Ed. Please note that the title was edited, to focus more on the esoteric traditions within Christianity. The esoteric ones may have influenced the exoteric ones, and the interplay is probably important, possibly within the organisational structure. Also, the esoteric traditions focus on inner development, and draw upon ideas from other sources beyond Western philosophy.

I would retract my earlier recs except for Light From Light than. That's a pretty good reader of the whose who in Christian mysticism. It tends to be more orthodox thinkers, but not confined to any one tradition. It has Origen, the Cappadocian Fathers, Augustine, Francis of Assisi, Teresa of Avila, Eckhart, etc. Google has some of the sections for free in a preview. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Light_from_Light/HlV06UetdzwC

Most of this stuff is free online in tons of places, so the main benefit is just the introductions and selection of excerpts here. A bunch of the originals are here in full: https://www.sacred-texts.com/chr/ , which is a great resource. It has the Cloud of Unknowing, etc. It has fewer texts that are considered more "orthodox," but it's not hard to find Augustine or the Cappadocians, etc. online in any event.

E.g., Augustine's big mystical (Neoplatonic-flavored) vision is documented in Book IX of his autobiography/prayer/philosophy text, the Confessions. Although his main theological text, De Trinitate, is surprisingly mystical and psychological, guiding the reader through a dialectical reading.

Gnostic texts are all available at Gnosis.org . The main benefit of Pagel's Gnostic Bible (best print edition I've found) is the introductions and the addition of Cathar works and Muslim "Gnostic-flavored" texts, as well as some texts from Hermeticism. Pagel's has some interesting stuff on how the Gospel of John can be seen as a "Gnostic" text, and how Valentinian Gnostics read I Corinthians as a Gnostic text, but TBH, I think this only works if we stretch the definition of "Gnostic" so broadly that it makes most of the Patristics, even the main developers of Nicean orthodoxy, into "Gnostics."



"He: Understanding Masculine Psychology," has a good Jungian analysis of the Grail myth from one of Jung's students. It's very short too. The same author also has similar works of Faust, and some other myths.

Similarly, Sanford has "The Man Who Wrestled with God," Jungian analyses of characters in Genesis, although I didn't like these quite as much.




With the exception of the Gospel of Thomas, which isn't "Gnostic" in the sense of embracing a demiurge tradition, having reference to Sophia, etc., the Gnostic texts date to a period after Christianity had spread throughout the Mediterranean and appear significantly after the writing of the canonical books of the NT or non-canonical, but widely used texts like the Shepard of Hermas and Epistle of Barnabas.

In terms of attempts to reconstruct the "historical Jesus," these generally aren't taken seriously because they represent major departures from prior tradition at a later date. Moreover, most of the Gnostic textual traditions aren't so much focused on Jesus, as they are on rewriting the Old Testament, so they are post dated by an even larger amount here.

I find Gnosticism plenty interesting, and we can always suppose that the "real" narrative of Jesus was very well suppressed for a long period following his life, but in general the idea that Jesus was a Gnostic is quite anachronistic as Gnosticism doesn't appear on the scene until later. Pagels, Quispel, Bauer, etc. seems to fall into the common trap of scholars who think their area of specialty can explain everything, with maximalist theses about the extent of Gnosticism in the early church that is essentially speculation given the dating of the texts we have. It's not unlike Magee, a specialist in esoterica, coming to the conclusion that Hegel was "primarily a hermetic author." This gets into the whole problem of publication bias in favor of unlikely findings.

In any event, we also have a veritable pleroma of different Jesuses in the orthodox tradition as well, with various levels of focus on the humanity of Jesus versus Christ's role as "the Logos," the Buddha-Jesus of far eastern Manicheanism, the Jesus that assiduously denies his divinity of the Koran, etc.

Claims to one narrative being "the real Jesus," miss the point I think. I'm inclined to agree with the polysemy of the Patristics and assume that divine revelation allows for different conceptualizations of the person of Jesus for different people, in different times, to suit their needs and this historical needs of an era.

The majority of the Bible is history, and if God works through history before Christ there is little reason to see why God shouldn't do so after. Thus, an evolution in the faith, with various strands of interpretation moving through a dialectical process, doesn't seem out of line with the core tenents of the faith. Indeed, I think this realization is why Christianity has such a larger history of producing speculative/philosophical histories than other faiths, from Eusebius and those who followed his utopian vision of progress based on Isiah 2 (Ambrose, Jerome, etc.), to Augustine's "City of God," to Hegel.

