In his Foreword to this volume, Kevin J. Vanhoozer has helpfully drawn attention to Francis Watson’savowedly theological work in the 1990s and 2000s. My aim here is to take up the story from there and focus in particular on his more recent work, on canonical and noncanonical Gospels. This field is evident most magnificently in his monograph Gospel Writing, but has continued to be discussed in a number of edited volumes and essays: a fascinating conference hosted by Francis in Durham, for example, produced the book Connecting Gospels.1 Its subtitle has been something of a motto for Francis’ recent work: Beyond the Canonical/Non-Canonical Divide. Francis’ comparative work on canonical and noncanonical Gospels can also be seen as a study of reception, as for example in his analysis of the Apocalypse of Peter’s rewriting and development of Matthew’s Olivet discourse.2 In that spirit, I will in this Afterword take the Gospel of Philip as a case study of Gospel reading – first, as a text that engages in Gospel reading; second, as it is read as Gospel in antiquity; and finally, how it might affect our reading of canonical Gospels.

Simon Gathercole surveys the various non-canonical gospels and their respective christologies. He first orients the reader to the field of research, noting the competitive positioning of non-canonical gospels relative to the four canonical gospels. He then shows how more recent scholarship has sought either to blur the canonical boundary or to compare and contrast the canonical gospels with their non-canonical counterparts in respect of history, theology and ethics.

Investigates the proliferating texts and traditions about Jesus in the early church and the decision in favour of the canonical four. By examining the competing options, the decision in favour of a fourfold gospel is seen as a decision for plurality within limits: the limits sustaining the coherence of the apostolic testimony to Jesus, and the plurality allowing the richness and complexity of the truth about Jesus to be displayed.