Study On The Theology Of The Gospel Of Thomas

As one of the most significant scriptures besides New Testament,the Gospel of Thomas is titled as the "Fifth Gospel".This ancient scripture which was unearthed in the middle of last century reflects a number of unique religious and philosophical features,it is important for the study of both early Christian theology and also the Gnosticism.The purpose of this dissertation is to analyze and summarize the theological thoughts of the Gospel of Thomas according to its text,as well as to compare the conclusions with different religious tradition.The first section of this dissertation presents an introduction of the Gospel of Thomas,along with its relationship to Christianity and Gnosticism.Then it performs a literature review.The second section interprets the worldview and eschatology form the viewpoint of cosmology,the Gospel of Thomas broke the dualism between the "City of God"and the "City of Man".Meanwhile,it raised an idea of "over-realized" eschatology which showed that the heaven was already came onto the earth and the man could only discover this fact by means of self-improvement and spiritual growth.The third section interprets the Christology of the Gospel of Thomas.Jesus was not a Saviour any longer,He was a revealer instead,this alteration of Jesus's identity fluctuated the basis of the Christian belief therefore.Besides that,the Gospel of Thomas abandoned the core doctrines such as Incarnation,Passion and Resurrection,the Crucifixion is neither a key point but it regarded Jesus as a spiritual leader who delivered the secret sayings to the human beings,the man who comprehended these sayings would fulfill the self-redemption.The fourth section interprets the theory of redemption from anthropological perspective.The Gospel of Thomas declined the concept of "Original Sin" and the God's plan of Salvation,it proposed an awareness of self-redemption instead.In the meantime,the Gospel emphasized the idea of unification which was crucial for the enhancement of one's own spirituality,and the isolated individual was incapable of returning to the primal being unless being unified with others.The dissertation applied a framework of "cosmos-theos-aner" to analyze the text of the Gospel of Thomas on account of its vital role in the study of religious philosophy and makes a summary of the theological thoughts of the Gospel of Thomas in the final section.Although these thoughts are disparate from the canonical Christian traditions,they are closer to the Eastern wisdom.Hence the dissertation carries on a comparative study which taken Buddhism as an example and probes into the theoretical value as well as the realistic significance to the religious dialogue.