Avenali Lectures

Elaine Pagels, Avenali Chair in the Humanities 2007-2008

“The Book of Revelation”
7:30pm| March 18 | Wheeler Auditorium

Follow-up panel discussion
4-6pm | March 19 | 315 Wheeler Hall, Maude Fife Room

Discussants:
Daniel Boyarin (Near Eastern Studies and Rhetoric)
Susanna Elm (History)

Moderator: Anthony J. Cascardi, Director of the Townsend Center for the Humanities

Elaine Pagels is a preeminent figure in the fields of religious studies and theology whose impressive scholarship has earned her international respect. The Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University, Pagels was awarded the Rockefeller, Guggenheim and MacArthur Fellowships in three consecutive years.

As a young researcher at Barnard College, she changed forever the historical landscape of the Christian religion by exploding the myth of the early Christian Church as a unified movement.  Her findings were published in the bestselling book, The Gnostic Gospels, an analysis of 52 early Christian manuscripts that were unearthed in Egypt.  Known collectively as the Nag Hammadi Library, the manuscripts show the pluralistic nature of the early church and the role of women in the developing Christian movement. As the early church moved toward becoming an orthodox body with a canon, rites and clergy, the Nag Hammadi manuscripts were suppressed and deemed heretical.  The Gnostic Gospels won both the National Book Critic’s Circle Award and the National Book Award and was chosen by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best books of the 20th Century.

In her New York Times bestseller Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas, Pagels focuses on religious claims to possessing the ultimate “truth.” She contends that, as Christianity became increasingly institutionalized, it became more politicized and less pluralistic. Says Pagels, “I’m advocating, on some level, the inclusion of [religious texts] that were considered blasphemous. I suggest that there are ways of embracing a far wider spectrum of religious diversity within Christianity and quite beyond Christianity.”  She presents even the most esoteric material in a fashion accessible to those who know nothing of her subject: a gift few scholars possess. She possesses them all in abundance.

Pagels is also the author of The Origin of Satan, which chronicles the evolution of Jewish and Christian concepts of evil. She sees a clear connection between the primarily western view of the world as a battleground between good and evil and the tendency of certain societies to demonize others. Her other books include Adam, Eve and the Serpent, which examines the creation myth and its role in the development of sexual attitudes in the Christian West.

When the Gospel of Judas was published in the spring of 2006, The Today Show, CNN, and other news media immediately called on Pagels to respond. Her latest book, Reading Judas (March 2007), is a New York Times bestseller. Co-authored with Karen King, it is the first book to illustrate how the newly discovered text provides a window onto understanding how Jesus’ followers understood his death, why Judas betrayed Jesus, and why God allowed it.

Pagels earned an M.A. from Stanford University and Ph.D. “with distinction” from Harvard. She possesses a working command of Greek, Latin, German, Hebrew, French, Italian and Coptic. She has written many scholarly articles and book reviews and has been profiled in TIME, The Atlantic Monthly, Vogue, Mirabella and The New Yorker.

Links:

Wikipedia Entry
Video: Interview with Stephen Colbert (The Colbert Report, 17 April 2007)
"Gospel According to Judas" (interview with Salon.com, 2 April 2007)
"The Gospel Truth" (US News & World Report, 10 December 2006)
"The Gospel Truth" (New York Times, 8 April 2006)
"Passions, Past and Present" (interview with the New Yorker, 8 March 2004)
Profile of Pagels on "Religion and Ethics Newsweekly"(PBS, 10 October 2003)
Listen: 'The Secret Gospel of Thomas' (NPR, 4 June 2003)
"Society and Community" (interview on NOW with Bill Boyers, PBS, 16 May 2003)
"From Jesus to Christ: The Story of the Storytellers" (excerpt from The Gnostic Gospels on PBS.org)