Difference between revisions of "Gnosticism"

<p> <b> Gnosticism. </b> The zeal with which a learner commences the study of ecclesiastical history is not unfrequently damped at an early stage, when he finds that, in order to know the history of religious thought in the 2nd cent., he must make himself acquainted with speculations so wild and so baseless that it is irksome to read them and difficult to believe that time was when acquaintance with them was counted as what alone deserved the name of "knowledge." But it would be a mistake to think too disdainfully of those early heretics who go by the common name of Gnostics. In the first place, it may be said in their excuse that the problems which they undertook to solve were among the most difficult with which the human intellect has ever grappled—namely, to explain the origin of evil, and to make it conceivable how the multiplicity of finite existence can all have been derived from a single absolute unconditioned principle. And besides, these speculators only did what learned theologians have constantly since endeavoured to do—namely, combine the doctrines which they learned from revelation with the results of what they regarded as the best philosophy of their own day, so as to obtain what seemed to them the most satisfactory account and explanation of the facts of the universe. Every union of philosophy and religion is the marriage of a mortal with an immortal: the religion lives; the philosophy grows old and dies. When the philosophic element of a theological system becomes antiquated, its explanations which contented one age become unsatisfactory to the next, and there ensues what is spoken of as a conflict between religion and science; whereas, in reality, it is a conflict between the science of one generation and that of a succeeding one. If the religious speculations of the 2nd cent. appear to us peculiarly unreasonable, it is because the philosophy incorporated with them is completely alien to modern thought. That philosophy gave unlimited licence to the framing of hypotheses, and provided that the results were in tolerable accordance with the facts, no other proof was required that the causes which these hypotheses assumed were really in operation. The <i> [[Timaeus]] </i> of [[Plato]] is a favourable specimen of the philosophic writings which moulded the Gnostic speculations; and the interval between that and a modern treatise on physics is fully as wide as between Gnosticism and modern scientific theology. So it has happened that modern thought has less sympathy with heretical theories deeply coloured by the philosophy of their own time than with the plain common sense of a church writer such as Irenaeus, which led him to proceed by the positive historical method, and reject what was merely fanciful and speculative. And it may be said that deeply important as were some of the particular questions discussed in the conflict between the church and Gnosticism, an even more important issue of that conflict was the decision of the method by which religious knowledge was to be arrived at. The Gnostics generally held that the Saviour effected redemption by making a revelation of knowledge, yet they but feebly attempted to connect historically their teaching with his; what was derived from Him was buried under elements taken freely from heathen mythologies and philosophies, or springing from the mere fancy of the speculator, so that, if Gnosticism had triumphed, all that is distinctively Christian would have disappeared. In opposition to them, church writers were led to emphasize the principle that that alone is to be accounted true knowledge of things divine which can be shewn by historical tradition, written or oral, to have been derived from the teaching of Christ and His apostles, a principle the philosophic justice of which must be admitted if Christ be owned as having filled the part in the enlightenment of the world which orthodox and Gnostics alike attributed to Him. Thus, by the conflict with Gnosticism reverence in the church was deepened for the authority of revelation as restraining the licence of human speculation, and so the channel was marked out within the bounds of which religious thought continued for centuries to flow. </p> <p> We deal here with some general aspects of the subject, referring to the articles on the chief Gnostic teachers for details as to the special tenets of the different Gnostic sects. </p> <p> <i> Use of the Word Gnosticism. </i> —In logical order we ought to begin by defining Gnosticism, and so fixing what extension is to be given to the application of the term, a point on which writers are not agreed. Baur, for instance, reckons among Gnostics the sectaries from whom the Clementine writings emanated, although on some of the most fundamental points their doctrines are diametrically opposed to those commonly reckoned as Gnostic. We conform to more ordinary usage in giving to the word a narrower sense, but this is a matter on which controversy would be only verbal, Gnosticism not being a word which has in its own nature a definite meaning. There is no difficulty in naming common characteristics of the sects commonly called Gnostic, though perhaps none of them is distinctive enough to be made the basis of a logical definition. They professed to be able to trace their doctrine to the apostles. Basilides was said to have learned from a companion of St. Peter; gospels were in circulation among them which purported to have been written by Philip, Thomas, and other apostles; and they professed to be able to find their doctrines in the canonical scriptures by methods of allegorical interpretation which, however forced, could easily be paralleled in the procedure of orthodox writers. If we made our definition turn on the claim to the possession of such a Gnosis and to the title of Gnostic, we should have to count Clement of Alexandria among Gnostics and <i> I. Timothy </i> among Gnostic writings; for the church writers refused to surrender these titles to the heretics and, claiming to be the true Gnostics, branded the heretical Gnosis as "falsely so called." If we fix our attention on the predominance of the speculative over the practical in Gnosticism, which, as Baur truly remarks, led men to regard Christianity less as a means of salvation than as furnishing the principles of a philosophy of the universe, we must allow that since their time very many orthodox writings have been open to the same criticism. We come very close to a definition if we make the criterion of Gnosticism to be the establishment of a dualism between spirit and matter; and, springing out of this, the doctrine that the world was created by some power different from the supreme God, yet we might not be able to establish that this