Posted on 05/19/2006 5:56:50 AM PDT by Caleb1411
Not "hearsay." Perjury. The authors of the Gnostic gospels write as if they have witnessed events which they came to believe in through occultic means, including quite plausibly, demonic possession.
>> Exactly. This interview presents a very distorted view of gnosticism. It would be hard to consider gnosticism attractive and tempting from this view! <<
Indeed, it would be very hard to find Gnosticism tempting from today's world view. That does not mean an unattractive depiction of Gnosticism is false. I dare say that people 100 years ago would argue that the modern cosmopolitan lifestyle of orgiastic and androgynous sex, social isolation, and mind-thumping hip-hop, exploding after spending 70 hours a day of caffeine-induced work behind a laptop very appealing. In a world of legitimized rape, temple prostitution, 99% enslavement rates, barbarian raids, gladiators and utter autocracy, people abused to the point of depravity perchance found comfort in Gnosticism's radical asceticism and asexuality.
(The article does make it sound like Gnosticism favored homosexuality; in principle, it favored asexuality, although I would hardly be surprised to find that homosexuality was rampant under such conditions.)
Wow.... for Gnostics it sounds as if light is dark and dark is light, and some literally worship the serpant of the garden, Satan himself.
Bad stuff.
Thomas?
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