An Overview of the History and Rediscovery of Gnosticism

By Sapphire

 

    Gnosticism is a concept of spiritual experience, which finds its roots in many religious practices including Asian, Babylonian, Egyptian, Greek, and Syrian pagan religions, mystic Judaism and the early Christianity. Gnosis comes from the Greek language and connotes “knowledge” or the “act of knowing”. Gnosticism is really a form of mystical existentialism.[1][1]  It begins with the premise that we are actually asleep, that our consciousness is cloaked with a shadow, which we must elucidate in order to win freedom.  It is the quest for the secrets of the universe, which can be found coded in myth and symbols.  Gnostics claimed to have secret knowledge about God, humanity, and the Universe and was one of three main belief systems in first century Christianity, though Gnosticism itself predates Christianity.   We find the birthplace of what is now known as Christian Gnosticism in the region of the Mediterranean. Most of the lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea were consolidated by the Roman Empire by 30 BC. Vast highways and shipping routes provided the peoples of the region the means to freely intermingle and exchange ideas, while Rome’s system of law unified the divergent populations under its rule. Though Rome was unbending in its demand for obedience to the state, it allowed a remarkably free expression of religious and philosophical thought. The Romans had a very practical attitude to religion, as they did with most things. The Romans’ own religion was not based on any central belief, but on a mixture of fragmented rituals, taboos, superstitions, and traditions, which they collected over the years from numerous sources.[2][2]

    Alexandria was the most eclectic and tolerant city in the Roman Empire in the early centuries.  As an important crossroads of the Mediterranean trade routes it was a repository not only of diverse goods, but of diverse ideas as well. A plethora of religious sects from Palestine, Egypt, Syria, and Mesopotamia existed side by side with Greek, Hellenistic, and Pythagorean thought. Zoroastrian and Mithraic schools mingled harmoniously those with Buddhist or Hindu leanings.  The library of Alexandra was the most comprehensive in the world until the orthodox Christians burned it down in 411 AD.   By the second century many different Christian-Gnostic sects existed, but came under increasing persecution as orthodox Christianity grew in power. Gnosticism tended to attract a more educated following and generally valued the necessity of individual freedom in finding salvation, though there was considerable variation in their beliefs and levels of tolerance. They commonly refused to bow to any authority other than their own, and for this reason began to be viewed as renegades, a danger to the growing power base of Constantine’s Church.[3][3]  Consequently they were ‘disdained and persecuted’ by the very community to which they once belonged.[4][4] 

    In the fifth century Rome was still attempting to impose its authority over heterodox Egypt who refused to accept Rome’s authority.  The greatest contribution from Egyptian Christianity was its development of the monastic system for housing and transmitting Gnostic thought.[5][5]  Egyptian Christians prided themselves on maintaining a ‘purer, more accurate record of Jesus and his teachings’ and functioned as a ‘loosely connected brotherhood’ that emphasized the pursuit of knowledge in contrast to hierarchical and authoritarian Rome.  From Syria and Egypt Gnostic tradition spread. It was a small leap into Spain considering that the Syrians controlled most of the trade going into Gaul and Spain.  Ships sailed daily from Alexandria to the Atlantic coast of Europe.  By the time orthodox Christianity reached Spain, Gnosticism had already rooted itself.  

    In the late fourth century a teacher and lay-preacher, Priscillian of Avila, defied Roman authority and actively sought to acquire material outside the established Roman Church.  One of his leading disciples journeyed to the Middle East in quest of uncanonical texts.  The teachings of Priscillian were Gnostic in character and drew heavily of Judaic literature, including forms of early Qabalism.[6][6] Priscillian propagated the Gnostic belief that the soul pre-existed the body, a view that was formally condemned by the Church in the sixth century. As a shadow of things to come, Priscillian and six of his followers were tortured and beheaded at the behest of Roman Bishop Ithicas in 386 AD.[7][7] Augustine supported the order. They were the first heretics to be executed.

    Ultimately, however, Gnosticism survived and continued to spread throughout Europe until it found its fullest expression in the Celtic Church of Ireland in the mid fifth to mid-seventh centuries. The Celtic people were never inclined towards system and structure, and the Christian churches they established reflected their spirit of independence all the way up until its official ending with the Synod of Kells in 1152 following the Norman invasion of Ireland. Ireland was fairly isolated from the arm of Rome. Separated by a sea and a continent at war, Ireland became a safe haven for scholars seeking refuge from the upheavals occurring elsewhere in the world. Vast quantities of literature were transported there for safekeeping and copying.  Irish monks are known to have visited Egypt, and Egyptian motifs as well as Syrian and Mesopotamian thoughts, heavily influence Celtic Christianity.  The Celtic Church had its own liturgy and Mass, both of which incorporated distinctly non-Roman elements. There was never a uniform liturgy and the natural Celtic love for art and poetry colored their masses.  They often added their own special touches unafraid to “sometimes add a formula here and a rite there.” [8][8] It even had its own translation of the Bible, and followed St. Patrick (who was possibly “polluted” with the Arian heresy) in refuting the Virgin Birth. The Celtic Church also noticeably omits mention of the Trinity and the Nicene Creed.[9][9]

