gnosticism

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The gnostics interpret God as depicted in the OT as being a tyrant bent on preventing humanity from attaining gnosis enlightenment etc Lucifer is characterised by some as the "light bearer" or prometheus insofar as he taught humanity how to create fire read attain knowledge and eventually gnosis.

Im wondering whether one could actually create a convincing OT symbolic account which preserves the polarity of God and Satan.

Im not acting as an apologist for Christianity this is a philosophical exercise. I know that this can be done with any text so im not trying to create a new religion or anything absurd like that.

Please deconstruct and pick this apart!

Last edited by Ectryon on 27 Aug 2014, 10:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Just a tip,
When you say, "reading the bible with an eastern approach," I interpret that as to mean from the perspective of the Eastern Orthodox Church or one of it's many variations. If I'm not mistaken, you mean approaching it from the gnostic perspective...

It is gnostic approach I suppose which in turn draws on eastern mysticism. I wanted to draw attention to the analytic style. I certainly didnt want to confuse the issue though

I see the God of the OT as a dark Lord who wants His people to submit, much in the same way a tyrannical King would and this, in fact, is the type of person who wrote these books of the old testament. Kings and high priests wishing to be kings, deluded, lost prophets wanting to control a people through their prophecies.

And we also have various "others" who are just as bad, wanting to destroy Yaweh's people so it's the kind of environment you either wipe them out or they do the same to you then *poof* gone forever because if someone wiped you out back then, in that area, they did their best to strike your existence from the face of the earth utterly so no one may ever know your face, name, lineage, nothing.

The gnostics see this God as the demiurgent one. This Lord came into existence out of Sophia, the divine blue energy of the universe, was so deeply in love with her father, she created earth all on her own. When she did this, the rulers leaked into existence from another universe. These rulers are called Archons and they are like vampires that need nourishment and they acquire it from energy that is full of negativity rather than radiant, positive kind. So these Archons are thought to create such situations through fake religions that inspire people to be insanely destructive in the name of that religion. Example is any religious fanatic that forces conversions, kills others and demands complete submission.

Archon activity can also be found in wars, politicians and are rumored to be the origin of psychopathology. The Archon can enter a person's mind and control them so they can direct others and "infect" them with negative energy, like a mad, psychopathic cult leader controlling them minds of cult members.

The trouble with modern or even semi modern interpretations of such things is that they're viewed within an historical framework, often with a mix of modern philosophical symbolism. In this context, even Plato could be considered modern.

But these stories had their genesis in prehistory, the time before writing, when such stories were passed down orally and where relevance, historicity and what passed as science in those times was almost diametrically different to how we see things now. Many of the stories have their roots in even earlier stories, such as the Epic of Gilgamesh.

Consider the two creation stories in Genesis. Both have different orders of events and both tackle creation from an entirely different perspective. The first (Gen 1:1 to Gen 2:4) has man last in the order of creation. It's purpose (without going into a long description) is to demonstrate the orderliness of God (Elohim in the original). It uses the old Sumerian 'fish-tank' view of the world. (A flat disc surrounded by a spherical solid firmament, onto which the stars were fixed. I'll leave out the detailed description.)

The second creation story (Gen 2:4 onwards into the fall), sees a more anthropomorphic God (Yahweh in the original) who creates man first, before the animals, and who walks in the garden seeking out his creation. It's purpose (again without a long winded explanation) is to show man's importance to God, creating him first and having a personal relationship.

These stories are not in conflict, except to the modern mind. The compiler of Genesis (and the other 5 books of the Pentateuch) seems to have put these together for a reason, and it's not to explain the events of creation (let alone act as an introduction to the devil).

In the tribal days of prehistory, myth (or mythos) was a verb, not an adjective. It was story passed between generations, often as part of the fireside ritual, practiced to keep away demons. And it was passed on, not to explain history, but to give spiritual truths/guidance regarding the natural order of the world.

In a more modern context, the serpent is taken as representing Lucifer, Satan or some other cognitive agent. But in the origins of the prehistory story, such a link is tenuous at best. Since the dawn of reason, man has known he is flawed. And in this perfectly made world, with its imperfect natural threats and catastrophes, there had to be a reason for this imperfection to taint such a perfect garden. Man gained the knowledge of good and evil, and in becoming corrupt, he corrupted the world and brought upon him the wrath of the perfect God.

Eventually, the stories of the oral tradition began to be written down. They were embellished, grown, had regional bits added and actual history incorporated. Historicity started to become important, but nothing like what we expect these days. Yet today, we read these ancient texts, expecting them to think of 'truth' in the same way that we do.

Satan, capital S, is a later invention. You won't find much on him in the OT. There he's "the satan", more of a prosecutor working for Yahweh in Job.

My understanding is that different gnostic groups had different views of what was wrong with Yahweh. To some he was evil, to others he was just incompetent. He's also confused about what he actually was or was not. A lesser deity playing a high god who wasn't aware of the higher heaven or his own origins.

The Book of enoch does actually refer to the Devil as a fallen angel. The NT draws from this. I loved what the Narrator said about the nature of truth. In interpreting the bible literally Christians end up tangled in apologetic convolutions.So much of the bible is clearly metaphorical and symbolic.

What confuses me about the gnostics is why they drew the conclusion that God is a tyrant when they could just as easily come to the conclusion that the biblical writers coloured events with their own perceptions. I believe that all religious writing is sacred but is ultimately mediated through the consciousness of man.


Genesis does seem to trace the evolution of humanity however from the birth of consciousness right through to hubris and utopia.

"Dad, where did I come from? Where did people come from? Where did the ground and the trees and the stars come from?"

"Well son, a being greater than us made it all... and made us too."

"Dad, why do those people speak funny?"