As one example I take to be blatant, and not very controversial by comparison to many other possible observations: Whereas what we know about Jesus from various sources (the Gnostic Gospels very much included) doesn’t present Jesus as expressing or engaging in many hypocrisies, I know of no institutionalized religion that has historically been more hypocritical than Christianity. This of itself can substantiate that the principles taught by Jesus are by in large diametrically opposite to the larger sum of principles upheld by Christianity in general.

This is going to be true for any large historical organization versus the life of an individual. The same difference exists between the stories of the lives of various saints or non-Christian holy men and the organizational faiths in which they exist. I don't think we should expect any human organization of significant size to be "filled with saints." I am not aware of such a thing ever existing. This gets to the idea that the Church is a place for those who are sick, not those who are already well.

More cynically, it is easier to air brush the history of one person than the history of an organization, especially when people are fighting to control said organization.

Christianity didn't just wipe out paganisms, it also wiped out Christianity - forms of it that weren't seen as being in the service of the dominant account

This is true, but I feel like there is a tendancy the vastly understate the differences that existed within orthodoxy itself. When people were arguing with Pleagius and the Pleagians they were still all inside the "catholic," church. Gnostics also operated inside the church for a while and essentially gnostic (if we take a broad definition) teachings remain in the mainstream within Origen, Pseudo Dionysus, etc. Meanwhile, some of the splits and suppressions were between groups that were theologically virtually identical. E.g., the Donatists were essentially Catholics who had a disagreement about the apostolic succession. Granted, there were differences, because Northwest African Christianity was more "fundamentalist/realist," both Donatists and non-Donatist, while Greek Christianity was less superstitious and more Neoplatonist by this point. Even prior to Christianity, you have highly allegorical readings of the OT with folks like Philo co-existing within Judaism as well.

Likewise, movements similar to those of the Cathars/Albagensians, Bogomils, Hussites, etc. existed without reaching the level of open schism in many cases.

In this way, I am suggesting that a fuller critique of the Christian worldview is important in philosophy, especially as the perspective shaped so much Western thinking, including the foundations of science, especially the ideas of Kant and Descartes. Any thoughts? — Jack Cummins

Christianity is a remarkable hodgepodge of preexisting religious, philosophical, social and cultural beliefs popular in the ancient Mediterranean world, but unusual for its intolerance and exclusivity, which came to thrive after it was absorbed into the Roman imperial state. I doubt there is anything original or unique about it; even its exclusive nature may be said to be derived from Judaism.

To the extent it's worldview made any contribution to Western thinking and science, it did so by way of ancient pagan thought which it borrowed so much from (the fact that pagan thought wasn't a very good fit with Christian doctrine was largely ignored, which is to say that the claim Jesus was God was ignored when convenient). The Renaissance and the Enlightenment owed much more to pre-Christian Greece and Rome that they did to Christ, Scripture or the Church Fathers.

Some of this may come down to scholarship, but it is likely that there are gaps here, which may reflect biases in theology, as well as the political aspects of the development of the Christian Church. This may say alot in itself, but it does make it hard to put the missing jigsaw pieces together coherently. — Jack Cummins

I'm not a scholar of religion, but I have some general ideas about how the Christian religion developed. For example : if Jesus had survived his crucifixion, Christianity, as we know it today, probably would never have emerged. Jesus seemed to intend only to revive the crumbling Jewish religion with messianic motivation. But after his death, other motives were promoted by some of his followers. Their ideas ranged from personalized synagogue Judaism, to nationalized temple Judaism, to monkish retreats like the Essenes, and to abstract philosophical thinkers such as the Gnostics.

However, the most important factor in spawning a completely new popular religion was the political power of the Roman Empire. It was emperor Constantine, who by imperial fiat converted a minor Jewish sect --- appealing mostly to the oppressed underclasses meeting in modest homes --- into a majestic imperial religion --- congregating in awe-inspiring sky-scraping gold-encrusted cathedrals. Then, in order to unify all the divided streams of Jesus/Judaism sectarianism, Roman church leaders surveyed the range of then current beliefs & practices --- circa 300 AD --- in order to compile a compendium Bible that would best serve the interests of an imperial religion, and a world-spanning state.

