Rating: 
Summary: WELL beyond belief.
Review: Elaine Pagels is a delightful writer, and one of the more reasonable of the skeptical Bible scholars I have read. Call the latter "damning with faint praise," however. Here, Pagels compares the Gospel of John, emphasizing faith in Jesus, to the "Gospel" of Thomas, that stresses realizing truth within oneself. She argues John was written to refute Thomas. She reconstructs how and why the former became "orthodox"
Christianity, and the latter, banned and forsaken of all but Zen Buddhists. Emphasizing differences between John and the Synoptic Gospels, she traces the rise of "orthodoxy" through Polycarp to Iraneaus and Tertullian, who made Christianity the dogma friendly religion it remained. I found much of Pagel's creation myth interesting, and her tone personable. (She is willing to admit good qualities in the dogmatism she opposes, for example.) But she does two things that make it hard for me to take the first part of her story seriously. First, she places John in a faith ghetto, apart not only from the other Gospels, but also the works of Paul, etc. I think that he agrees with the other writers of the New Testament on practically everything. Secondly, she makes the "Gospel" of Thomas the cornerstone of her thesis. This is a wobbly and insecure foundation, however. The idea that John was written to disprove Thomas is untenable for at least three reasons. First, (as Pagels herself admits here), John shows many marks of familiarity with the time, events, and persons of First Century Palestine, while Thomas (as I think she admits of the Gnostics in general, in the Gnostic Gospels) shows none. It was therefore entirely reasonable for early Christians to accept the obviously historical John and reject the even more obviousy unhistorical Thomas: where is the mystery? Secondly, many Biblical scholars believe, for what seem excellent reasons, that Thomas was written in the Second Century. Oxford scholar Tom Wright suggests that Thomas is not only unhistorical, it is even anti-historical: "Thomas did for the parables in the second century what Julicher, Dodd and Jeremias did in the twentieth, and perhaps for similar reasons, namely, the attempt to get away from their historical and very Jewish specificity." Pagels never mentions discouraging words like this from competing scholars, still less refutes any of the evidence on which they are based. We are supposed to accept her early dating for Thomas on blind faith, it seems. I wish she had been inspired by the Thomas who was full of doubts, rather than the Thomas who is simply doubtful. Thirdly, John resembles the Synoptic Gospels much, while Thomas resembles them little. I recently went over what the Jesus Seminar calls the "Five Gospels" with a fine-toothed comb, and narrowed it down to four again. First, I listed 45 characteristics of the Synoptic Gospels, 43 of which John strongly shares. I then compared Thomas and other ancient literature, and found that of six documents I compared with the canonical Gospels, Thomas resembled them the LEAST. (And two of the other documents were from China!) I found Thomas flagrantly a-historical, formulaic, lacking in developed, convincing characters, unconnected to space or time, un-Jewish, and platitudinous on occasion. Pagels claims that John, unlike the Synoptics, has no moral teaching. Actually John contains rich moral teaching of the highest caliber: it is Thomas (surprisingly, for a sayings "Gospel") that has none! In short, I find NO reason to take the "Gospel of Thomas" seriously as a source for the life of Jesus, or to call it a Gospel. John, on the other hand, is intimately related to the Synoptic Gospels in dozens of vital ways, and shows many signs of being a trustworthy account of something that happened. The early Christians chose these Gospels because they knew their work -- better than some modern scholars, it seems to me, who are making absolute fools of themselves by pushing such wares, when they ought to know better. I rather like Pagels, and I think she is trying to be honest. Some of the points she makes about the psychology of martyrdom and orthodoxy make sense to me. I find more sense in that argument than in Crossan's invention of the "Cross Gospel," Mack's fanciful sociological studies of imagined Q communities, still more the "Jesus Conspiracy" theories of Doherty, Freke or Gandy. But really, isn't it time skeptical historians defined what they mean by "Gospel," instead of using it as a prop to make unlikes sound the same? Isn't it time they argue for their beliefs historically, rather than making casual jumps to skeptical assumptions by saying, "Many of us can no longer believe all that," and thereafter simply ignore evidence that points to "all that?" Until skeptical historians bring their arguments out of the hothouse and face critism squarely, it is hard for me to see why those arguments should be taken seriously. author, Jesus and the Religions of Man
Rating: 
Summary: A polite contrast between Thomas and John
