The Coherence of “Gnosticism”

The Coherence of “Gnosticism”

Author: Einar Thomassen

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2020-11-23

Total Pages: 53

ISBN-13: 3110705826

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“Gnosticism” has become a problematic category in the study of early Christianity. It obscures diversity, invites essentialist generalisations, and is a legacy of ancient heresiology. However, simply to conclude with “diversity” is unsatisfying, and new efforts to discern coherence and to synthesise need to be made. The present work seeks to make a fresh start by concentrating on Irenaeus’ report on a specific group called the “Gnostics” and on his claim that Valentinus and his followers were inspired by their ideas. Following this lead, an attempt is made to trace the continuity of ideas from this group to Valentinianism. The study concludes that there is more continuity than has previously been recognised. Irenaeus’ “Gnostics” emerge as the predecessors not only of Valentinianism, but also of Sethianism. They represent an early, philosophically inspired form of Christ religion that arose independently of the New Testament canon. Christology is essential and provides the basis for the myth of Sophia. The book is relevant for all students of Christian origins and the early history of the Church.


What is Gnosticism?

What is Gnosticism?

Author: Karen L. King

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 9780674017627

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A study of gnosticism examines the various ways early Christians strove to define themselves in a pluralistic Roman society, while questioning the traditional ideas of heresy and orthodoxy that have previously influenced historians.


The Gnostics

The Gnostics

Author: Jacques Lacarriere

Publisher: Peter Owen Publishers

Published: 2014-08-01

Total Pages: 197

ISBN-13: 0720618029

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Gnostics have always sought to “know” rather than to accept dogma and doctrine, often to their peril. This inquiry into Gnosticism examines the character, history, and beliefs of a brave and vigorous spiritual quest that originated in the ancient Near East and continues into the present day.Lawrence Durrell writes, “This is a strange and original essay, more a work of literature than of scholarship, though its documentation is impeccable. It is as convincing a reconstruction of the way the Gnostics lived and thought as D.H. Lawrence’s intuitive recreation of the vanished Etruscans.”


Rethinking "Gnosticism"

Rethinking

Author: Michael Allen Williams

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 1999-04-12

Total Pages: 356

ISBN-13: 1400822211

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Most anyone interested in such topics as creation mythology, Jungian theory, or the idea of "secret teachings" in ancient Judaism and Christianity has found "gnosticism" compelling. Yet the term "gnosticism," which often connotes a single rebellious movement against the prevailing religions of late antiquity, gives the false impression of a monolithic religious phenomenon. Here Michael Williams challenges the validity of the widely invoked category of ancient "gnosticism" and the ways it has been described. Presenting such famous writings and movements as the Apocryphon of John and Valentinian Christianity, Williams uncovers the similarities and differences among some major traditions widely categorized as gnostic. He provides an eloquent, systematic argument for a more accurate way to discuss these interpretive approaches. The modern construct "gnosticism" is not justified by any ancient self-definition, and many of the most commonly cited religious features that supposedly define gnosticism phenomenologically turn out to be questionable. Exploring the sample sets of "gnostic" teachings, Williams refutes generalizations concerning asceticism and libertinism, attitudes toward the body and the created world, and alleged features of protest, parasitism, and elitism. He sketches a fresh model for understanding ancient innovations on more "mainstream" Judaism and Christianity, a model that is informed by modern research on dynamics in new religious movements and is freed from the false stereotypes from which the category "gnosticism" has been constructed.


The Spiritual Seed

The Spiritual Seed

Author: Einar Thomassen

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 566

ISBN-13: 9004148027

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This book is the first comprehensive study of the doctrines and history of "Valentinianism," making full use of the documents from Nag Hammadi as well as the reports of the Church Fathers.


Against the Valentinians

Against the Valentinians

Author: Tertullian of Carthage

Publisher: Dalcassian Publishing Company

Published: 2019-12-07

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 1987023064

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Adversus Valentinianos, or Against the Valentinians, is a famous refutation of Valentinianism by Tertullian, an orthodox contemporary of the Gnostics and one of the first to investigate them. The work satirized the bizarre elements that appear in Gnostic mythology, ridiculing the Gnostics for creating elaborate cosmologies, with multi-storied heavens like apartment houses.


Gnostic Religion in Antiquity

Gnostic Religion in Antiquity

Author: R. van den Broek

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2013-01-24

Total Pages: 267

ISBN-13: 1107031370

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An examination of Gnostic religion in Late Antiquity within its historical and religious context, using Greek, Latin and Coptic sources.


The Rediscovery of Gnosticism (2 vols.)

