Gnosticism (after gnôsis, the Greek word for "knowledge"
or "insight") is the name given to a loosely organized religious and philosophical
movement that flourished in the first and second centuries CE. The exact
origin(s) of this school of thought cannot be traced, although it is possible
to locate influences or sources as far back as the second and first centuries
BCE, such as the early treatises of the Corpus Hermeticum, the Jewish
Apocalyptic writings, and especially Platonic philosophy and the Hebrew
Scriptures themselves. In spite of the diverse nature of the various Gnostic
sects and teachers, certain fundamental elements serve to bind these groups
together under the loose heading of "Gnosticism" or "Gnosis." Chief among
these elements is a certain manner of "anti-cosmic world rejection" that
has often been mistaken for mere dualism. According to the Gnostics, this
world, the material cosmos, is the result of a primordial error on the
part of a supra-cosmic, supremely divine being, usually called Sophia
(Wisdom) or simply the Logos. This being is described as the final
emanation of a divine hierarchy, called the Plêrôma
or "Fullness," at the head of which resides the supreme God, the One beyond
Being. The error of Sophia, which is usually identified as a reckless desire
to know the transcendent God, leads to the hypostatization of her desire
in the form of a semi-divine and essentially ignorant creature known as
the Demiurge (Greek: dêmiourgos, "craftsman"), or Ialdabaoth,
who is responsible for the formation of the material cosmos. This act of
craftsmanship is actually an imitation of the realm of the Pleroma, but
the Demiurge is ignorant of this, and hubristically declares himself the
only existing God. At this point, the Gnostic revisionary critique of the
Hebrew Scriptures begins, as well as the general rejection of this world
as a product of error and ignorance, and the positing of a higher world,
to which the human soul will eventually return. However, when all is said
and done, one finds that the error of Sophia and the begetting of the inferior
cosmos are occurrences that follow a certain law of necessity, and that
the so-called dualism of the divine and the earthly is really a reflection
and expression of the defining tension that constitutes the being of humanity
-- the human being.
Table of Contents (Clicking on the links below will take you to those parts of this article)
1. The Philosophical Character of Gnosticism
Gnosticism, as an intellectual product, is grounded firmly in the general
human act of reflecting upon existence. The Gnostics were concerned with
the basic questions of existence or "being-in-the-world" (Dasein)
-- that is:
who we are (as human beings), where we have come
from, and
where we are heading, historically and spiritually
(cf. Hans Jonas, The Gnostic Religion 1958, p. 334). These questions
lie at the very root of philosophical thinking; but the answers provided
by the Gnostics go beyond philosophical speculation toward the realm of
religious doctrine and mysticism. However, it is impossible to understand
fully the meaning of Gnosticism without beginning at the philosophical
level, and orienting oneself accordingly. Since any orientation toward
an ancient phenomenon must always proceed by way of contemporary ideas
and habits of mind, an interpretative discussion of Gnostic thinking as
it applies to Psychology, Existentialism, and Hermeneutics, is not amiss
here. Once we have understood, to the extent of our ability, the philosophical
import of Gnostic ideas, and how they relate to contemporary philosophical
issues, then we may enter into the historical milieu of the Gnostics
with some degree of confidence -- a confidence devoid, to the extent that
this is possible, of tainting exegetical presuppositions.
a. Psychology
Who are we? The answer to this question involves an account (logos)
of the nature of the soul (psukhê or psyche); and the attempt
to provide an answer has accordingly been dubbed the science or practice
of "psychology" -- an account of the soul or mind (psukhê,
in ancient Greek, denoted both soul, as the principle of life, and mind,
as the principle of intellect). Carl Jung, drawing upon Gnostic mythical
schemas, identified the objectively oriented consciousness with the material
or 'fleshly' part of humankind -- that is, with the part of the human being
that is, according to the Gnostics, bound up in the cosmic cycle of generation
and decay, and subject to the bonds of fate and time (cf. Apocryphon
of John [Codex II] 28:30). The human being who identifies him/herself
with the objectively existing world comes to construct a personality, a
sense of self, that is, at base, fully dependent upon the ever-changing
structures of temporal existence. The resulting lack of any sense of of
permanence, of autonomy, leads such an individual to experience anxieties
of all kinds, and eventually to shun the mysterious and collectively meaningful
patterns of human existence in favor of a private and stifling subjective
context, in the confines of which life plays itself out in the absence
of any reference to a greater plan or scheme. Hopelessness, atheism,
despair, are the results of such an existence. This is not the natural
end of the human being, though; for, according to Jung (and the Gnostics)
the temporally constructed self is not the true self. The true self is
the supreme consciousness existing and persisting beyond all space and
time. Jung calls this the
pure consciousness or Self, in contradistinction
to the "ego consciousness" which is the temporally constructed and maintained
form
of a discrete existent (cf. C.G. Jung, "Gnostic Symbols of the Self," in
The
Gnostic Jung 1992, pp. 55-92). This latter form of 'worldly' consciousness
the Gnostics identified with soul (psukhê), while the pure
or true Self they identified with spirit (pneuma) -- that is, mind
relieved of its temporal contacts and context. This distinction had an
important career in Gnostic thought, and was adopted by St. Paul, most
notably in his doctrine of the spiritual resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:44).
The psychological or empirical basis of this view, which soon turns into
a metaphysical or onto-theological attitude, is the recognized inability
of the human mind to achieve its grandest designs while remaining subject
to the rigid law and order of a disinterested and aloof cosmos. The spirit-soul
distinction (which of course translates into, or perhaps presupposes, the
more fundamental mind-body distinction) marks the beginning of a transcendentalist
and soteriological attitude toward the cosmos and temporal existence in
general.
b. Existentialism
The basic experience of existence, described by the philosophy that
has become known as 'Existentialism,' involves a general feeling of loneliness
or abandonment (Geworfenheit, "having been thrown") in/to a world
that is not amenable to the primordial desires of the human being (cf.
Jonas, p. 336). The recognition that the first or primal desire of the
human being is for the actualization or positing of a concrete self or
'I' (an autonomous and discrete individual existing and persisting amidst
the flux and flow of temporal and external 'reality') leads to the disturbing
realization that this world is not akin to the human being; for this world
(so it seems) follows it own course, a course already mapped out and set
in motion long before the advent of human consciousness. Furthermore, that
the essential activity of the human being -- i.e., to actualize an autonomous
self within the world -- is carried out in opposition to a power or 'will'
(the force of nature) that always seems to thwart or subvert this supremely
human endeavor, leads to the acknowledgment of an anti-human and therefore
anti-intellectual power; and this power, since it seems to act, must also
exist. However, the fact that its act does not manifest itself as a communication
between humanity and nature (or pure objectivity), but rather as
a mechanical process of blind necessity occurring apart from the human
endeavor, places the human being in a superior position. For even though
the force of nature may arbitrarily wipe out an individual human existent,
just as easily as it brings one into existence, this natural force is not
conscious of its activity. The human mind, on the other hand, is.