Review: Pagels' award-winning "Gnostic Gospels" introduced us to the 1945 discovery in Nag Hammadi (Egypt) of an extraordinary cache of ancient papyrus books. The peasants who found the manuscripts feared that it might house something occultish but hoped it contained gold. They were of course disappointed with the contents, some of which they destroyed and some of which they sold off. These Coptic documents, at par with the discovery of Dead Sea Scrolls in their informational value, contained secret and deviant versions of early Christian teaching. As it were, commercial greed and academic rivalry ensured that it took a long time for the manuscripts to reach professional scholars. This new book is a lucid compilation of personal perspectives of Pagels, and hence a lot more opinionated than Gnostic Gospels. She furthers her dissection of the Nag Hammadi text and its relevance to modern Christianity. It is no mystery that she is enamoured with the views of Thomas, which have been overlooked in the favor of St. John's Gospel. And this is where the crux of this book lies -- in setting up a polite contrast between the ideologies of John and Thomas, and what could have been the face(s) of Christianity had these opposing views not been smudged by Iranaeus. The Nag Hammadi evidence seems to challenge several by-now established notions. For instance, it denies the physical resurrection. To Mark and his acolytes (Matthew and Luke) Jesus was not a god but a messiah in the Jewish tradition -- a human being. In John's discordant views though, His existence was wholly distinct from that of ordinary humans. Yet, Thomas failed, and John prevailed. Thanks in no small part to Iranaeus who in fact provided "the basic architecture of what would become orthodox Christianity". In the fourth century the emperor Constantine adopted Christianity, endorsed a creed to which all must subscribe and issued edicts against heretics and schismatics. Now the "Catholic" position had an imperial warrant; there was no salvation outside the church, which alone knew the "truth" and had the power to purge error. PS: such bigoted tweaking of religion as a conduit to power is the reality of pretty much every religion, not just Christianity. I found it refreshing that contrary to what the general populace is brainwashed into growing up with these days, the earliest years of Christianity actually sported several dissident doctrines of knowledge -- some worshiped God as both Father and Mother, others went in for sacred dancing, others proposed heterodox interpretations of baptism, and so on. This message, supported with evidence both old (as in the exhaustive analysis of Nag Hammadi, reason enough to grab this book now!) as well as new (e.g., the proliferation of the "new forms" that Christianity is taking in Africa, America, Korea, China), is pretty simple -- we cannot and indeed should not be reconciled to churches (translation: religious institutions) that claim sole access to the truth of doctrine and discipline. If that seems too esoteric for your tastes, this book is still a fabulous read for the layman language with which the ancient evidence of Nag Hammadi scrolls and an intimate knowledge of religious history are discussed.
Rating: 
Summary: Sort of about the Gospel of Thomas
Review: A pretty good, but light and unfocused introduction to the Gospel of Thomas (which hardly achieves the right to the book's subtitle). Pagels never seems to commit to her declared topic, and comes off "too unbiased" in my opinion. Her research contributes to gnostic studies in almost revolutionary ways, but she never seems to realize the magnitude of her subject matter, and takes an irritatingly bland middle-ground throughout. Is she a modern gnostic or not? I liked Pagel's earlier book on "The Gnostic Gospels" better, and was expecting a more detailed, in-depth discussion of the Thomas gospel in this brief tome. For the lay-reader and simply curious, this is a decent starting point. If you're looking for more details about gnosticism, she has contemporary recommendations of more recent publications in her bibliography. Personally, I'd highly recommend the following: "Gnosis", by Kurt Rudolph; "The Gnostic Religion," by Hans Jonas, & the older, more obscure "Fragments of a Faith Forgotten," by GRS Mead. And, of course, the actual Nag Hammadi Library printed & edited by James Robinson is "the source" (along with the syntopic Bible). As for "Beyond Belief", I have to agree with the reviewer responding to "Peculiar Reviewers" in that there are a handful of seemingly offended people out there who just don't get it when it comes to what gnosticism represents. It's very much alive and growing world-wide, and many would argue that it's never really disappeared, only taken on new forms. Pagels illustrates more specifically where and how Catholicism as we know it today came to be, and on what foundations (by ignoring discrepencies between many so-called "gnostic" texts in favor of the gospel of John, Matthew, Mark and Luke). She focuses more on John and its similarities and differences with the discarded Thomas gospel, which didn't jibe with the political direction the early church fathers such as Irenaeus were pushing so hard for. "Beyond Belief" seems to really be a blend of biblical history, and Pagel's personal philosophy of "practicing" faith instead of simply "believing"; or reading about it. Jesus would be proud.
