Various scholars have attempted to trace Gnostic dualism to Zoroastrianism and other features of Gnosticism to Buddhism or Judaism. These codices may have belonged to a nearby Pachomian monastery, and buried after Bishop Athanasius condemned the use of non-canonical books in his Festal Letter of 367. Lidzbarski, Mark 1915 Das Johannesbuch der Mander. Desiring to present apostolic authority for his teaching (without which he knew Christians would ignore him), he claimed that he had received instruction from a follower of Paul named Theodas or Theudas. Ecclesia means Church. [140] Earlier texts such as Apocalypse of Adam show signs of being pre-Christian and focus on the Seth, third son of Adam and Eve. Giessen: Alfred Tpelmann. Man, all this Unification stuff sounds like Buddhism. Gnostic Alchemical Church of Typhon Christ. Fromsermons to attending our faith-based community initiatives or events everything we do is done in Love. [41] Both schools attempted "an effort towards conciliation, even affiliation" with late antique philosophy,[42] and were rebuffed by some Neoplatonists, including Plotinus. [92], According to Walter Bauer, "heresies" may well have been the original form of Christianity in many regions. Gnostic and pseudo-gnostic ideas became influential in some of the philosophies of various esoteric mystical movements of the 19th and 20th centuries in Europe and North America, including some that explicitly identify themselves as revivals or even continuations of earlier gnostic groups. R. Macuch, Anfnge der Mander. Gnostic Christianity and Buddhism actually share some common ground. It continued to develop in the Mediterranean and Middle East before and during the 2nd and 3rd centuries, but decline also set in during the third century, due to a growing aversion from the Nicene Church, and the economic and cultural deterioration of the Roman Empire. [206], In the late 1980s scholars voiced concerns about the broadness of "Gnosticism" as a meaningful category. ", Markschies: "something was being called "gnosticism" that the ancient theologians had called 'gnosis' [A] concept of gnosis had been created by Messina that was almost unusable in a historical sense. Early Christian and Jewish religious systems, Traditional approaches Gnosticism as Christian heresy, In Plato's dialogue between Young Socrates and the Foreigner in his. In the end, all will rejoin in glorious Union with the Light of God. Syrian-Egyptian Gnosticism includes Sethianism, Valentinianism, Basilideans, Thomasine traditions, and Serpent Gnostics, as well as a number of other minor groups and writers. [88] Conversion to Islam, and the Albigensian Crusade (12091229), greatly reduced the remaining number of Gnostics throughout the Middle Ages, though Mandaean communities still exist in Iraq, Iran and diaspora communities. In the Gnostic Christian tradition, Christ is seen as a divine being which has taken human form in order to lead humanity back to recognition of its own divine nature. [213], The best known example of this approach is Adolf von Harnack (18511930), who stated that "Gnosticism is the acute Hellenization of Christianity. : pope), he drifted into open heresy. According to Hippolytus, Simonianism is an earlier form of the Valentinian doctrine.[135]. (Catholicism, Orthodox Church, Protestant, American Evangelical). [39][199] According to Harnack, Gnosticism was the "acute Hellenization of Christianity". [206], Hans Jonas (19031993) took an existential phenomenological approach to Gnosticism. First and foremost, Gnosticism did not square with what they had been taught or with the accepted writings of either the Old Testament or the apostolic period. J. M. Robinson, "Jesus: From Easter to Valentinus (Or to the Apostles' Creed)", Understanding Jewish History: Texts and Commentaries by, Schenke, Hans Martin. Matter-dwelling spirits. Finally, a possible exegetical tradition behind the Ascension of Isaiah and attested by Origen's Hebrew master, may witness to yet another angel Christology, as well as an angel Pneumatology.