Dr.Elaine Pagels, a preeminent scholar of religious history, teaches at Princeton University. Her best-selling books, “The Gnostic Gospels” and “Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas,” raise provocative questions about the basic beliefs of the Christian tradition and the social role of religion in the modern world. As a young researcher at Barnard College, Elaine Pagels changed forever the historical landscape of the Christian religion by exploding the myth of the early Christian Church as a unified movement. Her findings were published in 1979 in the best selling book, The Gnostic Gospels, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the National Book Award. The is was followed later that year with her selection as one of the first three recipients of the MacArthur Award. Pagels’ latest book, Beyond Belief, was published in May. Her other books include The Origin of Satan and Adam and Eve and the Serpent. She is the Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University and has published widely on Gnosticism and early Christianity. Link to this audio interview: http://www.gigadial.net/public/station/23562 Less