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Clement of Alexandria quotes a Gospel parable in which the kingdom is like a man who casts a net and keeps the better fish. Like the Gospel of Thomas, Clement puts a man at the center, but only Thomas has him choose one large fish.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Gospel of Thomas 1:8
Nag Hammadi
7 Jesus said, “Blessed is the lion that the man will eat, so that the lion becomes a man. And cursed is the man whom a lion will eat, and the lion will become a man.” 8 And he said, “The human being is like a wise fisherman who cast his net into the sea and drew it up from the sea full of little fish. Among them the wise fisherman found a large, fine fish. He threw all the little fish back into the sea, and chose the large fish without difficulty. Whoever has ears to hear should hear.” 9 Jesus said, “Look, the sower went out, took a handful of seeds, and scattered them. Some fell on the road, and the birds came and gathered them. Others fell on rock and they did not take root in the soil and did not produce ears. Others fell among thorns, and they choked the seeds and worms ate them. And others fell on good soil, and it produced good fruit. It yielded sixty per measure and one hundred and twenty per measure.”
Clement of Alexandria, Stromata 6.11.61
Early Christian
"I must decrease," said the prophet John, and the Word of the Lord alone, in which the law terminates, "increase." Understand now for me the mystery of the truth, granting pardon if I shrink from advancing further in the treatment of it, by announcing this alone: "All things were made by Him, and without Him was not even one thing." Certainly He is called "the chief corner stone; in whom the whole building, fitly joined together, groweth into an holy temple of God," according to the divine apostle. I pass over in silence at present the parable which says in the Gospel: "The kingdom of heaven is like a man who cast a net into the sea and out of the multitude of the fishes caught, makes a selection of the better ones." And now the wisdom which we possess announces the four virtues in such a way as to show that the sources of them were communicated by the Hebrews to the Greeks. This may be learned from the following: "And if one loves justice, its toils are virtues.
Date: 195 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
“... Some parallels have given rise to a view that early Christian authors were aware of a version of the parable like that of Thomas; the parallels are not especially close, however. (i) In the case of Clement (Strom. 1.1.16.3; 6.11.95.3), there are numerous differences. [...] The most widely discussed parallel is that in Clement, Strom. 6.11.95.3, where there is a similar focus on ‘the man’. The similarity is not especially strong, however, since the distinctive feature of Thomas, namely the choice of a single fish, does not appear there. [...] A second reason for taking the parable this way is the introduction: ‘The man is like …’. While this may be the result of a textual corruption of a more original ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a man …’, as it stands, the parable refers to the ideal human being. The subject is not any person in general, because the point of comparison is the wise fisherman. ...”
* 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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