The Lost Gospel: Decoding the Ancient Text that Reveals Jesus' Marriage to Mary the Magdalene

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First edition The Lost Gospel.jpg
First edition

The Lost Gospel: Decoding the Ancient Text that Reveals Jesus' Marriage to Mary the Magdalene is a book published by investigative journalist Simcha Jacobovici and Religious Studies historian Barrie Wilson in 2014. [1] It contends that the 6th century manuscript -- by Pseudo-Zacharias Rhetor now British Library Add MS 17202 -- commonly referred to as "Joseph and Aseneth" is really a disguised history. The book's assertions are not supported by mainstream Biblical scholarship.

Contents

Key claims

The book claims that Mary Magdalene was a Phoenician gentile and priestess modelled on the goddess Artemis, that she was venerated as the incarnate Artemis, being the wife and co-deity of the god Jesus modelled on Helios. The authors claim that the story of Joseph and Aseneth was already composed during Jesus' lifetime and precedes the canonical gospels.

The authors claim that it is a Christian rather than a Jewish text on the grounds that it was preserved and transmitted in the eastern Christian context of Syriac Christianity; and that it would be of no interest to monks if it were merely the story of an interracial marriage set in Patriarchal times. Moreover the narrative contains Christian terminology -- "Bride of God," "Son of God," and Eucharistic symbolism that would have no place within a Jewish context. Joseph and Aseneth is included in an anthology of 6th century manuscripts entitled A Volume of Records of Events that have Shaped the World. Without Christian import, the work would have no place in such a collection of such important writings as a narrative about Constantine's conversion, the finding of ancient relics and proof of immortality (The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus) among them.

The authors point out that work is prefaced by two letters indicating that the work contains "a hidden meaning" and that it is Christological in nature.

Using the interpretive methodology favoured by Syriac Christian scholars -- typological analysis -- the authors decode the writing as having to do with Jesus (Joseph) and Mary Magdalene (Aseneth). The narrative then becomes the story of their courtship, marriage, the children they had and concludes with a plot against their lives (Joseph's two sons Ephraim and Manasseh figuratively representing the children of Jesus and Mary Magdalene).

It is also speculated that the writing portrays an early form of Christianity that paralleled the Jewish movement led by James (Jesus' brother), and that this movement may have paved the way for 2nd century Gnosticism.

Translation of the Syriac narrative and covering Letters

In addition to a detailed decoding of the narrative, the book provides the first-ever English translation of Joseph and Aseneth based on the oldest existing text, that is, the Syriac version of the 6th century which is itself based on an earlier Greek account -- how much earlier than the 6th century is open to speculation. Modern digital imaging techniques were used to decipher the text hidden by smudges and other marks, thus restoring the manuscript to its original state.

The Lost Gospel also provides the first-ever translation of the two covering letters which explain how the Syriac translation came to be. Around 550 an anonymous individual wrote to his friend, Moses of Ingila. He had come across a "small, very old" book called Of Aseneth in the library in Resh'aina belonging to the bishops who had originally come from Aleppo. Suspecting that it contained a hidden message, he asked Moses of Ingila to translate the work from Greek into Syriac, a language with which he was more familiar. Moses of Ingila obliged, sending him a Syriac translation and noting that it was a work of wisdom, the meaning of which had to be carefully discerned. As he started to indicate the hidden Christological meaning, the text of the covering letter is suddenly cut off, while at the same time confirming the truth of mainstream Christianity and Jesus Christ in his letter [2] perhaps deliberately so in antiquity according to the authors.

Reaction by biblical scholarship

Israeli Biblical scholar, Rivka Nir called their work "serious-minded, thought-provoking and interesting", but described the thesis as objectionable, [3] and the book has been dismissed by mainstream Biblical scholarship, for example by Anglican theologian, Richard Bauckham. [4] The idea of a Jesus bloodline is rejected by the overwhelming majority of biblical scholars and scholars of the historical Jesus, such as Bart D. Ehrman, John P. Meier, Géza Vermes, Raymond E. Brown, Maurice Casey and Jeffrey J. Kripal. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] Even the Jesus Seminar, who supports several heterodox views about the historical Jesus, states that there is no historical evidence of a marriage between Jesus and Mary Magdalene. [11]

The Church of England compared The Lost Gospel to a Monty Python sketch, the director of communications for the Archbishop's Council citing the book as an example of religious illiteracy and that ever since the publication of The Da Vinci Code in 2003, "an industry had been constructed in which 'conspiracy theorists, satellite channel documentaries and opportunistic publishers had identified a lucrative income stream'." [12] The Lost Gospel was described as historical nonsense by Markus Bockmuehl. [13]

Author Ross Shepard Kraemer complained that her book When Aseneth Met Joseph: A Late Antique Tale of the Biblical Patriarch and His Egyptian Wife, Reconsidered was distorted by Simcha Jacobovici and Barrie Wilson (revised preface to the 2015 paperback edition). [14]

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Gospel Books which describe the life and teachings of Jesus

Gospel, meaning "Good News", originally meant the Christian message, but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out; in this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words and deeds of Jesus of Nazareth, culminating in his trial and death and concluding with various reports of his post-resurrection appearances.

