Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Pagels, Elaine - Mary Troychak (review date September-October 1995)

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Mary Troychak (review date September-October 1995)

SOURCE: A review of The Origin of Satan, in The Bloomsbury Review, September-October, 1995, p. 23.

[In the review below, Troychak discusses how events in Pagels's life motivated her to explore the dark side of Christianity.]

Five hundred years ago, Elaine Pagels would have been burned at the stake. She has read the sacred texts of Christianity and become fascinated with the devil. She expresses doubt that Jesus was actually crucified by Jews. She contends that the New Testament gospels—which millions of Christians believe to be the actual word of God set down by his apostles—are polemical tracts written generations later to strengthen the fledgling church against its enemies: the pagans without and the heretics within. Finally, she has gained this knowledge by studying forbidden books, suppressed and deviant gospels that had remained buried until 50 years ago.

The...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. B. Cobbey Crisler (review date 3 December 1979)
   2. Raymond E. Brown (review date 20 January 1980)
   3. Hyam Maccoby (review date June 1980)
   4. Kathleen McVey (essay date January 1981)
   5. Robin Lane Fox (review date 21 August 1988)
   6. Thomas D'Evelyn (review date 14 September 1988)
   7. Judith Ochshorn (review date April 1989)
   8. James Finn Cotter (review date Spring 1989)
   9. Henry Chadwick (review date 21 March 1990)
   10. Leslie Houlden (review date 18 June 1995)
   11. Mary Gordon (review date 26 June 1995)
   12. John P. Meier (review date 9 July 1995)
   13. Rockwell Gray (review date 30 July 1995)
   14. Norman Cohn (review date 21 September 1995)
   15. Mary Troychak (review date September-October 1995)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright