This chapter continues the investigation of the work of incarnation, using engagement with scholarship on the historical Jesus to understand how Christ’s person and work are shaped by his receptivity to the world. In particular, the chapter concentrates upon: 1) Christ’s relation to the non-human world; 2) Christ’s location within the context of Roman Palestine; 3) Christ’s spiritual and intellectual formation within Second Temple Judaism; and 4) the significance of Jesus’ religious upbringing for his messianic consciousness.

This chapter shows that Davidic traditions were closely connected to the temple. It looks at the way the Jesus tradition broadly, and Matthew specifically, ties Jesus’s activity in the sanctuary to Davidic imagery, arguing that this likely reflects memories that have their origin in Jesus himself. Among other things, special attention is given to the account of Jesuss triumphal entry and to Matthews accounts of Jesuss activity in the temple.

The cosmic eschatology of the Gospel of Mary is the subject of Chapter 4, and it primarily examines the opening dialogue between Jesus and the disciples. I argue that the cosmology of the Gospel of Mary is simpler and more christocentric than has been assumed by past exegetes. This gospel shares the common Christian belief that matter is the raw material of a cosmos shaped by God. Matter has been affected by passions, which in turn affect the individual causing sin and death. Jesus, here called ‘the Good’, has come to dissolve/restore the cosmos to its original constituent parts. The Gospel of Mary stands in contrast to the ‘traditional’ expectation of a future parousia as found in the synoptic gospels, and actively contradicts this expectation by stating that ‘the Son of Man is within’. The make-up and dissolution of the cosmos is interpreted by using ideas already present in John and Paul.

Although the Gospel of Mary is a dialogue gospel, the text’s narrative frame is just as integral to understanding the message of the gospel as the eschatological teachings in the dialogues. The narrative frame includes Jesus’ departure, Mary’s intervention, and the ensuing dispute among the disciples. This chapter explores possibilities for what was contained in the missing opening pages of the Gospel of Mary, firmly situating the text within the dialogue gospel genre. It then analyzes the Saviour’s farewell discourse, which encourages the disciples to be active participants in the Christian message of salvation. The section on Mary’s intervention focuses on her relationship with the male disciples and her relationship with Jesus, and argues that the Coptic manuscript heightens animosity between the disciples in contrast to the earlier Greek versions. Mary’s relationship to Jesus, on the other hand, is one of succession. The final part of the narrative frame sees the disciples split into two factions, with Mary and Levi on one side and Peter and Andrew on the other. It is unclear at the ending of the gospel whether the disciples are reconciled, and this is explored in light of other dialogue gospels such as the Pistis Sophia.