Christian History Home > Issue 96 > The Secret is Out
The Secret is Out
The discovery of the Nag Hammadi collection brought ancient Gnostic writings to light.
David M. Scholer | posted 10/01/2007 04:05PM
In 1945 an Arab peasant named Muhammed Ali and his brothers discovered a jar at the base of a cliff near the town of Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt. Inside the jar were 13 leather-bound papyrus books (codices). The manuscripts were immediately caught in a web of family rivalries, black market trading, and international intrigue, but finally they resurfaced and began to be studied by scholars. The Nag Hammadi "library," as it is often called, turned out to be a treasure trove of ancient Gnostic texts.
The 13 codices contained 52 tractates (individual writings—Coptic translations of Greek texts from the second and third centuries A.D. Out of those 52 tractates (which included a partial translation of a very short passage from Plato's Republic), 40 were Gnostic writings that scholars had never seen before. Most are secret apocalypses and/or "revelation" discourses. The collection also includes gospels (the most famous of which is the Gospel of Thomas), acts, and epistles. They combine pagan, Jewish, ... To view this item, you must be a member of ChristianHistory.net.
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