NOSIS TERMS AND PHRASES
http://gnosticq.com/az.text/glos.af.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_gnostic_terms
sarkic
earthly, hidebound, ignorant, uninitiated. The lowest level of human thought the fleshly, instinctive level of thinking.
hylic
lowest order of the three types of human. Unable to be saved since their thinking is entirely material, incapable of understanding the gnosis.
psychic
"soulful," partially initiated. Matter-dwelling spirits
pneumatic
"spiritual," fully initiated. immaterial, souls. Escaping the doom of the material world via gnosis
aeon
one of various levels of reality
archon
one of various powers in the cosmos
pleroma
fulfillment, the higher reality of archetypes (related to Plato's realm of Ideas). The region of light.
kenoma
the visible or manifest cosmos, "lower" than the pleroma
charisma
gift, or energy, bestowed by pneumatics through oral teaching and personal encounters
Sophia
"wisdom," worldly understanding; personified as Lady Wisdom, the syzygy of Christ
logos
The logos is the divine ordering principle of the cosmos; personified as Christ. See also Odic force
hypostasis
Literally "that which stands beneath" the inner reality, emanation (appearance) of God, known to psychics
ousia
essence of God, known to pneumatics. Specific individual things or being
gnosis
"knowledge," direct insight into God attained by pneumatics
syzygy
a divine active-passive, male-female pair of aeons, complementary to one another rather than oppositional
demiurge
an entity (usually seen as evil) responsible for the creation of the physical universe and the physical aspect of humanity. The creator God
theos
The Greek term for god. Used by Christian Gnostics for the monad
Emanation
The Supreme Light or Consciousness descends through a series of stages, gradations, worlds or hypostases, becoming progressively more material and embodied. In time it will turn around to return to the One (epistrophe), retracing its steps through spiritual knowledge and contemplation.
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also read: "The Hidden Passion" by L. CARUANA.
L. Caruana is an artist and writer living in Paris. He holds a Philosophy degree in Hermeneutics (the study of Biblical Interpretation) and is the author of Enter Through the Image: "The Ancient Image-Language of Myth", "Art and Dreams".
www.lcaruana.com
- The One - for God, Father, Parent, Root etc.
- The saviour - for the Son, Christ, Word, Autogenes, Seth etc.
- Sophia - for Wisdom, Achamoth, Pistis etc.
- Yaltabaoth - for Chief Archon, Archigenetor, Saklas etc.
- The Elect - for the Gnostics, Pneumatics, Chosen ones, sons of Seth etc.
ACHAMOTH
- In Valentinian Gnosticism, there is an Upper and Lower Sophia (Wisdom). See SOPHIA.
- The Lower Sophia is called Achamoth.
- According to The First Apocalypse of James, Achamoth’s mother is Sophia: “Sophia (...) is the mother of Achamoth.” (First Apocalypse of James)
- All beings in the Upper Aeons are androgynous angels (i.e. both male and female - see ANDROGYNE), except Achamoth, who is female from a female: “Achamoth (...) is female from a female.” (First Apocalypse of James)
- In the Valentinian system described by Ptolemy, Sophia suffered because she attempted to know the entirety of the Father. Thus, she stretched herself outward, until she finally met with ‘the Limit’ (horos) since the Father cannot be known in his entirety. Through this ‘passion’, Sophia accidentally produced ‘Desire’, which fell outside the limit. Although Sophia was restored to the upper Pleroma, ‘Desire’ became Achamoth, the Sophia fallen to the Lower Aeons.
- That Achamoth came forth from Sophia: “When the Desire of the Sophia above, also called Achamoth, had been banished from the Pleroma above, by necessity she was cast with her passion in places of Shadow and the Void.” (Ptolemy from Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses)
- That Achamoth is ‘female from female’: “Since Sophia had undertaken an impossible and unattainable task, she brought forth (...Achamoth...) a thing such as (only) a female by herself can bear.” (Ptolemy from Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses)
- According to The First Apocalypse of James, Achamoth (Sophia) produced Yaltabaoth and the Archons without intercourse from the father: “the Pre-existent One did not have intercourse with her (Achamoth), when she produced them (the Archons).” (First Apocalypse of James)
- Achamoth (Sophia) did not have the consent of her consort, Christ, when she created Yaltabaoth: “She (Achamoth) produced you without a male, since she was alone (and) in ignorance as to what lives through her mother because she thought that she alone existed.” (First Apocalypse of James)
- By creating alone, Achamoth (Sophia) produced a faulted being, Yaltabaoth, who was responsible for the material world, the Archons, and Adam and Eve. See SOPHIA.
- ADAM AND EVE
- Although Gnostic texts provide different versions, the general outline of Adam and Eve, their creation and fall, is as follows:
1. ADAM AND EVE - AS THE ANTHROPOS. See ANTHROPOS.
- In the Upper Aeons, the One created the Anthropos in its own image, as an androgynous angel (i.e. male and female). This was the First Adam, which was spirit-endowed (pneumatic Anthropos).
- Seeing this image in the Upper Aeons, Yaltabaoth and his Archons created the Second Adam, which was soul-endowed (psychic Anthropos). Like the First Adam, the Second Adam was androgynous.
- After Yaltabaoth accidentally breathed his own spirit (pneuma) into Adam, he and his Archons tried to retrieve it. They created the Third Adam, which was flesh-endowed (hylic Anthropos).
- Although the Third Adam was also androgynous, Yaltabaoth divided it into male and female. This was the creation of Adam and Eve.
- For all of the above, see ANTHROPOS.
- For the division of the Anthropos into Adam and Eve, then their temptation and fall, see the following.
2. ADAM AND EVE - THEIR DIVISION
- In the Apocalypse of Adam, Adam explains to his son Seth that Adam and Eve ‘resembled the angels’ (i.e. that they were an androgynous angel) but then Yaltabaoth ‘divided them in wrath’, making them male and female: “Listen to my words, my son Seth. When God had created me out of the earth, along with Eve, your mother, (...) we resembled the great eternal angels, for we were higher than the god who had created us and the powers with him, whom we did not know. Then God, the ruler of the aeons and the powers (i.e. Yaltabaoth), divided us in wrath.” (Apocalypse of Adam)
- As androgynous, Adam and Eve were immortal. They became mortal when they separated: “When Eve was still with Adam, death did not exist. When she was separated from him, death came into being.” (Gospel of Philip 68:22)
- Yaltabaoth separated Eve from Adam to retrieve Sophia’s spirit (or power) which he had acquired for himself, but then lost when he accidentally breathed it into Adam. Yaltabaoth saw Sophia’s spirit (also named Epinoia) as a feminine image within Adam. Thus, the Archon created Eve to try to retrieve it. But he failed and Sophia’s spirit remained in Eve.
- In the Apocryphon of John, Sophia’s spirit is called Epinoia: “Then the Epinoia of the light hid herself in him (Adam). And the chief archon wanted to bring her out of his rib (...) And he (Yaltabaoth) made another creature, in the form of a woman, according to the likeness of the Epinoia which had appeared to him.” (Apocryphon of John). See EPINOIA.
- Yaltabaoth failed: “But the Epinoia of the light cannot be grasped. Although darkness pursued her, it did not catch her.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Through Sophia’s spirit (or Epinoia), Eve awakened Adam: “And he (Adam) saw the woman beside him. And in that moment the luminous Epinoia appeared, and she lifted the veil which lay over his mind. And he became sober from the drunkenness of darkness.” (Apocryphon of John)
- In Hypostasis of the Archons, Eve was also created out of Adam. But Adam then returned to his second state (as the Second Adam, which was soul-endowed) while Eve became the spirit-endowed being. Due to the spirit in her, Eve awakened Adam: “They (the Archons) opened his side like a living woman. And they built up his side with some flesh in place of her, and Adam came to be endowed only with soul. And the spirit-endowed woman came to him and spoke with him, saying, ‘Arise, Adam.’” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- The spirit-endowed Eve reminded Adam of their original state: that they were once united as an androgynous angel: “She lifted the veil which lay over his mind. And he became sober from the drunkenness of darkness. And he recognized his counter-image.” i.e. he knew her to be his syzygy or consort. (Apocryphon of John)
- In Hypostasis of the Archons, Eve also does this by revealing herself to Adam as his female counterpart: “Then the authorities came up to their Adam. And when they saw his female counterpart speaking with him, they became agitated.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- For Christ and Sophia’s restoration of the divided Adam and Eve (and their descendents) into their androgynous angel, see CONSENT and CONSORT.
3. ADAM AND EVE - THE TEMPTATION
- Yaltabaoth then placed Adam and Eve before the two trees in paradise. He exhorted them to eat from the Tree of Life, since “The root of this (tree) is bitter and its branches are death, its shadow is hate and deception is in its leaves.” (Apocryphon of John)
- But, Yaltabaoth forbid them to eat from the Tree of Knowledge.
- In the Apocryphon of John, the Tree of Knowledge has Sophia’s spirit (Epinoia) in its fruit. And so, Christ descends in the form of an eagle and bids them to eat from it: “Sophia (is) she who came down in innocence in order to rectify her deficiency. (...) And through her they (Adam and Eve) have tasted the perfect knowledge. I (Christ) appeared in the form of an eagle on the tree of knowledge, which is the Epinoia from the foreknowledge of the pure light, that I might teach them and awaken them out of the depth of sleep. For they were both in a fallen state, and they recognized their nakedness.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Naked in this context means ‘naked of imperfection’: “And when they (the Archons) recognized that he (Adam) was luminous, and that he could think better than they, and that he was free from wickedness (or ‘naked of imperfection’ - Bentley translation), they took him and threw him into the lowest region of all matter.” (Apocryphon of John) See GARMENT.
- In Hypostasis of the Archons, Adam and Eve eat from the Tree of Knowledge, but they are taught to do so by the snake, who is positively identified as ‘the instructor’: “Then the female spiritual principle came in the snake, the instructor; and it taught them (to eat of the tree...). And the carnal woman took from the tree and ate; and she gave to her husband as well as herself; and these beings that possessed only a soul, ate. And their imperfection became apparent in their lack of knowledge; and they recognized that they were naked...” (Hypostastis of the Archons)
- Naked in this context means ‘naked of the spiritual element’: “they recognized that they were naked of the spiritual element.” See GARMENT.
4. ADAM AND EVE - THE FALL
- Because Adam and Eve recognized the cause of their imperfection, they withdrew from Yaltabaoth. In turn, he cursed them: “And when Yaltabaoth noticed that they withdrew from him, he cursed his earth. (...) And he cast them out of paradise and he clothed them in gloomy darkness.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Their fall was to forget their true origins: “He (Yaltabaoth) made them drink water of forgetfulness, from the chief archon, in order that they might not know from where they came.” (Apocryphon of John)
- In Hypostastis of the Archons, they fell into ‘distraction’: “They (the Archons) turned to their Adam and took him and expelled him from the garden along with his wife; for they have no blessing, since they too are beneath the curse. Moreover, they threw mankind into great distraction and into a life of toil, so that their mankind might be occupied by worldly affairs, and might not have the opportunity of being devoted to the holy spirit.” (Hypostastis of the Archons)
- Last of all, Adam and Eve were bound by Fate (the Heimarmene): “And bitter fate was begotten through them, which is the last of the changeable bonds. (...) For from that fate came forth every sin and injustice and blasphemy, and the chain of forgetfulness and ignorance (...). And thus the whole creation was made blind, in order that they may not know God, who is above all of them. And because of the chain of forgetfulness, their sins were hidden. For they are bound with measures and times and moments, since it (fate) is lord over everything.” (Apocryphon of John) See FATE.
- ADAMAS
- See ANTHROPOS.
- Also called Geradamas and Pigera-Adamas.
- A word-play on the name Adam and the Greek word for steel, adamas.
- Hence, as ‘Adamas’, Adam becomes ‘the man of steel’.
- Hence also the adjective ‘adamantine’ (solid, incorruptible) given to those descended from the Adamas (i.e. the heavenly Anthropos).
- Adamas as Man of light, and adamantine: “...a crown upon their heads with twelve adamantine stones in it, which were from Adamas, the Man of Light” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- In the Gospel of the Egyptians, the ‘incorruptible’ Adamas (i.e. the heavenly Anthropos) engenders an ‘incorruptible’ race through the Four Lights, Seth and the Son: “The incorruptible man Adamas asked for them a son out of himself, in order that he (the son) may become father of the immovable, incorruptible race, so that, ... the dead aeon may raise itself (and) dissolve. And thus there came forth from above the power of the great light, the Manifestation. She gave birth to the four great lights: Harmozel, Oroiael, Davithe, Eleleth, and the great incorruptible Seth, the son of the incorruptible man Adamas.” (Gospels of the Egyptians)
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ANGELS
- All angels are beings in the Upper Aeons.
- Each angelic being is a hypostasis, extension, image or reflection of the One. See AEONS.
- These are arranged into certain angelic orders or hierarchies, though all are ultimately one and unified. See ANGELIC ORDERS.
- Angels are androgynous. See ANDROGYNE.
- Angels, though they are androgynous, multiply through consent with their consorts. See CONSORT.
- Many important angels are named in the Gnostic texts.
- Foremost among these are the Four Lights: Armozel, Oriel, Daveithai and Eleleth: “For from the light, which is the Christ... the four lights (appeared) from the divine Autogenes... the light-aeon Armozel, which is the first angel.... And the second light (is) Oriel... And the third light is Daveithai,... And the fourth light Eleleth... These are the four lights which attend the divine Autogenes” (Apocryphon of John) See also FOUR LIGHTS.
- Also of great importance are the triads of angels who enrobe, baptize, enthrone, glorify and snatch away the initiate in the rite of the Five Seals: “And I delivered him to those who give robes - Yammon, Elasso, Amenai - and (...) to the baptizers - Micheus, Michar, Mnesinous - and (...) to those who enthrone - Bariel, Nouthan, Sabenai - and (...) to those who glorify - Ariom, Elien, Phariel - and (...) to those who snatch away - Kamaliel, [...]anen, Samblo (...) And he received the Five seals.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- In Valentinian Gnosticism, certain human beings (the seeds or Elect) have promised themselves to angels, and will re-unite with them in the Upper Aeons: “When the whole seed is perfected (...) the Savior and Sophia [will] form a pair (syzygy). These then are said to be bridegroom and bride, and the bridal chamber is the entire Pleroma. The spiritual beings will divest themselves of their souls and become intelligent spirits, and, without being hindered or seen, they will enter into the Pleroma, and will be bestowed as brides on the angels around the Savior.” (Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 1.7.1. See also Valentinian Exposition 39:29)
- Angels are also called ‘receivers’: “they who are worthy of (the) invocation, the renunciations of the five seals in the spring-baptism, these will know their receivers as they are instructed about them, and they will know them (or: be known) by them. These will by no means taste death.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- Angels are also called ‘Assembly of the Holy One’ and ‘shadowless lights’: “The whole multitude of those angels are called Assembly of the Holy Ones, the Shadowless Lights.” (Eugnostos the Blessed)
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ANGELIC ORDERS
- Angels are arranged into so many hypostases, aeons, orders or hierarchies around the One, although all are ultimately one with their source.
- In the Gospel of the Egyptians, there are at least five orders of angels: thrones, powers, glories, authorities and angels. E.g. - “...and the thrones which are in them, and the powers which surround them, glories, authorities, and the powers” (Gospel of the Egyptians) “She (Providence) passed through all the aeons which I mentioned before. And she established thrones of glory, and myriads of angels without number who surrounded them, powers and incorruptible glories, who sing and give glory, all giving praise with a single voice, with one accord, with one never-silent voice, (...) to the Father, and the Mother, and the Son.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- In the Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex, there are at least five types of angels, though the order is uncertain: powers, glories, angels, archangels, ministers. “These are the powers which were given to the forefather who was placed in the aeon of the mother. And there were given to him myriads upon myriads of glories, and angels and archangels and ministers, so that those that are of matter should serve him.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- Angels may also be arranged in a hierarchy from the One to ‘the countless myriads’: “Among the things that were created the monad is first, the dyad follows it, and the triad, up to the tenths. Now the tenths rule the hundredths; the hundredths rule the thousandths; the thousands rule the ten thousands. This is the pattern among the immortals.” (Eugnostos)
- In order to emphasize unity at every level, the numerical order of angels is composed of the monad (one-fold), dyad (two-fold), triad (three-fold) etc, as follows:
1. monad - onefold
2. dyad - twofold
3. triad - threefold
4. tetrad - fourfold
5. pentad - fivefold
6. hexad - sixfold
7. heptad or hebdomad - sevenfold
8. ogdoad - eightfold
9. ennead - ninefold
10. decad - tenfold
12. dodecad - twelvefold
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- ANIMALS
- Also called ‘beasts’.
- In general, all beings belonging to the Lower Aeons are animals.
- The Archons have the form of animals. See ARCHONS.
- The Hylic race of humans are also called animals. See THREE TYPES OF HUMANS.
- The Archons and their powers have the form of animals: “But their powers, which are the angels, are in the form of beasts and animals.” (Marsanes)
- Yaltabaoth has a lion’s face, and each of the Archons’ powers has an animal face, which is ‘the body belonging to the name’: “And the archons created seven powers for themselves, and the powers created for themselves six angels for each one until they became 365 angels. And these are the bodies belonging with the names: the first is Athoth, a he has a sheep's face (etc)”(Apocryphon of John)
- Because the Archons, as the makers of this world, are beasts, the world is also beastly: “For the world is from beasts and it is a beast” (Interpretation of Knowledge)
- Human beings belonging to the Hylic race are called animals or beasts: “There are many animals in the world which are in a human form.” (Gospel of Philip)
- Those descendents of Adam belonging to the Hylic race are animals: “Adam ate from the tree which bore animals. He became an animal and he brought forth animals.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The Hylic race worship the Archons, and hence, animals: “For this reason the children of Adam worship animals.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The Hylic race are beastial: “Having left knowledge behind, she (the soul) fell into bestiality. For a senseless person exists in bestiality, not knowing what is proper to say and what it is proper not to say.” (Authoritative Teaching)
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- ANTHROPOS
- Also called Man, First Man, Perfect Man, Adamas, Pigeradamas, Adam and Eve
- Although Gnostic texts provide different versions of the creation and fall of the Anthropos, the general outline is as follows:
1. CREATION OF THE ANTHROPOS
- In the Upper Aeons, the One created the Anthropos in its own image, as an androgynous angel (i.e. male and female). This was the First Adam, which was spirit-endowed (pneumatic Anthropos).
- Seeing this image in the Upper Aeons, Yaltabaoth and his Archons created the Second Adam, which was soul-endowed (psychic Anthropos). Like the First Adam, the Second Adam was androgynous.
- After Yaltabaoth accidentally breathed his own spirit (pneuma) into Adam, he and his Archons tried to retrieve it. They created the Third Adam, which was flesh-endowed (hylic Anthropos).
- The three Adams became the prototypes for the three different types of humans: the spirit-endowed (pneumatics), the soul-endowed (psychics), and the flesh-endowed (hylics). See THREE TYPES OF HUMANS.
- Although the Third Adam was also androgynous, Yaltabaoth divided it into male and female. This was the creation of Adam and Eve.
- For the division of the Anthropos into Adam and Eve, then their temptation and fall, see ADAM AND EVE.
2. THE SPIRITUAL, PSYCHIC AND HYLIC ANTHROPOS.
- In Origin of the World, three Adams appear, which correspond to the three types of humans - spiritual, psychic and hylic: “Now the first Adam, (Adam) of Light, is spirit-endowed and appeared on the first day. The second Adam is soul-endowed and appeared on the sixth day (...). The third Adam is a creature of the earth (choikos), that is, the man of the law, and he appeared on the eighth day.” (Origin of the World 117:28)
- In the Apocryphon of John, the One created Man (the Anthropos) by speaking and naming him: “And a voice came forth from the exalted aeon-heaven: ‘The Man exists and the son of Man.’” (Apocryphon of John) This is the creation of ‘the first Adam’, which is spirit-endowed (pneumatic Anthropos).
- Yaltabaoth and his Archons saw the glowing image of the Anthropos in the Upper Aeons and tried to copy it: “When all the authorities and the chief archon looked (...) they saw the form of the image in the water (of the Upper Aeons). And he (Yaltabaoth) said to the authorities which attend him, ‘Come, let us create a man according to the image of God and according to our likeness, that his image may become a light for us.’ (...) He created a being according to the likeness of the first, perfect Man.” (Apocryphon of John)
- In Hypostasis of the Archons, the Anthropos is named ‘Incorruptibility’ (a feminine word): “As incorruptibility looked down into the region of the waters, her image appeared in the waters.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- The Anthropos which Yaltabaoth and his Archons created was the Second Adam, which is soul-endowed (psychic Anthropos): “And the powers began: the first one (...) created a bone-soul; and the second one (...) created a sinew-soul; the third one (...) created a flesh-soul; and the fourth one (...) created a marrow-soul; the fifth one (...) created a blood-soul; the sixth one (...) created a skin-soul; the seventh one (...) created a hair-soul.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Although Yaltabaoth created the Second Adam, which is soul-endowed, it was still lacking in spirit. At the behest of Sophia, Christ and the Four Lights tricked Yaltabaoth into blowing his own spirit (which had come from his mother Sophia) into Adam: “And they (Christ and the Four Lights) said to Yaltabaoth, ‘Blow into his face something of your spirit and his body will arise.’ And he blew into his face the spirit which is the power of his mother (...) The body moved and gained strength, and it was luminous.” (Apocryphon of John 19:22)
- In Hypostasis of the Archons, Yaltabaoth blew a soul into Adam, and then the Spirit (i.e. the One) sent Adam his spirit (pneuma): “And he (Yaltabaoth) breathed into his face; and the man came to have a soul (and remained) upon the ground (...) Afterwards, the Spirit saw the soul-endowed man upon the ground. And the spirit (...) descended and came to dwell within him, and that man became a living soul. It called his name Adam,” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- To retrieve his spirit, Yaltabaoth and his Archons created the Third Adam, which is material and hylic: “They (the demons) all worked on it until, limb for limb, the natural and the material body was completed by them.” (Apocryphon of John)
- The third Adam was made of the earth: “The rulers laid plans and said, ‘Come, let us create a man that will be soil from the earth.’ They modeled their creature as one wholly of the earth.” Hypostasis of the Archons 87:24
- Specifically, the third Adam is a compound of earth, air, water and fire, making him mortal: “And they took counsel with the whole array of archons and angels. They took fire and earth and water and mixed them together with the four fiery winds. And they wrought them together and caused a great disturbance. And they brought him (Adam) into the shadow of death (...) and he became a mortal man.” (Apocryphon of John 20:33)
- For the division of the Anthropos into Adam and Eve, then their temptation and fall, see ADAM AND EVE.
FOUR LIGHTS (also called FIVE LIGHTS)
- The Four Lights are mentioned in the Sethian Gnostic texts.
- The Four Lights are Armozel, Oriel, Daveithai and Eleleth.
1. THE FOUR LIGHTS IN GENERAL
- The Four Lights are four angels which are four aeons (extensions or hypostases) around the saviour (Autogenes): “For from the light, which is the Christ (...) the four lights (appeared) from the divine Autogenes (...) the light-aeon Armozel, which is the first angel. (...)And the second light (is) Oriel. (...) And the third light is Daveithai. (...) And the fourth light Eleleth (...) These are the four lights which attend the divine Autogenes.” (Apocryphon of John)
- The four lights are aeons of the saviour (Autogenes). Though individual, they are parts of his wholeness or unity: “The Autogenes is the chief archon of his own aeons and angels as his parts, for those who are the four individuals belong to him; they belong to the fifth aeon together. The fifth exists in one; the four [are] the fifth, part by part. But these [four] are complete individually...” (Zostrianos)
- The Four Lights are also called ‘Light-Givers’: “Eleleth, the great angel, spoke to me."It is I," he said, "who am understanding. I am one of the four light-givers...” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- In describing Eleleth, he has the appearance of an angel: “Now as for that angel (Eleleth), I cannot speak of his power: his appearance is like fine gold and his raiment is like snow. No, truly, my mouth cannot bear to speak of his power and the appearance of his face!” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
2. THERE ARE ALSO FIVE LIGHTS
- The saviour (as Yoel) is sometimes called the Fifth Light: “...the fifth, Yoel, who presides over the name of him to whom it will be granted to baptize with the holy baptism that surpasses the heaven, the incorruptible one.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- Hence, there are also ‘Five Lights’ - “He sent, by means of the holy decree, the five lights down” (Apocrypohon of John)
3. THE FOUR LIGHTS RULING OVER TYPES AND AEONS
- The Four Lights rule over four aeons, in which four types of humans dwell. In the first light, Armozel, is the Geradamas (and Christ); in the second light, Oriel, is Seth (and Jesus); in the third light, Daveithai, is the Seed of Seth (and the saints), and in the fourth light, Eleleth, are the penitants ‘those who have gone astray’.
- “and the (first) great light Harmozel, the place of the living Autogenes (...) and he who is with him, the incorruptible man Adamas, the second, Oroiael, the place of the great Seth, and Jesus (...) the third, Davithe, the place of the sons of the great Seth, the fourth, Eleleth, the place where the souls of the sons are resting, the fifth, Yoel, who presides over the name of him to whom it will be granted to baptize with the holy baptism that surpasses the heaven, the incorruptible one.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- “And Pigera-Adamas... he (the One) placed over the first aeon with (...) the Autogenes, the Christ, by the first light Armozel (...). And he placed his son Seth over the second aeon in the presence of the second light Oriel. And in the third aeon the seed of Seth was placed over the third light Daveithai (...). And in the fourth aeon the souls were placed of those who do not know the Pleroma and who did not repent at once, but who persisted for a while and repented afterwards; they are by the fourth light Eleleth.” (Apocrypohon of John)
- This creates a possible historical schema of ‘four ages’. In the context of The Hypostasis of the Archons, the first three ages apparently took place before Noah and the flood. Then, the fourth Light, Eleleth, appears and describes the fourth age, which is the present age, when the Christ appears. Eleleth: “‘Still, that sown element (the sons of Seth) will not become known now. Instead, after three generations it will come to be known, and it has freed them from the bondage of the authorities' error.’ Then I (Norea) said, ‘Sir, how much longer?’ He (Eleleth) said to me, ‘Until the moment when the true man, within a modeled form, reveals the existence of the spirit of truth, which the father has sent. Then he will teach them about everything, and he will anoint them with the unction of life eternal, given him from the undominated generation. Then they will be freed of blind thought, and they will trample underfoot death, which is of the authorities, and they will ascend into the limitless light where this sown element belongs.’” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- In Zostrianos, there are three types of soul (like three types of humans), and the Four Lights rule over the ‘four species’ of the highest type, ‘the unbegotten souls’. Thus: “[Armozel] is placed upon the first aeon. (He is) a promise of god, [...] of truth and a joining of soul. Oroiael, a power (and) seer of truth, is set over the second. Daveithe, a vision of knowledge, is set over the third. Eleleth, an eager desire and preparation for truth, is set over the fourth.” (Zostrianos) See THREE TYPES OF HUMANS.
