Saying 88: The Messengers and the Prophets
The messengers and the prophets will come and give you what is already yours; you should give them what you have, and ask yourselves when they will come and collect what belongs to them.
Commentary
An exchange in which nothing new arrives: the prophets deliver what the hearer already owns. The last question, put back to the reader, is characteristically unanswered.
Parallels
This saying has no close parallel in the canonical gospels. Roughly half of the Gospel of Thomas is material of this kind, found nowhere else in the early Christian record.
Sayings on the same themes
- Saying 6 Saying 6: On Fasting, Prayer and Almsgiving The disciples ask how to fast, pray, give alms and eat; the answer is to stop lying and to stop doing what…
- Saying 37 Saying 37: When You Strip Without Shame Asked when he will appear to them, Jesus answers: when you undress without being ashamed, and trample your clothes underfoot like little…
- Saying 14 Saying 14: Fasting Brings Sin Fasting brings sin, prayer brings condemnation, almsgiving harms the spirit; go into any land, eat what is put before you, heal the…
- Saying 58 Saying 58: Blessed Is the One Who Has Toiled Blessed is the person who has worked hard and found life.
- Saying 99 Saying 99: My True Brothers and Mother Told that his brothers and mother are outside, Jesus says that those here who do the will of his Father are his…
- Saying 12 Saying 12: James the Just Asked who will lead them after he goes, Jesus sends the disciples to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth…