Resurrection Reconsidered: Thomas and John in Controversy

by Gregory J. Riley

Overview

This study centers on a protracted debate within early Christianity concerning a foundational aspect of the Gospel of Thomas and its related literature: the concept of the body and resurrection. It traces the background of this idea in the Semitic and Greco-Roman world, and its expression in the Thomas literature as a whole: the Gospel of Thomas, Book of Thomas, and Acts of Thomas. But the inspiration for the study, and its main focus, is the controversy between the two closely related Christian communities of Thomas and John, between the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of John, on the issue of resurrection, expressed in John most clearly in the story of Doubting Thomas.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780800628468
Publisher:	1517 Media
Publication date:	03/01/1995
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	232
Sales rank:	803,040
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.00(d)

About the Author

Gregory J. Riley is Associate Professor of New Testament at the Claremont School of Theology, Claremont, Calif.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Introduction

Chapter One

Afterlife and Resurrection in the Ancient Mediterranean World

The Background of the Thomas Tradition

Chapter Two

Thomas and the Appearance Stories in John

Chapter Three

The Pericope of Doubting Thomas

John 20:24-29

Chapter Four

The Body and Resurrection in the Thomas Tradition

The Gospel of Thomas

Chapter Five

The Body and Resurrection in the Thomas Tradition

The Book of Thomas and the Acts of Thomas

Summary and Conclusions

Bibliography

Index of Biblical References

Index of Modern Authors

Editorial Reviews

The principal thesis of this book is that the Gospel of John was written in part as a response to a Thomas community's Gospel of Thomas, particularly to counter that Gospel's theory of spiritual resurrection with a physical theory of resurrection.
— Society of Biblical Literature

Stevan L. Davies