Of course, the compilers of an official, emperor authorized, canon of God's Word --- beginning with the council at Nicea --- had to include the writings & doctrines of Paul, who single-handedly spread his version of the Gospel throughout the Roman empire. They also included John, who spiritualized the mundane mission & message of Jesus to make his humiliating death seem to be a victory instead of a defeat. Thus, giving new life to a moribund messianic revolution, whose inspirational leader, failed to rise from the grave as expected. It also replaced the martyred semi-divine messiah, with a living human political leader, whose religious role was appropriated from the Roman pagan political appointee*1, who ruled over all the various, mostly idol-worshiping religions of the empire. But, they excluded those writings that advocated skepticism & independent thinking.

Thus an isolated localized minor religion was transformed into a worldwide bastion of orthodoxy, with a novel hybrid theology, combining elements from Paganism, Gnosticism, Judaism, among others. Which may explain how adherents of the thousands of modern Christian sects can all claim to be faithful to the same Hebrew God that Jesus represented on Earth. The jigsaw puzzle of Christianity is held together by their common faith in the myth of a God, who came down to Earth to save mankind from the ravages of another God, whose mission is to make human life a living Hell*2. :smile:


*1. Why do they call the pope the pontiff?
It comes from the Latin 'pontifex” meaning any high or chief priest, a link or bridge builder between the people and the Almighty. Julius Caesar was called pontifex maximus 40 years before Jesus was born. After the time of Christ, the ancient Roman church had a college of pontiffs.
https://www.wytv.com/news/daybreak/pope-or-pontiff-both-are-correct/

*2. Sympathy for the Devil
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name, oh yeah
Ah, what's puzzling you
Is the nature of my game, oh yeah

:100:

:100:

As a matter of theological theses, the distinction between esoteric and exoteric are not easily separated. While the Valentinus group shared a room with the Pauline believers, they could agree that something was wrong with the world, and it needed fixing. The Augustinian acquisition of neo-platonism overlooks Plotinus rejecting that point of view.

So, there has long been the problem of how to reconcile the world as a perfect creation with the view of it as a place of struggle where the good guys could lose. This is still a critical question of existence, no matter what one might believe.

I find Kierkegaard's approach interesting in that his view of Love is not a necessary form of life but a weird addendum.

Pagel's has some interesting stuff on how the Gospel of John can be seen as a "Gnostic" text, and how Valentinian Gnostics read I Corinthians as a Gnostic text, but TBH, I think this only works if we stretch the definition of "Gnostic" so broadly that it makes most of the Patristics, even the main developers of Nicean orthodoxy, into "Gnostics." — Count Timothy von Icarus

I also mentioned Pagels. I have a book A Different Christianity, Robin Amis, which was drawn from the author’s research and experience residing at the famous Mt Athos Orthodox monastic complex. There's quite a bit of discussion of gnosis in that context.

Interestingly, I think that Indian philosophy provides something which might defuse the vexed relationship between 'pistis' (faith-based) and 'gnosis' in Western culture. I read Swami Vivekananda's books in my youth, and he talks about the various 'schools of yoga' (where 'yoga' signifies 'union' rather than the physical poses associated with yoga in Western culture.) There's raja, karma, bhakti, and Jñāna yoga (and I think a couple more). They are said to enable aspirants of different kinds and levels to relate to the Vedanta on their own level. Bhakti is devotional, of which the Hare Krishna sect was a famous example. And you can see a lot of resemblances between Indian Bhakti yogis and Southern European popular Catholicism (notwithstanding the cultural dissimilarities). Jñāna yoga is said to be the 'yoga of discerning wisdom' (the source of Vivekananda's name, as 'viveka' is Sanskrit for discernment). Raja was said to be the 'royal' yoga synthesising elements of all the schools. And so on. (I guess that the well-known modern gurus such as Ramana Maharishi would be Jñāna yogis. Also worth noting the linguistic connection between 'gnosis' and 'jñāna' as they come from the same Indo-European root.)

Likewise in East Asian Buddhism, there is the idea of the '84,000 (= a magic number) of "dharma doors"' through which the Dharma can be approached depending on the type of aspirant. (One of the volumes of Buddhist Abhidharma is called 'Types of Persons' - Buddhists have many of those kinds of categorial lists.) Another point is that in East Asian Buddhism, the most popular sect is Pure Land, which is aimed at attaining rebirth in the Western Paradise through faith in Amitabha (Buddha of Infinite Light). So that would correspond to the Bhakti cults of Hinduism, and also to the faith-based orientation of Christianity.

