BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST OF-? Published By The American Schools of Oriental Research (Jerusalem and Baghdad) Drawer 93A, Yale Station, New Haven, Conn. Vol. XV DECEMBER, 1952 No. 4 Fig. 1. The Gnostic Library of Chenoboskion. From Archaeology III, 1950, p. 70. Contents The Gnostic Library of Chenoboskion, by V. R. Gold ....................................... 70 The Answer to a Puzzle, by A. Sachs ........................................ 89 Indices to Volumes XT-XV, by C. H. Schmitt ............................................ 90 (Earlier Indices are in Vol. V.4 and in Vol. X.4) 70 THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XV, The Biblical Archaeologist is published quarterly (February, May, September, December) by the American Schools of Oriental Research. Its purpose is to meet the need for a readable, non-technical, yet thoroughly reliable account of archaeological discoveries as they are related to the Bible. Editors: G. Ernest Wright and Frank M. Cross, Jr., with the assistance of Floyd V. Filson in New Testament matters. Editorial correspondence should be sent to one of the above at 2330 N. Halsted St., Chicago 14, III. Editorial Board: W. F. Albright, Johns Hopkins University; Millar Burrows, Yale University. Subscription Price: $1.00 per year, payable to the American Schools of Oriental Research, Drawer 93A, Yale Station, New Haven, Conn. Ten or more subscriptions for group use, mailed and billed to one address, $0.50 per year for each. Subscriptions run for the calendar year. IN ENGLAND: seven shillings, six pence per year, payable to B. H. Blackwell, Ltd., Broad St., Oxford. BACK NUMBERS: Available at 35c each, or $1.35 per volume. Entered as second-class matter, October 2, 1942, at the Post Office at New Haven, Connecticut, under the Act of March 3, 1879. THE GNOSTIC LIBRARY OF CHENOBOSKION* Victor Roland Gold Hamma Divinity School One of the most interesting and most familiar of the early sects of Christendom was that represented by Gnosticism and its various subdi- visions. Although well-known by name, our information regarding them has come almost exclusively from the writings of the early Church Fathers. Among these are Irenaeus (d. about 202; especially in his Adversus Haereses I), Tertullian (d. about 222), Hippolytus (d. about 235; especially in his Refutatio), Origen (d. 253), Cyril of Jerusalem (d. 386), Epiphanius (d. about 404; especially in his Panarion) and Augustine (d. 430). To this group should be added the Neoplatonist, Plotinus (d. 270). The information provided by the Church Fathers and Plotinus was sufficient to give us a general impression of the distinctive doctrines and attitudes of the Gnostics, but it was at best of limited value because of its brevity and its unsympathetic attitude toward the heretical group. To this patristic material are to be added three codices containing original Gnostic wcrks. These are the fourth century Codex Askewianus, the fifth century Codex Berolinensis, and the Codex Brucianus, from the fifth or sixth century.1 Two papyrus fragments, one from the fourth century, in the British Museum, and the other, Rylands Papyrus 463, from the third century, until recently, completed the list of primary and secondary sources for our knowledge of Gnosticism.2 Our lack of extensive original Gnostic material which could provide us with information cencerning the origins of Christian Gnosticism, its relationship with the early Christian churches, systematic treatment of its teachings and its position in the development and content of certain sections of the New Testament canon has been felt acutely because of the attribution, in some circles, of Pauline and Johannine materials to Gnostic influences. Although the discovery in 1947 and subsequent pub- lication of the now famous Dead Sea Scrolls have contributed much to show that this New Treatment material was not so influenced,3 recovery of original Gnostic materials would aid materially in revaluitnhge , 1952, 4) THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST 71 the evidence, if any, which has been adduced to iidicate Gnostic influ- ences on the New Testament material in question. A step in this direction was accomplished in 1930 when a cache of Manichaean manuscripts was found in a wooden chest in the cellar of a ruined house in the Egyptian village of Medinet Madi, ancient Tere- nouthis, in the southern Fayyum. These documents of Manichaeism, a syncretistic sect which borrowed from Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and het- erodox forms of Christianity, especially Gnosticism, provided some light on the Gnostics, but for Gnosticism, it was still secondary material. THED ISCOVERYA T CHENOBOSKIO4N However, sometime in 1946, some peasants accidentally discovered an entire library of Gnostic writings. The place of discovery was about thirty-two miles north of Luxor, in the region of Nag Hammadi, near el-Qasr es-Sayyad (ancient Sheneset-Chenoboskion), at the foot of a steep mountain, Gebel et-Tarif, on the east bank of the Nile (Fig. 2). It was in this vicinity that St. Pachomius began his monastic community early in the fourth century A. D. The exact location of the manuscript deposit is still unknown; the region is honeycombed with caves and tombs. It has been determined, however, that, as in the case of the Dead Sea Scrolls, they were preserved in jars, perhaps in only one very large jar. When word of the discovery was first received, it was accompanied, as is to be expected under such circumstances, by unsubstantiated * The writer wishes to take this opportunity to express his gratitude to Professor W. F. Albright of the John Hopkins University for his many invaluable suggestions and generous assistance given during the preparation of this paper. 1. The Codex Askewianus, written on parchment, was purchased by an Englishman, Askew, in the second third of the eighteenth century and was first publicized in 1778. It is now in the British Museum. It contains the treatise Pistis Sophia and a treatise on penitence. The Codex Brucianus, written on papyrus, was purchased by a Scotsman, James Bruce, in the region of Thebes about 1769. It became the property of Bodleian Library, Oxford, in 1848. It contains the two Books of Yeu and a work without a title. The latter was published by Charlotte Baynes in 1935, A Coptic Treatise con- tained in the Codex Brucianus (Cambridge). The Codex Berolinensis, also on papyrus, was secured by Dr. C. Reinhardt from an antiquities dealer in Akhmim in 1895 and is now in the collection of the Egyptian Museum in Berlin. In addition to some non-Gnostic material, it contains the Gnostic Apocryphon of John, the Wisdom of Jesus, and a part of the Gospel of Mary. 2. The Mandaean literature, first published by M. Lidzbarski (1905-1925), furnished additional information concerning Gnosticism. The Mandaean system arose in southern Iraq in the fifth century A. D. and draws from Manichaean teachings, among others. 3. For example, the dualism of light and darkness is reflected in the "War between the Children of Light and the Children of Darkness." 4. The material for this paper is drawn from the following preliminary reports: "Le papyrus gnostique du Mus6e Copte" by Togo Mina (Vigiliae Christianae II1, 1948, 129-136); "Trois livres gnostiques in6dits" by Jean Doresse (ibid., 137-160); "Nouveaux textes gnostiques coptes d6couverts en Haute-Egypte" by Jean Doresse and Togo Mina (VC I11, 1949, 129-141); "Une biblioth6que gnostique copte" by Jean Doresse (La Nouvelle Clio 1, 1949, 59-70); "Die Gnosis in Aegypten" by Walter C. Till (La Parola del Passato, fasc. 12, 1949, 230-249); "Les nouveaux 6crits gnostiques d6couverts en Haute-Egypte" by H.-C. Puech (Coptic Studies in Honor of Walter Ewing Crum (Boston: The Byzantine Institute, Inc., 1950, pp. 91-154). "Les Apocalypses de Zoroastre, de Zostrien, de Nicoth6e . . . " by Jean Doresse (ibid., pp. 255-264); "The Apocryphon of John" by Walter C. Till (JournaF of Ecclesiastical History III, 1952, 14-22). 72 THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XV, rumors. For example, it was said that soIme of the pcasanits, utaware of the retail value of the manuscripts, used some of them as fuel- a story circulated also when the Origen manuscripts were found at Tura, near Cairo. The discovery of ancient materials in Egypt is suffi- ciently common so that it is almost certain that the discoverers of the library attached some monetary value to the find simply on the basis of its antique appearance. As nearly as can be determined, the lot of manuscripts was divided up and eventually appeared, by diverse routes, in Cairo. One incomplete codex is in the hands of a dealer; another, complete, was purchased by Togo Mina for the Coptic Museum in Cairo (Fig. 3), while the remainder, nine more or less complete volumes plus remains of two other collections, eventually 'fell into the hands of a collector, making a grand total of thirteen codices! The last group was later brought to the Coptic Museum, and negotiations are under way to acquire them permanently for the Museum collection. The Egyptian government has forbidden the