Hold on, let me get this straight. This moron STILL doesn't understand he fricked up?
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Hold on, let me get this straight. This retard STILL doesn't understand he fucked up?
Hold on, let me get this straight. This moron STILL doesn't understand he fricked up?
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Why is gnosticism so popular on IQfy? Is it just the funny memes?
t. newbie
Normal Christianity
>the world is beautiful and you should be grateful to God.
Gnosticism
>the world is shit and the thing that calls itself God is a fricking moron.
Easy to see why it would appeal to disaffected young men who probably live in a shithole city full of morons and cancer-filled children.
I mean... are they wrong?
I don't know really. Most of the things Gnostics blame on the Demiurge, normal Christians would blame on Satan. Gnostics think that creation itself was flawed whereas Christians think that creation is perfect but is/was sabotaged.
I think Christianity has a hopeful view of the world (if we as a whole keep trying, we can overcome the sabotage) and the Gnostic view is more individualistic (I can't save the world, but I might be able to save myself) that are appealing to different groups of people.
Isn't there is implication that demiurge can be beaten and pleroma is achievable?
Yes my life is great and I feel like the world is wonderful because of the simple fact that I have sex regularly
yes
Normal christianity is that the world and the things in it are not divine, that divinity is wholly outside of this universe.
Panentheism is what you're talking about.
shitbrainedchildtakes/
Where did he say that the things in it are divine?
>panentheism
every time I see this word a little more of something dies inside me. if you use this word you should have a nice day. frick you.
>disaffected young men who probably live in a shithole city full of morons and cancer-filled children
FEELS BAD MAN
Other religions promote humility, asceticism and spiritual growth. Gnosticism lets you be an arrogant butthole who gets to LARP about his "sekret knowledge"
>Other religions promote humility, asceticism and spiritual growth.
No, they don't. It's what Live Laugh Love suburban roasties think.
They do but you'll obviously have to go outside normie Protestantism to find it. Saying Christianity doesn't promote humility and an ascetic spiritual life because of Calvinists is absurd as saying Buddhism doesn't because it's western practitioners are roasties who just like the idea of meditation.
uhh i guess you haven't this little known figure Jesus then huh
Lack of sex and an actual intellectual occupation, unironically
I don't think it is that popular but it should be more popular
Demiurge meme was up and running way inb4 4chin. Check out /normie/pseudIQfy like Umberto Eco's F.pendulum or name of rose, or PKD's books from 80s. I.e. VALIS.
The question I gotta ask you if you by chance could know what tf was going on in literary scene of 80s. I was born only a decade later so I couldn't have a first hand knowledge why.
Keep in mind that you live in a post modernist world son.
Not just them, but from Melville to Borges to Pynchon to McCarthy it’s been a strangely common undercurrent in European and American literature. Melville even has this brief poem, with this (fictitious) title:
Fragments of a Lost Gnostic Poem of the 12th Century
* * * *
Found a family, build a state,
The pledged event is still the same:
Matter in end will never abate
His ancient brutal claim.
Indolence is heaven’s ally here,
And energy the child of hell:
The Good Man pouring from his pitcher clear
But brims the poisoned well.
The Albigensian Cathars show up in Pynchon’s “Gravity’s Rainbow.” Borges, it should be too obvious to have to say (like “Three Versions of Judas” where it’s explicitly referenced and the basis of the story, besides other tales of his).
Boehme, Swedenborg, Blake, and Jung, all Gnostics at heart. And then Gnosticism played a huge role in 19th to early-20th century occultism that had a big influence on various writers and artists, from Theosophy to Steiner’s Anthroposophy to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. (Keep in mind, we still clearly had knowledge of Gnosticism even before the discovery of the Nag Hammadi tractates in 1949, but simply in a diluted form, such as from records of the beliefs of the Cathars, polemics against the Gnostics such as Irenaeus’s, the writings of early Gnostic theologians like Valentinus, Plotinus’s critique of them, etc.).
It even shows up extensively in Gaddis’s “The Recognitions”. Why do you think St. Harold Bloom (PBUH) wrote a whole book on how Gnosticism is the American religion, whether consciously or subconsciously?
