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

296 THE DIFFERING APPROACH TO A THEOLOGICAL HERITAGE
a few comments: The first approach argues on the basis that the Gospel of
Thomas was written after the Gospel of John and has been influenced by
it either directly or indirectly. This approach has its merits, but in my
view it suffers from one decisive weakness: How can such an approach
explain the critical statements about Thomas in the Gospel of John?
According to this view, the author of the Fourth Gospel would have been
accidentally using the figure of Thomas in order to develop a paradigm
for a development of faith. How is it possible, then, that the Gospel of
Thomas, meaning the Thomas tradition, promotes precisely this disciple,
who has been criticized so much, as the main guarantor of the tradition.
A similar problem also concerns the second approach, according to
which the gospels of John and of Thomas independently use common
traditions. Such an approach can explain the thematic parallels, yet it cannot
satisfactorily answer why Thomas is the one who is held in so differing
esteem.
For this reason I lean toward the third approach or the fourth one;
each of them argues on the basis of a conflict between these traditions.
The difference between these approaches consists in whether both
gospels are derived from an originally common group, or whether these
groups have always been in rivalry with each other. Thus, Stephan
Davies and James Charlesworth, for example, argue on the basis that
both gospels originally stem from the same intellectual source. However,
they have developed this common heritage differently, and now they
rival each other. 35 By contrast, Gregory John Riley, April De Conick, or
Takashi Onuki are exponents of the proposition that the Gospel of Thomas
and the Gospel of John are rivals, but that they cannot be traced back to
common origins or circles.
I myself am still hovering between the third and fourth models.
However, I want to hint at an approach that could bring further insights
on the question:
3.4. An Impulse to the Debate
I explain this impulse to the debate on the basis of the—in my view—clearest
parallel between the Gospel of John and the Gospel of Thomas: the
35. Charlesworth, The Beloved Disciple, 370–72 and 387–89 are correct: he points out
that such an explanatory model does not necessarily imply that the Gospel of Thomas
must have been written before the Gospel of John. The corresponding developments
of the tradition could already have occurred earlier.