The Gospel of Thomas is manuscript of a Coptic text discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Unlike the canonical Gospels, it is not a narrative account of the life of Jesus of Nazareth. Instead it consists of 114 logia (sayings) attributed to Jesus, sometimes stand-alone, sometimes embedded in short dialogues or parables. After this Coptic version of the complete text was discovered, scholars soon realized that three different Greek text fragments previously found at Oxyrhynchus, also in Egypt, were part of the Gospel of Thomas. The earliest surviving written references to the Gospel of Thomas are found in the writings of Hippolytus of Rome (circa 235 A.D.) and Origen of Alexandria (circa 233 A.D.).
Quotes from the Gospel of Thomas…
I stood in the midst of the world and revealed myself to them in the flesh. I have found them all intoxicated, not one of them was thirsty and my soul grieved for the children of humanity.
They said to him, “Tell us who you are so that we may believe in you.” He said to them, “You examine the face of heaven and earth, but you have not come to know the one who is in your presence, and you do not know how to examine this moment.”
Jesus’ followers asked him, “When will the kingdom come?” He answered, “It will not come by watching for it. It will not be said, ‘Look, here it is,’ or ‘Look, there it is.’ Rather, the father’s kingdom is spread out upon the earth, and people do not see it.”
If you bring forth that which is within you, that which is within you will save you. If you fail to bring forth that which is within you, that which is within you will kill you.
When you know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will understand that you are children of the living father. But if you do not know yourselves, then you dwell in poverty, and you are poverty.
The kingdom of Heaven is within you, and whosoever knoweth himself shall find it.
