FREE THE GOSPEL OF JUDAS TWENTY-SIX!

UNL prof an expert on Sethian gospels, wants more access

By BOB REEVES / Lincoln Journal Star

John Turner, professor of classics and religion at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, is a scholar of the Coptic language and one of the leading experts on Sethian Gnosticism. That’s why he’s so eager to study the original documents contained in Codex Tchacos, the 1,700-year-old manuscript that contains the recently released Gospel of Judas and three other ancient religious works.

But he’s frustrated that he’s not able to examine the materials.

[...]

A transcription and translation are posted on the Web at www.nationalgeographic.com. The site also has some photos of the crumbling manuscripts for on-screen scrutiny, but only a few of the 26 pages of the gospel have been posted so far. Four pages of the manuscript are on display at National Geographic headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Turner is examining the available material but wants to see more. He’d like to have photographs of each page of the manuscript, so he could analyze the Coptic characters and make his own judgment about whether the transcription by scholars Rodolphe Kasser and Gregor Wurst is accurate

[...]

Seriously, I know the National Geographic Society is publishing the pictures in a book later this year, and I appreciate them releasing the transcriptions and some photos pretty promptly, but I can't see how it would hurt them to let people like Professor Turner have photos of the rest of the document in advance.