Rating:
Summary: peculiar reviewers
Review: I suppose the following observations are less concerned with the defense of Pagels' book as they are a criticism of several of the previous reviews. I think that it is important to note several ideas that are not proposed by Pagels within the pages of her book "Beyond Belief", the refutations of which are never the less included in at least one of the previous reviews. Examples include, but are not limited to: A) There are no suggestions in this book that the Gospel of John is completely different in content from the Synoptic Gospels of Mark, Matthew, and Luke. She merely points out several observations made by previous scholars apropos of the elevated Christology, fondness for apocalyptic warnings (somewhat akin to Paul's urgings from a much earlier time and tradition), and fiercely sectarian recasting of the Jesus story present in John (regardless of how similar it may be to the Synoptics in other respects); B) At no time does Pagels assert that the Gospel of Thomas is as-or more-alike to the Synoptics or Paul's letters than is the Gospel of John, nor does she make the similar claim that the Gospel of Thomas (and other "apocryphal" texts) are somehow more valid or historically accurate than the Gospels residing in the Canon; C) Pagels never questions the internal consistency of the Gospel Canon, and therefore does nothing to threaten the assertion that all four Gospels display obvious harmony (which they clearly do not, attempts to harmonize these divergent stories by well intentioned commentators and scholars have failed embarrassingly for nearly 2000 years; however, this is not the issue at hand for the above mentioned reason); D) Pagels does not present the idea that the content of the Gospel of Thomas is morally superior in all-or even most-respects to the Gospels of the Canon; and E) Pagels in no way proposes, or even intimates, that much of the tradition that has survived within orthodox Christian practice is the result of nefarious conniving, pious fraud, or a general desire to deceive. Instead, she attempts, like so many before her, to show that the motives of the early Church fathers were the result of a social-one might even add psychological-context that obtained during the early development of Christianity, as much politics as theology. In light of the above points, I am perplexed (but not surprised) by the criticisms contained within some of the previous reviews of this book.
Rating:
Summary: Slightly flawed, but worthwhile
Review: If you are a religious scholar, or a devout Christian of any persuasion, don't waste your time on this book. It will just tick you off, and you will go off on various rants and tangents about historical uncertainty, logical consistency (in an inherently illogical belief system), biography versus scholarship, and the evils of feminist deconstruction. However, if you are casually spiritual and have been turned off by "Christianity 101" as taught by most organized sects - the insistence on belief in dogma and hierarchy, this book is a lovely introduction to "Christianity 201". Elaine Pagels' conceit in "Beyond Belief" is a comparison and contrast between the gospel of John - one of the four gospels of the New Testament with which modern-day Christians are familiar - and the gospel of Thomas, which was suppressed as heretical by the early organizers of the church. Pagels points out that both of these gospels were written over 100 years after the death of Jesus, and appear to have re-interpreted to an extent the earlier gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. She reads in these later gospels that, unlike Matthew, Mark and Luke, John emphasized that the only way to heaven was through Jesus, while Thomas came down on the side that the "light of God" is present in all of us and the way to heaven can be found within ourselves. In fact she posits that John was written as a polemic to discredit the views expressed in Thomas. Her central thesis is that the early organizers of the church favored John and declared Thomas heretical because the message in John was less ambiguous, easier to teach, and easier to build a paternalistic hierarchy and power base upon. Pagels hints at an agenda here. She includes a bit of personal biography, and it is evident that this book was not intended as a rigorous work of scholarship - thank goodness, as almost nobody would read it if it was. As a literary work it is slightly disjointed and repetitive, but the prose flows nicely and does not bog down. As any good work of popular history should, it stands well on its own - it serves up historical facts for those who may be unaware of the sequence, personalities and context of the early Christian church - but also serves as a starting point for deeper reading into other sources. I recommend it to you as such.