- ARCHONS
- The rulers of the Lower Aeons
- Also called rulers, governors, authorities, guards, gate keepers, robbers, toll collectors, detainers, judges, pitiless ones, adulterers, man-eaters, corpse-eaters, fishermen
1. ARCHONS - IN GENERAL
- Yaltabaoth is the Chief Archon and created all the others. See YALTABAOTH.
- According to the Apocryphon of John, there are twelve Archons and their aeons, comprising the Lower Aeons
- Seven heavenly Archons are associated with the seven planetary heavens.
- Five Archons ‘of the Abyss’ are associated with the five sublunary realms created by earth, water, air and fire intermixed in the ether.
2. ARCHONS - THEIR CREATION BY YALTABAOTH
- Yaltabaoth has the power to create Archons and their aeons because of the spirit (pneuma) in him which he had acquired from his mother Sophia. He created the Archons from luminous fire: “This is the first archon who took a great power from his mother. And he removed himself from her and moved away from the places in which he was born. He became strong and created for himself other aeons with a flame of luminous fire which (still) exists now. And he joined with his arrogance which is in him and begot authorities for himself.” (Apocyphon of John)
- Being androgynous, Yaltabaoth generated androgynous Archons like himself: “This ruler (Yaltabaoth), by being androgynous, made himself a vast realm, an extent without limit. And he contemplated creating offspring for himself, and created for himself seven offspring, androgynous just like their parent.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- As androgynous (see ANDROGYNE), Yaltabaoth had both male and female genders. He generated his offspring through the consent of the male and female consorts within himself (see CONSORTS). Thus, the androgynous Yaltabaoth generated the Archons with the aid of a consort.
- This consort may have been ‘his arrogance which is in him’. He ‘joins’ with her to beget the authorities: “And he joined with his arrogance which is in him and begot authorities for himself.” (Apocyphon of John)
- This consort may have been his ‘blasphemous thought’, ‘the abyss’ or Pistis Sophia’, depending on the identification for the pronoun ‘she’: “He (Yaltabaoth) pursued it (his blasphemous thought) down to chaos and the abyss, his mother, at the instigation of Pistis Sophia. And she established each of his offspring in conformity with its power - after the pattern of the realms that are above, for by starting from the invisible world the visible world was invented.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- Yaltabaoth also created the androgynous Archons by the power of naming (see NAMES): “The ruler (Yaltabaoth) had a thought - consistent with his nature - and by means of verbal expression he created an androgyne. He opened his mouth and cooed to him. When his eyes had been opened, he looked at his father, and he said to him, "Eee!" Then his father called him Eee-a-o ('Yao').” And so on for 'Eloai' and 'Astaphaios'. (Origin of the World)
3. ARCHONS - THEIR HIERARCHY IN THE LOWER AEONS:
- Yaltabaoth placed seven Archons in the heavens and five over the Abyss: “And he (Yaltabaoth) placed seven kings - each corresponding to the firmaments of heaven - over the seven heavens, and five over the depth of the abyss, that they may reign. And he shared his fire with them.” (Apocyphon of John)
- The seven heavenly Archons were named Athoth, Harmas, Kalila-Oumbri, Yabel, Adonaiou (or Sabaoth) Cain and Abel: “The name of the first one is Athoth, whom the generations call the reaper. The second one is Harmas, who is the eye of envy. The third one is Kalila-Oumbri. The fourth one is Yabel. The fifth one is Adonaiou, who is called Sabaoth. The sixth one is Cain, whom the generations of men call the sun. The seventh is Abel.” (Apocyphon of John)
- The five Archons of the abyss were named Abrisene, Yobel, Armoupieel, Melceir-Adonein and Belias: “The eighth is Abrisene. The ninth is Yobel. The tenth is Armoupieel. The eleventh is Melceir-Adonein. The twelfth is Belias, it is he who is over the depth of Hades.” (Apocyphon of John)
- Each Archon may be associated with a planet (no Gnostic text makes this association explicit). And each Archon, according to the Apocryphon of John, has an adjunct or 'power' with the face of a beast. Thus, the seven planets, Archons, powers and beasts would be as follows:
- Saturn - Athoth - Athoth - sheep
- Jupiter -Harmas - Eloaiou - donkey
- Mars -Kalila-Oumbri - Astaphaios - hyena
- Sun -Yabel - Yao - seven-headed serpent
- Venus -Adonaiou - Sabaoth - dragon
- Mercury -Cain - Adonin - monkey
- Moon -Abel - Sabbede -fire-face
- Beneath the moon, five more Archons rule over five more spheres. These are the five 'sublunar' aeons composed of ether, fire, air, water and earth. From highest to lowest, the Archons and aeons are as follows:
- Abrisene - ether
- Yobel - fire
- Armnoupieel - air
- Melceir-Adonein - water
- Belias - earth
- A hierarchy of Archons, powers, and angels (i.e. demons) emerges, with 360 or 365 angels in all: “And the archons created seven powers for themselves, and the powers created for themselves six angels for each one until they became (360 or) 365 angels.” (Apocyphon of John)
- As 360 or 365, the Archons’ demons establish their rule over man in space (the 360 degrees on the horizon) and in time (365 days a year). Each of the 365 demons also rules over a part of man’s body and soul: “This is the number of the angels: together they are 365. They all worked on it (the body) until, limb for limb, the natural and the material body was completed by them.” (Apocyphon of John)
- As the planets in the heavens, the Archons rule over man by determining his astrological Fate (Heimarmene): “He (Yaltabaoth) made a plan with his authorities (i.e. Archons), which are his powers, and they committed together adultery with Sophia, and bitter fate was begotten through them, which is the last of the changeable bonds. (...) For they (humans) are bound with measures and times and moments, since it (Fate) is lord over everything.” (Apocyphon of John)
4. ARCHONS - AS ANDROGYNOUS. See ANDROGYNE
- Like their creator Yaltabaoth, the Archons are androgynous: “This ruler (Yaltabaoth), by being androgynous (...) created for himself seven offspring, androgynous just like their parent.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- As androgynous, each Archon has a male and female name: “Seven (Archons) appeared in chaos, androgynous. They have their masculine names and their feminine names. (For) Sambathas, his feminine name is Pronoia. (...For) Yao, his feminine name is Lordship, (for) Sabaoth: his feminine name is Deity, (for) Adonaios, his feminine name is Kingship, (for) Elaios: his feminine name is Jealousy, (for) Oraios: his feminine name is Wealth, and (for) Astaphaios, his feminine name is Sophia (Wisdom). These are the seven forces of the seven heavens of chaos. And they were born androgynous, consistent with the immortal pattern that existed before them.” (Origin of the World)
- In the Apocryphon of John, each power also unites with an authority: “And he (Yaltabaoth) united the seven powers in his thought with the authorities which were with him.” (Apocyphon of John)
5. ARCHONS - AS PLANETARY GATE-KEEPERS
- As the planetary gate-keepers, the Archons prevent souls from rising to the Upper Aeons after death (or in a visionary ascent). Certain souls (sinners, psychics, hylics) consorted with demons while they were in the body, and so they fell under the Archons’ power. They are turned around and cast down into another body or are punished. Other souls (virtuous, pneumatics, Elect) may pass freely if they have acquired certain sayings, signs, seals etc. or if they refused to consort with demons while they were in the body. See RESURRECTION.
6. ARCHONS - THEIR DESTRUCTION
- There are a limited number of ages - sometimes three (three descents of a saviour figure like Pronoia or Protennoia), sometimes four (one age for each of the the Four Lights. See FOUR LIGHTS).
- At the end will come the consummation: “(This...) has been apparent from creation down to the consummation of the age.” (Origin of the World)
- The time of the Archons is limited: “Jesus said, ‘Truly I say to you, for all of them the stars bring matters to completion. When Saklas (the blind god) completes the span of time assigned for him...’” (Gospel of Judas 54)
- The end of the Archons’ rule will be heralded by signs in the cosmos: “Then, when the great Authorities knew that the time of fulfillment had appeared - just as in the pangs of the parturient it (the time) has drawn near, so also had the destruction approached - all together the elements trembled, and the foundations of the underworld and the ceilings of Chaos shook, and a great fire shone within their midst, and the rocks and the earth were shaken like a reed shaken by the wind.” (Trimorphic Prontennoia 43:4)
- More cosmic signs: “Then the sun will become dark, and the moon will cause its light to cease. The stars of the sky will cancel their circuits.” (On the Origin of the World 126:10)
- The Lower Aeons will collapse, and the ‘luminous fire’ which created the Archons will also destroy them: “And their heavens will fall one upon the next and their forces will be consumed by fire. Their eternal realms, too, will be overturned.” (On the Origin of the World)
- Finally Sophia will cause their destruction. The Archons will destroy each other, or Yaltabaoth will destroy them and then himself: “And a great clap of thunder will come out of a great force that is above all the forces of chaos, where the firmament of the woman (Sophia) is situated. Having created the first product, she (Sophia) will put away the wise fire of intelligence and clothe herself with witless wrath. Then she will pursue the gods of chaos, whom she created along with the prime parent (Yaltabaoth). She will cast them down into the abyss. They will be obliterated because of their wickedness. For they will come to be like volcanoes and consume one another until they perish at the hand of the prime parent (Yaldabaoth). When he has destroyed them, he will turn against himself and destroy himself until he ceases to exist.” (On the Origin of the World 126:13)
7. ARCHONS - ALTERNATE NAMES
- The Archons as toll collectors: “...three of them will seize you - they who sit (there) as toll collectors...” (Jesus to James, First Apocalypse of James) “The toll-collector who dwells in the fourth heaven replied, saying...” (Apocalypse of Paul)
- As judges: James prays as he dies: “Do not give me into the hand of a judge who is severe with sin!” (First Apocalypse of James)
- As governors and administrators: “The governors and the administrators possess garments granted only for a time, which do not last.” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- As robbers: “This is the tomb of the newly-formed body with which the robbers had clothed the man, the bond of forgetfulness; and he became a mortal man.” (Apocalypse of John)
- As pitiless ones: “I have broken the gates of the pitiless ones” (Sophia of Jesus Christ); “the secure gates of those pitiless ones I broke” (Trimorphic Protonoia)
- as adulterers: “she (the soul) had given herself to wanton, unfaithful adulterers” (Exegesis on the Soul)
- As man-eaters and fishermen: “For man-eaters will seize us and swallow us, rejoicing like a fisherman casting a hook into the water.” (Authoritative Teaching)
- In the sense of man-eaters, the Archons are also corpse-eaters. They eat the dead (the non-Elect) while the angels of the Upper Aeons, as truth, eat the living (the Elect) as they ascend: “This world is a corpse-eater. All the things eaten in it themselves die also. Truth is a life-eater. Therefore no one nourished by truth will die...” (Gospel of Philip)
- Archons have souls, but no spirit: “they (the Archons) could not lay hold of that image, which had appeared to them in the waters, because of their weakness - since beings that merely possess a soul cannot lay hold of those that possess a spirit” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- Since they have no fullness, they are deficient. Though they exist at present, they will return to their state of non-existence: “their end will be like their beginning: from that which did not exist (they are) to return once again to that which will not be.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- They are likenesses, copies, imitations, shadows, phantasms and distorted reflections of the Upper Aeons: “(The Archons) are their (the Pleromas') likenesses, copies, shadows, and phantasms, lacking reason and the light (...). In the manner of a reflection are they beautiful. For the face of the copy normally takes its beauty from that of which it is a copy.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- (TO GO) ASTRAY
- Those who ‘go astray’ are caught in the traps and distractions of the Archons, and have not yet recognized the ‘gnosis’.
- If they later recognize the gnosis, they may still be saved (as Penitants)
- “...many go astray on the way.” (Gospel of Philip)
- “those on whom the counterfeit spirit descends are drawn by him and they go astray.” (Apocryphon of John)
- As the penitants: “And I said, ‘Lord, where will the souls of these go when they have come out of their flesh? (...) Those who have not known to whom they belong, where will their souls be?’ And he said to me, ‘In those, the despicable spirit has gained strength when they went astray. (...) After it comes out of (the body), it is handed over to the authorities (...), and they bind it with chains and cast it into prison, and consort with it until it is liberated from the forgetfulness and acquires knowledge. And if thus it becomes perfect, it is saved (...) It is not again cast into another flesh." (Apocryphon of John)
- Those who go astray do not know the difference between perishable and imperishable: “Now a difference existed among the imperishable aeons. Let us, then, consider (it) this way: Everything that came from the perishable will perish, since it came from the perishable. Whatever came from imperishableness will not perish but will become imperishable, since it came from imperishableness. So, many men went astray because they had not known this difference; that is, they died.” (Eugnostos the Blessed)
- The flesh of ‘non-understanding’ leads us astray. Jesus: “I do not speak of the flesh in which you dwell, but the flesh of non-understanding which exists in ignorance, which leads astray many from the of my Father.” (First Book of Jeu)
- CONSORT
- Also called syzygy, complement, partner, pair, counter-image, reflection
1. CONSORTS IN GENERAL
- Like the One, all beings in the Upper Aeons are androgynous, which is to say, singular beings that possess both male and female genders or names. See ANDROGYNE.
- These two genders or names are also called syzygies, which is translated as consorts, complements, partners, pairs, counter-images or reflections.
- Consorts are like male and female ‘reflections’ of one androgynous being.
- Hence, consorts resemble one another as ‘brother and sister’: “It is also said that she (Sophia) resembles her brother and her consort.” (Eugnostos the Blessed)
- Consorts are like ‘the bride and bridegroom’ that come together in the Bridal Chamber (i.e. the Upper Aeons): “the Savior and Sophia [will] form a pair (syzygy). These then are said to be bridegroom and bride, and the bridal chamber is the entire Pleroma.” (Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 1.7.1.) “From heaven the father sent her (the soul) her man, who is her brother, the firstborn. Then the bridegroom came down to the bride.” (Exegesis on the Soul 132:7)
- To create another androgynous being, the two consorts ‘consent’ to create a third. Like its parents, the third is androgynous with male and female names. See below.
- The consorts may also consent by ‘reflecting’ or through ‘a kiss’.
- Since the offspring is an extension of the One’s unity, the two consorts must also have the consent of the One.
- Sophia’s fault was that she created an offspring without the consent of the One, or of her consort, the Christ. Thus she begot her bastard son Yaltabaoth, who engendered the Lower Aeons.
2. CONSORTS IN THE ONE
- The One or ‘Parent’ is androgynous, but manifests itself as the Mother and the Father, who are consorts. Protennoia: “I am androgynous. I am Mother (and) I am Father.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- Hence, the One is syzygetic, with male and female genders. Protennoia: “I am 'He who is syzygetic' (...) I am called 'She who is syzygetic'.” (Trimorphic Protennoia) As is clear in the previous quotation, the ‘name’ of the male gender is ‘Father’ while the name of the female gender is ‘Mother’.
- The One is a monad (i.e. one) that also becomes a dyad (i.e. two) or a pair (i.e. consorts). In Valentinian Gnosticism, the Silence (Sige) is the consort of the One: “...the Ineffable One who dwells in the Monad. He dwells alone in silence, and silence is tranquility since, after all, he was a Monad and no one was before him. He dwells in the Dyad and in the Pair, and his Pair is Silence (Sige). And he possessed the All dwelling within him.” (Valentinian Exposition.) (‘his pair’ should be read here as ‘consort’).
3. CONSORTS IN CHRIST AND SOPHIA
- In general, Sophia and Christ are consorts.
- As such, Christ is the male name and Sophia is the female name of one androgynous being.
- When the syzygies come together in the Pleroma (i.e. the Upper Aeons), all will be made one and complete. Sophia and Jesus, as two consorts of one androgynous angel, are images of the Pleroma made one and complete: “But the syzygy is the complete one, and Sophia and Jesus (...) are images of the Pleroma.” (Valentinian Exposition)
- Christ’s consort is Sophia, and they are destined to re-unite: “And his consort is the Great Sophia, who from the first was destined in him for union...” (Sophia of Jesus Christ 101:16) ‘His’ refers to ‘the immortal androgynous man’, which is a name for Christ.
- Christ: “But I alone am the friend of Sophia.” (Second Treatise of the Great Seth 70:4)
- The angels, Yaltabaoth and the Archons also have consorts. See ANDROGYNE
4. CONSORTS CONSENTING WITH EACH OTHER
- To create another androgynous being in the Upper Aeons, the two consorts ‘consent’ to create a third.
- The third, though androgynous, has a male and female name.
- The texts Eugnostos the Blessed and The Sophia of Jesus Christ assume this schema.
- Christ is the consort of Sophia, and consented with her to ‘reveal’ a third: “Then Son of Man consented with Sophia, his consort, and revealed a great androgynous Light.” (Eugnostos)
- The Savior is the consort of Pistis Sophia, and consented with her to ‘reveal’ six androgynous offspring: “Then Savior consented with his consort, Pistis Sophia, and revealed six androgynous spiritual beings...” (Eugnostos)
5. CONSORTS REFLECTING WITH EACH OTHER
- Since the consorts are like male and female ‘reflections’ of one androgynous being, their union is not only verbal (‘to consent with one another’) but visual (‘to reflect one another’).
- Hence, instead of ‘consenting’, Christ and Sophia may also ‘reflect’ one another to produce an off-spring with a male and female name: “He (the Son of Man) reflected with Great Sophia, his consort, and revealed his first-begotten, androgynous son. His male name is designated 'First Begetter, Son of God', his female name, 'First Begettress Sophia, Mother of the Universe'.” (Sophia of Jesus Christ)
- ‘To reflect’ means that the consorts ‘recognize’ one another as their true ‘reflections’ or ‘counter-images’. In the Apocryphon of John, the spirit-endowed Eve reminds Adam of their original state: that they were once united as an androgynous angel: “She lifted the veil which lay over his mind. And he became sober from the drunkenness of darkness. And he recognized his counter-image.” i.e. he knew her to be his consort in the syzygy. (Apocryphon of John)
6. CONSORTS REQUIRE THE CONSENT OF THE ONE
- Since their offspring is an extension of the One’s unity, consorts also require the consent of the One.
- In the Apocryphon of John, Barbelo asks the invisible Spirit (i.e. the One) for his consent in order to produce the aeons of Foreknowledge, Indestructibility, Eternal Life and Truth: “She (Barbelo) requested from the invisible, virginal Spirit to give her foreknowledge. And the Spirit consented. And when he had consented, the foreknowledge came forth.” This schema is repeated for Indestructibility, Eternal Life and Truth. (Apocryphon of John)
- In the Gospel of the Egyptians, consorts are created with the consent of the Parent: - “And the parent consented, and the full complement of the luminaries joined in the consent. Consorts were shown forth to bring about the completion of the octet...” (Gospel of the Egyptians 52:3 Bentley translation)
- The angels in the Upper Aeons do not beget in the same manner as beings in the Lower Aeons. These beget by ‘casting off’ a third, while the angels extend the One’s unity: “The emanation of the Totalities, which exist from the One who exists, did not occur according to a separation from one another, as something cast off from the one who begets them. Rather, their begetting is like a process of extension, as the Father extends himself to those whom he loves, so that those who have come forth from him might become him as well.” (Tripartite Tractate 73:19)
7. CONSORTS CONSENTING THROUGH A KISS
- To create a third, two consorts may manifest their consent through a kiss.
- In the Upper Aeons, the angelic beings are androgynous. When they ‘embrace’ (i.e. kiss), their embrace engenders an androgynous angel like themselves: “The whole multitude of those angels are called 'Assembly of the Holy Ones, the Shadowless Lights.' Now when these greet each other, their embraces become like angels like themselves.” (Eugnostos)
- The Father and the Son brought forth the Upper Aeonic beings through kisses, since a kiss manifests union: “Those which exist have come forth from the Son and the Father like kisses, because of the multitude of some who kiss one another with a good, insatiable thought, the kiss being a unity, although it involves many kisses.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- This mystery transpires in the Upper Aeons. Nevertheless, Jesus kissed his disciples to manifest this mystery here below, in the Lower Aeons.
- By kissing his disciples, he initated them into an awareness of the unity of the Upper Aeons, and that they were a part of that unity.
- Hence, Jesus kisses his disciple James before revealing the hidden gnosis: James: “And he kissed my mouth. He took hold of me, saying, "My beloved! Behold, I shall reveal to you those things that (neither) the heavens nor their archons have known.” (Second Apocalypse of James)
- But a kiss is also a form of spiritual union which replaces sexual intercourse. While others (the Psychics and Hylics) beget offspring ‘in a natural way’ (i.e. through sexual intercourse), the perfect (the Pneumatics) ‘conceive and give birth’ to their offspring ‘by a kiss’. The kiss becomes a kind of spiritual intercourse, conception and begetting: “All who are begotten in the world are begotten in a natural way (...But) it is by a kiss that the perfect conceive and give birth. For this reason we also kiss one another. We receive conception from the grace which is in one another.” (Gospel of Philip)
- Jesus and Mary Magdalene are the male and female offspring of the divided Adam and Eve. Christ and Sophia will come together as one at the end of time to repair that separation (see below). Hence, Jesus kisses Magdalene to secretly reveal that anticipated mystery here in the Lower Aeons: “And the companion of the (the savior is) Mary Magdalene. [...] (He) loved her more than all the disciples, and used to kiss her often on her mouth.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The Gospel of Thomas says that all those who ‘make the male and female into a single one’ will enter the kingdom. They do this, perhaps, by recognizing one another as the male and female aspects of one androgynous angel. “Jesus said to them: "When you make the two into one (...) that is, to make the male and the female into a single one, so that the male will not be male and the female will not be female – (...) then you will enter [the kingdom].” (Gospel of Thomas 22)
- Christ descended to repair the separation of Adam and Eve, and their descendents, into male and female. He will do this by uniting with Sophia in the Upper Aeons at the end of time (see below): “If the woman had not separated from the man, she should not die with the man. His separation became the beginning of death. Because of this, Christ came to repair the separation, which was from the beginning, and again unite the two, and to give life to those who died as a result of the separation, and unite them. But the woman is united to her husband in the bridal chamber. Indeed, those who have united in the bridal chamber will no longer be separated. Thus Eve separated from Adam because it was not in the bridal chamber that she united with him.” (Gospel of Philip)
- In Dialogue of the Saviour, those who ‘have known their consorts’ will not perish: “These do not die, [...] they are not destroyed, for they have known their consorts and him who would receive them.” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- Thus, a man and woman may become consorts who recognize one another as the male and female reflections (or images) of one androgynous angel. They do this by ‘offering their consent’ in a marriage rite, which may be the rite of the Bridal Chamber. See BRIDAL CHAMBER
8. THE FALL OF SOPHIA BECAUSE SHE DID NOT HAVE HER CONSORTS’ CONSENT
- Sophia’s fault was that she created an offspring without the consent of the One, or of her consort, the Christ. Thus she begot her bastard son Yaltabaoth, who engendered the Lower Aeons.
- In one text it is said that Sophia had no father or consort:“(Sophia) Achamoth had no father nor male consort, but she is female from a female.” (First Apocalypse of James)
- However, most texts agree that she had a father and consort, but she did not seek their consent.
- Sophia did not have the consent of the father or of her consort:“And the Sophia of the Epinoia, being an aeon, conceived a thought from herself (...). She wanted to bring forth a likeness out of herself without the consent of the Spirit, - he had not approved - and without her consort, and without his consideration. And though the person of her maleness had not approved (i.e. consented) (...still) she brought forth.” (Apocryphon of John 9:25) “...Then she (Sophia) knew that her consort had not agreed (i.e. consented) with her. She repented with much weeping.” (Apocryphon of John 13:34)
- “Sophia, who is called Pistis, wanted to create something, alone without her consort” (Hypostasis of the Archons 94:5)
- “...she (Sophia) cut herself off from her consort.” (Valentinian Exposition 34:38)
9. THE RAISING OF SOPHIA IN THE RESTITUTION, WHEN SHE GAINS HER CONSORTS’ CONSENT
- At the end of time, in the Restitution, Sophia’s fault will be corrected. Christ will descend and raise her up. Then together they will re-unite in their androgynous angel: “The bridal chamber as union of Christ and Sophia: “When the whole seed is perfected, then, they say, will the mother, (Sophia-)Achamoth leave the place of the Middle, enter into the Pleroma, and receive her bridegroom, the Savior, who came into being from all (the aeons), with result that the Savior and Sophia, who is Achamoth, form a pair (syzygy) These then are said to be bridegroom and bride, but the bridal chamber is the entire Pleroma..” (Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 1.7.1)
- These means that Christ will give the consent which Sophia did not have in the beginning. With that consent, the two consorts will re-unite.
- THE ELECT
- Literally, ‘the Elect’ comes from electi, meaning ‘the shining ones’ or ‘those who shine with light’.
1. THE ELECT IN GENERAL
- Those who have the gnosis, and so will return to the Upper Aeons to re-unite with the One.
- Also called ‘the Sons of Light’, ‘the Children of Seth’, ‘the unwavering race of the Perfect Man’, ‘the faultless ones’, ‘the immovable race’, ‘the offspring of the perfect race’, ‘the chosen race’, ‘the race of Adonaios’, ‘the sons of men’.
- In the beginning, when the One divided itself into the many, that manifold included the Father, Mother, Christ, Sophia, the angels and, more particularly, the Elect. The Elect were a part of the One’s all-encompassing unity. At present, their spirits (pneuma, divine spark, pearl, dew drop etc) have fallen into the Lower Aeons, and are trapped in bodies. But, after the consummation, the Elect will rise up and come to exist once more in the Upper Aeons.
- Different schema describe how the names and the images of the Elect came to exist in the Upper Aeons before Yaltabaoth engendered the Lower Aeons.
- In one schema, the Elect are ‘pre-existent’ because they existed before the foundation of the world.
- In another schema, the saviour-figure Seth placed the seeds of the Elect in the Upper Aeons.