characteristic belongs to every sect which we count as Gnostic; and if we are asked why we do not count such sects as the [[Manicheans]] among the Gnostics, the best answer is that usage confines the word to those sects which arose in the ferment of thought when Christianity first came into contact with heathen philosophy, excluding those which clearly began later. A title of honour claimed by these sectaries for themselves, and at first refused them by their opponents, was afterwards adopted as the most convenient way of designating them. </p> <p> We have no reason to think that the earliest Gnostics intended to found sects separated from the church and called after their own names. Their disciples were to be Christians, only elevated above the rest as acquainted with deeper mysteries, and called γνωστικοί , because possessed of a Gnosis superior to the simple faith of the multitude. Probably the earliest instance of the use of the word is by Celsus, quoted by Origen, v. 61, where, speaking of the multiplicity of Christian sects, he says that there were some who professed to be Gnostics. Irenaeus (i. xxv. 5, p. 104), speaking of the Carpocratians and in particular of that school of them which [[Marcellina]] established at Rome, says that they called themselves Gnostics. It is doubtless on the strength of this passage that [[Eusebius]] ( <i> H. E. </i> iv. 7), quoting Irenaeus in the same context, calls [[Carpocrates]] the father of the sect called that of the Gnostics. In the habitual use of the word by Irenaeus himself it does not occur as limited to Carpocratians. Irenaeus, in his first book, when he has gone through the sects called after the names of heretical teachers, gives in a kind of appendix an account of a number of sects in their general characteristics Ophite, but he does not himself use that name. He calls them "multitudo Gnosticorum," tracing their origin to Simon Magus, and counting them as progenitors of the Valentinians. And constantly we have the expression Basilidians, Valentinians, etc., "et reliqui Gnostici," where, by the latter appellation, the Ophite sects are specially intended. The form of expression does not exclude from the title of Gnostic the sects named after their founders; and the doctrine of the [[Valentinians]] is all through the work of Irenaeus a branch of "Gnosis falsely so called"; yet it is usually spoken of less as Gnosticism than as a development of Gnosticism, and the Valentinians are described as more Gnostic than the Gnostics, meaning by the latter word the Ophite sects already mentioned. In the work of Hippolytus against heresies, the name is almost exclusively found in connexion with the sect of the Naassenes or Ophites, and three or four times it is repeated (v. 2, p. 93; 4, p. 94; 11, p. 123) that these people call themselves Gnostics, claiming that they alone "knew the depths." The common source of Epiphanius and [[Philaster]] had an article on the Nicolaitanes, tracing the origin of the Gnostics to Nicolas the [[Deacon]] (see also Hippolytus, vii. 36, p. 258, and the statement of Irenaeus [II. ii. p. 188] that Nicolaitanism was a branch of Gnosis). Epiphanius divides this article into two, making the Gnostics a separate heresy ( <i> Haer. </i> 26). Hence ancient usage leaves a good deal of latitude to modern writers in deciding which of the 2nd-cent. sects they will count as Gnostic. </p> <p> Classification of Gnostic Sects.—Some general principles of philosophic classification may be easily agreed on but when they come to be applied it is found that there are some sects to which it is not obvious where to assign a place and that some sects are separated whose affinities are closer than those of others which are classed together. A very important though not a complete division is that made by Clement of Alexandria (Strom. iii. 5) into the ascetic and licentious sects: both parties agreeing in holding the essential evil of matter; the one endeavouring by rigorous abstinence to free as much as possible man's soul from the bondage to which it is subjected by union with his material part and refusing to marry and so enthral new souls in the prisons of bodies; the other abandoning as desperate any attempt to purify the hopelessly corrupt body and teaching that the instructed soul ought to hold itself unaffected by the deeds of the body. All actions were to it indifferent. The division of Neander is intended to embrace a wider range than that just described. Taking the common doctrine of the Gnostic sects that the world was made by a Being different from the supreme God he distinguishes whether that Being was held to have acted in subordination to the [[Supreme]] and on the whole to have carried out his intentions or to have been absolutely hostile to the supreme God. Taking into account the generally acknowledged principle that the Creator of the world was the same as the God worshipped by the Jews we see that Gnostics of the second class would be absolutely hostile to Judaism which those of the former class might accept as one of the stages ordained by the Supreme in the enlightenment of the world. Thus Neander's division classifies sects as not unfriendly to Judaism or as hostile to it; the former class taking its origin in those [[Alexandrian]] schools where the authority of such teachers as [[Philo]] had weight the latter among Christian converts from Oriental philosophy whose early education had given them no prejudices in favour of Judaism. Gieseler divides into Alexandrian Gnostics whose teaching was mainly influenced by the Platonic philosophy and [[Syrian]] strongly affected by Parsism. In the former the emanation doctrine was predominant in the latter dualism. Undoubtedly the most satisfactory classification would be if it were possible as Matter suggested to have one founded on the history of the generation of the sects distinguishing the school where Gnosticism had its beginning and naming the schools which successively in different places altered in different directions the original scheme. But a good classification of this kind is rendered impossible by the scantiness of our materials for the history of Gnosticism. Irenaeus is the first to give any full details and he may be counted two generations later than Valentinus; for [[Marcus]] the disciple of Valentinus was resisted by one whom Irenaeus looked up to with respect as belonging to the generation above his own. The interval between Valentinus and the beginning of Gnosticism was moreover probably quite as great as that between Valentinus and Irenaeus. The phrase used by Hippolytus in telling us that the Naassenes boasted that they alone "knew the depths" was also a watchword of the false teachers reprobated in the [[Apocalypse]] (Rev_2:24). We can hardly avoid the