Recovering Jewish-Christian Sects and Gospels (Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae)

 chapter five

“persecution within oneself” () or even to the actual persecution of
Thomasine Christians. As a matter of fact, both these themes are par-
alleled in theBook of Thomas the Contender(,–; ,–). If
theBook of Thomas the Contenderis a later product of the same sphere
of tradition as theGospel of Thomas,itislogicaltolinktheediting
of the Nag Hammadi version ofGos. Thom.  to the time when the
Book of Thomas the Contenderwas composed or attached to the same
Nag Hammadi codex as theGospel of Thomas.Inanycase,theCop-
tic version of the saying seems to have reselected and rearranged tradi-
tional wisdom topics in the service of a persecuted or more ascetically-
oriented community. The Coptic version evidently represents a later stage
in the development of the tradition than the Jewish-Christian/P.Oxy. ver-
sion.^68

...Your Brothers and Mother Are Standing Outside

Gos. Thom. /Epiphanius, Pan. ..

Gos. Thom.

The disciples said to him, “Your
brothers and your mother are
standing outside.”
He said to them,
“Thoseherewhodothewillof
my father are my brothers and my
mother. It is they who will enter the
kingdom of my father.”

Epiphanius,Pan. ...

(NGH: TheGospel of the Ebionites).

Further they deny that he is a man,

apparently from the word that the

Savior spoke when he was told:

“See thy Mother and brothers stand

outside,” viz. “Who is my mother

and who are my brothers?” And he

stretched his hand over the disciples

and said: “Those are my brothers and

my mother and my sisters who do the

will of my Father.”

Clem. .: For the Lord also said: “My brothers are those who do the
will of my Father.”^69

The Jewish-Christian Fragment
Epiphanius quotes theGospel of the Ebionitesin order to show that
the Ebionites deny Jesus’ being a man. The synoptic parallels for the

(^68) Scholars usually ascribe the differences between the P.Oxy. version and the Coptic
version to the (Coptic) editor of theGospel of Thomas. See Klijn , ; Fitzmyer ,
; Fieger , –.
(^69) The translation is from Holmes , .