- In another schema, the Elect are the Pneumatic Race
2. THE ELECT AS GNOSTICS - THOSE WHO KNOW THE FATHER
- The Elect ‘know’ the Father: “ the elect and solitary, who have known the Father” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- The Elect are ‘elected to salvation’ because they have knowledge (the gnosis), and will not fall into ignorance (lack of knowledge): “We are elected to salvation and redemption since we are predestined from the beginning not to fall into the foolishness of those who are without knowledge” (Treatise on Resurrection)
3. THE ELECT AS PRE-EXISTENT AEONS OF THE FATHER
- The Upper Aeons, which include the Elect (the Totalities), are extensions of the Father, without separation. In the end, they will return to him: “The emanation of the Totalities, which exist from the one who exists, did not occur according to a separation from one another, as something cast off from the one who begets them. Rather, their begetting is like a process of extension, as the Father extends himself to those whom he loves, so that those who have come forth from him might become him as well.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- The Elect exist in the One, and so are eternal: “But that which comes to be in the Eternal One is in the One of the life and the immortality of the life...” (Apocalypse of Peter)
- Like all beings in the Upper Aeons, the Elect are images which reflect the One to itself. They are ‘pre-existent images’: “the Father (...) created the pre-existent images” (Tripart Tractate)
- As ‘pre-existent’, the Elect came into being in the Upper Aeons before they came into being in the Lower Aeons: “Jesus said, ‘Blessed is he who came into being before he came into being.’” (Gospel of Thomas 36:17)
- This prior-existence gives post-existence: “The Lord said, ‘Blessed is he who is before he came into being. For he who is, has been and shall be.’” (Gospel of Philip 64:10)
- Having experienced pre-existence, the Elect know they are immortal: “(Jesus said:) ‘Blessed is he who will stand at the beginning. And he will know the end, and he will not taste death.’” (Gospel of Thomas 36:14)
- Having ‘pre-existed’ in the Upper Aeons (the kingdom), the Elect will return to it: “Jesus said, ‘Blessed are the solitary and elect, for you will find the kingdom. For you are from it, and to it you will return.’” (Gospel of Thomas 41:27)
- Since images of the Elect ‘reflected’ the light of the One at the beginning, they will do so again at the end: “Then the souls will appear, who are holy through the light of the Power, (...) And they will be in the aeon of beauty of the aeon of judgment, since they are ready in wisdom, having given glory to him who is in the incomprehensible unity; and they see him because of his will, which is in them. And they all have become as reflections in his light. They all have shone, and they have found rest in his rest.” (Concept of our Great Power)
4. THE ELECT AS THE SONS OF SETH
- The Elect are also called Sethians or the sons of Seth
- According to this schema, Seth is a saviour-figure much like Christ. The heavenly Seth placed the seeds of the Elect in the Upper Aeons, while the earthly Seth placed the pneuma and gnosis in all his earthly descendents.
- More precisely, the heavenly Adam (Geradamas) had a son, the heavenly Seth (Emmacha Seth), who sowed the seeds of the Elect in the Upper Aeons (the aeon of the Fourth Light, Eleleth). This schema appears in Sethian texts such as The Gospel of the Egyptians, Three Steles of Seth and (with some variations) in The Apocryphon of John.
- Meanwhile, the earthly Adam and Eve begot the earthly Seth and his sister Norea. With the aid of Norea, Seth’s descendents will preserve the pneuma and gnosis in the Lower Aeons. This schema appears in The Hypostasis of the Archons and The Apocalypse of Adam.
- In the Upper Aeons, Emmacha Seth is the son of Geradamas. Emmacha Seth: “I bless thee, Father Geradama(s), I, as thine (own) Son, Emmacha Seth, whom thou didst beget without begetting” (Three Steles of Seth)
- The heavenly Adam (Adamas) asked for a heavenly son (Seth), who became the father of the Elect: “The incorruptible man Adamas asked for them a son out of himself, in order that he (the son) may become father of the immovable, incorruptible race. (This is...) the great incorruptible Seth, the son of the incorruptible man Adamas.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- Seth sowed the seeds of the Elect in the Upper Aeons: “Then the great Seth came and brought his seed. And it was sown in the aeons” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- In the Apocryphon of John, the heavenly Adam (Pigera-Adamas) appears in the first aeon, his son Seth appears in the second aeon and the seed of Seth (the Elect) appear in the third aeon: “Through the revelation of the will of the invisible Spirit (...) the perfect Man (appeared...), he whom the virginal Spirit called Pigera-Adamas, and he placed him over the first aeon (...) And he (the Spirit) placed his son Seth over the second aeon in the presence of the second light Oriel. And in the third aeon the seed of Seth was placed over the third light Daveithai.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Adam and Eve once had the pneuma (spirit, divine spark) and the gnosis (knowledge of the Upper Aeons). This knowledge was then hidden in ‘the seed of Seth’, where it will come out after the three parousias. Adam speaking to Seth: “And the glory in our heart(s) left us, me and your mother Eve, along with the first knowledge that breathed within us. And it (glory) fled from us; ... But it (knowledge) entered into the seed of great aeons. For this reason I myself have called you by the name of that man who is the seed of the great generation or from whom (it comes).” (Apocalypse of Adam)
- The wife of Seth is Norea. She is the undefiled daughter of Eve who, together with Seth, gives birth to the Sons of Seth: “Again Eve became pregnant, and she bore Norea. And she said, ‘He has begotten on me a virgin as an assistance for many generations of mankind.’ She is the virgin whom the forces did not defile. Then mankind began to multiply and improve.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- In the Gospel of the Egyptians, Seth bore his race through Edokla: “This is the race which came forth through Edokla.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- In many ‘Sethian’ Gnostic texts, the Elect are called ‘the children of Seth: “the children of Seth, who are above thousands of thousands, and myriads of myriads, of the aeons” (Melchizedek)
4. THE ELECT AS THE PNEUMATIC RACE
- The Elect are the Pneumatic race, who are ‘saved in every way’, in contrast with the Psychic race, who are saved by their works, and the Hylic race, who will be ‘destroyed in every way’: “The spiritual race will receive complete salvation in every way. The material will receive destruction in every way, just as one who resists him. The psychic race, since it is in the middle when it is brought forth and also when it is created, is double according to its determination for both good and evil.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- “Mankind came to be in three essential types, the spiritual, the psychic, and the material... Each of the three essential types is known by its fruit. And they were not known at first but only at the coming of the Savior, who shone upon the saints and revealed what each was.” (Tripartite Tractate) See THREE TYPES OF HUMANS.
5. THE ELECT AS UNFALLEN
- According to this schema, Adam and Eve transmitted the pneuma and the gnosis to Seth, Norea and all their descendents (the Pneumatic race). Hence, they are unfallen. Meanwhile, Adam and Eve did not transmit these to Cain and Abel. Thus, all of their descendents are fallen (belonging to the Psychic and Hylic races).
- Eleleth reveals to Norea that the Archons cannot defile her or her descendents: “And these authorities (Archons) cannot defile you and that generation; for your abode is in incorruptibility, where the virgin spirit dwells, who is superior to the authorities of chaos and to their universe.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- Again: “You (Norea), together with your offspring, are from the primeval father; from above, out of the imperishable light, their souls are come. Thus the authorities (Archons) cannot approach them, because of the spirit of truth present within them; and all who have become acquainted with this way exist deathless in the midst of dying mankind.”(Hypostasis of the Archons).
- Hence, the Elect are without fault, and called the “faultless ones” (Tripartate Tractate)
6. OTHER NAMES FOR THE ELECT
- The Elect are those “whom all the generations of men will not know. For they will be on a high mountain, upon a rock of truth.” (Apocalypse of Adam)
- The Elect are “the unwavering race of the perfect Man”, “those who are from the immovable race”, “the offspring of the perfect race” (Apocryphon of John)
- “this incorruptible, holy race of the great savior, and those who dwell with them in love” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- “the chosen race” (First Book of Jew)
- Since they come from the ‘Son of Man’, the Elect are ‘the sons of men’: “For [...] which do not move, I [...] you, all the sons of men. For you are from that place. In the hearts of those who speak out of joy and truth, you exist.” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- Jesus: “ all the ones with me - those of the race of Adonaios.” (Second Treatise of Seth)
- The Elect are called “the sons of light” (Apocalypse of Peter)
- As ‘the Sons of Light’: “I will reveal myself to those who have heard my mysteries, that is, the Sons of the Light.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- The ‘sons of light’ are above all earthly authorities: “I have given you authority over all things as Sons of Light, that you might tread upon their power with your feet.” (Sophia of Jesus Christ)
- The Elect are “another race who are not of this age.” (Apocalypse of Peter)
- The Elect are from the eternal realm: “the great generation of Adam will be exalted, for prior to heaven, earth, and the angels, that generation, which is from the eternal realms, exists.” (Gospel of Judas)
- The Elect are free of Fate and the stars’ rulership: “No host of angels (i.e. demons) of the stars will rule over that generation.” (Gospel of Judas 37)
- The Elect are the kingless fourth race: “Consequently, four races exist. There are three that belong to the kings of the eighth heaven. But the fourth race is kingless and perfect, being the highest of all. For these shall enter the holy place of their father. And they will gain rest in repose and eternal, unspeakable glory and unending joy.”(On the Origin of the World)
- Though ‘kingless’, they each have ‘a crown’: “since you have the great crown which [...].” (Marsanes) See CROWN
7. RITES TO INITIATE THE ELECT
- Through the rite of the Five Seals, the Elect remember their true origin, as names and images in the Upper Aeons which reflect the One back to itself.
- The rite of the Five Seals includes the Baptism, Chrism, Eucharist and Bridal Chamber, through which the ‘image’ of an Elect is sealed in the luminous waters of the Upper Aeons, and his ‘name’ is spoken in its silence. See FIVE SEALS.
- The names of the Elect were inscribed in the Book of the Living at the beginning, and will be called at the end. See BOOK OF THE LIVING
8. THE NON-ELECT
- The Elect belong to the Pneumatic Race. However, those of the Psychic race may also be redeemed and ascend to the Upper Aeons. See REPENTENCE.
- A person may ‘become elect’ (verb form): “For you (sg.) will become elect with the elect ones in the last times, as the invisible Spirits runs up above. And you yourselves, run with him up above, since you have the great crown which [...].” (Marsanes)
- In the beginning, the Father created a group of beings through which he could reflect upon himself - even though they did not know it. This may be the Psychic race, who are redeemed even though they are without knowledge: “While they (the members of the church) were in the Father's thought, that is, in the hidden depth, the depth knew them, but they were unable to know the depth in which they were; nor was it possible for them to know themselves, nor for them to know anything else.” (Tripartate Tractate)
- The redeemed of the Psychic race may still ‘become manifest’ and be ‘made known’. A prayer addressed to the One: “Thou alone art he who has given character to all creation. Thou hast manifested them in thyself. Thou art the demiurge (in the positive sense) of those that have not yet manifested - these which thou alone knowest, and we do not know them. Thou alone art he who gives signs of them to us, so that we should ask of thee concerning them, that thou shouldst manifest them, and we should know them through thee alone.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex).
- The remainder of the Non-Elect are the unredeemed Psychics, or those of the Hylic race, who are called ‘beasts’. See ANIMALS
9. THE ELECT AND THE NON-ELECT
- The Elect are ‘free men’ and ‘VIRGINS’ while the non-elect are ANIMALS, slaves and defiled: “A bridal chamber is not for the animals, nor is it for the slaves, nor for defiled women; but it is for free men and virgins.” (Gospel of Philip)
- the Elect are ‘glass decanters’ made through breath (the pneuma) while the non-elect are ‘earthenware jugs’ made without breath (no pneuma): “Glass decanters and earthenware jugs are both made by means of fire. But if glass decanters break, they are done over, for they came into being through a breath. If earthenware jugs break, however, they are destroyed, for they came into being without breath.” (Gospel of Philip) See JARS.
10. THE NUMBER OF THE ELECT
- Several Gnostic texts say the consummation will come when the number of the Elect is reached.
- This number is vague, and is called variously ‘the number of Sodom’, ‘the cypher of Melchizedek’ or ‘the number of perfect souls’.
- It may include the number of Pneumatics who, at present, are trapped in the Lower Aeons, but will come to know (gnosis) that they belong in the Upper Aeons.
- It may also include the number of Psychics who are saved.
- The Elect are the sons of the heavenly man, and are innumberable: “The heavenly man has many more sons than the earthly man. If the sons of Adam are many, although they die, how much more the sons of the perfect man, they who do not die but are always begotten.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The number of Sethians is the number of Sodom: “Then the great Seth came and brought his seed. And it was sown in the aeons which had been brought forth, their number being the amount of Sodom. Some say that Sodom is the place of pasture of the great Seth, which is Gomorrah. But others (say) that the great Seth took his plant out of Gomorrah and planted it in the second place, to which he gave the name 'Sodom'.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- The number of the Elect is ‘the cypher of Melchizedek’. When this number is reached, the Gnostic saviour will end the Archons rule: “It happened now when these things in their time were known, and when the number of the cipher of Melchizedek, the Paralemptor (of the Light), occurred, he (the saviour) came forth, and he went into the midst of the archons of all the aeons, and to the midst of all the archons of the Heimarmene and those of the sphere. And he agitated them, and he caused them quickly to abandon their circles, and immediately they were afflicted...” (Pistis Sophia - Ch. 26)
- Again, the consummation (the end of the Archons’ rule) will come when ‘the number of perfect souls’ is reached: “And he took their light to the Treasury of the Light. (...) so that they should not dissolve, but that they should be retarded, and should spend a great time until the completion of the number of perfect souls which would be in the Treasury of the Light.” (Pistis Sophia - Ch. 26)
- Again, ‘the number of perfect souls’: “And there would have been delay in the completion of the number of perfect souls, which will be accounted among the inheritance of the height, through the mysteries, and will be in the Treasury of Light.” (Pistis Sophia - Ch. 23.)
- EXISTENCE
- The One exists, and is the source of all that exists.
- For this reason, the One is called, quite simply, “the One who exists” (Tripartite Tractate)
- Everything that exists (the Totalities) is an extension of the One’s existence: “The emanation of the Totalities, which exist from the one who exists, did not occur according to a separation from one another, as something cast off from the one who begets them. Rather, their begetting is like a process of extension, as the Father extends himself to those whom he loves, so that those who have come forth from him might become him as well.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- In Gnosticism, naming has an ontological power. Each time the One names a new Upper Aeonic being, it comes to exist: “But the Father is perfect, knowing every space within him. If he wishes, he manifests whomever he wishes, by giving him form and giving him a name, and he gives a name to him, and brings it about that those come into existence.” (Gospel of Truth)
- Yaltabaoth created the Lower Aeons, which are considered to be ‘shadows’ of the Upper Aeons. The Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex offers a radical ontological dualism, where the Upper Aeons ‘exist’ but the Lower Aeons ‘lack existence’: “And then the existent separated itself from the non-existent. And the non-existent is the evil which has manifested in matter. And the enveloping power separated those that exist from those that do not exist. And it called the existent "eternal", and it called the non-existent "matter". And in the middle it separated those that exist from those that do not Exist, and it placed veils between them.” (Bruce Untitled ms)
- A less extreme form of ontological dualism posits that the all Upper Aeonic beings have ‘true existence’ while the lower aeonic beings lead a false existence. Hence, the All ‘truly exist’: “Holy are you, O Father of the All who truly exist.” (Melchizedek 16:16)
- FACE
- In one Gnostic text, the face of the Father (here, called Logos and demiurge) becomes an extended metaphor for the Upper Aeons: “This is he upon whose head the aeons are a crown, casting forth rays. The circuit of his face is the unknown in the outer worlds, these who seek after his face at all times, wishing to know it, for his word has reached them, and they want to see him. And the light of his eyes penetrates to the places of the outer pleroma. And the word which comes from his mouth penetrates what is above and below. And the hair of his head is the number of the hidden worlds, and the boundary of his face is the image of the aeons.The hairs of his face are the number of the outer worlds.And the stretching out of his hands is the manifestation of the cross.” (Untitled Bruce)
- Since the Father finds his image in the Son, the Son is called “the face of the invisible” and “the countenance of the Father” (Tripartite Tractate)
- Yaltabaoth has many faces: “But Yaltabaoth had a multitude of faces, more than all of them (the Archons), so that he could put a face before all of them, according to his desire” (Apocalypse of John)
- FIVE SEALS
- See also SEALS.
- The Five Seals are mentioned in the Sethian Gnostic texts such as The Gospel of the Egyptians, The Trimorphic Protennoia and The Apocryphon of John.
- No Gnostic text gives an explicit description of the Five Seals. They remain a mystery.
- The Five Seals were granted in a ritual, which was composed of several important rites.
- By receiving the Five Seals, the Gnostic could ascend once more to the Upper Aeons.
1. THE FIVE SEALS IN GENERAL
- The Five Seals exist in the uppermost light (i.e. the Upper Aeons?): “These are the glories that are higher than every glory, that is, the Five Seals...” (Trimorphic Protennoia 49:26)
- The Five Seals come from the Father in the Upper Aeons: “the five seals which the Father brought forth from his bosom” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- Christ gives the seals: “There is a sonship in their midst, which is called Christ the Verifier. It is he who verifies each one, and he seals him with the seal of the Father as he sends them in to the first Father, who exists in himself.” (Untitled Bruce)
- Through the Five Seals, the saviour (here, Protennoia) dwells in the Elect, just as they will come to dwell with the saviour in the Upper Aeons - Protennoia: “And I proclaimed to them the ineffable Five Seals in order that I might abide in them and they also might abide in me.” (Trimorphic Protennoia 50:9)
2. THE FIVE SEALS ARE GRANTED IN AN ASCENT TO THE UPPER AEONS
- The Elect receive the Five Seals in an ascent to the watery light of the Upper Aeons, where they are ‘sealed’. Through this rite, they will beome imperishable. The Saviour (Pronoia) speaking of a soul: “And I raised him up, and sealed him in the light of the water with five seals, in order that death might not have power over him from this time on.” (Apocryphon of John 31:22)
- The Five Seals are granted in the Upper Aeons. They give knowledge of the mysteries, and unify one with the Light: “And they took him into the light-place of his Fatherhood. And he received the Five Seals from the Light of the Mother, Protennoia, and it was granted him to partake of the mystery of knowledge, and he became a Light in Light.” (Trimorphic Protennoia 48:30)
3. THE RITE OF THE FIVE SEALS AS A FIVE-FOLD BAPTISM AND VISIONARY ASCENT
- In the Trimorphic Protennoia, the Five Seals are granted during a five-fold ritual that resembles a baptism and visionary ascent to the Upper Aeons. Five orders of angels (with three angels in each order) initiate the catechumen.
- First, the catechumen receives water (presumeably in a baptism) which ‘strips off’ from him the psychic and material garments before ‘putting on’ him a garment of light (which is knowledge of the Father): “I gave to him from the Water of Life, which strips him of the chaos that is in the uttermost darkness that exists inside the entire abyss, that is, the thought of the corporeal and the psychic. All these I put on. And I stripped him of it, and I put upon him a shining Light, that is, the knowledge of the Thought of the Fatherhood.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- During the visionary portion of the baptism, the catechumen is delivered to five orders of angels: ‘those who give robes of light’, ‘the baptizers’, ‘those who enthrone’, ‘those who glorify’, and ‘those who snatch away’: “And I delivered him to those who give robes - Yammon, Elasso, Amenai - and they covered him with a robe from the robes of the Light; and I delivered him to the baptizers, and they baptized him - Micheus, Michar, Mnesinous - and they immersed him in the spring of the Water of Life. And I delivered him to those who enthrone - Bariel, Nouthan, Sabenai - and they enthroned him from the Throne of Glory. And I delivered him to those who glorify - Ariom, Elien, Phariel - and they glorified him with the glory of the Fatherhood. And those who snatch away snatched away - Kamaliel, [...]anen, Samblo, and the servants of the great holy luminaries - and they took him into the light-place of his Fatherhood. And he received the Five seals from the Light of the Mother, Protennoia, and it was granted him to partake of the mystery of knowledge, and he became a Light in Light.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- Thus, the five-fold rite of baptism and visionary ascent consists of:
1. Receiving a robe of light
2. Baptism in the water of life
3. Enthronement on the throne of glory
4. Glorified in the glory of the Father
5. Snatched away
4. THE FIVE SEALS AS A FIVE-FOLD RITUAL
- In Gnosticism, the rite of Baptism often appears in conjunction with other rites. These include ‘putting on a garment of light’, ‘the chrism’, ‘the renunciation and invocation’ and ‘the Bridal Chamber’. See BAPTISM.
- The rite of baptism is sometimes called a seal and recognized as a seal. (The author is contending against Christian baptism): “There are some, who upon entering the faith, receive a baptism on the ground that they have it as a hope of salvation, which they call the "seal", not knowing that the fathers of the world are manifest (in) that place. But he himself knows that he is sealed.” (Testimony of Truth)
- The Gospel of Philip offers a crucial text for the Five Seals. In one passage, it groups together five important rites: the baptism, chrism, eucharist, redemption and Bridal Chamber: “The Lord did everything in a mystery, a baptism and a chrism and a eucharist and a redemption and a bridal chamber. [...] he said, "I came to make the things below like the things above, and the things outside like those inside. I came to unite them in the place." [...] here through types [...]and images.” (Gospel of Philip)
- It is possible that the five rites mentioned here are, in fact, the Five Seals. If so, the nature of ‘the redemption’ needs to be clarified.
- In another passage, the Gospel of Philip identifies the redemption with the resurrection. At the same time, it describes it as an intermediary rite between the baptism and Bridal Chamber: “There were three buildings specifically for sacrifice in Jerusalem. The one facing the west was called ‘The Holy’. Another, facing south, was called ‘The Holy of the Holy’. The third, facing east, was called ‘the Holy of the Holies’, the place where only the high priest enters. Baptism is ‘the Holy’ building. Redemption is the ‘Holy of the Holy’. ‘The Holy of the Holies’ is the bridal chamber. Baptism includes the resurrection and the redemption; the redemption (takes place) in the bridal chamber.” (The Gospel of Philip)
- The redemption was identified with the resurrection. According to the Gospel of Philip, the resurrection is a visionary ascent through the aeons. This vision of the resurrection is first seen in this life to prepare us for our after-life resurrection: “Those who say they will die first and then rise are in error. If they do not first receive the resurrection while they live, when they die they will receive nothing.” (Gospel of Philip) “While we are in this world, it is fitting for us to acquire the resurrection, so that when we strip off the flesh, we may be found in rest.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The Tripartite Tractate confirms that the redemption is ‘an ascent’: “...the redemption also is an ascent to the degrees which are in the Pleroma (i.e. an ascent through each aeon of the Upper Aeons) and to those who have named themselves and who conceive of themselves according to the power of each of the aeons (i.e. for the names of the angels).” (Tripartite Tractate)
- Like the resurrection, the redemption was most likely a visionary ascent of the catechumen through the aeons, so as to prepare him for his after-death ascent. During this initiatory rite, secret names and signs (also called seals) were revealed to him. First, in ‘the renunciation’, he was given secret names and signs to protect him against the Archons, in an ascent through the Lower Aeons. Then, in ‘the invocation’, more names and signs were given for the angels, in an ascent through the Upper Aeons.
- The Gospel of the Egyptians mentions the invocation and renunciation as part of the Five Seals rite, particularly during the baptism. The invocation and renunciation ‘instruct’ the catechumen about ‘those who will receive him’ in his ascent through the aeons: “But from now on, through the incorruptible man Poimael, and they who are worthy of (the) invocation (and) the renunciations of the five seals in the spring-baptism, these will know their receivers as they are instructed about them, and they will know them (or: be known) by them. These will by no means taste death.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- The invocation is described in The Tripartite Tractate as a ‘confession of faith’ in the names of the angels, and in their existence. Such a confession is called ‘the redemption’. It forms a part of ‘the baptism in the fullest sense’: “As for the baptism which exists in the fullest sense, into which the Totalities will descend and in which they will be, there is no other baptism apart from this one alone, which is the redemption into God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, when confession is made through faith in those names, which are a single name of the gospel, when they have come to believe what has been said to them, namely that they exist. From this they have their salvation, those who have believed that they exist. This is attaining in an invisible way to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in an undoubting faith. And when they have borne witness to them, it is also with a firm hope that they attained them, so that the return to them might become the perfection of those who have believed in them and (so that) the Father might be one with them, the Father, the God, whom they have confessed in faith and who gave (them) their union with him in knowledge.” (Tripartite Tractate 127:25)
- In this same sense, The Trimorphic Protennoia says the catechumen will come to possess ‘particular names’ through the rite of the Five Seals: “He who possesses the Five Seals of these particular names has stripped off the garments of ignorance and put on a shining Light.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- The above quotation makes clear that coming to possess the names is like stripping off one robe and putting on another. The rite of ‘putting on the robe of light’ was closely affiliated with baptism and the Bridal Chamber. See BAPTISM and BRIDAL CHAMBER. But the enrobing rite during the baptism was also called ‘the redemption’: “The baptism which we previously mentioned is called ‘garment of those who do not strip themselves of it’, for those who will put it on and those who have received redemption wear it...” (Tripartite Tractate)
5. CONJECTURED RECONSTRUCTION OF THE FIVE-FOLD RITUAL
- Hence, the rite of the Five Seals, as suggested by The Gospel of Philip, was a five-fold rite. These five important rites may have been performed separately at different times. Otherwise, they may have been performed together in one complex rite.
- In this case, several preliminary rites would have prepared the catechumen for the baptism. In particular, there was the ‘renunciation’, ‘invocation’ and ‘enrobing’ (which are also related to ‘the redemption’). The baptism became the climax of a visionary ascent, when the catechumen entered the Upper Aeons so that ‘his image was sealed in the watery light’ and ‘his name was spoken in the silence’. See BAPTISM. At that moment, he also received his ‘garment of light’ in the ‘Bridal Chamber’. See GARMENT OF LIGHT and BRIDAL CHAMBER.
- The complete rite may be recomposed as follows:
- First, the catechumen was ritually ‘stripped’ of certain garments, which symbolized his material and psychic existence.
- In the preliminary rite of ‘the renunciation’, he received secret names and signs to protect him against the Archons. This may have been during a visionary ascent through the Lower Aeons, which was recited aloud with the aid of a sacramental text. Otherwise, the demons and Archons may have been cursed aloud and execrated (as still occurs in the Roman Catholic rite of baptism, where ‘enrobing’ also occurs).
- In the preliminary rite of ‘the invocation’, more names and signs were recited to gain the protection of the angels. This would also have been during a visionary ascent through the Upper Aeons. Otherwise, the catechumen would have confessed his belief in the existence of the angels.
- Since Gnostics practised multiple baptisms, the catechumen may have been baptized a first time at the end of the renunciation, and second time at the end of the invocation, to prepare him for a third and final baptism.
- The final baptism was experienced as an immersion into the watery light of the Upper Aeons. The catechumen may have received a special sign or signet, which symbolized that his unique image had been ‘sealed’ or impressed in the watery light that moment. Through this image, the Father would reflect upon himself. The catechumen may also have received a special name, which symbolized that the Father himself had uttered this name to name himself.
- Along with an image and a name, the catechumen also received his ‘garment of light’. This garment would protect him for the rest of his life in this world and also during his ascent through the aeons after his death.
- Since baptism was understood as an immersion in the watery light of the Upper Aeons, the catechumen emerged from the glowing baptismal waters with his ‘garment of light’. Such a baptism was interpreted, at the same time, as a union or marriage with the light in the Bridal Chamber. The catechumen was seen to be the feminine soul and the Father was the masculine light. These two were ‘united in the Bridal Chamber’, and from that time onward, the soul wore the ‘garment of light’ in remembrance of her union with the Father. Hence, the rite of the Bridal Chamber may have followed the baptism, in the form of a ritual kiss to welcome the catechumen into the community of Gnostics. See KISS.
