Resurrection in Acts of Thomas
(avg. read time: 6–12 mins.)
To this point, we have examined four apocryphal Acts related to the apostles:
Our final example of the apocryphal Acts we are examining here is also the longest one. Divided into thirteen “acts” and 170 chapters, the text relates stories of the apostle Thomas—often referred to as Judas Thomas—in India. This is the most extensive relatively early example of Thomas’s long-standing traditional association with India. This association is upheld today by the Saint Thomas Christians (including the Malankara Orthodox Syrians and various others), who are historically related to Syriac Christians. The book indicates this by how, after Thomas’s martyrdom, his body is brought to Mesopotamia.
This text itself was originally composed in Syriac, and the Greek text is a translation of the same.1 One can also see the ascetic influence that was strong among Syriac Christians at the time. The influence even took on the form of Encratism that has been regarded as heterodox. This is actually clearer in the Greek text than the extant Syriac mss, where there have been attempts to excise Encratite elements. While we see an emphasis on virginity here like we noted in the Acts of Paul and Thecla, it goes even beyond that.
On the subject of resurrection, I note that this is the only one of the apocryphal Acts that N. T. Wright addresses in his The Resurrection of the Son of God. This was my first introduction to the book many years ago. He describes it as “of Manichaean tendency,” and says a couple sentences later:
It lacks the developed mythologies of Valentinian gnosticism, but shares in a loosely dualist and encratistic worldview in which the redeemer descends to earth, reveals to the initiates who he is and thus who they are, and re-ascends to lead the way back to the world of light. The faithful are thus set free from the realm of the material body. This ahs some analogies with Gnosticism, even though the major motifs of the latter are absent.2
Central to this characterization is the “Hymn of the Pearl” (chs. 108–113), also called the “Hymn of the Soul.” Of course, for all the attention it has garnered (being a rather interesting text), it is only extant in one Syriac ms and one Greek ms of this work, and it is in different locations. Moreover, scholars have long recognized that it is an independent work that was incorporated into the Acts. This would seem to suggest that it is ill-advised to interpret the whole work through this lens. But it leads Wright to say that the story of the colt in chs. 39–41 is symbolic as the colt, “represents the body, which ‘carries’ the soul for a while, but cannot be redeemed with it, so is not raised from the dead by the apostle.”3 This allegorical interpretation is not suggested by the text itself. It is a result of assumptions that Wright brings to the text. And I am not convinced that he has represented this text fairly when he concludes with this statement about Thomas’s prayer in ch. 147:
What matters is the soul, not the body. The latter is cheerfully left behind, not wanted on the final voyage. Here we have truly turned a corner, losing sight of virtually all the texts we have studied in this chapter, never mind the New Testament. We back once more in the world of ancient Platonism. Resurrection is not even reinterpreted, but simply rejected. We are on the threshold of gnosticism.4
There are certainly heterodox elements in this text. Its links to Encratism are often noted. It is similar to the docetic texts in the Acts of John in how it presents Jesus appearing in the likeness of Thomas (11–13), though this may simply refer to how Thomas is said to be Jesus’s twin. And Thomas does, in fact, use the language of being set free from the body in his martyrdom (160). But like the Acts of John, these elements are mixed with others that are closer to orthodoxy. If resurrection is “simply rejected,” one must wonder why there are resurrection miracles and why the text maintains belief in Jesus’s resurrection (without reinterpreting it).
As usual, my analysis will proceed first with explicit references to resurrection. I will then follow with consideration of implicit links to the same. However, because of the mixed theological character here, I must acknowledge that this last section is more mixed, more suggestive, and potentially less probable than other implicit links we have noted in this ongoing series.
Explicit References
Before the non-occurrence of a raising that Wright interprets allegorically, there is an episode of the raising of Gad, the brother of King Gundaphorus. The king had threatened to kill Thomas because he thought that Thomas was disrespecting him for not building him a palace while saying that he was building him a heavenly one. Gad then dies and is able to see this heavenly palace. But after the brief vision, his soul is returned to his body, and he is said to live again (ἀνέζησεν; 23). Gad later uses the same verb to describe himself as having grieved, died, and revived (ἀνέζησα; 23).
