Gnosticism

Gnosticism is a blanket term for various mystical initiatory religions and sects, which were most prominent in the first few centuries CE. It is also applied to modern revivals of these sects and, sometimes, by analogy to all religious movements based on secret knowledge gnosis, thus leading to confusion.

Gnosticism in modern times

Gnosticism has been treated at length by several modern authors, philosophers and psychologists:

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• William Blake, the nineteenth century Romantic poet and artist, was according to some sources well-versed in the doctrines of the Gnostics, and his own personal mythology contains many points of cohesion with several Gnostic myths (for example, the Blakean figure of Urizen bears many resemblances to the Gnostic Demiurge). However, efforts to dub Blake a "Gnostic" have been complicated by the complex nature and extent of Blake's own mythology, and the variety of myths and themes that may be referred to as "Gnostic"; thus, the exact relationship between Blake and the Gnostics remains a point of scholarly contention, though a comparison of the two often reveals intriguing points of cohesion.
• After a series of visions and archival finds of Cathar-related documents, Jules Doinel "re-established" the Gnostic Church in the modern era. Founded on extant Cathar documents with a heavy influence of Valentinian cosmology, the church, officially established in the autumn 1890 in Paris, France, consisted of modified Cathar rituals as sacraments, a clergy that was both male and female, and a close relationship with several esoteric initiatory orders (see link http://www.gnostique.net for more information). The church eventually split into two opposing groups that were later reconciled in the leadership of Joanny Bricaud. Another splinter church with more occult leanings was established by Robert Ambelain around 1957, from which several other schisms have produced a multitude of distantly-related occult-oriented marginal groups.
• The "traditionalist" René Guénon founded in 1909 the Gnostic review La Gnose. He believed in and throughout his works exposed the idea that modern thought, by its preference to the quantity more than to the quality, is the root of all evil aspects of modernity. The whole scientific enterprise would just be the beheaded relic of a lost Sacred Science. Modern technology and its realizations, worshipped by his contemporaries, would have been just a latter epiphany of the Kali Yuga (alias Dark Age), in a Cyclical Conception of Time.
• Carl Jung and his associate G. R. S. Mead worked on trying to understand and explain the Gnostic faith from a psychological standpoint. Jung's "analytical psychology" in many ways schematically mirrors ancient Gnostic mythology, particularly those of Valentinus and the "classic" Gnostic doctrine described in most detail in the Apocryphon ("Secret Book") of John. Jung understands the emergance of the Demiurge out of the original, unified monadic source of the spiritual universe by gradual stages to be analogous to (and a symbolic depiction of) the emergence of the ego from the unconscious. However, it is uncertain as to whether the similarities between Jung's psychological teachings and those of the Gnostics are due to their sharing a "perennial philosophy", or whether Jung was unwittingly influenced by the Gnostics in the formation of his theories; Jung's own "Gnostic sermon", the Septem Sermones ad Mortuos, would tend to imply the latter. Uncertain too are Jung's claims that the Gnostics are aware of any psychological meaning behind their myths. On the other hand, what is known is that Jung and his ancient forebears disagreed on the ultimate goal of the individual: whereas the Gnostics clearly sought a return to a supreme, other-worldly Godhead, Jung would see this as analogous to a total identification with the unconscious, a dangerous psychological state.
• Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, founder of Theosophy enjoyed and wrote extensively on Gnostic ideas.
• The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche in his concept of the "eternal return".
• The philosopher Hans Jonas wrote extensively on Gnosticism, interpreting it from an existentialist viewpoint.
• Eric Voegelin identified a number of similarities between ancient Gnosticism and those held by a number of modernist political theories, particularly Communism and Nazism. He identifies the root of the Gnostic impulse as alienation, that is, a sense of disconnectedness with society and a belief that this lack of concord with society is the result of the inherent disorderliness or even evil of the world. This alienation has two effects. The first is the belief that the disorder of the world can be transcended by extraordinary insight, learning, or knowledge, called a Gnostic Speculation by Voegelin. The second is the desire to implement a policy to actualize the speculation, or as Voegelin describes to "Immanentize the Eschaton", to create a sort of heaven on earth within history. The totalitarian impulse is derived from the alienation of the proponents of the policy from the rest of society. This leads to a desire to dominate (libido dominandi) which has its roots not just in the conviction of the imperative of the Gnostic's vision but also in his lack of concord with a large body of his society. As a result, there is very little regard for the welfare of those in society who are impacted by the resulting politics, which ranges from coercive to calamitous (cf. Stalin's nostrum: "You have to crack a few eggs to make an omelet"). This totalitarian impulse in modernism has been noted by Catholic writers, particularly in Henri de Lubac's work "The Drama of Atheist Humanism", which explores the connection between the totalitarian impulses of political Communism, Fascism and Positivism with their philosophical progenitors Hegel, Feuerbach, Marx, Comte and Nietzsche. Indeed, Voegelin acknowledges his debt to this book in creating his seminal essay "Science, Politics, and Gnosticism". The Catholic catechism makes an oblique reference to the desire to "Immanentize the Eschaton" in article 676: The Antichrist's deception already begins to take shape in the world every time the claim is made to realize within history that messianic hope which can only be realized beyond history through the eschatological judgment. The Church has rejected even modified forms of this falsification of the kingdom to come under the name of millenarianism, especially the "intrinsically perverse" political form of a secular messianism. Other Catholic scholars have extended it using vivid imagery created by Abbé Augustin Barruél.
• Samael Aun Weor commented extensively on the Pistis Sophia in his book The Pistis Sophia Unveiled, and founded International Gnostic Movement, one of the Occultist movements that claimed inheritance from ancient Gnosticism.
• In the United States there are several gnostic churches with diverse lineages, one of which is the Ecclesia Gnostica, affiliated with an organization for studies of gnosticism named the Gnostic Society, primarily in Los Angeles. The current leader of both organizations is Stephan A. Hoeller who has also written extensively on Gnosticism and the occult.
• Aleister Crowley's Thelema system is influenced by and bears major features in common with Gnosticism, especially in that adherants work to come to their own direct knowledge of the divine (referred to as the Great Work). There are several Thelemic Gnostic organizations, including Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica as an ecclesiastical body and Ordo Templi Orientis as an initiatory body.
• Mar Didymos of the Thomasine Church has reinterpreted Gnosticism and the thomasine gospels from an Illuminist viewpoint. The method employed by clergy and initiates of the Thomasine Church involves the use of the scientific method and of critical thinking rather than dogmatism. Mar Didymos stresses the use of scientific theory or the use of a synthesis of well developed and verified hypotheses derived from empirical observation and deductive/indicative reasoning about factual data and tested through experimentation and peer review. This is antithetical in principle and method as compared to all of the existing modern Gnostic churches.