inference that these Naassenes inherited a phrase continuously in use among heretical teachers since before the publication of the Revelation. Of the writers who would deny the pastoral epistles to be St. Paul's a large proportion date the Revelation only 2 or 3 years after St. Paul's death; therefore whether or not it was St. Paul who wrote of the "falsely called knowledge," it remains probable that heretical pretenders to Gnosis had arisen in his lifetime. If the beginnings of Gnosticism were thus in apostolic times we need not be surprised that the notices of its origin given by Irenaeus more than a century afterwards are so scanty; and that the teachers to whom its origin has been ascribed Simon [[Menander]] Nicolas Cerinthus remain shadowy or legendary characters. It follows that conclusions as to the order of succession of the early Gnostic sects and their obligations one to another are very insecure. Still some general facts in the history of the evolution of Gnosticism may be considered fairly certain; and we are disposed to accept the classification of [[Lipsius]] and count three stages in the progress of Gnosticism even though there may be doubt to what place a particular sect is to be assigned. The birthplace of Gnosticism may be said to be [[Syria]] if we include in that [[Palestine]] and [[Samaria]] where church tradition places the activity of those whom it regards as its founders Simon and Menander. It may also be inferred from the use made of O.T. and of [[Hebrew]] words that Gnosticism sprang out of Judaism. The false teaching combated in Colossians which has several Gnostic features is also distinctly Jewish insisting on the observance of Sabbaths and new moons. The Epp. to Timothy and Titus dealing with a somewhat later development of Gnosticism describe the false teachers as "of the circumcision," "professing to be teachers of the law" and propounders of "Jewish fables." It is not unlikely that what these epistles characterize as "profane and old wives' fables" may be some of the Jewish [[Haggadah]] of which the early stages of Gnosticism are full. The story of [[Ialdabaoth]] e.g. told by Irenaeus (i. 30) we hold to date from the very beginning of Gnosticism if not in its present shape at least in some rudimentary form as fragments of it appear in different Gnostic systems especially the representation of the work of [[Creation]] as performed by an inferior being who still fully believed himself to be the Supreme saying "I am God and there is none beside me," until after this boast his ignorance was enlightened. The Jewish [[Cabbala]] has been asserted to be the parent of Gnosticism; but the records of Cabbalistic doctrine are quite modern and any attempt to pick out the really ancient parts must be attended with uncertainty. Lipsius (p. 270 and Grätz referred to by him) shews that the Cabbala is certainly not older than Gnosticism its relation to it being not that of a parent but of a younger brother. If there be direct obligation the Cabbala is the borrower but many common features are to be explained by regarding both as branches from the same root and as alike springing from the contact of Judaism with the religious beliefs of the farther East. Jewish Essenism especially furnished a soil favourable to the growth of Gnosticism with which it seems to have had in common the doctrine of the essential evil of matter as appears from the denial by the [[Essenes]] of the resurrection of the body and from their inculcation of a disciplining of man's material part by very severe asceticism. (See Lightfoot Colossians 119 seq.) Further the Ebionite sects which sprang out of Essenism while they professed the strongest attachment to the [[Mosaic]] law not only rejected the authority of the prophetical writings but dealt in a very arbitrary manner with those parts of the [[Pentateuch]] which conflicted with their peculiar doctrines. We have parallels to this in theories of some of the early Gnostic sects which referred the Jewish prophetical books to the inspiration of beings inferior to Him by Whom the law was given as well as in the arbitrary modes of criticism applied by some of the later sects to the books of Scripture. A form of Gnosticism thus developed from Judaism when the latter was brought into contact with the mystic speculations of the East whether we suppose Essenism to have been a stage in the process of growth or both to have been independent growths under similar circumstances of development. Lipsius notes as the characteristics of those sects which he counts as belonging to the first stage of Gnosticism that they still move almost or altogether within the circle of the Jewish religious history and that the chief problem they set themselves is the defining the relation between Christianity and Judaism. The solutions at which they arrive are very various. Those Jewish sects whose Essenism passed into the Ebionitism of the Clementines regarded Christianity as essentially identical with Judaism either religion being sufficient for salvation. These sects are quite orthodox as to the Creation their utmost deviation (if it can be called so) from the received belief being the ascription of Creation to the immanent wisdom of God. Other Jewish speculators came to think of the formation of matter as accomplished by a subordinate being carrying out it may be the will of the Supreme but owing to his finiteness and ignorance doing the work with many imperfections. Then came the theory that this subordinate being was the God of the Jews to which nation he had issued many commandments that were not good though overruled by the Supreme so as to carry out His ends. Lastly came the theory of the Cainites and other extreme Ophite sects which represented the God of the Jews as the determined enemy of the Supreme and as one whose commands it was the duty of every enlightened Gnostic to disobey. With all their variety of results these sects agreed in the importance attached to the problem of the true relations of Judaism to Christianity. They do make use of certain heathen principles of cosmogony but these such as already had become familiar to [[Syriac]] Judaism and introduced not so much to effect a reconciliation between Christianity and heathenism as to give an explanation of the service rendered to the world by the publication of Christianity the absolute religion. This is made mainly to consist in the aid given to the soul in its struggles to escape the bonds of finiteness and darkness by making known to it the supersensual world and awaking it to the consciousness of its spiritual origin. [[Regarding]] this knowledge as the common privilege of Christians the first speculators would count their own possession of it as differing rather in degree than in kind; and so it