And so a gap or fissure -- a product of reflection -- is set up, by which
the human being may come to orient him/herself with and toward the world
in which s/he exists and persists, for a brief moment. Martin Heidegger
has described this brief moment of orientation with/in (toward) the world
as "care" (Sorge), which is always a care or concern for the "moment"
(Augenblick) within which all existence occurs; this "care" is understood
as the product of humankind's recognition of their unavoidable being-toward-death.
But this orientation is never completed, since the human soul finds that
it cannot achieve its purpose or complete actualization within the confines
set by nature. While the thwarting necessity of nature is, for the Existentialist,
a simple, unquestioned fact; for the Gnostics it is the result of the malignant
designs of an inferior god, the Demiurge, carried out through and by this
ignorant deity's own law. In other words, nature is, for modern Existentialism,
merely indifferent, while for the Gnostics it was actively hostile toward
the human endeavor. "[C]osmic law, once worshipped as the expression of
a reason with which man's reason can communicate in the act of cognition,
is now seen only in its aspect of compulsion which thwarts man's freedom"
(Jonas, p. 328). Time and history come to be understood as the provenance
of the human mind, over-against futile idealistic constructions like law
and order, nomos and cosmos. Knowledge, at this point, becomes
a concrete endeavor -- a self-salvific task for the human race.
Becoming aware of itself, the self also discovers that it is
not really its own, but is rather the involuntary executor of cosmic designs.
Knowledge, gnosis, may liberate man from this servitude; but since
the cosmos is contrary to life and to spirit, the saving knowledge
cannot aim at integration into the cosmic whole and at compliance with
its laws. For the Gnostics ... man's alienation from the world is to be
deepened and brought to a head, for the extrication of the inner self which
only thus can gain itself (Jonas, p. 329).
The obvious question, then -- Where did we come from? --
only becomes intelligible alongside and within the more dynamic question
of Where are we heading?
c. Hermeneutics
In the context of ancient Greek thinking, hermêneia was
usually associated with tekhnê, giving us the tekhnê
hermêneutikê or "art of interpretation" discussed by
Aristotle
in his treatise De Interpretatione [Peri Hermêneias]. Interpretation
or hermeneutics, according to Aristotle, does not bring us to a direct
knowledge of the meaning of things, but only to an understanding of how
things come to appear before us, and thereby to provide us with an avenue
toward empirical knowledge, as it were. "Moreover, discourse is hermêneia
because
a discursive statement is a grasp of the real by meaningful expression,
not a selection of so-called impressions coming from the things themselves"
(Paul Ricoeur, The Conflict of Interpretations 1974, p. 4). In this
sense, we may say that the "art of interpretation" is a distinctly historical
method
of understanding or coming to terms with reality. In other words, since
our "expression" is always an ex-position, a going-out from the
given forms or patterns of reality toward a living use of these forms with/in
Life, then we, as human beings persisting in a realm of becoming, are responsible,
in the last analysis, not for any eternal truths or "things in themselves,"
but only for the forms these things take on within the context of a living
and thinking existence. Knowledge or understanding, then, is not of immutable
and eternal things in themselves, but rather of the process by which things
-- i.e., ideas, objects, events, persons, etc. -- become revealed within
the existential or ontological process of coming-to-know. The attention
to process and the emergence of meaning occurs on the most immediate experiential
level of human existence, and therefore contains about it nothing of the
metaphysical. However, the birth of metaphysics may be located within this
primordial or phenomenal structure of basic "brute" experience; for it
is the natural tendency of the human mind to order and arrange its data
according to rational principles. The question will inevitably arise, though,
as to whence these rational principles derive: are they a derivative product
of the phenomenal realm of experience? or are they somehow endemic to the
human mind as such, and hence eternal? If we take the first question as
an answer, we are led to phenomenology, which "discovers, in place of an
idealist subject locked within [a] system of meanings, a living being which
from all time has, as the horizon of all its intentions, a world, the world"
(Ricoeur, p. 9). According to the general contemporary or 'post-modern'
formulation, such a "living being" is directed, intentionally, always and
only toward a multiplicitous world or realm in which human activity itself
becomes the sole object of knowledge, apart from any 'transcendent' metaphysical
ideals or schemas. For the Gnostics, on the other hand, who worked within
and upon the latter question, giving it a positive, if somewhat mytho-poetical
answer, rational principles, which seem to be culled from a mere contact
with sensible reality, are held to be reminders of a unified existence
that is an eternal possibility, open to anyone capable of transcending
and, indeed, transgressing this realm of experience and process
-- i.e., of history. This 'transgression' consists in the act of balancing
oneself with/in, and orienting oneself toward, history as an interplay
of past and present, in which the individual is poised for a decision --
either to succumb to the flux and flow of an essentially decentered cosmic
existence, or to strive for a re-integration into a godhead that is only
barely recollected, and more obscure than the immediate perceptions of
reality.
i. Reception and Revelation
Where are we heading? This question is at the very heart of Gnostic
exegesis, and indeed colors and directs all attempts at coming to terms,
not only with the Hebrew Scriptures, which served as the main text of Gnostic
interpretation, but with existence in general. The standard hermeneutical
approach, both in our own era, and in Late Hellenistic times, is the receptive
approach -- that is, an engagement with texts of the past governed by the
belief, on the part of the interpreter, that these texts have something
to teach us. Whether we struggle to overcome our own "prejudices" or presuppositions,
which are the inevitable result of our belonging to a particular tradition
by way of the hermeneutical act (Gadamer), or allow our prejudices to shape
our reading of a text, in an act of "creative misprision" (Bloom) we are
still acknowledging, in some way, our debt to or dependence upon the text
with which we are engaged. The Gnostics, in their reading of Scripture,
acknowledged no such debt; for they believed that the Hebrew Bible was
the written revelation of an inferior creator god (dêmiourgos),
filled with lies intended to cloud the minds and judgment of the spiritual
human beings (pneumatikoi) whom this Demiurge was intent on enslaving
in his material cosmos. Indeed, while the receptive hermeneutical method
implies that we have something to learn from a text, the method employed
by the Gnostics, which we may call the 'revelatory' method, was founded
upon the idea that they (the Gnostics) had received a supra-cosmic revelation,
either in the form of a "call," or a vision, or even, perhaps, through
the exercise of philosophical dialectic. This 'revelation' was the knowledge
(gnôsis) that humankind is alien to this realm, and possesses
a "home on high" within the plêrôma, the "Fullness,"
where all the rational desires of the human mind come to full and perfect
fruition. On this belief, all knowledge belonged to these Gnostics, and
any interpretation of the biblical text would be for the purpose of explaining
the true nature of things by elucidating the errors and distortions of
the Demiurge. This approach treated the past as something already overcome
yet still 'present,' insofar as certain members of the human race were
still laboring under the old law -- i.e., were still reading the Scriptures
in the receptive manner. The Gnostic, insofar as he still remained within
the world, as an existing being, was, on the other hand, both present and
future -- that is to say, the Gnostic embodied within himself the salvific
dynamism of a history that had broken from the constraint of a tyrannical
past, and found the freedom to invent itself anew. The Gnostic understood
himself to be at once at the center and at the end or culmination of this
history, and this idea or ideal was reflected most powerfully in ancient
Gnostic exegesis. We must now turn to a discussion of the concrete results
of this hermeneutical method.
