the-bible-and-the-dead-sea-scrolls

288 THE DIFFERING APPROACH TO A THEOLOGICAL HERITAGE
In all these questions the Gospel of John itself does not offer explicit
information. Instead, we also have to rely on external evidence. The
varying and at times contradictory contributions to the debate are based
on differences in the argumentative and methodological presuppositions.
At this point the exegete of the Gospel of John must rely on the reconstruction
of information not given by the author of the Gospel of John.
This fact opens the field for a wide variety of interpretations, the reason
for this many-layered debate.
At this point we focus the question of how the Gospel of Thomas can
help in answering some of these questions. For this purpose it is necessary
to turn briefly to the introductory questions of this work. The Gospel
of Thomas is the most fascinating and most controversial writing of all the
New Testament Apocrypha. 17 This prominent position is the result of the
following facts: There is evidence for the existence of the Gospel of Thomas
as early as the end of the second century C.E., e.g., by Hippolytus,
Origen, or Eusebius. However, the only complete copy was not found
until 1945 in the Nag Hammadi Writings. As a consequence of this finding,
parts of the Oxyrhynchus papyri, which had already been found at
the turn of the nineteenth to the twentieth century, could be identified as
older Greek fragments of the Gospel of Thomas. Yet even if the only extant
versions of the Gospel of Thomas were thus found in Egypt, it is rather
obvious that the origins of this tradition are even older. Linguistic evidence
Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1999), 11. Even more difficult is the question of the relationship
between Pauline and Johannine theology. Although there are marked affinities,
there are hardly any explicit references. An affinity between Johannine and
Pauline theology would be all the more reasonable if Ephesus is seen as the seat of
the Johannine school, insofar as the Pauline school also had its seat there. Cf.
Alexander J. M. Wedderburn, A History of the First Christians (London: T & T Clark,
2004), 178; Udo Schnelle, “Paulus und Johannes,” EvT 47 (1987): 212–28, passim;
Dieter Zeller, “Paulus und Johannes,” BZ NS (1983): 167–182, 167
17. Helpful overviews on the controversy and scholarly debate on the Gospel of
Thomas are given by, e.g., Francis T. Fallon and Regina M. Cameron, “The Gospel
of Thomas. A Forschungsbericht and Analysis,” ANRW 25.6:4195–4251; Koester,
Ancient Christian Gospels, 75–127; Bentley Layton and Thomas O. Lambdin, “The
Gospel according to Thomas,” in Nag Hammadi Codex II,2–7, vol. 1, Gospel According
to Thomas, Gospel According to Philip, Hypostasis of the Archons and Indexes (ed. B. Layton;
NHS 20; Leiden: Brill, 1989), 95–128; Stephen J. Patterson, “The Gospel of
Thomas and the Synoptic Tradition: A Forschungsbericht and Critique,” Foundation
and Facets Forum 8, nos. 1–2 (1992): 45–97; Gregory J. Riley, “The Gospel of Thomas
in Recent Scholarship,” CurBS 2 (1994): 227–52; Christopher M. Tuckett, “Das
Thomasevangelium und die synoptischen Evangelien,” BTZ 12 (1995): 186–200;
Jens Schröter, Erinnerung an Jesu Worte: Studien zur Rezeption der Logienüberlieferung in
Markus, Q und Thomas (WMANT 76; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag,
1997), 122–40.