Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

andrewcriddle wrote:

John T wrote:.

I find the history/origins of Gnosticism complicated but very revealing in how people saw their geocentric universe.
Modern science, i.e. astronomy, has all but debunked any remaining doubt that Gnosticism is pseudo-intellectual and trusts exclusively in magic.
We can argue later the real motives of gnostics in their attempt to graft into Christianity but they got caught and exposed (as wolves in sheep clothing) by Irenaeus and others.

Perhaps the best short summary (if you call one hour of reading short) I have read in many years can be found here and seems to answer most of your questions.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06592a.htm

Although a good article at the time this is about 100 years old.

It is out of date. E.G. It was written before the Nag Hammadi documents were discovered.

Andrew Criddle

Can you give an example how the Nag Hammadi made the summary outdated?
What little I have read of the Nag Hammai (Valentinian Exposition, Apocryphon of James, On the Origin of the World, etc,) it still follows the general themes outlined in the summary.

The ploy by the gnostics remains the same. Take the scriptures of a existing religion and rewrite the arching themes and characters to fit Gnosticism. That is to say, secret knowledge of the different levels of heavens (hebdomad, ogdoad, pleroma) leads to salvation. The con is almost as old as the Egyptians who paid for their own personal copy of the Book of the Dead in order to safely navigate a path to heaven after they died.

http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhl.html

These are nice questions but you are behaving like a stupid person that watches FOX News. It's not a matter of choosing between two certainties so that we can move on past the issues that raise uncertainty. What gnostikos meant in earliest Christianity isn't something that we wrap up so we can ignore it and move on to other things. We know SOMETHING about the word. We know it was an unusual philosophical terminology from Plato which wasn't used by everyday people. But all this other stuff you introduce isn't really helpful if you simply want closure i.e. if you want to create a monolithic understanding of "THE gnostics" as if (a) there were groups that named themselves as such or (b) only heretics used the terminology. As with most of this stuff there is likely more that we don't know than we do know. If you want to rush off content in creating a caricature so that you can ignore a tradition or a terminology that's fine. But know that your definitions are self-serving

All what I was trying to do is point out the main cause of the historical battle between Christianity and Gnosticism.

The battle is well documented and settled. If you want to continue to go on a fools errand in trying to convince others (or perhaps yourself) that a peculiar case ending of a Greek word or the different spelling of a Roman name proves that the early church fathers didn't understand Gnosticism i.e. Valentinus, when in fact they did, well, that is up to you.

As for me, I'm not here to engage in stupid arguments.
I am a man of science and logic. So, yes I watch FOX news and when I want to have a good laugh at ignorant liberals, well, I watch fake news on CNN, MSNBC or Stephen Colbert.

Now, if you want to talk about the origins of Gnosticism, well, I consider that a worthy subject.
Better yet, let's debate the different meaning of logos for Christians and Gnosticisim.

However, if you continue to engage in ad hominem attacks on those who are simply asking honest questions or God forbid trying to help you learn, well then, I'm done with this thread.

John T

John T wrote:
Can you give an example how the Nag Hammadi made the summary outdated?
What little I have read of the Nag Hammai (Valentinian Exposition, Apocryphon of James, On the Origin of the World, etc,) it still follows the general themes outlined in the summary.

One specific example

The Gospel of Thomas must have been of considerable length (1300 lines); part of it, in an expurgated recension, is possibly extant in the once popular, but vulgar and foolish, "Stories of the Infancy of Our Lord by Thomas, an Israelite philosopher", of which two Greek, as Latin, a Syriac, and a Slavonic version exist.

with the discovery of the Gospel of Thomas at Nag Hammadi we now know that the Gospel of Thomas used by Gnostic groups is an entirely different work from the Infancy Gospel attributed to Thomas.

More generally the article is over confident about the existence of pre-Christian Gnosticism and probably exaggerates the importance of Babylonian astrology in the origins of Gnosticism. The article may exaggerate the degree to which Gnostics were utter pessimists and has an IMO rather odd tendency to regard Gnosticism as a form of pantheism.

Andrew Criddle

1. There are many Gnostic works attributed to Thomas. It is very doubtful that the one you are referring to is the same one Hippolytus, Origen, and Eusebius were referring to. Even so, The Gospel of Thomas a.k.a. The Secret Sayings of Jesus, neither supports or contradicts the doctrine of Gnosticism. I think it is simply a cut and paste and interpolation of Q and not a "gospel" in that sense at all.

2. The summary that I provide in the link is still valid and I agree that: "Many scholars, moreover, would hold that every attempt to give a generic description of Gnostic sects is labour lost." ...Newadvent

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06592a.htm

3. If you think you have another example that shows Nag Hammadi books have caused experts to rethink the history/doctrines of Gnosticism, please provide them.

Sincerely,

John T

You seem to imply that these issues are all "settled" and that this 100 year old article is now canonical law unless otherwise disproved. Laughable. OF COURSE the Nag Hammadi discovery transformed our understanding of Gnostic Christianity. It's BIZZARE to think it wouldn't have.

Secret Alias wrote: ↑Fri Jun 30, 2017 11:40 am You seem to imply that these issues are all "settled" and that this 100 year old article is now canonical law unless otherwise disproved. Laughable. OF COURSE the Nag Hammadi discovery transformed our understanding of Gnostic Christianity. It's BIZZARE to think it wouldn't have.

And.... I'm done here.