Editing Nag Hammadi Library (section)

==Translation==
The first edition of a text found at Nag Hammadi was from the Jung Codex, a partial translation of which appeared in Cairo in 1956, and a single extensive facsimile edition was planned.  Due to the difficult political circumstances in Egypt, individual tracts followed from the Cairo and Zurich collections only slowly.

This state of affairs did not change until 1966, with the holding of the [[Messina Congress]] in [[Italy]].  At this conference, intended to allow scholars to arrive at a group consensus concerning the definition of gnosticism, [[James M. Robinson]], an expert on religion, assembled a group of editors and translators whose express task was to publish a [[bilingual]] edition of the Nag Hammadi codices in English, in collaboration with the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity at the [[Claremont Graduate University]] in [[Claremont, California]].

Robinson was elected secretary of the [[International Committee for the Nag Hammadi Codices]], which had been formed in 1970 by [[UNESCO]] and the Egyptian Ministry of Culture; it was in this capacity that he oversaw the project.  A facsimile edition in twelve volumes was published between 1972 and 1977, with subsequent additions in 1979 and 1984 from the publisher [[E.J. Brill]] in [[Leiden]], entitled, ''The Facsimile Edition of the Nag Hammadi Codices.'' This made all the texts available for all interested parties to study in some form.

At the same time, in the [[German Democratic Republic]], a group of scholars—including [[Alexander Böhlig]], Martin Krause and [[New Testament]] scholars [[Gesine Schenke]], [[Hans-Martin Schenke]] and [[Hans-Gebhard Bethge]]—were preparing the first German language translation of the find.  The last three scholars prepared a complete scholarly translation under the auspices of the [[Berlin]] [[Humboldt University]], which was published in 2001.

The James M. Robinson translation was first published in 1977, with the name ''The Nag Hammadi Library in English'', in collaboration between E.J. Brill and [[Harper & Row]].  The single-volume publication, according to Robinson, 'marked the end of one stage of Nag Hammadi scholarship and the beginning of another' (from the Preface to the third revised edition).  Paperback editions followed in 1981 and 1984, from E.J. Brill and Harper, respectively.  A third, completely revised, edition was published in 1988.  This marks the final stage in the gradual dispersal of gnostic texts into the wider public arena—the full complement of codices was finally available in unadulterated form to people around the world, in a variety of languages. A cross reference apparatus for Robinson's translation and the Biblical canon also exists.<sup>[]</sup>

Another English edition was published in 1987, by [[Yale]] scholar [[Bentley Layton]], called ''The Gnostic Scriptures: A New Translation with Annotations'' (Garden City: Doubleday & Co., 1987). The volume included new translations from the Nag Hammadi Library, together with extracts from the [[Heresiology|heresiological]] writers, and other gnostic material.  It remains, along with ''The Nag Hammadi Library in English,'' one of the more accessible volumes of translations of the Nag Hammadi find. It includes extensive historical introductions to individual gnostic groups, notes on translation, annotations to the text, and the organization of tracts into clearly defined movements.

Not all scholars agree that the entire library should be considered Gnostic. Paterson Brown has argued that the three Nag Hammadi Gospels of Thomas, Philip and Truth cannot be so labeled, since each, in his opinion, may explicitly affirm the basic reality and sanctity of incarnate life, which Gnosticism by definition considers illusory.<sup>[]</sup>