2. The Gnostic Mytho-Logos
The Gnostic Idea or Notion was not informed by a philosophical world-view
or procedure; rather, the Gnostic vision of the world was based upon the
intuition of a radical and seemingly irreparable rupture between the realm
of experience (pathos) and the realm of true Being, i.e., existence
in its positive, creative, or authentic aspect. The problem
faced by the Gnostics was how to explain such a radical, pre-philosophical
intuition.
This intuition is 'pre-philosophical' because the brute experience of existing
in a world that is alien to humankind's aspirations may submit itself to
a variety of interpretations; and the attempt at an interpretation may
take on the form of either muthos or logos
-- either a merely
descriptive rendering of the experience, or a rationally ordered account
of such an experience, including an explanation of its origins. The
ancient Greek explanation of this experience was to call it a primal 'awe'
or 'wonder' felt by the human being as he faces the world that stands so
radically apart from him, and to posit this experience as the beginning
of philosophy (cf. Aristotle, Metaphysics 982b 10-25 and
Plato, Theaetetus 155d). But the Gnostics recognized this
'awe' as the product of a radical disruption of the harmony of a realm
persisting beyond becoming -- that is, beyond 'becoming' in the sense of
pathos,
or 'that which is undergone'. The muthos always corresponds to the
'first-hand' account rendered by one who has undergone, immediately, the
effect of a certain event. The myth is always an explanation of something
already known, and therefore carries its truth-claim along with it, just
as the immediacy of an event forbids any doubt or questioning on the part
of the one undergoing it. The logos, on the other hand, is the product
of a careful reflection (dianoia), and refers, for its truth-value,
not to the immediate moment of 'grasping' a phenomenon (prolêpsis),
but to the moment of reflection during which one attains a conceptual knowledge
of the phenomenon, and first comes to 'know' it as such -- this is
gnôsis:
insight. The direct result of this gnôsis is the emergence
from the sense of existence as pathos, to the actuality of being
as aisthêsis -- that is, reception and judgment of experience
by way of purely rational or divine criteria. Such criteria proceeds directly
from the logos, or divine 'ordering principle,' to which the Gnostics
believed themselves to be related, by way of a divine genealogy. Although
Gnostic onto-theology proceeds by way of an elaborate myth, it is a myth
informed always by the
logos, and is, in this sense, a true mythology
--
that is, a rendering, in the immediacy of language, of that which is ever-present
(to the Gnostic) as a product of privileged reflection.
a. The Myth of Sophia
According to Gnostic mythology (in general) We, humanity, are existing
in this realm because a member of the transcendent godhead, Sophia (Wisdom),
desired to actualize her innate potential for creativity without the approval
of her partner or divine consort. Her hubris, in this regard,
stood forth as raw materiality, and her desire, which was for the mysterious
ineffable Father, manifested itself as Ialdabaoth, the Demiurge, that renegade
principle of generation and corruption which, by its unalterable necessity,
brings all beings to life, for a brief moment, and then to death for eternity.
However, since even the Pleroma itself is not, according to the Gnostics,
exempt from desire or passion, there must come into play a salvific event
or savior -- i.e., Christ, the Logos, the "messenger," etc. -- who descends
to the material realm for the purpose of negating all passion, and raising
the innocent human "sparks" (which fell from Sophia) back up to the Pleroma
(cf. Apocryphon of John [Codex II] 9:25-25:14 ff.). This process
of re-integration with/in the godhead is one of the basic features of the
Gnostic myth. The purpose of this re-integration (implicitly) is
to establish a series of existents that are ontologically posterior to
Sophia, and are the concrete embodiment of her 'disruptive' desire -- within
the unified arena of the Pleroma. Indeed, if the Pleroma is really
the Fullness, containing all things, it must contain the manifold principles
of Wisdom's longing. In this sense, we must not view Gnostic salvation
as a simply one-sided affair. The divine "sparks" that fell from
Sophia, during her "passion," are un-integrated aspects of the godhead.
We may say, then, that in the Hegelian sense the Gnostic Supreme God is
seeking, eternally, His own actualization by way of full self-consciousness
(cf. G.W.F. Hegel, History of Philosophy vol. 2, pp. 396-399).
But it is not really this simple. The Supreme God of the Gnostics
effortlessly generates the Pleroma, and yet (or for this very reason!)
this Pleroma comes to act independently of the Father. This is because
all members of the Pleroma (known as Aeons) are themselves "roots and springs
and fathers" (Tripartite Tractate 68:10) carrying Time within themselves,
as a condition of their Being. When the disruption, brought about
by the desire of Sophia, disturbed the Pleroma, this was not understood
as a disturbance of an already established unity, but rather as the disturbance
of an insupportable stasis that had come to be observed as divine.
Indeed, when the Greeks first looked to the sky and admired the regularity
of the rotations of the stars and planets, what they were admiring, according
to the Gnostics, was not the image of divinity, but the image or representation
of a 'divine' stagnancy, a law and order that stifled freedom, which is
the root of desire (cf. Jonas, pp. 260-261). The passion of Sophia
-- her production of the Demiurge, his enslavement of the human "sparks"
in the material cosmos, and the subsequent redemption and restoration --
are but one episode in the infinite, unfolding drama of spiritual existence.
We, as human beings, just happen to be the unwitting victims of this particular
drama. But if, as the Gnostics hold, our salvation consists in our
becoming gods (Poimandres 26) or "lord[s] over creation and all
corruption" (Valentinus, Fragment F, Layton) then how are we to be confident
that, in ages to come, one of us will not give birth to another damned
cosmos, just as Sophia had done?
b. Christian Gnosticism
The Christian idea that God has sent his only "Son" (the Logos)
to suffer and die for the sins of all humankind, and so make possible the
salvation of all, had a deep impact on Gnostic thought. In the extensive
and important collection of Gnostic writings discovered at Nag Hammadi,
Egypt in 1945, only a handful present the possibility of having originated
in a pre-Christian, mostly Hellenistic Jewish milieu. The majority of these
texts are Christian Gnostic writings from the early second to late third
centuries CE, and perhaps a bit later. When we consider the notion of salvation
and its meaning for the early Gnostics, who stressed the creative aspect
of our post-salvific existence, we are struck by the bold assertion that
our need for salvation arose, in the first place, from an error committed
by a divine being, Sophia (Wisdom), during the course of her own creative
act (cf. Apocryphon of John [Codex II] 9:25-10:6). Since this is
the case, how, we are led to ask, will our post-salvation existence be
any less prone to error or ignorance, even evil? The radical message of
early Christianity provided the answer to this problematical question;
and so the Gnostics took up the Christian idea and transformed it, by the
power of their singular mytho-logical technique, into a philosophically
and theologically complex speculative schema.
