Scholars Convinced: Jesus’ Wife Gospel is a Forgery!

By Nigel Tomes, Nov. 13, 2012.

Two months have elapsed since Harvard Prof. Karen L. King dropped a bombshell by announcing the ‘discovery’ of the previously- unknown, Gospel of Jesus’ Wife. King grabbed the global spotlight by introducing a papyrus fragment written in Coptic script which she claims dates back to the 4th-century. Four of the fragment’s 33 words translate into “Jesus said… my wife,” suggesting Jesus was married (or, at least, that some people thought so). Prof. King linked Jesus’ (alleged) wife with Mary Magdalene, asserting “The Gospel of Jesus’s Wife makes it possible to speak with certainty of the existence of a tradition affirming that Jesus was married (probably to Mary Magdalene), and it is highly probable that this tradition dates to the 2nd half of the 2nd century,” King wrote in a paper reportedly forthcoming in the prestigious Harvard Theological Review [HTR]. These extravagant claims go well beyond the scant evidence contained in the fragment’s 8 incomplete sentences. Although it refers to “Mary,” it’s impossible to say if this “Mary” is Jesus’ mother, Mary Magdalene or some other Mary. Moreover, King has offered no evidence supporting her claim that this 4th-century Coptic scrap derives from a 2nd-century Greek original. But these ‘details’ were swept aside in the media’s feeding frenzy over the possibility that Jesus was married. The Daily Mail (UK) proclaimed: 'Proof' Jesus was married found on ancient papyrus that mentions how Son of God spoke of his wife & Mary Magdalene” [Daily Mail (UK), 18 Sept. 2012] The Telegraph (UK) countered with, “Ancient Papyrus Could Be Evidence that Jesus Had a Wife” [Telegraph, (UK), 19 Sept. 2012] This initial response gave Dr. King’s 15 minutes of glory basking in the media’s spotlight. In retrospect, it was the high point for the Jesus’ Wife Gospel. Since then it’s been pretty much downhill all the way.

Scholars React with Skepticism

Prof. Francis Watson

Christian Askeland, of Münster, Germany, reported from the Rome conference where Prof. King presented her findings to Coptic scholars that two-thirds of attendees were extremely skeptical about the fragment’s authenticity, while the remaining one-third were sure it’s a forgery. Two days later, Prof. Francis Watson of Durham Univ. (UK) published a 6-page online article, “The Gospel of Jesus’ Wife: How a fake Gospel-Fragment was composed.” He claimed the Jesus’ Wife Fragment was a “copy & paste job” from the Coptic version of the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas. Moreover, Dr. Watson alleged that a line-break in Thomas had been copied into the Jesus’ Wife Fragment, a tell-tale sign of a forgery. Brown University’s Dr. Leo Depuydt was also outspoken; he declared, “The evening before, when I saw it online [on the Times website] before it was in print, I already knew it was a fake.” Dr. Depuydt’s critique is due to appear in the HTR. Other scholars were more tentative in their response.

Initial Response

Prof. Mark Goodacre

Mark Goodacre, Prof. in the Religion Department at Duke Univ., N. Carolina, USA, is representative of scholars willing give Prof. King’s Jesus’ Wife Gospel, the benefit of the doubt. Prof. Goodacre certainly isn’t hostile to Karen King’s claims; he has “no axe to grind.” He refers to Dr. King as a careful scholar who is “massively respected in the scholarly guild,” [Lisa Wangsness, Boston Globe, Sept. 27, 2012] “She’s made her mark on the field,” Goodacre said, “It’s a massive contribution to scholarship.” [Lisa Wangsness, Boston Globe, Nov. 11, 2012]

Dr. Goodacre’s initial response to King’s discovery [The Gospel of Jesus' Wife, Goodacre’s NT Blog, Wed., Sept. 19, 2012] notes the following points:

(1) “The way that this has been handled by Karen King & the others … (Harvard Divinity School; etc.) is exemplary…”

(2) “The fragment appears to be genuine but some will definitely want to place a question mark over its authenticity until more study can be done… [However] one of the 3 referees, for Harvard Theological Review, was skeptical about the authenticity of the piece.”

(3) “The text really does seem to presuppose that Jesus had a wife.  In Jesus' speech, he uses the Coptic phrase tahime, ‘My wife’.”

(4) “I am not a papyrologist but I can't get over how amateurish & blotchy the fragment's text looks.”   

Evidently Prof. Goodacre had reservations about the fragment. However he can’t be accused of having prejudged its authenticity.

