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Luke has Jesus bring fire on the earth, and Matthew has him bring a sword. In the Gospel of Thomas he brings fire, sword and war, and the war is found only in Thomas, probably added to explain the sword.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Matthew 10:34
New Testament
34 “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace but a sword! 35 For I have come to set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, 36 and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household.
Luke 12:49
New Testament
49 “I have come to bring fire on the earth—and how I wish it were already kindled! 50 I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is finished! 51 Do you think I have come to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!
Gospel of Thomas 1:16
Nag Hammadi
15 Jesus said, “When you see one who was not born of woman, fall on your faces and worship him; that one is your Father.” 16 Jesus said, “People perhaps think I have come to cast peace upon the world, and they do not know that I have come to cast divisions upon the earth: fire, sword, war. For there will be five in a house: three will be against two and two against three, the father against the son and the son against the father, and they will stand as solitary ones.” 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.”
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Notes and References
“... The principal interpretative debate over this saying (parr. Matt. 10.34–36; Lk. 12.51–53) concerns the meaning of ‘house’ in 16.3, and what follows from that. [...] 16.2 They do not know that I have come to bring divisions on the earth. This confirms the implication in 16.1 about the ignorance of humanity (cf. GTh 28, 113). [...] 16.2 Fire, sword, war. Luke has ‘fire’ (12.49), Matthew has ‘sword’ (10.34), ‘war’ is distinctive to Thomas. It is probably merely a gloss on ‘sword’, explaining the metaphor, even if it is with another metaphor. The overall effect of all three terms is to make even more vivid the earlier reference to ‘divisions’. ...”
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