i. Basilides
The Christian philosopher Basilides of Alexandria (fl. 132-135
CE) developed a cosmology and cosmogony quite distinct from the Sophia
myth of classical Gnosticism, and also reinterpreted key Christian concepts
by way of the popular Stoic philosophy of the era. Basilides began his
system with a "primal octet" consisting of the "unengendered parent" or
Father; Intellect (nous); the 'ordering principle' or "Word" (logos);
"prudence" (phronêsis); Wisdom (sophia); Power (dunamis)
(Irenaeus, Against Heresies 1.24.3, in Layton, The Gnostic Scriptures
1987)
and "justice" and "peace" (Basilides, Fragment A, Layton). Through the
union of Wisdom and Power, a group of angelic rulers came into existence,
and from these rulers a total of 365 heavens or aeons were generated
(Irenaeus 1.24.3). Each heaven had its own chief ruler (arkhôn),
and numerous lesser angels. The final heaven, which Basilides claimed is
the realm of matter in which we all dwell, was said by him to be ruled
by "the god of the Jews," who favored the Jewish nation over all others,
and so caused all manner of strife for the nations that came into contact
with them -- as well as for the Jewish people themselves. This behavior
caused the rulers of the other 364 heavens to oppose the god of the Jews,
and to send a savior, Jesus Christ, from the highest realm of the Father,
to rescue the human beings who are struggling under the yoke of this jealous
god (Irenaeus 1.24.4). Since the realm of matter is the sole provenance
of this spiteful god, Basilides finds nothing of value in it, and states
that "[s]alvation belongs only to the soul; the body is by nature corruptible"
(Irenaeus 1.24.5). He even goes so far as to declare, contra Christian
orthodoxy, that Christ's death on the cross was only apparent, and did
not actually occur 'in the flesh' (Irenaeus 1.24.4) -- this doctrine came
to be called
docetism.
The notion that material existence is the product of a jealous and corrupt
creator god, who favors one race over all others, is really the 'mythical'
expression of a deeply rooted ethical belief that the source of
all evil is material or bodily existence. Indeed, Basilides goes so far
as to assert that sin is the direct outcome of bodily existence, and that
human suffering is the punishment either for actual sins committed, or
even just for the general inclination to sin, which arises from the bodily
impulses (cf. Fragments F and G). In an adaptation of Stoic ethical categories,
Basilides declares that faith (pistis) "is not the rational
assent of a soul possessing free will" (Fragment C); rather, faith is the
natural mode of existence, and consequently, anyone living in accordance
with the "law of nature" (pronoia), which Basilides calls the "kingdom,"
will remain free from the bodily impulses, and exist in a state of "salvation"
(Fragment C). However, Basilides goes beyond simple Stoic doctrine in his
belief that the "elect," i.e., those who exist by faith, "are alien to
the world, as if they were transcendent by nature" (Fragment E); for unlike
the Stoics, who believed in a single, material cosmos, Basilides held the
view, as we have seen, that the cosmos is composed of numerous heavens,
with the material realm as the final heaven, and consequently corrupt.
Since this final heaven represents the 'last gasp' of divine emanation,
as it were, and is by no means a perfect image of true divinity, adherence
to its laws can lead to no good. Further, since the body is the means by
which the ruler of this material cosmos enforces his law, freedom can only
be attained by abandoning or "becoming indifferent to" all bodily impulses
and desires. This indifference (adiaphoria) to bodily impulses,
however, does not lead to a simple stagnant asceticism. Basilides does
not call upon his hearers to abandon the material realm only to dissolve
into negativity; instead, he offers them a new life, by appealing to the
grand hierarchy of rulers persisting above the material realm (cf. Fragment
D). When one turns to the greater hierarchy of Being, there results a "creation
of good things" (Fragment C, translation modified). Love and personal creation
-- the begetting of the Good -- are the final result of Basilides' vaguely
dialectical system, and for this reason it is one of the most important
early expressions of a truly Christian, if not "orthodox," philosophy.
ii. Marcion
Marcion of Sinope, in Pontus, was a contemporary of Basilides.
According to Tertullian, he started his career as an orthodox Christian
-- whatever that meant at such an early stage of development of Christian
doctrine -- but soon formulated the remarkable and radical doctrine that
was to lead to his excommunication from the Roman Church in July 144 CE,
the traditional date of the founding of the Marcionite Church (Tertullian,
Against
Marcion 1.1; cf. Kurt Rudolph, Gnosis 1984, p. 314). The teaching
of Marcion is elegantly simple: "the God proclaimed by the law and the
prophets is not the Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ. The God (of the Old
Testament) is known, but the latter (the Father of Jesus Christ) is unknown.
The one is just, but the other is good" (Irenaeus 1.27.1). Marcion believed
that this cosmos in which we live bears witness to the existence of an
inflexible, legalistic, and sometimes spiteful and vengeful God. This view
arose from a quite literal reading of the Old Testament, which does contain
several passages describing God in terms not quite conducive to divinity
-- or at least to the idea of the divine that was current in the Hellenistic
era. Marcion then, following Paul (in Romans 1:20) declared that God is
knowable through His creation; however, unlike Paul, Marcion did not take
this "natural revelation" as evidence of God's singularity and goodness.
Quite the contrary, Marcion believed that he knew the God of this realm
all too well, and that He was not worthy of the devotion and obedience
that He demanded. Therefore, Marcion rejected the teaching of the orthodox
Christian Church of his era, that Yahweh (or Jehovah) is the Father of
Christ, and, through a creative excision of what he termed "Judaistic interpolations"
in Luke and ten Pauline Epistles, Marcion simultaneously put forth his
notion of the "alien God" and His act of salvation, and established the
first Canon of Scripture used in a 'Christian' Church (Jonas, pp. 145-146).
Marcion was not a philosopher in the sense that term has come to imply.
He never developed, as far as we can tell from the surviving evidence,
a systematic metaphysical, cosmological, or anthropological theory in the
manner of a Basilides or a Valentinus (whom we shall discuss below), nor
did he appeal to history as a witness for his doctrines. This latter point
is the most important. Unlike the majority of Gnostics, who elaborated
some sort of divine genealogy (e.g., the Sophia myth) to account for the
presence of corruption and strife in the world, Marcion simply posited
two opposed and irreducible Gods: the biblical god, and the unknown or
"alien" God, who is the Father of Christ. According to Marcion, the god
who controls this realm is a being who is intent on preserving his autonomy
and power even at the expense of the (human) beings whom he created. The
"alien" God, who is the Supremely Good, is a "god of injection," for he
enters this realm from outside, in order to gratuitously adopt the pitiful
human beings who remain under the sway of the inferior god as His own children.
This act is the origin of and reason for the Incarnation of Christ, according
to Marcion.