Gnosticism in popular culture

Gnosticism has also seen something of a resurgence in popular culture in recent years.

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• Grant Morrison's comic series The Invisibles draws on Gnostic mythemes, both in terms of overall structure and through occasional direct reference. Morrison's other works, such as Animal Man and The Filth, also possess frequent moments of structural cohesion with Gnostic worldviews, though these make no direct reference.
• Alan Moore, acclaimed writer of From Hell, Watchmen, V for Vendetta and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, converted to Gnosticism in the late 1990s. His work, like that of the Gnostics, demonstrates a keen interest with the often-ambivalent relationship between subject and reality, consciousness (especially altered and enlightened states of consciousness) and revolt against constrictive systems of control. In Watchmen, one character who hatches a monstrous plot to save the world might be said to be subscribe to Gnosticism much as Voegelin describes the phenomenon.
• Anatole France's novel The Revolt of the Angels (La Revolte des Anges) weaves the story of an unhappy guardian angel and the doctrine of Yaldabaoth, to satiric effect.
• Several works of science fiction author Philip K. Dick draw on various gnostic notions, especially his late novel Valis and The Divine Invasion.
• Robert Charles Wilson's work has gnostic themes to it, particularly overt in his novel Mysterium (1994).
• Allen Ginsberg uses several Gnostic terms in his poem Plutonian Ode.
• Harold Bloom explores Gnosticism in his novel ', and, with William Golding, traces Gnosticism in American beliefs in The American Religion: The Emergence of the Post-Christian Nation. Another work of Bloom's - Genius, in which he reviews 100 literary figures and identifies their own peculiar genius - makes introductory reference to Gnosticism as "the religion of literature".
• Some conspiracy theories have Gnostic overtones. (Much due to Eric Voegelin.)
• Such films as Dark City, Pleasantville, The Matrix, The Truman Show, Twelve Monkeys, Groundhog day, Vanilla Sky and even Toy Story can be compared to Gnosticism because they present the idea that the world we perceive is an illusion created by someone who does not love us, and that the key to unravelling this illusion and perceiving reality (often this perception is concurrent to a "return" to reality) resides in a form of self-knowledge or enlightenment.
• Philip Pullman's trilogy His Dark Materials draws heavily on Gnostic themes.
• The role playing game Kult is also based on Gnostic ideas, as is the MTV animated science fiction television series, Æon Flux.
• Gnosticism figures heavily in the Jesus Mysteries Thesis of Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy.
• The authors Umberto Eco, Emile Cioran and Jorge Luis Borges are heavily inspired by gnosticism. In the case of the former, this is particularly evident in two novels: Foucault's Pendulum and Baudolino. In the latter novel, one character describes the Gnostic creation myth at length.
• The role-playing games Final Fantasy VII and X, Chrono Trigger, Chrono Cross, and Xenogears by Squaresoft as well as the Xenosaga series now in the hands of an ex-Square team known as Monolith Soft contain subtle, if not outright (as in the case of Xenosaga), themes of and references to Gnosticism.
• Dan Brown's bestselling novel The Da Vinci Code draws on Gnostic scriptures and modern re-interpretations of those works as well as a pseudohistory of christian faiths along the lines of Holy Blood, Holy Grail'.
• In her book "The Secret Magdalene", the writer Ki Longfellow explores the birth of gnosticism in her novel treatment of the life of Mary Magdalene, as well as in the life of Jesus - contending that both experienced "gnosis", which is also called "Christ Consciousness" as well as "Enlightenment".
• In her book "Piece By Piece", the musician Tori Amos explores the influences and experiences in her life that have shaped her musical compositions. In the first two chapters she explores the Gnostic belief that Mary Magdalene wrote the 4th Gospel of the apostles, this research would have a profound impact on her 2005 work The Beekeeper.
• In the Marvel Comics universe, the origins of the Earth are described using Gnostic conventions, specifcally the Demiurge as the creator of the universe, and other ideas. This view of the creation of the Marvel earth was expounded upon in the back-up features of the 1989 Annual issues of their comics, all part of the "Atlantis Attacks" crossover.