This is not a common verb for resurrection, but it was associated with resurrection imagery in Luke 15:24. Unlike that context, though, this is not meant metaphorically or spiritually. Gad lives again because his soul returns to his body.
The next pertinent episode is the one Wright mentioned. After the donkey colt has conversed with Thomas, being like Balaam’s donkey, and Thomas has accepted his offer to sit upon him until he enters the city, Thomas dismisses the colt (39–41). Shortly thereafter, he dies, and the crowd who has witnessed this interaction calls on Thomas to “bring him to life and raise him up” (ζωοποίησον αὐτὸν καὶ ἀνέγειρον; 41). Thomas declares he is able to raise (ἐγεῖραι) him through the name of Jesus, but he is not going to raise (ἐγείρω) him (41). He does not explain why other than to say it is expedient and profitable for the colt if he is not raised.
Again, I should emphasize that the allegorical interpretation of this event that Wright gives is not native to this text. That does not in itself invalidate it. But this is not part of a larger teaching on there being no need for resurrection. Nothing about the story itself is obviously allegorical. The wonder of the colt being able to talk indicates that this is meant as a literal story. And this would not be the first time in stories of the apocryphal Acts that it was considered better for someone not to have been resurrected in some scenario. We have seen similar ideas in the Acts of Peter and the Acts of John, works which also had presentations of resurrection more in line with the NT and early Christian orthodoxy, even where there were mixtures of heterodox elements. The colt is also not obviously excluded simply for being an animal, as we have seen an animal can be a candidate for resurrection in these stories.
Nor does Thomas refuse to raise the dead for the rest of the narrative. After he hears the story of a recent convert who murdered a woman he loved when she would not commit to a bond of chastity with him after he converted, he prays to Jesus to raise (ἐγείρῃς) her (53). He then instructs the young man to act so as to reverse the deed in raising (εγεἰρω) her, and she responds by springing up (54). Indeed, Thomas will later be identified as peculiar by the fact that it is reported that he raises (ἐγείρει) the dead (96). In anticipation of his coming death by the order of Misdaeus, he says that he sleeps and awakens no more to sleep again; he dies and lives again (ἀναβιῶ) to taste death no more (142).5 These are some of the features of the text that Wright did not mention, as they would not fit his characterization of it.6 Though, it is also curious that Wright quoted part of Thomas’s prayer in 147 while overlooking the resurrection imagery therein that he “made alive the dead” (τὸν νεκρὸν ἐζωοποίησα).
Furthermore, if we are to think that this text simply rejects resurrection, it would surely be counterproductive for the text to call Jesus, God of God, the Savior who “makes the dead live” (ὁ τοὺς νεκροὺς ζωοποιῶν). Yet that is exactly the statement we find in ch. 47. The key term is also used for characteristic and identifying action in giving life in the context of death multiple times in the NT (John 5:21; Rom 4:17; 8:11; 1 Cor 15:22, 36, 45; 2 Cor 3:6; 1 Pet 3:18). It is even similar to a later description in ch. 60 as “the one who lives and makes alive those who lie in death” (ὁ ζῶν καὶ ζωοποιῶν τοὺς ἐν τῷ θανάτῳ κατακειμένους).
It would also be counterproductive for the text to make traditional affirmations of the gospel. We see in ch. 59 that Jesus is said to have been “crucified and raised after three days from the dead” (σταροῦται καὶ ἐγείρεται διά τριῶν ἡμερῶν ἐκ νεκρῶν). The wording is not exactly like most formulations in the Gospels (or 1 Cor 15:4 for that matter), but it does resemble Matt 26:61 // Mark 14:58 with how others describe what Jesus said he would do to “the temple.” It is still a fitting description for Jesus’s resurrection and its timing (cf. Matt 27:63; Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:34; John 2:19–22). It also fits with many other declarations of how his resurrection separated him from the rest of the dead.