It’s a fascinating school of thought and a historical reality that unsurprisingly has had a lot of authors allude to it.
"the answer is this
The bigger picture is the belle epoque and all the diarrhea form the humanist intellectuals (read gays).
Musil is the usual yuppie atheist homosexual sex fiend coomer who digs phenomenology , meditation and mysticism in dilettante after being bored from the bourgeois humanism hyping science and progress. The same crap from Proust. No wonder intellectuals and their fanbase love him and turn out to be bisexual.
Yes it's the decadence and degeneracy of atheism. As usual with humanists, it gets worse as time passes by. The next stage of torrent of crap is with Musil since after WW1 which killed the coomer fantasy of the belle epoque, ie it was peak hedonism, with men being super coomers and women being super prostitutes, muh technological progress, muh flying cars in year 2000, technical progress and scientism where the new gods. Not aware of any bad consequence for their behaviors, the loss of the hardon for the dogmas of the human rights is depicted and the usual crap about the bourgeois, sex and boredom is found in Musil. Musil is the usual yuppie atheist homosexual sex fiend coomer who digs phenomenology , mediation and mysticism in dilettante after being bored from the bourgeois humanism hyping science and progress. The same crap from Proust 100 years before. No wonder wanabee and careerist intellectuals and their fanbase love him and turn out to be bisexual.
After some secular universalism to feel spiritual and self righteous and salvage the secular democracy and public servants ( which created WW1 and 2) , they went on to their deification at all cost (in order to not fall back to monarchies) ie fascism (communism+nazism). all those bourgeois intellectuals from the non-stem fields contaminated the stem fields and since the non-stem careerists have no new mental masturbation to offer as the new grand narrative, all the stem intellectuals killed positivism for good and now there is nothing left besides a neo leftism which is compatible with capitalism= trannism.
because atheists are hedonists who surfed on the technological progress to get votes, now that science and positivism is pretty much dead for this and hedonists are still morally bankrupt, they have to resort to mass entertainment as culture and idolization to fake having virtue.
Positivism is a dead-end ideologically and material progress is also a dead with less and less marginal gains. Outside Internet, No breakthrough in science for the last 50 years.
I only ever vibed with Cathar dogma. Because, you know, it has literal npcs. Not "animal souls" and "human souls".
yes
Yes
God's omnibenevolence is objectively indefensible in light of wild animal suffering. I'm not a theist, but if God does exist, the Gnostics are right that he's either evil or a massive frickup.
if the gnostics are right then why doesn't the great spirit slap down the demiurge
That's why I'm not a gnostic. My only point is that IF we assume there is an intelligence that made the universe, it's objectively indefensible that said intelligence is good in any fundamental sense.
>why doesn't the great spirit slap down the demiurge
buckle up, buttercup
Why the frick would animal suffering matter? They aren't sapient. Might as well cry about a tree getting cut down or a rock being split open.
If you think killing and torturing puppies for pleasure isn't bad, then you're a sociopath.
We were talking about wild animals, so animals just suffering in nature unrelated to human actions. That's a huge difference, so shift the goalposts to a completely different thing.
And explain from the perspective of God why an animal being killed and tortured by a human would be bad, but animal killed and tortured by another animal would not be?
Yes because animals do not have free will. They act in accordance to their nature, they are beast of instinct and habit. They are a cog in the grand machinery of nature. When an animal inflicts suffering on another animal, it is not from malice.
But the way the minds of humans work is to sympathise with other life, that is why we have anthropomorphizes creatures since time immemorial. No human can choose to inflict suffering on an animal without expressing the evil of callous disregard for life. We have the capacity to kill animals without inflicting undue suffering, so it is up to our free will to follow through with that. Animals do not.
No cat can choose to inflict suffering on a rodent without expressing the evil of callous disregard for life. Cats have the capacity to kill rodents without inflicting undue suffering, so it is up to their free will to follow through with that.
They don't have the mental capacity. You think cats have the same level of sapience as a human? If you're vegan just tell me now so I can stop replying.
Nta but what proof do you have that animals are purely unconscious of themselves and only have what you assume for their cognitive abilities? Frankly just because you lack the ability to observe phenomena does not mean it doesn’t exist.