In spite of the absence of any solid philosophical or theological foundation
for this rather simple formulation, Marcion's idea nevertheless expresses,
in a somewhat crude and immediate form, a basic truth of human existence:
that the desires of the Mind are incommensurable with the nature of
material existence (cf. Irenaeus 1.27.2-3). Yet, if we follow Marcion's
argument to its logical (or perhaps 'anti-logical') conclusion, we discover
an existential expression (not a philosophy) of the primal feeling of "abandonment"
(Geworfenheit). This expression plays upon the subtle yet poignant
opposition of "love of wisdom" (philosophia) and "complete wisdom"
(plêrosophia). We are alone in a world that does not lend
itself to our quest for unalterable truth, and so we befriend wisdom, which
is the way of or manner in which we attain this intuited truth. According
to Marcion, this truth is not to be found in this world -- all that is
to be found is the desire for this truth, which arises amongst human
beings. However, since this desire, on the part of human beings, only produces
various philosophies, none of which can hold claim to the absolute truth,
Marcion concludes that the
noetic beings (humans) of this realm
are capable of nothing more than a shadow of wisdom. It is only by way
of the guidance and grace of an alien and purely good God that humankind
will rise to the level of
plêrosophia
or complete wisdom (cf.
Colossians 2:2 ff.). Moreover, instead of attempting to discover the historical
connection between the revelation of Christ and the teachings of the Old
Testament, Marcion simply rejected the latter in favor of the former, on
the belief that only the Gospel (thoughtfully edited by Marcion himself)
points us toward complete wisdom (Irenaeus 1.27.2-3; Tertullian, Against
Marcion 4.3).
While other Christian thinkers of the era were busy allegorizing the
Old Testament in order to bring it into line with New Testament teaching,
Marcion allowed the New Testament (albeit in his own special version) to
speak to him as a singular voice of authority -- and he formulated his
doctrine accordingly. This doctrine emphasized not only humankind's radical
alienation from the realm of their birth, but also their lack of any genealogical
relation to the God who sacrificed His own Son to save them -- in other
words, Marcion painted a picture of humanity as a race displaced, with
no true home at all (cf. Giovanni Filoramo, A History of Gnosticism
1992, p. 164). The hope of searching for a lost home, or of returning to
a home from which one has been turned out, was absent in the doctrine of
Marcion. Like Pico della Mirandola, Marcion declared the nature of humankind
to be that of an eternally intermediate entity, poised precariously between
heaven and earth (cp. Pico della Mirandola, Oration on the Dignity of
Man, 3). However, unlike Pico, Marcion called for a radical displacement
of humankind -- a 'rupture' -- in which humanity would awaken to its full
(if not innate) possibilities.
iii. Valentinus and the Valentinian School
The great Christian teacher and philosopher Valentinus (ca. 100-175
CE) spent his formative years in Alexandria, where he probably came into
contact with Basilides. Valentinus later went to Rome, where he began his
public teaching career, which was so successful that he actually had a
serious chance of being elected Bishop of Rome. He lost the election, however,
and with it Gnosticism lost the chance of becoming synonymous with Christianity,
and hence a world religion. This is not to say that Valentinus failed to
influence the development of Christian theology -- he most certainly did,
as we shall see below. It was through Valentinus, perhaps more than
any other Christian thinker of his time, that Platonic philosophy, rhetorical
elegance, and a deep, interpretive knowledge of scripture became introduced
together into the realm of Christian theology. The achievement of Valentinus
remained unmatched for nearly a century, until the incomparable Origen
came on the scene. Yet even then, it may not be amiss to suggest that Origen
never would have 'happened' had it not been for the example of Valentinus.
The cosmology of Valentinus began, not with a unity, but with a primal
duality, a dyad, composed of two entities called "the Ineffable"
and "Silence." From these initial beings a second dyad of "Parent" and
"Truth" was generated. These beings finally engendered a quaternity of
"Word" (logos), "Life" (zôê), "Human Being" (anthropos),
and "Church" (ekklêsia). Valentinus refers to this divine
collectivity as the "first octet" (Irenaeus 1.11.1). This octet produced
several other beings, one of which revolted or "turned away," as Irenaeus
tells us, and set in motion the divine drama that would eventually produce
the cosmos. According to Irenaeus, who was writing only about five years
after the death of Valentinus, and in whose treatise Against Heresies
the outline of Valentinus' cosmology is preserved, the entity responsible
for initiating the drama is referred to simply as "the mother," by which
is probably meant Sophia (Wisdom). From this "mother" both matter
(hulê) and the savior, Christ, were generated. The realm of
matter is described as a "shadow," produced from the "mother," and from
which Christ distanced himself and "hastened up into the fullness" (Irenaeus
1.11.1; cp. Poimandres
5). At this point the "mother" produced another
"child," the "craftsman" (dêmiourgos) responsible for the
creation of the cosmos. In the account preserved by Irenaeus, we are told
nothing of any cosmic drama in which "divine sparks" are trapped in fleshly
bodies through the designs of the Demiurge. However, it is to be assumed
that Valentinus did expound an anthropology similar to that of the classical
Sophia myth (as represented, for example, in the
Apocryphon of John;
cf. also The Hypostasis of the Archons, and the Apocalypse of
Adam), especially since his school, as represented most significantly
by his star pupil Ptolemy (see below), came to develop a highly complex
anthropological myth that must have grown out of a simpler model provided
by Valentinus himself. The account preserved in Irenaeus ends with a description
of a somewhat confused doctrine of a heavenly and an earthly Christ, and
a brief passage on the role of the Holy Spirit (Irenaeus 1.11.1). From
this one gets the idea that Valentinus was flirting with a primitive doctrine
of the Trinity. Indeed, according to the fourth century theologian Marcellus
of Ancyra, Valentinus was "the first to devise the notion of three subsistent
entities (hypostases), in a work that he entitled On the Three Natures"
(Valentinus, Fragment B, Layton).
Valentinus was certainly the most overtly Christian of the Gnostic philosophers
of his era. We have seen how the thought of Basilides was pervaded by a
Stoicizing tendency, and how Marcion felt the need to go beyond scripture
to posit an "alien" redeemer God. Valentinus, on the other hand, seems
to have been informed, in his speculations, primarily by Jewish and Christian
scripture and exegesis, and only secondarily by 'pagan' philosophy, particularly
Platonism. This is most pronounced in his particular version of the familiar
theological notion of "election" or "pre-destination," in which it is declared
(following Paul in Romans 8:29) that God chose certain individuals, before
the beginning of time, for salvation. Valentinus writes, in what is probably
a remnant of a sermon:
From the beginning you [the "elect" or Gnostic Christians]
have been immortal, and you are children of eternal life. And you wanted
death to be allocated to yourselves so that you might spend it and use
it up, and that death might die in you and through you. For when you nullify
the world and are not yourselves annihilated, you are lord over creation
and all corruption (Valentinus, Fragment F).
This seems to be Valentinus' response to the dilemma of the permanence
of salvation: since Sophia or the divine "mother," a member of the Pleroma,
had fallen into error, how can we be sure that we will not make the same
or a similar mistake after we have reached the fullness? By declaring that
it is the role and task of the "elect" or Gnostic Christian to use up death
and nullify the world, Valentinus is making clear his position that these
elite souls are fellow saviors of the world, along with Jesus, who was
the first to take on the sin and corruption inherent in the material realm
(cf. Irenaeus 1.11.1; and Layton p. 240). Therefore, since "the wages of
sin is death" (Romans 6:23), any being who is capable of destroying death
must be incapable of sin. For Valentinus, then, the individual who is predestined
for salvation is also predestined for a sort of divine stewardship that
involves an active hand in history, and not a mere repose with God, or
even a blissful existence of loving creation, as Basilides held. Like Paul,
Valentinus demanded that his hearers recognize their createdness.
