The Infancy Gospel of Thomas

The Childhood of Jesus

The Infancy Gospel of Thomas presents the child Jesus as a being of terrifying divine power who has not yet learned restraint. When a boy accidentally bumps into him, Jesus curses him and he dies. When a teacher tries to educate him, Jesus humiliates him before the whole synagogue. When another child breaks his water jar, Jesus miraculously fills his cloak with water instead — but when a child des

Codex Digital EditionComing soonEdition currently in preparation

Edition022

FormatDigital PDF

Editorial statusIn review

TraditionMystery Schools

Before you read

Context without the mythology.

Codex ISO separates the surviving evidence from later interpretation, so you can encounter the text without being told what to believe about it first.

01 / Historical context

Written circa 150–200 AD. Condemned by the Decretum Gelasianum. Shows a Jesus who is terrifying, wilful, and divine before he is good — a portrait the Church could not accept.

02 / Why it matters

The canonical Gospels skip from the manger to the Jordan. This is what they omitted.

From / associated with the text

““When Jesus was five years old he was playing at the crossing of a stream, and he gathered together the waters that flowed there into pools, and made them immediately pure.””

THE CODEX STANDARD

Source before story.

We identify the edition, translation and surviving evidence; distinguish documentation from tradition; and state uncertainty rather than turning it into a sales claim.

Our editorial standard ↗

Continue the archive

The Infancy Gospel of Thomas

Context without the mythology.

Source before story.

Read next.

The Odes of Solomon

The Gospel of Bartholomew

The Apocalypse of Paul