Who Is Jesus The Christ? A Study of Early Gnostic and Orthodox Christianity

Who is Jesus the Christ?
A Study of Early Gnostic and Orthodox Christianity
Class Index Page
(Updated 29 March 2004)

An Adult Lenten Sunday School Class by Tim Bryan and Bill Stroop
March 7 - April 4, 2004

Scope and Intent	Class Schedule	Resources	CLASS 1 March 7, 2003
CLASS 2 March 14, 2004	CLASS 3 March 21, 2004	CLASS 4 March 28, 2004	CLASS 5 April 4, 2004

Scope and Intent

     This Sunday School class is designed as a Lenten study of the person and divinity of Jesus. Lent is when many Christians spend time in self-examination and repentance, and in meditation upon God and God's word through prayer and the reading of Scripture. The word "Lent" comes from an Old English word meaning "spring." Early Christians spent Lent in penitence and fasting in preparation for the paschal Feast, or Pascha. As early Christianity developed, the preparatory fast became attached to another fast of forty days which was performed in imitation of Jesus' fasting in the wilderness. The forty-day fast became an important part of preparation for baptism and for those who were guilty of notorious sins who were being restored to the Christian assembly. In our western Church tradition, Lent became that forty-day period between Ash Wednesday and Holy Saturday, omitting Sundays.

     Early Christianity was an interesting period, during which there were many conflicting views on the person of Jesus and on how salvation was achieved. Many Gnostic Christians believed that salvation was a deliverance from the corrupt material world through knowledge of "otherworldly" things. Orthodox Christians insisted that creation itself was good, and that salvation came by way of Jesus' death on the cross. There were many differing views about the divinity and mortality of Jesus Christ, and there were many theories about Jesus' death on the cross. Many of these ideas did not make it into the canon of the Holy Bible; several were actively suppressed by the Church. Yet, many of the questions asked by early Christians about Jesus are still with us.

     At St. Paul's we will devote five Sunday School classes to a discussion of early Christianity, Gnostic Christianity, and the person of Jesus. This will be a time to meditate upon what we mean when we speak of Jesus as a human being and as the son of God. Beginning with "Friends Talking" on March 7 during the 10-10:45 AM Sunday School hour, Tim Bryan and Bill Stroop will introduce some of the concepts of early Christianity and the Gnostic scriptures, Jewish pseudepigrapha, Kabbalah, Christian Apocrypha, and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Then on March 14 and March 21, Tim will discuss Gnostic and Orthodox Christian views of the person of Jesus (class titles to be announced). On March 28 and April 2, Bill will discuss Jesus' last day, and we will look at what scripture and recent archeological findings tell us about Jesus' activities on the day he died (class titles to be announced).

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Session Schedule

Date	Principal Instructor	Session	Topic	Comments and Resources
March 7, 2004	Tim Bryan	Class 1	Jesus of Nazareth: An Introduction to Early Gnostic and Orthodox Christianity	This session is part of the "Friends Talking" forum. For background and further information, see the books by Chadwick, Hayes & Holladay, and Pagels in the Resources.
March 14, 2004	Tim Bryan	Class 2	The Development of the Canon of Scripture (the Q Document and the Two Source Hypothesis) and Introduction to Gnostic Literature	See the "Development of the New Testament Canon" and "The History of Gnosticism" in the Resources.
March 21, 2004	Tim Bryan	Class 3	The Gnostic Controversies: What Was All The Fuss About?	See the "Battle of Orthodoxy Versus Gnosticism" in the Resources.
March 28, 2004	Bill Stroop	Class 4	Jesus' Last Day 1: The Last Supper	*Essays from Jesus: The Last Day* will be used/discussed. See the Resources.**
April 4, 2003	Bill Stroop	Class 5	Jesus' Last Day 2: Gesthemene and The Crucifixion	*Essays from Jesus: The Last Day* will be used/discussed. See the Resources. Other new references are listed in the class notes pertaining to crucifixion.**

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Resources

The following books and resources will be used by Tim and Bill to prepare this class.

Gnostic Texts
- Barnstone, Willis (Ed.). The Other Bible. New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco, 1984.
- Robinson, James M., Paul Hoffman, John S. Kloppenborg. The Critcial Edition of Q. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2000.
The History of Gnosticism and Other Works about Gnostic Christianity
- Chadwick, Henry. The Early Church, Revised Edition. London, England: Penguin Books, 1990. See especially pages 12-132.
- House, H. Wayne. Chronological and Background Charts of The New Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1981.
- House, H. Wayne. Charts of CHristian Theology & Doctrine. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1992.
- Pagels, Elaine. The Gnostic Gospels. New York, NY: Vintage Books, 1981.
- Pagels, Elaine. Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas. New York, NY: Random House. 2003.
- Walton, Robert C. Chronological and Background Charts of Church History. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1986.
- Frend, W.C. "The Gnostic Sects and the Roman Empire." Journal of Ecclesiastical History 5:25-37, 1954.

The Battle of Orthodoxy versus Gnosticism (The Councillar Debates)

Payne, Robert. "A Hammer Struck at Heresy." Christian History 51:11-19, 1996.
_______. "Sifting Through the Christ Controversies." Christian History 51:20-21, 1996.
Shelly, Bruce L. "Fine-Tuning the Incarnation." Christian History 51:22-24, 1996.
Gonzales, Justo, Jr. "Finding the Truth." Christian History 51:26-30, 1996.
Miller, Stephen M. "Malcontents for Christ." Christian History 51:32-34, 1996.
Nassif, Bradley. "heresy in the Early Church." Christian History 51:36-37, 1996.
Smith, James D., III. "Testing the Prophets" Christian History 51:38-44, 1996.

Development of the New Testament (how the Gnostic writings and Q were used to produce the canonical gospels)

Davies, Stevan L. New Testament Fundamentals, Revised Edition. Santa Rosa, CA: Polebridge Press. 1994.
Funk, Robert W., Roy W. Hoover, and the Jesus Seminar. The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus. New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco, 1993.
Funk, Robert W., and the Jesus Seminar. The Acts of Jesus: The Search for the Authentic Deeds of Jesus. New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998.
Harrington, Daniel J., S.J. Interpreting the New Testament: A Practical Guide. Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1979.
Hayes, John H., and Carl R. Holladay. Biblical Exegesis: A Beginners Handbook, Revised Edition. Atlanta, GA: John Knox Press, 1987.

On the the Last Day and the Crucifixion
- Edwards, William D., Wesley J. Gabel, and Floyd E. Hosmer. "On the Physical Death of Jesus Christ." Journal of the American Medical Association. 255/11 (1986): 1455-1463.Meinhardt, Molly Dewsnap (Ed.). Jesus: The Last Day. Washington, D.C.: Biblical Archeological Society, 2003.
On Line Resources
- Early Christian Writings. In addition to the Gospel of Thomas (see below), there are many other early Christian and non-Christian wiritings in existence. This site has links to several of these documents.
- The Gospel of Thomas. This is a site where you can read the original document yourself.
- The Nag Hammadi Library. This is a site dedicated to the material found in 1945 at Nag Hammadi in Egypt.

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