Abstract
Despite discovery prior to the Nag Hammadi Codices, the texts featured in Evans’ work, the Pistis Sophia (PS) (Askew Codex) and the Books of Jeu (BksJ) (Bruce Codex), have received much less attention. This book fills a significant gap, and attempts to reconstruct the groups behind these ‘Jeuian’ texts, so called after their key demiurge.
The Jeuian literature is first overviewed, with the author’s position on ‘Gnosticism’ clarified (it is understood as a spiritual framework). Appendices provide simplified diagrams of Jeuian cosmology. The book has three major parts. Part 1 deals with baptism and ascent in the BksJ and PS 4 136–143. It is argued that these texts provide a guide for the soul’s ritual purification and ascent through mystical realms to the Treasury of Light, Jeu’s residence. The BksJ are suggested to be specialised guides for instructors, and PS 4 135–143 an initiate’s guide to lower cosmological levels. The diagrams in the BksJ are compared with others from late antiquity, yet seen as ultimately unique. Part 2 addresses the moral framework in the Jeuian literature (PS 4 144–148 and PS 3), with punishments outlined for souls in realms according to severity of sin. These texts, Evans suggests, were read by initiates before baptism. An important observation is the increased utilisation of Christian scripture, attributed to syncretisation attempts with the ‘Gnostic Christian’ environment of 3rd–4th-century Egypt, and/or a method of competing with Sethianism, offering less controversial adaptions of familiar material. Part 3 mainly deals with PS 1–2: the myth of Pistis Sophia’s fall from and restoration to the thirteenth aeon. Although similar to other stories of wisdom’s redemption, Evans views it as specific to the Jeuian system.
Evans highlights well the gradual development of the texts, and their manipulation of material to attract members. While I believe Evans is correct to be cautious about the group’s affinity with mainstream Christianity (Jesus’s birth, death, and resurrection are not important, and he is not called ‘Christ’), I find it less problematic than the author to accept that they could have identified as Christians (in one form or another), especially at later points in the texts’ development, when Evans acknowledges the increasing influence of surrounding ‘Gnostic Christianity’. Considering the complex cosmological systems in these texts, Evans’ presentation is extremely accessible, with essential concepts summed up clearly, and will be an asset to scholars of Gnosticism, early Christianity, and late-antique religion more broadly.