- In conjunction with the baptism, the catechumen may have been anointed with holy oil in the rite of the chrism. See CHRISM.
- At the end, the rite of the eucharist may have been celebrated with all those present. See EUCHARIST.
- In this way five different rites were granted over the course of one complex rite, which granted the catechumen Five Seals: the redemption, baptism, bridal chamber, chrism and eucharist. The catechumen emerged from this rite with a name, an image, and a garment of light.
6. EXAMPLE OF A COMPLEX RITUAL
- In the Acts of Thomas, Judas Thomas performs four of the rites mentioned above: chrism, baptism and the eucharist, as well as the enrobing. Through this complex rite, the catechumen (a woman named Mygdonia) receives her ‘seal’: “And when Narcia had brought these things, Mygdonia stood before the apostle with her head bare; and he took the oil and poured it on her head, saying: Thou holy oil given unto us for sanctification, secret mystery whereby the cross was shown unto us, thou art the straightener of the crooked limbs, thou art the humbler (softener) of hard things (works), thou art it that showeth the hidden treasures, thou art the sprout of goodness; let thy power come, let it be established upon thy servant Mygdonia, and heal thou her by this freedom. And when the oil was poured upon her he bade her nurse unclothe her and gird a linen cloth about her; and there was there a fountain of water upon which the apostle went up, and baptized Mygdonia in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost. And when she was baptized and clad, he brake bread and took a cup of water and made her a partaker in the body of Christ and the cup of the Son of God, and said: Thou hast received thy seal, get for thyself eternal life. And immediately there was heard from above a voice saying: Yea, amen. And when Narcia heard that voice, she was amazed, and besought the apostle that she also might receive the seal; and the apostle gave it her and said: Let the care of the Lord be about thee as about the rest.” (Acts of Thomas 121)
- FRAGRANCE
- Fragrance is made from oil, and so it becomes an image for the chrism and, by extension, Christ.
- Fragrance is manifest on the breath, and so it becomes an image of the pneuma (spirit or breath).
1. FRAGRANCE AS OIL
- The notion of fragrance brings together ‘ointment’, the ‘oil of the chrism’, and ‘those who are anointed’: “Spiritual love is wine and fragrance. All those who anoint themselves with it take pleasure in it. While those who are anointed are present, those nearby also profit (from the fragrance).” (Gospel of Philip)
2. FRAGRANCE AS BREATH
- The Elect possess the pneuma, which may be likened to the divine breath. Hence, they are like the fragrant breath of the Father: they were exhaled (material existence in the Lower Aeons) but they will be inhaled (spiritual existence in the Upper Aeons). As exhaled, they became cold (divided in the Lower Aeons), but once they are inhaled, they will become warm (unity in the Upper Aeons): “because the children of the Father are his fragrance, for they are from the grace of his countenance. For this reason, the Father loves his fragrance, and manifests it in every place. And if it mixes with matter, he gives his fragrance to the light, and in his repose, he causes it to surpass every form (and) every sound. For it is not the ears that smell the fragrance, but (it is) the breath that has the sense of smell and attracts the fragrance to itself, and is submerged in the fragrance of the Father, so that he thus shelters it, and takes it to the place where it came from, from the first fragrance, which is grown cold. It is something in a psychic form, being like cold water which has frozen (?), which is on earth that is not solid, of which those who see it think it is earth; afterwards, it dissolves again. If a breath draws it, it gets hot. The fragrances, therefore, that are cold are from the division. For this reason, faith came; it dissolved the division, and it brought the warm pleroma of love, in order that the cold should not come again, but (that) there should be the unity of perfect thought.” (Gospel of Truth)
- Again, a word-play on ‘pneuma’ is made, as breath and as spirit. The Elect are the breath of the Father (the Pneuma), and have the sweetness of his fragrance: “It is by virtue of his will that the Father, the one who is exalted, is known, that is, (by virtue of) the spirit which breathes in the Totalities and it gives them an idea of seeking after the unknown one, just as one is drawn by a pleasant aroma to search for the thing from which the aroma arises, since the aroma of the Father surpasses these ordinary ones.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- As ‘the Word’, the Lord is ‘exhaled’ from the Father: “The Lord picked up a stone and held it in his hand, saying ‘What am I holding in my hand?’ He (Judas) said, ‘It is a stone.’ He (the Lord) said to them, ‘That which supports the earth is that which supports the heaven. When a Word comes forth from the Greatness, it will come on what supports the heaven and the earth. For the earth does not move. Were it to move, it would fall. But it neither moves nor falls, in order that the First Word might not fail. For it was that which established the cosmos and inhabited it, and inhaled fragrance from it.’” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- The fragrance as ‘incense’: “Therefore, the incense of life is in me. I mixed it with water after the model of all archons, in order that I may live with you in the peace of the saints, you who exist really truly forever.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
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- GARMENT (OF LIGHT)
- As a garment in general, also called (positively) ‘clothing’ ‘robe’ ‘raiment’ ‘toga’ ‘soul garments’ and (negatively) ‘perishable rags’.
- As a garment of light, also called: ‘imperishable clothing’, ‘robe of light’, ‘robe of glory’ ‘bridal clothing’ ‘wedding robe’ ‘armor of light’ ‘garment of life’.
- verbs for ‘to put on’: ‘to clothe’ ‘to enrobe’ ‘bestow’
- verbs for ‘to take off’: ‘disrobe’ ‘strip’ ‘unclothe’
- adjectives: ‘naked’, ‘unclothed’.
1. GARMENTS IN GENERAL
- Garment has a positive sense, particularly when it is the ‘garment of light’ which is ‘imperishable’. This is ‘put on’ during the ceremony of Baptism (and Bridal Chamber). It protects one’s spirit during its ascent to the Upper Aeons.
- But garment also has a negative sense, when it is called the ‘garment of darkness’ which is ‘perishable’. This is the body which was ‘put on’ the spirit when it descened into the Lower Aeons.
- There are also ‘soul garments’ which enveloped the spirit as it descended through the planetary doorways of the Lower Aeons.
- ‘Naked’ has a positive sense, when one has ‘stripped off’ the garment of darkness or the body.
- But, ‘naked’ also has a negative sense, if one does not possess the garment of light.
- When the Saviour descended, he ‘put on’ the perishable garment of darkness, which is the body. But, when he rose from the dead, he ‘stripped himself’ of this, revealing the imperishable garment of light. This became a model for ‘putting on’ the garment of light during the ceremony of Baptism (and Bridal Chamber).
2. THE SAVIOUR’S DESCENT AND ASCENT, AS AN ARCHETYPE FOR THE BAPTISMAL RITE OF DISROBING AND ENROBING
- The Mother gave the Son a garment in which were all the forms needed to descend or ascend: “Afterwards the mother established her first-born son (...) And she gave to him a garment' in which to accomplish all things. And in it were all bodies: the body of fire, and the body of water, and the body, of air and the body of earth, and the body of wind, and the body ( of angels), and the body of archangels, and the body of powers, and the body of mighty ones, and the body of gods, and the body of lords. In a word, within it were all bodies so that none could hinder him from going to the height or from going down to the abyss.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- Hence, when Christ descended past the Archons, he disguised himself by putting on their (the Archons’) garments: “I clothed myself with everything of theirs.” (First Apocalypse of James) “I revealed myself in the likeness of their shape. And I wore everyone's garment, and I hid myself within them, and they did not know the one who empowers me.” (Trimorphic Protennoia 47:13)
- After putting on the Archon’s garments (which may be the soul garments - see below), he ‘put on humanity’: “Know who Christ is (...). This one, being God, became man for your sake. This is the one (...) who has put on humanity (...) that man might become like God. (...) O Christ, King, who has revealed to men the Great Divinity.” (Teachings of Silvanus 110:14)
- Then, the saviour became the first to strip off these ‘perishable rags’ and put on the ‘eternal’ or ‘imperishable’ garment: “He (Jesus) draws himself down to death, though life eternal clothes him. Having stripped himself of the perishable rags, he put on imperishability” (Gospel of Truth)
- This becomes the archetype for the baptismal rite, particularly the disrobing and enrobing.
- The saviour performed the baptismal rite, which included ‘the enrobing’. Hence, the Saviour is called “he who clothes” (Tripartite Tractate)
- The Saviour himself may become a garment for the Elect: “He (the saviour) was a garment (composed) of every grace” (Tripartite Tractate)
- The Elect ‘wear’ Christ like a garment of light: “if we are manifest in this world wearing him (Christ), we are that one’s beams (of light)” (Treatise on Resurrection)
- During the baptismal rite, we put on Christ, who is ‘the living man’: “The living water is a body (i.e. baptismal water becomes a garment). It is necessary that we put on the living man. (i.e. Christ as a garment) Therefore, when he is about to go down into the water, he unclothes himself, in order that he may put on the living man.” (Gospel of Philip)
3. GARMENT, IN THE POSITIVE SENSE, AS GARMENT OF LIGHT BESTOWED DURING THE BAPTISM.
- The garment of light is ‘put on’ during the baptismal rite: “The baptism which we previously mentioned is called ‘garment of those who do not strip themselves of it’, for those who will put it on and those who have received redemption wear it...” (Tripartite Tractate)
- This ‘robe of light’ is bestowed by three ‘enrobing’ angels in a visionary ascent during the baptism: “And I delivered him to those who give robes - Yammon, Elasso, Amenai - and they covered him with a robe from the robes of the Light” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- This garment is composed ‘of light’, which is the same light that we once experienced in the Upper Aeons (before we fell into material existence in the Lower Aeons). Protennoia: “And I am inviting you into the exalted, perfect Light. Moreover, (as for) this (Light), when you enter it (...) you will accept robes from those who give robes, and the baptizers will baptize you, and you will become (...) the way you first were when you were Light.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- At the end of the Hymn of the Pearl, the young prince returns to his kingdom, and two ‘treasurers’ (angels) enrobe him with his robe of light. Two important images emerge to describe the garment.
- First, the garment is ‘a mirror’ in which he sees himself as an image of the One: “When suddenly I saw my garment reflected as in a mirror, I perceived in it my whole self as well, and through it I recognized (gnosis) and saw myself. For, though we derived from one and the same, we were partially divided; and then we were one again with a single form. Nay also the treasurers who had brought the garment I saw as two beings, but there existed a single form in both, one single royal token consisting of two halves.” (Hymn of the Pearl in the Acts of Thomas, Bentley translation)
- Second, the garment is received and put on in an act of ‘union’: “With regal movements, it (the garment of light) was spreading toward me, urging me to take it, and love urged me to receive it. And I stretched forth and received it and put on the beauty of its colors.” (Hymn of the Pearl in the Acts of Thomas, Barnstone translation)
- Through the ‘garment of light’ one sees one’s self, as in a mirror, as an image of the One. Recognizing these two as a unity, one merges with the One. This merging or union is described as a ‘sacramental union’ or ‘wedding’ which takes place in the Bridal Chamber.
4. GARMENT, IN THE POSITIVE SENSE, AS GARMENT OF LIGHT BESTOWED IN THE BRIDAL CHAMBER
- To ‘put on a garment of light’ is to actually ‘become the light’ - it is a state of total immersion and union with the divine light. This ‘immersion’ is ritually made present through the baptismal rite, while the ‘union’ is made present through the rite of the Bridal Chamber (which are two parts of the same rite): “It (baptism) is also called ‘bridal chamber’ because of the agreement and the indivisible state of those who know they have known him. It is also called ‘the light which does not set and is without flame’ since it does not give light, but those who have worn it are made into light.” (Tripartite Tractate 128:33)
- To ‘put on a garment of light’ is ‘to enter the Bridal Chamber’: “...clothe yourselves in light and enter the bridal chamber.” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- The garment of light is bestowed ‘sacramentally in the union’: “The powers do not see those who are clothed in the perfect light, and consequently are not able to detain them. One will clothe himself in this light sacramentally in the union.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The garment of light is ‘bridal clothing’: “And she learns about her light, as she goes about stripping off this world, while her true garment clothes her within, (and) her bridal clothing is placed upon her in beauty of mind, not in pride of flesh.” (Authoritative Teaching)
- The garment (of light) becomes a wedding garment in the Bridal Chamber. The mystery of the Bridal Chamber brings unity, but that mystery is not discussed: “...to the height. There I am, in the eternal realms that no one has seen or understood, where the wedding of the wedding robe is. It is the new wedding, not the old, and it does not perish, for the new bridal chamber is of the heavens, and it is perfect. As I have revealed, there are three ways, and this is an undefiled mystery in the spirit of the eternal realm that is not destroyed or divided or even discussed, for it is indivisible, universal, and permanent.” (Second Treatise of the Great Seth 57:10 - Meyer translation)
- In conclusion, the Bridal Chamber is closely associated with the rite of the baptism. During this rite, the catechumen is baptised in the watery light of the Upper Aeons. He emerges from the baptismal water with his ‘garment of light’. This immersion in the watery light is interpreted, at the same time, as a union or marriage with the light. The catechumen is the feminine soul and the Father is the masculine light. These two are ‘united in the Bridal Chamber’, and from that time onward, the soul wears the ‘garment of light’ in remembrance of her union with the Father.
- For ‘putting on a garment of light’ in the context of the baptism and Bridal Chamber, see FIVE SEALS as well as BAPTISM and BRIDAL CHAMBER.
5. GARMENT, IN THE POSITIVE SENSE, AS A PROTECTIVE GARMENT OF LIGHT
- The idea of a ‘garment of light’ is pre-Gnostic, and may be found in the Transfiguration in the canonical gospels, and in Psalm 104:2 (which is based on the Egyptian hymn to Aten): “Thou art clothed with honour and majesty, who coverest thyself with light as with a garment” (Psalm 104:2)
- The garment of light will protect the soul as it ascends: “He who will receive that light will not be seen, nor can he be detained. And none shall be able to torment a person like this, even while he dwells in the world. And again when he leaves the world, he has already received the truth in the images.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The garment of light is protective, like armor: “I have armed myself with an armor of light; I have become light!” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- The garment (of light) will protect against the mud and filth of the Lower Aeons: “You walked in mud, and your garments were not soiled, and you have not been buried in their filth, and you have not been caught.” (First Apocrypohon of James)
- It is also called the ‘garment of life’: “’How will our garments be brought to us?’ The Lord said, ‘There are some who will provide for you, and there are others who will receive [...]. For it is they who will give you your garments. For who will be able to reach that place which is the reward? But the garments of life were given to man because he knows the path by which he will leave. And it is difficult even for me to reach it!’” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- Baptism cleanses the soul, just as garments are cleansed: “just as garments, when dirty, are put into the water and turned about until their dirt is removed and they become clean. And so the cleansing of the soul is to regain the newness of her former nature and to turn herself back again. That is her baptism.” (Exegesis on the Soul)
- It is also called the ineffable garment, though it has many names: “The first monad furthermore sent him an ineffable garment which was all light and all life and all resurrection, and all love and all hope and all faith and all wisdom, and all gnosis, and all truth...” (etc for 20 more examples)(Bruce Untitled ms)
- There is also a garment of friendship and goodness: “...that I might put on friendship and goodness as a garment” (Melchizedek)
6. GARMENT, IN THE NEGATIVE SENSE, AS A GARMENT OF DARKNESS WHICH IS STRIPPED AWAY IN THE BAPTISMAL RITE
- Sophia created the ‘garment of darkness’ when she created Yaltabaoth: “And when the mother (Sophia) recognized that the garment of darkness was imperfect, then she knew that her consort had not agreed with her.” (Apocryphon of John)
- The garment of darkness is perishable and ‘does not last’ “The governors and the administrators (i.e. Archons) possess garments granted only for a time, which do not last.” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- The body is a garment (or robe), and includes the eyes and what they see. Jesus to Peter: “put your hands upon your eyes - your robe - and say what you see.” (Apocalypse of Peter)
7. NAKED AS A LACK OF GARMENT
- As has been seen, ‘garment’ is positive, as a ‘garment of light’ and negative as the ‘garment of the body’.
- Hence, to be naked, unclothed or stripped has the opposite sense of garment.
- Naked is postive when one is stripped of ‘the garment of the body’
- Naked is negative when one is stripped of ‘the garment of light’
8. NAKED IN THE POSITIVE SENSE, AS STRIPPING OFF THE GARMENT OF THE BODY
- In the Apocryphon of John, Adam and Eve ‘recognized they were naked’. In contrast to Genesis, where ‘nakedness’ is negative, this is regarded as positive, since they recognized that they were ‘naked of imperfection’ (ie. they lacked the imperfect garment of the body).
- After Yaltaboath unwittingly breathed the pneuma into Adam, the Archons “...recognized that he (Adam) was luminous, and that he could think better than they, and that he was free from wickedness, (or ‘naked of imperfection’ - Bentley translation. So) they took him and threw him into the lowest region of all matter. (...) This is the tomb of the newly-formed body with which the robbers had clothed the man.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Through Christ and Epinoia, Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge and “they recognized their nakedness” (i.e. they recognized that, in their true state, they were naked of the imperfect garment of the body). (Apocryphon of John)
- Hence, ‘naked’ has a positive meaning, if one has ‘stripped off’ the garment of darkness, which is the corruptible body: “When you strip off from yourselves what is corrupted, then you will become illuminators in the midst of mortal men.” (Christ quoted in Peter’s letter to Philip)
- The saviour (as Protennoia): “I gave to him from the Water of Life, which strips him of the chaos that is in the uttermost darkness that exists inside the entire abyss, that is, the thought of the corporeal and the psychic. All these I put on. And I stripped him of it, and I put upon him a shining Light, that is, the knowledge of the Thought of the Fatherhood.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
9. NAKED, IN THE NEGATIVE SENSE, AS AN ABSENCE OF THE GARMENT OF LIGHT
- In Hypostasis of the Archons, after Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge, their eyes were opened and they recognized that they were ‘naked of the spiritual element’: “Then the female spiritual principle came in the snake, the instructor; and it taught them (to eat of the tree...). And the carnal woman took from the tree and ate; and she gave to her husband as well as herself; and these beings that possessed only a soul, ate. And their imperfection became apparent in their lack of knowledge; and they recognized that they were naked of the spiritual element.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- Without the garment of light, one is naked: “No one will be able to go in to the king if he is naked.” (Gospel of Philip)
- James refers to Christ’s descent and crucifixion as a ‘stripping’ and ‘nakedness’: “he (the Lord) who stripped himself and went about naked, he who was found in a perishable (state)” (Second Apocalypse of James)
- James on Jesus: “For just as you are first having clothed yourself, you are also the first who will strip himself, and you shall become as you were before you were stripped.” (Second Apocalypse of James)
- In one passage, ‘naked’ may have a negative meaning (without the garment of light) and a positive meaning (without the garment of darkness): “they wish to rise in the flesh, and they do not know that it is those who wear the flesh who are naked. It is those who [...] to unclothe themselves who are not naked.” (Gospel of Philip)
10. SOUL GARMENTS
- Soul garments, like the bodily garment, were placed over the individual spirit as it descended into the Lower Aeons. Probably, there are seven soul garments, one bestowed by each of the Archons (planetary gate-keepers) as the individual spirit descended through their planetary doorways.
- Marsanes mentions soul garment: “the souls which are without guile, and the soul-garments, the likenesses of the simple ones.” (Marsanes)
- In the Gosepl of Mary, there is a visionary ascent in which the soul passes through the gateways of desire, ignorance and wrath (presumeably there are seven in all, but the text is fragmented). At one gateway, desire tries to prevent the soul’s passage, saying: “‘I did not see you descending, but now I see you ascending. Why do you lie, since you belong to me?’ The soul asnswered and said, ‘I saw you. You did not see me nor recognize me. I served you as a garment and you did not know me.’” (Gospel Mary) Hence, the soul became a garment for desire. Presumeably, there were soul garments for wrath, ignorance and other negative qualities.
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- GOD-WRITTEN BOOKS
- A term referring to a book inspired by the Spirit (i.e. the One or Father).
- Note at the end of The Gospel of the Egyptians: “The Gospel of the Egyptians. The God-written, holy, secret book. Grace, understanding, perception, (and) prudence (be) with him who has written it - Eugnostos the beloved, in the Spirit - in the flesh, my name is Gongessos - and my fellow lights in incorruptibility. Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior, Ichthus. God-written (is) the holy book of the great, invisible Spirit. Amen.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
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- GOSPEL
- A Gospel is a text which spreads ‘the good news’ of the gnosis (knowledge)
1. THE GNOSTIC GOSPELS IN GENERAL
- Many of the Gnostic gospels are attributed to the apostles, such as James, John, Judas, Philip and Mary Magdalene
- Like the canonical gospels, many of these have a narrative form.
- Uniquely, The Gospel of Thomas offers a ‘list of sayings’ which resembles the hypothesized ‘Q list’ of Jesus’ sayings which the writers of Luke and Matthew used to compose their canonical gospels
- Other literary forms used by the Gnostic writers include the Apocaylpse (a ‘revelation’), the Apocryphon (a ‘hidden revelation’), Acts and Epistles
- Many of the Sethian Gnostic texts are attributed to a saviour figure who reveals the gnosis: Seth, Zostrianos, Melchizedek, Marsanes, etc.
- A ‘tri-partite’ form is common to many Gnostic texts, such as The Tripartite Tractate, The Trimorphic Protennoia, The Three Steles of Seth, etc.
2. WRITING GOSPELS
- Each of the disciples wrote his own gospel, recounting what the saviour said to him ‘in secret or in the open: James (after the crucifixion): “...the twelve disciples were all sitting together and recalling what the Savior had said to each one of them, whether in secret or openly, and putting it in books - But I was writing that which was in [my book] - lo, the Savior appeared...” (Apocryphon of James 2:8)
- The disciples wrote down his words ‘according to their desire’: “Then many will follow him (the saviour), and they will labor in their birthplaces. They will go about; they will write down his words according to (their) desire.” (Concept of Our Great Power 42:31)
- There are no canonical books. Rather, each may write through ‘grace’ and ‘the gift of prophecy’, without fear of provoking jealousy: “By having a brother who regards us as he also is, one glorifies the one who gives us grace. Moreover, it is fitting for each of us to enjoy the gift that he has received from God, and that we not be jealous, since we know that he who is jealous is an obstacle in his (own) path, since he destroys only himself with the gift and he is ignorant of God. He ought to rejoice and be glad and partake of grace and bounty. Does someone have a prophetic gift? Share it without hesitation. Neither approach your brother jealously nor ... (8 lines missing). Now your brother also has his grace: Do not belittle yourself, but rejoice and give thanks spiritually, and pray for that one, in order that you might share the grace that dwells within him. So do not consider him foreign to you, rather, (as) one who is yours, whom each of your fellow members received. By loving the Head who possesses them, you also possess the one from whom it is that these outpourings of gifts exist among your brethren.” (Interpretation of Knowledge)
- This explains the appearance of many Gnostic Gospels, attributed to different disciples, with divergent points of view.
3. READING GOSPELS
- Just as divine prophecy allows the Gnostic to write a gospel, it also inspires his reading of the gospel, allowing him ‘to discern the Word’: “But is someone making progress in the Word? Do not be hindered by this; do not say: ''Why does he speak while I do not?", for what he says is (also) yours, and that which discerns the Word and that which speaks is the same power.” (Interpretation of Knowledge)
4. TESTIMONY OF VISION
- Some Gnostic texts are the testimony of a vision: “... and he said to me, ‘Write down the things that I shall tell you, and of which I shall remind you, for the sake of those who will be worthy after you. And you will leave this book upon a mountain and you will adjure the guardian: "Come Dreadful One"’. And after he said these (things), he separated from me. But I was full of joy, and I wrote this book which was appointed for me, my son Messos, in order that I might disclose to you the (things) that were proclaimed before me in my presence. And at first I received them in great silence, and I stood by myself, preparing myself. These are the things that were disclosed to me, O my son Messos ... (13 lines missing)... proclaim them, O my son Messos, as the seal for all the books of Allogenes.” (Allogenes)
4. DIVINE INSPIRATION
- The Gospel of the Egyptians is called a ‘God-written book’. See GOD-WRITTEN BOOK.
- The Gospel of the Egyptians is also attributed to the saviour-figure Seth. It will be placed ‘in a high mountain’ until its message is revealed ‘at the end of times’ for the salvation of ‘the holy race’: “This is the book which the great Seth wrote, and placed in high mountains on which the sun has not risen, nor is it possible (that it should do so). And since the days of the prophets and the apostles and the preachers, the name has not at all risen upon their hearts, nor is it possible (that it should do so). And their ear has not heard it. The great Seth wrote this book with letters in one hundred and thirty years. He placed it in the mountain that is called 'Charaxio,' in order that, at the end of the times and the eras, by the will of the divine Autogenes and the whole pleroma, through the gift of the untraceable, unthinkable, fatherly love, it may come forth and reveal this incorruptible, holy race of the great savior, and those who dwell with them in love, and the great, invisible, eternal Spirit, and his only-begotten Son, and the eternal light, and his great, incorruptible consort, and the incorruptible Sophia, and the Barbelon, and the whole pleroma in eternity. Amen.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
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- GRACE
- the generosity of the Father, working through the Holy Spirit and the Son, to grant freedom and release
- Father gracefully frees his children through knowledge: “so also will he (the Father) give them (his children) grace to know what exists, that is, the one who knows himself eternally,” (Tripartite Tractate)
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- HELL
- Also called ‘Hades’, ‘Tartaros’, ‘the abyss’, ‘the outer darkness’ and ‘limitless chaos’. It is a place of ‘fire’ and ‘punishment’. It is also called ‘the Middle’ and ‘a dark lump’.
1. HELL IN GENERAL
- The Lower Aeons (including the earth) are already a form of Hell, where trapped souls are tempted and tormented by demons.
- However, grace and redemption still exist on earth - for the present time. After ‘the Judgement’, there will be no redemption. The outermost reaches of the Lower Aeons will then become Hell.
- For the end of the Lower Aeons, the judgement and punishment of the damned, see RESOLUTION.
- Generally, Hell is described by the same terms reserved for the Lower Aeons: the ‘abyss’ or ‘the outer darkness’. But, unlike the Lower Aeons at the present time, it will become a a place of eternal punishment.