is not easy to draw a sharp line of distinction between their doctrine on the subject of Gnosis and that admitted as orthodox. Our Lord had described it as the privilege of His disciples to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven; later when His followers learned of a suffering [[Messiah]] and of the fulfilment in Jesus of the types of the Mosaic law they felt that the veil had been removed for them and that they enjoyed a knowledge of the meaning of the O.T. Scriptures to which their unconverted brethren were strangers. This feeling pervades the Ep. to the Hebrews and still more that of Barnabas. Another doctrine which St. Paul describes as a mystery formerly kept secret but now revealed through his gospel is the admission of the [[Gentiles]] on equal terms with the Jews to the inheritance of the kingdom of Christ. It was no part of orthodox Christian doctrine that all Christians possessed the true Gnosis in equal degree. Some required to be fed with milk not with strong meat and had not their senses exercised by reason of use to discern between good and evil. Clement of Alexandria distinguished between faith and knowledge. The difference therefore between the Gnostic doctrine and that of the church mainly depends on the character of what was accounted knowledge much of the Gnostic so-called knowledge consisting in acquaintance with the names of a host of invisible beings and with the formulae which could gain their favour. </p> <p> Gnosticism, in its first stage, did not proceed far outside the limits of Syria. What Lipsius counts as the second stage dates from the migration of Gnostic systems to Alexandria, where the myths of Syriac Gnosis came to be united to principles of [[Grecian]] philosophy. Different Gnostic systems resulted according as the principles of this or that Grecian school were adopted. Thus, in the system of Valentinus, the Pythagorean Platonic philosophy predominates, the Stoic in that of the [[Basilidians]] as presented by Hippolytus. In these systems, tinged with Hellenism, the Jewish religion is not so much controverted or disparaged as ignored. The mythological personages among whom in the older Gnosis the work of creation was distributed are in these Hellenic systems replaced by a kind of abstract beings (of whom the Valentinian aeons are an example) which personify the different stages of the process by which the One [[Infinite]] Spirit communicates and reveals itself to derived existences. The distinction between faith and knowledge becomes sharpened, the persons to whom faith and knowledge respectively are to serve as guides being represented as essentially different in nature. The most obvious division of men is into a kingdom of light and a kingdom of darkness. The need of a third class may have first made itself felt from the necessity of finding a place for members of the Jewish religion, who stood so far above heathenism, so far below Christianity. The Platonic trichotomy of body, soul, and spirit afforded a principle of threefold classification, and men are divided into earthly (ὑλικοί or χοϊκοί ), animal (ψυχικοί ), and spiritual (πνευματικοί ). In these Hellenic Gnostic systems the second class represents not Jews but ordinary Christians, and the distinction between them and the Gnostics themselves (who are the spiritual) rests on an assumed difference of nature which leaves little room for human free will. [[Salvation]] by faith and corresponding works is disparaged as suitable only for the psychical, the better sort of whom may, by this means, be brought to as high a position in the order of the universe as their nature is capable of; but the really spiritual need not these lower methods of salvation. It suffices for them to have the knowledge of their true nature revealed for them to become certain of shaking off all imprisoning bonds and soaring to the highest region of all. Thus ordinary historical Christianity runs the risk of meeting the same fate in the later Gnostic systems that befell Judaism in the earlier. The doctrines and facts of the religion are only valued so far as they can be made subservient to the peculiar notions of Gnosticism; and the method of allegorical interpretation was so freely applied to both Testaments that all the solid parts of the religion were in danger of being volatilized away. </p> <p> The natural consequence of this weakening of the historic side of Christianity was the removal of all sufficient barrier against the intrusion of heathen elements into the systems; while their moral teaching was injuriously affected by the doctrine that the spiritual were secure of salvation by necessity of their nature and irrespectively of their conduct. Gnosticism, in its third stage, struggles in various ways to avoid these faults, and so again draws nearer to the teaching of the Catholic church. Thus the DOCETAE of Hippolytus allow of immense variety of classes, corresponding to the diversity of ideas derived from the world of aeons, which each has received; while again they deny to none a share in our Lord's redemption, but own that members of different sects are entitled, each in his degree, to claim kinship with Jesus and to obtain forgiveness of sins through Him. So again in one of the latest of the Gnostic systems, that of PISTIS SOPHIA, there is no assertion of an essential diversity of nature among men, but the immense development of ranks and degrees in the spiritual world, which that work professes to reveal, is used so as to provide for every man a place according to his works. In the system of Marcion, too, the theory of essentially different classes is abandoned; the great boast of Christianity is its universality; and the redemption of the [[Gospel]] is represented, not as the mere rousing of the pneumatic soul to consciousness of privileges all along possessed, but as the introduction of a real principle of moral life through the revelation of a God of love forgiving sins through Christ. </p> <p> We add brief notes on a few main points of the Gnostic systems. </p> <p> <i> Creation and Cosmogony. </i> —Philo ( <i> de Op. Mund. </i> ) had inferred from the expression, "Let us make man," of <i> [[Genesis]] </i> that God had used other beings as assistants in the creation of man, and he explains in this way why man is capable of vice as well as virtue, ascribing the origin of the latter to God, of the former to His helpers in the work of creation. The earliest Gnostic sects ascribe the work of creation to angels, some of them using the same passage in <i> Genesis </i> (Justin. <i> Dial. cum Tryph. </i> c. 67). </p> <p> <i> [[Doctrine]] with respect to Judaism. </i> —The doctrine that the Creator of the world is not the supreme God leads at once to the question, What then is to be thought of the