I think a case could be made that Christianity developed into a kind of faith-based autocracy at the expense of the other kinds of religious mentality that are represented in those variants that are found in Asian religions. Due to its universalising tendency, it really only validates and allows 'salvation by faith alone' (especially since Protestantism). The scholastic mystics, of course, also drew on and incorporated elements from (neo)platonism (via Pseudo-Dionysius and the Greek-speaking theologians). But then, many of the Scholastic mystics also flirted with, and were even accused of, heresy (e.g. Meister Eckhardt, St John of the Cross). That's why I've spent a lot of time re-tracing the steps, so to speak, to understand these stages of development in history of ideas. Christianity has ended up as a very 'all or nothing', 'our way or the highway' as a consequence of those developments - probably the reason why so many have sought out alternative religious models and conceptions from the East and elsewhere.

I appreciate the informed clarifications and corrections.

What’s your take on the Gospel of Mary? The text is dated 60 or so years after Jesus’s death, true. But it is often interpreted to present perspectives in keeping with the values of early Gnosticism (although Gnostic cosmology is not addressed in it). The differences there mentioned between Mary and Peter – which I so far take to point to a rift between, what was to become, full-fledged Gnosticism and orthodoxy – are also mentioned in other texts, including the Gospel of Thomas.

As to my view that Jesus and the Christian Church are in many ways antithetical, do you find reason to affirm the Jesus and/or his teachings are not in direct opposition to the stringent hierarchy of religious power which was to later become full-fledged Christianity? If so, I'd be interested to learn more of why you don't find a direct opposition between the two.

I have thought about your question of why I find symbolic understanding to be important. It is likely that I would not have found this if I had not been socialised into a religious perspective, especially the Judaeo- Christian one, and had to disentangle the concrete and the symbolic.

On the other hand, the symbolic aspects of understanding may span the different between logic and intuition, as well as the perspectives of the sciences and the arts. Bridges between these may be important in human understanding and meaning.

There may not be a clear distinction between the esoteric and the exoteric as it may be more dynamic. Even within the Bible the 'Gospel of John' and 'The Book of Revelation' are more esoteric and influenced by Gnosticism. It does come down to how reality is seen in many ways, especially the importance of inner reality. The distinction between the rituals of religion and the inner aspects of spiritual development are a tension, as well as that which is seen to be an overall approach for everyone to follow as religion and the more 'secret' aspects of initiation for some. However, it is probably extremely fluid.

I am glad that you raise the question of what happened to the historical Jesus, especially in regard to the resurrection. My own interest in uncovering the Grail tradition is in relation to this. It seems to be so important in understanding and disentangling facts and mythical ideas. The problem is so much literature, and trying to understand the historical agendas which are underlying them.

What you are saying about the relationship between Christianity and its roots in Judaism and the particular understanding of 'Jahweh' are important. It does seem the Judaic picture of reality is a vital part of this, especially the idea of human beings having an intimate personal relationship with God.

I have moved into an area populated by the Jewish community in a way which I have never encountered before, and do see this as an essential aspect for understanding the roots of the Christian worldview.

As the thread began on a general approach towards the deconstruction of Christianity, I may not have followed through with a clear picture of Gnosticism, as emerging in the Gnostic Gospels, which is an important area in itself.

It is a complex topic and one issue which I would raise is a puzzling passage in 'The Gospel of Thomas':
'Simon Peter said to them, ''Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life". Jesus said, "I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter into the kingdom of heaven'.

This passage may raise issues about gender but, basically, I don't think that it is about that entirely but about the idea of perfection versus bodily pleasures. This is where Gnosticism becomes complex in the question of acceptance or rejection of the body and sexuality. The Gnostics rejected the idea of 'body' as inferior to 'spirit'. This, in itself can be interpreted in many ways. So, I am asking here about what has been the influence of Gnosticism, especially in views about the role of sexuality in the development of Christian thinking?

