Childhood Gospel According to Thomas

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The childhood gospel according to Thomas (abbreviated KThom ) purports to "report a series of episodes from the youth of Jesus". It is an apocryphal script that can be found in almost all apocryphal collections. It was probably created at the end of the 2nd century . Its author cannot be identified, but is given in most manuscripts as "Thomas the Israelite".

The Gospel of Childhood is not to be confused with the Gospel of Thomas, which is better known today .

content

There are reports of childhood deeds of Jesus of Nazareth : According to KThom, Jesus was not only capable of miraculous work since his departure into the desert, but very early on. Above all, the scriptures tell of healings through the child Jesus. But she also reports on value-neutral miracles and destructive acts of the young Jesus. The following is a selection of the most famous stories:

Jesus and the clay birds

At the age of six (he is seven in slightly different scriptures) Jesus meets with other boys in an abandoned clay pit. The children shape all sorts of bird figures out of clay and enjoy them. An "old Jew" (or an old rabbi ) sees this and scolds the children because it is the Sabbath and handicrafts are prohibited on the Sabbath. When Jesus tells the old man that it is not his place to scold the children like that, the rabbi wants to crush the clay figures. Jesus quickly claps his hands and calls to the figures to fly away. The figures come to life and fly away screaming loudly.

Jesus and Zeno

When Jesus is playing with some of the neighbors' children on the flat roofs of Nazareth, little Zenon falls into the depths and lies dead. Some playmates (according to different scriptures, they are neighbors) claim that Jesus pushed Zeno while he was playing. Jesus denies the act and asks the dead boy's parents to question their child. To do this, Jesus goes to Zeno and says to him: "Wake up!" and in fact Zeno is returning to life. Then Zenon tells his parents that he stepped on the edge of the roof and therefore fell off the roof. So Jesus was innocent.

Jesus and the water jar

Mary asks Jesus to fetch her some water from the nearby well and gives the boy a jug. While Jesus is trying to draw water with the other children, the jug slips away and breaks. The children are heartbroken because they cannot give up their jugs. But Jesus comforts her and carries the water home in his apron without spilling a drop.

Jesus and Zacchaeus

After Jesus used his powers to kill a boy in a quarrel, Joseph decides to give the boy to the scholar Zacchaeus . He offers to teach Jesus and to teach him "morals and decency". But soon there was bitter verbal battles between Jesus and Zacchaeus over the interpretation and spelling of the letters. When Jesus dares to correct the scholar, Zacchaeus gives up and says to Joseph: “So I ask you, Brother Joseph, take this child back to your house. Because this is something big, a god or an angel, that I don't know how to say it. "

The story of Jesus and Zacchaeus is followed by other, very similar anecdotes , which ultimately lead to the story also passed down in the Bible, in which Jesus impressed the rabbis and readers of a Jewish temple.

Manuscripts and provenance

The gospel was widely used in Greek, Syrian, Hebrew, Latin, Georgian, and Old Bulgarian manuscripts. There are Greek versions of different lengths with numerous text deviations. The most famous version with 19 chapters goes back to Konstantin von Tischendorf .

It is not clear in which language the script was originally written.

reception

Koran

In the Koran, in sura 5, reference is made to the story in the Gospel of Childhood according to which Jesus formed sparrows out of clay and brought them to life. The statements are part of the belief in Jesus in Islam :

“(At that time) when God said: Jesus, Son of Mary! Remember my grace, which I showed you and your mother, [...] and (at that time) when you, with my permission, created something out of clay that looked like birds and blew into them so that, with my permission, they (after all real ) Birds were. [...] "

- Sura 5, verse 110 : Translation : Rudi Paret

High Middle Ages (Europe)

The childhood gospel according to Thomas had "like analogous texts stimulating the performing arts and legends since the high Middle Ages", for example the depictions of episodes from the childhood of Jesus in the Klosterneuburg Gospels (14th century):

  • Jesus carries water home in his lap because the water jar has broken; other children look on in amazement.

  • Jesus gives Mary the water in his lap.

  • Jesus puts together the broken jugs of the children who wanted to do the same and who willfully smashed their jars.