In another prayer in ch. 80 Thomas references the three-stage gospel narrative. He glorifies Jesus that he died in order to make us live (ζωοποιήσῃ). He glorifies him for his resurrection (ἀναστάσει) “that was from the dead” (τῇ ἀπὸ τῶν νεκρῶν), for it was by this that rising (ἔγερσις) and rest came to our lives. The first term for resurrection is the typical one for resurrection in the NT (see here), while the latter only appears in Matt 27:53 for describing Jesus’s resurrection (cf. Irenaeus, Haer. 1.2.1; 1.11.2). Then he glorifies Jesus for his ascension into the heavens and how it opened the way and the promises to us.7
Other explicit references to resurrection appear in the context of sacraments. In connection with baptism and the new birth it signifies, Thomas praises God as the one who raises (ἀνιστῶν) the new person (132). Subsequently, those who partake of the eucharist are blessed with incorruptibility and immortality (133). In the final reflection on the eucharist, as Thomas is reflecting on the various events of the gospel climax, he prays in correspondence with the new tomb that believers would receive renewal of soul and body, and as Jesus arose (ἀνέστης) and revived (ἀνεβίωσας), he prays that those who partake would revive (ἀναβιώσαντες), live (ζήσωμεν), and stand before him in righteous judgment (158), signifying resurrection at the final judgment (as we have seen many times elsewhere). Earlier in the Syriac, partaking of the eucharist is linked with remission of sins and everlasting resurrection (50).
Implicit Links
Because of the admixture of traditional statements about resurrection, stronger emphases on the soul (including as distinct from the body), and Encratite elements, it is not always clear that the typical implicit links to resurrection are indicative of resurrection here as well. But it is at least possible or probable in some instances that this is so. As one example of a motif where this ambiguity applies, consider the vocabulary of incorruptibility, immortality, and everlasting life (15; 37; 49–50; 85; 101; 103–104; 120–121; 124; 130; 133; 135–137; 139). Some of these are linked with sacraments, which may make the association with the particulars of the gospel story more probable. But they may be subject to more spiritualized application without implying the resurrection of the body. It is also a question of whether this association holds in the Greek or the more sanitized and orthodox Syriac (as in the example of ch. 50 where the Syriac does make a definite link with resurrection while the Greek does not).
Similarly, in other cases we have seen, it could be taken for granted that receiving life in the age to come (21) would be linked with resurrection to everlasting life. But that is not as clear here. Nor is it obvious that inheriting the kingdom, though it is language inherited from the New Testament and its teachings related to resurrection, necessarily implies resurrection either (66; 94; 108).
On the other hand, in light of the references to the major gospel events, the references to Jesus’s coming again and his being the eternal King, since they are juxtaposed to the references to his death, imply his resurrection (28; 83; 128; 139). Likewise, God being the judge of the living and the dead, as we have seen many times already (Acts 10:42; Rom 14:9; 2 Tim 4:1; 1 Pet 4:5; Barn. 7:2; Polycarp, Phil. 2:1; Acts John 8; Acts Peter 17), well enough implies resurrection for the dead to receive judgment (28). Thomas’s expectation of reigning in the kingdom and judging the twelve tribes of Israel is obviously derived from the Gospels (Matt 19:28 // Luke 22:28–30), but it is not clear that it has been reinterpreted to imply something other than resurrection to participate in that judgment.
Two other miscellaneous links should be mentioned. First, as with others we have seen, this text refers to Sunday as “the Lord’s day” (29), which derives from the fact that Jesus was raised on the first day of the week. Second, the description of God as the life that has subdued death (122) probably derives from his resurrecting action.
N. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God, vol. 3 of Christian Origins and the Question of God (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003), 532–33.
Ibid., 533.
Ibid., 533–34.
The uses of the present tense in this chapter are instances of what has been called the “futuristic present.” Furthermore, the key verb here is used for resurrection in 2 Clem. 19:4, as well as 2 Macc 7:9; Josephus, Ant. 18.14.
More ambiguous is the description of formerly demon-possessed women lying as the dead after the demons leave them (77) and Thomas calling on God for their lives to be aroused (ἀναστήτωσαν; 81). This does not appear to be a resurrection per se, but it is described in similar terms as awaking from sleep (cf. 29; 60).
Another summary later refers to the harrowing of hell while leaving Jesus’s resurrection implicit in the reference to his coming up (156).