Thomas 29: Great Wealth in Poverty
Put your hand flat on the table and look at it for a few seconds. Knuckles, a scar or two, the veins that show more every year. Somewhere behind those fingers is the one doing the looking, and nobody has ever explained to anyone’s satisfaction how the two got together. Saying 29 of the Gospel of Thomas is about that exact puzzle. It gets quoted as proof that the Gnostics hated the body, because it ends by calling the body “poverty.” Read the whole thing, though, and the word that keeps coming back is “marvel.” Let’s look at what the saying actually claims, and how the wonder in it outweighs the insult. ...