The Rediscovery of Gnosticism (2 vols.)

Author: Bentley Layton

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2018-08-14

Total Pages: 926

ISBN-13: 9004378596

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Preliminary Material /Bentley Layton -- The Domestication of Gnosis /Henry Chadwick -- Gnosis and Psychology /Gilles Quispel -- The Challenge of Gnostic Thought for Philosophy, Alchemy, and Literature /Carsten Colpe -- Lying Against Time: Gnosis, Poetry, Criticism /Harold Bloom -- In Search of Valentinus /G. C. Stead -- Religio-Historical Observations on Valentinianism /Ugo Bianchi -- Valentinian Gnosis and the Apocryphon of John /Gilles Quispel -- Valentinianism and the Gospel of Truth /R. McL. Wilson -- The Dog and the Mushrooms /Rowan A. Greer -- Self-Generating Principles in Second-Century Gnostic Systems /John Whittaker -- La Gnose Valentinienne et les Oracles Chaldaïques /Michel Tardieu -- Gnostic Writings as Witnesses for the Development of the Sayings Tradition /Helmut Koester -- Gnostic and Orthodox views of Christ's Passion: Paradigms for the Christian's Response to Persecution? /Elaine H. Pagels -- Gnosis and the Piety of Metaphor: The Gospel of Truth /Joel Fineman -- Gnosis und Christentum /Barbara Aland -- Concluding Discussion -- The Descent of the Soul in Middle Platonic and Gnostic Theory /John Dillon -- Gnosticism and the Making of the World in Plotinus /Dominic J. O'meara -- Gnostic Monism and the Gospel of Truth /William R. Schoedel -- Valentinisme italien et valentinisme oriental: leurs divergences à propos de la nature du corps de Jésus /Jean-Daniel Kaestli -- Conflicting Versions of Valentinianism? Irenaeus and the Excerpta ex Theodoto /James F. Mccue -- Les «Mythes» Valentiniens de la création et de l'eschatologie dans le langage d'Origène: le mot hypothesis /Marguerite Harl -- «Vraie» et «fausse» gnose d'après Clément d'Alexandrie /Andre Mehat -- Did Gnostics Make Pictures? /Paul Corby Finney -- Preliminary Material /Bentley Layton -- Philo on Seth /Robert Kraft -- Report on Seth Traditions in the Armenian Adam Books /Michael E. Stone -- The Figure of Seth in Gnostic Literature /Birger A. Pearson -- Discussion /Bentley Layton -- Some Related Traditions in the Apocalypse of Adam, the Books of Adam and eve, and 1 Enoch /George W. E. Nickelsburg -- Sethian and Zoroastrian Ages of the World /Carsten Colpe -- Discussion /Bentley Layton -- Stalking Those Elusive Sethians /Frederik Wisse -- Die “Sethianische” Gnosis--Eine häresiologische Fiktion? /Kurt Rudolph -- Discussion /Bentley Layton -- The Phenomenon and Significance of Gnostic Sethianism /Hans-Martin Schenke -- Triade uno Trinität in den Schriften von Nag Hammadi /Alexander Böhlig -- Discussion /Bentley Layton -- Sethians and Johannine Thought /James M. Robinson -- Discussion /Bentley Layton -- Concluding Discussion /Bentley Layton -- The Arrogant Archon and the Lewd Sophia /Nils A. Dahl -- Aspects of the Jewish-Gnostic Controversy /Ithamar Gruenwald -- Literary Criticism of the Cologne Mani Codex /Albert Henrichs -- From Baptism to the Gnosis of Manichaeism /Ludwig Koenen -- Gnostic Instructions on the Organization of the Congregation /Klaus Koschorke -- The Naassene Psalm in Hippolytus (Haer. 5. 10.2) /M. Marcovich -- Le cadre scolaire des traités de l'Ame et le Deuxième Traité du Grand Seth (CG VII, 2) /Louis Painchaud.


Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World

Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World

Author: Kevin Corrigan

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2013-07-25

Total Pages: 753

ISBN-13: 9004254765

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This Festschrift honors the life and work of John D. Turner (Charles J. Mach University Professor of Classics and History at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln) on the occasion of his 75th birthday. Professor Turner’s work has been of profound importance for the study of the interaction between Greek philosophy and Gnosticism in late antiquity. This volume contains essays by international scholars on a broad range of topics that deal with Sethian, Valentinian and other early Christian thought, as well as with Platonism and Neoplatonism, and offer a variety of perspectives spanning intellectual history, Greek and Coptic philology, and the study of religions.