This may be okay if you want to rewrite traditional religion to conform to your own sensibilities, but it definitely is not okay when translating ancient texts. If some ancient writer calls God "he", then by God the translation should say so!

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is incredibly fascinating, but it is not an easy read. I really had to slog my way through it and could usually only manage about 35 pages per sitting.

The books covers the history of the Nag Hammadi Library which is great because many people have no idea that it even exists. It then goes on to give summaries and evaluations of each of the texts. Great information, but probably not for "the masses." I would not recommend this to anyone who is a casual reader interested in either the NH Library or Gnosticism. But if you've already done some reading on the subject(s) and are looking for the details, then this is the book for you.

[Cliff · Rating 2 out of 5]

I got very interested in the various Apocryphal books recently, and I've been studying some of them on my own, but figured I'd read this as a place to start. I was hoping for something engaging that would help me lay a foundation from which to understand the underline issues. The problem with this book is, not only does it not do that, it really doesn't do much of anything useful.

Meyers does a pretty good job of explaining the source of where various documents come from, I.e the Nag Hammadi library, but after that, he gives only a shallow, superficial explanations of what is in the various documents and what it means. He does little to put them in a larger context or explain the theology behind them other than the most basic, superficial understanding. It would be as if I did a 3 page commentary on Matthew, heavily using words like "substitutional atonement," and "personal incarnation of one person of the trinity" without discussing anything that lead up to it. It would say everything and nothing. I was able to follow what he was saying with a little background knowledge and some help from google, but all that did was confirm to me he isn't saying all that much.

Of course, part of this honestly comes from the fact that the Gnostic theology is simply largely incoherent, at least compared to the deep, thoughtful, complex and beautiful theology of various forms of orthodox Christianity. I've read certain Apocryphal books that I can understand why people find them attractive, but most of the actual Gnostic writings are simply not that interesting, at least as presented by Meyers. They seem to me to, quite obviously, be written by someone trying to graft a new popular movement onto their own cause, which is little but (old) new ageism. That's not even to get into the archeological/historical debate, which from my study is similarly lopsided against taking these writings seriously.

I'm planning on continuing to study scripture, the Apocrypha, and the entire debate over what scripture is, and what it means. I think it's one of the most interesting intellectual/theological debates out there, and frankly has the most consequences. I hope that future study leads me to books more thoughtful and deep than this one,

[Erik Graff · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is only in small part about the 1945 discoveries in Nag Hammadi and that part is mostly lifted, with appropriate acknowledgments, from James M. Robinson. What it actually focuses on are two collections: the Berlin Codex and those codices from Nag Hammadi--and then mostly on the texts, some of them overlapping, themselves.

The focus on texts, presented only in part, is unfortunate because here Meyer offers very little insight and nothing I could discern as new. Other, complete collections are readily available. However, if, as he notes, he's presenting his own translations of the (mostly) Coptic texts, then perhaps there is something of value here, but not something which will be of much use or interest to the lay reader or of much practical utility to the expert.

[Steven Percifield · Rating 3 out of 5]

To have benefitted from the reading of this work, one would need to be a dedicated student of the early Christian period.

In my case, this very scholarly treatise fell upon deaf (non-scholarly) ears.

If there is one thing I was able to infer from it, it is that those who established the traditions of the of the early Church were likely at the root of the misogynistic attitudes which characterize--to this day--many European and Middle Eastern-derived culture.

[Stacy]

Page 55: "From an historical point of view, orthodoxy and heresy may be understood as rhetorical constructs, as Karen King states, fashioned in the arena of political debate. Understood in this light, orthodoxy and heresy have little to do with truth and falsehood and everything to do with power and position. In a vote, the majority defines what is orthodox, and the minority is charged with being heretical."

[Lee]

A scholarly view of the Nag Hammadi libraries, a collection of "underground" early Christian texts, which have been more or less suppressed by the church since the 4th century.
Not exactly a page-turner, but vital and fascinating reading for anyone interested in this period of history

[PsychoSchematics · Rating 3 out of 5]

A must read for those who really want to KNOW.

[Vickie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this to be a fastinating book - easy for the novice to read & understand. Inspired me to learn more about Gnostism.

[Trey Nowell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall ha a good foundation of works, very factual.