It is interesting to think how the perspectives of Christianity came together. There are probably so many influences ranging from Egyptian ideas, Hermeticism as well as the diverse influences upon Judaism. The cross cultural influences are probably extremely important, especially the dialogue between Western and Eastern philosophy, as well as idealism and its many oppositions

The issue of Gnosticism and its impact and upon puritanical thinking and its opposition was an aspect which I was seeking to explore. However, this may have got lost as other threads on Christianity were created in its aftermath. Also, I wonder about the dialogue between Western and Eastern influences in thinking about sexuality, so I have created a new thread on religious perspectives in thinking about sexuality. This is aimed at going beyond the black and white thinking for and against Christianity, or other religious perspectives, and seeing more subtle shades. Gnosticism may be important here, in highlighting in between areas, especially in the thinking in areas between orthodoxy and heresy, which may be an enormous spectrum.

So, I am asking here about what has been the influence of Gnosticism, especially in views about the role of sexuality in the development of Christian thinking? — Jack Cummins

"Gnosticism" is a term that religion experts came up with to group together a collection of early Christian sects. A common feature is a divinity called Sophia, who falls out of heaven and spawns a blind god called Samael. This blind god is the creator of our world and you could say he's either evil or just insane. We might say insane because he doesn't mean to be evil. Samael and Yahweh are supposed to be the same guy.

German religion scholars used to be passionate about discovering the origin of the imagery in Gnostic Christianity and finally decided it was so far back as to be undiscoverable, especially when they discovered some similar imagery in Pacific Northwest native American religions, which would make the origin at least 10,000 years ago. Other scholars have claimed that trying to find an origin is a mistake, that these images bubble up from a common psychic substrate. This would be a kind of structuralism.

It's kind of hard to miss the powerful veins of feeling in the Grail stories, but those stories came from one French guy around the 12th Century. He was a professional story teller. Within 50 years of his death, there were Grail stories all over Europe, with each teller adding unique twists to it. I think we could compare it to science fiction fixtures in our world. Think about zombie apocalypse themes that have pervaded for the last decade or so. Those images are probably also appearing from lower levels of the psyche.

I'm less familiar with the Gospel of Mary, but IIRC scholars tend to think it was set down after the Gospel of John and the Pauline epistles due to seeming references. I think the earliest versions we have date to a good deal later.

I would think that this makes the date a bit flexible because, while Paul's letters can be dated fairly well, John cannot be, leaving a large window for it.

I do recall that scholars cautioned about reading later Gnosticism into the book simply because it had originally be found in its most complete form in a compilation of later Gnostic texts. This isn't surprising, as later Gnosticism still used canonical texts in many cases for exegesis and the Canon itself wasn't fully closed until after Gnosticism declined, although we see Canons being recommended from very early on (e.g. Origen).

In any event, I agree with Pagels assessment that John itself is a "Gnostic," Gospel, if we define Gnostic as: 'a form of Christianity with a focus on enlightenment/gaining special knowledge, and a strong undercurrent of Platonist and Stoic thought." The problem here is that I don't know if the term "Gnostic," is that instructive here, because this would seem to make Saint Augustine, the key figure of solidified Latin orthodoxy, a "Gnostic," as well, with his pansemiotic interpretation of reality and his highly Platonist cosmology.

My first in depth encounter with Gnosticism was a history that spoke of Christians who would read Euclid's elements in church and study the Stoics, following their conception of Logos Spermatikos, looking to peel back the curtain on reality. I found this intensely interesting. However, as I learned more about the early church, I realized this sort of description could as well be said of non-Gnostic theologians, e.g. Origen (granted he was condemned as a heretic, but only centuries later, and his works weren't suppressed), Ambrose, or Augustine.

So, it seems to me like the term Gnostic is more useful if we limit it to either traditions with Neoplatonic-like emanations, the Aeons (e.g. the Ogdoad) and the esoteric Hermetic-inspired systems that came with it, or simply to demiurge traditions, which are radically different from orthodoxy.

A similar problem comes up when we talk of "Protestantism." It's hard to talk about Anglicanism, Lutheranism, the Charismatic Movement (e.g. Pentacostals), Mormonism, Evangelicals, Quakers, Amish, Jehovah's Witnesses, Behemism, and Unitarians as anything like a unified movement outside of the purely historical sense. They have different Bibles to a degree, radically different doctrines, with some rejecting the Trinity and embracing a sort of Arianism, etc., and some won't use electricity.