   Most Gnostics did not believe in a physical messiah or a doctrine of vicarious atonement. Most also did not believe in the virgin birth or that the physical person of Jesus was the Christ.  The Christ was something Jesus became by virtue of gnosis, and was something to which all Gnostics aspired. The Gnostics also did not believe in the physical death of Christ, and denied that the crucifixion really took place. In order not to lose Ireland completely Rome refrained from officially branding them as heretics and thus they for the most part escaped large-scale persecution and destruction of their manuscripts.    One of the doctrines that influenced the Celtic Church in the 5^th and 6^th centuries was the doctrine of pelagianism. Pelagianism was a Christian Gnostic sect that rose in the 5th century and challenged St. Augustine's conceptions of grace and predestination. The celebrated monk and theologian Pelagius (c.355–c.425), who rejected the doctrine of original sin and taught that children are born innocent of sin, advanced the doctrine. He taught that the law, as well as grace, could lead one to salvation and that pagans had been able to enter heaven by virtue of their moral actions before the coming of Christ. The church fought pelagianism from the time that Celestius was denied ordination in 411. Pelagius preached in Africa and Palestine, attracting many able followers, much to the dismay of the orthodox church. In 415, Augustine warned St. Jerome in Palestine that Pelagius was spreading a dangerous heresy, and Jerome took action to prevent the spread of this “heresy”.  Pelagianism was officially condemned at the Council of Ephesus in 431 AD. A modified version called semi-pelagianism, which also rejected the Augustinian doctrine of predestination and taught that God willed the salvation of all men equally, was condemned at the Council of Orange in 529 AD.    By the end of the 5^th century Gnosticism had been wiped out; only a small sect called the Mandeans (Pure Ones) survived. The Mandeans still exist today in Iran and Iraq.

    In 1945 an Arab peasant in Nag-Hammadi, Egypt made an amazing discovery.  Many rumors obscured the circumstances of the finding of the find at Nag-Hammadi, and for years even the identity of the Arab peasant was unknown.  It was thirty years after this discovery that Muhammad Ali al Samman finally revealed the story. Ali and his brothers had gone out to the Jabal to dig for a soft soil used to fertilize crops. While they were digging, Ali hit a red clay jar.  Ali was hesitant about breaking open the jar lest it contain jinn or a spirit[10][10], but in the hope that it might contain gold he decided to take the risk. He raised his hatchet, and smashed the jar.  What he found was not gold, but thirteen papyrus books bound in leather.  Upon returning home he discarded the books on a pile of straw next to the oven. His mother admits that she burned much of the papyrus along with the straw used for kindling.[11][11]

    A few weeks later after avenging their father’s death, Muhammad Ali asked a local priest to hold the books in case of a police investigation.  Suspecting the books might have value, a history teacher who noticed one of the books, sent it to a friend in Cairo.  The books were sold on the black market and soon drew the attention of Egyptian authorities.  Considerable drama surrounds the acquisition of the books, which were eventually deposited in the Coptic Museum in Cairo.  However a large portion of the thirteenth manuscript was smuggled to America where it drew the interest of Professor Quispel, a distinguished historian of religion.  Quispel had obtained The Gospel of Thomas.

     In 1947 a similar discovery was made, the finding of the “Dead Sea Scrolls” by Bedouin nomads in Qumran, a ruined Essene community about fourteen miles from Jerusalem. As the full significance of these two discoveries finally come to light after their long suppression, enormous questions about history and religion have been raised. Research since this discovery has established that many long held beliefs about the Essenes were in fact erroneous.  They were not solely resigned to the desert wilderness, but in fact had houses in urban centers as well, though mainly for their wandering brethren.  They were not celibate, many were married and had children, and there is evidence to support that they were not actually pacifists at all.  In fact a forge for making weapons was found in the Qumran community, along with arrowheads and other debris excavated from the ruins.[12][12] The increasing knowledge and interest in the Nag Hammadi codices and the Dead Sea Scrolls by ever widening circles has left its indelible mark on the consciousness of Christendom.