Reporting Dr. Watson’s Findings

Soon after Goodacre reported Durham Prof. Francis Watson found links between the Jesus’ Wife Fragment and the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas. He wrote “Watson's analysis shows that the Jesus’ Wife Fragment appears to be dependent specifically on our Coptic Thomas.” Prof. Goodacre did not rush to label the Jesus’ Wife Gospel a modern forgery, rather he offered two possibilities, “As I see it, there are two options here.  Either the author of the Jesus [Wife] fragment got hold of [the Gospel of Thomas] in the late 4th century to be buried for 1500 years, or she/he got hold of it after …1945 [when it was discovered].” Evaluating, these options, Goodacre concluded, “While we cannot rule out the [first] possibility …it is much more likely that the author got hold of it [the Gospel of Thomas] in the modern period with its multiple reproductions, in print and internet, of that one witness.” Hence, Goodacre concluded the Jesus’ Wife Fragment was more likely a modern forgery, than an ancient forgery dating back to the 4th century.

Prof. Leo Depuydt

‘Divorcing Mrs. Jesus,’ Dr. Leo Depuydt's Report

Days later, Goodacre’s Blog detailed Prof. Depuydt's analysis, “which sheds further doubt on the authenticity of the fragment.” [‘Divorcing Mrs. Jesus,’ Leo Depuydt's Report, NT Blog, Oct. 10, 2012]. “There is no doubt in my mind whatsoever that the [Jesus’ Wife] text …is a patchwork of words and phrases from the published and well-known Coptic Gospel of Thomas…” Depuydt wrote, “It is therefore clear that the Text is not an independent literary composition at all;” in other words, it’s a fake.

“Further Evidence of Modern Forgery”

The next day, Goodacre posted “another twist to the tale,” called, “Jesus' Wife Fragment: Further Evidence of Modern Forgery,” reporting on Andrew Bernhard’s “brilliant analysis of the links between the fragment and Grondin's Interlinear [of Thomas’ Coptic Gospel].” Bernhard’s piece was titled, “How the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife Might have been Forged: A Tentative Proposal.” His contention, is that, “Line 1 of the Gospel of Jesus' Wife fragment copies a typo from … [the] interlinear of Coptic Thomas.” This tell-tale typo, Berhard contends, has been reproduced from the PDF version of Michael Grondin's Interlinear Coptic-English Translation of the Gospel of Thomas.” Notice, however, that Bernhard’s piece is called, “How the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife might have been Forged: a Tentative Proposal.” His proposal about how it “might have been forged” is “tentative” (not conclusive). These scholars can’t be accused of rushing to judgment on this issue.

Smoking Gun?

Goodacre responded to Bernhard’s find by asking “Is this the smoking gun?  It certainly looks like the author of the Gospel of Jesus' Wife fragment betrays his or her knowledge of Mike Grondin's interlinear by reproducing this one, rare typographical error, resulting in strange Coptic.” Again, note the tentative evaluation. For other scholars, this “smoking gun” rules out the possibility of an ancient forgery, leaving the only reasonable option that the “Jesus’ Wife Gospel” is a modern forgery. Thus Thomas L. McDonald, writes, “Given the accuracy of the online version, this is a striking point of similarity. The online [Interlinear] version is remarkably clean. The idea that this exact error was also made by a scribe 1600 ago years beggars belief.” [Thomas L. McDonald, Jesus’s Wife: Textual Fingerprints of a Forger, 11 Oct., 2012]

“Case of Authenticity a Very Difficult”

Faced with this accumulating evidence, Dr. Goodacre concludes, “I would have already put money on this thing being problematic, given the links between the fragment and the Coptic Gospel of Thomas," he explained. "But the link with the online Interlinear version of the Gospel of Thomas really makes, for me, the case of authenticity a very difficult one.” [Jeremy Hsu, Did Jesus have a wife? Scholar calls parchment 'forgery', Oct., 17, 2012, Tech News Daily] Still Prof. Goodacre was reluctant to make a definitive judgment at this point. This growing chorus questioning the authenticity of the Jesus’ Wife Gospel caused the Smithsonian to shelve a TV documentary and the Harvard Theological Review to make publication of King’s paper conditional on tests of the fragment’s ink. Clearly “the tide of scholarly opinion [was]… turning decidedly against the authenticity of the fragment” [Thompson & Kneipm, Swift Rise & Apparent Demise of "Jesus' Wife," Sightings, Oct., 25, 2012]

The Final Straw

Michael Grondin

Finally a Nov. 9 Blog entry, by Prof. Mark Goodacre arrived at a definitive conclusion. The piece, entitled, “The Jesus' Wife Fragment: How the Forgery Was Done,” featured Andrew Bernhard’s full exposition of how the Gospel of Jesus' Wife was forged based on Michael Grondin's online interlinear Gospel of Thomas. Bernhard’s article is entitled, “Notes on the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife Forgery.” Goodacre calls it “a well-written, persuasive account of how he sees the forger of the [Jesus’ Wife] fragment working” to perpetrate the Jesus’ Wife fraud using the interlinear Gospel of Thomas. Note that Goodacre’s title is definite—“How the Forgery Was Done” and Bernhard’s former evaluation, “How [it] might have been Forged: a Tentative Proposal,” has become “Notes on the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife Forgery.” Both authors are now convinced, based on the accumulated evidence, that the Jesus’ Wife Gospel is a modern forgery.