2. DESCRIPTIONS OF HELL AND PUNISHMENT
- The Lower Aeons are the ‘exterior shadow’ which is also called ‘darkness’ and ‘limitless chaos’: “Now the eternal realm (aeon) of truth has no shadow outside it, for the limitless light is everywhere within it. But its exterior is shadow, which has been called by the name 'darkness' From it, there appeared a force, presiding over the darkness. And the forces that came into being subsequent to them called the shadow 'the limitless chaos'.” (Origin of the World)
- Hell is also the Outer Darkness: “this sort (...) will be cast into the outer darkness” (Apocalypse of Peter)
- Hell is the Outer Darkness, Chaos, Hades and Abyss: “Therefore they fell down to the pit of ignorance which is called ‘the Outer Darkness’ and ‘Chaos’ and ‘Hades’ and ‘the Abyss.’” (Tripartite Tractate)
- As Hades: “...the power which is in Hades will be completed at the appointed time.” (Paraphrase of Shem 21:10)
- As ‘abyss’, ‘dark narrow place’, Tartaros and Hades: “...Truly I (the saviour) tell you (Thomas) that he (the condemned) will be handed over to the ruler above who rules over all the powers as their king, and he will turn that one around and cast him from heaven down to the abyss, and he will be imprisoned in a narrow dark place. Moreover, he can neither turn nor move on account of the great depth of Tartaros and the heavy bitterness of Hades...” (Book of Thomas the Contender 142:30)
- The damned are “those who fall outside” (Tripart Tractate) (presumably outside ‘the limit’)
- The damned are handed over to the angel Tartarouchos: “They will hand [...] over to [...] angel Tartarouchos [...] fire pursuing them” (Book of Thomas the Contender)
- The damned are punished according to their nature: “They will be thrown down to the abyss and be afflicted by the torment of the bitterness of their evil nature.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 141:32)
- The damned are imprisoned and restrained so that ‘they cannot move’: “...he will be imprisoned in a narrow dark place. Moreover, he can neither turn nor move on account of the great depth of Tartaros and the heavy bitterness of Hades...” (Book of Thomas the Contender 142:30)
- The damned are burned by fire: “Their mind is directed to their own selves, for their thought is occupied with their deeds. But it is the fire that will burn them.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 142:1)
- There is no escape from the fire: “[...] fire pursuing them [...] fiery scourges that cast a shower of sparks into the face of the one who is pursued. If he flees westward, he finds the fire. If he turns southward, he finds it there as well. If he turns northward, the threat of seething fire meets him again. Nor does he find the way to the east so as to flee there and be saved, for he did not find it in the day he was in the body, so that he might find it in the day of judgment.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 143:1)
- Hell is eternal punishment, with no hope of repentence: “And I (John) said, ‘Lord, these also who did not know, but have turned away, where will their souls go?’ Then he (the saviour) said to me, ‘To that place (...) where there is no repentance. And (...) they will be punished with eternal punishment.’” (Apocryphon of John 27:21)
- Hell is the place ‘of weeping and gnashing of teeth’. The Saviour: “Then all the powers which are above, as well as those below, will [...] you. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth over the end of all these things.” (Dialogue of the Saviour 127:13)
- The dead become shades: “Only a little while longer, and that which is visible will dissolve; then shapeless shades will emerge, and in the midst of tombs they will forever dwell upon the corpses in pain and corruption of soul.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 141:14)
- Hell is also called the Middle, a place of death and true evil: “And so he dwells either in this world or in the resurrection or in the middle place. God forbid that I be found in there! In this world, there is good and evil. Its good things are not good, and its evil things not evil. But there is evil after this world which is truly evil - what is called ‘the middle’. It is death. While we are in this world, it is fitting for us to acquire the resurrection, so that when we strip off the flesh, we may be found in rest and not walk in the middle. For many go astray on the way. For it is good to come forth from the world before one has sinned.” (Gospel of Philip) See MIDDLE.
- In a more radical interpretation of the end, the Lower Aeons will become nothing more than a ‘dark lump’: “And in the last day the forms of nature will be destroyed with the winds and all their demons; they will become a dark lump, just as they were from the beginning.” (Paraphrase of Shem 45:15)
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- IGNORANCE
- Ignorance is an absence of knowledge. It may also be called ‘unknowing’
- Ignorance is a form of ‘mindlessness’, ‘forgetfulness’ or ‘oblivion’
- It is imagined as ‘darkness’ or a ‘cavern’
1. THE WORLD WAS CREATED IN IGNORANCE
- When Sophia created the demiurge Yaltabaoth, she did so in ignorance: “And when she (Sophia) saw (the consequences of) her desire, it changed into a form of a lion-faced serpent. And its eyes were like lightning fires which flash. She cast it away from her, outside that place, that no one of the immortal ones might see it, for she had created it in ignorance.” (Apocryphon of John)
- The Yaltabaoth that Sophia created was, himself, ignorant of where he had come from: “And when Pistis Sophia desired to cause the thing that had no spirit to be formed into a likeness and to rule over matter and over all her forces, there appeared for the first time a ruler, out of the waters, lion-like in appearance, androgynous, having great authority within him, and ignorant of whence he had come into being.” (On the Origin of the World)
- Due to his ignorance, Yaltabaoth thought that he alone was God: “For he was ignorant, thinking that there existed no other except his mother alone. And when he saw the multitude of the angels which he had created, then he exalted himself above them.” (Apocryphon of John)
- This ignorant God then created Adam and Eve. Although the gnosis (knowledge) was secretly planted in Adam and Eve, the ignorant God trapped them in fleshly bodies. Thus he brought them into the ignorance of ‘darkness’, ‘desire’, ‘forgetfulness’ and ‘death’: “And they (the Archons) brought him (Adam) into the shadow of death, in order that they might form (him) again from earth and water and fire and the spirit which originates in matter, which is the ignorance of darkness and desire, and their counterfeit spirit. This is the tomb of the newly-formed body with which the robbers had clothed the man, the bond of forgetfulness; and he became a mortal man.” (Apocryphon of John)
- All of Adam and Eve’s descendents are restrained by ignorance: “When a multitude of human beings had come into existence, through the parentage of the Adam who had been fashioned, and out of matter, and when the world had already become full, the rulers were master over it - that is, they kept it restrained by ignorance.” (On the Origin of the World)
- All of Adam and Eve’s descendents will remain ignorant until ‘the true man’ (i.e. the saviour) frees them through knowledge: “Thus did the world come to exist in distraction, in ignorance, and in a stupor. They all erred, until the appearance (parousia) of the true man.” (On the Origin of the World)
2. IMAGES OF IGNORANCE
- By eating ‘the fruit’ from ‘the tree of unknowing’, humanity came to dwell in the ‘ignorant chaos’ of the Lower Aeons: “For as for our tree from which we grew, a fruit of ignorance is what it has; and also its leaves, it is death that dwells in them, and darkness dwells under the shadow of its boughs. And it was in deceit and lust that we harvested it, this (tree) through which ignorant Chaos became for us a dwelling place.” (Trimoprhic Protennoia)
- Ignorance as mindlessness: “For you descended into a great mindlessness” (First Apocryphon of James)
- Ignorance as forgetfulness or oblivion: “the bonds and eternal oblivion were nullified.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- Ignorance as a cavern: “Woe to you, captives, for you are bound in caverns!” (Book of Thomas the Contender)
- Ignorance as darkness: “you dwell in darkness and death!” (Book of Thomas the Contender)
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- LOVE
- Typically, Gnosticism expresses unity through knowledge: the One knows the all just as the all come to know him.
- However, Gnostic unity may also be expressed through love: the One loves the all, just as the all come to love him.
- Hence, love underlies the extension of the many from the One, and re-union of the many with the One: “...the Father extends himself to those whom he loves, so that those who have come forth from him might become him as well.” (Tripartite Tractate 73:25)
- The saviour is ‘the beloved’ of the Father: “the one who is properly called ‘Saviour’ and ‘Redeemer’ and ‘the Well-Pleasing one’ and ‘the Beloved’.” (Tripartite Tractate 87:6)
- But the Father spreads his love to all: “...to everyone and everything comes the fatherly kindness and affection and love...” (Prayer of Thanksgiving 63:33)
- The saviour teaches us to love one another like oneself: “Love your brother like your life! Protect him like the pupil of your eye!” (Gospel of Thomas 25)
- The ‘kingdom’ is like a city filled with brotherly love: “Then he beautified the kingdom, like a city filled with everything pleasing, which is brotherly love and the great generosity...” (Tripartite Tractate 96:35)
- The Elect dwell together with all types of men, through love: “...this incorruptible, holy race of the great savior, and those who dwell with them in love.” (Gospel of the Egyptians 68:20)
- Love must be spread to all: “Spiritual love is wine and fragrance. All those who anoint themselves with it take pleasure in it. While those who are anointed are present, those nearby also profit (from the fragrance).” (Gospel of Philip)
- To love is to give: “Faith receives, love gives. No one will be able to receive without faith. No one will be able to give without love. Because of this, in order that we may indeed receive, we believe, and in order that we may love, we give, since if one gives without love, he has no profit from what he has given.” (Gospel of Philip)
- Love must be manifest in one’s deeds. Those deeds are directed toward manifesting the fullness of heaven here on earth: “love is alive in me to accomplish a work of fullness!” (Second Apocalypse of James 62:16)
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- MALE AND FEMALE
1. MALE AND FEMALE IN GENERAL
- Male and female must be regarded, first of all, as principles, and secondly as the genders of certain human beings.
- The male and female principles are opposed to each other. This creates two possible schema in Gnosticism.
- In the first schema, the male and female exist as a unity in the Upper Aeons, but became divided in the Lower Aeons. Hence, the division of male and female symbolizes falleness into the Lower Aeons while the unity of male and female symbolizes salvation into the Upper Aeons.
- In the second schema, the male principle provides ‘spirit’ and ‘form’ (which are imperishable and incorruptible) while the female principle provides ‘body’ and ‘matter’ (which are perishable and corruptible). Hence, the female symbolizes falleness into the Lower Aeons while the male symbolizes salvation into the Upper Aeons.
2. THE UNITY OF MALE AND FEMALE IN THE UPPER AEONS
- All beings in the Upper Aeons unite the male and female, as bi-sexual androgynes. Although they are singular (androgynous), they possesses both male and female genders or names (bi-sexual). The male and female genders of an androgyne are called ‘syzygies’ or consorts. See ANDROGYNE and CONSORT.
- This begins with the One or ‘Parent’, who is androgynous, as both Mother and Father. Protennoia: “I am androgynous. I am Mother (and) I am Father, since I copulate with myself. I copulated with myself and with those who love me, and it is through me alone that the All stands firm. I am the Womb that gives shape to the All by giving birth to the Light that shines in splendor.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- The androgynous One also manifests itself through Sophia and Jesus, as well as the seeds (i.e. the Elect) and their angelic consorts in the Upper Aeons: “But the syzygy is the complete one, and Sophia and Jesus and the angels and the seeds are images of the Pleroma.” (Valentinan Exposition)
- Though androgynous, each syzygy (consort) has a male and female name: “In the beginning, he (the One) decided to have his likeness become a great power. Immediately, the principle (or beginning) of that Light appeared as Immortal Androgynous Man. His male name is 'Begotten, Perfect Mind'. And his female name is 'All-wise Begettress Sophia'. It is also said that she resembles her brother and her consort.” (Eugnostos the Blessed) The androgynous angels beget more androgynous angels when their male and female names or ‘consorts’ consent to unite. See CONSORT.
- Most importantly, the Anthropos was made male and female: “And he made his necessities (genitals) in the type of those that go forth and those that come in” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
3. THE SEPARATION OF MALE AND FEMALE IN THE LOWER AEONS
- Yaltabaoth then divided the androgynous Anthropos into male and female, Adam and Eve. Adam speaking to his son Seth: “When God had created me out of the earth, along with Eve, your mother, I went about with her in a glory. (...) We resembled the great eternal angels (i.e. we were androgynous), for we were higher than the god who had created us and the powers with him, whom we did not know. Then God, the ruler of the aeons and the powers (i.e. Yaltabaoth), divided us in wrath. Then we became two aeons (i.e. male and female).” (Apocalypse of Adam 64:6)
- The separation of Adam and Eve into man and woman was one aspect of their ‘fall’ into the Lower Aeons. At the same time, they acquired material bodies and became mortal. Thus, they could only prolong their existence through desire and sexual intercourse. Adam speaking to his son Seth: “I knew a sweet desire for your mother. Then the vigor of our eternal knowledge was destroyed in us, and weakness pursued us. Therefore the days of our life became few. For I knew that I had come under the authority of death.” (Apocalypse of Adam)
- Desire and sexual intercourse only prolong material existence: “Now up to the present day, sexual intercourse continued due to the chief archon. And he planted sexual desire in her who belongs to Adam. And he produced through intercourse the copies of the bodies.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Both male and female are needed for sexual intercourse and conception: “And if you (Asclepius) wish to see the reality of this mystery, then you should see the wonderful representation of the intercourse that takes place between the male and the female. For when the semen reaches the climax, it leaps forth. In that moment, the female receives the strength of the male; the male, for his part, receives the strength of the female, while the semen does this.” (Asclepius)
- The only hope of salvation from this situation is if the male and female again become one spiritually, as they were in the Upper Aeons. Christ descended in order to inaugerate the rite of the Bridal Chamber, where the male and female may re-unite, not in body, but in spirit, and so return to the Upper Aeons: “If the woman had not separated from the man, she should not die with the man. His separation became the beginning of death. Because of this, Christ came to repair the separation, which was from the beginning, and again unite the two, and to give life to those who died as a result of the separation, and unite them. But the woman is united to her husband in the bridal chamber. Indeed, those who have united in the bridal chamber will no longer be separated. Thus Eve separated from Adam because it was not in the bridal chamber that she united with him.” (Gospel of Philip) See BRIDAL CHAMBER.
4. THE MALE PRINCIPLE AS SPIRIT AND FORM; THE FEMALE PRINCIPLE AS BODY AND MATTER
- When a child is conceived during sexual intercourse, according to Aristotlean physics, the male principle provides ‘form’ while the female principle provides ‘matter’. From the semen comes the form, template or image which is ‘stamped’ upon the formless matter in the womb.
- Gnosticism extends this schema to say that the male principle provides the spiritual form or image from the Upper Aeons, while the female principle provides the formless matter of the Lower Aeons.
- This schema for conception and birth then extends, in Gnosticism, to the creation of the entire cosmos. Sophia is the female principle that ‘conceived and gave birth’ to the formless matter of the Lower Aeons. She did this without the contribution of the male principle (her consort Christ) and so the Lower Aeons lacked spiritual form. Instead, Yaltabaoth copied forms from the Upper Aeons to give the Lower Aeons their present shape. This schema may be laid out as follows:
- Sophia is a female that conceived and gave birth without the contribution of her male consort: “And the Sophia (...) conceived a thought from herself. (...) And though the person of her maleness had not approved, (...still) she brought forth. And (...) something came out of her which was imperfect and different from her appearance, because she had created it without her consort. And it was dissimilar to the likeness of its mother, for it has another form.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Without the male principle, the Lower Aeons were composed of matter lacking spiritual form, and hence, like an aborted fetus: “Sophia, who is called Pistis, wanted to create something, alone without her consort. (...) And what she had created became a product in the matter, like an aborted fetus. And it assumed a plastic form molded out of shadow, and became an arrogant beast resembling a lion.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- This formless matter ‘had no spirit in it’. Still, when Sophia tried to give it form, it became the lion-headed serpent Yaltabaoth: “Then Pistis (Sophia) came and appeared over the matter of chaos, which had been expelled like an aborted fetus - since there was no spirit in it. (...) And when Pistis Sophia desired to cause the thing that had no spirit to be formed into a likeness and to rule over matter and over all her forces, there appeared for the first time a ruler, out of the waters, lion-like in appearance.” (On the Origin of the World) “And when she saw the consequences of her desire, it changed into a form of a lion-faced serpent.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Yaltabaoth then copied the forms from the Upper Aeons to give the Lower Aeons their present shape: “And having created [...] everything, he (Yaltabaoth) organized according to the model of the first aeons which had come into being (i.e. the Upper Aeons), so that he might create them (the Lower Aeons) like the indestructible ones.” (Apocryphon of John)
- For this reason, all things in the Lower Aeons are ‘children of the female only’ and ‘without form’. Only the male principle, the saviour from the Upper Aeons, can ‘give form’: “As long as we were children of the female only, as of a dishonorable union, we were incomplete, childish, without understanding, weak, and without form, brought forth like abortions, in short, we were children of the woman. But having been given form by the Savior, we are the children of the man (husband) and of the bride-chamber” (Excerpta ex Theodoto 68).
- Because the Lower Aeons are generated by Sophia alone, they have ‘the defect of femaleness’: “And in this way the defect of femaleness appeared.” (Eugnostos)
- Sophia (as Achamoth) is female from female, without the redeeming quality of the male: “Achamoth had no father nor male consort, but she is female from a female.” (First Apoc James)
- One role of the saviour is to divide the male principle, which is light and incorruptible, from the female principle, which is dark and corruptible: “like Isaiah, who was sawed with a saw, (and) he became two. So also the Son of Man divides us by the word of the cross. It divides the day from the night and the light from the darkness and the corruptible from incorruptibility, and it divides the males from the females.” (Test Truth)
- Another role of the saviour is to redeem the perishable female element by making it like the imperishable male element: “The perishable has gone up to the imperishable and the female element has attained to this male element.” (First Apocryphon of James)
- The ‘female’ principle includes desire: - “After I parted from the somatic darkness in me and the psychic chaos in mind and the feminine desire [...] in the darkness, I did not use it again.” (Zostrianos)
- The ‘female’ principle includes the passions, which bring division instead of unity: “And do not become female, lest you give birth to evil and (its) brothers: jealousy and division, anger and wrath, fear and a divided heart, and empty, non-existent desire.” (Second Treatise of the Great Seth)
- Hence, salvaltion requires that we reject the female principle, and ‘choose maleness’: “Flee from the madness and the bondage of femaleness, and choose for yourselves the salvation of maleness.” (Zostrianos 131:5 )
- Again: “Simon Peter said to them: ‘Let Mary go away from us, for women are not worthy of life.’ Jesus said: ‘Look, I will draw her in so as to make her male, so that she too may become a living male spirit, similar to you. (But I say to you): Every woman who makes herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.’” (Gospel of Thomas 114)
- Again: “Judas said, ‘You have told us this out of the mind of truth. When we pray, how should we pray?’ The Lord said, ‘Pray in the place where there is no woman.’ Matthew said, ‘'Pray in the place where there is no woman,' he tells us, meaning 'Destroy the works of womanhood,' not because there is any other manner of birth, but because they will cease giving birth.” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
5. MALE PRINCIPLE AS MIND; FEMALE PRINCIPLE AS SOUL
- In many Gnostic text, the mind (nous) is regarded as male: “he is a disciple of his mind, which is male.” (Testimony of Truth)
- Meanwhile, the soul (psyche) is regarded as female.
- When the soul was in the Upper Aeons, it was ‘virgin and androgynous’: “As long as she was alone with the father, she was virgin and in form androgynous” (Exegesis on the Soul)
- But when the soul fell into the Lower Aeons, it became female and even acquired a womb: “Wise men of old gave the soul a feminine name. Indeed she is female in her nature as well. She even has her womb.” (Exegesis on the Soul)
- As long as the soul remains female in the Lower Aeons, it risks defilement, becoming like ‘a prostitute’: “And in her body she prostituted herself and gave herself to one and all” (Exegesis on the Soul)
- But through the male principle of the saviour, the female soul can acquire ‘the life-giving spirit’ in a ‘marriage made perfect by the Father’: “Thus when the soul had adorned herself again in her beauty (she) enjoyed her beloved (saviour), and he also loved her. And when she had intercourse with him, she got from him the seed that is the life-giving spirit, so that by him she bears good children and rears them. For this is the great, perfect marvel of birth. And so this marriage is made perfect by the will of the father.” (Exegesis on the Soul)
- It follows from the above passage that the saviour is the male principle from the Upper Aeons which ‘has intercourse’ with the female principle in the Lower Aeons (the fallen soul). In doing so, the male provides ‘spirit’ and ‘form’ for the female soul, who in turn gives birth. Although the Aristotlean model of conception and birth underlies this schema, the ‘marriage’ is spiritual rather than fleshly. For the spiritual marriage, see BRIDAL CHAMBER.
- In the following passage from Silvanus, it becomes clear that a three-part division between mind, soul, and body is allegorized as male, female, and animal. Thus, mind = male, soul (psychic) = female, body = beast. “Understand that you have come into being from three (...) The body has come into being from the earth (...) the soul, has come into being from the thought of the Divine. (...) the mind has come into being in conformity with the image of God. (...) If you cast out of yourself the substance of the mind, which is thought, you have cut off the male part, and turned yourself to the female part alone. You have become psychic (...) If you cast out the smallest part of this, so that you do not acquire again a human part - but you have accepted for yourself the animal thought and likeness - you have become fleshly, since you have taken on animal nature.” (Silvanus)
6. MALE AND FEMALE - MISCELLANEOUS
- The greatness of the male principle is emphasized through the adjective ‘thrice’ or ‘triple’. Hence, the saviour becomes ‘the triple male child: “I saw the good divine Autogenes; and the Savior, who is the youthful, perfect Triple-Male Child” (Allogenes). See THRICE.
- While ‘female’ and ‘prostitute’ refer to the state of the soul in the Lower Aeons, ‘male’ and ‘virgin’ refer to the state of being in the Upper Aeons. Hence, certain Upper Aeonic beings are given the epithet ‘male virgin’: “the unreproducible Voice (...) a male virgin by virtue of a hidden Intellect, that is, the Silence hidden from the All, being unreproducible” (Trimorphic Protennoia) See VIRGIN.
- In particular, Barbelo is refered to as ‘the male virgin’ or ‘virginal male’: “And I saw holy powers by means of the Luminaries of the virginal male Barbelo” (Allogenes) See BARBELO.
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- NOREA
- A figure from the Sethian Gnostic texts. She is the undefiled daughter of Eve who, together with Seth, gives birth to the Sons of Seth, who are the race of the Elect: “Again Eve became pregnant, and she bore Norea. And she said, ‘He has begotten on me a virgin as an assistance for many generations of mankind.’ She is the virgin whom the forces did not defile. Then mankind began to multiply and improve.” (Hypostasis of the Archons)
- One text or ‘hymn’ is dedicated to her, called The Thought of Norea. In it, Norea offers praise to the trinity of Father, Mother and Son: “It is Norea who cries out to them. They heard, (and) they received her into her place forever.” (Thought of Norea)
- In this text, she appears as a saviour-figure who is fallen and redeemed (the ‘saved saviour’ motif): “There will be days when she will behold the Pleroma, and she will not be in deficiency, for she has the four holy helpers (the Four Lights?) who intercede on her behalf.” (Thought of Norea)
- Rather mysteriously, she speaks of ‘two names which create a single name’: “the thought of Norea, who speaks concerning the two names which create a single name.” (Thought of Norea) See NAMES.
- According to Pearson, the variant spellings of her name (Norea, Orea, Noraia, Oraia, Horaia, Nora, Noria, Nuraita and Nhuraita) point backward to the Greek Horaia, which is based on the Hebrew Na’amah (‘pleasing’ ‘lovely). As Naamah, she appears in Genesis 6:2 as one of the ‘daughters of man’ that consorted with ‘the sons of God’. The Hypostasis of the Archons (where Norea appears) re-evaluates and reverses her role from negative to positive (as ‘virgin mother’ of the race of the Elect).
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- PERFECT
- The ‘perfect’ are the Elect and those who are saved. They belong in the Upper Aeons. See ELECT.
- The Elect are ‘the perfect race’ descended from ‘the perfect man’: “the unwavering race of the perfect Man” (Apocryphon of John) “the offspring of the perfect race” (Apocryphon of John)
- One can ‘become perfect’: - “He who will remember these and give glory always will become perfect” (Three Steles of the Great Seth)
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- PLEROMA
-Literally, ‘the fullness’ or ‘perfection’.
- The Pleroma is the totality of beings in the Upper Aeons. See AEONS and THE ALL.
- The Pleroma is also called the ‘emanations of the Father’, the ‘treasuries of light’ and the ‘immeasurable deep’.
- The Pleroma or Fullness describes the Upper Aeons, while its opposite ‘the Deficiency’ describes the Lower Aeons: “The disciples said to him, ‘What is the fullness, and what is the deficiency?’ He said to them, ‘You are from the fullness, and you dwell in the place where the deficiency is.’” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- as ‘emanations of the Father’: “Therefore, all the emanations of the Father are pleromas, and the root of all his emanations is in the one who made them all grow up in himself.” (Gospel of Truth)
- As ‘treasuries of light’: “and a multitude of emanations will come forth from all the Jeus, through the command of my Father when he moves them, and they will fill all the treasuries. And they will be called ranks of the Treasuries of the Light.” (First Book of Jeu)
- In the Untitled Bruce Codex ms, the Pleroma is described as a temple-city with four gates and a Holy of Holies: “He created the holy Pleroma in this way: four gates with four monads within it, one monad to each gate and six helpers (parastatai) to each gate, ... and an unutterable aspect - to each gate. One of his aspects looks forth from the gate to the outer aeons, the other looks inwards to the Setheus, and the other looks to the height, and the sonship is in each monad. ... The unutterable aspect of the overseer looks towards to the holy of the holies, that is, the infinite one who is the head of the sanctuary.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- The Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex also describes the Pleroma as ‘the body’ of the monad, which is like the mother-city “This is the manner in which they are all within the monad : there are twelve monads making a crown upon its head ; each one makes twelve. And there are ten decads surrounding its shoulders. And there are nine enneads surrounding its belly. And there are seven hebdomads at its feet, and each one makes a hebdomad. And to the veil which surrounds it like a tower, there are twelve gates. There are twelve myriad powers at each gate, and they are called archangels and also angels. This is the mother-city of the only-begotten one.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- As the ‘immeasurable deep’: “After these things there is another place which is broad, having hidden within it a great wealth which supplies the All. This is the immeasurable deep.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- One may also ‘become full’: “Become full, and leave no space within you empty.” (Apocalypse of James)
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- PRE-EXISTENCE
- The state of being in the Upper Aeons, before material time and space were created in the Lower Aeons. See also STAND AT REST.