      Most Gnostic teachings correspond closely with hermetic teachings. Indeed Hermeticism and Gnosticism are so closely linked that many of their writings overlap each other.[13][13]  The primary differences between the two were the Hermeticists followed a reclusive lifestyle, while the Gnostics lived secular lifestyles in cities and that Hermeticists looked to the archetypal figure of Hermes as the embodiment of salvational teaching and initiation, while the Christian Gnostics looked to Jesus.[14][14] The goal of both groups was gnosis, which to them meant the liberating experience of true inner knowledge; both saw physical existence as a limitation of the unconscious from which the human spirit sought liberation. “ It was once fashionable to characterize Hermeticism as "optimistic" in contract to Gnostic "pessimism," but such differences are currently being stressed less than they had been. The Nag Hammadi scriptures have brought to light a side of Gnosticism that joins it more closely to Hermeticism than many would have thought possible.  It is true that the Gnostic view of the world often seems very negative, but that is only one side of the story.  The other side is very positive and offers the opportunity for growth. It offers us the opportunity to become the spiritual beings we really are, thereby redeeming the world. The two sides of the story complement each other, and must be interpreted together.  There are apparent contradictions, not only between Hermetic and Gnostic writings, but also within both the Gnostic and Hermetic materials themselves. Contradiction was and is an integral part of both traditions because these two schools have always sought to expand consciousness by forcing the mind to use the powers of intuition – to transcend the limits of the intellect.  Dogma was anathema to the spirit behind the goal of “inner-knowledge” and revelation.

    Though Gnosticism seemed to die out centuries ago, its influence never did.  It continued to follow the Christian Church like a phantom in the dark, and many aspects continued to be passed on through various mystery schools. Hermeticism, Gnosticism and Neoplatonism represent the foundation of all the major western occult currents.[15][15]  Many arcane secrets of the Gnostics and Hermeticists became public primarily through the work of H.P. Blavatsky and her Theosophical Society in the late nineteenth century.   Gnosticism in its various forms has always appealed to intellectuals who crave spiritual experience beyond what can be had through ordinary means.  It has never been appealing to the general public for the same reasons calculus is not appealing to the masses.  Today, however, Gnosticism is enjoying a popular revival and numerous Gnostic churches have sprung up.  This is mainly due to its universality and non-dogmatism, as opposed to that of institutional religion.  People have grown dissatisfied with traditional religion, scientific materialism, and consumerism, and are searching for deeper meaning. Perhaps this is the result of a global awakening in modern man, or perhaps it is merely part of the cyclical nature of our evolution.

     The path of modern Gnosis means to allow the light of the Spirit to work through us here on earth.  Instead of viewing the world as an evil place from which our spirits must escape, the enlightened Gnostic view is one of ridding ourselves of the complexes that cloud our vision so that the inner- light is able shine through more fully.  By purifying ourselves of our collective neuroses we become able to see that we are not really separate from God at all. The Tree of Life is a two- way path; the light of heaven shines down upon us and we shine back.  We have only to open our eyes to see, and we see that the light was within us all along. Human incarnation is a precious opportunity to bring Heaven to Earth.

     Mankind has always felt the urge to develop and nurture a connection to the universe, a sense of belonging, while at the same time seeing himself as the star of perfection that he is.  It is through the expansion of the individual consciousness outward towards the universal consciousness that we become the masters of our own temples of being.   We experience ourselves through what is called Nous (Mind). It is only through us that God can experience himself, and it is only through our psyches that our consciousness can experience itself. “As above so Below”.  Plotinus describes Nous as the ‘knowing principle’.  It is the subject of every experience.  Nous is consciousness, which extends awareness from the center of the circle to the circumference, experiencing the psyche. It is the spark of light within radiating outward to the circumference of the circle that is the culmination of all consciousness. Alienation from life results in a smallness of self and feeds the fears that lurk in the shadows.  By numbing our fears we desensitize ourselves to the miracle of living. The great man eagerly embraces the chain of experiences life has to offer.  It is through these experiences that we broaden our minds, sharpen our intellects, exalt our spirits, and test our courage.  The willingness to accept responsibility for changing unwanted conditions within ourselves is to accept the responsibility of being the sons (and daughters) of God we are.  It is the willingness to accept our rightful place as a “star among the company of stars”.   Those who limit their experience and cater to the fears and petty jealousies of the ego block the path to their spiritual unfoldment.  Mastery of the Self in all its aspects is the only way to freedom. In the Gospel of Thomas Jesus says, “If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you.  If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” [16][16]  To the Gnostics ignorance was the true source of evil in the world. It is from ignorance of the self that suffering occurs. A person who remains oblivious to his true self and his true purpose cannot experience fulfillment.