I think the risk is that we can conflate the different types of "Gnostic," and confuse something like Sethian "Gnosticism," with its Yahweh as the demonic figure Yaldaboath, and its retelling of the Genesis story with a focus on Yaldaboath and his Archons gang raping Eve and spawning Cain, with the "Gnosticism ," of John, Paul, and Thomas. The former is anachronistic in the early church, not the least because it had no canonical Bible. Thus, the Hebrew scriptures weren't necessarily included, and you had efforts like the the Gospel of Maricon to compress the relevant story without the heavy reference to the OT.

Writing retellings of the OT only makes sense as a religious project once mainstream Christianity has come to accept the OT is canonical and begins building a systematic theology atop it though.

The tension with Peter shows up in Acts and in the Epistles as well. It's clear that Paul and Peter had a falling out, although it also appears like they likely made up and agreed to disagree. Paul has a more Greek oriented brand of Christianity, and more of the Gnostic themes, although without the hard dualism. Peter and James hew more closely to the Jewish tradition. John gives us a more Gnostic-like view, and also a more dualistic view akin to later Gnosticism (in the Johannine epistles, not the Gospel of John; these likely were written at different times, or even by different people). So, it makes sense that it shows up in non-cannonical early texts as well. Pseudepigrapha attributed to Peter seems to take his camp to a more hardline place.

I have no doubt these books influenced early doctrine. The Gospel of James, while not Canon, clearly had a huge influence on the veneration of Mary and the idea of perpetual virginity and immaculate conception. After all, there was no early Canon. Although it is also remarkable how quickly a core Canon congealed, with Hermas and Barnabas being the only two very widely cited books that get dropped in the NT.

As to my view that Jesus and the Christian Church are in many ways antithetical, do you find reason to affirm the Jesus and/or his teachings are not in direct opposition to the stringent hierarchy of religious power which was to later become full-fledged Christianity?

IDK. There are a lot of ways to read the Bible. It isn't a rule book, and it tells the same events in very different ways. I think there is definitely plenty of support in the Gospels for some sort of hierarchy, although most of how the "church," is supposed to work comes from Acts and the Epistles. These support the idea of an organized church and a leadership, but also a fairly flat, non-hierarchical structure. Paul is a leader in Acts, but not an official one, and he writes like someone doesn't want to get authority simply from formal authority in his letters (all the Epistle writers do, none lean on authority). The analogy of the Church as a body allows for some hierarchy and organization, there is a head, eyes, heart, etc., but we have times when our hands or teeth dictate behavior too (think of a toothache and how it guided us). First Corinthians lays out how different people have different gifts and different needs, and how flexibility is important.

So, the example of the Papacy does seem very far from that, but it's also worth noting that the Papacy of 200-500 is not really like what it evolved into. The Pope was originally a first among equals, like the Patriarch of Constantinople, but grew in the chaos left by the collapse of the Western Roman empire. Plus, the Roman Catholic Church still allows a huge amount of autonomy; it has to with its size. It had its own charismatic movement, people's liberation theology, simultaneous socialist and reactionary movements, etc. The churches hyperbolic power doesn't really show up until it bans marriage for priests in order to stop parishes from becoming hereditary fiefdoms. This was really a blow against the nobility.

The hierarchy can definetly be a negative thing, we have so many examples of that. But it also allowed the Church to be independent and stand up to recalcitrant elites on behalf of the common people. You have Ambrose forcing Emperor Theodocius to wear penitents garb after massacring civilians (and in one telling, crawling up the church stairs). You have Gregory VII forcing the Holy Roman Emperor to walk barefoot through the snow in a hair shirt for attempting to make the Church a political instrument. With power came corruption, but power also did allow the Church to intervene for the good in some cases (e.g. particularly rapacious lords being chastised by their clergy, the Pope stopping a war between Argentina and Chile in the 20th century, etc.). It seems like a sort of impossible balance, the need to wield temporal power but not be corrupted by it.

Last thing I'd add is that the undercurrents of Gnosticism never really go away. They just change shape to conform with orthodoxy and develop more. You see them in orthodox forms in Augustine or Eckhart, or flaring up is schisms like the Cathars. The Christian mystical tradition really keeps the core of Gnosticism, if not the demiurge tradition, quite alive. Even the esoteric system comes back by way of its influence on Judaism and the advent of Kabbalah later (Schloem is excellent on this), which then spreads back into Christianity in the Renaissance.

A very insightful reply. Thank you for it.

I recognize the distinction between inner and outer reality that you have drawn out. It seems to me that if one has a practice that keeps one alive and builds strength, it is not a program or a regime but being able to take advantage of an insight.

