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Gnostics
Gnosticism (from Ancient Greek: , romanized: ''gnōstikós'', Koine Greek: �nostiˈkos 'having knowledge') is a collection of religious ideas and systems that coalesced in the late 1st century AD among early Christian sects. These diverse groups emphasized personal spiritual knowledge ('' gnosis'') above the proto-orthodox teachings, traditions, and authority of religious institutions. Generally, in Gnosticism, the Monad is the supreme God who emanates divine beings; one, Sophia, creates the flawed demiurge who makes the material world, trapping souls until they regain divine knowledge. Consequently, Gnostics considered material existence flawed or evil, and held the principal element of salvation to be direct knowledge of the hidden divinity, attained via mystical or esoteric insight. Many Gnostic texts deal not in concepts of sin and repentance, but with illusion and enlightenment. Gnosticism likely originated in the late first and early second centuries around Alex ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marcionism
Marcionism was an Early Christianity, early Christian Dualistic cosmology, dualistic belief system that originated with the teachings of Marcion of Sinope in Rome around 144 AD. Marcion was an Diversity in early Christian theology, early Christian theologian, Evangelism, evangelist, and an important figure in early Christianity. He was the son of a bishop of Sinop, Turkey, Sinope in Pontus (region), Pontus. About the middle of the 2nd century (140–155) he traveled to Rome, where he joined the Syrian Gnostic Cerdo (Gnostic), Cerdo. Marcion preached that the benevolent God of the Gospel who sent Jesus Christ into the world as the Salvation in Christianity, savior was the true God, Supreme Being, different and opposed to the Dystheism, malevolent Demiurge#Gnosticism, Demiurge or creator god, identified with the Yahweh, Hebrew God of the Old Testament. He considered himself a follower of Paul the Apostle, whom he believed to have been the only true Apostles in the New Testament ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gnosis
Gnosis is the common Greek noun for knowledge ( γνῶσις, ''gnōsis'', f.). The term was used among various Hellenistic religions and philosophies in the Greco-Roman world. It is best known for its implication within Gnosticism, where it signifies a spiritual knowledge or insight into humanity's real nature as divine, leading to the deliverance of the divine spark within humanity from the constraints of earthly existence. Etymology ''Gnosis'' is a feminine Greek noun which means "knowledge" or "awareness." Liddell Scottbr>entryγνῶσις, εως, ἡ, A. seeking to know, inquiry, investigation, esp. judicial, "τὰς τῶν δικαστηρίων γ." D.18.224; "τὴν κατὰ τοῦ διαιτητοῦ γdeetr." Id.21.92, cf. 7.9, Lycurg.141; "γ. περὶ τῆς δίκης" PHib.1.92.13 (iii B. C.). 2. result of investigation, decision, PPetr.3p.118 (iii B. C.). II. knowing, knowledge, Heraclit.56; opp. ἀγνωσίη, Hp. Vict.1.23 (dub.); opp. ἄγ� ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monad (Gnosticism)
In some Gnostic systems, the supreme being is known as the Monad, the One, the Absolute, Aiōn Teleos (the Perfect Aeon, ), Bythos (Depth or Profundity, ), Proarchē (Before the Beginning, ), Hē Archē (The Beginning, ), the Ineffable Parent, and/or the primal Father. The Monad is an adaptation of concepts of the monad in Greek philosophy to Christian belief systems. The ''Apocryphon of John'', written , gives the following description: {{blockquote, The Monad is a monarchy with nothing above it. It is he who exists as God and Father of everything, the invisible One who is above everything, who exists as incorruption, which is in the pure light into which no eye can look. "He is the invisible Spirit, of whom it is not right to think of him as a god, or something similar. For he is more than a god, since there is nothing above him, for no one lords it over him. For he does not exist in something inferior to him, since everything exists in him. For it is he who establishes hims ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Proto-orthodox Christianity
