*1. [Included in James M. Robinson, ed., The Nag Hammadi Library in English, Translated and Introduced by Members of the Coptic Gnostic Library Project of the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity, 4th rev. ed. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1996) — Ed.]
*2. “Jesus” in Aramaic, and in Hebrew, Yehoshua.
1. [The word imaginal, coined by the philosopher Henry Corbin, refers to an act of creative imagination that transcends the subjectivity of ordinary imagination. See The Gospel of Mary Magdalene by Jean-Yves Leloup (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions, 2001); and The Voyage and the Messenger by Henry Corbin (Berkeley, Calif.: North Atlantic Books, 1998). —Trans.]
2. Cf. Jean-Yves Leloup, The Gospel of Mary Magdalene (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions, 2002); and L’Évangile de Thomas (Paris: Albin Michel, 1986).
3. Cf. volume 1 (1956) of the Coptic Gnostic Papyri in the Coptic Museum at Old Cairo.
4. H. M. Schenke, Koptish-Gnostische Schriften aus den Papyrus Codies von Nag Hammadi (Hamburg Bergstadt, Theologische Forschung 20, 1960), 33–65; 81–82.
5. Jacques Ménard, L’Évangile de Philippe (Paris: Édition Cariscrip, 1988). Although our translation and our interpretation are quite divergent from his, our debt to Ménard’s overall work remains considerable.
6. John 1:35–39; 43–46.
7. Ibid., 6:5–7.
8. Ibid., 12:20–23.
9. Ibid., 14:7–11.
10. Acts 8:26–40.
11. Ibid., 8: 5–13.
12. A historical study of Christianity’s origins and founding texts would make a passionately interesting ecumenical project in which Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, and other churches could bring together their knowledge and skills in a common work.
13. [The author uses the word anthropology (Fr. anthropologie) in a special way: He means it in its original, pre-modern sense of a comprehensive philosophy of human nature and its place in the cosmos, not as the study of human cultures and biological evolution. — Trans.]
14. Cornelius Castoriadis, Figures du pensable (Paris: Le Seuil, 1999).
15. Cf. Jean-Yves Leloup, The Gospel of Mary Magdalene (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions, 2002), 157–65.
16. 1 Cor 15:50.
17. Cf. 1 Cor 15 on the subject of resurrection. [It is important to note that the author uses the words soul and spirit based their original meanings, which are significantly different from their modern usages. In antiquity the Greek psyche, which means soul, did not have the same elevated status that the soul assumed in later Christianity, nor was it confused with spirit (pneuma in Greek), as it later came to be and still is in current usage. For the ancients the soul included aspects of the mortal body, mind, and emotions, as well as something of the spirit transcending them. It was an intermediary reality between the physical and the spiritual. In a further refinement of this intermediation, the nous appears here as that “fine point” of psyche (soul) that is closest to pneuma (spirit).—Trans.
18. Philip, logion 9:5–11.
19. Ibid., logion 10:1–5.
20. Ibid., logion 11:1–11.
21. Cf. Saint John Damascene, An Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, I, 4.
22. Philip, logion 12:7–10.
23. Cf. Charles Mopsik, translation and commentaries, Lettre sur la sainteté. Le secret de la relation entre l’homme et la femme dans la cabale, étude préliminaire (Paris: Verdier, 1986), 16–17.
24. Ibid., 15–16.
25. Also known as Nahmanides (1194–1270), a Spanish rabbi who emigrated to Palestine. [This letter has more recently been attributed to Rabbi Joseph Gikatilla, q.v. later in the introduction. —Trans.]
26. Cf. Charles Mopsik, Lettre sur la sainteté, 14–15.
27. Ibid., 7.
28. Philip, logion 60:2–3.
29. Plato, The Symposium, translation by Jowett.
30. Rabbi Joseph Gikatilla, Le Secret du mariage de David et Bethsabée (Paris: Éditions de l’Éclat, 1994), 45–46.
31. Quoted in Charles Mopsik, Lettre sur la sainteté, 27.
32. Philip, logion 55:3–4.
33. See Jean-Yves Leloup, The Gospel of Mary Magdalene, 10–13.
34. Pirouch esser sefirot belima (Kabez al Yad: Éditions Scholem, 1976), 372.
35. Philip, logion 76:11–18.
36. Charles Mopsik, Lettre sur la sainteté, 231–32.
37. Ibid., 132.
38. Ibid., 249–50.
39. [Here, the author prefers to import the word for human being from the original Greek. In the context of this gospel, anthropos refers to a realized human being, whether man or woman. It is not to be confused with andros, a man. Likewise, a Son of Man, though in the masculine gender, might also refer to a woman. —Trans.]
40. Cf. 1 Cor 15:50.
41. Cf. John 6:53.
42. Cf. Matthew 6:6.
43. Cf. Matthew 3:15.
44. [Previous English translations of the Gospel of Philip read “oil” here. See www.metalog.org/ and www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhl.html. —Trans.]
45. See note 39.
46. Cf. John 8:34.
47. Cf. 1 Peter 4:8.
48. Cf. Matthew 3:10.
49. Cf. John 8:32.
50. Cf. Matthew 15:13.