Customer Reviews
Yet again another super book! - By: "Smith" Reader, 28 Aug 2008 
Beyond Belief The Secret Gospel of Thomas is yet again another super book by Elaine Pagels. In this highly readable book the author takes the readers on a jouney to show the important parts of the 'Secret Gospel' & how the mix with traditional understanding. I partticularly like the way the author mixes her own emotions with the story. Making this for me at least a powerful read.
A fine discernment of spirits - By: Brian Griffith, 14 Jan 2008 With patient scholarship Pagels compares two versions of early Christianity - that foundin the Gospel of Thomas, with that seenin the Gospel of John. She explores the differencesin focus, meaning, & implications for Christians through the ages. Combining the skills of a linguist, a theologian & a fine critic of literature, she brings out the major contrastsin understanding between different groups of early Christians. Her work exposes ancient issues of spiritual discernment, where different speakers claimed to represent Jesusin remarkably different ways. She shows the dilemmas & choices made by early Christians, to help usin making similar choices today:
"Anyone who has seen foolishness, sentimentality, delusion, & murderous rage disguised as God's truth knows that there is no easy answer to the problem that the ancients called the discernment of spirits. Orthodoxy tends to distrust our capacity to make such discriminations & insists on making them for us. ... [But] Most of us sooner or later find that, at critical pointsin our lives, we must strike out on our own ..." (p. 185-186)
I'm glad to see Pagels also has a book contrasting Gnostic texts with the letters of Paul.
Not about what it claims to be about - By: Philip Jones, 02 Jan 2008 
I would reinforce much of what 'calmly' saysin her/his review: despite its subtitle, "The secret gospel of Thomas", the bulk of this book is about how the orthodoxy of Irenaeus gained control of the early church.
There are some occasions where the author focuses on Thomas, &in particular the rivalry between the Gospels of John & of Thomas is well portrayed. But a reader who is expecting to find an exhaustive treatment of Thomas - despite the inclusion of the complete text of Thomas as an appendix - will be disappointed.
That same reader will certainly enjoy a well-written encounter with Irenaeus, Valentinus & the many diverse arguments which followed the bursting forth of Christianity into the gentile world; and,in those terms it is a good piece of expository writing which unravels the various influences & movements with great clarity.
I enjoyed reading it. I will probably return to it when I need to refresh my thoughts about the emergence of orthodoxy, the formation of the biblical canon, & the development of the creeds. But that's not what you think you're getting from the titlein its present form.
Appeasing orthodoxy - By: calmly, 25 Oct 2007 In "The Gnostic Gospels", although Pagels stated early Christianity had needed orthodoxyin order to survive, she lent an energetic voice to the Gnostics. But here,in "Beyond Belief", that voice is much weaker.
Indeed, for a book subtitled "The Secret Gospel of Thomas", there is surprisingly not all that much about the Gospel of Thomas. When it is discussed, it is oftenin a comparison with the Gospel of John, such that the John receives a fair share of attention. Irenaeus seems to get more attention that either, so "Beyond Belief" could just as well have been titled "The Impact of Irenaeus". In this book, Pagels doesn't venture much "beyond belief."
Pagels' writingin "Beyond Belief" often tends to be tedious or muddled. "The Gnostic Gospels" had been sharp & compelling. Its ~200 pages seemed to carry 500 pages worth of information. To the contrary, "Beyond Belief"'s ~200 pages feels like it could have been donein 100 pages. It definitely reads like a draft that is missing one or more rewrites. Perhaps to produce another work of the caliber of "The Gnostic Gospels" is too much to expect.
"The Gnostic Gospels" benefittedin that Pagels came across primarily as a historian. The powerful impact of that work derives from the history & historical texts she presented. Butin "Beyond Belief", Pagels opens at the Church of Heavenly Restin New York, presenting herself primarily as a (rather orthodox) Christian. She presents Iranaeus with such care as to seem to champion him, thenin the final couple pages of the book makes a mild plea to let people strike out some on their own.
As she demonstratated with "The Gnostic Gospels", Pagels is capable of substantially better. She had gone through a very difficult time. The level of scholarship of "Beyond Belief" seems high, but Pagels doesn't seem focusedin this book. Or she may have been struggling with how (or whether) to integrate the Gnostic perspective into her own Christian identity. In an interview after "Beyond Belief", with regard to the The Gospel of Thomas, Pagels said: "What I now see is that it's not necessarily contrary; it's complementary". By weakening the tension between the Orthodox & Gnostic, Pagels has undercut the power of the Gnostic messages, dragging them into conventional respectability. Perhaps she believes that they can be acceptedin that way by mainstream Christians.
Challenging comparison between gnostic and orthodox gospels - By: J. Mann, 27 May 2006 The traditional orthodox response to the Gnostic gospels, or indeed those gospels that failed to be includedin the Bible, is that there is a clear qualitative difference between the two groups of writings.
Gnostic gospels for example typically:
- introduce a special disciple who Jesus favoured above the others & to whom he imparted secret teachings
- promotes teachings different to the orthodox gospels
- has stories & sayings not foundin the orthodox gospels
- changes stories & sayings foundin the orthodox gospels
- portrays a different Jesus to that foundin the orthodox gospels
What Elaine Pagels points out is that all these points characterise the gospel of John.
- there is the "disciple who Jesus loved" who clearly is favoured by Jesus
- prompts the idea of Jesus being God, which is not foundin the other gospels
- stories such as Lazarus & the turning of waterin wine are not foundin the synoptic gospels
- there is no last supperin the gospel of John, the attack on the money changersin the temple happens at the start of Jesus' ministry etc
- the character of Jesusin the gospel of John is very different to thatin the synoptic gospels - his manner of speech, his attitude to the Jews, the very idea of who he is.
Pagels therefore shows thatin terms of style the Gnostic gospels are not so far from the Bible after all, if we draw our comparisons with the gospel of John rather than Matthew, Mark & Luke. She argues that the gospels of Thomas & John show remarkable similarities, & that John may well have been written as an "answer" to Thomas. The primary difference between the two is thatin Thomas the truth is foundin the world, Jesus is just a teacher of truth, a bringer of enlightenment, but he himself is not the truth. He has found the truth within himself & we too can find the truth within ourselves.
In the gospel of John Jesus is God, he is the Truth, "no one comes to the Father but my me". John therefore represents an exclusivist & hierarchical model of spiritual truth, one which the church developed into the concepts of orthodoxy & heresy. Pagels argues thatin the first few centuries Christians held a variety of beliefs about God & Jesus, but when Constantine established the Christian church as the official church of Rome it became necessary to create a hierarchy of ecclesiastical power, & this was achieved through the creation of a single "truth" & therefore the exclusion of those who failed to obey the dogma decided by the orthodox church. This artificial division of believers is most clearly seenin the debates around the creation of the Nicene creed & the books includedin the New Testament canon.
The early part of this book is excellentin its comparison between Thomas & John & what this says about the early traditions within Christianity. The book loses focusin the second half where Pagels finds it difficult to keep the complexity of church historyin a single narrative, & eventually seems to say "well, you will just have to read some other books to understand what happened".
Nevertheless the overall message of the book is that early Christianity had many powerful & complex traditions that were tragically destroyed when orthodox Christianity attained political power. This is essentially a retelling of the central theme of Pagels' earlier book "The Gnostic Gospels" but from a different perspective; it is an important message & one which creates a powerful & compelling frameworkin which to read the Gnostic gospels.