However, unlike Paul, they recognized their creator as the "Ineffable Parent,"
and not as the God of the Hebrew Scriptures. The task of Christian hermeneutics
after Valentinus was to prove the continuity of the Old and New Testament.
In this regard, as well as in the general spirituality of his teaching
-- not to mention his primitive trinitarian doctrine -- Valentinus had
an incalculable impact on the development of Christianity.
1) The System of Ptolemy
Ptolemy (or Ptolemaeus, fl. 140 CE) was described by St.
Irenaeus as "the blossom of Valentinus' school" (Layton, p. 276). We know
next to nothing about his life, except the two writings that have come
down to us: the elaborate Valentinian philosophical myth preserved in Irenaeus,
and Ptolemy's Epistle to Flora, preserved verbatim by St. Epiphanius.
In the former we are met with a grand elaboration, by Ptolemy, of Valentinus'
own system, which contains a complex anthropological myth centering around
the passion of Sophia. We also find, in both the myth and the Epistle,
Ptolemy making an attempt to bring Hebrew Scripture into line with Gnostic
teaching and New Testament allegorization in a manner heretofore unprecedented
among the Gnostics.
In the system of Ptolemy we are explicitly told that the cause of Sophia's
fall was her desire to know the ineffable Father. Since the purpose of
the Father's generating of the Aeons (of which Sophia was the last) was
to "elevate all of them into thought" (Irenaeus 1.2.1) it was not permitted
for any Aeon to attain a full knowledge of the Father. The purpose of the
Pleroma was to exist as a living, collective expression of the intellectual
magnitude of the Father, and if any single being within the Pleroma were
to attain to the Father, all life would cease. This idea is based on an
essentially positive attitude toward existence -- that is, existence understood
in the sense of striving, not for a reposeful end, but for an ever-increasing
degree of creative or 'constitutive' insight. The goal, on this view, is
to produce through wisdom, and not simply to attain wisdom as an object
or end in itself. Such an existence is not characterized by desire for
an object, but rather by desire for the ability to persist in creative,
constitutive engagement with/in one's own 'circumstance' (= circumscribed
stance
or individual arena). When Sophia desired to know the Father, then, what
she was desiring was her own dissolution in favor of an envelopment in
that which made her existence possible in the first place. This amounted
to a rejection of the gift of the Father -- i.e., of the gift of individual
existence and life. It is for this reason that Sophia was not permitted
to know the Father, but was turned back by the "boundary" (horos)
that separates the Pleroma from the "ineffable magnitude" of the Father
(Irenaeus 1.2.2).
The remainder of Ptolemy's account is concerned with the production
of the material cosmos out of the hypostatized "passions" of Sophia, and
the activity of the Savior (Jesus Christ) in arranging these initially
chaotic passions into a structured hierarchy of existents (Irenaeus 1.4.5
ff., and cp. Colossians 1:16). Three classes of human beings come into
existence through this arrangement: the "material" (hulikos), the
"animate" (psukhikos), and the "spiritual" (pneumatikos).
The "material" humans are those who have not attained to intellectual life,
and so place their hopes only upon that which is perishable -- for these
there is no hope of salvation. The "animate" are those who have only a
half-formed conception of the true God, and so must live a life devoted
to holy works, and persistence in faith; according to Ptolemy, these are
the "ordinary" Christians. Finally, there are the "spiritual" humans, the
Gnostics, who need no faith, since they have actual knowledge (gnôsis)
of intellectual reality, and are thus saved by nature (Irenaeus 1.6.2,
1.6.4). The Valentinian-Ptolemaic notion of salvation rests on the idea
that the cosmos is the concrete manifestation or hypostatization of the
desire of Sophia for knowledge of the Father, and the "passions" her failure
produced. The history of salvation, then, for human beings, has the character
of an external manifestation of the threefold process of Sophia's own redemption:
recognition of her passion; her consequent "turning back" (epistrophê);
and finally, her act of spiritual production, whence arose Gnostic humanity
(cf. Irenaeus 1.5.1). Salvation, then, in its final form, must imply a
sort of spiritual creation on the part of the Gnostics who attain the Pleroma.
The "animate" humans, however, who are composed partly of corruptible matter
and partly of the spiritual essence, must remain content with a simple
restful existence with the craftsman of the cosmos, since no material element
can enter the Pleroma (Irenaeus 1.7.1).
In his Epistle to Flora (in Epiphanius 33.3.1-33.7.10), which
is an attempt to convert an "ordinary" Christian woman to his brand of
Valentinian Christianity, Ptolemy clearly formulates his doctrine of the
relation between the God of the Hebrew Scriptures, who is merely "just,"
and the Ineffable Father, who is the Supreme Good. Rather than simply declaring
these two gods to be unrelated, as did Marcion, Ptolemy develops a complex,
allegorical reading of the Hebrew Scriptures in relation to the New Testament
in order to establish a genealogy connecting the Pleroma, Sophia and her
"passion," the Demiurge, and the salvific activity of Jesus Christ. The
scope and rigor of Ptolemy's work, and the influence it came to exercise
on emerging Christian orthodoxy, qualifies him as one of the most important
of the early Christian theologians, both proto-orthodox and "heretical."
c. Mani and Manichaeism
The world religion founded by Mani (216-276 CE) and known to
history as Manichaeism has its roots in the East, borrowing elements from
Persian dualistic religion (Zoroastrianism), Jewish Christianity, Buddhism,
and even Mithraism. The system developed by Mani was self-consciously syncretistic,
which was a natural outgrowth of his desire to see his religion reach the
ends of the earth. This desire was fulfilled, and until the late Middle
Ages, Manichaeism remained a world religion, stretching from China to Western
Europe. It is now completely extinct. The religion began when its founder
experienced a series of visions, in which the Holy Spirit supposedly appeared
to him, ordering him to preach the revelation of Light to the ends of the
earth. Mani came to view himself as the last in a series of great prophets
including Buddha, Zoroaster, Jesus, and Paul (Rudolph, p. 339). His highly
complex myth of the origin of the cosmos and of humankind drew on various
elements culled from these several traditions and teachings. The doctrine
of Mani is not 'philosophical,' in the manner of Basilides, Valentinus
or Ptolemy; for Mani's teaching was not the product of a more or less rational
or systematic speculation about the godhead, resulting in Gnosis, but the
wholly creative product of what he felt to be a revelation from the divinity
itself. It is for this reason that Mani's followers revered him as the
redeemer and holy teacher of humankind (Rudolph, p. 339). Since Manichaeism
belongs more to the history of religion than to philosophy proper (or even
the fringes of philosophy, as does Western Gnosticism), it will suffice
to say only a few words about the system, if for no other reason than that
the great Christian philosopher Augustine of Hippo had followed the Manichaen
religion for several years, before converting to Christianity (cf. Augustine,
Confessions
III.10).
