Jesus as Dennis the Menace in the Infancy Gospel

In a recent post on the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, I mentioned John Dominic Crossan's comparison of the child Jesus in the Infancy Gospel with Dennis the Menace.  When I heard him say "Dennis the Menace", I instantly thought of the character pictured above on the left, Dennis the Menace from the British comic The Beano.  It occurred to me later that since this was an American programme, Banned from the Bible, broadcast on the History Channel, he was perhaps referring to the character pictured in the middle above, the American Dennis the Menace, who is almost exactly the same age as his British namesake, both first published in March 1951.

But which one was John Dominic Crossan referring to?  Both of them are mischievous young boys, but my ignorance of the American version makes it difficult for me to compare and contrast.  The British Dennis is undoubtedly a "brat", but which would Crossan have known?  His time spent in both Ireland and America will have given him exposure to both versions, but I'd guess it's the American one he will have known best, perhaps especially if he has children, grandchildren, nieces or nephews over here.

Typo in Elliott's Apocryphal New Testament, on Infancy Gospel of Thomas?

There is a cross-reference in J. K. Elliott, The Apocryphal New Testament: A Collection of Apocryphal Christian Literature in an English Translation (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993): 78 that I think may be in error. The passage is Infancy Gospel of Thomas 12.1-2:

Again, in the time of sowing the child went out with his father to sow corn in their field. And as his father sowed, the child Jesus also sowed one grain of corn. 2. And when he had reaped it and threshed it, he brought in a hundred measures, * and he called all the poor of the village to the threshing-floor and gave them the corn, and Joseph took the residue. He was eight years old when he performed this sign.

At the point marked here by the *, there is a footnote referencing Luke 16.7. Luke 16.7 reads, "Then he asked another, ‘And how much do you owe?’ He replied, ‘A hundred containers of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill and make it eighty.’" That is clearly not right. I think the intended reference must be Luke 8.8, "Some [seed] fell into good soil, and when it grew, it produced a hundredfold.”

Update (Saturday, 13.25): In comments, Andrew Criddle notes that the word κόρος occurs both in Luke 16.7 (ἑκατὸν κόρους σίτου) and in Tischendorf's Greek A recension of the Infancy Gospel. Moreover, κόρος is a hapax in the New Testament. That is clearly the point of the cross-reference in Elliott, so I withdraw my suggestion that it is a typo, even if it is a strange choice of cross-reference given the clearer content parallels with the Synoptics here and elsewhere that are not marked. Incidentally, a look at Tony Burke's Critical Edition of the text shows some interesting variation in the Greek witnesses at this point, κόρους ρ in his Gs, μέδιμνους ρ in his Ga and μόδια ἑκατόν in his Gc (Burke, 192-3).

Infancy Gospel of Thomas on Youtube

We are into the second week of a junior / senior seminar on the Non-canonical Gospels here at Duke. It's the first time I have taught a course like this at the undergraduate level and it is already proving really stimulating. We took as our first text the Protevangelium of James and we are now moving on to the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. It gives me the opportunity to share one of my favourite Youtube clips, an animated version of Infancy Thomas 9:



There is another short video of interest on Youtube that relates to the Infancy Gospel. It is about four minutes long and is clearly a clip from a longer documentary. From the look of it, it is an American (Discovery Channel? History Channel?) piece surveying non-canonical Gospels. Of particular interest in this clip are the comments from John Dominic Crossan, who is as engaging as ever. He comments on Jesus as a "divine brat" in the text, "Dennis the Menace as god", but adds that Jesus learns ultimately that "The function of great power and great wisdom is to do good":



Update (Friday, 9.55): In comments, Tony Burke mentions that the clip above is from Banned from the Bible (History Channel, 2003).