The story of the origins of the Nag Hammadi texts is fascinating, dark, and full of intrigue. It is perhaps best told by Elaine Pagels in her monumental book, The Gnostic Gospels in 1979.
The scene is 1945 in Upper Egypt. Near the town of Naj ‘Hammádì is a mountain filled with hundreds of caves covered with burials dating back thousands of years. Muhammad ‘Alí al-Sammán, an Egyptian peasant, and his brother were digging for soft soil they could use for their family’s crops when they hit a meter tall earthen jar. They were initially afraid of the jar because it might contain a jinn, or genie. However, in the hopes that it might contain gold, they broke open the jar to find thirteen leather bound books (“codices”) written on papyrus leaves. They brought the books home, and tragically, their mother used some of the papyrus as kindling for their fire.
At the same time, the brothers were seeking for the right opportunity to avenge their father’s killing. They waited for just the right moment when they attacked another man by hacking off each of his limbs, ripping out his heart, and devouring it. During a polic investigation into the murder, the brothers gave the books to a priest, who shared them with a local history teacher, who sent them to a friend in Cairo to determine if they had any value. Some of the texts got lost through the Black Market until they were acquired by the government to be given to the Museum in Cairo (The Coptic Museum), but several were smuggled out of Egypt and sold in America. This drew the attention of scholars from all over the world.
Originally, the thirteen books contained fifty-two unique, early Christian texts that were rejected by an early Orthodoxy that had emerged in the first couple hundred years of Christianity. Each of the texts were Coptic translation made over 1,500 years prior to their discovery. They were based on Greek originals. Some were considered apocryphal (“hidden”), or Gnostic (“knowledge”), or even heretical, especially once Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the empire. They were likely hidden in the jar in the cave by monks from a nearby abbey seeking to preserve the texts from a violent crackdown on non-church approved books. Early Christian thinkers like Irenaeus complained of the many extent Gospels and other texts that were possessed by many, which conflicted with the goal of a universal, or Catholic, church.
The fifty-two texts represent an incredible amount of diversity in early Christian writing that is not found in the New Testament. Some are books of poems, others are alternative gospels that conflict with New Testament writings, some are theological dialogues in the vein of Plato, myths, and others. Some of them, particularly the Gospel of Philip and the Gospel of Thomas, date back to the writing of the four canonical Gospels. Some have likened these heretical Gnostic writings to a kind of mystical alternative to the orthodox church teaching: like Zen Buddhism, or Kabbalah in Judaism, or Sufism in Islam.
The Nag Hammadi texts are as follows:
The Acts of Peter and the Twelve Apostles
Allogenes – The Foreigner
The Apocalypse (Revelation) of Adam
The (First) Apocalypse (Revelation) of James
The (Second) Apocalypse (Revelation) of James
The Apocalypse (Revelation) of Paul
The Apocalypse (Revelation) of Peter
The Apocryphon (Secret Book) of James
The Apocryphon (Secret Book) of John
Asclepius 21-29
Authoritative Teaching
The Book of Thomas the Contender
The Concept of Our Great Power
The Dialogue of the Savior
The Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth
Eugnostos the Blessed
The Exegesis on the Soul
The Gospel of the Egyptians
The Gospel of Philip
The Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Truth
The Hypostasis of the Archons – The Reality of the Rulers
Hypsiphrone
The Interpretation of Knowledge
The Letter of Peter to Philip
Marsanes
Melchizedek
On the Anointing
On the Baptism A and B
On the Eucharist A and B
On the Origin of the World
The Paraphrase of Shem
Plato, Republic 588A-589B
The Prayer of the Apostle Paul
The Prayer of Thanksgiving
The Second Treatise of the Great Seth
The Sentences of Sextus
The Sophia of Jesus Christ
The Teachings of Silvanus
The Testimony of Truth
The Thought of Norea
The Three Steles of Seth
The Thunder, Perfect Mind
The Treatise on the Resurrection
Trimorphic Protennoia – Three Forms of First Thought
The Tripartite Tractate
A Valentinian Exposition
Zostrianos