"Well son, some men tried to build a tower up to where god lives. He didn't want visitors, so he played a prank on them, so that they couldn't understand each other and couldn't keep building that darned tower."

"Dad, why is there a rainbow after it rains?"

"Well son, you know how I give Mum flowers when I stuff up? Well, god forgot to turn off the water one day and flooded the whole world. He told us that he fixed the plumbing, but he also wanted to give us something nice to say sorry."

Enoch isn't part of the OT. It's a later work that isnt included. So to read "Satan" into the OT you have to look with a Christian viewpoint for things that had not developed yet. Which they do all the time. Also, iirc, Enoch includes several stories about fallen angels with various names who provide knowledge to mankind (warfare, jewelry, makeup, etc) . Satan isn't one of them. The leader (Azazel?) was buried out in the desert to await later judgement. He doesn't sound particularly active in the world. My point was that it's hard to know much about the character from the Jewish OT and even Enoch doesn't get you there quite yet.

As to their motives there were many groups who followed variants of gnostic theology. Gnostics, Cathars, Bogomils, Marcionites, Paulicans and I think a few others that I can't remember. They may have had individual motives for their views of Yahweh but I think a straight reading of the text makes him seem pretty crazy. The contrast between Jesus and Yahweh was as stark then as it is now.

The book of enoch was written before Christ so it is part of the Jewish tradition. Beta Israeli sects consider it canonical too

Some scholars place the older parts at 300BC. So that puts it well ahead of the Christian era.

The Christian Ethiopian Orthodox church also considers it canonical.

Gnostics didn't consider God to be a tyrant. They considered the creator of this world, the demiurge, to be a tyrant.

But your question is still valid. Why did they read the OT, see the judgmental tyrant creator in it and decide its not God. They could have come to the conclusion that the biblical writers coloured events with their own perceptions and the creator was God.

I always figured Gnosticism was a synthesis of Jesus's teaching and Plato's teachings. Plato is where the concept of the demiurge originally came from and a very popular belief in Greece and the area during Jesus's era. My guess anyways.

Looking at the Bible in terms of Old and New Testament is to inherently look at it from a Christian perspective. The "OT" is not a unit of information that was written all at the same time. Lucifer is mentioned in the section of the "OT" referred to as the Prophets by the Jews. The first 5 books of the "OT" are referred to as the Torah. The Torah informed the prophets because the prophets were Jews. As a side note, some if not many of the prophets may have had mental illnesses judging from some of what they wrote or what was written down and attributed to them. So, if Lucifer is an idea originating well after the ideas of the book of Genesis, I think it would be an error to interpret Genesis through the lens of the Lucifer concept.

Genesis contains several stories and themes which are common to the mythology/folklore/scriptures of many different cultures and peoples. They are origin stories whose purpose is to supply an origin for things which humans could never hope to know the true origins of. If interpreted metaphorically they can be seen as thought-provokingly philosophical. If taken literally they can seem childish or simple. I suspect that consumers of the Genesis stories who were (more) contemporary with the stories themselves did not take them literally and did not see the deity described in Genesis as the same deity described in later stories, particularly the exodus and the events that took place after the exodus. I have reasons to suspect this which are drawn from scholarship but which my brain can not be called upon at this point in time to explain.

Yeah, the OT is not the Tanakh or Jewish Scriptures and the OT itself has variants but it's easy shorthand for the early bible. One problem here is that Lucifer is not a character in Jewish scripture. It's just the Latin translation for morning star or day star and it's not capitalized even there. Christians spin it into their own mythology and equate the word with their elaborate Satan figure. Jews do not agree with how Christians view many parts of the OT or Tanakh. Jesus isn't the only sticking point.

From what Ive read the Jewish roots of the Devil are found in the cosmic water dragon that Yahweh repeatedly brags about fighting. This is a popular regional combat myth that is present in other older religions. Over time this elemental figure representing chaos is turned into a moral enemy. Christians doing most of the work while riffing on later Jewish apocalyptic sources. The water dragon makes a final appearance in Revelations where he is finally defeated and where the sea itself is destroyed as well.

On topic: Various Gnostic like groups usually saw Yahweh as a devil figure. The true god is above him living in a higher heaven or Pleroma. Jesus is either the true good God or a representative who passes on the knowledge required to escape this evil realm. They often saw the material world as evil. Having been created by an evil being. So it's Jesus that is still the key not the serpent from the Garden even though he is also sometimes associated with knowledge (not evil).

The theme of a trickster or snake who steals immortality from man is present in older stories. Gilgamesh had the fruit of immortality stolen by a snake while he slept. Adapa refuses the bread of life when he visits the realm of the gods. He's been tricked by the god Ea who tells him it will lead to his death. These are simple Near Eastern stories to explain why man never has immortality. In Eden a snake tricks man into making an error that prevents him from eating from the tree of life. Yahweh fears that Adam will eat that now too and banishes him. The talking snake is punished by being made to crawl on its belly which explains the origin of crawling snakes. Snakes were also seen as immortal in the ancient world due to the shedding of their skins so involving them in stories with immortality granting food is natural. In Gilgamesh it's clear that the snake eats the magic food, sheds its skin and leaves. In Eden that is left unsaid but was possibly assumed by audiences of the time.

Sorry for this inexcusable anachronism. I just wanted to raise the idea that Gnosticism doesn't have an account of God's immanence, that is his presence in the world. He is present through wisdom (Christ is God's Wisdom):

This is the true knowledge. The. Matter is also far from being debased and inherently evil. God became man and this makes both the claim to a tyrannical God and the evil of matter untenable.










The order of material things has had sin introduced to it, much as rust can be introduced into cereal crops, but
so matter is not evil inherently. The cosmos is the "seed" which will receive a new kind of splendour when Christ returns in glory.