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| {{Gnosticism}}
| | #REDIRECT [[Nag Hammadi Library]] |
| The '''Nag Hammadi library''' (also known as the "[[Chenoboskion]] Manuscripts,” or as the "Gnostic Gospels"<sup>[1]</sup>) is a collection of early Christian and [[Gnostic texts]] discovered near the [[Upper Egypt]]ian town of [[Nag Hammadi]] in 1945.
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| Thirteen leather-bound [[vellum]] [[codex|codices]] buried in a sealed jar were found by a local farmer named Muhammed al-Samman.<sup>[2]</sup> The writings in these codices comprised fifty-two mostly Gnostic [[treatise]]s, but they also include three works belonging to the ''[[Hermetica|Corpus Hermeticum]]'' and a partial translation/alteration of [[Plato]]'s [[Republic (Plato)|''Republic'']]. In his introduction to ''The Nag Hammadi Library in English'', James Robinson suggests that these codices may have belonged to a nearby [[Saint Pachomius|Pachomian]] monastery and were buried after [[Saint Athanasius]] condemned the use of [[Biblical canon|non-canonical]] books in his [[Easter letter|Festal Letter of 367 A.D]]. The discovery of these texts significantly influenced modern scholarship into early [[Christianity]] and [[Gnosticism#Christianity and Gnosticism|Gnosticism]].
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| The contents of the codices were written in the [[Coptic language]]. The best-known of these works is probably the [[Gospel of Thomas]], of which the Nag Hammadi codices contain the only complete text. After the discovery, scholars recognized that fragments of these sayings attributed to Jesus appeared in manuscripts discovered at [[Oxyrhynchus]] in 1898 ([[Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 1|P. Oxy. 1]]), and matching quotations were recognized in other early Christian sources. Subsequently, a 1st or 2nd century date of composition circa 80 [[AD]] or earlier <!--- History International channel this date ---> has been proposed for the lost Greek originals of the [[Gospel of Thomas]]. The buried manuscripts date from the 3rd and 4th centuries.
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| The Nag Hammadi codices are currently housed in the [[Coptic Museum]] in [[Cairo]], [[Egypt]].
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| * 1. "Gnostic Gospels" after [[Elaine Pagels]]' 1979 book of the same name, but the term [[Gnostic Gospels]] also has a more generic meaning.
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| * 2. [[Marvin Meyer]] and [[James M. Robinson]], ''The Nag Hammadi Scriptures: The International Edition''. HarperOne, 2007. pp 2-3. ISBN 0-06-052378-6
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