- The One pre-exists: “I invoke you, the one who is and who pre-existed in the name which is exalted above every name.” (Prayer of the Apostle Paul A:11)
- The One then created images of itself, which ‘pre-existed’: “He (the Father) created the pre-existent images” (Tripartite Tractate 96:24)
- The Father, which is the first image or emanation of the One, pre-existed: “...through the incorruptible bosom, and through the great light of the Father, who pre-existed.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- The Mother Barbelo, which is the next image or emanation of the One, pre-existed: “Great is the first aeon, male virginal Barbelo, the first glory of the invisible Father, she who is called ‘perfect’. Thou (fem.) hast seen first the one who truly pre-exists because he is non-being. And from him and through him thou hast pre-existed eternally.” (Three Steles of the Great Seth)
- All creatures in the Lower Aeons are shadows of ‘pre-existing things’ in the Upper Aeons: - “But the creature is a shadow of pre-existing things.” (Valentinian Exposition)
- Through the gnosis, each of the Elect may come to know their pre-existence in God: (Barbelo:) “If you seek with a perfect seeking, then you shall know the Good that is in you; then you will know yourself as well, as one who derives from the God who truly pre-exists.” (Allogenes 56:15)
- Knowledge reveals ‘the pre-existent One’: “He who gave them (the Elect) knowledge of him (Christ) was one of his powers for enabling them to grasp that knowledge in the fullest sense is called (...) ‘the revelation of those things which were known at first’ and ‘the path toward harmony and toward the pre-existent one...’” (Tripartite Tractate 127:8)
- To ‘pre-exist’ is ‘to stand at the beginning’. These will know the end: (Jesus said:) “Blessed is he who will stand at the beginning. And he will know the end, and he will not taste death.” (Gospel of Thomas 18 - 36:14)
- Blessed is he who came into being (i.e. pre-existed) before he came into being (in the flesh): “Jesus said, ‘Blessed is he who came into being before he came into being.” (Gospel of Thomas 19 - 36:17)
- He who pre-existed shall exist afterward and always:“The Lord said, ‘Blessed is he who is before he came into being. For he who is, has been and shall be.’” (Gospel of Philip 64:10)
- At the end of time, during the restoration, the Elect will return to their ‘pre-existence’: “The restoration is at the end, after the Totality reveals what it is (...) that is, the return to the pre-existent” (Tripartite Tractate)
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- REDEMPTION
- Also called ‘ransom’.
1. REDEMPTION IN GENERAL
- According to the traditional Christian view, all the descendents of Adam are in a fallen state because of they have inherited Adam’s original sin. This situation could only be remedied by Christ ‘the redeemer’ whose suffering became the ransom or pledge paid (to God or Satan) ‘to redeem’ the descendents of Adam and relieve them of original sin. Through Christ, sins are forgiven.
- This schema of redemption still applies in some Christian Gnostic texts. See RANSOM.
- However, other Gnostic texts re-interpret the story of Adam, so that a portion of Adam (and Seth’s) descendents, called the Elect, are ‘faultless’ and ‘without sin’.
- Hence, Christ’s suffering was not required to ‘redeem’ the Elect.
- ‘Redemption’ takes on a different meaning in the remainder of the Gnostic texts.
- The role of the saviour or ‘redeemer’ in Gnosticsm is as a ‘revealer’. The saviour reveals the gnosis, to awaken the Elect and remind them of their true origin in the One. He does this by instigating certain rites, such as baptism, wherein the gnosis is revealed to the Elect. This is particularly true of the complex rite called the Five Seals.
2. THE REDEMPTION OF CHRIST AS THE ARCHETYPE FOR REDEMPTION
- In some Gnostic texts, the man Jesus is separate from the heavenly Christ (or Word) which descended into him during his baptism in the Jordan.
- In the Tripartite Tractate, the Son (Jesus) is in need of redemption, because he had become a man. It is the heavenly Word which ‘descended upon him’ that offered him ‘redemption’: “Not only do humans need redemption, but also the angels, too... even the Son himself, who has the position of redeemer of the Totality, needed redemption as well - he who had become man - since he gave himself for each thing which we need, we in the flesh, who are his Church. Now, when he first received redemption from the word which had descended upon him, all the rest received redemption from him, namely those who had taken him to themselves.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- Hence, in the First Apocryphon of James, Jesus says to James that, during the time of his crucifixion, his (Jesus’) redemption ‘will be near’. Jesus: “Behold, I shall reveal to you everything of this mystery. For they will seize me the day after tomorrow. But my redemption will be near.” (First Apocryphon of James)
- As a man, Jesus ‘received knowledge’ (gnosis) from the heavenly saviour that had descended into him (during his baptism in the Jordan). His ‘redemption’ was the revelation of his true ‘unitary state’ with the One. Likewise, the Elect will receive this redemption through the rite of baptism, which will ‘instruct’ them about the gnosis: “When the redemption was proclaimed, the perfect man (i.e. Jesus) received knowledge immediately, so as to return in haste to his unitary state, to the place from which he came, to return there joyfully, to the place from which he came, to the place from which he flowed forth. His members (i.e. the chruch of the Elect), however, needed a place of instruction, which is in the places which are adorned (for the baptismal rite), so that they might receive from them (the garment of light, which is) resemblance to the images and archetypes, like a mirror, until (the end of time, when) all the members of the body of the Church are in a single place and receive the restoration at one time, when they have been manifested as the whole body, namely the restoration into the Pleroma.” (Tripartite Tractate)
- Hence, through his own baptism, when the heavenly saviour descended into him to reveal the gnosis, Jesus instigated the rite of redemption, which is a baptismal rite in which the gnosis is revealed.
3. REDEMPTION AS PART OF THE BAPTISMAL RITE IN THE FIVE SEALS
- The redemption forms part of a complex baptismal rite, called the Five Seals.
- The Gospel of Philip offers a crucial text for the Five Seals. In one passage, it groups together five important rites: the baptism, chrism, eucharist, redemption and Bridal Chamber: “The Lord did everything in a mystery, a baptism and a chrism and a eucharist and a redemption and a bridal chamber. [...] he said, ‘I came to make the things below like the things above, and the things outside like those inside. I came to unite them in the place.’ [...] here through types [...]and images.” (Gospel of Philip)
- It is possible that the five rites mentioned here are, in fact, the Five Seals. If so, the nature of ‘the redemption’ needs to be clarified.
- In another passage, the Gospel of Philip identifies the redemption with the resurrection. At the same time, it describes it as an intermediary rite between the baptism and Bridal Chamber: “There were three buildings specifically for sacrifice in Jerusalem. The one facing the west was called ‘The Holy’. Another, facing south, was called ‘The Holy of the Holy’. The third, facing east, was called ‘the Holy of the Holies’, the place where only the high priest enters. Baptism is ‘the Holy’ building. Redemption is the ‘Holy of the Holy’. ‘The Holy of the Holies’ is the bridal chamber. Baptism includes the resurrection and the redemption; the redemption (takes place) in the bridal chamber.” (The Gospel of Philip)
4. THE REDEMPTION AS RESURRECTION
- The redemption was identified with the resurrection. According to the Gospel of Philip, the resurrection is a visionary ascent through the aeons. This vision of the resurrection is first seen in this life to prepare us for our after-life resurrection: “Those who say they will die first and then rise are in error. If they do not first receive the resurrection while they live, when they die they will receive nothing.” (Gospel of Philip) “While we are in this world, it is fitting for us to acquire the resurrection, so that when we strip off the flesh, we may be found in rest.” (Gospel of Philip)
- Like the resurrection, the redemption was most likely a visionary ascent of the catechumen through the aeons, so as to prepare him for his after-death ascent. During this initiatory rite, secret names and signs (also called seals) were revealed to him. First, in ‘the renunciation’, he was given secret names and signs to protect him against the Archons, in an ascent through the Lower Aeons. Then, in ‘the invocation’, more names and signs were given for the angels, in an ascent through the Upper Aeons.
- The Gospel of the Egyptians mentions the invocation and renunciation as part of the Five Seals rite, particularly during the baptism. The invocation and renunciation ‘instruct’ the catechumen about ‘those who will receive him’ in his ascent through the aeons: “But from now on, through the incorruptible man Poimael, and they who are worthy of (the) invocation (and) the renunciations of the five seals in the spring-baptism, these will know their receivers as they are instructed about them, and they will know them (or: be known) by them. These will by no means taste death.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- The invocation is described in The Tripartite Tractate as a ‘confession of faith’ in the names of the angels, and in their existence. Such a confession is called ‘the redemption’. It forms a part of ‘the baptism in the fullest sense’: “As for the baptism which exists in the fullest sense, into which the Totalities will descend and in which they will be, there is no other baptism apart from this one alone, which is the redemption into God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, when confession is made through faith in those names, which are a single name of the gospel, when they have come to believe what has been said to them, namely that they exist. From this they have their salvation, those who have believed that they exist. This is attaining in an invisible way to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in an undoubting faith. And when they have borne witness to them, it is also with a firm hope that they attained them, so that the return to them might become the perfection of those who have believed in them and (so that) the Father might be one with them, the Father, the God, whom they have confessed in faith and who gave (them) their union with him in knowledge.” (Tripartite Tractate 127:25)
- As the ‘resurrection’, the rite of redemption gave the catechumen knowledge (gnosis) of the names of the beings in the Lower and Upper Aeons who would receive him during his post-mortem or visionary ascent.
5. THE REDEMPTION AS PUTTING ON A GARMENT OF LIGHT
- The Trimorphic Protennoia says that, through the rite of the Five Seals, the catechumen will come to possess ‘particular names’, and compares this to ‘putting on a garment of light’: “He who possesses the Five Seals of these particular names has stripped off
- The rite of ‘putting on the robe of light’ was closely affiliated with baptism and the Bridal Chamber. See FIVE SEALS, BAPTISM and BRIDAL CHAMBER.
- But the enrobing rite during the baptism was also called ‘the redemption’: “The baptism which we previously mentioned is called ‘garment of those who do not strip themselves of it’, for those who will put it on and those who have received redemption wear it...” (Tripartite Tractate)
- To ‘put on a garment of light’ is to actually ‘become the light’ - it is a state of total immersion and union with the divine light. This ‘immersion’ is ritually made present through the baptismal rite, while the ‘union’ is made present through the rite of the Bridal Chamber (which are two parts of the same rite): “It (baptism) is also called ‘bridal chamber’ because of the agreement and the indivisible state of those who know they have known him. It is also called ‘the light which does not set and is without flame’ since it does not give light, but those who have worn it (i.e. the garment of light) are made into light.” (Tripartite Tractate 128:33)
- In the end, the experience of unity with the One became ‘the redemptive knowledge’ which was bestowed during the rites of the Five Seals (enrobing, baptism, Bridal Chamber): “Now the promise (i.e. the Elect) possessed the instruction (i.e. gnosis) and the return to what they are from the first (i.e. experience of unity), from which they possess the drop (i.e. pneuma) so as to return to him, which is that which is called ‘the redemption’.” (Tripartite Tractate)
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- REFLECT
- The Greek word ‘eikon’ can mean both ‘image’ or ‘reflection’. See IMAGE.
- The Upper Aeons resulted from the One ‘reflecting’ upon itself: “Seeing himself within himself in a mirror, he appeared resembling himself...” (Sophia of Jesus Christ) See AEONS.
- Each of these aeons is an extension of the One, through which it reflects upon itself.
- The beings in the Upper Aeons are androgynous (see ANDROGYNE) with male and female names (see MALE/FEMALE) which consent with one another as consorts (see CONSORT) to beget a new androgynous being. ‘To consent’ in this manner is also ‘to reflect’: “He (the Son of Man) reflected with Great Sophia, his consort, and revealed his first-begotten, androgynous son. His male name is designated 'First Begetter, Son of God', his female name, 'First Begettress Sophia, Mother of the Universe'.” (Sophia of Jesus Christ)
- Yaltabaoth created the Lower Aeons as an image or ‘reflection’ of the Upper Aeons: “In relation to the reflection which he (Yaltabaoth) saw in it, he created the world. With a reflection of a reflection he worked at producing the world” (Zostrianos)
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- REPENTENCE
1. REPENTENCE IN GENERAL
- Repentence comes from the Greek metanoia, which means to change (meta) our mind (noia) or turn around (meta) our way of knowing (noia).
- In the Christian sense, it is to seek forgiveness for a fault.
- In Gnostic myth, Sophia is the archetype of the repentent soul.
- Certain Gnostic texts place great emphasis on the soul's repentence.
- Finally, the Psychic (or soul-endowed) type of human would ascend to the Upper Aeons if they repented in the sense of 'turning around their way of knowing' and received the Gnostic revelation.
2. SOPHIA AS THE ARCHETYPE OF THE REPENTENT SOUL
- Sophia began as ‘Wisdom’, the last of the twelve Upper Aeons. But, after she created Yaltabaoth without the consent of Christ (her consort), she fell into the Lower Aeons. Recognizing her fault, Sophia repented: “...And she (Sophia) repented and she besought the Father of the truth, saying, ‘Granted that I have renounced my consort (Jesus). Therefore I am beyond confirmation as well. I deserve the things I suffer. I used to dwell in the Pleroma putting forth the Aeons and bearing fruit with my consort’ And she knew what she was and what had become of her.” (Valentinian Exposition 34:23)
- Through her repentence, Sophia was placed a special aeon: “But when she (Sophia) had seen the wickedness which had happened, and the theft which her son had committed, she repented. (...) She repented with much weeping. And the whole pleroma heard the prayer of her repentance (...) And she was taken up not to her own aeon but above her son, that she might be in the ninth until she has corrected her deficiency.” (Apocryphon of John)
- This is confirmed in Zostrianos: “But to Sophia a place of rest was given in exchange for her repentance.” (Zostrianos)
3. THE REPENTENT SOUL
- Like Sophia, the soul has fallen to the Lower Aeons, where she may ‘prostitute’ herself by consorting with demons. But if she ‘repents’, she is saved: “But when the father who is above visits her and looks down upon her and sees her sighing - with her sufferings and disgrace - and repenting of the prostitution in which she engaged, and when she begins to call upon his name so that he might help her, [...] saying ‘Save me, my father, for behold I will render an account to thee, for I abandoned my house and fled from my maiden’s quarters. Restore me to thyself again.’” (Exegesis on the Soul 128:26)
4. THE PSYCHIC RACE AS REPENTENT.
- In the Gnostic schema, there are three types of humans: the spirit-endowed Pneumatics, the soul-endowed Psychics and the flesh-endowed Hylics. See THREE TYPES OF HUMANS.
- Due to the spirit in them, the Pneumatics will return to the Upper Aeons. The Psychic will return to the Upper Aeons if their souls do good and ‘repent’ for the evil that they have done. (The Hylics, apparently, are beyond repentence and redemption.)
- This schema appears, with some variations, in the fragmentary text Zostrianos. Of the ‘three species of immortal soul’ mentioned, the first in unclear, the second resembles the Psychics, whose souls are immortal because they have repented, the third resembles the Pneumatics, who have gained knowledge: “There are three species of immortal soul: first, those who have taken root upon the Exile (...) second, those who stand [upon the] Repentance (...which are) those who committed all sins and repented. (...) The third (species) is that of the souls of the self-begotten ones because they have a word of the ineffable truth, one which exists in knowledge and [power] from themselves alone and eternal [life].”
- Similarly, in the Apocryphon of John, the Pneumatics and Psychics are given their respective places in the Upper Aeons, before Yaltabaoth creates the world. The ‘seed of Seth’ (Pneumatics) have their place ‘in the third aeon’ while ‘repentent souls’ (Psychics) have their place ‘in the fourth aeon’: “And in the third aeon, the seed of Seth was placed (...) And in the fourth aeon the souls were placed of those who do not know the Pleroma and who did not repent at once, but who persisted for a while and repented afterwards.”
- This text goes on to say that, at the end of time, those who are without the gnosis will go to a place ‘where there is no repentence’: “And I (John) said, ‘Lord, these also who did not know, but have turned away, where will their souls go?’ Then he (the saviour) said to me, ‘To that place (...) where there is no repentance. And (...) they will be punished with eternal punishment.’” (Apocryphon of John) See HELL.
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- RESOLUTION
- Also called, positively, the ‘restoration’, ‘restitution’ ‘time of fulfillment’ and ‘time of redemption’
- Also called, negatively, ‘the consummation of the age’, ‘the coming end of the Aeon’, ‘the time of dissolution’, ‘the appointed time’, ‘the last day’
1. THE RESOLUTION IN GENERAL
- The resolution is the end.
- In the Lower Aeons, catastrophies will signal the end of time. For the Archons, it will be the end of their rule and the dissolution of the Lower Aeons. For one part of humanity (the Psychic and Hylic) it will be a time of judgement and damnation.
- In the Upper Aeons, it will become a time of rejoicing, when Sophia and Christ will re-unite. As well, the Elect will re-ascend to the Upper Aeons and become joined with the angels.
- Finally, the all will re-unite with the One
2. TIME IN THE LOWER AEONS IS LIMITED
- Various expressions are used in the Gnostic texts to show that time in the Lower Aeons is limited, and the end is approaching.
- ‘While you have time: “While you have time in the world, listen to me...” (Book of Thomas the Contender 138:4)
- ‘Time is short’: “One’s time in this world is short.” (Zostrianos 4:19)
- ‘The days have shortened’: “For already the slackening of our bondage has approached, and the times are cut short, and the days have shortened, and our time has been fulfilled, and the weeping of our destruction has approached us, so that we may be taken to the place we recognize.” ( Trimorphic Prontennoia 44:14)
- ‘The appointed time’: “...the power which is in Hades will be completed at the appointed time.” (Paraphrase of Shem 21:10)
- ‘The hour is not yet come’. The Saviour: “Indeed, as long as the hour is not yet come, it (the immortal soul) shall resemble a mortal one.” (Apocryphon of Peter 75:28)
- ‘The coming end of the aeon’. Protennoia: “I shall tell them of the coming end of the Aeon and teach them of the beginning of the Aeon to come, the one without change, the one in which our appearance will be changed. We shall be purified...” (Trimorphic Protennoia 42:18)
- ‘The last day’: “...in the last day they will rest in their root.” (Paraphrase of Shem 39:19)
- ‘The consummation of the age’: “...which has been apparent from creation down to the consummation of the age” (On the Origin of the World)
3. SIGNS OF THE END OF TIME
- The phoenix (a symbol for the saviour?) will appear as a sign: “And the phoenix first appears in a living state, and dies, and rises again, being a sign of what has become apparent at the consummation of the age.” (On the Origin of the World 122:29)
- The consummation of the age will be marked by many signs in the heavens and on earth: “Before the consummation of the age, the whole place will shake with great thundering. Then the rulers will be sad, [...] their death. The angels will mourn for their mankind, and the demons will weep over their seasons, and their mankind will wail and scream at their death. Then the age will begin, and they will be disturbed. Their kings will be intoxicated with the fiery sword, and they will wage war against one another, so that the earth is intoxicated with bloodshed. And the seas will be disturbed by those wars. Then the sun will become dark, and the moon will cause its light to cease. The stars of the sky will cancel their circuits.” (On the Origin of the World 126:1)
- More signs in the underworld and on earth: “Then, when the great Authorities knew that the time of fulfillment had appeared - just as in the pangs of the parturient it (the time) has drawn near, so also had the destruction approached - all together the elements trembled, and the foundations of the underworld and the ceilings of Chaos shook, and a great fire shone within their midst, and the rocks and the earth were shaken like a reed shaken by the wind.” (Trimorphic Prontennoia 43:4)
- The stars will also bear signs: “Jesus said, ‘Truly I say to you, for all of them the stars bring matters to completion. When Saklas (the blind god) completes the span of time assigned for him...’” (Gospel of Judas 54)
- “And the sign of the aeon that is to come will appear. And the aeons will dissolve.” (Concept of Our Great Power 42:20)
4. DESTRUCTION OF THE ARCHONS AND THE LOWER AEONS
- The text On the Origin of the World clearly lays out the destruction of the Archons and their aeons. It is Sophia - who created Yaltabaoth in the beginning - who will ‘cast him into the abyss’: “And a great clap of thunder will come out of a great force that is above all the forces of chaos, where the firmament of the woman is situated (i.e. the Middle, the aeon of Sophia). Having created the first product (i.e. Yaltabaoth), she (Sophia) will put away the wise fire of intelligence and clothe herself with witless wrath. Then she will pursue the gods of chaos (i.e. the Archons), whom she created along with the prime parent (Yaltabaoth). She will cast them down into the abyss.” (On the Origin of the World)
- Then the Archons will attempt to destroy one another, until Yaltabaoth destroys them and himself: “They (the Archons) will be obliterated because of their wickedness. For they will come to be like volcanoes and consume one another until they perish at the hand of the prime parent (Yaltabaoth). When he has destroyed them, he will turn against himself and destroy himself until he ceases to exist.” (On the Origin of the World)
- Then will come the destruction of the Lower Aeons: “And their heavens will fall one upon the next and their forces will be consumed by fire. Their eternal realms, too, will be overturned. And his heaven will fall and break in two. His [...] will fall down upon the [...] support them; they will fall into the abyss, and the abyss will be overturned. The light will [...] the darkness and obliterate it: it will be like something that has never been. And the product to which the darkness had been posterior will dissolve. And the deficiency will be plucked out by the root (and thrown) down into the darkness.” (On the Origin of the World)
- The Lower Aeons will become ‘a dark lump’: “And in the last day the forms of nature will be destroyed with the winds and all their demons; they will become a dark lump, just as they were from the beginning.” (Paraphrase of Shem 45:15)
- In some texts, it is the saviour who will destroy ‘this house’ (which is the body or the world). Jesus: “I shall destroy this house, and no one will be able to build it again.” (Gospel of Thomas 45:34 - 71)
- James: “This (house) I shall doom to destruction and derision of those who are in ignorance.” (Second Apocryphon of James 60:20)
5. THE RESURRECTION
- Most Gnostic texts agree that there will be no bodily resurrection.
- The soul dwells temporarily in the body, which belongs to the Archons: “The body is a temporary dwelling which the rulers and authorities have as an abode.” (Interpretation of Knowledge 7:30)
- At the end of this time, the spirits and the souls will depart from the body: Jesus: “When these people, however, have completed the time of the kingdom and the spirit leaves them, their bodies will die but their souls will be alive, and they will be taken up.” (Gospel of Judas 43)
- Hence, there is no resurrection of the flesh: “Do not expect, therefore, the carnal resurrection.” ( Testimony of Truth 36:29)
6. THE JUDGEMENT OF SOULS
- Gnosticism has developed a schema of three types of humans: the spirit-endowed Pneumatics, the soul-endowed Psychics, and the flesh-endowed Hylics. See THREE TYPES OF HUMANS.
- The spirit-endowed Pneumatics (the Elect) are saved absolutely. The soul-endowed Psychics may be saved or damned. The flesh-endowed Hylics are inevitably ‘damned to destruction’: “The spiritual race will receive complete salvation in every way. The material will receive destruction in every way (...) The psychic race, since it is in the middle when it is brought forth and also when it is created, is double according to its determination for both good and evil.” (Tripartite Tractate 119:16)
- The Apocryphon of John expands on this schema. There are two types of Pneumatics: those who avoid the corruption of the flesh and those who do not. Both as saved. Then there are the Psychics, who have souls but are without spirit. They are repeatedly re-incarnated until they acquire the gnosis. Then they are saved. Last of all those without the gnosis (the Hylics?), who are damned eternally.
- First of all, those with the spirit (pneuma) who avoid corruption of the flesh - are saved: “Those on whom the Spirit of life will descend (...) will be saved and become perfect and be worthy of the greatness and be purified in that place from all wickedness and the involvements in evil. (...) Such then are worthy of the imperishable, eternal life.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Second, those with the spirit (pneuma) who do not avoid corruption of the flesh - are still saved: “Through the intervention of the incorruptible one, it is saved, and it is taken up to the rest of the aeons.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Third, those without the spirit (pneuma) are repeatedly re-incarnated until they acquire the gnosis - and are saved: “After it comes out of (the body), it (the soul) is handed over to the authorities, who came into being through the archon, and they bind it with chains and cast it into prison (i.e. body), and consort with it until it is liberated from the forgetfulness and acquires knowledge. And if thus it becomes perfect, it is saved.” (Apocryphon of John)
- Fourth, those without the gnosis - are damned for eternity: “(They will go) to that place where the angels of poverty go they will be taken, the place where there is no repentance. And they will be kept for the day on which those who have blasphemed the spirit will be tortured, and they will be punished with eternal punishment.” (Apocryphon of John)
7. PUNISHMENT
- The Book of Thomas the Contender describes the punishment reserved for the damned on ‘the day of judgement’.
- First the damned will ‘hide in their tombs’, but their evil deeds will be ‘shown forth’. The saviour: “Listen to what I am going to tell you and believe in the truth. That which sows and that which is sown will dissolve in the fire - within the fire and the water - and they will hide in tombs of darkness. And after a long time they shall show forth the fruit of the evil trees, being punished, being slain in the mouth of beasts and men at the instigation of the rains and winds and air and the light that shines above.” (Book of Thomas the Contender)
- Then the damned will be ‘handed over to the ruler’ (the Archons?) who will cast them down: “He will be handed over to the ruler above who rules over all the powers as their king, and he will turn that one around and cast him from heaven down to the abyss, and he will be imprisoned in a narrow dark place.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 143:1)
- The damned are handed over to the angel Tartarouchos (?): “They will hand [...] over to [...] angel Tartarouchos [...] fire pursuing them” (Book of Thomas the Contender)
- The damned are punished according to their nature: “They will be thrown down to the abyss and be afflicted by the torment of the bitterness of their evil nature.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 141:32)
- The damned are imprisoned and restrained so that ‘they cannot move’: “...he will be imprisoned in a narrow dark place. Moreover, he can neither turn nor move on account of the great depth of Tartaros and the heavy bitterness of Hades...” (Book of Thomas the Contender 142:30)
- The damned are burned by fire: “Their mind is directed to their own selves, for their thought is occupied with their deeds. But it is the fire that will burn them.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 142:1)
- There is no escape from the fire: “[...] fire pursuing them [...] fiery scourges that cast a shower of sparks into the face of the one who is pursued. If he flees westward, he finds the fire. If he turns southward, he finds it there as well. If he turns northward, the threat of seething fire meets him again. Nor does he find the way to the east so as to flee there and be saved, for he did not find it in the day he was in the body, so that he might find it in the day of judgment.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 143:1)
- Hell is eternal punishment, with no hope of repentence: “And I (John) said, ‘Lord, these also who did not know, but have turned away, where will their souls go?’ Then he (the saviour) said to me, ‘To that place (...) where there is no repentance. And (...) they will be punished with eternal punishment.’” (Apocryphon of John 27:21)
- Hell is the place ‘of weeping and gnashing of teeth’. The Saviour: “Then all the powers which are above, as well as those below, will [...] you. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth over the end of all these things.” (Dialogue of the Saviour 127:13)
- The dead become shades: “Only a little while longer, and that which is visible will dissolve; then shapeless shades will emerge, and in the midst of tombs they will forever dwell upon the corpses in pain and corruption of soul.” (Book of Thomas the Contender 141:14)
- Hell is also called the Middle, a place of death and true evil: “And so he dwells either in this world or in the resurrection or in the middle place. God forbid that I be found in there! In this world, there is good and evil. Its good things are not good, and its evil things not evil. But there is evil after this world which is truly evil - what is called ‘the middle’. It is death. While we are in this world, it is fitting for us to acquire the resurrection, so that when we strip off the flesh, we may be found in rest and not walk in the middle. For many go astray on the way. For it is good to come forth from the world before one has sinned.” (Gospel of Philip) See MIDDLE.