exportation of the manuscripts and has committed them to the hands of a committee for study and eventual publication. So far as is known to the present writer, this situation still holds. LEATHER-BOUNCDO DICESIN COPTIC The state of preservation of this invaluable library is most remark- able. Except for some abrasions on the covers and the loss of a few fragments of papyrus, probably through modern handling, nine of the codices are complete with leather covers, which seem to resemble mod- ern portfolios rather than regular bookbindings (Fig. 1). Some of the covers have been decorated, one of them with what appears to be a crux ansata (handled cross). In view of the extremely brittle nature of the papyrus, the present state of the codices is even more astonishing, especially when one recalls the vicissitudes of marketing to which at least nine of them were exposed. Out of about a thousand pages of manuscript, 794 are intact! Another interesting feature of this collection is the fact that all of them are in Coptic; they are virtually the oldest Coptic manuscripts yet found. Most of them are in the dialect called Sahidic, though an earlier form of the dialect than previously known. The remainder are in an early Coptic dialect which has since disappeared. The hand natur- ally varies in style, etc., since a number of scribes are represented in the collection, but on the whole it is excellent. On the basis of language and palaeography, the scholars, who have been able to refer directly to the manuscripts agree in dating them between the middle of the third and the end of the first half of the fourth century A. D. The oldest extensive manuscript of the Greek Bible, including the New Testament, is the Codex Vaticanus, dating from the fourth century A. D., about the same time as the completion of the collection at Chenoboskion. Thus, 1.952, 4) THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST 73 at about the same time that an orthodox scribe was completing our oldest copy of the Greek Bible in Alexandria in Lower Egypt, a hetero- dox community at Chenoboskion in Upper Egypt was completing its collection of the oldest Gnostic manuscripts yet discovered. In spite of the fact that all of our manuscripts are written in Coptic, it is agreed that most, if not all, of them rest on Greek originals. J. Dor- esse thought that the Wisdom of Jesus, based upon the Epistle of Eugnostos, was composed in Coptic. However, H.-C. Puech has dis- ~ I i:L t'(cid:127),'.." ?~ ..: . l q*l .r7* ; cJ?(cid:127) (cid:127) :.'~r :?? .,.(cid:127).': -Cm T(cid:127)2. . .(cid:127) .f ~...4. ... " :.:*' .(cid:127) .- . .:.".'.?:':3(cid:127) .. ".. ?. " ? ." ..:,;!i ." " =- ?;-?I. ". ., - ? ..' . . ?. " . ..-:... : .. .... .. ? . Fig. 2. Map showing the location of Sheneset-Chenoboskion in Upper Egypt. From Archaeology III, 1950, p. 69. covered in Oxyrynchos papyrus No. 1080 (third or beginning of fourth century A. D.) what he considers to be a copy of the Greek original of the Wisdom of Jesus. Thus it appears likely that we have no original Coptic work represented in this collection. The variety of material contained in the collection is also of con- siderable interest. It consists of discussions of cosmogony (world or- igins), treatises of a dogmatic nature, dialogues, prayers, "gospels," "epistles," and apocalypses. Some of the mnaterial is said to have been confided by Jesus to one or more of His disciples either during His 74 THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XV, earthly career or after His resurrection. In other instances they are prophetic visions or simply learned discussions by one of the teachers of the sect. All of them, regardless of alleged origin or content, trans- mit material not intended for general information but only for the initi- ated. Possession of this information purports to make the individual able to overcome his earthly nature, to free himself from its bondage and to acquire salvation. GNOSTICA POCALYPTILCI TERATURE In our newly discovered literature, this Gnosis (Knowledge) is presented in a variety of ways, but always in an esoteric manner. First of all, we may note the three great apocalypses, which seem to be those which, according to the pagan writer, Porphyry, were combatted by the Neoplatonist Plotinus: Allogenes Supreme, The Apocalypse of Messos,, and the Apocalypse of Zostrianus.5 Epiphanius tells us that the Archontics, a Gnostic sect related to the called Seth Allogenes, "the Stranger," while Sethians (also Ophites, an Ophite sect), Barbelognostics,6 and Archontics designated the seven sons of Seth as Allogeneis, "the Strangers." In the first instance, we have a transcendent God as a stranger to this world while in the second case we have hypercelestial entities such as Eternal Life or individuals of the Kingdom of Light such as Man, Adam or the Savior-just as one finds among the Syriac-speaking Marcionites and Mandeans in the syn- onymous term, nukraya ("the strangers"). One finds similar ideas among the Valentinians7 and in the author of the Apocryphon of John. Seth stands apart, separate and distinct from the remainder of the inhabitants of the world who are divided between the Material and the Psvychic. His group consists of the Spiritual Ones. The Sethians explain this by having Seth brought into the world by a "superior power," called Mother or Woman, while Cain and Abel were begotten by the angelic creators of the world. The Archonties, and later the Manichaeans, traced Cain and Abel to a union of the devil (in the Apc.cryphon of John - Yaldabaoth) and Eve while the father of Seth was Adam - thus Cain is the principle of the Material Race, Abel the Psychic and Seth the Spiritual. Regardless of the variations, Seth, the third son of Adam,8 represented a being apart from the others and so his followers were likewise apart-strangers. That this conception forms the background of Paul's idea of Christians as pilgrims and strangers here on earth is obviously most unlikely. Whether this apocalypse is a revelation of Seth himself or simply under his patronage remains to be seen. It seems probable that our treatise is a Gnostic-Sethian document, composed in the early third century A. D., or a bit later. It appears to have been wiead in Rome by Plotinus; it enjoved a place of authoritv in Egypt in the fourth cen- tuiry, as noted by Epiphanius; and occupied an honorable place along 1952, 4) THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST 75 with the Apocryphron of John among the esoteric works of the seventh- eighth century sect, the Audians ('odaye), cited by the Syriac author, Theodore bar Konai. With the Apocalypse of Allogenes, Porphyry mentions in his biog- raphy of Plotinus four additional apocalypses, those of Zoroaster, Zostri- anus, Nikotheos and Messos. The significance of the title of the last named had been a source of some discussion. Since the name of Messos L....;.??~I?~:C ' ~~ ~1 o I) ~r ,;. i",: ,_(cid:127),lo: ,i, ,tt '.(cid:127) b.I(cid:127) . ..... c"i.. 1;?,: C(cid:127).I'. C"O ' . ,*lli(cid:127)? i.t (cid:127)' Ii ' :(cid:127)?' ( ? ~~ ?l^~,t(cid:127).(cid:127)(cid:127):~(cid:127) ~~~ (cid:127)," (cid:127)?::(cid:127) .,..r ,.:?, "?. -h ,.,- ; . .:. .,/(cid:127)::)-.fi-~.,~,,,~.t (cid:127)... :.,. . , ... .. I 61of~ Fig. 3. Two pages of the manuscript owned by the Coptic Museum in Cairo. From Archaeology III, 1950, p. 72. 5. The classification of the treatises follows that of Doresse in La Nouvelle Clio (cf. note 4). The primary division is based on difference in dialect: 1. Sahidic; 2. the previously unknown Coptic dialect, first thought to be Sub-akhmimic, but now recognized as an extinct Coptic dialect or subdialect. The secondary division is based on content. 6. The Ophites (Greek ophis=snake) or Naassenes (Hebrew are so-called because of the importance the serpent played in this Gnnoashtiacs -ssnyastkeem) . It is an early Gnostic sect with many subdivisions and is described by Hippolytus, Irenaeus, Origen and Epiphanius. The serpent played the role of the divine entity placed by God in Paradise in the Apocryphon of John (q.v.). In some groups the serpent is identified with Sophia ("Wisdom"), who is a divine spark which fell on the waters when Christ and His mother (female Holy Spirit) flew upward toward heaven. The Barbelo- gnostic6 resembled the Ophites in many ways but their particular emphasis was placed upon the female being Barbelo (cf. the Apocryphon of John). The Barbelo- gnostics are another major group of Gnostic sects though smaller than the Ophite group. For a good discussion of Gnosticism even though it does not include the materials from Chenoboskion, cf. Hans Leisegang, Die Gnosis, 3rd edition (also avail- able in a French translation La Gnose, based on the 3rd German edition, Paris: Payot. 1951). 7. The Valentinians are an early Gnostic sect founded by Valentinus who was born in Lower Egypt, according to Epiphanius, educated in Alexandria, and lived in Rome from about 135-160 A. D. Through him, Gnosticism was transformed into the heterodox sect which was able to compete seriously with Christianity and evoked such bitter criticism from the Church Fathers. 8. Prof. Albright has pointed out that not only was Seth the third son of Adam but also the Egyptian god who was the adversary of Osiris and was identified nearly 4,000 years ago with Canaanite Baal. Later Seth became a sort of Egyptian Satan. 76 TIlE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XV, was most inusual, some amended it to read Moses: others interpreted it to refer to a mediator or to some central place in mystic Gnostic topography. Although without a title, the manuscript in question con- tains references in its text to Messos. So the solution is simply that Messos is the name of a man, perhaps a Gnostic prophet or seer. Whether or not the Apocalypsc of Zoroaster is a part of the Apocalypse of Zctrianus is still a matter of discussion, but we can now be sure of having at least three of the five Gnostic apocalypses men- tioned by Porphyry-and the two remaining (Zoroaster and Nikotheos) may yet be recovered when all the new texts have been studied care- fully. The composition of all three antedates 240 A. D. and come from the same Sethian circle. In addition to these, there is a group of apocalypses more or less directly attributed to the Great Seth. Among these may be noted two copies of the Book oef the Great Invisible Spirit or the Gospel of the Egyptians, composed by the Great Seth and written down by the learned Eugnostos, also called Goggessos (cf. below). Another important reve- lation is the Paraphrase cf Seem (Fig. 4) or the Second Treatise of the Great Seth. This work is the Paraphrasis Seth mentioned by Hippo- lytus and may be among those to which Epiphanius refers in the large collection of works used by the Gnostics and attributed to Seth. Finally, it may be noted that among the Manichaeans, Sern, who was considered to be the same as Seth or Sethel, was counted as one of the "prophets of the nations" in the list of celestial envoys in the course of history from Adam to Mani. In this same category is the Revelation of Adam to his Son Seth, which, in general terms, describes the coming of different saviors. It is possibly one of the Apocalypses of Adam mentioned by Epiphanius in his Panarion; reminiscences are probably to be found in the Manich- aean Book of Mysteries and in later Syriac and Armenian Gnostic works also attributed to Adam. Another book mentioned by Epiphanius is that of Noria, called the Hypostasis of the Archons in the newly discovered Gnostic documents. In this book, Noria is the faithless wife of Noah; she succeeds in burn- ing the ark three times but eventually the patient Noah completes its construction and escapes the Deluge, brought on by the Demiurge and his entourage of archons. Variations on the theme are to be found in the account of Theodoret where Noria is the wife of Adam, in that of Pseudo-Tertullian and Pseudo-Jerome in which the celestial mother, Barbelo (cf. below), sends the Flood, and others. In Mandaean writings she appears as the wife of Noah, though on other occasions she is the wife of the scribe Dinanukht. It is possible that the Hypostasis of the Archons represents an earlier account on which the other versions of the story of Noria are based or to which they are at least related. 1952, 4) THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST 77 Although the Apocalypsc of Dositheuts immediately calls to mind the Samaritan messiah, Dositheus, preliminary observations seem to pre- clude the possibility of associating the two. In the outline of the origin of Gnosticism according to some early ecclesiastical authors, the Samari- tan Dositheus was the teacher of Simon the Magician9 with subsequent Gnostic sects simply the heirs of their doctrine. Our Apocalypse of Dositheus, apparently unrelated to the Samaritan sect, may simply have appropriated the name of an early Gnostic "father" to give it claim to authority. It is likewise doubtful that it belongs to the books of Dosi- theus mentioned by Origen. However, it is possible that there is no relation with the Dositheus of history and tradition but with some one entirely unrelated. The treatise also bears the sub-title, The Three Steles of Seth, from which one might infer that the material contained in the document was originally engraved on stone and hidden in an inaccessible place until the proper time for its recovery and interpre- tation for the initiated. Dositheus may therefore have been the dis- coverer and/or interpreter of this revelation from the Great Seth. The nature of its contents places the Apocryphc.n or Secret Book of John (Fig. 5) in the category of apocalypses. The three editions of the Apocryphon