towards the history of early jewish christianity the composers of theGospel of the Hebrewswere some type of Ebionites
who opposed Paul, they would probably also have agreed with James’
understanding of righteousness, which is totally different from that of
Paul.
Nevertheless, even we do see some family resemblance between Q,
the Gospel of Matthew, James and theGospel of the Hebrewsit is not
sure if speak in terms of traditions connected to a history of one specific
community (or communities). Since Wisdom traditions are so apparent
in theGospel of the Hebrews, the case might actually be the same as with
theGospel of Thomasand “Gnosticism.” It is not so much a question about
clearly definable “religion” or communities as about a philosophy and
wisdomthatcanbecultivatedindifferentbutlike-mindedcommunities.
The results of the last analytical chapter of this volume, where theGospel
of Thomaswas compared with Jewish-Christian fragments, would fit this
kind of overall picture.
As the above discussion shows, it is difficult to find a home for the
Gospel of the Hebrews(and its branch of Ebionism) in the early here-
siological accounts. There are probably two reasons for this. First, the
heresiologists were mostly interested in those groups that caused trou-
ble within Christian communities and especially so in the West. This is
exemplified in the fact that we do not have any description of the heresy
of “Thomasites” in the heresiological accounts. However, had there been
a teacher in Rome who had based his/her proclamation mainly on the
Gospel of Thomas, we would probably have this heresy also listed. The
criteria for “heresies” were different in the East and in the West. Tatian,
for instance, appeared heretical in the eyes of the Western writers but was
fully accepted in the East.^2 In the previous chapters, I have argued that
theGospel of Thomasand theGospel of the Hebrewsare best understood
if placed in the approximately same geographical and literary setting:
the Syro-Palestinian geographical area and post-synoptic harmonizing
gospel traditions. Thus, it is understandable that there are no “heresies”
connected to these gospels although the gospels themselves were known
to the church fathers.
The secondreason is that the framers of theGospel of the Hebrewswere
probably living mainly within Jewish communities, first in the Hellenistic
diaspora and later also among Syriac speaking Jews. The analysis of the
Rich Man’s Question in the Latin translation of Origen’sCommentary
(^2) Luomanen & Marjanen ; Petersen .