    Gnostics from all traditions use different terminology and symbolism to express common concepts.  They don’t all necessarily agree with each other, quite the contrary, arguments abound, but these disagreements are minor compared to the essence of their shared views.  They have no qualms about borrowing wisdom from other cultures; the original “Christians” were in fact a convergence of many different Gnostics both pagan and Jewish.  The Nassene School of Christianity asserted that the mythologies of all religions were ultimately portrayals of one unified spiritual system.  They were also known to have been initiated into the ‘pagan mysteries of the Great Mother’ [17][17] and to have expanded the mysteries of Isis into the schools of Gnosis.  The Orphites, derived from the name of the Greek sage, Orpheus, were connected to the Cult of Dionysus and made many secret contributions to Gnostic teachings.  Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, and Hermes Trismegistus were all revered by various Gnostic sects.  The pagan origins of Christ are evident in the solar figures of Osiris and Sol Ivictis. The Gnostics knew Christ by many names and in many different forms.  The Gospel of Philip cautions: Names are very deceptive because they turn the heart aside from the real to the unreal.  Whoever hears the word “God” doesn’t think of reality, but of what is unreal.  Likewise with words such as “Father”, “Son”, “Holy Spirit”, “life”, “light”, “resurrection” “church”, and so on.”  No matter how it is expressed or what names are used, inner-truth remains constant. 

 

Chapter 2

The Essential Characteristics of Gnosticism

 

       The first essential characteristic of Gnosticism is the belief that human beings are capable of attaining direct, personal, and absolute knowledge of the divine/truth and that this attainment is the greatest one that can be made in life.  Gnosticism is knowledge by and of the true self, or self-within-the self, and it is through this knowledge that freedom is won.  It is a lie to believe that we truly know who we are or what life is.  At best we can only glimpse bits and pieces.  Every experience, every person we come into contact with changes us, however imperceptibly. Yet there is always ‘that which remains’, the light of the divine.  This light is our unerring compass, and it remains forever constant. False identification with the psyche, family, friends, our race, religion, environment etc. is a hindrance to perception of the Truth.  That is not to say we should not be loyal to those we love; it is simply to say that our first loyalty must always be to the true Self. The path of self-knowledge is a never-ending journey filled with unexpected discoveries.  This is the path of gnosis.  It is the path back to the mystery that is the source of all, but it is not a going back to the past, it is here and now.  Alcmeon the Pythagorean writes, “Men die because they cannot join the beginning and the end.” [18][18]  The Germanics taught that the future is in present and that the present is a culmination of all things past.  The future is “that which is becoming”.

   Elaine Pagels, an eminent scholar of Gnosticism says “to know one self at the deepest level is simultaneously to know God: this is the secret of Gnosis.” [19][19] Self-knowledge is knowledge of God; the self and the divine are identical.  In the Gospel of Thomas Jesus says, “I am not your master.  Because you have drunk, you have become drunk from the bubbling stream, which I have measured out.  He who will drink from my mouth will become as I am: I myself shall become he, and the things that are hidden will be revealed to him.”  The Gospel of Thomas is one of the books condemned and destroyed by the orthodox Christians and may be as old or older than the four canonical gospels.  A Gnostic knows who his true self is. The reception of this knowledge, however, is not a smooth process because the information is not one of contemplation or rational idealism, but an extreme and alien knowledge, the knowledge of the Logos. “ The image of a wall being breached is a metaphor for the relationship of the self to the call of the redeemer who awakens and sets growing the seed of light buried within the human soul.  Rather than merely being heard, this incoming call is imagined as something substantial which penetrates the hearer, such as described in the 12^th “Ode of Solomon” ’and they were penetrated by the word and knew him that made it.’ ” [20][20] The Gospel of Thomas says, “Blessed are they who have been persecuted within themselves” and also “Let him who seeks continue seeking until he finds.  When he finds, he will be troubled.  When he becomes troubled, he will be astonished, and he will rule over the All.”

    Gnostics wished to free themselves from the limitations of their personal and cultural identities and experience unity with the All.  They purposely defied social and religious taboos in order to decondition themselves from imposed social mores as a means of discovering their true spiritual identities.  For some this was done through asceticism, for others it was through libertine indulgence.  Sometimes two people from the same school employed opposite methods. [21][21] It has been stated that libertinism, by its very nature, applies to the pneumatic.  The pneumatic (spiritual) man, in contrast to his less evolved brothers and sisters is free from the law. The concept is that the pneuma confers a kind of noble privilege, creating of a new kind of man, one who is not subjugated by the obligations or the criteria of the mundane world. [22][22] Carpocretes (a first century Alexandrian Platonist who started Gnostic sect based on the Gospel of Mark) taught that “our ideas of good and bad conduct are only matters of human opinion, not divine decree.  He taught his students to enjoy life, including the pleasures of sex.” Epiphanes, thought to be the son of Carpocretes, writes, “God created the delights of love equally for all humankind.  But men have repudiated the very thing which is the source of their existence”. [23][23] Some Gnostics were believed to have practiced sacramental nudity and ritual sex, which naturally led to a great deal of slander and misrepresentation of the Gnostics, especially by the orthodoxy.  They were often accused of immorality, as is often the case of the ignorant when faced with mysteries they can’t or won’t understand.