- The damned are “those who fall outside” (Tripart Tractate) (presumably outside ‘the limit’)
- Hell is also the Outer Darkness: “this sort (...) will be cast into the outer darkness” (Apocalypse of Peter)
- Hell is the Outer Darkness, Chaos, Hades and Abyss: “Therefore they fell down to the pit of ignorance which is called ‘the Outer Darkness’ and ‘Chaos’ and ‘Hades’ and ‘the Abyss.’” (Tripartite Tractate)
8. THE COMPLETION OF THE NUMBER OF THE ELECT
- Several Gnostic texts say the consummation will come when the number of the Elect is reached.
- This number is vague, and is called variously ‘the number of Sodom’, ‘the cypher of Melchizedek’ or ‘the number of perfect souls’. See ELECT.
- In the Pistis Sophia, the number of the Elect is ‘the cypher of Melchizedek’. When this number is reached, the Gnostic saviour will end the Archons rule: “It happened now when these things in their time were known, and when the number of the cipher of Melchizedek, the Paralemptor (of the Light), occurred, he (the saviour) came forth, and he went into the midst of the archons of all the aeons, and to the midst of all the archons of the Heimarmene and those of the sphere. And he agitated them, and he caused them quickly to abandon their circles, and immediately they were afflicted...” (Pistis Sophia - Ch. 26)
- Again, the consummation (the end of the Archons’ rule) will come when ‘the number of perfect souls’ is reached: “And he took their light to the Treasury of the Light. (...) so that they should not dissolve, but that they should be retarded, and should spend a great time until the completion of the number of perfect souls which would be in the Treasury of the Light.” (Pistis Sophia - Ch. 26)
- Irenaeus mentions this idea when he writes: “When the whole seed is perfected, (...) they will enter into the Pleroma” (Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 1.7.1) See below.
9. ASCENT AND RETURN OF THE ELECT TO THE UPPER AEONS
- In the beginning, Sophia mistakenly engendered Yaltabaoth without the consent of her consort, Christ. As a result, she was sent to ‘the Middle’ (between the Upper and Lower Aeons), awaiting the time of the restitution, when her fault would be remedied. After the destruction of Yaltabaoth and the Lower Aeons, she would rise again to the Upper Aeons and re-unite with Christ, her consort. This time is called ‘the marriage of the bride and bridegroom’, which would take place in the Upper Aeons. As such, the Upper Aeons or Pleroma would become the Bridal Chamber in which, not only Christ and Sophia, but all the fallen Elect would be re-united.
- Irenaeus describes the entire schema of the restitution: the union of Christ and Sophia, as well as the spirits (Pneumatics) and their angels, in the Bridal Chamber of the Pleroma (Upper Aeons): “When the whole seed is perfected, then, they say, will the mother, (Sophia) Achamoth leave the place of the Middle, enter into the Pleroma, and receive her bridegroom, the Savior, who came into being from all (the aeons), with result that the Savior and Sophia, who is Achamoth, form a pair (syzygy) These then are said to be bridegroom and bride, but the bridal chamber is the entire Pleroma. The spiritual beings will divest themselves of their souls and become intelligent spirits, and, without being hindered or seen, they will enter into the Pleroma, and will be bestowed as brides on the angels around the Savior.” (Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 1.7.1 cf. Excerpta ex Theodoto 63-65)
- The Valentinian Exposition, though a fragmented text, describes this same schema: “That she (Sophia) should suffer, was not the will of the Father, for she dwells in herself alone without her consort (Christ) (...) But the syzygy is the [complete one], and Sophia and Jesus and [the angels] and the seeds are [images of] the Pleroma. (...) Moreover when Sophia [receives] her consort and Jesus receives the Christ and the seeds and the angels, then [the] Pleroma will receive Sophia joyfully, and the All will come to be in unity and reconciliation.” (Valentinian Exposition)
- Hence, the restoration of the Pleroma is described as a time of unity, when the many will re-unite with the One.
- “When the redemption was proclaimed, the perfect man received knowledge immediately, so as to return in haste to his unitary state, to the place from which he came, to return there joyfully, to the place from which he came, to the place from which he flowed forth. (Then...) all the members of the body of the Church are in a single place and receive the restoration at one time, when they have been manifested as the whole body, namely the restoration into the Pleroma.(...) The restoration is at the end, after the Totality (...) return to the pre-existent, and (after) the Totalities reveal themselves in that one.” (Tripartite Tractate 123:3)
- The restoration is a ‘gathering together’: “And the uniting of their members was the gathering together of the dispersed of Israel. (...) And they all became one, as it is written: ‘They all became one in the one and only One’.” (Untitled Text in Bruce Codex )
- The light will fill the Pleroma: “And the light will withdraw up to its root. And the glory of the unbegotten will appear. And it will fill all the eternal realm.” (On the Origin of the World 126:35)
- All will shine as reflections of the One’s light: “Then the souls will appear, who are holy through the light of the Power, who is exalted, above all powers, the immeasurable, the universal one, I and all those who will know me. And they will be in the aeon of beauty of the aeon of judgment, since they are ready in wisdom, having given glory to him who is in the incomprehensible unity; and they see him because of his will, which is in them. And they all have become as reflections in his light. They all have shone, and they have found rest in his rest.” (Concept of our Great Power 47:9)
- For eternity: Jesus: “Neither the sun nor the moon will rule there, nor the day, but the holy will abide there always, in the eternal realm with the holy angels.” (Gospel of Judas 45)
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- REST
- The aeon of the One, where we find relief from suffering, temptation
- a kind of meditation and release from the world
- Also called 'repose'.
- the opposite of ‘tumult’, ‘confusion’, ‘distraction’
- the opposite of ‘toil’ (or ‘labour’, which the disciples must do to preach)
- The aeon of the One: “His aeon is indestructible, at rest and existing in silence, reposing (and) being prior to everything.” (Apocryphon of John)
- An eternal rejoicing: “They (the pleroma) are all at rest in him, ever rejoicing in ineffable joy, over the unchanging glory and the measureless jubilation that was never heard or known among all the aeons and their worlds. But this much is enough, lest we go on endlessly.” (Eugnostos)
- The children return to the Father to find rest: “they rest in him who is at rest... having come to be in the resting-place” (Gosp Truth)
- “it is a short time until man will receive the enjoyment of the things which are eternally good, in which is the place of rest...” (Tripartite Tractate)
- “the path to eternal rest” (Tripartite Tractate)
- “The children of the bridal chamber have just one name: rest. Altogether, they need take no other form, because they have contemplation...” (Gospel of Philip)
- Returning to the Upper Aeons, “She (the soul) found her rising. She came to rest in him who is at rest. She reclined in the bride-chamber. She ate of the banquet for which she had hungered. She partook of the immortal food. She found what she had sought after. She received rest from her labors, while the light that shines forth upon her does not sink. To it belongs the glory and the power and the revelation for ever and ever. Amen.” (Authoritative Teaching)
- Also used to mean ‘has its reflection in’: “This is the nature of the holy imperishable spirits, upon which the Son rests, since it is his essence, just as the Father rests upon the Son.” (Tripart. tract)
- The opposite of ‘rest’ is ‘toil’: “And he called the land on the right side ‘the land of rest’, and the land on the left ‘the land of toil’.” (Untitled Bruce ms)
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- BLIND
- A state of ignorance in the Lower Aeons, where one has no vision for the invisible things of the Upper Aeons.
- Jesus to Peter: “’If you want to know their blindness, put your hands upon (your) eyes - your robe - and say what you see.’ But when I had done it, I did not see anything. I said ‘No one sees (this way).’ Again he told me, ‘Do it again.’ And there came in me fear with joy, for I saw a new light greater than the light of day.” (Apocalypse of Peter)
- “And blessed is he who has opened the eyes of the blind.” (Gospel of Truth)
- Those who do not see or hear Christ are “deaf and blind”; they are “completely dead.” (Apocalypse of Peter)
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- BONDS
- All that restrain spirits from returning to the Upper Aeons.
- Also called ‘chains’, ‘bars’, ‘walls’, ‘secure gates’.
- The Bonds of the Lower Aeons: forgetfulness, oblivion, ignorance, fate, time.
- “Every bond I loosed from you, and the chains of the demons of the underworld I broke, these things which are bound on my members, restraining them. And the high walls of darkness I overthrew, and the secure gates of those pitiless ones I broke, and I smashed their bars” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- “For from that fate came forth every sin and injustice and blasphemy, and the chain of forgetfulness and ignorance (...) For they are bound with measures and times and moments, since it (fate) is lord over everything.” (Apocryphon of John)
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- BOOK OF THE LIVING
- The book in which the names of the Elect are inscribed: “Those who are to receive teaching are the living, who are inscribed in the book of the living.” (Gospel of Truth) See NAMES.
- The book exists in the Father: “...the living book of the living - the one written in the thought and the mind of the Father, which from before the foundation of the totality was within his incomprehensibility.” (Gospel of Truth)
- By suffering on the cross, Jesus brought life to those inscribed in the book: “For this reason, the merciful one, the faithful one, Jesus, was patient in accepting sufferings until he took that book, since he knows that his death is life for many.” (Gospel of Truth)
- Through his crucifixion, that book was ‘published’: “For this reason Jesus appeared; he put on that book; he was nailed to a tree; he published the edict of the Father on the cross.” (Gospel of Truth)
- There is a Gnostic belief that the number of the Elect (Pneumatics) and the Saved (Psychics) is a limited number. And when that number is reached, the end will come. See ELECT
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- CROWN
- Also called diadem, eternal crown, crown of stability.
1. THE CROWN IN GENERAL
- The Father has a crown, while all of its Upper Aeonic beings (the angels, the Elect) make up its crown.
- The Mother has a crown.
- The Son has a crown, and also bestows crowns.
- Crowns were bestowed upon the disciples (?)
- Primarily, crowns are bestowed upon the Elect.
- The crown shines with light.
- The ‘crowning’ occurs during the rite of baptism.
- As such, the crown is bestowed upon those who have come to exist within the Upper Aeons.
2. THE CROWN OF THE FATHER
- The Father’s crown is the aeons that surround him, filled with light: “This is the Father of the All. This is he upon whose head the aeons are a crown, casting forth rays.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- The Father has a crown, which it bestowed upon 365 types of Upper Aeonic beings. The crown gives light and is a sign of unity. Those below who are in the body pray to ‘receive the crown’: “And there is a crown upon the indivisible one in which is every species of life... This is the crown which the Father of the All gave to the indivisible one, in which there are 365 species, and they shine and fill the All with imperishable and inextinguishable light. This is the crown which gives power to every power. And this is the crown for which all the immortal ones pray (...) And after the invisible one, all the aeons will receive their crowns from it and hasten forth with the indivisible one. And the All will receive their completion through the imperishable one. And for this reason do those who have received bodies pray, wishing to leave their bodies behind, and to receive the crown which is laid up for them in the imperishable aeon.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- The crown bestowed by the Father upon the All contains the names of the All: “the Father of the All, the indescribable one, sent a crown in which is the name of the All, whether endless, or unutterable, or incomprehensible, or imperishable, or unknowable, or still, or all-powered, or indivisible. This is the crown of which it is written: ‘It was given to Solomon on the day of the joy of his heart.’” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
3. THE CROWN OF THE MOTHER
- In the Acts of Thomas, Judas-Thomas sings a hymn to a heavenly being called ‘the maiden’ who, in the last line of the hymn, is called ‘Mother of Wisdom’ (i.e. Sophia). She wears a crown: “The maiden is the daughter of light / Upon her stands and rests the majestic effulgence of kings / (...) In the crown of her head the king is established.” (Acts of Thomas)
4. THE CROWN OF THE SON
- The Son has a crown, which has stability (stands?) and shines with light: “And then the triple-powered one in whom the Son was hidden came forth, and on his head was the crown of stability, making myriads upon myriads of glories...” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- Seth says the Thrice Male (a saviour figure) wears and bestows crowns: “O crown-bearer, crown-giver! We bless thee eternally.” (Three Steles of Seth)
5. THE CROWN IS BESTOWED UPON THE DISCIPLES
- The ‘twelve beneficent ones’ (disciples?) received ‘unfading crowns’: “And they (the ‘twelve beneficent ones’ ie disciples) bless the only-begotten one, saying : "Through thy image we have seen thee, we have fled to thee, we have stood with thee, we have received the unfading crown, which has been known through thee. Glory to thee for ever, O only begotten one" And they all said : "Amen" at once.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- The ‘twelve fathers’ (disciples?) surrounding the Setheus (a saviour figure) received a diadem (i.e. crown) which shines with light: “These are the twelve fathers which surround the Setheus (...) Again another twelve surround his head and they have a diadem upon their heads. And they cast rays to the worlds which surround them from the light of the only-begotten one hidden within him, this one whom they seek after.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- This ‘Setheus’ is described as a king: “This is Setheus who dwells in the sanctuary like a king” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- The crown has twelve stones: “a crown upon their heads with twelve adamantine stones in it, which were from Adamas, the Man of Light” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
6. THE CROWN IS BESTOWED UPON ALL UPPER AEONIC BEINGS (INCLUDING THE ELECT)
- “And there are myriads upon myriads of powers receiving crowns upon their heads from the crown of the triple-powered one” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- “And all these powers which are in this god-begetting land receive crowns upon their heads. By this means the Paralemptores are known, because of the crowns upon their heads, whether or not they are from the indivisible one.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- The crown comes from the word, and shines with light: “Then Setheus sent a creative word with which were many powers having crowns upon their heads. And their crowns sent forth rays, and the shining of their bodies enlivened ' the place to which they came.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- The eternal crown: “And he (unclear pronoun reference) received the grace of the only-begotten one, which is his Christhood, and he received the eternal crown.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- Fragment from Marsanes: “since you have the great crown which [...].” (Marsanes)
- Although the Elect are crowned, they are also said to belong to ‘the kingless fourth race’: “Consequently, four races exist. There are three that belong to the kings of the eighth heaven. But the fourth race is kingless and perfect, being the highest of all. For these shall enter the holy place of their father. And they will gain rest in repose and eternal, unspeakable glory and unending joy.”(On the Origin of the World)
7. THE CROWN IS BESTOWED IN THE RITE OF THE BAPTISM
- In the ‘Fire Baptism’ described in The First Book of Jeu, Jesus crowns his disciples as part of the baptismal rite: “He crowned them all with the plant of the pigeon grass” (First Book of Jeu p. 109)
- During the baptism, the catechumen is delivered to angels who enrobe, baptize, enthrone, glorify and snatch away. Perhaps ‘crowning’ was part of the rite of ‘enthroning’: “And I delivered him to those who give robes - Yammon, Elasso, Amenai - and they covered him with a robe from the robes of the Light; and I delivered him to the baptizers, and they baptized him - Micheus, Michar, Mnesinous - and they immersed him in the spring of the Water of Life. And I delivered him to those who enthrone - Bariel, Nouthan, Sabenai - and they enthroned him from the Throne of Glory. And I delivered him to those who glorify - Ariom, Elien, Phariel - and they glorified him with the glory of the Fatherhood. And those who snatch away snatched away - Kamaliel, [...]anen, Samblo, and the servants of the great holy luminaries - and they took him into the light-place of his Fatherhood. And he received the Five seals from the Light of the Mother, Protennoia, and it was granted him to partake of the mystery of knowledge, and he became a Light in Light.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
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- DEFICIENCY
- Also called the ‘lack’.
- The Upper Aeons are called the Fullness.
- By contrast, the Lower Aeons are called the Deficiency.
- The Deficiency as opposite of the Fullness: “The disciples said to him, ‘What is the Fullness, and what is the Deficiency?’ He said to them, ‘You are from the Fullness, and you dwell in the place where the Deficiency is (i.e. the Lower Aeons).’” (Dialogue of the Savior 139:13)
- After the resurrection: “the light flows down upon the darkness, swallowing it up; and the Pleroma fills up the Deficiency.” (Treatise on Resurrection)
- During the ‘consummation’ (end of the world): “And the Deficiency will be plucked out by the root (and thrown) down into the darkness. And the light will withdraw up to its root.” (On the Origin of the World)
- The Lower Aeons are called the Deficiency because they lack the Upper Aeons’ light and fullness. Being deficient, they are dark, empty and an abyss: “Therefore they (the Archons) fell down to the pit of ignorance which is called ‘the Outer Darkness’ and ‘Chaos’ (i.e. emptiness) and ‘Hades’ and ‘the Abyss.’” (Tripartite Tractate)
- Being deficient, the Lower Aeons are shadows lacking light: “Now the eternal realm (aeon) of truth has no shadow outside it, for the limitless light is everywhere within it. But its exterior is shadow, which has been called by the name 'darkness'” (Origin of the World)
- Finally, the Deficiency even lacks existence: “And then the existent separated itself from the non-existent. And the non-existent is the evil which has manifested in matter. And the enveloping power separated those that exist from those that do not exist. And it called the existent "eternal", and it called the non-existent "matter". And in the middle it separated those that exist from those that do not Exist, and it placed veils between them.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- See also AEONS (LOWER)
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- DESIRE
- Desire is likened to bitterness, drunkeness, fire (see BITTERNESS, DRUNKENESS, FIRE), a turning wheel, the source of wrath.
- Yaltabaoth planted desire in Eve so the first couple would produce more bodies: “Now up to the present day, sexual intercourse continued due to the chief archon. And he planted sexual desire in her who belongs to Adam. And he produced through intercourse the copies of the bodies, and he inspired them with his counterfeit spirit.” (Apocryphon of John)
- The chief demon Yoko rules over desire: “The four chief demons are: Ephememphi, who belongs to pleasure, Yoko, who belongs to desire, Nenentophni, who belongs to grief, Blaomen, who belongs to fear.” (Apocryphon of John)
- From desire comes wrath, etc: “from desire (comes) anger, wrath, and bitterness, and bitter passion, and unsatedness” (Apocryphon of John)
- Desire as fire: “the fire that burns in you”, “O bitterness of the fire that blazes in the bodies of men” (Book of Thomas the Contender)
- Desire as a turning wheel: “the wheel that turns in your minds!”(Book of Thomas the Contender)
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- DISCIPLES
- Are also called ‘apostles’, ‘apprentices’, ‘labourers’.
- Jesus calls his disciples ‘laborers’ and ‘apprentices’. Jesus speaking to Thomas: “If the deeds of the truth that are visible in the world are difficult for you to perform, how indeed, then, shall you perform those that pertain to the exalted height and to the pleroma which are not visible? And how shall you be called 'laborers'? In this respect you are apprentices, and have not yet received the height of perfection.” (Book of Thomas the Contender)
- Hence the saviour says to his disciples that they must ‘rest’ from their ‘labours’: “The Savior said to his disciples, ‘Already the time has come, brothers, for us to abandon our labor and stand at rest. For whoever stands at rest will rest forever.’” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- Those who follow the saviour will ‘labour’ and ‘write down his words according to their desire’: “Then many will follow him (the saviour), and they will labor in their birthplaces. They will go about; they will write down his words according to (their) desire.” (Concept of Our Great Power 42:31)
1. THE TWELVE
- Because there are twelve Upper Aeons and twelve disciples, a symmetry arises which the Gnostic writers exploited.
- In the Acts of John, Christ dances with his twelve disciples, who form a ring around him. During the dance, he compares the twelve discliples to the twelve aeons above: “The number Twelve danceth on high. Amen. The Whole on high hath part in our dancing. Amen.” (Acts of John)
- Christ says that the disciples first existed in the Upper Aeons, and then entered bodies that were prepared for them: “Because of this indeed I have chosen you from the beginning through the First Mystery. Rejoice now and be glad, because when I entered the world I brought the twelve powers with me, as I told you from the beginning, which I took from the twelve saviours of the Treasury of Light, according to the command of the First Mystery. These now I cast into the wombs of your mothers when I came into the world, and it is these which are in your bodies today.” (Pistis Sophia Ch 7)
- The twelve disciples are like twelve ‘aspects’ of Christ i.e. they are like twelve aeons bearing his image. Each has his face: “There is a sonship in their midst, which is called Christ the Verifier (...) And this Christ bears twelve aspects...” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- When the disciples dance around Christ, he says, “A mirror am I to thee that perceivest me. Amen.” Hence, each of the disciples sees their own face in Christ.
- A Gnostic diagram from the Book of Jew depicts a small circle with twelve spokes leading outward to twelves small circles surrounding it. This would be a visible representation of the above schema.
2. SPECIAL DISCIPLES
- Each of the disciples wrote his own gospel, recounting what the saviour said to him ‘in secret or in the open: James (after the crucifixion): “...the twelve disciples [were] all sitting together and recalling what the Savior had said to each one of them, whether in secret or openly, and [putting it] in books - [But I] was writing that which was in [my book] - lo, the Savior appeared...” (Apocryphon of James 2:8)
- They wrote down his words ‘according to their desire’: “Then many will follow him (the saviour), and they will labor in their birthplaces. They will go about; they will write down his words according to (their) desire.” (Concept of Our Great Power 42:31)
- This explains the appearance of many Gnostic gospels attributed to disciples such as John, James, Peter, Thomas, Mary Magdalene etc. See GOSPEL.
- Typically, the author of such a gospel has a special relationship to the saviour. In the case of James, he is the saviour’s ‘brother’; Thomas is the saviour’s ‘twin’ and Mary Magdalene is the saviour’s ‘companion’.
3. JAMES THE BROTHER
- In one gospel according to James, the Lord says to James that he is not Jesus’ brother ‘materially’: “I (Jesus) have given you a sign of these things, James, my brother. For not without reason have I called you my brother, although you are not my brother materially.” (First Apocalypse of James 24:15).
- In another gospel according to James, his mother tells him that Jesus is his ‘step-brother’: “Once when I was sitting deliberating, he opened the door. That one whom you hated and persecuted came in to me. He said to me, ‘Hail, my brother; my brother, hail.’ As I raised my face to stare at him, (my) mother said to me, ‘Do not be frightened, my son, because he said “My brother” to you (sg.). For you (pl.) were nourished with this same milk. Because of this he calls me “My mother”. For he is not a stranger to us. He is your step-brother [...].’” (Second Apocalypse of James 50:23)
4. JUDAS THOMAS THE TWIN
- Although two important gospels are attributed to Thomas, this name appears to be an epithet for Judas.
- The Gospel of Thomas begins: “These are the secret sayings which the living Jesus spoke and which Didymos Judas Thomas wrote down.” (Gs Thom 32:10). Of the three names given, only Judas is a proper name, while Didymos and Thomas (tauma) mean ‘the twin’ in Greek and Aramaic. Hence, the above could be translated ‘the twin’ Judas ‘the twin’.
- The Book of Thomas the Contender also introduces the apostle as “Judas Thomas” (Th. Cont. 138:2) and in their dialogue, the saviour calls him “my twin and true companion” (Book of Thomas the Contender 138:8).
5. MARY MAGDALENE THE COMPANION
- The Gospel of Philip describes Mary Madgalene’s special relationship to the saviour: - “And the companion of the (saviour was) Mary Magdalene. [...] (He) loved her more than all the disciples, and used to kiss her often on her (mouth). The rest of the disciples (became angry) [...]. They said to him "Why do you love her more than all of us?" The Savior answered and said to them,"Why do I not love you like her? When a blind man and one who sees are both together in darkness, they are no different from one another. When the light comes, then he who sees will see the light, and he who is blind will remain in darkness.” (Gospel of Philip 63:32)
- Again, Magdalene is called his ‘companion’: “There were three who always walked with the Lord: Mary, his mother, and her sister, and Magdalene, the one who was called his companion. His sister and his mother and his companion were each a Mary.” (Gospel of Philip)
- Magdalene shows more understanding than the other disciples: “She (Magdalene) uttered this as a woman who had understood completely.” (Dialogue of the Saviour 139:12)
- At the end of the Gospel of Mary (Magdalene), Andrew and Peter question the account Magdalene gives. Levi responds that the saviour ‘loved her more than us’: “When Mary had said this, she fell silent (...) Andrew answered and said to the brethren, ‘Say what you wish to say about what she has said. I at least do not believe that the Savior said this. For certainly these teachings are strange ideas.’ Peter answered (...) ‘Did He really speak privately with a woman and not openly to us? Are we to turn about and all listen to her? Did He prefer her to us?’ Then Mary wept and said to Peter, ‘My brother Peter, what do you think? Do you think that I have thought this up myself in my heart, or that I am lying about the Savior?’ Levi answered and said to Peter, ‘Peter you have always been hot tempered. Now I see you contending against the woman like the adversaries. But if the Savior made her worthy, who are you indeed to reject her? Surely the Savior knows her very well. That is why He loved her more than us.’” (Gospel of Mary)
6. FEMALE DISCIPLES
- Madgalene appears among the disciples in several texts, including The Dialogue of the Saviour, The Gospel of Philip and The Gospel of Mary (Magdalene)
- The First Apocalypse of James says that Jesus had seven women disciples. James: “Yet another thing I ask of you: who are the seven women who have been your disciples? And behold all women bless you.” (First Apocalypse of James 38:15) Unfortunately, Christ’s answer to this question breaks off at the end of the page.
- Two pages later, Christ says to James: “When you speak these words of this perception, encourage these four: Salome and Mariam and Martha and Arsinoe...” (First Apocalypse of James 40:22)
- In the Gospel of Thomas, Salome also appears as a disciple: “Jesus said: ‘Two will rest on a bed. The one will die, the other will live.’ Salome said: ‘(So) who are you, man? You have gotten a place on my couch as a stranger and you have eaten from my table.’ Jesus said to her: ‘I am he who comes from the one who is (always) the same. I was given some of that which is my Father’s.’ (Salome said:) ‘I am your disciple!’ (Jesus said:) ‘Therefore I say: If someone becomes like (God), he will become full of light. But if he becomes one, separated (from God), he will become full of darkness.’” (Gospel of Thomas saying 61)
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- DOUBLE-MINDEDNESS
- Those who contend against the Gnostics do not understand on account of their ‘double-mindedness’: “They do not know the power of God, nor do they understand the interpretation of the scriptures, on account of their double-mindedness.” (Testimony of Truth)
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- DRUNK
- The opposite of sober. ‘Sober’ describes a state equivalent to existence in the Upper Aeons. See SOBER.
- Hence, to be ‘drunk’ is to exist in the Lower Aeons.
- Lower aeonic existence is compared to drunkeness, desire, deception, forgetting, sleep and bitterness.
- Drunkeness as debauchery, forgetting, desire, greed and deception: “That one then will fall into drinking much wine in debauchery. For wine is the debaucher. Therefore she (the soul) does not remember her brothers and her father, for pleasure and sweet profits deceive her.” (Authoritative Teaching)
- Drunkeness as ignorance. It is the opposite of sober: “O soul, persistent one, be sober and shake off your drunkenness, which is the work of ignorance. If you persist and live in the body, you dwell in rusticity.” (Silvanus)
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- KISS
- The Elect, and all beings in the Upper Aeons, are a mulititude which share their origin in the One. The kiss is a ritual act which acknowledges this hidden unity.
