bloggedy blog

:: Thursday, January 22, 2004 ::

Salon review: The Gnostic Bible
Add biblical scholar Marvin Meyer and poet/translator Willis Barnstone to the list of authors cashing in on the gnosticism craze. Their new book, The Gnostic Bible: Gnostic Texts of Mystical Wisdom form the Ancient and Medieval Worlds, is "a huge collection of Gnostic sacred writings," writes Donna Minkowitz in her Salon review of the book. (Subscription or free one-day pass to Salon required to read the review.) "These include not just the famous Jewish and Christian heresies from before the third century A.D. that are usually indicated by the G-word, but also medieval Manichaean, Cathar, Persian, and even Islamic and Chinese heresies that stem, in one way or another, from that original Middle Eastern manic Gnostic spark."

Minkowitz doesn't hide her joy in discovering such a collection -- "I was very excited to see all of these radical, anti-Yahweh religious texts assembled in one volume, some of them in English for the first time" -- but seems disappointed that "Barnstone and Meyer end up giving us the worst of both worlds, academia and uninformed pop culture."

"Their edition combines the sorts of things that give academic writing a bad name -- long, dry introductions to the texts, obtrusive footnotes that state the obvious -- with no effort to elucidate the really juicy and controversial points on which lay readers might like some guidance," writes Minkowitz. She adds: "I'm sad to tell you, based on this new edition, that it is heartbreakingly easy for radical, God-mocking heresies to turn into smarmy vanilla orthodoxy." Well, yeah. Any reader of The Da Vinci Code could have told her that.

:: Andrew 07:12 + ::
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