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The Gospel of Philip connects Romans' account of a commandment bringing death with the tree that killed Adam. Calling the tree the Law turns Paul's struggle into a reading of Eden, where knowing good and evil cannot, by itself, make someone do good.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Romans 7:10
New Testament
7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Absolutely not! Certainly, I would not have known sin except through the law. For indeed I would not have known what it means to desire something belonging to someone else if the law had not said, “Do not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing the opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of wrong desires. For apart from the law, sin is dead. 9 And I was once alive apart from the law, but with the coming of the commandment, sin became alive 10 and I died. So I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life brought death! 11 For sin, seizing the opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it I died.
Gospel of Philip 10:20
Nag Hammadi
I wish that [garden is the place where it] will be said to me: [“... eat] this,” or, “do not eat [that,” as you] desire. This is the place where I will eat everything, where the Tree of Knowledge dwells, the one that killed Adam. However, the Tree of Knowledge here has restored life to man. The Law was the tree. It was able to bestow knowledge of good and evil. It neither took away from him evil, nor did it establish him in what is good. Instead, it produced death for those who ate of it, because when he said, “eat this,” “do not eat that,” it was the origin of death.
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Notes and References
“... Is the law which energizes the passions itself ‘‘sin'’? Paul answers that it is not, but adds that “I would not have known sin apart from the law” (7:7). According to the Gospel of Philip, the law evoked the awareness that destroyed Adam's innocence: “the law was the tree: it has power to give knowledge (gnosis) of good and evil.” But the law could not keep man from “place him in the good"; the knowledge it conveys to man only destroys him.''* Effectively, ‘the law of nature” is only ‘‘death.""''® ...”
Pagels, Elaine Hiesey
The Gnostic Paul: Gnostic Exegesis of the Pauline Letters
(pp. 31-32) Fortress Press, 1975
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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