Peter to Philip

Another text shared between Tchacos and Nag Hammadi is a work claimed from Peter to Philip. Sadly there's no Greek to triangulate the Coptic; but here's Nag Hammadi's take.

It only starts with the letter; most of it is about yet another appearance by Jesus to the Apostles, whom Peter leads. The core of it concerns the same gnostic myth we see in the apocalypse of James - probably why the two shared Tchacos. Although it's in a different volume over in Nag Hammadi. Also like Tchacos-James, it's subordinationist, although without James' Arian jargon.

The main myth here is that a feminine force - the Mother - in her folly, disobeyed the Father. She wanted to "raise up aeons" but made mistakes which the Arrogant One, which I assume is Yaltabaoth from the Johannine apocraphon I mean apocryphon, seized upon. I don't see where this is Biblical in the slightest so I file it as voodoo, like Enoch. Note the misogynic tendency in gnosticism traceable even to the Gospel of Thomas.

The Philip tradition seems more in tune with the feminine, as in the Gospel associated with him (which is in Nag Hammadi) and the Gospel of Mary (which is not). The latter shows Peter in a bad light, for its part.

This short revelation's content is relevant to Tchacos, where Nag Hammadi treated this as a tack-on. I'd further thought, and I suspect most of us think, that Tchacos has the original for ApJames. Tchacos-Peter, here, disappoints me. Peter's theme is human suffering. In this it echoes the first letter ascribed to Peter in our New Testament. Where Nag Hammadi's Jesus was a stranger to suffering, Tchacos would swap with that Jesus is a stranger to death.

As a work about pain here is a creed about the Passion, with the crown first and then the purple as John 19:2 (and not Mark 15:17). Philip's prominence is likewise Johannine although Philip does get noted in the Synoptics as well. Jesus' parting words on "peace" (for believers) and his command "fear not" look like John 14:27.

Besides 1 Peter and John, "behold I am with you always" looks to translate Matthew 28:20. John 14:16 instead has Jesus promise that the Paraclete will be with you always.

Interestingly Origen hits out at a Johannine-inspired notion that Jesus ever promised not to judge [guilty] those who believed in his name. For John 3:18 - Origen points out - you must believe in Jesus, in order for Jesus not to judge you. The names of Jesus are important to Tchacos-James, as I noted yesterday; the Father can be only "He Who Is" but the Son's names are passwords. (Remember, Nag Hammadi's edition is late and bad.)

This "Peter" text serves to unite Peter's community with John's, on Peter's terms.