

The Prayer of Thanksgiving -- The Nag Hammadi Library

    (Above image of the Gospel of Thomas courtesy of the
    Institute for Antiquity and Christianity, Claremont Graduate University)

The Nag Hammadi Library

    The Prayer of Thanksgiving

Translated by James Brashler, Peter A. Dirkse and Douglas M.
    Parrott

      This the prayer that they spoke:

"We give thanks to You! Every soul and heart is lifted up to You, undisturbed
      name, honored with the name 'God' and praised with the name 'Father', for to everyone and
      everything (comes) the fatherly kindness and affection and love, and any teaching there
      may be that is sweet and plain, giving us mind, speech, (and) knowledge: mind, so that we
      may understand You, speech, so that we may expound You, knowledge, so that we may know
      You. We rejoice, having been illuminated by Your knowledge. We rejoice because You have
      shown us Yourself. We rejoice because while we were in (the) body, You have made us divine
      through Your knowledge.

"The thanksgiving of the man who attains to You is one thing: that we know You. We
      have known You, intellectual light. Life of life, we have known You. Womb of every
      creature, we have known You. Womb pregnant with the nature of the Father, we have known
      You. Eternal permanence of the begetting Father, thus have we worshiped Your goodness.
      There is one petition that we ask: we would be preserved in knowledge. And there is one
      protection that we desire: that we not stumble in this kind of life."

When they had said these things in the prayer, they embraced each other and they went
      to eat their holy food, which has no blood in it.

Scribal Note

I have copied this one discourse of his. Indeed, very many have come to me. I have not
      copied them because I thought that they had come to you (pl.). Also, I hesitate to copy
      these for you because, perhaps they have (already) come to you, and the matter may burden
      you. Since the discourses of that one, which have come to me, are numerous ...

   Original translation of this text was prepared by members of the

Coptic Gnostic Library Project of the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity, Claremont Graduate School.

The Coptic Gnostic Library Project was funded by UNESCO, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and other Institutions.

 E. J. Brill has asserted copyright on texts published by the Coptic Gnostic Library Project.

The translation presented here has been edited,  modified and formatted for use in the Gnostic Society Library.

For academic citation, please refer to published editions of this text.

    | Nag Hammadi Library | Gnostic Society
    Library | Gnosis Archive |