God of the Jews, who certainly claimed to have created the world? This question is most distinctly answered in the doctrine of the Ophite system ( <i> Iren. </i> i. 30). According to it he who claimed to be a jealous God, acknowledging none other, was led by sheer ignorance to make a false pretension. He was in truth none other than the chief of the creative angels, holding but a subordinate place in the constitution of the universe. It was he who forbad to [[Adam]] and [[Eve]] that knowledge by which they might be informed that he had superiors, and who on their disobedience cast them out of Paradise. </p> <p> <i> Doctrine concerning the Nature of Man. </i> —With the myth, told by Saturninus, of the animation of a previously lifeless man by a spark of light from above, he connected the doctrine, in which he was followed by almost all Gnostic sects, that there would be no resurrection of the body, the spark of light being taken back on death to the place whence it had come, and man's material part being resolved into its elements. [[Saturninus]] is said to have taught the doctrine, antagonistic to that of man's free will, that there were classes of men by nature essentially different, and of these he counted two—the good and the wicked. The doctrine became common to many Gnostic systems that the human frame contained a heavenly element struggling to return to its native place. </p> <p> <i> Redemption and Christology. </i> —The Gnostic systems generally represent man's spirit as imprisoned in matter, and needing release. The majority recognize the coming of Christ as a turning-point in human affairs, but almost all reduce the Redeemer's work to the impartation of knowledge and the disclosure of mysteries. With regard to the nature of Christ, the lowest view is held by Justinus, who describes Jesus but as a shepherd boy commissioned by an angel to be the bearer of a divine revelation, and who attributes to Him at no time any higher character. Carpocrates makes Jesus a man like others, only of more than ordinary steadfastness and purity of soul, possessing no prerogatives which other men may not attain in the same or even higher degree if they follow, or surpass, His example. Besides furnishing an example, He was also supposed to have made a revelation of truth, to secret traditions of which the followers of Carpocrates appealed. At the opposite pole from those who see in the Saviour a mere man are those who deny His humanity altogether. We know from St. John's epistle that the doctrine that our Lord had not really come in the flesh was one which at an early time troubled the church. </p> <p> <i> Authorities. </i> —The great work of Irenaeus against heresies is the chief storehouse whence writers, both ancient and modern, have drawn their accounts of the Gnostic sects. It was primarily directed against the then most popular form of the heresy of Valentinus, and hence this form of Gnosticism has thrown all others into the shade, and many modern writers when professing to describe Gnosticism really describe Valentinianism. Irenaeus was largely copied by Tertullian, who, however, was an independent authority on Marcionism; by Hippolytus, who in his work against heresies adds, however, large extracts from his independent reading of Gnostic works; and by Epiphanius, who also gives a few valuable additions from other sources. The <i> Stromateis </i> of Clement of Alexandria, though provokingly desultory and unsystematic, furnish much valuable information about Gnosticism, which was still a living foe of the church. The writings of [[Origen]] also yield much important information. The matter, not borrowed from Irenaeus, to be gleaned from later heresiologists is scanty and of doubtful value. </p> <p> Modern works which have made valuable contributions to the knowledge of Gnosticism include Neander, <i> Genetische Entwickelung </i> (1818), and <i> Church Hist. </i> vol. ii. (1825 and 2nd ed. 1843, trans. in Clarke's series); Burton, <i> Bampton Lectures </i> (1829); Baur, <i> Christliche Gnosis </i> (1835); <i> Die christliche Kirche der drei ersten Jahrhunderte </i> (1853, 2nd ed. 1860); and Mansel, <i> The Gnostic Heresies </i> (1875). </p> <p> [G.S.] </p>

<p> <strong> GNOSTICISM </strong> </p> <p> 1. Gnosticism proper . The term, which comes from the Gr. <em> gnôsis </em> , ‘knowledge,’ is now technically used to describe an eclectic philosophy of the 2nd cent. a.d. which was represented by a number of sects or divisions of people. The philosophy was constructed out of Jewish, Pagan, and Christian elements, and was due mainly to the inevitable contact and conflict between these various modes of thought. It was an attempt to Incorporate Christian with Jewish and Pagan ideas in solving the problems of life. The more important of these problems were (1) How to reconcile the creation of the world by a perfectly good God with the presence of evil; (2) how the human spirit came to be imprisoned in matter, and how it was to be emancipated. The first problem was solved by predicating a series of emanations starting from a perfectly good and supreme God, and coming down step by step to an imperfect being who created the world with its evils. Thus there was an essential dualism of good and evil. The second problem was solved by advocating either an ascetic life, wherein everything material was as far as possible avoided, or else a licentious life, in which everything that was material was used without discrimination. Associated with these speculations was a view of Christ which resolved Him into a phantom, denied the reality of His earthly manifestation, and made Him only a temporary non-material emanation of Deity. Gnosticism culminated, as the name suggests, in the glorification of knowledge and in a tendency to set knowledge against faith, regarding the former as superior and as the special possession of a select spiritual few, and associating the latter with the great mass of average people who could not rise to the higher level. Salvation was therefore by knowledge, not by faith. The will was subordinated to the intellect, and everything was made to consist of an esoteric knowledge which was the privilege of an intellectual aristocracy. </p> <p> <strong> 2. Gnosticism in relation to the NT </strong> . It is obvious that it is only in the slightest and most partial way that we can associate Gnosticism of a fully developed kind with the NT. </p> <p> There is a constant danger, which has not always been avoided, of reading back into isolated NT expressions the Gnostic ideas of the 2nd century. While we may see in the NT certain germs which afterwards came to maturity in Gnosticism, we must be on our guard lest we read too much into NT phraseology, and there by draw wrong conclusions. One example