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The Nag Hammadi Treasures

Roughly a dozen years after the ascension of Jesus, Mark, the author of the earliest of the New Testament Gospels, traveled to the city of Alexandria, Egypt. He shared the stories of Jesus' life, death, resurrection, and ministry with the people he met. Mark's teachings gave rise to the Coptic Christian Church. Christianity flourished in Egypt, and within fifty years spread throughout the region and beyond. From diverse religious sects, myriad theological texts emerged, including apocalyptic, Gnostic, and monastic.

Strange Story of Discovery

The Egyptian Coptic Church also played an important role in infant Christianity as a defender of the faith against Gnostic heresies. The church points out that the Nicene Creed was developed while its own Athanasius served as a deacon and then bishop of Alexandria in A.D. 327 to 373. In fact, Athanasius became known by the title of “the Father of Orthodoxy.” During the first three centuries A.D., there were many diverse Christian sects from which certain “secret” and sacred writings emerged. But increasingly, as the emerging literalist church (or what was evolving into the orthodox faction) grew stronger and its suppression and destruction of texts continued against “unorthodox” beliefs, fewer writings to reveal the alternative views of early Christianity could be found.

Modern scholars knew that such texts once existed because of references to them in the writings of orthodox fathers seeking to eliminate heresy. Those heresiologists asserted that some Gnostic sects (in the first few centuries) claimed to possess texts with secret teachings of Jesus. The orthodox clerics argued that the Gnostics' texts were full of fantastical ideas and that the Gnostics were heretics who had misinterpreted Jesus' words. But the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls (though technically not considered Gnostic) at Qumrum, and, more recently, the Nag Hammadi find in Upper Egypt, yielded actual copies of some of those controversial works that many of the orthodox early fathers found so offensive.

The Gospel of Thomas found at Nag Hammadi preserves wisdom sayings, parables, eschatological sayings about the destiny of humankind and the world, prophecy, and Christian community rules. Scholars note that the original Greek version of this gospel was in use in early second-century Egypt. The gospel was among the fifty-two texts discovered in the earthenware jar.

Today, several books and Internet sites present the story of the Nag Hammadi discovery, but a brief synopsis of it is warranted here. Sometime in December of 1945, Muhammad Ali, an Egyptian peasant belonging to the al-Samm n clan, was with his younger brother Abu al-Magd and some other fellahin (peasants) on camelback near a cliff known as Jabal al-Tarif (a mountain honeycombed in caves) near Nag Hammadi. The group sought a natural fertilizer, sabakh , that had built up in the dry desert sands among the boulders near the base of the cliff. The peasants needed the fertilizer for their fields.

With their camels hobbled, the peasants launched into digging. Abu al Magd hit upon an ancient earthenware storage jar. The red jar stood approximately three feet tall and was sealed with a large bowl. Initially, no one removed the bowl for fear that the jar held a bad spirit or jinn inside.

The Contents of an Ancient Jar

Muhammad Ali eventually broke open the jar and found a stash of old codices, or leather-bound books. The twelve codices and eight separate leaves that he discovered were not all later classified as Gnostic writings. Some were categorized as philosophical works while others were distinctly Hermetic texts that fit better into the category of Egyptian tales. A total of fifty-two tractates were found.

Muhammad Ali ripped apart some of the books to share with others, but his companions didn't want them. So he removed his turban and used the cloth to transport the books to his home. His mother started a fire with pages from the some of the books.

Muhammad Ali clearly remembered the date of the discovery because he had been involved in a blood feud with a man from a village near the Jabal al-T rif mountain. His enemy had murdered Muhammad Ali's father, who had been a night watchman, in retaliation for the watchman shooting an intruder. Many months after the death of their father, Muhammad Ali and his brother took revenge. They sought out, killed, and dismembered their father's attacker, according to Gnostic scholar Marvin Meyer, writing in The Gnostic Discoveries . That book states that the brothers cut out the man's heart and immediately devoured it.

Who was Didymos Judas Thomas?

The Syrian Christians identified Judas Thomas as the brother of Jesus. Didymos in Greek means “twin,” as does Thomas in Aramaic. He founded many Christian communities in the East and eventually went to India. He was the “Doubting Thomas” of the canonical scriptures (John 20:24–25).

At some point after finding the codices, Muhammad Ali gave a few of the texts to a local history teacher. The teacher sent one of the books to an associate in Cairo. He hoped to find out whether or not the codex had monetary value. It did. The later purchase of the texts by antiquities dealers piqued the interest of representatives of the Egyptian government. They acquired one copy and seized ten and a half of the thirteen books. They placed them for safekeeping in the Coptic Museum in Cairo. But someone smuggled out one of the books — the thirteenth codex with five separate texts — and offered it for sale. The codex contained five unique texts but some of the pages were missing. The late religious historian and Gnostic scholar Gilles Quispel in the Netherlands heard about it and convinced the Jung Foundation to buy it. Unfortunately, the manuscript was missing pages. Quispel then went to the Coptic Museum, where he borrowed photos of the appropriate pages and began translating the material. He suddenly realized that he possessed a “secret” Gospel of Thomas, a Gnostic text whose author declared he was Didymos Judas Thomas the twin and that the text contained the “hidden” or secret sayings of Jesus.

