Contrary to orthodox sources, which interpret Christ's death as a sacrifice redeeming humanity from guilt and sin, this gnostic gospel sees the crucifixion as the occasion for discovering the divine self within. Yet with this different interpretation, the Gospel of Truth gives a moving account of Jesus' death:
... the merciful one, the faithful one, Jesus, was patient in accepting sufferings... since he knows that his death is life for many.... He was nailed to a tree... He draws himself down to death though eternal life clothes him. Having stripped himself of the perishable rags, he put on imperishability...
Another remarkable Valentinian text, the Tripartite Tractate, introduces the Savior as "the one who will be begotten and who will suffer." Moved by compassion for humanity, he willingly became
what they were. So, for their sake, he became manifest in an involuntary suffering.... Not only did he take upon himself the death of those who he intended to save, but also he accepted their smallness... He let himself be conceived and born as an infant in body and soul.
Yet the Savior's nature is a paradox. The Tripartite Tractate explains that the one who is born and who suffers is the Savior foreseen by the Hebrew prophets; what they did not envision is "that which he was before, and what he is eternally, an unbegotten, impassible Word, who came into being in flesh." Similarly, the Gospel of Truth, having described Jesus' human death, goes on to say that
the Word of the Father goes forth into the all... purifying it, bringing it back into the Father, into the Mother, Jesus of the infiniteness of gentleness.
A third Valentinian text, the Interpretation of the Gnosis, articulates the same paradox. On the one hand the Savior becomes vulnerable to suffering and death; on the other, he is the Word, full of divine power. The Savior explains: "I became very small, so that through my humility I might take you up to the great height, whence you had fallen."
None of these sources denies that Jesus actually suffered and died; all assume it. Yet all are concerned to show how, in his incarnation, Christ transcended human nature so that he could prevail over death by divine power. The Valentinians thereby initiate discussion of the problem that became central to Christian theology some two hundred years later—the question of how Christ could be simultaneously human and divine.