of this danger may be given. Simon Magus occupies a prominent place in the thoughts of many 2nd and 3rd cent. writers, and by some he is regarded as one of the founders of Gnosticism. This may or may not have been true, but at any rate there is absolutely nothing in &nbsp;Acts 8:1-40 to suggest even the germ of the idea. </p> <p> It is necessary to consider carefully the main idea of <em> gnosis </em> , ‘knowledge,’ in the NT. ( <em> a </em> ) It is an essential element of true Christianity, and is associated with the knowledge of God in Christ (&nbsp; 2 Corinthians 2:14; &nbsp; 2 Corinthians 4:6 ), with the knowledge of Christ Himself (&nbsp; Philippians 3:8 , &nbsp; 2 Peter 3:18 ), and with the personal experience of what is involved in the Christian life (&nbsp; Romans 2:20; Rom 15:14 , &nbsp; 1 Corinthians 1:5; &nbsp; 1 Corinthians 3:19 , &nbsp; Colossians 2:3 ). In the term <em> epignosis </em> we have the further idea of ‘full knowledge’ which marks the ripe, mature Christian. This word is particularly characteristic of the <em> Pauline Epistles of the First [[Captivity]] </em> (Phil., Col., Eph.), and indicates the Apostle’s view of the spiritually-advanced believer. But <em> gnosis </em> and <em> epignosis </em> always imply something more and deeper than intellectual understanding. They refer to a personal experience at once intellectual and spiritual, and include intellectual apprehension and moral perception. As distinct from wisdom, knowledge is spiritual experience considered in itself, while wisdom is knowledge in its practical application and use. In <em> Colossians </em> it is generally thought that the errors combated were associated with certain forms of Gnosticism. Lightfoot, on the one hand, sees in the references in ch. 2 Jewish elements of scrupulousness in the observance of days, and of asceticism in the distinction of meats, together with Greek or other purely Gnostic elements in theosophic speculation, shadowy mysticism, and the interposition of angels between God and man. He thinks the references are to one heresy in which these two separate elements are used, and that St. Paul deals with both aspects at once in &nbsp; Colossians 2:8-23 . With Gnostic intellectual exclusiveness he deals in &nbsp; Colossians 1:18 and &nbsp; Colossians 2:11 , with speculative tendencies in &nbsp; Colossians 1:15-20 , &nbsp; Colossians 2:9-15 , with practical tendencies to asceticism or licence in &nbsp; Colossians 2:16-23 . Hort ( <em> Judaistic Christianity) </em> , on the other hand, sees nothing but Judaistic elements in the Epistle, and will not allow that there are two independent sets of ideas blended. He considers that, apart from the phrase ‘philosophy and vain deceit’ (&nbsp; Colossians 2:8 ), there is nothing of speculative doctrine in the Epistle. He says that angel-worship was already prevalent quite apart from philosophy, and that there is no need to look beyond Judaism for what is found here. This difference between these two great scholars shows the extreme difficulty of attempting to find anything technically called Gnosticism in Colossians. ( <em> b </em> ) The <em> Pastoral Epistles </em> are usually next put under review. In &nbsp; 1 Timothy 1:4; &nbsp; 1 Timothy 4:8 , we are hidden by Lightfoot to see further developments of what had been rife in Colossæ. Hort again differs from this view, and concludes that there is no clear evidence of speculative or Gnosticizing tendencies, but only of a dangerous fondness for Jewish trifling, both of the legendary and casuistical kind. ( <em> c </em> ) In the <em> First Epistle of John </em> (&nbsp; 1 John 4:1; &nbsp; 1 John 4:3 ) we are reminded of later Gnostic tendencies as represented by Cerinthus and others, who regarded our Lord as not really man, but only a phantom and a temporary emanation from the Godhead. The prominence given to ‘knowledge’ as an essential element of true Christian life is very striking in this Epistle, part of whose purpose is that those who possess eternal life in Christ may ‘know’ it (&nbsp; 1 John 5:13 ). The verb ‘to know’ occurs in the Epistle no less than thirty-five times. ( <em> d </em> ) In <em> Revelation </em> (&nbsp; Revelation 2:6; &nbsp; Revelation 2:15; &nbsp; Revelation 2:20; &nbsp; Revelation 2:24; &nbsp; Revelation 3:14; &nbsp; Revelation 3:21 ) it is thought that further tendencies of a Gnostic kind are observable, and Lightfoot sees in the latter passage proof that the heresy of Colossæ was continuing in that district of Asia Minor. The precariousness of this position is, however, evident, when it is realized that the errors referred to are clearly antinomian, and may well have arisen apart from any Gnostic speculations. </p> <p> From the above review, together with the differences between great scholars, it is evident that the attempt to connect the NT with the later Gnosticism of the 2nd cent. must remain at best but partially successful. All that we can properly say is that in the NT there are signs of certain tendencies which were afterwards seen in the 2nd cent. Gnosticism, but whether there was any real connexion between the 1st cent. germs and the 2nd cent. developments is another question. In the clash of Judaistic, Hellenic, and Christian thought, it would not be surprising if already there were attempts at eclecticism, but the precise links of connexion between the germs of the NT and the developments of the 2nd cent. are yet to seek. </p> <p> One thing we must keep clearly before us: <em> gnosis </em> in the NT is a truly honourable and important term, and stands for an essential part of the Christian life. Of course there is always the liability to the danger of mere speculation, and the consequent need of emphasizing love as contrasted with mere knowledge (&nbsp; 1 Corinthians 8:1; &nbsp; 1 Corinthians 13:2 ), but when <em> gnosis </em> is regarded as both intellectual and moral, we see at once how necessary it is to a true, growing Christian life. The stress laid upon <em> epignosis </em> in later books of the NT, Pauline and Petrine, and the marked prominence given to the cognate terms in 1 John, clearly indicate the importance placed on the idea by [[Apostolic]] writers as a safeguard of the Christian life. While it is the essential feature of the young Christian to <em> have </em> (forgiveness); and of the growing Christian to <em> be </em> (strong); it is that of the ripe Christian to <em> know </em> (&nbsp; 1 John 2:12-14 ). [[Knowledge]] and faith are never contrasted in the NT. It is a false and impossible antithesis. ‘Through faith we understand’ (&nbsp; Hebrews 11:3 ). Faith and sight, not faith and reason, are antithetical. We know in order to believe, credence leading to confidence; and then we believe in order to know more. Knowledge and