Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas by Elaine Pagels
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Book Reviews of Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas
Book Review: Beyond Credibility
Summary: 1 Stars
Elaine Pagels is an advocate of what is commonly called "lost books" of the Bible-manuscripts that have been fairly recently discovered and are considered by some modern scholars to have been inappropriately suppressed from the canon of New Testament (NT) Scripture. In Beyond Belief, she uses these previously unaccepted sources, especially the Gospel of Thomas, to try to reinvent Christianity in a form more suitable to her personal tastes. She wants to rescue Christians from their blind acceptance of rigid dogma that was established, in her opinion, by a few headstrong leaders who strong-armed their way to positions of influence in the early Christian church. She believes that Christians should embrace many of these "lost" texts to create a new, more appealing, and politically-correct form of Christianity.
Pagels reveals her pluralistic views in statements like "this research helped clarify what I cannot love: the tendency to identify Christianity with a single, authorized set of beliefs...coupled with the conviction that Christian belief alone offers access to God." She goes on to say that "what matters in religious experience involves much more than what we believe (or what we do not believe)." On her view, there should be no such thing as orthodoxy or heresy because there should be no established belief system. She goes on to further chastise the Church by asserting that "given the notorious human capacity for self-deception, we can, to an extent, thank the church for this [orthodoxy]." Even though she acknowledges a "notorious human capacity for self-deception", apparently that only happens in the Church and not when people form personal spiritual beliefs nor when she expresses her own views of the Church. However, it is precisely because of the possibility of self-deception that we should humbly seek consensus for our beliefs based on objective facts.
One wonders why Pagels would work so hard to convince us that the Gospel of Thomas should be in the Bible. She has clearly stated her opinion that doctrine is unimportant and those who promote it are unthinking and arrogant. It seems that Pagels is caught in a vicious circle of denying the appropriateness of orthodoxy while at the same time trying to persuade Christians what its orthodox beliefs should be. Even with her view of Scripture as a purely human collection of writings, her argument that we somehow have lost books of the Bible still fails because, in doing so, she denies the right of the early Christian Church to define the doctrines that represented their own beliefs. Furthermore, Pagels' contention that the divinity of man is a "lost" doctrine of the Bible is obviously antithetical to Christianity as well as Judaism.
Pagels' postmodern approach has too many flaws, her methods are dubious, and her evidence is woefully inadequate. Pagels' Beyond Belief is indeed beyond our belief.
Book Review: Beyond Truth
Summary: 1 Stars
Elaine Pagels' book, Beyond Belief: the Secret Gospel of Thomas, is less a book about the Gospel of Thomas than it is an historical review that questions the traditional views of the development of creedal Christian orthodoxy. In fact, without the Gospel of Thomas being included in the appendix, one would hardly know anything about this document based on the contents of the book alone. Her whole purpose seems to be to promote a positive picture of early Gnostic beliefs and to present them as a viable alternative to standard Christian beliefs. She tries to show that current orthodoxy is but an accident of history and might easily have developed upon Gnostic lines. The gist of Pagels' book, however, is not to say that traditional beliefs are wrong and Gnostic beliefs are right. Instead, her effort really seems to be to try to undermine the belief that the doctrines of the church really amount to anything more than one opinion among many. She says, "what matters in religious experience involves much more than what we believe (or what we do not believe)." This attitude is displayed throughout her book and is in fact an attitude she wants her readers to share as she tries to eliminate any historical underpinnings to the doctrines themselves.
While this work shows a tremendous amount of research, and a scholarly, and fair minded approach to the views of others, it contains many flaws that make it ultimately to be a mere polemic. Her apparent biases against objective truth prevent her from even presenting a stronger argument than she does. As a result, we are left only with her attempt to fill out her stated bias against an exclusivistic Christianity. She believes that Christian doctrine was made up from the inner personal spiritual experiences of early believers and then formalized and canonized by church leaders. This produces a work that is a hit and run effort to undermine historic Christianity and its early development. It is full of vague accusations, innuendos and slanders designed to pry out the foundation stones of her readers faith and make them question whether their faith is even close to what it claims to be. This book would certainly be dangerous to the faith of an uniformed or doubting believer.
Book Review: Help, I can't get through 1 Stars
I have to agree with haroldmcinnes---blah, blah, blah. I haven't finished the book yet because I keep looking up her errors, and the errors she cites from other writers. I keep saying to myself, "What's your point?" "Quit rambling", "What is it you're trying to say?" She just keeps writing one paragraph after another copied from other authors, saying this could be, and what if, and we don't know, etc., etc., etc. I came back to this site to see if others felt the same way I do, and do they ever? At least I'm not alone in my confusion as to what is supposed to be shown in this book. Amazon really ought to let us give no stars. I went against my better judgement and bouoht a used copy, even though I don't buy books that the publishers no longer let us see inside of. Now I know why they don't let us preview the book. From now on I will follow my knee-jerk reactions to publishers (speaking of 'jerk'. Sorry for the pun--actually, no I'm not)who won't let us see inside the book.Please, please, please read "Hidden Gospels: How the Search for Jesus Lost Its Way", by Philip Jenkins, either before or after you read this. That is IF you really have to read it. He shows how these "gospels" and others have been around for hundreds of years, and are no secret at all. They seem to be "found" whenever there is a need for support for a radical social movement, like radical feminism
It has also been said by many others that a declining culture almost always seeks a mystic religion as support for their radical ideas. In other words, folks, this is an old tale not very well told, and certainly NOT a recent discovery.
Book Review: Ramble and No Structure at ALL
Summary: 1 Stars
This is the first time I write a review on Amazon, unfortunately not a good one. Someone recommended this book to me because it's more "unbiased and convincing". As a person who is growing in faith, I decided to check this little book out. After 50 pages, I had to put it down because there is no way I can follow the author's arguement. In fact, I only saw a compile of passages in the 4 orthodox gospels and the gospel of Thomas, under a bunch of loosely constructed themes. It's not "convincing" in anyway, because I can't see her points! Might as well read all these gospels and reach your own conclusion.
If you want to read this book, I suggest you sit down for a whole day and finish it in one shot, because that is the only way to understand what the author is trying to get at. I only have a couple of hours for reading every day at the most, so I gave up.
Book Review: Anti-Christian
Summary: 1 Stars
If you are looking to buy this book for an in depth view of The Gospel of Thomas keep searching. This book is no more than someones personal views toward Christianity. I read the complete book and learned nothing but a woman who is angry with God for personal tragedies in her life. She filled the book with referrances to scholars that back her bitterness to Christianity. I can only say that I hope the Lord brings peace and true understanding to her but I will not waste my time and money on anymore books by Elaine pagels.