  • Jesus commands the carpenter Joseph to raise a dead man.

  • Joseph raises the dead on the stretcher.

  • While playing, the child Zeno falls from the roof of a house, two Jews accuse Jesus of giving him a push.

  • Jesus raises the dead child to testify to the accusers of Jesus' innocence.

  • Jesus and other children catch fish on the Sabbath.

  • A Jew who reprimands the children for this falls dead on the spot.

  • The children therefore sue Jesus in the case of adult Jews.

  • At the request of Mary and Joseph, Jesus raises the dead again.

  • Jesus plays with lions and leads them to the city gate. The townspeople are afraid.

  • Jesus brings the clay birds of his playmates to life.

  • Jesus argues with the teacher Zacharias about the nature of letters; the teacher wants to chastise him with the rod.

Literary assessment

The childhood gospels are to be valued as “testimonies of popular piety”, but cannot be used as historical sources. The KThom “vividly describes what the life of a child who is born as the Son of God and endowed with all power could look like. [...] A special attraction arises from the fact that in antiquity childhood was essentially determined by a lack of power and rights, and this is precisely what Jesus does not ”.

literature

  • Tony Burke (ed.): De infantia Iesv evangelivm Thomae (= Corpvs Christianorvm : Series Apocryphorum. 17). Brepols, Turnhout 2010, ISBN 978-2-503-53419-0 ( text edition, Greek).
  • Gerhard Schneider (Ed.): Evangelia infantiae apocrypha / Apokryphe childhood evangelisms. (= Fontes Christiani . 1st episode 18). Herder, Freiburg 1995, ISBN 3-451-22233-7 , S, 147-171 ( text edition, Greek-German).
  • Alfred Schindler (Ed.): Apocrypha to the Old and New Testament. Manesse, Zurich 1988, ISBN 3-7175-1756-2 ( text edition, German).
  • Sofia Donka Petkanova: Childhood Legends of Jesus . In: Encyclopedia of Fairy Tales. Volume 7. de Gruyter, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-11-013478-0 , Sp. 1355-1361 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
  • Philipp Vielhauer : History of early Christian literature. Introduction to the New Testament, the Apocrypha, and the Apostolic Fathers. de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1978, ISBN 3-11-007763-9 , pp. 672-678 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
  • Robert McLachlan Wilson:  Apocrypha II . In: Theologische Realenzyklopädie (TRE). Volume 3, de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1978, ISBN 3-11-007462-1 , pp. 316–362.

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ Art. Apokryphen II, in: Theologische Realenzyklopädie (TRE), Vol. 3, p. 332.
  2. ^ Hans-Josef Klauck: Apocryphical Gospels - An Introduction. Clark, London / New York 2003, ISBN 0-567-08390-X , pp. 73 f. ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  3. ^ Klaus-Gunther Wesseling:  Thomas, Apostle Jesu Christi. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 9, Bautz, Herzberg 1995, ISBN 3-88309-058-1 , Sp. 1292-1323.  ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
  4. ↑ Thomas Söding : Apocryphal Christmas? The Bible and popular piety. Münster undated, p. 1 f. ( online ; PDF; 69 kB). Reprinted under the title: Apocryphal Christmas? Ox and donkey, stable and manger, virgin and child. In: Pastoralblatt for the dioceses of Aachen, Berlin, Essen, Hildesheim, Cologne, Osnabrück, ISSN  1865-2832 , Vol. 57 (2005), pp. 355-361.
  5. ^ Philipp Vielhauer , in: Edgar Hennecke , Wilhelm Schneemelcher : Apokryphen des Neue Testament. P. 672 ff.
  6. ^ Hans-Josef Klauck: Apocryphical Gospels - An Introduction. Clark, London / New York 2003, ISBN 0-567-08390-X , p. 64 ( limited preview in the Google book search): “One should not expect historically reliable information, even in exceptional cases, from this literature.”
  7. ^ Judith Hartenstein:  Childhood Gospel according to Thomas (KThom). In: Michaela Bauks, Klaus Koenen, Stefan Alkier (Eds.): The Scientific Bibellexicon on the Internet (WiBiLex), Stuttgart 2006 ff., Accessed on January 20, 2014.