The term proto-orthodox Christianity or proto-orthodoxy describes the early Christian movement that was the precursor of Christian orthodoxy. Older literature often referred to the group as "early Catholic" in the sense that their views were the closest to those of the more organized "Catholic" Church that was the State church of the Roman Empire during the 4th and 5th centuries. The term "proto-orthodox" was coined by Bentley Layton, a scholar of Gnosticism and a Coptologist at Yale, but is often attributed to New Testament scholar Bart D. Ehrman, who has popularized the term by using it in books for a non-academic audience. Ehrman argues that when this group became prominent by the end of the third century, it "stifled its opposition, it claimed that its views had always been the majority position and that its rivals were, and always had been, 'heretics', who willfully 'chose' to reject the 'true belief'." Although early Christianity had many diverse sects and doctrines, crit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Valentinianism
Valentinianism was one of the major Gnostic Christian movements. Founded by Valentinus ( CE – CE) in the 2nd century, its influence spread widely, not just within the Roman Empire but also from northwest Africa to Egypt through to Asia Minor and Syria in the east. Later in the movement's history, it broke into Eastern and a Western schools. The Valentinian movement remained active until the 4th century, declining after Emperor Theodosius I issued the Edict of Thessalonica in 380, which established Nicene Christianity as the state religion of the Roman Empire. No evidence exists that Valentinus was labeled a heretic during his lifetime. Irenaeus of Lyons, who was the first patristic source to describe Valentinus's teachings—though likely incompletely and with a bias toward the time's proto-orthodox Christianity—did not finish his apologetic work '' Against Heresies'' until the later 2nd century, likely sometime after Valentinus's death. The rapid growth of the Vale ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sethianism
The Sethians (Greek language, Greek: Σηθιανοί) were one of the main currents of Gnosticism during the 2nd and 3rd century AD, along with Valentinianism and Basilideans, Basilideanism. According to John D. Turner, it originated in the 2nd century AD as a fusion of two distinct Hellenistic Judaism, Hellenistic Judaic philosophies and was influenced by Christianity and Middle Platonism. However, the exact origin of Sethianism is not properly understood. History Mentions The Sethians (Latin ''Sethoitae'') are first mentioned, alongside the Ophites, in the 2nd century, by Irenaeus (who was antagonistic towards Gnosticism) and in Pseudo-Tertullian (Ch. 30). According to Frederik Wisse, all subsequent accounts appear to be largely dependent on Irenaeus. Hippolytus repeats information from Irenaeus. According to Epiphanius of Salamis (c. 375), Sethians were in his time found only in Egypt and Palestine, but fifty years earlier, they had been found as far away as Kingdom of Arme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elcesaites
The Elcesaites, Elkasaites, Elkesaites or Elchasaites were an ancient Jewish Christian sect in Lower Mesopotamia, then the province of Asoristan in the Sasanian Empire that was active between 100 and 400 CE. The members of this sect, which originated in the Transjordan, performed frequent baptisms for purification and had a Gnostic orientation. The name of the sect derives from the alleged founder, Elkhasaí ( in Hippolytus), Elksai ( in Epiphanius), or Elkesai ( in Eusebius, and Theodoret). Patristic testimony The sect is directly mentioned only in the commentaries on "heresies" by Early Church Fathers. Hippolytus () Hippolytus of Rome ('' Refutation of All Heresies'', IX, 8–13) records that in the time of Pope Callixtus I (217–222 AD), a Jewish Christian called Alcibiades of Apamea came to Rome, bringing a book which he said had been received in Parthia by a just man named Elchasai. According to Alcibiades, the book had been revealed by an angel high (337,920 cubit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Platonism
Platonism is the philosophy of Plato and philosophical systems closely derived from it, though contemporary Platonists do not necessarily accept all doctrines of Plato. Platonism has had a profound effect on Western thought. At the most fundamental level, Platonism affirms the existence of abstract objects, which are asserted to exist in a third realm distinct from both the sensible external world and from the internal world of consciousness, and is the opposite of nominalism." Philosophers who affirm the existence of abstract objects are sometimes called platonists; those who deny their existence are sometimes called nominalists. The terms "platonism" and "nominalism" have established senses in the history of philosophy, where they denote positions that have little to do with the modern notion of an abstract object. In this connection, it is essential to bear in mind that modern platonists (with a small 'p') need not accept any of the doctrines of Plato, just as modern nomina ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hellenistic Judaism
