The Gospel of Truth

Named from its own opening words ("The Gospel of Truth is a joy..."); not a narrative gospel but a meditation or homily on how the Father, unknown to all, is made known through Jesus, who dissolves Error and forgetfulness with knowledge. Irenaeus (c. AD 180) says the followers of Valentinus had a "Gospel of Truth", and many scholars think this is that book, perhaps by Valentinus himself, written in Greek in the mid-2nd century AD; the author is not named. It survives in Coptic in Nag Hammadi Codex I, 3 (with fragments in Codex XII), and uses the parable of the lost sheep, a "living Book of the Living" and images of jars, nightmares and fragrance. This is Mark M. Mattison's public-domain translation from Codex I; chapter numbers are the manuscript's page numbers (16-43) and each paragraph is a verse. His section headings and notes are not reproduced; square brackets mark gaps and restorations, parentheses his supplied words. Not part of any church's canon.