I've had Robinson's "Nag Hammadi Library" for some years. The paperback cover is all beat up. The pages are dog-eared, and I've scribbled a few notes here and there as I have struggled to understand these obscure texts.
Then I noticed this new (2007) edition has come out. I decided to see what sort of progress has been made in the study of these texts.
I'm immediately impressed. First of all, this is a hardcover version, as opposed to my old paperback edition of the NHL.
Second, the translation and layout of these texts are much more readable.
If you get really interested in these texts, you can compare various translations, or even learn Coptic. I think you're more likely to get interested in these texts if you start with readable translations such as those found here.
There are places in my old Nag Hammadi Library where it's very difficult to make any sense of what the text says. Seems to me the problem isn't the original writer's inability to write or my inability to read, but something that happened somewhere in between. This new volume reads more clearly in some of these difficult sections. The Second Discourse (Treatise) of the Great Seth, for example, is much more readable in this volume.
As another reviewer has said, several texts not found at Nag Hammadi are included in this volume, including the Gospel of Judas. Um, are these all the gnostic texts? I wouldn't say so. "Gnostic" is a pretty hard-to-define category anyway. It's a label stuck on these people by their adversaries in the late second century.
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Reviews with images
Nag Hammadi Scriptures - the International Edition
For anyone that is interested in searching through the scriptures, this volume is a must have. The book arrived as advertised but I had to purchase the hardcover version eventually. The hard cover version is bigger, and the quality of the paper is thicker and better than that of the paperback version. Of course, the hardcover version is sturdier and will last longer with proper handling. The font size used in the hardcover is also slightly bigger making the reading a better experience.This is an amazing refence book, very rich in contents.
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Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2008
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Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2021
This is an amazing refence book, very rich in contents.
Nag Hammadi Scriptures - the International Edition
Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2021
For anyone that is interested in searching through the scriptures, this volume is a must have. The book arrived as advertised but I had to purchase the hardcover version eventually. The hard cover version is bigger, and the quality of the paper is thicker and better than that of the paperback version. Of course, the hardcover version is sturdier and will last longer with proper handling. The font size used in the hardcover is also slightly bigger making the reading a better experience.Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2021
This is an amazing refence book, very rich in contents.
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