Mary Magdalene Follower of Jesus

Mary Magdalene, sometimes called Mary of Magdala, or simply the Magdalene or the Madeleine, was a woman who, according to the four canonical gospels, traveled with Jesus as one of his followers and was a witness to his crucifixion and resurrection. She is mentioned by name twelve times in the canonical gospels, more than most of the apostles and more than any other woman in the gospels, other than Jesus's family. Mary's epithet Magdalene may mean that she came from the town of Magdala, a fishing town on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee in Roman Judea.

New Testament Second division of the Christian biblical canon

The New Testament (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christianity. The New Testament's background, the first division of the Christian Bible, is called the Old Testament, which is based primarily upon the Hebrew Bible; together they are regarded as sacred scripture by Christians.

<i>Infancy Gospel of Thomas</i>

The Infancy Gospel of Thomas is a biographical gospel about the childhood of Jesus, believed to date at the latest to the second century. The Infancy Gospel of Thomas was thought to be Gnostic in origin because of references to a "Gospel of Thomas", but those works are not referencing this Infancy Gospel, as many scholars had thought, but rather to the wholly different Gospel of Thomas.

Gospel of Philip Christian Gnostic gospel

The Gospel of Philip is a non-canonical Gnostic Gospel dated to around the 3rd century but lost in medieval times until rediscovered by accident, buried with other texts near Nag Hammadi in Egypt, in 1945.

Injil is the Arabic name for the Gospel of Jesus (Isa). This Injil is described by the Qur'an as one of the four Islamic holy books which was revealed by God, the others being the Zabur, the Tawrat, and the Qur'an itself. The word Injil is also used in the Quran, the Hadith and early Muslim documents to refer to both a book and revelations made by Allah to prophet Isa.

Acts of Philip

The Greek Acts of Philip is an episodic gnostic apocryphal book of acts from the mid-to-late fourth century, originally in fifteen separate acta, that gives an accounting of the miraculous acts performed by the Apostle Philip, with overtones of the heroic romance.

Joseph and Aseneth

Joseph and Aseneth is a narrative that dates from between 200 BCE and 200 CE. The first part of the story, an expansion of Genesis 41:45, describes the diffident relationship between Aseneth, the daughter of an Egyptian priest of Heliopolis and the Hebrew patriarch Joseph, the vision of Aseneth in which she is fed honeycomb by a heavenly being, her subsequent conversion to the God of Joseph, followed by romance, marriage, and the birth of Manasseh and Ephraim. The second part involves a plot by the Pharaoh's son, who recruits Dan and Gad to kill Joseph, only to be thwarted by Benjamin and Levi.

On the issue of the sexuality of Jesus, the traditional understanding of Christian churches and theologians is that Jesus did not marry and remained celibate until his death. That has not prevented speculation about alternative and fringe theories of his sexuality. The Gospels and the New Testament reveal little on the subject.

The Jesus bloodline refers to the proposition that a lineal sequence of descendants of the historical Jesus has persisted to the present time. The claims frequently depict Jesus as married, often to Mary Magdalene, and as having descendants living in Europe, especially France but also the UK. Differing and contradictory Jesus bloodline scenarios, as well as more limited claims that Jesus married and had children, have been proposed in numerous modern books. Some such claims have suggested that Jesus survived the crucifixion and went to another location such as France, India or Japan.

Simcha Jacobovici

Simcha Jacobovici is an Israeli-Canadian film director, producer, freelance journalist, and New York Times bestselling author.

James D. Tabor is a Biblical scholar and Professor of Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he has taught since 1989 and served as Chair from 2004–14. He previously held positions at Ambassador College, the University of Notre Dame (1979–85), and the College of William and Mary (1985–89). Tabor is the founder and director of the Original Bible Project, a non-profit organisation aimed to produce a re-ordered new translation of the Bible in English.

