Book of Bartholomew
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The Book of Bartholomew, also known as the Book of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, by Bartholomew the Apostle, is a pseudonymous work of New Testament apocrypha. It survives only in the Coptic language, which was the probable original language of the text. The date of authorship is uncertain. Most scholars favor it to have been written in the 5th or 6th century, although an even later date of perhaps the 8th or 9th century has been suggested. Much of the work is in the form of an apostolic memoir, a genre common in Coptic homilies.
Much of the work is about the theological implications of the Passion of Jesus. It also includes lists of angelic beings and depictions of heaven, as well as hymns perhaps used for liturgy. The initial section of the Book of Bartholomew is a retelling of the Harrowing of Hell, where Jesus interacts with the personification of Death and frees most souls from Hades in the three day period between his death and resurrection. The middle section of the work is pseudepigraphically attributed to the testimony of Bartholomew the Apostle, a figure who was held in much higher esteem in Egyptian Coptic Christianity than elsewhere. He tells tales of hymns sung by angels and special blessings placed on Mary Magdalene and the apostles. Bartholomew and the apostles then celebrate a Eucharist together. The final section shifts to the acts of Thomas the Apostle. Thomas's son Siophanes is resurrected and returns with tales of heavenly geography he traveled while dead; the astonished denizens of the city convert en masse, and Thomas makes Siophanes their bishop. Thomas travels back to the Mount of Olives via cloud, and re-enacts the story of Doubting Thomas where he demands to see the risen Jesus and touch his wounds. Jesus ascends back to heaven, and the apostles celebrate another Eucharist.
The book is not to be confused with the Questions of Bartholomew, a separate work. There is a mysterious Gospel of Bartholomew referred to in some ancient church writings; it is not known whether it referred to this work, the Questions of Bartholomew, or a lost work.