Hellenistic Judaism was a form of Judaism in classical antiquity that combined Jewish religious tradition with elements of Hellenistic culture and religion. Until the early Muslim conquests of the eastern Mediterranean, the main centers of Hellenistic Judaism were Alexandria in Egypt and Antioch in Syria (modern-day Turkey), the two main Greek urban settlements of the Middle East and North Africa, both founded in the end of the 4th century BCE in the wake of the conquests of Alexander the Great. Hellenistic Judaism also existed in Jerusalem during the Second Temple Period, where there was a conflict between Hellenizers and traditionalists. The major literary product of the contact between Second Temple Judaism and Hellenistic culture is the Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Bible from Biblical Hebrew and Biblical Aramaic to Koine Greek, specifically, Jewish Koine Greek. Mentionable are also the philosophic and ethical treatises of Philo and the historiographical works of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Basilideans
The Basilidians or Basilideans were a Gnostic sect founded by Basilides of Alexandria in the 2nd century. Basilides claimed to have been taught his doctrines by Glaucus, a disciple of St. Peter, though others stated he was a disciple of the Simonian Menander. Basilides enjoined on his followers, like Pythagoras, a silence of five years. They kept the anniversary of the day of the baptism of Jesus as a feast day and spent the eve of it in reading. Basilides also instructed his followers not to scruple eating things offered to idols. The sect had three grades – material, intellectual and spiritual – and possessed two allegorical statues, male and female. The sect's doctrines were often similar to those of the Ophites and later Jewish Kabbalah. Basilidianism survived until the end of the 4th century as Epiphanius knew of Basilidians living in the Nile Delta. It was however almost exclusively limited to Egypt, though according to Sulpicius Severus it seems to have found an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mandaeans
Mandaeans (Mandaic language, Mandaic: ࡌࡀࡍࡃࡀࡉࡉࡀ) ( ), also known as Mandaean Sabians ( ) or simply as Sabians ( ), are an ethnoreligious group who are followers of Mandaeism. They believe that John the Baptist was the final and most important prophet. They may have been among the earliest religious groups to practice baptism, as well as among the earliest adherents of Gnosticism, a belief system of which they are the last surviving representatives today. The Mandaeans were originally native speakers of Mandaic language, Mandaic, an Eastern Aramaic languages, Eastern Aramaic language, before they nearly all switched to Mesopotamian Arabic or Persian language, Persian as their main language. After 2003 invasion of Iraq, the invasion of Iraq by the United States and Multi-National Force – Iraq, its allies in 2003, the Mandaean community of Iraq, which before the war numbered 60,000–70,000 persons, collapsed with most of the community relocating to Iran, Syria ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Valentinus (Gnostic)
Valentinus ( Greek: Οὐαλεντῖνος; ) was the best known and, for a time, most successful early Christian Gnostic theologian. He founded his school in Rome. According to Tertullian, Valentinus was a candidate for bishop but started his own group when another was chosen. Valentinus produced a variety of writings, but only fragments survive, largely those quoted in rebuttal arguments in the works of his opponents, not enough to reconstruct his system except in broad outline. His doctrine is known only in the developed and modified form given to it by his disciples, the Valentinians. He taught that there were three kinds of people, the spiritual, psychical, and material; and that only those of a spiritual nature received the '' gnosis'' (knowledge) that allowed them to return to the divine Pleroma, while those of a psychic nature (ordinary Christians) would attain a lesser or uncertain form of salvation, and that those of a material nature were doomed to perish. Valentinu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