Translation from the Greek into Coptic

The texts found at Nag Hammadi had been translated into Coptic from the original Greek. Scholars say the translations were not always elegant, and the scribes who did the translating and copying certainly missed subtle nuance and profundity. As Christianity took hold and flourished, it brought an end to the use of other Egyptian scripts and gave rise to the Coptic. Some experts say that the Christians did not want to use the ancient hieroglyphs and other scripts of the Egyptian civilization, in order to avoid any connection to Egypt's pagan past. The Coptic script took twenty-four letters from the Greek and added six new characters for sounds required that did not exist in Greek.

The texts found at Nag Hammadi were translations into Coptic made some 1,500 years earlier. Those copies were made from originals that were much older and written in Greek. Scholars and scientists can date the manuscripts found at Nag Hammadi through their Coptic script and the papyri on which they are written, but the dates of the originals provoke sharp disagreement.

Why Bury the Texts in a Jar?

Who buried the texts at the base of the Jabal al-T rif mountain? And why? Several religious historians have pointed out that a Christian monastery stood not far from Nag Hammadi. The monastery took its name from a man named Pachomius, who became a Christian after being forced to serve in the Roman army. He sought to live the life of a hermit, but decided that solitary life was inferior to community asceticism and ended up establishing six or seven cenobitic religious communities (monasteries and nunneries) overseen by an abbot/abbess where men and women lived monastic lives, sharing their possessions instead of living alone as hermits. He never became a priest, nor did his monks, but his cenobitic communities became popular and eventually housed thousands of spiritual seekers.

Who was Saint Pachomius?

Pachomius, also called Abba Pachomius, was an Egyptian Coptic Christian founder of cenobitic monasticism. He was born in circa A.D. 292. With an old hermit named Palemon, he built a monastery in the second century that attracted monks to an ascetic life. Tradition states that he established a rule to govern the monastery that was given to him by an angel. He died of plague in A.D. 348.

Some experts theorize that the monks at St. Pachomius buried the jar containing the books, possibly to preserve them from destruction from the orthodoxy. Those monks perhaps felt a special connection with the books or simply did not want that part of their library destroyed in the event that one day the books could be returned. But the truth is that no one knows for certain who buried the books or why. What is known is that the desert sand acted like a drying agent. If someone had attempted to preserve them, it seems that they considered the possible hazard of insects and the elements.

Other Sacred Texts Buried in Jars

The Judean Desert is home to historical sites like Qumran, Ein Gedi, Hebron, and Masada and holds the promise of perhaps more discoveries like those already found at Qumran and Masada. The desert runs from Jerusalem at the northernmost part south to the Negev Desert and then extends west of the Dead Sea.

The Dead Sea Scrolls, which are not considered Gnostic but more correctly Jewish texts, were found near Wadi Qumran and the Dead Sea. They represent another spectacular cache of biblical and non-biblical texts found amid pottery shards and in earthenware jars. Someone had hidden the scrolls in eleven caves. The discovery of the scrolls between 1947 and 1956 yielded over 800 documents. Scholars speculated that the scrolls were hidden at a time when the Romans targeted Jewish and Christian writings for destruction. The scrolls included a diversity of writings but most date from 250 B.C. to A.D. 68. Unlike the Nag Hammadi codices, the Dead Sea Scrolls unfortunately were poorly preserved. A shepherd discovered the first of the scrolls in a cave located near the northern end of the Dead Sea. The mostly intact and moderately well-preserved book of Isaiah turned up in the first group of seven scrolls. Experts dated it to before 100 B.C., making it the oldest surviving copy of a biblical book from the Hebrew scriptures.

The Essenes at Qumran

Subsequent expeditions and surveys made of the eleven caves turned up more pottery shards and scroll fragments, enough to reveal a working theory (which later proved to be true) that the settlement at Qumran was most likely an Essene community. Perhaps it was known to John the Baptist, relative of Jesus, whom some considered to have been an Essene because of the many parallels between John's life and the Essenes.

