This chapter deals with an aspect of the Nag Hammadi texts often portrayed as one of the reasons why they do not fit into a Christian context: namely, the many passages touting different constellations of vowels and magical letters. These have not been neglected in previous research but have mainly been treated separately, in light of the particular text and their specific context, representing their ‘pagan’ origin. This chapter focuses on the question of why this phenomenon appears in an otherwise chiefly Christian text collection and how they would have been understood and used by those who owned, copied and read the Nag Hammadi texts. The magical vowel features in the texts are read in light of the mystical practices with letters of Pachomius the Great, as described in Pachomius’ Letter 6 and the Greek Vita Pachomi. It is argued that the magical letter feature of the texts would have made them of particular interest for monks in a Pachomian milieu.

This chapter introduces the scholarly conflict over the origin of the Nag Hammadi codices and problematises them from the various perspectives. It argues that there are strong scholarly trends in both camps that have influenced the study and understanding of the texts and, further, that the codices’ material features have been understudied in previous analyses of their provenance. The chapter goes on to provide an overview of previous research and concludes with an outline of the content of the book. It maintains that the texts’ palaeographical, visual and editorial features may offer ways through the polarised scholarly debates concerning the background of the texts. It also suggests that by learning more about this significant, early Christian manuscript find we stand to gain important new insights about a formative period of early Christian history when the boundaries of orthodoxy and heresy were beginning to take shape.

This chapter studies the implications of the multiple versions of texts in the Nag Hammadi codices. Previously, scholars have viewed the existence of such duplicates as indicating that the texts were not meant to be regarded as a collection, or even that they were not owned by the same people. Who would keep two copies of the same text? This chapter offers a new interpretation and argues that reading two or more text versions parallel to each other could, in fact, be used as a valuable interpretative and theological exercise tool. The various Nag Hammadi duplicates and triplicates are studied, and the differences between them are analysed in light of ancient school exercises practised in Christian monasteries. Keeping multiple versions turned them into useful pedagogic tools when training monks in interpretation and the practice of reformulating gnomic sentences. The chapter draws on the growing field studying textual fluidity in ancient texts.

This chapter introduces the scholarly conflict over the origin of the Nag Hammadi codices and problematises them from the various perspectives. It argues that there are strong scholarly trends in both camps that have influenced the study and understanding of the texts and, further, that the codices’ material features have been understudied in previous analyses of their provenance. The chapter goes on to provide an overview of previous research and concludes with an outline of the content of the book. It maintains that the texts’ palaeographical, visual and editorial features may offer ways through the polarised scholarly debates concerning the background of the texts. It also suggests that by learning more about this significant, early Christian manuscript find we stand to gain important new insights about a formative period of early Christian history when the boundaries of orthodoxy and heresy were beginning to take shape.

This chapter surveys the body of ancient Gnostic apocalypses, works that differentiate God from the creator of the world and identify humanity as divine. These apocalypses are important for our understanding of Greek, Jewish, Coptic, and Manichaean literature, as well as early Islam, but a brief look at two such apocalypses—the Apocryphon of John and the Apocalypse of Paul—reminds us that their use of visionary motifs and pseudepigraphy also served diverse ends in the world of early Christianity.