The main point of distinction between the doctrine of Mani and the Western
branch of Gnosticism (Basilides, Valentinus, etc.), is that in Manichaeism
the "cosmology is subservient to the soteriology" (Rudolph, p. 336). This
means, essentially, that Mani began with a fundamental belief about the
nature of humanity and its place in the cosmos, and concocted a myth to
explain the situation of humankind, and the dynamics of humanity's eventual
salvation. The details of the cosmology were apparently not important,
their sole purpose being to illustrate, poetically, the dangers facing
the souls dwelling in this "realm of darkness" as well as the manner of
their redemption from this place. The Manichaean cosmology began with two
opposed first principles, as in Zoroastrianism: the God of Light, and the
Ruler of Darkness. This Darkness, being of a chaotic nature, assails the
"Kingdom of Light" in an attempt to overthrow or perhaps assimilate it.
The "King of the Paradise of Light," then, goes on the defensive, as it
were, and brings forth Wisdom, who in her turn gives birth to the Primal
Man, also called Ohrmazd (or Ahura-Mazda). This Primal Man possesses a
pentadic soul, consisting of fire, water, wind, light, and ether. Armored
with this soul, the Primal Man descends into the Realm of Darkness to battle
with its Ruler. Surprisingly, the Primal Man is defeated, and his soul
scattered throughout the Realm of Darkness. However, the Manichaeans understood
this as a plan on the part of the Ruler of Light to sow the seeds of resistance
within the Darkness, making possible the eventual overthrow of the chaotic
realm. To this end, a second "Living Spirit" is brought forth, who was
also called Mithra. This being, and his partner, "Light-Adamas," set in
motion the history of salvation by putting forth the "call" within the
realm of darkness, which recalls the scattered particles of light (from
the vanquished soul of Ohrmazd). These scattered particles "answer" Mithra,
and the result is the formation of the heavens and earth, the stars and
planets, and finally, the establishment of the twelve signs of the zodiac
and the ordered revolution of the cosmic sphere, through which, by a gradual
process, the scattered particles of light will eventually be returned to
the Realm of Light. The Manichaeans believed that these particles ascend
to the moon, and that when the moon is full, it empties these particles
into the sun, from whence they ascend to the "new Aeon," also identified
with Mithra, the "Living Spirit" (Rudolph, pp. 336-337). This process will
continue throughout the ages of the world, until all the particles eventually
reach their proper home and the salvation of the godhead is complete.
It should be clear from this brief exposition that humanity as such
does not hold the prime place in the salvific drama of Manichaeism, but
rather a part of the godhead itself -- i.e., the scattered soul of Ohrmazd.
The purpose of humanity in this scheme is to aid the particles of light
in their ascent to the godhead. Of course, these particles dwell within
every living thing, and so the salvation of these particles is the salvation
of humanity, but only by default, as it were; humanity does not hold a
privileged position in Manichaeism, as it does in the Western or strictly
Christian Gnostic schools. This belief led the Manichaeans to establish
strict dietary and purity laws, and even to require selected members of
their church to provide meals for the "Elect," so that the latter would
not become defiled by harming anything containing light particles. All
of this, however, is a long way from philosophy. Hans Jonas was right to
describe Manichaeism as representing "a more archaic level of gnostic thought"
(Jonas, p. 206). Now that we have examined one of the non-philosophical
directions taken by Gnostic thought, let us proceed to discuss its role
in the philosophical development of the era.
3. Platonism and Gnosticism
Long before the advent of Gnosticism, Plato had posited two contrary
World Souls: one "which does good" and one "which has the opposite capacity"
(Plato, Laws X. 896e, tr. Saunders). For Plato, this did not
imply that the cosmos is under the control of a corrupt or ignorant god,
as it did for the Gnostics, but simply that this cosmos, like the human
soul, possesses a rational and an irrational part, and that it is the task
of the rational part to govern the irrational. The question arose, however,
among Platonists, regarding Plato's true position on this matter.
Was he declaring that a part of the cosmos is evil? or that the divine
Demiurge (who, in the highly influential Timaeus account, is said
to have crafted the cosmos) actually produced an evil soul? Both of these
conjectures flew in the face of everything that the ancient thinkers believed
about the cosmos -- i.e., that it was divine, orderly, and perfect. A common
solution, among both Platonists and Pythagoreans, was to interpret the
second or "evil" Soul as Matter, that is, the material or generative principle,
which is the opposite of the truly divine and unchanging Forms. The purpose
of the Intellectual principle, or the "good" Soul, is to bring this disorderly
principle under the control of reason, and thereby maintain an everlasting
but not eternal cosmos (cf. Timaeus 37d). Since the cosmos,
according to Plato in the Timaeus, cannot be as perfect as the eternal
image upon which it is founded, a generative principle is necessary to
maintain the "living creature" (which is precisely how the cosmos is described),
and therefore not really "evil," even though it possesses the "opposite
capacity" (generation, and hence, corruption) from that of the Good or
Rational Soul.
a. Numenius of Apamea and Neo-Platonism
Several centuries after Plato, around the time when the great Gnostic
thinkers like Valentinus and Ptolemy were developing their systems, we
encounter the Platonic philosopher Numenius of Apamea (fl. 150 CE).
The main ideas of Numenius' philosophy, preserved in the fragments of his
writings that survive, bear clear traces of Gnostic influence. His cosmology
describes, in language strikingly similar to that of the Gnostics, the
degradation of the divine dêmiourgos upon his contact with
pre-existent Matter (hulê, or the "indefinite" principle):
[I]n the process of coming into contact with Matter, which
is the Dyad, [the Demiurge] gives unity to it, but is Himself divided by
it, since Matter has a character prone to desire [epithumêtikon
êthos] and is in flux. So in virtue of not being in contact with
the Intelligible (which would mean being turned in upon Himself), by reason
of looking towards Matter and taking thought for it, He becomes unregarding
(aperioptos) of Himself. And he seizes upon the sense realm and
ministers to it and yet draws it up to His own character, as a result of
this yearning towards Matter [eporexamenos tês hulês]
(Numenius, Fragment 11, in Dillon 1977, The Middle Platonists, pp.
367-368).
