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In a groundbreaking discovery, researchers in Germany have found the earliest surviving copy of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. This apocryphal fragment, which dates back to the 4th or 5th century AD, offers a glimpse into the childhood of Jesus as depicted in this ancient text.
In the early days of Christianity, different communities wrote their own accounts of Christ's life, but many of these didn’t make it into the New Testament. Those early texts that weren't deemed canonical by the early Church are called apocryphal gospels. Parts of these texts sometimes matched up with the official, canonical gospels, but most of the time they did not.
Christian tradition
One of these is the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, which recounts stories of a young Jesus performing miracles, such as bringing clay birds to life. Whereas the miracles in the canonical gospels are clearly about healing and relieving suffering, these stories lack a similar sense of purpose.
Even though these texts are not in the New Testament, they have still influenced some Christian traditions.
One such tradition is the Harrowing of Hell, which is celebrated on Holy Saturday. It’s mentioned in the Apostles’ Creed and alluded to in the New Testament, but the detailed story comes from the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus. This gospel also gives us the names of the soldier who speared Jesus (Longinus) and the two criminals crucified with Him (Dismas and Gestas).
So, even though apocryphal gospels aren’t part of Scripture, they’ve still had an impact on Christian beliefs and traditions.
Overlooked and rediscovered
As explained by Medievalists.net, the newly found papyrus fragment had been overlooked at the Hamburg Carl von Ossietzky State and University Library for quite some time. It was finally identified by Dr. Lajos Berkes, from the Institute for Christianity and Antiquity at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and Professor Gabriel Nocchi Macedo from the University of Liège. The results of their research have been published in the journal Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik.
This discovery is quite significant for the field of early Christian studies. Previously, the oldest known Greek version of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas dated back to the 11th century. The gospel, which was probably written in the 2nd century AD, was popular in Antiquity and the Middle Ages.
Dr. Berkes explained to Medievalists.net the significance of the fragment:
“If we date it to the 4th to 5th century, it’ll be the earliest known copy. We also learned more about how the text was passed down: Our findings show that the Infancy Gospel of Thomas was originally written in Greek.”
The fragment, which comes from late ancient Egypt, is about 11 by 5 centimeters and has 13 lines of Greek text, with about 10 letters per line. The researchers initially dismissed the document as an everyday one because of its clumsy handwriting. However, they noticed the word “Jesus” in the text. By comparing it with other digitized papyri, they were able to figure out what the fragment said.
This discovery challenges what we know about the history of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, and offers valuable insights into early Christian texts and how they spread.