Anatomy of the Jesus’ Wife Forgery

Andrew Bernhard

Andrew Bernhard summarizes his findings as follows:

1. The Gospel of Jesus’ Wife borrows the framework for a simple dialogue between Jesus and his disciples from Gospel of Thomas...

2. All decipherable words in Jesus’ Wife appear in the Gospel of Thomas with a single exception: TAHIME (“my wife.”)

3. The words of each line of text in the Jesus’ Wife are found in close proximity to each other in the Gospel of Thomas

4. The forger has slightly redacted [revised] the Gospel of Thomas by making masculine [his] pronouns feminine [her] and (attempting to) transform affirmative/negative statements into their opposites.

5. More than half a dozen notable textual features in the Jesus’ Wife can be attributed to a forger’s dependence on Grondin’s Interlinear.

Jesus’ Wife a Modern Forgery

Based on this, Andrew Bernhard concludes “I think it is now fair to begin openly describing the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife as a modern forgery. Although it is admittedly a novel type of forgery, its text can be explained too easily and too completely as a ‘patchwork’ of words and short phrases drawn from theGospel of Thomas by a forger relying on Grondin’s Interlinear. The possibility that Gospel of Jesus’ Wife is a genuinely ancient writing seems extremely remote.

…Every word in Jesus’ Wife (except one) can be traced back to Gospel of Thomas, and every line of text inJesus’ Wife contains words found in close proximity to each other in Gospel of Thomas – even when there is no obvious relationship between them… Where a word might easily have been spelled differently in the different texts, both Jesus’ Wife and Gospel of Thomas have the same spelling... The forger has also inadvertently included several tell-tale peculiarities in grammar and spelling that reveal the modern origin ofJesus’ Wife. [A. Bernhard, Notes on the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife Forgery]

Forger’s Fingerprints in every Line

“The forger’s “fingerprints” are discernible in every line of text that has more than one word in it,” says Bernhard, enumerating:

In line 1, the forger has reproduced a typographical error from Grondin’s Interlinear … and a line break from [Thomas’ Gospel].

The 2nd line has been copied verbatim from Gospel of Thomas… except the forger has changed a third-person pronoun from masculine to feminine.

In line 3, the forger has used a Coptic spelling for the name “Mary” that is barely attested in antiquity but could well be derived from the English translation in Grondin’s Interlinear.

In line 4, the forger has omitted a conjunction…that would ordinarily be expected, probably as the result of a line break in [Thomas’ Gospel].

Line 5 contains a simple inversion of a negative phrase found in Gospel of Thomas, and the forger has switched its subject from masculine to feminine. …

In line 7, the forger has merely rearranged text from Gospel of Thomas… switching a masculine pronoun to its feminine equivalent …to mask the identity of his or her source. [Bernhard, Notes on the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife Forgery]

Only “My Wife” not copied from Thomas

“In the end, only a single Coptic word in Jesus’ Wife could not have been copied directly from Gospel of Thomas. This word— [rendered, “my wife”] …instantly transformed the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife into an international sensation. [It] appears near the center of the small papyrus fragment. It …could easily have been formed by anyone using Grondin’s Interlinear and the most widely available Coptic-English dictionary in the world: TAHIME (“my wife”).” [Bernhard, Notes on the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife Forgery]

Awaiting Ink Tests—‘Icing on the Cake’

Reportedly Prof. “King is now awaiting the results of ink composition tests, which cannot establish for sure that it is authentic — but they could reveal that it is a forgery. ‘I’m on the edge of my seat as much as anybody,’ she said. ‘And we’ll see’.” [Lisa Wangsness, Boston Globe, Nov. 11, 2012] While Prof. King is waiting these results, a growing number of scholars have already reached a definite conclusion regarding the authenticity of the (so called) Gospel of Jesus’ Wife fragment. They’ve judged the Jesus’ Wife Gospel a forgery, a fake, a fraud. For them, scientific tests showing modern ink ingredients would simply be ‘icing on the cake,’ confirming a modern forgery. Inconclusive test results will leave that forgery conclusion intact.