In this fragment, Numenius is transferring a basic Gnostic anthropological
idea into the realm of cosmology. It is a common feature of Gnostic systems
to describe the individual human soul's contact with the material realm
as resulting in a forgetting of the soul's true origin. Platonism, also,
warned against the soul's becoming too attached to the realm of the senses,
since this realm is changing and illusory, and does not accurately reflect
the divinity. However, neither Platonism nor Gnosticism described such
a danger as affecting, in any way, the Demiurge; for the Gnostics declared
the Demiurge to be just as much a part of the cosmos as he was its
ruler,
and the orthodox Platonists located the Demiurge outside the cosmos, declaring
the cosmos to be self-sufficient (following Timaeus 34b). Numenius,
however, went further and bridged the gap between the sensible cosmos and
the Intelligible Realm by linking the Demiurge to the latter by way of
contemplation, and to the former by way of his "desire" (orexis)
for matter. In Fragment 18, Numenius tells us that the Demiurge derives
his "critical faculty" (kritikon) from his contemplation of the
Good, and his "impulsive faculty" (hormêtikon) from his attachment
to Matter (Dillon, p. 370). This idea seems to foreshadow Plotinus' doctrine
that the individual soul will always take on certain characteristics of
Matter, and that these characteristics manifest themselves in the form
of sense perceptions that must be brought under the controlling influence
of rational judgment (cf. Enneads I.8.9 and I.1.7). Unlike Plotinus,
however, who leaves the World-Soul or active part of the Demiurge safely
beyond the affective cosmic realm, Numenius posits a Demiurge that is both
transcendent and immanent, and arrives at a doctrine of a cosmos that,
even on the highest level -- the level of the celestial bodies -- is not
devoid of evil influence, since even the Demiurge, the highest cosmic deity,
is infected by the tainting influence of Matter. "This importation of evil
into the celestial realm is surely more Gnostic than Platonist, and did
not comment itself to such successors as Plotinus or Porphyry, though it
does seem to be accepted by Iamblichus" (Dillon, p. 374).
Plotinus, during the height of his teaching career at Rome (ca. 255
CE), composed a treatise "Against Those Who Declare the Creator of This
World, and the World Itself, to be Evil," also known, simply, as "Against
the Gnostics" (Ennead II.9) in which he argues for the divinity
and goodness of the cosmos, and upholds the ancient Greek belief in the
divinity of the stars and planets, declaring them to be our "noble brethren,"
and responsible only for the good things that befall humankind. Porphyry,
in his Life of Plotinus, tells us that Plotinus commissioned him,
along with his fellow student Amelius, to write more treatises attacking
the Gnostics on points that Plotinus skipped over (Porphyry, Life of
Plotinus 16). Porphyry also mentions by name two Gnostic treatises
that were discovered in Egypt in 1945, and are now readily available to
scholars: Zostrianos, and Allogenes, in the Nag Hammadi Collection
of Codices. These texts, as well as the Tripartite Tractate
(also in the Nag Hammadi Collection) show how tightly Platonism and Gnosticism
were intertwined in the early centuries of our era.
4. Concluding Summary
Gnosticism began with the same basic, pre-philosophical intuition that
guided the development of Greek philosophy -- that there is a dichotomy
between the realm of true, unchanging Being, and ever-changing Becoming.
However, unlike the Greeks, who strived to find the connection between
and overall unity of these two 'realms,' the Gnostics amplified the differences,
and developed a mytho-logical doctrine of humankind's origin in the realm
of Being, and eventual fall into the realm of darkness or matter, i.e.,
Becoming. This general Gnostic myth came to exercise an influence on emerging
Christianity, as well as upon Platonic philosophy, and even, in the East,
developed into a world religion (Manichaeism) that spread across the known
world, surviving until the late Middle Ages. In the twentieth century,
there began a renewed interest in Gnostic ideas, particularly in the pioneering
work of Hans Jonas, the Existentialist philosopher and student of Martin
Heidegger. The psychologist Carl Jung, as well, drew upon Gnostic motifs
in his theoretical work, and the increasing emphasis on Hermeneutics in
late twentieth century thought owes something to the analyses of Gnostic
myth and exegesis done by Harold Bloom, Paul Ricoeur, and others.
More than any of these accomplishments, however, it was the discovery
in 1945, in Egypt, of a large collection of Coptic Gnostic codices, now
known as the Nag Hammadi Collection, or the Nag Hammadi Library. This collection
contains works of the Valentinian School, as well as of many earlier and
contemporaneous sects, and sheds much needed light on the nature and structure
of what to this day is still called, with some reservations, the Gnostic
Religion. The study of this library has led certain scholars to question
the existence of any unified movement called "Gnosticism" or the "Gnostic
Religion." Michael Allen Williams, in 1996, published a book entitled Rethinking
"Gnosticism": An Argument For Dismantling A Dubious Category (Princeton
University Press 1996). Through a detailed study of numerous texts of the
Nag Hammadi Collection, Williams attempts to show that the extreme diversity
underlying the texts that many scholars have lumped together under the
catch-all phrase of "Gnosticism," casts doubt on the existence of anything
like a Gnostic religion. Moreover, he argues, such a wholesale consignment
of these texts to what is, in fact, a modern designation, blinds us to
the deeper meaning of these diverse intellectual monuments. It should be
noted, however, that the early Church Fathers, like Clement of Alexandria,
Irenaeus, Origen, Hippolytus, Epiphanius, and even 'pagan' philosophers
like Plotinus and Porphyry, who have preserved for us accounts and occasionally
some original documents of philosophers and theologians whom they term
"Gnostic," were also contemporaries or near contemporaries of many of the
figures and schools that they criticize and interpret. The insights of
these writers, then, who were living and working side by side, and almost
always in conflict with, members of the Gnostic sects, should be given
priority over any modern attempts to revise our understanding of what Gnosticism
is.
5. References and Further Reading
a. Sources
Dillon, John (1977). "Numenius of Apamea" in The Middle Platonists
(Cornell University Press).
Filoramo, Giovanni. A History of Gnosticism, tr. Anthony Alcock
(Oxford: Blackwell Publishers 1990, 1992).
Hegel, G.W.F. "The Gnostics" in Lectures on the History of Philosophy,
vol 2. "Plato and the Platonists," tr. E.S. Haldane and Frances H. Simson
(University of Nebraska Press; Bison Books Edition 1995).
Jonas, Hans (1958, 2001). The Gnostic Religion: The Message of the
Alien God and the Beginnings of Christianity (Boston: Beacon Press).
Layton, Bentley (1987). The Gnostic Scriptures (Doubleday: The
Anchor Bible Reference Library).
Plato. Laws, tr. Trevor J. Saunders, in Plato: Complete Works,
ed. John M. Cooper (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing 1997).
Plato. Timaeus, tr. Donald J. Zeyl, in Plato: Complete Works.
Plotinus. The Enneads, tr. A.H. Armstrong, in 7 volumes (Harvard:
Loeb Classical Library 1966).
Ricoeur, Paul. The Conflict of Interpretations (Northwestern
University Press 1974).
Rudolph, Kurt. Gnosis: The Nature and History of Gnosticism,
tr. Robert McLachlan Wilson (Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark Ltd. 1984).
Segal, Robert A. (ed.) The Gnostic Jung (Princeton University
Press 1992).
b. Suggestions for Further
Reading
Barnstone, Willis (1984 ed.) The Other Bible (Harper San Francisco).
Bultmann, Rudolph (1956). Primitive Christianity in its Contemporary
Setting (New York: Meridian Books).
Fideler, David (1993). Jesus Christ, Sun of God: Ancient Cosmology
and Early Christian Symbolism (Wheaton, Illinois: Quest Books).
Pagels, Elaine (1975). The Gnostic Paul: Gnostic Exegesis of the
Pauline Letters (Philadelphia: Trinity Press).
Williams, Michael Allen. Rethinking "Gnosticism": An Argument For
Dismantling A Dubious Category (Princeton University Press 1996).
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