Texts in Conversation
Irenaeus reports a story the Marcosians told, where the boy Jesus will not say beta until his teacher explains alpha. In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus asks why his disciples seek the end before they have found the beginning.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Gospel of Thomas 1:18
Nag Hammadi
17 Jesus said, “I will give you what no eye has seen and what no ear has heard and what no hand has touched and what has not arisen in the human heart.” 18 The disciples said to Jesus, “Tell us how our end will be.” Jesus said, “Have you discovered the beginning, that you are seeking the end? For where the beginning is, there the end will be. Blessed is the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death.” 19 Jesus said, “Blessed is the one who existed before coming into being. If you become my disciples and listen to my words, these stones will serve you. For you have five trees in paradise which do not change, summer or winter, and their leaves do not fall. Whoever knows them will not taste death.”
Irenaeus, Against Heresies 1.20
Early Christian
1 Besides the above [misrepresentations], they adduce an unspeakable number of apocryphal and spurious writings, which they themselves have forged, to bewilder the minds of foolish men, and of such as are ignorant of the Scriptures of truth. Among other things, they bring forward that false and wicked story which relates that our Lord, when He was a boy learning His letters, on the teacher saying to Him, as is usual, Pronounce Alpha, replied [as He was bid], Alpha. But when, again, the teacher bade Him say, Beta, the Lord replied, First tell me what Alpha is, and then I will tell you what Beta is. This they expound as meaning that He alone knew the Unknown, which He revealed under its type Alpha.
Date: 175-190 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
“... 18.2 Jesus said, ‘Have you uncovered the beginning, such that you seek the end?’ Literally, ‘For have you uncovered …’: the [...] is out of place here. This saying may be related to the apocryphal story of Jesus as a boy correcting his teachers about alpha and beta (IGT 6.9; cf. 13.1–2), which in some form is adopted by the Marcosians. (The parallel is not exact: alpha and omega would fit better with GTh 18.2.) If there is a relation, the thought is that just as Jesus’ first teacher does not understand alpha and therefore cannot possibly deal with beta (IGT 6.9), so the disciples do not understand the beginning, and so should not be concerning themselves with the end. ...”
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