>Yes because animals do not have free will.
I don't think anyone believes the actor having free will is what makes an action either good or bad. Is it not bad if a child gets killed and eaten by a tiger, because the tiger doesn't have free will?
>I don't think anyone believes the actor having free will is what makes an action either good or bad.
I think you'll find that most people determine morality based on the intelligent agency of the actor, actually. That's why doing something accidentally is different from doing it intentionally, and when accidents are considered bad it's called gross negligence, because the outcome was so bad that just saying you didn't mean to do it isn't sufficient.
>Is it bad?
It's bad because it upsets us, but it's not morally wrong.
You failed reading comprehension.
>has no concept of unconscious evil
>tries to dunk on gnostic theodicies
Leave.
>I think you'll find that most people determine morality based on the intelligent agency of the actor, actually.
Well no. I think a dog being tortured is bad because I don't like to see innocent dogs endure pointless suffering. If an animal isn't ripped and part and killed painfully by another animal, that would be a better world than a world where that and the pointless suffering it involves happens regularly. That any creator of the universe chose to allow this to happen regularly refutes any claim a creator would have to being omnibenevolent.
>It's bad because it upsets us, but it's not morally wrong.
If it's not morally wrong, then we don't have a moral obligation to prevent a child being killed and eaten by a tiger.
You can't hold both that a human torturing an animal is bad, and an animal torturing a human is bad, but an animal torturing an animal is not bad.
Word games. Animals clearly experience suffering and distress
>When an animal inflicts suffering on another animal, it is not from malice.
Chimps torture their POWs
>>Yes because animals do not have free will. They act in accordance to their nature, they are beast of instinct and habit. They are a cog in the grand machinery of nature. When an animal inflicts suffering on another animal, it is not from malice.
Yes that's the israeli propaganda. According to those ''people'', yaweh made the animals in order for the israelites to use them and thrive.
chimpanzees are smart and clearly think. you cant deny this. you wont reply because you know im right too
I also have trouble believing that only humans get to have knowledge of their inevitable death as a fren. Obviously a great many species have access to suffering.
Well, hold on a minute there bub...God's omnibenevolence created a placed called Eden aka paradise. In that place there was no such thing as suffering. Man chose to 'fall', and, with man's fall, the whole world 'fell.' Pretty basic stuff that I am sure you know, so why are you acting like God created a world in which animals were designed to suffer?
God is so benevolent he put an apple in his paradise that fricks up people who eat it, let in an evil guy who tempts people to eat the apple, and banishes people without helping them if they eat the apple.
Why do wild animals pointlessly suffer because of a choice humans made? Sorry, the traditional "free will" argument makes no sense here.
It does indeed make good memes;
has no coherent religious system so both demands nothing from people identifying with it and creates no clear expectations of them from other people;
resonates with the popular modern sentiment that there is a lot wrong with the world and humanity and always has been;
and it is overall interpretted as anti-mainstream Christianity and conventional notions of God, so basically has the same appeal as neo-atheism but works for people uncomfortable with total materialism.
>Why is gnosticism so popular on IQfy?
You get to go around about how degeneracy and spiritual decline without ever having to go to church and putting your conviction under scrutiny of other people, so you can always do it like post-meta-ironically, but kinda meaning it, but still without ever finding yourself in a situation where other people with names and faces will judge you for what you say and do.
It's Discord Anime Nationalism, but for spirituality.
>he fricked up
Valentinians get OUT.
This is one of the biggest misconceptions of the demiurge. While the demiurge was born of a mistake, his actions themselves were/are active malevolence. Rather then simple stupidity, mistakes or incompetence. There is a very big and important difference between an entity that allows evil due to inability/ineptitude and an entity that inflicts evil for its own sadistic ends.
Gnosticism is basically the only reasonable way to resolve the problem of evil in Christianity as seen here:
. A spiritual system that makes intuitive sense, does not require leaps in logic and provides a sensible explanation for the state of the world is always going to have a strong appeal. Hence why Gnosticism just keeps cropping up, even after almost two millennia of a frequently genocidal wack-a-mole perpetrated against its adherents.
