The Infancy of Christ by St. Thomas

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This is a biographical gospel about the childhood of Jesus, believed to date at the latest to the second century. The Infancy Gospel of Thomas is generally considered to be Gnostic in origin. The text describes the life of the child Jesus from the age of five to age twelve, with strange and sometimes malevolent, supernatural events. He is presented as a precocious child who starts his education early. The stories cover how the young Incarnation of God matures and learns to use his powers for good and how those around him first respond in fear and later with admiration. This strange text, which few people nowadays read, might shed some interesting light on the actual psychology of Jesus: a precocious, strange and not always cuddly young man, who from early on was conscious of his supernatural destiny. In education nowadays we speak of such persons as Indigo children, or as Gifted and talented, and recognise that they have special needs to be able to simultaneously explore and develop their own unique gifts, and likewise find ways to relate to the social and familial world around them. This reading and Commentary by Dr Thomas Daffern explores these complex matters in some detail.