found in the Library of Chenoboskion together with the copy which forms a part of the Codex Berolinensis should provide a critical edition of this work which was used about A. D. 180-185 by Irenaeus as a basis for his criticism of the Barbelognostics (Adversus Haereses, 1, 29), making it an important early document of Gnosticism, though our present copies are of a later date. Although the work entitled Pistis Sophia has been familiar since the publication of the three books of Pistis Sophia contained in the Codex Askewianus by Schwartze and Petermann in 1851, the source of the title has remained enigmatic. Among the treatises discovered at Nag Hammadi is a rather long apocalyptic work, without title, which seems to have served as a source for sections of the Pistis Sophia. Ap- parently used by the Ophite sect, its composition antedates 250 A. D. In the Letter of Eugnostos, the name Sophia Pangeneteira appears as the feminine component of a bisexual creature whose masculine name is Soter (Savior), Creator of all things. Sophia Pangeneteira is also called "Pistis." This bisexual creature, Soter and Pistis Sophia, produces six bisexual spirits. The name of the sixth one is Archigenetor (masc.) and Pistis Sophia (fem.). The Wisdom of Jesus, based on the Epistle, mentions Pistis Sophia or Sophia Pangeneteira as one of the aeons. Thus it appears that Pistis Sophia is drawn from the Gnosticism represented 9. Simon Magus is the Samaritan sorcerer whom Philip baptized (Acts 8:5-24). His conversion seems to have been short-lived for, although we hear nothing about his defection in Acts, the Church Fathers preserve a tradition that he was the founder of the Gnostic movement, some of whose teachings later appear in the Valentinian system. 78 THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XV, by the newly recovered library, and a century-old question can be answered. In addition to two apocalyptic works without titles, there is the final part of a treatise called the Triple Discourse of the Triple Proten- noia, qualified by the sub-title, Sacred Book written by the Father (i. e., by the Great Seth). This group of Gnostic apocalypses is com- pleted by another apocalypse without a title but is attributed to the Great Seth and ends with a theme common to these documents, "As for these revelations, do not disclose them to anyone who is in the flesh, but impart them only to the brethren who belong to the generation of life." GNOSTICC OMMENTARIEOSR ABSTRACTT REATISES There is a small group of commentaries or abstract treatises of the same Sethian nature as the apocalypses just noted. The most im- portant of these is the Sethian cosmogony, The Epistle of Eugnc.stos the Blessed, of which there are two editions. Although it has been impossible to study the text, it is possible that the Exegesis concerning the Soul contains a discussion of the soul and its many attributes which, according to Hippolytus, was a favored theme of the Naassenes.1o Completing this group of works are three treatises of a cosmogonic nature but without titles. NEW HERMETIWC RITINGS Completely unexpected and most surprising is the existence of five Hermetic works in the collection of manuscripts from Chenoboskion, four of which were not even known to have existed. Included in this group are the Authentic Discc-urse of Hermes to Thoth, Meditation on the Supreme Power (a prophecy filled with Biblical and Christian allusions), a Hermetic epistle without a title, a treatise of Hermes to his disciple, but without a title, and finally Asclepius, chapters 7 and 11, which were previously known from a Latin translation by Pseudo- Apuleius, although the tone of the Coptic work is more sober than the Latin translation had indicated. Hermes was the name given by the Greeks to the Egyptian god of wisdom, Thoth. Our previous liter- ature on the subject had been limited to that attributed to Hermes Trismegistos (Thrice-greatest Hermes), such as that contained in the eighteen treatises of the Corpus Hermeticum (of which Poimandres is the best known), and in quotations in Stobaios and Latin and Arabic authors. Now we are able not only to supplement this literature, but also to see that its connection with heterodox Christianity was more direct than had been previously supposed by most scholars. That this collection of Hermetic works was not simply a result of accidental inclu- sion in the cache or an acquisition of miscellaneous esoteric works as a matter of interest but not for regular use is indicated by the fact that in the same codex, written in the same dialect and by the same