Saint Thomas the Apostle: New Testament, Apocrypha, and Historical Traditions by Johnson Thomaskutty (review)

The issue of the nature and significance of the mysterious apostle Thomas, usually understood to be Didymus Judas Thomas from the Gospel of John (also known as "Doubting Thomas"), has received some attention in past years, as is, for instance, attested in a recent work by K. S. Mathew, J. C. Chennattuserry and A. Bungalowparambil, St. Thomas and India: Recent Research (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2020). Johnson Thomaskutty's monograph is one of the few that attempts to synthesise all of the extant early Thomasine literature into one analysis, which is both the strength but, sadly, also the weakness of the book. While Thomaskutty's goal is to analyse all of the ancient Thomasine works, he specifically asks:

Are the Thomas references in the Gospel of John, the Thomas compositions, and the early Thomas traditions in northwestern and southern India purely legendary as biblical scholars have assumed or do they preserve unexamined historical traditions intermittently as the Thomas Christians in India have believed? Thus, this study is an endeavor to understand the person and work of Didymus Judas Thomas from a comprehensive perspective using an interdisciplinary methodology.

(1; my italics)

We should, for a moment, consider the implications of this goal. Thomaskutty at the very start of the book juxtaposes "legend" and "unexamined historical traditions" and gives us the impression that he might be seeking the "historical Thomas" and his relation to India and Indian Christianity. Indeed, as one reads the book, the author's sympathy for the historical value of Thomasine texts and traditions is quite apparent. At times it even seems as if the author wants to reclaim (the historical) Didymus Judas Thomas for Indian Christianity; although not stated directly, it seems that such an endeavour for Thomaskutty would also lend (historical) authority to ancient Indian Christian traditions.

Unfortunately, a study such as this would be plagued by problems from the outset. Thomaskutty is never truly clear what he means by seeking "unexamined historical traditions" for Thomas. All of the texts he lists, have been examined in the past (thus, they are not, strictly, "unexamined"). And when one looks at the repertoire of literature under discussion, including the Gospel of John, the Gospel of Thomas, Book of Thomas the Contender, Acts of Thomas, and Infancy Gospel of Thomas, along with several patristic and later traditions, it is clear that the analysis will require great nuance and a high level of abstraction in order to be relevant and to make a contribution, which is, unfortunately, not the case with this book. Except for the analysis of the Gospel of John's character of Thomas (Thomaskutty established himself as a NT scholar of Johannine literature with his book, Dialogue in the Book of Signs: A Polyvalent Analysis of John 1:19–12:50 [Leiden: Brill, 2015], which was generally well received in the field) the discussions tend to be cursory and with varying degrees of detail and critical reading.

The first part of the book examines the figure of Thomas in the Gospel of John. This is the most detailed part of the book. This section is mostly a conventional exegetical and literary analysis of the relevant Thomas passages in John. The discussion focuses on John 11:16; 14:5; 20:24–28; and 21:2. The bulk of the discussion centres on the literary character of Thomas in the Gospel of John. It should be said that Thomaskutty also assumes that Thomas is the Beloved Disciple, which is further strengthened by a foreword written by James Charlesworth in this book (who argued the point extensively, but not always persuasively). However, it should be said that this is by no means an decided point in scholarship. In the first part, after introductory material, the context of Lazarus's death and Jesus's death (John 11:1–12:11) is discussed, as...