The Gnostic Gospels
In order to understand the gnostic gospels, we must understand what Gnosticism is. As a preface, most of the resources are Catholic due to the Catholic Church having a catalog of history on Gnosticism during the first few centuries. Gnosticism, a word from the Greek word gnosis, meaning knowledge, began possibly before the time of Christ. Gnostics viewed themselves as “those who know.” Early Gnostics believed all matter is inherently evil and due to this, they believe Christ did not take the flesh of humanity that His humanity was merely illusion, and similarly, He did not actual die on the cross and only appeared to die. They often times deny the divinity of Christ and instead believe He was a created being below God but above man.1
While the timeline of when Gnosticism developed within certain parts of Christianity, we see the Apostles themselves had to combat a form of it during their time. In the first letter of John, he writes “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are of God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God” (1 John 4:1-2). John is exhorting the reader, someone near Ephesus, to not believe everyone who speaks to them of God but to “test the spirits to see whether they are of God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world” and he clearly was referring to a form of Gnosticism by noting “every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God” because the Gnostics did not confess that Jesus Christ had come in the flesh.
In the letter Paul wrote to the Colossians, he said “See to it that no one makes a prey of you by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ.” (Col 2:8). Paul wrote this because the gnostics considered themselves “knowers” and as such, believed that knowledge was necessary for salvation instead of the grace flowing from belief in Jesus Christ.2 In particular, the Gnostics believed people are saved by acquiring secret knowledge (gnosis), which is imparted only to those initiated as Gnostics.3
Writings from the Church Fathers at the end of the first century also indicate the early Church was dealing a form of Gnosticism called Docetism a group who believed Jesus did not have a physical body and instead was a sort of “phantasm”. 4 Ignatius of Antioch (d. 110) wrote of Christ in his letter to the Ephesians, “there is only one Physician, having both flesh and spirit, born and unborn, God become man, true life in death, from Mary and from God, first passible and then impassible – Jesus Christ our Lord”5 strongly affirming the divinity and flesh of Christ.
In the New Testament, we have the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, written prior to 100 AD and recent developments and studies regarding ancient papyrus (the material used for the original writings) indicate an earlier date of 70 AD. The Apostles Matthew and John wrote their own, Mark wrote for Peter, and Luke wrote for Paul. In the Council of Rome, the Church Fathers reviewed various texts to canonize them to build the New Testament. The New Testament books were written before the end of the first century AD but they were not canonized, officially compiled, until 382 AD in the Council of Rome.6 Prior to canonization, these texts were actually in use from the Church Fathers and being used in the Liturgical practices, a tradition going back to the Apostolic Fathers (the Church Fathers taught by the Apostles).
One of the most important criterion considered was the apostolic connection to the texts, they had to be written by an Apostle or someone with close connections to an Apostle. The texts being canonized also needed to conform with the fundamental Christian beliefs that had been established. Another major consideration was the text had to be in widespread use among the faithful, which served to show the contents did not appeal solely to a particular region and instead served as a means of recognizing already-authoritative literary works.7
The orthodox Christians (those who follow the canonized Scriptures) can trace their roots back to the Apostles who walked with Christ, whereas the gnostics are unable to do this. In 1945 the Gnostic gospels, commonly referred to as the Nag Hammadi Library, a collection of thirteen ancient books (called “codices”) containing over fifty texts, was discovered in upper Egypt.8 There are few if any cases of known authorship with the Nag Hammadi and other Gnostic texts. For example, The Letter of Peter to Philip can be traced back to the end of the second century or even into the third, ruling out a literal letter from the apostle Peter to Philip, and instead moving it to a genre known as pseudepigrapha — writings falsely ascribed to noteworthy individuals to lend credibility to the material.9 These texts as a whole are often incongruent with canonized texts. A common theme among the Gnostic Gospels is that they contain the “secret words” of Jesus written down by “twin Judas Thomas,” which, when their interpretation is known, grant immortality, something entirely different than orthodox Christianity.10 https://catholicexchange.com/what-is-the-gospel-of-st-thomas/. They also tend to disregard the belief in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, the fundamental foundation of the Christian faith.
Modern Gnostics claim during the infancy of orthodox Christian Church, the Gnostics were persecuted out of fear of people finding God on themselves without the Church. They add to this stating they believe the Church desired and continues to desire a monopoly on religion and spirituality, however this is simply not true. The Apostles and the earliest Church Fathers were fighting Gnosticism, while being persecuted themselves by the Romans, and considered it a heresy because it undermines the fundamental aspects of Christianity. The early Gnostics believed that orthodox Christians were wrong in their beliefs and were attempting to influence people away from the truth within the Church and into their own belief system. I am sure there was good intent behind the early Gnostics, however the dangers posed by this were catastrophic for building Christianity, thus it was declared a heresy.
Ultimately, Gnostic Christians remove the core aspects of Christianity that make Jesus the Christ. They often deny the body of Christ as well as His bodily resurrection, which is the foundation of Christian faith. The Gnostic Gospels cannot be traced back to their purported authors and are incongruent, often contradictory, with the canonized texts written on behalf of the original Apostles themselves. Since these texts have resurfaced, modern Gnostics have distorted the view of Christ to create a belief system they compare to other religions, such as Buddhism, as shown in the book “Living Buddha, Living Christ.” As a result of the modern gnostic movement, many people are pulled away from the Sacraments (baptism, confirmation, communion, reconciliation) and God’s grace that flows through them. This causes those individuals to lose touch with God’s grace in the Sacraments and in their lives leading them astray.
There is no need to do this. Christianity is a very universal religion which is why it has permeated the entire world. One does not need to strip Christianity of what makes it Christian for the sake of molding it to one’s culture and world view, instead one should look into Christianity to learn why it truly is universal no matter the background, country, or culture. reason it has permeated the world. One does not need to strip Christianity of what makes it Christian just to make it universal to fit one’s world view.
If you decide to read the Gnostic Gospels, please do so with a holy curiosity to learn about them. It is best to be grounded in the truth and remember the authorship is questionable and the content is incongruent, often contrary, to the Gospels who have a proven authorship from the original Apostles.
References
1Staff, Catholic Answers. n.d. “What’s Gnosticism?” Catholic Answers. Accessed June 23, 2025. https://www.catholic.com/qa/whats-gnosticism
2 Spencer, Robert. 1996. “Knowing the Gnostics.” Catholic Answers. January 1. https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/knowing-the-gnostics
3Staff, Catholic Answers. n.d. “What’s Gnosticism?” Catholic Answers. Accessed June 23, 2025. https://www.catholic.com/qa/whats-gnosticism
4Gambero, Luigi. 1999. Mary and the Church Fathers. San Francisco: Iganatius Press. Page 26
5Gambero, Luigi. 1999. Mary and the Church Fathers. San Francisco: Iganatius Press. Page 31
6Nash, Tom. n.d. “Who Compiled the Bible and When?” Catholic Answers. Accessed June 25, 2025. https://www.catholic.com/qa/who-compiled-the-bible-and-when.
7Becerra, Daniel. 2019. “The Canonization of the New Testament.” BYU. https://rsc.byu.edu/new-testament-history-culture-society/canonization-new-testament
8n.d. “The Nag Hammadi Library.” The Gnostic Society Library. Accessed June 25, 2025. http://gnosis.org/naghamm/nhl.html.
9Groothius, Douglas. 2009. “The Gnostic Gospels: Are they Authentic?” Christian Research Institute. April 21. https://www.equip.org/articles/the-gnostic-gospels-are-they-authentic/#:~:text=A%20writing%20is%20considered%20authentic,the%20author%20of%20the%20text.
10Editors, CE. 2006. “What is “The Gospel of St. Thomas”?” Catholic Exchange. September 16. https://catholicexchange.com/what-is-the-gospel-of-st-thomas/.
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