Michael Toms (1941–2013)

I think this is the third translation of the Gospel of Thomas I've read, and possibly the most recently published (1992). Translator Marvin Meyer's introduction conspicuously suspends judgment about the "gnostic" character of the text, and thus side-steps the terminological morass surrounding "Gnosticism." Instead, he emphasizes a shared culture with the Cynic philosophers of antiquity.

This "gospel" is one of the most significant components of the Nag Hammadi Library discovered in Egypt in show more the mid-20th century. It differs from the canonical gospels by entirely lacking a narrative spine, and consisting solely of purported teachings of Jesus. It thus provides another point of reference for the text-critical approach that postulates a Q (Ger. Quelle, "source") text to serve as a prior reference common to Matthew and Luke, as well as demonstrating that a document of this form did exist among Christians of the first centuries. The text in this edition is printed with a typeset Coptic original on facing pages, and there are endnotes for each logion ("saying"). The notes supply alternate readings of the Coptic, along with parallels in canonical and extra-canonical Christian scriptures, ancient theological writings, and other literature of the period.

Appended to this edition is "A Reading" of the gospel by literary critic and academic Harold Bloom. I found myself fairly sympathetic to most of this "sermon" from Bloom, although it does repeatedly advert to his idiosyncratic identification of American Protestantisms and Mormonism as "gnostic." The one point at which he lost me altogether was when he wrote, "What is surely peculiar is the modern habit of employing 'gnosis' or 'gnosticism' as a conservative or institutionalized Christian term of abuse" (120). Bloom overlooked Irenaeus and Hippolytus somehow, along with the many centuries of theologians who took them as authorities, I guess.

Both Meyer and Bloom drew my attention to logion 13, which had not arrested me in previous readings of this gospel. Jesus rewards Thomas with three secret "sayings" or "words," not themselves reproduced in the text. Meyer's notes about other references to three secret words are intriguing (75); they include "IAO IAO IAO" from Pistis Sophia 136, and other non-canonical gospels intimate identities with divine father, mother, and son. Hippolytus offered what seem to be corrupted forms of the three instructions "precept upon precept," "line upon line,"and "here a little, there a little" from Isaiah 28. Bloom's highly speculative and metaphysical explication did not persuade me, but there are Thelemic doctrines which I think can be curiously enhanced by reference to this logion. show less

There are now years of hesitation in getting into Campbell's longer works; somehow I just end up exploring a page here and there, at times chapters, go back watching his audiovisual conversations and then spend my days and nights thinking about his ideas. It is like someone being unable to strike a balance between one's excitement and one's fear in his first bungee diving, or for that matter first glacier hike, railway or air journey.

In all these years of ideological wooing, he remains one show more of my favorite thinkers. He oscillates between Freud and Jung, takes sparingly from them, moves ahead of them, goes back and forth at times, never assertively formulaic like Freud, never too abstract in his individualism like Jung.

Sometimes I do remind myself that I haven't read any of his longer works from cover to cover! I think part of the reason is my personal approach to reading where culmination of a reading project necessarily means a break, a kind of emotional closure of sorts, a disconnect while assimilating the fragments of memories, not memories of ideas but memories of reading experience. I don't want closure with Campbell. He is like Jung in this aspect; you should bank on him if you get past that sexagenarian barrier; I want to keep wooing him till he prepares me for death, the final dream, or metadream of sorts.

These conversations are similar attempts at ideological wooing; they would prepare you to undertake some amazing journeys into the life of mind with him; and no preparation is enough if you really want to connect with the inner meaning of Campbell's philosophies of myth. show less

Somewhat similar to the Bill Moyers PBS special (and book) Power of Myth, this book consists of interviews between Michael Toms and Joseph Campbell. As such, we get to eavesdrop on a sparkling conversation that illuminates the role of myth in our lives. There's a lot of familiar ground to those who've read Campbell's work, but I like this book because it serves a convenient overview and provides a lot of interesting wisdom.

Thomas tells us more about the historical Jesus than all of the Dead Sea Scrolls put together. This book combines a very readable style with an up-to-date introduction, transcription, translation, notes, and bibliography. The notes alone provide the best available commentary on the 114 sayings, explaining many otherwise obscure passages and supplying many ancient parallels that support these interpretations.