    Like the Thelemite [24][24], the Gnostic views spirituality as a dynamic process.  Gnosis is not a state of having awakened, but a process of continually awakening. It is an adventure of the Spirit in which, new discoveries are constantly being made. Paul writes, “Make no mistake about it, if there is anyone among you who fancies himself wise, he must become a fool again to gain true wisdom.  If anyone thinks he knows, he knows nothing yet in the true sense of knowing.” Gnostics cherish the constant changing and progressive movement of the Spirit. The forces of divine revelation are not static. Gnosis is a creative experience, fluid and flexible. Gnostics are not interested in dogmas and creeds.  They express their spirituality in story, allegory, and ritual and know that to communicate with the spirit you must use the language of the spirit and that is a language of sight, scent, touch, sound, and intuition. Gnostics often resorted to ritual acts in order to more fully to cement the abstract notions of Gnosis.  Tangible actions such as giving a sign, a word, a formula, and a certain action gave an immediate realization of salvation. Irenaeus, the Bishop of Lyons in Gaul in the late first and early second centuries, complains “every one of them generates something new, day by day, according to his ability for no one is deemed perfect (or mature) who does not develop some mighty fiction.” [25][25] Perhaps the Gnostics realized that if doctrines became dogmas they would become Demiurges, which would then need to be destroyed and creatively reinterpreted. Contradiction was in fact part of the tradition itself.  The collection of texts at Nag Hammadi indicates that Gnostics used dissonance between texts as a means of inspiration, as a catalyst to awaken higher perceptions.[26][26] They often attempted to produce higher states of mind as in the tradition of Zen koans or in ‘speech that cannot be grasped’.  A powerful example from the Nag Hammadi is “Thunder of a Perfect Mind”:

 

I am the honored one and the scorned one.

I am the whore and the holy one.

I am the wife and the virgin.

I am the mother and the daughter….

I am the silence that is incomprehensible

And the idea whose remembrance is frequent.

I am the voice whose sound is manifold

And the appearance is multiple

I am the utterance of my name.

 

     The third essential characteristic of Gnosticism is the recognition of the material world as “illusion”. In an age where we are bombarded by the artificial stimulus of technology and media, the wisdom of Gnosticism may perhaps be more relevant than ever. “The Khabs is in the Khu, not the Khu in the Khabs” (Liber AL I:8).  The Khu is the Egyptian akh, which I refer to later in this book.  It is the terrestrial intelligence through which experience is gained by means of self-consciousness. The khabs or  “inner light” resides in this subtle body. Khabs is “a star”, a part of Nuit (God), and therefore Nuit herself. We are not to make the mistake of thinking that the image of the self is the self. Like the Buddhist, the Gnostic sought to break through the illusion, but unlike the Buddhist, he did not attempt to go through the no-mind of Zen, but rather, through the alien mind of the logos.” [27][27]

    Gnosticism taught that the physical manifestation of the world was a mistake, an imperfection of God.  Man’s state in this world is that of dissatisfaction, bondage, and exile.  The world is a place of exile from our true state, but it is also a place of redemption.  We are separated for the chance of union.  “I am divided for love’s sake for the chance of union” (Liber AL I: 29).  The old view is that when man becomes fully enlightened he joins with God and is no longer tied to the karmic wheel of reincarnation.  The Thelemic view is that life is about constant change.  Every act of love gives birth to something new.  Every experience changes us.  Through continual expansion of our awareness and experience in all directions we reach towards Nuit (God). Man experiences a sense of exile only when he is not following his true Will.

     Basilides taught that the Demiurge (the manifested and inferior reflection of the Supreme, unmanifest God) with his angels was responsible for the creation of the worlds and all that is material.  The Sophia of Jesus Christ, part of the Nag-Hammadi Library says,  “The Lord of the Universe is not called ‘Father’, but ‘Forefather’, the beginning of those that will appear, but he (the Lord) is the beginningless Forefather.  Seeing himself within himself in a mirror, he appeared resembling himself, but his likeness appeared as Divine Self-Father, and as Confronter over the Confronted ones, First Existent Unbegotten Father.  He is indeed of equal age with the light that is before him, but he is not of equal power.  And afterward was revealed a whole multitude of confronting, self-begotten ones, equal in age and power, being in glory (and) without number, whose race is called ‘The Generation over Whom There Is No Kingdom’ from the one in whom you yourselves have appeared from these men.”  The suffering of humanity is because we are divided within ourselves.  The Gospel of Philip states, “It was on the cross that Jesus was divided.”  Jesus dies physically, but when he resurrects he becomes the Christ, the consciousness of God.  When we know ourselves to be pure consciousness, when we no longer confuse who we appear to be and whom we really are, then suffering ends.