Rating: 
Summary: Beyond Thomas
Review: Recognizing the hazards both of wholly subjective belief and of uqnuestioning acceptance of religious authority, Elaine Pagels synthesizes in five lucid and luminous chapters the way in which conflicts in interpretation and ecclesial (and then imperial) politics yielded the structure of orthodoxy. The Gospel of Thomas is only part of the story, but 'The Secret Gospel of Thomas' (included in the second hardcover and current paperback edition) is more alluring to the audience to whom the book is addressed than "How Irenaeus Fought Valentinianism and Constantine Established Athanasian Christianity". But any title would be misleading, since the import of the book is to open up to the reader's view the common task that he or she shares with the teachers and bishops who sought solutions for the same difficulties in the early centuries of Christianity. While she shows, through the Gospel of Thomas and other Nag Hammadi texts, that there was a rich and unquestionably Christian tradition which was officially suppressed, those whose actions led to its suppression aren't written off as villains, but presented as likewise engaged in the quest for truth. At the same time, she demonstrates that the actions taken by Irenaeus, Athanasius and Constantine were themselves bold personal initiatives, not mere adherence to an absolutely clear tradition. Irenaeus' reading of the gospel of John, for example, which has become the one which is regarded as orthodox, was contested at the time he formulated it and remains contestable. The exclusion of other readings and the denial of spiritual license to the books excluded from the New Testament, she contends, prevent us from understanding the cultural and spiritual heritage, as similar actions and restrictions in other religions do to those cultures. What lies beyond the sort of contractual belief of subscription to certain articles of faith is 'epinoia', which she declines to translate, but sees as essential to a living faith which entails response rather than submission. Those who value much of what their faith tradition holds but who can't gloss over the evils of the harm many do in the name of preserving it will be the most appreciative readers of 'Beyond Belief'. It's also an excellent introduction to the tradition that is still held in suspicion by many of those who believe themselves to be the divinely-entrusted guardians of belief.
Rating:
Summary: WELL beyond belief.
Review: Elaine Pagels is a delightful writer, and one of the more reasonable of the skeptical Bible scholars I have read. Call the latter "damning with faint praise," however. Here, Pagels compares the Gospel of John, emphasizing faith in Jesus, to the "Gospel" of Thomas, that stresses realizing truth within oneself. She argues John was written to refute Thomas. She reconstructs how and why the former became "orthodox"
Christianity, and the latter, banned and forsaken of all but Zen Buddhists. Emphasizing differences between John and the Synoptic Gospels, she traces the rise of "orthodoxy" through Polycarp to Iraneaus and Tertullian, who made Christianity the dogma friendly religion it remained. I found much of Pagel's creation myth interesting, and her tone personable. (She is willing to admit good qualities in the dogmatism she opposes, for example.) But she does two things that make it hard for me to take the first part of her story seriously. First, she places John in a faith ghetto, apart not only from the other Gospels, but also the works of Paul, etc. I think that he agrees with the other writers of the New Testament on practically everything. Secondly, she makes the "Gospel" of Thomas the cornerstone of her thesis. This is a wobbly and insecure foundation, however. The idea that John was written to disprove Thomas is untenable for at least three reasons. First, (as Pagels herself admits here), John shows many marks of familiarity with the time, events, and persons of First Century Palestine, while Thomas (as I think she admits of the Gnostics in general, in the Gnostic Gospels) shows none. It was therefore entirely reasonable for early Christians to accept the obviously historical John and reject the even more obviousy unhistorical Thomas: where is the mystery? Secondly, many Biblical scholars believe, for what seem excellent reasons, that Thomas was written in the Second Century. Oxford scholar Tom Wright suggests that Thomas is not only unhistorical, it is even anti-historical: "Thomas did for the parables in the second century what Julicher, Dodd and Jeremias did in the twentieth, and perhaps for similar reasons, namely, the attempt to get away from their historical and very Jewish specificity." Pagels never mentions discouraging words like this from competing scholars, still less refutes any of the evidence on which they are based. We are supposed to accept her early dating for Thomas on blind faith, it seems. I wish she had been inspired by the Thomas who was full of doubts, rather than the Thomas who is simply doubtful. Thirdly, John resembles the Synoptic Gospels much, while Thomas resembles them little. I recently went over what the Jesus Seminar calls the "Five Gospels" with a fine-toothed comb, and narrowed it down to four again. First, I listed 45 characteristics of the Synoptic Gospels, 43 of which John strongly