A capacity to act with a particular understanding rather than knowledge as reserved through devotion.
The most mystical versions are ostensive gestures.

I agree with Pagels assessment that John itself is a "Gnostic," Gospel, — Count Timothy von Icarus

In Beyond Belief, she actually says the opposite - that the Gospel of Thomas represents the gnostic schools, and the gospel of John the mainstream which won the political battle for dominance in the early Church leading to the banishment of Gnosticism under Iraneus and Tertullian. The Gospel of John emphasizes the divinity of Jesus Christ and the importance of belief in him as the path to salvation. It portrays Jesus as the eternal Word (Logos) of God who becomes flesh and reveals God's love and truth to humanity.

In contrast, the Gospel of Thomas is a collection of sayings attributed to Jesus, without a detailed narrative or reference to Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection. It leans more towards a wisdom-oriented approach, focusing on secret teachings and hidden knowledge that lead to spiritual enlightenment. The Gospel of Thomas is not concerned with the historical events of Jesus' life but rather with his teachings as a pathway to a higher understanding of oneself and the divine.

(Also interesting to note that after Jesus' ascension, the Apostle Thomas crossed the Indian Ocean and established one of the oldest continually-existing denominations of Christianity in Kerala on the western shores of India, where it is still extant to this day. Although I'll add that I do agree that demarcation of what is and isn't spefically gnostic is very challenging.)

Yeah, the Gnostic Paul and Gnostic John are sort of her big early theses. I am not surprised that she revised them. Despite being ancient history, gnostic scholarship is pretty rapidly developing due to new finds in the last 70 years or so, right up through the 2000s. I'd imagine Beyond Belief might benefit from that. I've only read her early stuff.

Beyond Belief was the first (actually I think only) book of Pagels that I read. At the time I had the view that the gnostic sects were trying to convey a kind of experiential spirituality which was much nearer to the kind of popular Eastern 'consciousness-raising' philosophies that we see today, than to mainstream 'Churchianity'. Indeed at the time I found a book by a Christian evangalist, 'Against the Modern Gnostics', which said that the upsurge of interest in consciousness philosophies was a kind of resurgent gnosticism (which I think is true although I was inclined to be more for it than against it.)

Although I should add that further reading on gnosticism - particularly Hans Jonas - dissolves the idea that they are kind of soft-edged new aged types. Ancient gnostic sects were fiercely ascetic and forbidding from our point of view.

There's a book, Ars Vitae: The Fate of Inwardness and the Return of the Ancient Arts of Living, by Elizabeth Lasch-Quinn, which you may find interesting. It addresses ancient Gnosticism, Stoicism and Epicureanism and discusses modern versions of them--efforts to renew them as an alternative to secular world views. I was impressed by her knowledge of the works of those who purport to be modern Stoics, including the loathsome Ryan Holiday (who seems to view Stoicism as a method to succeed in the world, particularly in business). I'm not that familiar with the works of Gnosticism, so can't tell how deeply she dives into that.

I am glad that you raise the question of what happened to the historical Jesus, especially in regard to the resurrection. My own interest in uncovering the Grail tradition is in relation to this. It seems to be so important in understanding and disentangling facts and mythical ideas. The problem is so much literature, and trying to understand the historical agendas which are underlying them. — Jack Cummins

As far as I can tell, the historical Jesus was a mundane locally-focused Jewish Messiah candidate --- whose socio-political mission was limited to reviving the self-image of the sifted sediment of Abraham's seed, then living under the heel of yet another oppressive Gentile empire. In which case, it's possible that the flesh & blood Jesus had a child with Mary, as later mythologized in the Holy Grail legends. But it's also likely that --- due to his ignominious end --- his revival mission would have disappeared in the dust of history, like all the other Jewish messiahs of the era*1.

However, as a spiritual incarnation of the one & only super-human God, in the form of a world-conquering Christ, the notion of carnal knowledge with a worldly woman would have clashed with the glorious mystical myth that Rome wanted to propagate. So, I suspect that any documentation of his physical lineage would have been suppressed by the Roman Bible editors, whose official agenda might be to separate the noble Roman Christ from his humble Jewish roots.