- Hence, the Elect are like kisses. They are many, but kiss one another as a sign of their hidden unity: “Those which exist have come forth from the Son and the Father like kisses, because of the multitude of some who kiss one another with a good, insatiable thought, the kiss being a unity, although it involves many kisses.” (Tripart. tract)
- ‘The Assembly’ (the multitude who have emerged from the One) greet one another by embracing: “The whole multitude of those angels are called 'Assembly of the Holy Ones, the Shadowless Lights.' Now when these greet each other, their embraces become like angels like themselves.” (Eugnostos the Blessed)
- Through such a kiss, the angels in the Upper Aeons may engender more angels, with no loss of unity. See CONSORT.
- By kissing his disciples, the saviour initated them into an awareness of the unity of the Upper Aeons, and that they were a part of that unity.
- Hence, Jesus kisses his disciple James before revealing the hidden gnosis: James: “And he kissed my mouth. He took hold of me, saying, ‘My beloved! Behold, I shall reveal to you those things that (neither) the heavens nor their archons have known.’” (Second Apocryphon of James)
- A kiss is also a form of spiritual union which replaces sexual intercourse. While others (the Psychics and Hylics) beget offspring ‘in a natural way’ (i.e. through sexual intercourse), the perfect (the Pneumatics) ‘conceive and give birth’ to their offspring ‘by a kiss’: “All who are begotten in the world are begotten in a natural way (...But) it is by a kiss that the perfect conceive and give birth. For this reason we also kiss one another. We receive conception from the grace which is in one another.” (Gospel of Philip)
- The kiss becomes a form of ‘spiritual intercourse’ to increase the number of the Elect. Through a ritual kiss, they initiate new members into their community of unity.
- The saviour often kissed Mary Magdalene: “And the companion of the (saviour is) Mary Magdalene. (He) loved her more than all the disciples, and used to kiss her often on her mouth. The rest of the disciples (were displeased by this). They said to him ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Saviour answered and said to them, ‘Why do I not love you like her? When a blind man and one who sees are both together in darkness, they are no different from one another. When the light comes, then he who sees will see the light, and he who is blind will remain in darkness.’” (Gospel of Philip)
- According to the Christian-Gnostic interpretation, Mary Magdalene is the paradigm of the fallen and redeemed soul (‘the lost sheep’). Hence, the saviour kissed her to acknowledge that she belonged with the saved and the Elect.
- According to Valentinian Gnostic interpretation, Jesus and Mary Magdalene are the male and female offspring of the divided Adam and Eve. The heavenly Christ and Sophia are also divided: they are two consorts of one androgynous being which separated when Sophia fell from the Upper Aeons at the beginning of time. In the end, Christ will descend to redeem Sophia, unite with her, and repair their separation. Hence, Jesus kisses Magdalene to secretly reveal the anticipated mystery (the union of Christ and Sophia) here in the Lower Aeons. See CONSORTS.
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- LANGUAGE
- From the Gnostic perspective, the language we have inherited is misleading. The stories, words and images that have come to us through the Bible are, in fact, the creation of the Archons, and exist to deceive us: “The twelve prophets were laughingstocks, since they have come forth as imitations of the true prophets. They came into being as counterfeits through the Hebdomad (i.e. Seven Archons)” (Second Treatise of the Great Seth)
- The Second Treatise of the Great Seth goes on to say that Adam, Abraham, David, Solomon and Moses were all ‘laughingstocks’ or ‘jokes’ - since the story of the Fall and the trials of the Chosen People are all false.
- Therefore, the Gnostics must invent a new language. The saviour descends ‘below the Archons’ language’ to speak a new revelation. Protennoia: “I am the first one who descended (...) And I spoke, I, together with the Archons and Authorities. For I had gone down below their language, and I spoke my mysteries to my own - a hidden mystery - and the bonds and eternal oblivion were nullified.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- The Gnostics used language subversively, by re-writing and inversing the existing stories such as ‘the Fall of Adam’ or ‘Moses and the Flood’. See for example The Apocalypse of Adam.
- The Gnostics incorporated new imagery, particularly of a saviour-revealer, from the non-Christian ‘Sethian’ sources (which may have been a radical sect of Judeans).
- The Gnostics also incorporated conceptual terminology from Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, Hermeticism etc. into a Christian context.
- Finally, they re-wrote gospels, attributing them to the apostles. See GOSPELS.
- In the end, they created a new language and cosmology, to express unity (the One) underlying a radical dualism (the Upper and Lower Aeons).
- In this new language and cosmology, the One is 'ineffable' and so, beyond naming, indeed, beyond language. It is a mystery.
- The One exists 'in silence' (sige). The aeons around him are also called the Silence. See AEONS.
- The Son, as a manifestation of the Father, is called 'the Word' (logos). See WORD. He bears the hidden name of the Father: “Now the name of the Father is the Son. It is he who first gave a name to the one who came forth from him (...) For indeed, the Father's name is not spoken, but (rather,) it is apparent through a Son.” (Gospel of Truth 38:7) See NAME.
- In the Trimorphic Protennoia, a Trinity emerges, with its three aspects related to language: the Voice, Speech, and Word. These relate, respectively, to the Father, Mother and Son: “(There are) three permanences: the Father, the Mother, the Son. Existing perceptibly as Speech, it (Voice) has within it a Word...” (Trimorphic Protennoia) See TRINITY.
- Since pneuma means both ‘spirit’ and ‘breath’, then the Elect (who possess the pneuma) may ‘breath’ the spirit through the voice and through the word. In terms of the Trinity, they ‘speak the word through the voice’. Protennoia: “It is through me that the Voice originated, and it is I who put the breath (pneuma) within my own.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
- The manifestation of breath is particularly clear when speaking certain vowels sequences: “Therefore we glorify thee: ma mo o o o eia ei on ei! The Aeon of Aeons!” (Trimorphic Protennoia). See NAMES.
- Certain Gnostic texts offer secret hidden names for the Father, the Son and, indeed, all beings in the Upper and Lower Aeons: “Really, truly, iEa aiO, in the heart, who exists, u aei eis aei, ei o ei, ei os ei (or: (Son) forever, You are what you are, You are who you are)! This great name of yours is upon me, O self-begotten Perfect one, who is not outside me.” (Gospel of the Egyptians) See NAMES.
- In this manner, the Gnostic language preserves the mystery in the silence.
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- LISTEN
- Since the Gnostic language (see LANGUAGE) preserves its revelation in a mystery, one must ‘listen’ and hear hidden meanings in each word.
- Hence, Jesus repeatedly urges his disciples to ‘listen’:
- Jesus to James: “I proclaim to you to tell you these (words) that I shall speak. When you hear, therefore, open your ears and understand” (Second Apocryphon of James)
- Jesus to James: “You are the one to whom I say: Hear and understand - for a multitude, when they hear, will be slow witted. But you, understand as I shall be able to tell you.” (Second Apocryphon of James)
- Jesus to James: “Behold, I speak in order that I may come forth. Pay attention to me in order that you may see me!” (Second Apocryphon of James)
- To truly listen and understand the saviour is to ‘drink from his mouth’: “He who will drink from my mouth will become like me. I myself shall become he, and the things that are hidden will be revealed to him.” (Gospel of Thomas 108)
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- NAMES
1. NAMES IN GENERAL
- Naming has ontological power. Whatever is named comes to exist.
- This began in the Upper Aeons, when the silent and unnameable One named itself, thus extending its existence through the Upper Aeons.
- It continued in the Lower Aeons, when Yaltabaoth named his Archons.
- In Gnosticism, it was important to know (gnosis) the names of all the beings in the Upper and Lower Aeons. This knowledge was necessary for the resurrection and ascent through the aeons.
- The saviour revealed the names of all the aeons.
- The saviour also revealed the ‘hidden’ names and how to pronounce them.
- This knowledge was revealed to the Elect during the preparatory rites of the baptism.
- During the baptism, the catechumen also received a baptismal name.
2. BEFORE NAMING WAS THE SILENCE
- The One is unnameable: “Thou art one (...) How shall we give thee a name? We do not have it, For thou art the existence of them all.” (Three Steles of the Great Seth)
- Hence, the One is called ‘the Father whose name cannot be uttered’ (Gospel of the Egyptians). He is ‘the unproclaimable Father’ or ‘the silent Silence’. (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- As ‘the ineffable One, he dwells in the silence: “the Ineffable One who dwells in the Monad. He dwells alone in silence.” (Valentinian Exposition.)
- His aeons that surround him are also called ‘the silence’ (Gospel of the Egyptians). The aeons are “...the Silence that surrounds every one of them.” (Trimorphic Protennoia 35:34)
3. THE ONE CREATED THE UPPER AEONS BY NAMING
- The One created the Upper Aeons by naming itself in the silence. Each Upper Aeonic being possesses a name by which the One named itself: “This one, however, stretched himself out and it was that which he stretched out which gave a foundation and a space and a dwelling place for the universe, a name of his being” (Tripartite Tractate)
- This began with the trinity of the Father, Mother and Son: “Three powers came forth from him; they are the Father, the Mother, (and) the Son, from the living silence.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- It is particularly the Son who bears the unspeakable name of the Father: “Now the name of the Father is the Son. It is he who first gave a name to the one who came forth from him, who was himself, and he begot him as a son. He gave him his name, which belonged to him.” (Gospel of Truth) For the names of the Son, see below.
- As the Word, the Son possesses the name (of the Father): “(This is) the Son who is perfect in every respect - that is, the Word who originated through that Voice; who proceeded from the height; who has within him the Name.” (Trimorphic Protennoia)
4. YALTABAOTH CREATED THE LOWER AEONS BY NAMING
- Like the Upper Aeons, the Lower Aeons were created by naming.
- Yaltabaoth named himself ‘God’. He then named the Archons, bringing them and their aeons into existence: “But Yaltabaoth had a multitude of faces (...) Because of the power of the glory he possessed of his mother's light, he (Yaltabaoth) called himself God. (...) And when he spoke it happened. And he named each power beginning with the highest: the first is (...) Athoth; the second is (...) Eloaio; and the third is (...) Astraphaio (then Yao, Sabaoth, Adonein and Sabbateon). And these have a firmament corresponding to each aeon-heaven.” (Apocryphon of John)
- In another version, Yaltabaoth names his Archons ‘by means of verbal expression’, which are vowel sequences: “Next, the ruler (Yaltabaoth) had a thought - consistent with his nature - and by means of verbal expression he created an androgyne. He opened his mouth and cooed to him. When his eyes had been opened, he looked at his father, and he said to him, ‘Eee!’ Then his father called him Eee-a-o ('Yao'). Next he created the second son. He cooed to him. And he opened his eyes and said to his father, ‘Eh!’ His father called him 'Eloai'. Next, he created the third son. He cooed to him. And he opened his eyes and said to his father, ‘Asss!’ His father called him 'Astaphaios'” (On the Origin of the World)
5. MALE AND FEMALE NAMES
- Since the angels in the Upper Aeons and the Archons in the Lower Aeons are androgynes (see ANDROGYNE), they each have a male and female name, which is the name of each consort or ‘syzygy’ in the androgyne (see CONSORT). This began with the One that named itself Father and Mother, then extended through all the aeons.
- All the androgynous angels in the Upper Aeons have male and female names: “In the beginning, he (the One) decided to have his likeness become a great power. Immediately, the principle (or beginning) of that Light appeared as Immortal Androgynous Man. His male name is 'Begotten, Perfect Mind'. And his female name is 'All-wise Begettress Sophia'. It is also said that she resembles her brother and her consort.” (Eugnostos the Blessed)
- The androgynous Archons in the Lower Aeons have male and female names: “Seven appeared in chaos, androgynous. They have their masculine names and their feminine names.” (On the Origin of the World)
6. THE ONTOLOGICAL POWER OF NAMING
- Naming has ontological power: by pronouncing the name, it comes to exist: “What exists, exists through that name,” (Tripartite Tractate 61:12)
- The aeons came to exist through their names: “And he established the four aeons. With a word he established them.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- Hence, the Father ‘brings about existence’ by naming: “But the Father is perfect, knowing every space within him. If he wishes, he manifests whomever he wishes, by giving him form and giving him a name, and he gives a name to him, and brings it about that those come into existence who, before they come into existence, are ignorant of him who fashioned them.” (Gospel of Truth)
7. NAMING AS KNOWLEDGE OF SECRET NAMES
- One aspect of the gnosis is to know the names of the beings in the Upper and Lower Aeons.
- The Father gave his name to those whom he had created, so they would know him: “in order that they might recognize (i.e. know) who is the Father who exists for them, he gave them the name ‘Father’” ( Tripartite Tractate 61:12)
- However, there are ‘revealed’ names and ‘hidden’ names: “’Jesus’ is a hidden name, ‘Christ’ is a revealed name. (...) ‘The Nazarene’ is he who reveals what is hidden.” (Gospel of Philip)
- Some of the names (‘words’) were not written down, but were communicated secretly (probably in the baptismal rite): “they (the Elect) will be known up to the great aeons, because the words they have kept, of the God of the aeons, were not committed to the book, nor were they written.” (Apocalypse of Adam)
- The initiate may have learned the names of the Upper Aeonic beings by repeatedly ‘invoking’ them. Such is the case in Melchizedek, in which these beings are repeatedly invoked with the formula: “Holy are you, Holy are you, Holy are you, (____), for ever and ever, Amen.” (Melchizedek)
8. SECRET NAMES OF THE UPPER AND LOWER AEONS
- The ‘renunciation’ and the ‘invocation’ formed part of the baptismal rite (see FIVE SEALS). The purpose of the ‘renunciation’ was to learn the secret names of the Archons in the Lower Aeons, while the purpose of the ‘invocation’ was to learn the secret names of the angels in the Upper Aeons: “But from now on, through the incorruptible man Poimael, and they who are worthy of (the) invocation (and) the renunciations of the five seals in the spring-baptism, these will know their receivers as they are instructed about them, and they will know them (or: be known) by them. These will by no means taste death.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
- After death, the soul would rise up through the aeons, with the hope of attaining eternal existence in the Upper Aeons. But first, it had to pass by the seven archons of the Lower Aeons. The archons could prevent the soul’s passage and throw it back down to earth, where it would be re-incarnated in another body. See RESURRECTION.
- Part of the preparation for the baptismal rite was to learn the names and signs that would render the archons powerless, and allow the soul to pass beyond them.
- When Yaltabaoth created the archons, he did so by naming them into existence (see above). But the archons ‘have two names’. A second name was given to them by the Father (here called ‘the glory which belongs to heaven’) in order to ‘render them powerless’: “They (the archons) were given names according to the glory which belongs to heaven (i.e. the Father) for the destruction of the powers. And in the names which were given to them by their Originator (i.e. Yaltabaoth), there was power. But the names which were given them according to the glory which belongs to heaven (i.e. the Father) mean for them destruction and powerlessness. Thus they have two names.” (Apocryphon of John 12:26)
- As ‘the Word’, the saviour descended with the hidden names of the archons and secretly revealed them to his disciples: “Now the Word (Logos) that is superior to all beings was sent for this purpose alone: that he might proclaim the unknown. He said, ‘There is nothing hidden that is not apparent, and what has not been recognized will be recognized.’ And these were sent to make known what is hidden, and the seven authorities of chaos and their impiety. And thus they were condemned to death.” (On the Origin of the World 125:14, c.f. Mk 4:22)
- The saviour (Seth) brought ‘invisible secret symbols’ which are revealed during the ‘renunciation’ and ‘invocation’ in the baptismal rite: “He (the saviour Seth) passed through the three parousias (...) to save her (the race) who went astray, through invisible, secret symbols, through (...) the baptism, (...) through the renouncing of the world, and the god of the thirteen aeons (i.e. the Archons), and (through) the convocations of the saints and the ineffable ones (i.e. the angels).” (Gospel of the Egyptians 63:4)
- Hence, the saviour ‘opened the path’ to the Upper Aeons. He taught them the archons’ secret names (‘you have mastered every word on earth’), so that they need not fear the archontic gate-keepers as they raise up through the Lower Aeons: “The Savior said to his disciples, ‘(...) when I came, I opened the path, and I taught them about the passage which they will traverse, the elect and solitary, who have known the Father (...). When the time of dissolution arrives, the first power of darkness (i.e. archon) will come upon you. Do not be afraid! (...) If you are going to be afraid of what is about to come upon you, it will engulf you. For there is not one among them who will spare you or show you mercy. But in this way, look at (the archon without fear), since you have mastered every word on earth. (...) The crossing place is fearful before you. But you, with a single mind, pass it by!’” (Dialogue of the Saviour)
- In a fragmentary text, James asks the Lord ‘what word he must say’ to escape the Archons during his ascent. James: “But I have become afraid before them, since they rule. For what will they do? What will I be able to say? Or what word will I be able to say that I may escape them?’ The Lord said, ‘James, (...) do not be concerned for anything else except your redemption. For behold, I shall complete this destiny upon this earth as I have said from the heavens. And I shall reveal to you your redemption.’” (First Apocryphon of James)
9. NAMES SPOKEN WITH THE TONGUE OF FLESH AND WITH THE TONGUE OF THE FATHER
- As was stated above, the name of the Father ‘cannot be uttered’ and ‘dwells in the silence’.
- From the Father came a series of ‘unutterable’ names which exist ‘in the silence’: “And every name came into existence from the Father whether unutterable, or imperishable (...) every name which is in the silence, all of which came into existence from the Father.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- These are called the ‘unutterable names’: “And in the midst of the immeasurable deep there are five powers which are called by these unutterable names: 1. The first is called love', (etc)” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex)
- These ‘unutterable names’ cannot be spoken with ‘a tongue of flesh’: “Indeed, to speak of him with a tongue of flesh, of the manner in which he exists, is an impossibility.” (Untitled Text in the Bruce Codex) “They blessed him (the Anthropos) in songs of praise which were ineffable and unutterable by tongues of flesh” (Untitled Bruce)
- Hence, the unutterable names are not spoken ‘with the tongue of flesh’. Rather, they are ‘spoken with the tongue of the Father’: “The true God will be called Jeu, the father of all the Jeus; his name in the tongue of my Father is this: ...” (First Book of Jeu).
10. THE SILENT BREATH PASSING THROUGH VOICE, SPEECH AND WORD
- To speak ‘with the tongue of the Father’ is to mysteriously utter the unutterable names. This is done through ‘the silent breath’.
- The Trimorphic Protennoia develops a schema which begins with ‘the breath’ which exists in ‘the silence’, and then moves through ‘voice’ to ‘speech’ and ‘word’ (or ‘name’).
- Since pneuma means both ‘spirit’ and ‘breath’, the silent ‘spirit’ may be ‘breathed out’ through the ‘voice’ until it becomes manifest in ‘speech’ and ‘word’.
- The ineffable One is the spirit which exists in the silence. It then becomes manifest as the Father (voice), Mother (speech) and Son (word): “(There are) three permanences: the Father, the Mother, the Son. Existing perceptibly as Speech, it (Voice) has within it a Word (...) They exist in the manner of Three (...) secretly within a silence of the Ineffable One” (Trimorphic Protennoia) See TRINITY.
- Since the Elect possess the pneuma, they may ‘breath’ the silent spirit through voice, speech and word. In terms of the Trinity, the spirit within them gives them the silent breath which passes through the voice to speak the word. Protennoia: “It is through me that the Voice originated, and it is I who put the breath (pneuma) within my own (i.e. within the Elect).” (Trimorphic Protennoia 45:27)
- Although the breath has a voice to speak through the word, it remains a ‘hidden voice’ which preserves the silent spirit in the breath: “I am a Voice speaking softly. I exist from the first. I dwell within the Silence that surrounds every one of them. And it is the hidden Voice that dwells within me, (...) within the immeasurable Silence.” (Trimorphic Protennoia 35:32)
- Through the pneuma in them, the Elect may speak the hidden, unutterable names which no one else can pronounce. This is the sense of the phrase: “They blessed him in songs of praise which were ineffable and unutterable by tongues of flesh...” (Untitled Text in Bruce Codex)
- As was stated above, there are ‘hidden’ and ‘revealed’ names. The Archons in particular have ‘two names’, one which was spoken by Yaltabaoth to create them, and one which was spoken by the Father to render them powerless.
- The saviour taught these hidden names to his disciples and the Elect. But, he also taught them how to pronounce the hidden names, by breathing the spirit through them.
11. COMBINING VOWELS AND CONSONANTS IN SECRET NAMES
- There are many secret or hidden names in the Gnostic texts. Most of the names for the beings from the Upper Aeons contain long vowel sequences, with a notable absence of consonants. The Elect utter the ‘unutterable names’ and sing ‘ineffable songs of praise’ by releasing the pneumatic breath through the long vowel sequences. In this way, the hidden names are ‘spoken with the tongue of the Father’ and their secrets are preserved in the silence.
- By contrast, the names for beings in the Lower Aeons contain consonants as well as vowels. These consonants are ‘spoken with the tongue of flesh’.
- Through the combinations of consonants and vowels in their names, the Archons have ‘two names which create a single name’: “He it is (Adamas) who is within all of the Adams, possessing the thought of Norea, who speaks concerning the two names which create a single name.” (The Thought of Norea 28:30)
- In the Gnostic text Marsanes, a hierarchy of sounds in names is created. This hierarchy puts vowels above consonants.
- Although the text of Marsanes is extremely fragmented, the following schema arises. There are the long or double vowels, called ‘dipthongs’ (which are superior), the short or semi-vowels, called ‘vowels’ (which are intermediate), and the voiceless consonants, called ‘oxytones’ (which are inferior).
- Note: in ancient Greek, there are seven vowels. In our Latin script, the vowels ‘eta’ and ‘omega’ are denoted by capitals (or a bar over top). Hence, the seven Greek vowels are:
- a - alpha
- e - epsilon
- E - eta
- i - iota
- o - omicron
- u - upsilon
- O - omega
- In Marsanes, the simple or short vowels are: eee, iii, ooo, uuu, OOO
- The simple or short vowels are ‘similarly’ listed as: aaa, eee, EEE, iii, ooo, uuu, OOO, OOO, OOO
- From these simple or short vowels, the long or double vowels, called diphthongs, are made. The diphthongs are: ai, au, ei, eu, Eu, ou, Ou, oi, Ei, ui, Oi, auei, euEu, oiou, ggg, ggg, ggg, aiau, eieu, Eu, oiou, Ou, ggg, ggg, aueieu, oiou, Eu.
- In the following passage, the hierarchy of long or double vowels (dipthongs), then short or simple vowels (vowels), and finally consonants (oxytones) is established. These sounds are then ‘combined’ to constitute ‘the nomenclature of the gods and the angels (i.e. archons): “But know that the oxytones (i.e. voiceless consonants) exist among the (short or single) vowels, and the diphthongs (long or double vowels) which are next to them. But the short ( or single vowels) are inferior, and the [...] are [...] by them. Those that [...], since they are intermediate [...]. The sounds of the (short) semivowels are superior to the voiceless (consonants). And those that are double (the long vowels or dipthongs) are superior to the (short) semivowels, which do not change. But the aspirates (short and long vowels) are better than the inaspirates (of) the voiceless (consonants). And those that are intermediate (short vowels) will accept their combination in which they are (...)
- Marsanes says that he has revealed certain aspects of the mystery, but remained silent concerning others. These ‘were taught’ (in the preparations for the baptismal rite?): “With regard to them, they were not allowed to reveal the whole topic, but only those things that are apparent. You (pl.) were taught about them, that you should perceive them” (Marsanes)
12. THE HIDDEN NAMES OF THE FATHER REVEALED THROUGH THE SON
- The Father’s ‘invisible’ name cannot be spoken, but is ‘revealed’ through the Son: “Now the name of the Father is the Son. It is he who first gave a name to the one who came forth from him, who was himself, and he begot him as a son. He gave him his name, which belonged to him; he is the one to whom belongs all that exists around him, the Father. His is the name; his is the Son. It is possible for him to be seen. The name, however, is invisible, because it alone is the mystery of the invisible, which comes to ears that are completely filled with it by him. For indeed, the Father's name is not spoken, but (rather,) it is apparent through a Son.” (Gospel of Truth)
- In the Book of Jeu, the ‘true God’ is called ‘Jeu’ (from ‘Jesus’): “The true God will be called Jeu, the father of all the Jeus; his name in the tongue of my Father is this.” (First Book of Jeu) Note: ‘Jeu’ is a mistranslation, and should be rendered through the five vowels ‘i-e-o-u’
- Parts of The Gospel of the Egyptians appear to be instructional texts or hymns sung aloud in preparation for the baptismal rite. In one baptismal hymn, the name IEOU appears as a long vowel sequence. Through these vowels, the spirit was breathed out to pronounce the unpronounceable name of the Father, as manifest in the name of the Son, iEou e aO:
“And the throne of his glory was established (...)
on which his unrevealable name
is inscribed, on the tablet [...]
the word,
the Father of the light of everything,
he who came forth from the silence,
while he rests in silence,
he whose name
is in an invisible symbol.
A hidden, invisible mystery came forth:
iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
oooooooooooooooooooooo
uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
And in this way,
the three powers gave praise
to the great, invisible, unnameable,
virginal, uncallable Spirit”
(Gospel of the Egyptians)
- Following the Trimorphic Protennoia, ‘the three powers’ would be the Voice, Speech and Word, which express the pneuma ‘Spirit’ through the breath.
- According to Bentley, the long vowel sequences spell out the name of the Son, ‘iEou’, followed by ‘e’ meaning ‘five’ (the Son as the Fifth Light?), followed by ‘a’ for alpha, and ‘O’ for omega (the ‘alpha and omega’ as ‘the beginning and the end’). Through this formula, all seven Greek vowels are pronounced to ‘give praise’ to the ‘unnameable Spirit’.
13. BAPTISMAL NAMES
- During the baptismal rite, the catechumen received a holy name. That name was ‘inscribed’ in the watery light of the Upper Aeons. Henceforth, the Father would ‘name himself’ through that name. See BAPTISM.
- The baptismal name inscribed in the water: “And
- The baptismal name inscribed in light: “...in order that he may inscribe your name in our great light” (Concept Great Power)
- The race of the Elect are those whose names are inscribed in the Upper Aeons and ‘written in the Book of the Living’: “Those who are to receive teaching are the living, who are inscribed in the book of the living.” (Gospel of Truth) “Those whose name he knew in advance were called at the end, so that one who has knowledge is the one whose name the Father has uttered.”(Gospel of Truth) See BOOK OF THE LIVING.
- The baptismal name was a ‘spiritual name’ in contrast to the name given at birth, which was a ‘name in the flesh’. At the end of The Gospel of the Egyptians, the author reveals his name ‘in spirit’ as Eugnostos and his name ‘in the flesh’ as Gongessos: “The Gospel of the Egyptians. The God-written, holy, secret book. Grace, understanding, perception, and prudence be with him who has written (i.e. copied) it - Eugnostos the beloved, in the Spirit - in the flesh, my name is Gongessos - and my fellow lights in incorruptibility.” (Gospel of the Egyptians)
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