trust act and react on each other. Truth and trust are correlatives, not contradictories. It is only mere speculative knowledge that is ‘falsely so called’ (&nbsp; 1 Timothy 6:20 ), because it does not take its rise and find its life and sustenance in God’s revelation in Christ; but Christian <em> gnosis </em> received into the heart, mind, conscience and will, is that by which we are enabled to see the true as opposed to the false ‘to distinguish things that differ’ (&nbsp; Philippians 1:10 ), and to adhere closely to the way of truth and life. The [[Apostle]] describes the natural earth-bound man as lacking this spiritual discernment; he has no such faculty (&nbsp; 1 Corinthians 2:14-15 ). The spiritual man (&nbsp; 1 Corinthians 2:15; &nbsp; 1 Corinthians 3:1 ), or the perfect or ripe man (&nbsp; 1 Corinthians 2:8 ), is the man who <em> knows </em> ; and this knowledge which is at once intellectual, moral and spiritual, is one of the greatest safeguards against every form of error, and one of the choicest secrets of the enjoyment of the revelation of God in Christ. </p> <p> W. H. Griffith Thomas. </p>

<p> Importance of Gnosticism The significance of gnosticism for students of Christianity has two dimensions: the first is its prominence in the history of the church, and the second is its importance for interpreting certain features of the New Testament. Gnosticism emerged in schools of thought within the church in the early second century and soon established itself as a way of understanding Christianity in all of the church's principal centers. The church was torn by the heated debates over the issues posed by gnosticism. By the end of the second century many of the Gnostics belonged to separate, alternative churches or belief systems viewed by the church as heretical. Gnosticism was thus a major threat to the early church; and the early church leaders, such as Irenaeus (died about 200), Tertullian (died about 220), and Hippolytus (died about 236), wrote voluminously against it. Many of the features of gnosticism were incorporated into the sect of the [[Manichees]] in the third century, and [[Manichaeism]] endured as an heretical threat to the church into the fourth century. </p> <p> Gnosticism is also important for interpreting certain features of the New Testament. Irenaeus reported that one of the reasons John wrote his Gospel was to refute the views of Cerinthus, an early Gnostic. Over against the gnostic assertion that the true God would not enter our world, John stressed in his Gospel that Jesus was God's incarnate Son. Other interpreters of the New Testament understand gnosticism to be crucial at many other points in interpreting the New Testament as will be discussed to follow. </p> <p> [[Heretical]] Gnostic Sects The Gnostics who broke away or were expelled from the church claimed to be the true Christians, and the early Christian writers who set themselves to refute their claims are the major source for descriptions of the heretical gnostic sects. Although wide variations existed among the many gnostic sects in the details of systems, certain major features were common to most of them—the separation of the god of creation from the god of redemption; the division of Christians into categories with one group being superior; the stress on secret teachings which only divine persons could comprehend; and the exaltation of knowledge over faith. The church rejected such teachings as heretical, but many people have continued to find attraction in varieties of these ideas. </p> <p> Gnostics generally distinguished between an inferior god whom they felt was responsible for the creation and the superior god revealed in Jesus as the Redeemer. This was a logical belief for them because they opposed matter to thought in a radical way. Matter was seen as inferior, sin-causing, and always deteriorating; thought or knowledge distinguished persons from matter and animals and was imperishable, capable of revealing god, and the only channel of redemption. The gnostic [[Marcion]] thus rejected the Old Testament, pointing out that the lesser or subordinate god revealed in it dealt with matter, insisted on law rather than grace, and was responsible for our decaying, tragedy-filled world. The god who revealed himself in Jesus and through the additional secret teachings was, on the other hand, the absolute god, and was not incarnate in human flesh because the absolute god would not enter evil matter—Christ only seemed or appeared to be a person, but He was not. </p> <p> Gnostics divided Christians into groups, usually the spiritual and the carnal. The spiritual Christians were in a special or higher class than the ordinary Christians because they had received, as the elect of the good deity, a divine spark or spiritual seed in their beings which allowed them to be redeemed. The spiritual Christians were the true Christians who belonged to the heavenly world which was the true one. This belief that the spiritual Christians did not really belong to this world resulted in some Gnostics seeking to withdraw from the world in asceticism. Other gnostic systems took an opposite turn into antinomianism (belief that moral law is not valid for a person or group). They claimed that the spiritual Christians were not responsible for what they did and could not really sin. Thus they could act in any way they pleased without fear of discipline. </p> <p> Gnostics placed great stress on secret teachings or traditions. This secret knowledge was not a product of intellectual effort but was given by Jesus, the [[Redeemer]] from the true deity, either in a special revelation or through His apostles. The followers of the gnostic Valentinus claimed, for example, that Theodus, a friend of Paul's, had been the means of transmission of the secret data. The secret knowledge was superior to the revelation recorded in the New Testament and was an essential supplement to it because only this secret knowledge could awaken or bring to life the divine spark or seed within the elect. When one received the gnosis or true knowledge, one became aware of one's true identity with a divine inner self, was set free (saved) from the dominion of the inferior creator god, and was enabled to live as a true child of the absolute and superior deity. To be able to attain to one's true destiny as the true deity's child, one had to engage in specific secret rituals and in some instances to memorize the secret data which enabled one to pass through the network of powers of the inferior deity who sought to keep persons imprisoned. Salvation was thus seen by the gnostics in a cosmic rather than a moral context—to be saved was to be enabled to return to the one true deity beyond this world. </p> <p> The Gnostics thought faith was inferior to