On the other hand, some practical-minded people seem to prefer a romantic-but-plausible mundane myth over barely-believable other-worldly sublime fantasies. For example, the dual-god gnarly-gnostic Cathars may have promoted a more down-to-earth fable of Jesus as a real royal king, who founded a genetic Jewish dynasty, doomed to propagate on the margins of Imperial Rome*2. Like our modern-day video games, sometimes our gritty fairy-tale heroes battle the forces of Evil as muscular underdogs, rather than as super-heroes with divine powers. :smile:


*1. Many Messiahs :
. . . . making Jesus of Nazareth the most widely followed and most famous Jewish Messiah claimant in human history. Aside from Christians, Muslims also believe that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah but not the Son of God. Aside from the New Testament, Jesus of Nazareth is allegedly mentioned by Josephus in the Antiquities of the Jews and by Tacitus in his Annals.
Several Jewish rebels and military leaders lived in the 1st century, including Judas of Galilee, Theudas, Simon of Peraea, and Athronges, all of whom are only documented by Josephus in surviving accounts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Jewish_messiah_claimants

*2. What is the difference between Cathars and Catholics?
The main difference between Cathars and Catholics is their beliefs about creation. Catholics commonly understand the creation of the world to be good before it was corrupted, while Cathars believed that the world was created by an evil force.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/cathars-overview-history-beliefs-catharism.html

There's a book, Ars Vitae: The Fate of Inwardness and the Return of the Ancient Arts of Living, by Elizabeth Lasch-Quinn, which you may find interesting. — Ciceronianus

The description on Amazon.com reminds me of Pierre Hadot's Philosophy as a Way of Life. Thanks anyway. :up:

I think it's similar in intent. The Latin portion of the title is taken from my daemon, Marcus Tullius Cicero, by the way: Philosophia est ars vitae (philosophy is the art of living.

So, in this context, I am raising the philosophy questions of how was Chrisianity was constructed, and may it be deconstructed? If the emphasis on the supernatural is demystified, how does the traditional stand as a philosophy and foundation for ethics? It may be connected to a belief in God and life after death, but these are components and how do they come together? — Jack Cummins

I feel the important point here is that it was constructed. That is, it is an invention of interpreters, not a Divine revelation direct to the Pope and his priests. This invention may easily be deconstructed in such a way that it makes sense, but to do so would require a good grasp of the Perennial philosophy. I'd put (upper-case) Gnosticism aside as a distraction and focus on (lower-case) gnosticism and Classical Christianity. . . .

In this way, I am suggesting that a fuller critique of the Christian worldview is important in philosophy, especially as the perspective shaped so much Western thinking, including the foundations of science, especially the ideas of Kant and Descartes. Any thoughts?

I completely agree. The most obvious evidence of this need is a well known book by Richard Dawkins. He clearly buys into orthodox theology and thinks that by disposing of this he is disposing of religion. This is nonsense and poor scholarship. He should take your advice and dig deeper.

Whitehead notes that the orthodox Christianity of the Roman church is a 'religion in search of a metaphysic'. What we need is a metaphysical theory that explains and justifies the teachings of Jesus and the only available option is the neutral theory endorsed by Perennial philosophy. This denies the existence of the God of most Christians yet at the same time fully justifies it as a useful metaphor.

Generally I enthusiastically agree with you that this is a vital philosophical issue and that Western philosophy suffers from not properly investigating it. But how does one persuade people to be interested in mysticism when they are so sure it's a lot of nonsense they can't be bothered? Dawkins shares with many philosophers.an inability to see that the all the best arguments against the God of orthodox theology and the unquestioning faith He is said to require come from within religion, and that what he calls Christianity is a straw man invented by the later Roman church.

I feel the best way to investigate Christianity is to investigate metaphysics, for this approach will prevent a lot of potential misunderstandings. I was brought up a Christian but gave it up because I could make no sense of it - until forty years later I got to know Buddhism and the metaphysical theory that is its philosophical foundation. This allows the teachings of Jesus to sit comfortably alongside those of the Upanishads, Sufism, Buddhism, Taoism and the Christian mystics.- for instance the sermons of Meister Eckhart and the Mystical Theology of the pseudo-Dionysius - and may be securely defended in logic.

I'd say the nearest orthodox Christian theology comes to truth is the the Doctrine of Divine Simplicity as endorsed by Aquinas, but Christians are not encouraged to study this since it is too 'mystical'. A religion that discourages questioning of the doctrine is obviously flawed, regardless of what else it states. . . .