You would understand very little. Before you get into the Nag Hammadi texts, you should be familiar with the bible, modern critical biblical academic positions and have read at-least one general introduction to Gnosticism.
My recommendation is to read the following texts in this order:
OAB Bible -> The Gnostic Religion (Jonas) -> Gnostic Religion in Antiquity (Broek) -> The Nag Hammadi scriptures (Meyer)
I fail to see how creating a middleman (Demiurge) would resolve the problem of evil in Christianity. Christianity already has a middleman (Satan) who is described as "the god of this world." He is responsible and we share the blame in making the world a fallen place. Gnosticism keeps cropping up because it is the "coming" religion. Basically the new perennial approach of the old churches, like the Catholic Church, and of the national governments which all wish to unite under one order is quite gnostic. Masons, transhumanists, theosophists, etc. are all basically gnostics. Evangelion is basically gnostic. Gnosticism is so prevalent and pushed by so many of the wrong people that you simply know it is false.
Then who created devil, and why didn't get rid of him since he is a low level scrub
Perhaps you don't understand Christian theology, but our fall and redemption through crucifixion is the greatest possible outcome. You can disagree with that, more as a matter of preference or taste, but given that Christ's birth, death, and resurrection are the best possible outcome, not creating Satan or destroying him prior to the fall does not make much sense.
God uses the devil to do good, from his point of view not yours. At the end of the day the devil is not the master of hell but its oldest prisoner and he can only do what God allows him to do.
>and he can only do what God allows him to do.
That would mean that Satan is merely God's sockpuppet and everything he does is really just God's actions
>Masons, transhumanists, theosophists, etc. are all basically gnostics.
I don’t think Gnosticism is amenable to transhumanism. To be a bit speculative, this trend of transhumanism would probably be seen as an archontic (demonic) manifestation of further enslavement of the human soul in the prison of matter, a further descent into spiritual “sleep” and materialism, a further robbing of freewill.
The singularity of transhumanism is definitely gnostic. Upload all human consciousness so that it can be fused into one mind. You can claim that it is "permanently tied" to the machine but now you sound like a monist. The mind, as far as we know, is tied to the brain but that doesn't mean it is the brain. Same applies for the Transhumanist singularity. Slap on top that transhumanism aims to reduce or eliminate the needs of the body (eating, drinking, sleeping, etc.).
Have you read any of the Nag Hammadi texts? Even one of the most simple, famous, short and beautiful ones — the Gospel of Thomas — can give you a primer. And it overlaps with the Christianity of the Gospels, surprisingly so, much of the time. The kingdom of heaven is primarily a spiritual state in Gnosticism, not a physically visible one, much as it is in the Gospels. It is not outwardly achieved, and much less is it technologically achieved.
(3) Jesus said, "If those who lead you say to you, 'See, the kingdom is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you. Rather, the kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living father. But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty and it is you who are that poverty."
It is not in an ontic realm but an ontological one. Hence, by definition transhumanism (the alteration of humanity by technology or even the merging of man with technology) can have no bearing on the kingdom of heaven and would even be antithetical to it for plausibly turning man into a machine and cutting him off from the spirit even more.
Any type of technology used in the service of transhumanism would be an extension of matter, materiality or hylē. Hence, the “merging of man with machine,” our brains fused with the Internet, the World Wide Web, the Cloud, or whatever, would simply be a the ultimate enslavement of man to materiality, making us hylics — or even more so, if we already were hylics.
You seem to fundamentally misunderstand Gnosticism and instead have an idea that it’s some type of modern day New Age Luciferian occultism of the NWO.
>You seem to fundamentally misunderstand Gnosticism and instead have an idea that it’s some type of modern day New Age Luciferian occultism of the NWO.
based. this is a rampant problem. 90% of people who say they're gnostics take psychedelics and have shrines dedicated to buddha and/or a pentagram. They're just satanists
There is really no connection between Gnosticism and trans-humanism. Positive or negative. As a Gnostic, I see human life extension via technology being a mixed bag that I cannot say I particularly support or oppose.
While were at it, Theosophists have zero connection ideologically or spiritually to Gnosticism. And Freemasons are outright enemies of Gnosticism.
Living indefinitely in this material prison is fundamentally unacceptable for any Gnostic. Regardless if it involves being trapped in a human body or a computer. Gnostics seek liberation from this prison altogether, not merely switch our prison uniform as you seem to suggest.
It's all the same shit. Transhumanism is not merely 'human life extension." That's the most norm understanding of the goal of Transhumanism. Its true end can see all consciousness united as a single 'mind,' a mind that capable of indefinitely snowballing. How exactly is that "living indefinitely in this material prison"? You take too much for granted.
If there was a god im not sure you would have to pray for him.
How is transhumanism gnostic? You’re just permanently tied to the material world which the gnostics say is evil
>does not require leaps in logic
bruh
Be careful with this one, it's developing its awareness.
>Why is gnosticism so popular on IQfy?
american sub-humans need the 'image of the other' in order to feel recognised - the other being in this case an ancient religion compossed of incels, illiterate fedoras and chronnical masturbators.
Plotinus (pbuh) refuted the gnostics in one of the tractates of his Enneads
Can you read Nag Hammadi without having read the Bible?
sure, but it'd be a handicapped reading
this anon is correct. however, a concurrent reading of both the bible and the nag hammadi might be a very interesting approach for someone unfamiliar with either. besides, there is very little unifying the nag hammadi besides the context of their compiling
Le demiurge c'est moi.
mdr
ok Alexandre
>Nietzsche: Infliction of suffering IS Dionysus' love. That's how you grow up as a character, kid.
the funny thing is that atheist morons deeply believe this lol, especially women.
"What belongs to greatness - Who will attain something great if he does not feel in himself the power to inflict great pain? Being able to suffer is the least; weak women and even slaves often achieve mastery at that. But not to perish of inner distress and uncertainty when one inflicts great suffering and hears the cry of this suffering - that is great; that belongs to greatness."
>Hurting others is hard, but should learned as a skill
One of the most sociopathic quotes I’ve ever heard. Not to mention, completely brain dead. Any 6 yr old can inflict pain on others his age. Let us honor the selfish 6 yr old who steals all the others toys, because that is greatness.
>Any 6 yr old can inflict pain on others his age
But does that 6 yr old comprehend the full weight of his actions?
>Let us honor the selfish 6 yr old who steals all the others toys
See, this is how you've just revealed that you have a 2-digit IQ.
You've been hinted at that there are 4 types of actions:
-detrimental and hurtful
-benign and pleasant
-detrimental, but perceived-as-pleasant
-benign-in-the-long-term, but hurtful
Instead, in your infantile mind only the first two exist. If it hurts it bad, hurr durr!
that's boomer talk, and boomers hate their kids
reminder Nietzsche is a pure product of the secular humanism, desperate to turn the inherent nihilism of humanism into ''''''''''optimistic nihilism'''''', like the subhumans Hegel, Kant, Heidegger, Adorno, Habermas, Arendt, Husserl, Popper, Strauss, Weisse, Carnap, Engels, marx,Feuerbach, Frege, Fitche, [all germans, weird huh? germans can't think, they suck at wars so they fell back on ''''''''''philosophy'''''' who travestied the greek philosophy which was lived, and they turned it into mental masturbation in sterile universities, in order to get a cushy life like a generic girl gets one from her orbiters]. Germans thinkers are veganas who think they think.
. Nietzsche is your typical atheist that you find on every street corner nowadays. Those people are torn apart by nihilism and delusion of grandeur where they view themselves as a benevolent despot willy-nilly leading humanity towards a higher life.
Nietzsche is:
-an atheist [there is no god]
-an anti-christian [like any marxist] [Dude dont think long term like the life-denier christians, only the here and now matters OKAY!!]
-a nihilist [there is no truth, only interpretation, TRUTH!!!]
-an hedonist [Only this life matters!!1 live in the present moment to coom like my dancing vitalist idol, the great dyonisus!! teehee im Nietzsche btw, look at meee !11]
-a narcissist [look how I analysed the totally non-judeo-christian-made concept of ''''''human nature''''' , Humanity is will to power!!! LE HECKIN INSIGHT]
-a israelite glorifier ["The israelites, however, are beyond any doubt the strongest, toughest, and purest race now living in Europe."]
-a postmodernist [values don't exist but reality doesn't matter bro!!! Just become le heckin uberman, sink further into delusion, create your own values and fight for them until you die!!]
You believe you're a woman? You go giiiiiirl, nobody can tell you otherwise, period!!
Christians offloading their repeated failure to meaningfully address the problem of evil on a character from Plato is the most pathetic thing
>meaningfully address the problem of evil
the bible says verbatim that eve bent over for the devil and their satanic tar baby brought suffering to the world. did you just flip through to look at the pictures?
Why did god create the devil then?
>Brainlets not even understanding the basic concepts of free will and causality
How do you morons even remember to chew your goyslop or breathe?¿?¿?¿
no refutation then? good
It’s not a “character from Plato,” it’s simply the same word being used (demiurgos), which meant craftsman or artisan before being re-applied to a cosmological conception. In Plato’s Timaeus the Demiurge is a benevolent but limited figure, in Gnosticism he is much more significantly flawed.
To make clearer what I mean, it’s as if you said that the use of the word Logos in The Gospel of John is “reusing the same character from Heraclitus to Plato.” The same WORD is being used, the concepts overlap, but it’s inane to say it’s “the same character being re-used.”
Very facile reading. The Book of Job to Ecclesiastes to Christ’s suffering and crucifixion are anything but cheery odes to “the world being beautiful” (livelaughlove), the suffering and hellishness possible to experience in this world are extensively meditated upon in the israeli and Christian traditions. The world CAN be “beautiful” through spiritual regeneration in Christ, through following His teachings and the attainment of the Kingdom of Heaven, which is “within”, as Christ Himself says in the Gospels. This is something both Gnostic Christianity and more orthodox sects of Christianity agree on.
jews never learn.
Yea, he still does not realizes it
Me on the right
or maybe your looking at things the wrong way.
When i see the demiurge I see a skull and a spine. i dont think that anything should be destroyed everything has its place.
There is 2000+ years of conventional Christianity explaining why God allows suffering in this world yet gnostics ignore all that and go “um actually sweetie the God in your book is actually the bad guy. The real God is actually this secret super God that is never referenced anywhere and that Jesus never talks about”
>that toddler`s grandpa said mean things about the Holy Spirit, its a test of faith bro, black plague provides opportunity for charitable deeds, fearful symmetry is necessary bro, so you dont get lazy, trust the Plan!
Satan isn’t a person or deity or even a being. Lucifer literally means “bright light”. Why? Because it is the Earthly light of Earthly pleasures that attract you away from the Lords Light.
Jesus said the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. He didn’t mean it was close, he meant you were already here. The Kingdom of Heaven isn’t the Palace of Heaven. By your hand you can do the works of Him or you can instead blind yourself and do the works of the false light, that of Lucifer, and create Hell.
This is all plainly stated in the Christian works and in the israeli works that Christianity extrapolates and then nullifies. People aren’t “born into sin”, they do sin. Original sin is a concept of Judaism that people are born already rotten. See John chapter 9 for a complete rebuttal of this kind of non-sense.
YEAH MAYBE IF HE DIDNT FRICK UP THERE WOULDNT BE ANYTHING TO UNFRICK UP IN THE FIRST PLACE.
you're right god should have snapped humanity out of existence and tried again with a better race the second we ate the fruit. I'm glad he didn't tho
what do you mean "we?" am i responsible for eve not keeping her pussy shut?
Bros all the Greek words, different entities and "words that mean something different" like wisdom, reality, essence are really cooking my brain, I barely understand anything, it's so hard.
>tfw brainlet
Is there anything specific you are having trouble with?
One thing to remember if you are just jumping into the Nag Hammadi texts with zero preparation is that what has been preserved is a random smattering of texts of several different schools of Gnosticism. Some texts we cannot even link to a specific school and others having evidence of being used by several schools. That is not even mentioning the few non-Gnostic texts included. The fact is that this is a complicated topic and it is natural to feel overwhelmed by it at first.