The Essenes, a Jewish sect observant of the Torah, had split from the type of Judaism associated with the Jerusalem Temple. They took refuge in the desert at Wadi Qumran to live their lives in alignment with their mystical beliefs. Experts like James Robinson, previously mentioned as a Gnostic scholar of the New Testament and early Christianity and editor of the The Nag Hammadi Library , expressed the notion that the discovery facilitated scholarly understanding of not only that separatist sect but also the pluralistic ways Judaism was expressed in the ancient world. The Dead Scrolls do not mention Jesus or Christianity. The authors were copyists and commentators. Their writings raised the question about whether or not the Essenes were a Jewish Gnostic sect. Robinson noted how the Essenes embraced ideas that seemed more in keeping with dualism and Gnosticism — and, moreover, that the codices found at Nag Hammadi picked up where the Dead Sea Scrolls left off.

The Essenes — or Essenoi, as ancient Jewish historian Josephus called them — led a simple communal life but one that included celibacy. They chose a leader whom they obeyed, practiced collective ownership and strict vegetarianism (fruits, roots, and bread), refrained from swearing oaths, did not sacrifice animals, and carried weapons only for self-protection. They shunned immoral activities and believed their souls were immortal.

The Essenes held Messianic and apocalyptic beliefs. Baptism was an important ritual. They called themselves “Sons of Light” and the “Holy Ones” (because they believed the Holy Spirit was present and dwelt with them) and referred to their leader as “Teacher of Righteousness.” They broke away from Temple Judaism because they thought people were becoming too worldly; they believed that the “end-times” were near and that they were the chosen ones to prepare the way for the coming of the Lord. Some say Jesus may have either been an Essene or had contact with them.

Writings from Masada

Other writings of antiquity have been found at Masada and other nearby sites. Masada was a great fortress that housed two palaces of Herod the Great. The fortress sits above the Judean Desert and the Dead Sea on a flat mesa. It was the site of a battle between the Romans and a sect of the Jewish people revolting against them. The Jews held off the Romans for three years and then, when capture seemed imminent, all 967 committed suicide rather than be taken. In 1963 to 1965, several large-scale excavations were conducted on the Masada site in a joint venture of the Hebrew University, the Israel Exploration Society, and Israel's Department of Antiquities. Archeologists discovered many fragments from twelve first-century scrolls. Some contained writings from certain books of the Hebrew scriptures, including Genesis and Leviticus. Also found were fragments from other biblical and apocryphal books.

Writings from Nag Hammadi, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Masada, and elsewhere represent discoveries in the land of the Nile, but through the centuries many other manuscripts have been found. Such finds of antiquities aid tremendously in the scholarship of the ancient world and its beliefs.

Papyrus, Parchment, and Jars

The ancients used papyrus and parchment for writing surfaces. The papyrus was a common type of reed growing in the Nile Valley. The long-stemmed, bulbous reed was valued for its high durability. After the reed was cut into several long strips and placed flush together in rows, other strips were placed across the rows. The papyrus “page,” after being wetted with water and weighted down, was put in the sun to dry. Once dried, the page was burnished with shells to make the surface solid enough for writing.

Parchment was the dried skin of any number of animals found in ancient times, including calves, donkeys, goats, and sheep. By the end of the third century, parchment was preferred over papyrus among scribes intending to make books. Folding the parchment into two, they could cut the folds and get four writing pages. A book consisted of a grouping of these pages, or leaves, into quires.

The Dead Sea Scroll book of Isaiah that heralds the prophecy of John was found in a jar that stood a little under two feet tall and nine inches in diameter. This type of jar has only been found in the caves at Qumran; thus the jar represents a piece of linkage between the Dead Sea Scrolls and possibly the Essene library.

The voice of him that crieth out in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain … the Lord hath spoken it. — Isaiah 40:3–5

The Baffling Copper Scroll

The Copper Scroll found in 1952 and designated as 3Q15 was among the Dead Sea Scrolls' most curious finds. It had nothing to do with religious ideas or doctrine, but may have described the Temple treasure, and huge quantities of it at that. The scroll was found in Cave 3 at Khirbet Qumran. While many of the Dead Sea Scrolls were found by the Bedoin, the Copper Scroll was discovered by archeologists. The oxidized metal scroll was too brittle to be unrolled, and it took scholars roughly five years to figure out how to manipulate the copper to be able to decipher it. Experts finally agreed to cut it into twenty-three strips, each forming a circle. Reading and translating the text proved difficult, since the script was in ancient Hebrew and scholars did not know many of the vocabulary words found on the scroll. In addition, the experts could not decipher the directions (although they were fairly precise and specific) to the treasure's location. According to scholarly commentary, some of the places had different names and some places no longer existed. Opinion is divided between whether the treasure belonged to the Jerusalem Temple (prior to its destruction) or to the Essenes at Qumran. Finally, there are those who think the scroll's description of treasure was nothing more than a work of fiction.