Lost Gospel may refer to:

<i>The Lost Tomb of Jesus</i>

The Lost Tomb of Jesus is a docudrama co-produced and first broadcast on the Discovery Channel and Vision TV in Canada on March 4, 2007, covering the discovery of the Talpiot Tomb. It was directed by Canadian documentary and film maker Simcha Jacobovici and produced by Felix Golubev and Ric Esther Bienstock, while James Cameron served as executive producer. The film was released in conjunction with a book about the same subject, The Jesus Family Tomb, issued in late February 2007 and co-authored by Jacobovici and Charles R. Pellegrino. The documentary and the book's claims have been rejected by the overwhelming majority of leading experts within the archaeological and theological fields, as well as among linguistic and biblical scholars.

<i>The Jesus Family Tomb</i>

The Jesus Family Tomb: The Discovery, the Investigation, and the Evidence That Could Change History (ISBN 0061192023) is a controversial book by Simcha Jacobovici and Charles R. Pellegrino published in February 2007. It tells the story of the discovery of the Talpiot Tomb on Friday March 28, 1980 and makes an argument that it is the tomb of Jesus Christ and his family.

Barrie A. Wilson is Professor Emeritus and Senior Scholar, Humanities and Religious Studies, York University, Toronto, where he has taught since 1974. An historian of religion, he specializes in movements in early Christianity. Throughout the 1990s he was Chair, Religious Studies, Atkinson College, York University. From 1969 to 1974 he taught Ancient Philosophy and Logic at Saint Louis University in St. Louis, Missouri.

Pseudo-Zacharias Rhetor is the designation used by modern scholarship for the anonymous 6th-century author who compiled a twelve-part history in the Syriac language around 569. It contains portions of the otherwise lost Ecclesiastical History of the real Zacharias Rhetor.

Infancy gospels Genre of religious texts

Infancy gospels are a genre of religious texts that arose in the 2nd century. They are part of New Testament apocrypha, and provide accounts of the birth and early life of Jesus. The texts are of various and uncertain origin, and are generally non-canonical in major modern branches of Christianity. They include the Gospel of James, which introduces the concept of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary, and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, both of which cover many miraculous incidents from the life of Mary and the childhood of Jesus that are not included in the canonical gospels. Although the Life of John the Baptist focuses on John the Baptist rather than Jesus or his immediate family, it is also included in the genre as its events would be contemporary with Jesus's early life.

Moses of Ingila was a Syriac Christian author who translated a number of texts from Greek into the Syriac language.

References

  1. ↑ Simcha Jacobovici, Barrie Wilson. The Lost Gospel. New York: Pegasus, 2014
  2. ↑ "In short, to tell the truth: our Lord, our God, the Word who, at the will of the father and by the power of the Holy Spirit of the Lord, took flesh, and <became human> and was united to the soul with its senses completely..." (Simcha Jacobovici, Barrie Wilson, The Lost Gospel, page 384).
  3. ↑ Nir, Rivka (Fall 2016). Book Review, The Lost Gospel. Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus. Volume 14, issue 3: page 296, 305.
  4. ↑ Assessing the Lost Gospel by Richard Bauckman
  5. ↑ Ehrman, Bart D. (2006-05-01). Peter, Paul and Mary Magdalene: The Followers of Jesus in History and Legend. Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-974113-7.
  6. ↑ Casey, Maurice (2010-12-30). Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian's Account of His Life and Teaching. A&C Black. ISBN   978-0-567-64517-3.
  7. ↑ Vermes, Geza (2011-06-30). Jesus the Jew. Hymns Ancient & Modern Limited. ISBN   978-0-334-05293-7.
  8. ↑ Meier, John P. (1991). A Marginal Jew: The roots of the problem and the person. Doubleday. ISBN   978-0-385-26425-9.
  9. ↑ Kripal, Jeffrey J. (2008-09-15). The Serpent's Gift: Gnostic Reflections on the Study of Religion. University of Chicago Press. ISBN   978-0-226-45382-8.
  10. ↑ Brown, Raymond Edward (1994). The Death of the Messiah: From Gethsemane to the Grave : a Commentary on the Passion Narratives in the Four Gospels. Doubleday. ISBN   978-0-385-19397-9.
  11. ↑ Funk, Robert Walter; Seminar, Jesus (1998). The Acts of Jesus: The Search for the Authentic Deeds of Jesus. HarperSanFrancisco. ISBN   978-0-06-062978-6.
  12. ↑ Lost Gospel claims Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had children, by Victoria Ward, The Daily Telegraph, 12 November 2014
  13. ↑ Markus Bockmuehl, Ancient Apocryphal Gospels, page 21 (Westminster John Knox Press, 2017. ISBN   9780664263058)
  14. ↑ Ross Shepard Kraemer,When Aseneth Met Joseph: A Late Antique Tale of the Biblical Patriarch and His Egyptian Wife, Reconsidered (Oxford University Press, 1998. ISBN   0-19-511475-2)
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