    The relation of the mind to the physical world has always been a balancing act.  Our very survival depends upon the objective world, and indeed competition for survival is nature’s way of bringing out man’s natural powers, for better or worse.  On the other hand overabundance of wealth historically leads to spiritual stagnation and impoverishment and is often remedied by the destruction of wealth through war, economic, depression or voluntary sacrifice. Mind over matter is integral to our spiritual survival and immortality.  The wise man rightly sets the rank of spirit above that of matter.

 “Even when material excesses flow from the highest of spiritual motives, unsavory characters, who should be discoursing on Confucius and Socrates and their heirs if not studying sacred scriptures, show up to make gross capital of them.” [28][28] The Cistercians were a perfect picture of practical economy in their heyday; their monasteries set up over streams to facilitate access to drinking water, milling of grain, bathing, and sewage disposal. During the Middle Ages the highly efficient unpaid-labor force of the frugal Cistercian monks and their lay brothers created a huge excess over their own consumption, contributing to an economic mini-boom in Europe. Greedy laymen then moved in to purchase the leadership of the monasteries in order to turn a quick profit, which is anathema to the true Cistercian spirit. Abbots squabbled among themselves, leaving the ingeniously confederated order in disorder.[29][29] 

 

 Joachim of Flora

 

    A Cistercian named Joachim had another more spiritual form of facility in mind. Joachim of Flora conceived of a utopian, cruciform monastic system (New Jerusalem) to live out the Age of Love that he envisioned before he died. Joachim proclaimed his idea with the religious intention of desecularizing the church and restoring its spiritual purity. His expectation was that his new order would strengthen the austerity of a spiritual life over the over worldliness of the church and it would also encourage the desire of radical change to earthly time. [30][30]

    Joachim seems to have been in real life a worldly young nobleman of Calabria. According to the story he visited the Holy Land around the year 1175 where he was converted, saw visions, and was inspired with prophetic powers and a directive from God to speak and write about the future. He was also inspired to interpret the scriptures, which believed were codes to mystical mysteries. He returned to Italy, where he was ordained as a priest and took the vows of the Cistercian Order. Joachim was eventually appointed Cistercian abbot of Corazzo against his will, but was able to get his resignation accepted.  He then retired to Flora to write his books, where he founded the Abbey of Flora, a center devoted to strict observance of discipline.

   The sayings and writings of Abbot Joachim interpreted every episode of the Old Testament in terms of the New and of both in the terms of later history. Each Biblical character or event represents some person or occurrence or condition in the present, or prefigures some state of man or of the church in the future.[31][31] Joachim's idea is embraced by his three main works: the Concordia Novi ac Veteris Testmanti, the Expositio in Apocalypsim, and the Psalterium decem chordarum. In these, he promulgated three aspects of his eschatology. First, he wrote, the Age of Holy Spirit is imminent. Second, the Antichrist will appear to persecute the Christians. Third, Viri Spiritualis (New Spiritual Men) would defeat the Antichrist and lead human beings into the new age, in which the monastery would dominate the world. According to Spiritualis Intelligentia, or 'Spiritual Understanding' of Two Testaments, he divided history into three successive ages: the Age of Father, the Age of Son, and the Age of Holy Spirit. In the history of Christianity, the first age, which flourished under the Law, representing power and inspiring fear, began with Adam. The second, which flourished under the Gospel, began with Uzzia. The third age began at the time of Benedict and would last until the Day of Judgement. The third age heralded a new dispensation of universal love, which would proceed from the Gospel of Christ, but transcend the letter of it. There would be no need for disciplinary institutions. Joachim held that the second period was nearing its end, and that the third epoch would actually begin “after some great cataclysm which he tentatively calculated would befall in 1260”. [32][32]  This teaching may well have been the origin of Crowley’s three Aeons of the Mother (Isis), the Father (Osiris), and the Child (Horus).[33][33]

    Saint Francis was believed to be the expected advent of the Son of God. Radicals went so far as to say that the spirit had gone out of both Testaments and into Joachim's three books, which they dubbed The Eternal Gospel. Needless to say, his enthusiastic admirers distorted the actual teachings of Joachim. He certainly never meant to inspire a revolt against the church.  In fact he submitted his writings to the Church for approval in 1200 and died prior to the 1215 condemnation of his teachings by the Lateran Council.  Joachim has “always been given the title of beauteous, because, as a mystic and a prophet, he refreshed the life of the Church”.[34][34]  Interestingly, however, there have been numerous groups who have attempted to regenerate Catholicism from within based on an esoteric Christianity espousing a belief in a golden age in which the Holy Spirit would be the ascendant.  This naturally led to an elevation of the feminine principle and even sacramental sex, which leads us to the next characteristic of Gnosticism.