The Obscure Texts Scrutinized

When Quispel produced the photograph of the first page of the Gospel of Thomas and the translation in 1956, his pronouncements generated intense excitement and interest in ancient Christianity and the Gnostics. He asserted that the Gospel of Thomas might have been written quite early in the first century. Other scholars say that some of the sayings found in that Gnostic gospel may actually predate the canonical gospels and belong in even earlier traditions, perhaps within twenty or so years after the ascension of Jesus, or roughly A.D. 50 to A.D. 100.

The translations and commentaries on the Gnostic scriptures discovered at Nag Hammadi are a result of intense academic scrutiny and dedication to the work. In their wide diversity, those texts shed light for the modern world on those who collected the library — they were early Christians involved in a radical movement. Their obscure texts often contained meanings that were obvious and at the same time secret. Scholars scrutinizing the texts and writing commentaries are careful to place the Nag Hammadi library in its ancient philosophical and religious traditions and settings. For out of that world arose the belief in transcendence central to Christianity.

The Search Goes On

While the scholarly work on the Nag Hammadi texts continues, archeologists and religious scholars hope that there are still more writings to be found in Upper Egypt. Robinson and his institute have begun excavating the basilica of St. Pachomius. Those fourth-century ruins are located near where the Nag Hammadi materials were found. And some experts have conjectured that the monks at St. Pachomius may have been the ones to have copied and bound the Nag Hammadi manuscripts.

Relationship of Gnostic Writings to the Canon

Did the New Testament borrow from Gnosticism? The Gnostic writings reveal that a canon existed in the second century that was nearly identical to the formal New Testament canon adopted at various Christian councils, including Laodicea, Carthage, and Hippo. Some modern scholars have attempted to show that some of the canon is indebted to Gnostic texts while others argue that the canon was a response against Gnostic ideas. An example of the former is the Gospel of John, and examples of the latter include the Gospel of Luke, Act of the Apostles, the pastoral Epistles, and Paul's letters to the Corinthians and Ephesians.

It is well known that other gospels existed alongside those deemed acceptable to the orthodox church. Some of those texts may have been earlier versions; others were thought to have been edited, redacted, or otherwise distorted and therefore unacceptable. The consensus is still out as to whether or not any of them actually are earlier versions of those found in the canon. Some of those texts include the Gospel of Cerinthus, Gospel of Mani, Gospel of Appelles, Gospel of Bardesanes, Gospel of Balisides, and Gospel of Marcion, which was Marcion's version of the Gospel of Luke that he claimed was the original. The early church fathers branded them all heretical, and specific information about them only exists in the attacks on the texts by the orthodox heresiologists.

Other texts include the Gospel of Thomas, which current scholarship suggests belongs to a “sayings” tradition that preceded the canonical gospels and from which the canon texts may have borrowed. However, it is impossible, according to some experts, to say for certain that the sayings tradition was either Gnostic or non-Gnostic. Another piece of writing is the Gospel of Philip, which also includes some sayings that may have bearing on the four New Testament Gospels, but linkage remains to be seen.

The books of the New Testament were originally composed in Greek and translated into Syriac and Latin probably around A.D. 150. The Egyptian translation was likely done around A.D. 200. The copies that scholars used today of these texts are simply lineal descendants of the originals.

Expanding on What Is Known

After the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325 made the divinity of Jesus official dogma in a vote of 217 to 3 and responded to the Arian heresy, subsequent councils were called to further refine Christian dogma and law. By the time the Council at Laodicea convened at Phrygia in A.D. 364, an approved list of scriptures was already in use. But some were books in dispute. The Council at Laodicea enacted sixty rules that further codified church doctrine. Forty-one sacred texts were banned from the canon and additional rules or church laws were also laid down. Many of the decrees had to do with Christians avoiding contact with heretics (presumably including Gnostics). Other subsequent councils enacted rules that further refined the core Christian ideal, while also strengthening the power and unity of the church. The modern archeological discovery of ancient texts places a new lens upon what scholars know about the birth and evolution of early Christianity and the development and refinement of its canon of sacred writings.

New Source Material for Scholars

After the magnificent discovery at Nag Hammadi, scholars can only hope that the archeological excavations that are going on in the world, the manuscripts that continue to be sold on the antiquities market, and the serendipitous discoveries that have brought other ancient materials to light will uncover new materials to shed light on the birth of Christianity and the world of the Gnostics.

Were the Dead Sea Scrolls discovered accidentally?

Yes. As the story goes, a Bedouin shepherd whom some sources identify as Mohammed Ahmed el-Hamed discovered the first of the scrolls in 1947 when he tossed a rock into a cave to frighten out his missing animal and heard pottery shattering. Inside were several jars with linen-wrapped scrolls.

These recovered materials from antiquity are invaluable to scholars in whose lifetime the materials were first discovered, and to subsequent generations of scholars who will study them with new questions and theories. With archeological excavations continuing throughout the ancient world, scholars hope to find new source materials that will teach modern people about the origins and influences of the sacred and religious thinking of the ancients.