knowledge. The true sons of the absolute deity were saved through knowledge rather than faith. This was the feature of the various systems that gave the movements its designation: they were the Gnostics, the knowers. Yet what this precise knowledge was is quite vague. It was more a perception of one's own existence that solved life's mysteries for the Gnostic than it was a body of doctrine. The knowledge through which salvation came could be enhanced by participation in rituals or through instruction, but ultimately it was a self-discovery each Gnostic had to experience. </p> <p> Origins of the Gnostic Concepts Gnosticism would not have been a threat to the early church if it had not been quite persuasive in the first centuries of the Christian era, and the question of where such ideas came from and what human needs they met must be addressed. </p> <p> The classic answer to the question of why gnosticism arose is that it represents the “radical Hellenizing of Christianity.” In this view, gnosticism resulted from the attempt of early Christian thinkers to make Christianity understandable, acceptable, and respectable in a world almost totally permeated by Greek assumptions about the reality of the World. The expansion of Christianity from Palestine and its Jewish world of thought to the [[Roman]] Empire where Greek thought reigned called for an interpretation of Christianity that was more understandable. Common [[Hellenistic]] perceptions, such as the fact that matter and spirit were thought to be alien to one another, were incorporated into this re-statement of Christianity with the various gnostic systems as a result. </p> <p> This classic view of the heretical gnostic sects as distortions of Christianity by Hellenistic thought has much strength because it is easily demonstrated how the Gnostics could use New Testament texts, bending them to their purposes. In &nbsp;1 Corinthians 3:1-4 , for example, Paul chides the [[Corinthian]] Christians for being “people of the flesh” (NRSV) or carnal when they should be spiritual. This text could with ease be used as the foundation for supporting the Hellenistic idea of the superiority of certain persons in the Christian community. In this and many other instances, terms or expressions in the New Testament, especially in the writings of Paul and John, could be lifted out of context and used in ways not originally intended by the authors to support gnostic doctrines. </p> <p> The classic explanation does leave some problems unsolved, however. Little doubt exists that there are ideas, attitudes, and practices incorporated into many of the gnostic heresies that are found outside of Hellenistic thought and much earlier than the second century of the Christian era. In particular, the ultimate goal of the Gnostics—to return to the absolute deity beyond matter and to be in some sense absorbed into the deity—belongs to near eastern pre-Christian mystical thought and not primarily to the Hellenistic world. </p> <p> The existence of such non-Hellenistic features in the gnostic sects has occasioned studies of the possibility of there being a pre-Christian gnosticism which could be understood in itself rather than as an heretical offshoot of the Christian faith. Some researchers came to the conclusion that there was a full-fledged, organized, pre-Christian gnostic religion with a literature and most crucially—the hope of a redeemer who would be sent from the true deity and ascend back to him after awakening the spiritual persons to their redemption. Some radical scholars even went so far as to maintain that the way the early Christians proclaimed Christ was dependent on and modeled after such gnostic expectation. This view thus came to be almost the exact opposite of the classic view of the gnostic sects as Christian heresies and made Christianity heavily dependent on gnosticism. This quite radical view of gnosticism has been shown to be inadequate because no literary evidence whatsoever exists for a full-blown pre-Christian gnosticism. As for a pre-Christian gnostic redeemer expectation, it is now generally acknowledged that this was a figment of the researcher's imagination without any relevant documentary evidence. </p> <p> Although the radical conclusions of some scholars regarding a highly developed pre-Christian gnosticism have been discounted, it does seem clear that there were many ideas, assumptions, and perceptions about deity, reality, and the relationships of persons to gods and the world that were incorporated into the gnostic sects from outside Hellenistic sources. Two literary discoveries have both inspired and tended to support this line of research—the [[Dead]] Sea Scrolls at Qumran in 1946 and the Nag Hammadi library in 1945 with many gnostic documents. The value of the study of gnosticism for interpreting the New Testament is greatest from the point of view that there was a pre-Christian gnosticism which was not an organized religion but was more a general attitude among thoughtful persons that although ignorance abounded, one could through knowledge come to understand one's true identity and find union or relationship with the absolute deity. This way of conceiving of a pre-Christian gnosticism supplements the classic view by providing an explanation for the rapid and widespread development of so many diverse gnostic heretical sects so quickly. This view also offers an explanation of why the New Testament could so easily be exploited by gnostic sects. The early Christian preachers and writers, seeking to speak and write to be understood, used terms current in the first century world in the vague context of gnostic religious longings and gave them new meaning in the context of the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus. </p> <p> Harold S. Songer </p>

<p> An early system of philosophy professedly Christian. One of their theories was that the Lord was an Æon and not really a man. Apparently to refute this the apostle insists on Christ having come 'in flesh.' &nbsp;1 John 4:2,3; &nbsp;2 John 7 . The same may be alluded to in &nbsp;Colossians 2:9 , "in him dwelleth all the fulness of the [[Godhead]] <i> bodily </i> ," in opposition to their mysticism. See GENEALOGIES. </p>

<p> During the period of the prevalence of Gnosticism there took place the earlier developments of Christian theology. Gnosticism gave a powerful impetus to the formation of a New Testament canon of Scripture; and to the shaping of the earliest creed. See James M.A. D.D. General Editor. Entry for 'Gnosticism'. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/isb/g/gnosticism.html. 1915.APOSTLES '''Copyright Statement''' These files are public domain and were generously provided by the folks at WordSearch Software. '''Bibliography Information''' Orr </p>