To know how to find. To find without knowing: Wisdom in the Gospel of Thomas

Abstract

At the SBL meeting in Orlando in 1998, the contemporary metaphor theory practised by cognitive linguists such as Lakoff, Johnson and Turner, was used to identify some of the basic metaphors appearing in Thomas 1-5, which the author believes to be important for coming to terms with the metaphoricity of many of the sayings in the Gospel. The ensuing discussion of Thomas 08 and Thomas 109 is yet another attempt to show how the insights of cognitive linguistics, which have for the most part been ignored by contemporary commentators on the parables and aphorisms of Jesus, can perhaps provide us with fresh insights into this part of the sayings of the Jesus tradition.