shares. I then compared Thomas and other ancient literature, and found that of six documents I compared with the canonical Gospels, Thomas resembled them the LEAST. (And two of the other documents were from China!) I found Thomas flagrantly a-historical, formulaic, lacking in developed, convincing characters, unconnected to space or time, un-Jewish, and platitudinous on occasion. Pagels claims that John, unlike the Synoptics, has no moral teaching. Actually John contains rich moral teaching of the highest caliber: it is Thomas (surprisingly, for a sayings "Gospel") that has none! In short, I find NO reason to take the "Gospel of Thomas" seriously as a source for the life of Jesus, or to call it a Gospel. John, on the other hand, is intimately related to the Synoptic Gospels in dozens of vital ways, and shows many signs of being a trustworthy account of something that happened. The early Christians chose these Gospels because they knew their work -- better than some modern scholars, it seems to me, who are making absolute fools of themselves by pushing such wares, when they ought to know better. I rather like Pagels, and I think she is trying to be honest. Some of the points she makes about the psychology of martyrdom and orthodoxy make sense to me. I find more sense in that argument than in Crossan's invention of the "Cross Gospel," Mack's fanciful sociological studies of imagined Q communities, still more the "Jesus Conspiracy" theories of Doherty, Freke or Gandy. But really, isn't it time skeptical historians defined what they mean by "Gospel," instead of using it as a prop to make unlikes sound the same? Isn't it time they argue for their beliefs historically, rather than making casual jumps to skeptical assumptions by saying, "Many of us can no longer believe all that," and thereafter simply ignore evidence that points to "all that?" Until skeptical historians bring their arguments out of the hothouse and face critism squarely, it is hard for me to see why those arguments should be taken seriously. author, Jesus and the Religions of Man
Rating:
Summary: Origins of Belief
Review: I have only recently learned of the existence of the "secret" Gospels. My first questions about them were, "What do these secret Gospels say?" and "Why are these secret Gospels not included in the bible?". Elaine Pagels' primary focus is on the Gospel of St. Thomas. Because Thomas is often labeled as "Doubting Thomas" or the apostle of the weakest faith, I thought Pagels' focus was an interesting choice. While the book itself gives little of the actual text written by Thomas, differences between the Gospel of Thomas and the others are highlighted. The main source of comparison for Thomas is the Gospel of John. Of the four Gospels of which most people are familiar, John is the most controversial because his differs form the other three on many levels. The author's discussion expands into the choice of the four Gospels and the reasoning behind this choice. Very few people are actually aware of how the Gospels and New Testament were developed. Pagels also looks briefly at other secret Gospels including the Gospel of Truth, the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, and the Dead Sea Scrolls. I appreciate that the author went throught the process by which these books were rediscovered. Many Christians find these alternative Gospels to be heresy because of there differences to the canon Gospels. I find this book to be a great explanation behind the divergence in Christianity. It was enlightening to see Jesus in new ways. Differing forms of Christianity developed from the differing missionaries who ventured to different lands. The fact that what in most cases are small differences can lead all Christians back to the basics of the faith is a beautiful reflection of the faith. God, Jesus, or the Chirstian faith is not able to be categorized into boxes as many sects of Chirstian faith would have you believe. The book is merely encouragement to those who endeavour to, in the words of Jesus, "seek and you shall find!"
Rating:
Summary: The Universal Revelator of Truth
Review: I have'nt read the book yet, our bookshop don't have it yet but I'll get one. And I know its going to be a great one 'cause I've read The Gospel of Thomas. That was very Enlightening for me, it has given me an extra energy of my faith, and light of why we are here now. I'm Mr. Nobody but I am a happy man.
My big disappoinment after reading these great reviews from all of you people and this has been going on for a while now, is Why IRAQ end up like this? I am not trying to make us feel guilty, it just shows that we have not really embrace the real value of the gospel. Many of us has not found our own truth yet. It will someday. Now my favorite saying is 'LOVE AND AWARENESS IS THE WAY'...its like saying JESUS AND BUDDHA IS THE WAY
Thank you Elaine,
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant Details
Review: Elaine H. Pagels writes a brilliant detailed book regarding the belief of the Bible and it's teachings. The passages that she writes and the historical research that she has produced has made for an extrememly impressive piece of work that I can understand and believe. I am very impressed with this author's dedication. I recommend this highly.
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