Book Reviewed: The Gnostic Paul: Gnostic Exegesis of the Pauline Letters by Elaine Pagels

Was Paul a gnostic believer? The New Testament describes apostle Paul preached Christian communities all his life as the leader of the ministry of Jesus Christ in the first century. But what is known about Paul comes from Sunday school stories that were meant to keep kids reverent and obedient. Volumes have been written after the discovery of early Christian and Gnostic texts discovered in Nag Hammadi in 1945. These texts shed light on early Christianity and give glimpses of Paul, and project him as the apostle of the heretics. What does divinity school scholarship tell us about the enigmatic thirteenth apostle who looms larger than life in the New Testament? Gnostic beliefs clashed strongly with accepted Christian doctrine in the first two centuries. By the end of the second century, Gnostics broke away from the church. Their core belief was dualistic in nature which proposes that that there are two realities, the physical and spiritual realms. They believed that the material world (matter) is evil and therefore one must achieve spiritual realm to find everlasting peace. This concept is remarkably like the Sankhya Philosophy of Hinduism founded by the sage Kapila in 800 B.C.E. In this book, the author examines and interprets the texts of the Pauline Epistles; 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Hebrews in the historical and cultural context. She considers each of these non-pastoral epistles, and questions about their authorship. She examines how the Pauline epistles were read by second century Valentinian Gnostics and argues that Paul was in fact gnostic. Valentinus, a leading gnostic and follower of Paul in the second century preached that only spiritual people received the gnosis (knowledge) and they would find the Divine Pleroma, while non-gnostic Christians with material nature will perish. Maricon, another major gnostic leader from Sinope (present-day Turkey) in 150 C.E., preached Gnosticism followed a version of New Testament that included a redacted gospel of Luke and ten edited epistles of Paul. One of the difficulties in understanding Paul with the earliest Christianity has been explaining his lack of relationship to the early “sayings” tradition (the transmission and quoting of the sayings of Jesus also called “Oral” tradition). Paul quotes few sayings of Jesus in his epistles. But he became a Christian in Syria and spent the first fifteen years of his ministry there. It is in this area, the “sayings” tradition was the strongest in the first century C.E., Was this because his heretic beliefs conflicted with the parables and canonical gospels? Princeton University Professor Elaine Pagels offers a thorough analysis of the early Christian beliefs and the gnostic traditions that influenced apostles like Paul, Thomas, and Mary Magdalene