Search

1. Discovery and General Features Nag Hammadi (Arab. Najʿ Ḥammādı̄, near the site of the ancient town of Chenoboskion) is a town in Upper Egypt about 80 km. (50 mi.) northwest of Luxor and the Valley of the Kings. In 1945 some Coptic MSS were discovered nearby, at the base of a boulder near the foot of a mountain called the Jabal al-Tarif. The corpus contains 12 codices, plus leaves from a 13th, with 52 tractates in all (including six doublets).…

1. Term The term “Mandaean” is used for a Gnostic-type baptismal fellowship (Baptism) that existed on the eastern borders of Syria and Palestine in the first century a.d. and that is the only one of such representatives of the syncretism of antiquity to survive to this day. Modern Mandaeans, some 15,000 in number in the late 1970s, live in the marshy delta region of the Tigris and Euphrates, in the Iranian province of Khūzestān, and in the Iraqi cities of Baghdad and Basra. Since the Iran-Iraq War of 1980–88 we have not had reliable statistics about their numbers. Within East Aramaic the Mandaeans developed their own literary language with its own script and produced an extensive religious literature. The term “Mandaean” (Aramaic for “Gnostics”) is a late one. The Mandae…

…

…

…

Part of 10 Psalms - 10.4 Secondary Translations 10.4.2.1 Background and Text TransmissionThe Coptic Psalter is a translation of the Greek Septuagint Psalter (10.3.1) and not of mt-Ps (10.2.2). The numbering of the Coptic Psalms follows lxx.1 All Coptic versions, like lxx, include the “apocryphal” Psalm 151. The Psalter was the most used and widespread book of the bible in the Coptic churches and monasteries,2 and is attested in four dialects of Coptic: Sahidic, Bohairic, Middle Egyptian (Mesokemic), and Fayyumic, although in a quite different manner. In the form of complete books (codices) it has been transmitted in Sahidic, Bohairic, and Middle Egyptian, whereas only fragments are preserved in Fayyumic. In addition, some tiny fragments from Psalm 46 survived in the Akhmimic dialect,…

[English Version] (NHC I,5; TractTrip), titelloser gnost. Lehrtraktat valentinianischer Herkunft (Valentinianismus), der im Text in drei thematische Komplexe von der transzendenten Welt über die Schöpfung bis zur Erlösung oder Verdammnis des Menschen gegliedert ist. Charakteristisch ist die zentrale Rolle des Logos sowohl bei der Schöpfung (hier funktional anstelle der Sophia) als auch der Erlösung. Die Anthropologie ist dreistufig ausgeprägt. Peter Nagel Bibliography Ed.: H. Attridge/E. Pagels, NHC I (The Jung Codex) (NHS 22f., 1985) E. T…

…

[English Version] Reitzenstein, Richard (2.4.1861 Breslau – 23.3.1931 Göttingen), klassischer Philologe und Religionshistoriker, 1888 PD in Breslau, ab 1889 Prof. in Rostock, Gießen, Straßburg, Freiburg i.Br., seit 1914 in Göttingen. Als Vertreter der Religionsgeschichtlichen Schule legte R. bahnbrechende, aber methodisch nicht hinreichend reflektierte Forschungen zum antiken Synkretismus, zur Gnosis und zum Manichäismus …

[German Version] The 20 Psalms of Thomas constitute the last group of the Coptic Mani­chaean Psalm-book (Manichaeism). Their meter and strophic structure point to an East Aramaic original with a striking similarity to Mandaean hymns (Mandaeism). Most of the psalms were produced during the period of Mani’s ministry (240–276). Unlike the majority of the Manichaean psalms, these contain very few references to Jesus (Pss 12 and 16). Mani’s disciple Thomas is traditionally considered their author. The form of the superscription thōm may possibly go back to Aram. tāmā, “twin,” and would refer …

…

[German Version] …

[German Version] (451, Upper Mesopotamia – 521, Batna/Sarug), prolific Syrian church author. Having become an ascetic at a young age, he officiated as episcopal visitor in Haura and was appointed bishop of Batna/Sarug in 518. He was initially a follower, though later an opponent of the School of Antioch (Antiochene theology) and professed a Christology situated between the positions of Alexandria (Alexandrian theology) and Chalcedon (Chalcedonian Definition). He ¶ mainly wrote metrical homilies ( mēmre), but also hymns, prose homilies and letters on biblical exegesis …

[German Version] (Apr 2, 1861, Breslau – Mar 23, 1931, Göttingen), classical philologist and historian of religion who became a Privatdozent in Breslau in 1888 and, from 1889 onward, professor in Rostock, Giessen, Strasbourg, Freiburg im Breisgau, and, from 1914, in Göttingen. As a representative of the …