Gnostic worldview of the Abrahamic God
FOR the past few weeks, we have seen the distinction between the indigenous characterisation of the impersonal life force (“Mwari”) and the humanoid, masculine and personal Abrahamic God.
We have learnt about the nature and essence of the indigenous characterisation of the impersonal life force from the language, itself a bearer of thoughts, meaning and experiences.
Let’s now characterise the humanoid and personal Abrahamic God from a Gnostic worldview.
Understanding Gnosticism
The early application of the term “gnostic” is said to have been by a Christian theologian Irenaeus (c 202 CE).
He used the term to denote various deviations that he was criticising in his tract “On the Detection and Overthrow of the So-Called Gnosis” (also known as “Adversus Haereses or Against Heresies”).
As a result, we have inherited the categorical term for the Gnostics from a vehement detractor.
Used 29 times in the Greek Scriptures (New Testament), the term “gnosis” (Strong’s Greek Concordance #1108) is literally defined as “a knowing, knowledge, understanding way”.
This is a feminine noun whose root is “ginsk?” (#1097), which means “experientially know, functional knowledge gleaned from first-hand (personal) experience, connecting theory to application, application-knowledge, gained in (by) a direct relationship”.
Gnosis is “the knowledge of what we are, what we have been, the place from which we have come, the place into which we have fallen, the goal we are striving for and from which we have been pulled away, and the nature of our birth into (ignorance) and of our awakening”. (Theodotus, 140-160 CE, a Valentinian Gnostic)
So to be “Gnostic” is “to be conscious to the awakening, liberating and experiential knowledge so that one realises and then actualises his/her own human agency and causative power”.
Gnostics acquired knowledge through the study of nature and its physical laws, initiation and skills of intuition. As a result, schools of initiation were set up by the Gnostics for study, initiation of new members and through a connection with “Sophia” (#4678, Greek for “wisdom”) for the improvement of the individual and society.
Later, we have the word “philosophy” literally meaning, “the art of using wisdom or the love/affection for wisdom.” “Philo” means “to love” and “Sophia” is the feminine power of wisdom.
Origins of Abrahamic God
To Gnostics, the Abrahamic God is called the Demiurge, derived from Greek “demiurgos” (#1217), for a public builder, a craftsman or artisan.
The term was first used in Plato’s “Timaeus” to describe the creator of the world. Other terms for this figure include Saklas (Aramaic for “fool” and Syriac sækla “the foolish one”), Samael (Syriac sæma-el; “blind deity” or “deity of the blind” in Aramaic).
Accordingly, Gnostics consider the creator in Genesis 2 and subsequent texts of Hebrew Scriptures at best an ignorant pretender, at worst, a cruel malevolent deceiver.
The creation of the world by the Demiurge was derived from its masculine nature deficient of wisdom, making it malevolent, cruel and bloodthirsty.
Gnostics say above or superior to the Abrahamic God or Demiurge, is a real and true divine entity. This supreme divine figure is of noble character and is the First Principle of all things. It is sexually dualistic (Masculine-Feminine, Father-Mother), infinite, invisible, intangible, impersonal and eternal.
The supreme divine figure has dwelt for all eternity in a “pleroma” (#4138) or fullness of inaccessible light, and hence it was called the Abyssas in Genesis 1:2 to denote the unfathomable nature of its perfections.
Some Gnostics call it the “Bythos” (Greek for “the Depth“or “Profundity“). Other Greek terms include “the Monad” or “the One” (also used by Neoplatonists).
At the beginning of creation, this being is in many gnostic myths described as spontaneously emanating a progressive series of divine intelligences (“aeons”).
Taken together, these emanations and their origin are known as the “pleroma” or “fullness”. It is knowledge, through personal experience of divine fullness that constitutes “gnosis”.
This is the narrative also found in ancient Egyptian wisdom and mystical Judaism about the origin of the world and humanity.#
“The Monad” or “the One” generated “Lesser Divinities” or emanations. Each successive generation of emanations conspired in producing the next generation, through coaction or co-operation with a divine equal or partner. In this way, it was thought that the Male provided the organising principle and supplied the child’s form, while the Female supplied its constituent matter.
Sophia was one of the last emanations of the “Parent” (“The Monad” or “the One”), deviated from this pattern by attempting to create by herself, without the aid of her partner. The result of this was the coming into existence the imperfect, malformed and malevolent Demiurge, who went on to create the material world.
Human salvation and betterment is attained through “gnosis” (the acquisition of awakening, liberating and experiential knowledge), not any kind of sacrifice to the Abrahamic God as it preferred humanity to be asleep and ignorant.
Gnosticism is a necessary variance from the malevolent Abrahamic God as it locates sovereign power and authority within human agency. The humanoid and masculine Abrahamic God has motivated people to be satisfied with an intoxicating drug of unquestioning submission and compliance.
Gnosticism, grounded inhumanism is a cure against such a dangerous drug. The will to honour, truth and agency is a better alternative to the dehumanising and tyrannical horror of the Abrahamic God institutionalised through Christianity in 325.
References
Stephan A Hoeller, “The Gnostic World View: A Brief Summary of Gnosticism”
Kurt Rudolph, “Gnosis: The Nature & History of Gnosticism”
Willis Barnstone & Marvin Meyer, “The Gnostic Bible”
Jean Doresse, “The Secret Books of the Egyptian Gnostics”
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