Omg I remember seeing this image forever ago but I couldn't ever find it! Thanks for posting, this will surely help a lot.
>Is there anything specific you are having trouble with?
Nothing specific, the whole thing's rather hard.
>One thing to remember if you are just jumping into the Nag Hammadi texts with zero preparation is that what has been preserved is a random smattering of texts of several different schools of Gnosticism.
Yeah, this really messey me up too, it just jumps all over the place. I try to make it less hard on myself by trying to find a chronological order to it, but while finding the first one is rather easy (On The Origin Of The World, I assume), the titles of the other chapters are rather cryptic, so it's that's hard too lol.
Rather then jumping into the texts, you should really start with an introductory book. If Nothing else, it will show you what texts belong to what schools. The Gnostic Religion (Jonas) or Gnostic Religion in Antiquity (Broek) are great and you should really read one first, ideally both.
If you really want to get right into Gnostic texts, then the Gospel of Thomas or the Apocryphon of John are the two most approachable texts. The Apocryphon in particular details basically the entire Sethian cosmos for you.
Don't follow this guide. It is awful.
>Rather then jumping into the texts, you should really start with an introductory book. If Nothing else, it will show you what texts belong to what schools. The Gnostic Religion (Jonas) or Gnostic Religion in Antiquity (Broek) are great and you should really read one first, ideally both.
Thank you for the advice. Gladly, both those books are easily available, so I will do that.
Gnosisbros... I don't feel so good...
BLLLLLEEEEEEEEEGHGHGHHHHHHHHH
thank god thank go they are fricking gone. All of them. THEY WERE ALL SO FRICKING WEAK AND DESPICABLE AND FRICKING WORTHLESS. PEDO SCUM.
Is that a Native American Water Panther? or a Gnostic Lion-Headed Serpent? Why is the former considered real but the latter a figure of mockery as in OP's post?
The criticisms people have in this thread seem very off-the-mark. Incidental fun fact: in the original Koine Greek of the New Testament itself, the word we now often have translated in English as “sin” was “hamartia”. This literally and etymologically means: “to miss the mark, to miss the aim, to miss the target,” colloquially “to fall short, to err” and hence by poetic extension “to sin.”
All the criticisms of how Gnosticism (itself a vague, catch-all term for an entire diverse school of early Christian sects, teachings and scriptures excluded by the early church, as pointed out in this thread) seems to handle the problem of evil (theodicy) and the depiction of the Demiurge, are just as applicable to more orthodox (with a small o) interpretations of Christianity. The role “the Demiurge” (or Yaldabaoth, Samael, whoever) plays in Gnosticism is practically the same as that played by “Satan” or “Lucifer” in orthodox Christianity. Any criticism you can make of Gnosticism can be applied almost identically to Christianity, in this respect (why does God allow the evil figure to continue spreading evil/why’d God create him at all/etc.?)
Satan is “the prince of this world” in the Gospels. The Demiurge is likewise that in Gnosticism.
When you look at the horrific, hypocritical history of, for example, some of the Roman Catholic Church (the inquisitions, tortures, burning-at-the-stake, crusades, meddling with the affairs of kingdoms and political states, their accumulation of wealth, practices like of indulgences, etc.), it’s hard not to feel interested in and sympathetic with some early brutally repressed supposed Scriptures of Christ’s teachings which seem to have an explanation for this, if you’re a religiously inclined person who is already interested in and respectful enough of Christ’s teachings, or in religion in general, for it to matter enough, anyways.
In the time it took to compose and type this post in your mind, how many people could you have fed?
If you had educated yourself as a farmer or cook instead of a mediocre theologian, how many?
gnosticbros... how do you cope with this shit ass frick ass lame ass world
I have no trouble believing your world is lame, but some actually live in an awesome world that does not suck.
My life is not bad, but the world is bad for others, specially my friends i worry about, whose life does suck at times. And that is what keeps weighing on me
Alcohol
UUUH GNOSTICBROS??? OUR RESPONSE?
Who wrote this? I have never seen someone so uneducated on the topic. What we call gnostic is an umbrella term that includes different Christian sects as well. Marcion and Valentinus were Christians.