    The fourth essential characteristic of Gnosticism is the image of God as duality.  God is both Man and not man.  Man is God, yet not God. God is also seen as a union of opposing forces, as a conjoining of male and female.  One group of Gnostic sources claims to have received a secret tradition from Jesus through James and Mary Magdalene (who was accepted by Gnostics as the consort of Jesus).  Members worshipped both the divine Father and divine Mother.  Several sects used sexual symbolism. The "beloved disciple" who appears in the Gospel of Philip is not John but Mary Magdalene: But Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her often on the mouth. The rest of the disciples were offended by it and expressed disapproval. They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ (Philip 63. 30-35) In the Gospel of Mary, Peter himself, in addressing Mary, acknowledges that "the Savior loved you more than the rest of women" (10:5) and proceeds to then ask her for an interpretation of the hidden wisdom of the savior, which was specially revealed to her. Mary then gives an account of the soul’s journey through the Aeons, from which she was eventually released, to finally experience the fullness of the Light. When she reveals her mystical experience to the rest of the disciples, Peter rebukes her, saying, "Did he really speak privately to a woman and not openly to us?" (Mary 17:20)  The male disciples challenge her authority, with Peter seeming to represent patriarchal hostility towards women’s equality in ministry. According to the text, however, most of the disciples affirm the Gnosis communicated through Mary. In Pistis Sophia: a similar conflict is portrayed.  Peter complains that Mary is usurping his authority and monopolizing time. When he asks Jesus to silence her, however, Jesus rebukes him saying that whoever is inspired by the Spirit is empowered to speak, whether man or woman. Thus in both accounts Mary Magdalene emerges as a heroine who shares in the secret Gnosis of Jesus.

    Epiphanes writes, “The Father of All gave us eyes to see with and his only law is justice, without distinction between man and woman.”[35][35] Gnostic women certainly enjoyed far more freedom and equality than their orthodox sisters did.  It was customary for them to travel in male/female pairs as missionaries, and they frequently held leading positions as teachers and prophetesses.[36][36] Ireneaus was aghast by the fact that the Gnostic sage, Marcus, encouraged women to become priestesses and officials in the Eucharist.[37][37]

    Further evidence of gnostic worship of the female as well as the male is found in accounts of the Church Fathers, which describe how Alexandrian Gnostics carried the statue of Persephone in procession from an underground crypt to their church on the eve of the Epiphany. Catholicism is still chastised by Protestants for worshipping Mary as a pagan goddess. The Qabalah also possesses a polytheistic myth in its ten sephiroth, at least three of which qualify as goddesses by any reasonable standard. In the scheme of gnostic feminine/masculine duality a single point in the center of a circle represents consciousness (Hadit). The radius depicts his sister/lover Sophia, the psyche.  The radius has two ends, one rooted in the center of consciousness, the other in the circumference, which is the body of the world (Nuit).  The goddess has two aspects the Higher Sophia and the Lower Sophia.  The Higher is Sophia in gnosis; the Lower is the fallen psyche into identification with the body. Plotinus, credited with being the father of neoplatonism, explains: “ In the advanced stages of contemplation, rising from body to psyche to consciousness, the object contemplated becomes more and more the intimate possession of the contemplator.  When we reach consciousness itself, there is complete identity of the knower and the known.” [38][38] The Unbegotten Father allows Sophia’s ignorance because it is only through ignorance that knowledge can be attained.

    According to the Gospel of Philip it is the separation of the spiritual element (Eve) from the psyche (Adam) that was the original cause of death in the world: "When Eve was in Adam, death did not exist. But when she separated from him, death came into being." (Philip 68:22-25.)  "The principle point, rather, is that the perfected human being is one who has united the elements of both sexes within themselves. The function of the redeeming logos is to affect this reunion: "Because of this Christ came to repair the separation that was from the beginning and again unite the two." (Philip 70:10-20)  Adam does not mean "man' in Hebrew. The word meaning a "man" is "ish." ‘Adam" actually means "mortal" or "human being," signifying an androgynous unity. An ancient Jewish midrash says, "Man and woman were originally undivided," that is, Adam was at first created bisexual, as a hermaphrodite (Genesis Rabbah 8:1).  In the theology of the Valentinians, it is the division of the sexes in the Genesis story that is the root of the human plight. For the Gnostic, the bridal chamber represents the sacred place where reconciliation of soul and spirit, male and female, takes place.  In other words it is the end of duality.

    The Gospel of Philip describes five great sacraments: baptism, chrism, eucharist, redemption, and the bridal chamber.  It states, “Christ came to rectify the separation…and join the two components; and to give life unto those who died by separation and join them together.  Now a woman joins with her husband in the bridal chamber and those who have joined in the bridal chamber will not reseparate.  In A Valentinian Exposition we read, “And the angels of the males and the seminal ones of the females are all pleromas (archetypal cosmos, state of perfection). Moreover, whenever Sophia receives her consort and Jesus receives the Christ and the seeds and the angels, then the pleroma will receive Sophia joyfully, and the All will come to be in unity and reconciliation. For by this the Aeons have been increased; for they knew that should they change, they are without change”.  

    It was commonly believed that like the buddhist, the gnostic viewed the world as a curse, a place of sorrow to be escaped. Anything composed of matter is the work of the demiurge and to have children is to perpetuate the error and suffering of divine life trapped in the material world. According to some not only was the world of the demiurge an “abortion” of matter, but it is also described as an illusion. Thus everything experienced by the body was part of an elaborate, structural lie. Many Gnostics were so negative that they hated procreation and sex. Yet a deeper investigation of the Gnostic texts reveals a more positive doctrine than previously thought possible. The true significance of the demiurge is its symbolic identification with the ego.  The ego blinds us to our true essence and purpose.  The ego like the demiurge is lost in its own puffed up fantasies about its self-importance and purpose for creating the world (or the image of the self).  In trying to understand how pain, suffering, injustice, and cruelty can arise from a God who is supposedly love and goodness, the gnostics created the myth of an imperfect emanation of God as the creator.  In the same way it is the ego, which causes otherwise loving, good people to be petty, small-minded, and sometimes cruel. It is ignorance and attachment to the impermanent and an ego-image results in sickness, suffering, and death. Identification with our false selves, not allowing an ego-image to die, results in a state of permanent conflict and disharmony within the self. Egocide (letting the old idea of the self die so a new self can be born) is the symbolic act of killing the ego – a sacrifice of the ego to the Self, the lower to the higher. After egocide it is still necessary to go through a grieving process. The ability to let go means the ability to transcend self-imposed limitations. Transcending old modes of thinking and feeling clears the way for personal transformation. Transcendence is not a place to get stuck, however, to get stuck in transcendence leads to aloofness, inflation, and isolation. Transformation is the next step. Transformation is the union of opposites, which leads to creative change.  Transformation is the fruit of gnosis gone right.

      Crowley describes three schools of magick: the white, black, and yellow.  These designations are not to be confused with “black magick”/sorcery and “white magick”.  The black school is the school of the buddhists, zoroastrians, and gnostics…that is that the world is evil and a curse.  The yellow school embraced by the Way of the Tao views the world as neutral and the path of salvation is that of inaction.  Finally the white school, the one embraced by thelemites, Germanic, Celtic, and many other pagans, is one of joy.  Crowley writes, “To us, every phenomenon is an act of love.  Every experience is necessary.  Every experience is a sacrament and a means of growth.  Hence ‘existence is pure joy ‘ (AL, II: 9).  “A feast every day in your hearts in the joy of my rapture!  A feast every night unto Nu, and the pleasure of uttermost delight!” (AL, II: 42,43). In Magick Without Tears, he writes, “the man who denounces life merely defines himself as a man unequal to it.  The brave man rejoices in giving and taking hard nocks, and the brave man is joyous. The Scandinavian idea of Valhalla may be primitive, but it is manly…He understands that the only joy worth while is the joy of continual victory, and the victory itself would become as tame as croquet if not spiced by equally continual defeat.”

 

“Now he who would become as a king unto himself must not renounce the kingdoms of this world, but must conquer the lands and estates of others and usurp their thrones….”  ” O seeker! All this must thou bear witness to, and become a partaker in without becoming defiled or disgusted, and without contempt or reverence; then of a certain thou shalt find the Golden Key….”

  --From The Temple of Solomon the King, Aleister Crowley

 

 

    Malkuth (the material world) is the Word made flesh and is as much a part of God as the logos. Life is not a curse but an opportunity.  We have been separated for the chance of union, for in that union its divine rapture. A natural life of spontaneity is one in which each act is performed with love and with the attitude of reverence and delight. It is to take each experience and make it a part of us.  For only in the complete annihilation of duality, only in the sacred marriage of two can the One be realized and changed.  It is the process of discovery and growth that is the real reward.

     It is true that the gnostic masters often seem to portray human incarnation in a negative light as a form of imprisonment from which we need to escape, but that is only half the story. Thus it would be unfair to relegate the Gnostics to the black School, when quite the contrary is actually true. To say that the world is a bad place and we should hate it would simply be ingratitude for the divine gift of life and the opportunity given us to strive towards and experience love and union. The urge to experience more than the material world is the urge towards freedom from the limits of our psyches and our bodies.  The opportunity to expand the consciousness is the real message behind Gnosticism.