[36]. The First Gnostic Church of Christ @thefirstgnosticchurchofchr4314 2.13K subscribers Home Videos Playlists Community Channels About Recently uploaded Popular 36:06 V9-FGCC Reads Comments & Q/A;. Proponents of the view that Paul was actually a gnostic, such as Elaine Pagels, view the reference in Colossians as a term that has to be interpreted in a gnostic sense. According to Williams the term needs replacing to more accurately reflect those movements it comprises,[7] and suggests to replace it with the term "the Biblical demiurgical tradition". [130]:IX[131] The Valentinians embraced a Mandaean baptismal formula in their rituals in the 2nd century CE. Did Jesus talk to the cross on which he died, and did the cross of Christ walk out of the tomb while speaking? [28] Contemporary scholarship largely agrees that Gnosticism has Jewish or Judeo-Christian origins;[28] this theses is most notably put forward by Gershom G. Scholem (18971982) and Gilles Quispel (19162006). [208], According to Ioan Culianu, gnosis is made possible through universal operations of the mind, which can be arrived at "anytime, anywhere". If all matter is corrupt, Christ's body also was corrupt. [102] The fact that he claimed to have received his gospel directly by revelation from God appealed to the gnostics, who claimed gnosis from the risen Christ. Late in the 2d century, orthodox leaders began to produce works to counter the growing Gnostic influence. [191] Celia Green has written on Gnostic Christianity in relation to her own philosophy. As Christianity developed and became more popular, so did Gnosticism, with both proto-orthodox Christian and Gnostic Christian groups often existing in the same places. Of course. [citation needed] Ghazali characterized them as a group who are outwardly Shias but were actually adherence of a dualistic and philosophical religion. [192], Early 20th-century thinkers who heavily studied and were influenced by Gnosticism include Carl Jung (who supported Gnosticism), Eric Voegelin (who opposed it), Jorge Luis Borges (who included it in many of his short stories), and Aleister Crowley, with figures such as Hermann Hesse being more moderately influenced. The Haran Gawaita and the Baptism of Hibil-Ziwa. Find a church today! ", Political influence of Evangelicalism in Latin America, Beliefs condemned as heretical by the Catholic Church, Relationship between religion and science, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gnosticism&oldid=1142053447, Articles containing Ancient Greek (to 1453)-language text, Articles needing additional references from October 2022, All articles needing additional references, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from February 2023, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from June 2022, Articles with unsourced statements from August 2020, Wikipedia articles needing factual verification from November 2010, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from October 2021, Articles with unsourced statements from February 2022, Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, psychic "soulful", partially initiated. One such issue is whether Gnosticism ought to be considered one form of early Christianity, an interreligious phenomenon, or an independent religion. The Gnostic Church was established by Jesus of Nazareth in accordance with the rites of Melchizedek. [45] In the west, the teachings of the school moved into Syria, Northern Arabia, Egypt and North Africa. [39] Ugo Bianchi, who organised the Congress of Messina of 1966 on the origins of Gnosticism, also argued for Orphic and Platonic origins. Holy See: Yonkers, New York. In the early- to mid-fourth century, Sethianism fragmented into various sectarian Gnostic groups such as the Archontics, Audians, Borborites, and Phibionites, and perhaps Stratiotici, and Secundians. Gnostic Thelemite organizations, such as Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica and Ordo Templi Orientis, trace themselves to Crowley's thought. Intellectuals who were heavily influenced by Gnosticism in this period include Lawrence Durrell, Hans Jonas, Philip K. Dick and Harold Bloom, with Albert Camus and Allen Ginsberg being more moderately influenced. Valentinians understood the conflict between Jews and Gentiles in Romans to be a coded reference to the differences between Psychics (people who are partly spiritual but have not yet achieved separation from carnality) and Pneumatics (totally spiritual people). [note 29] Hippolytus (170235) wrote the ten-volume Refutation Against all Heresies, of which eight have been unearthed. A Counter to Gnosticism. [6]:109 Birger A. Pearson compares the Five Seals of Sethianism, which he believes is a reference to quintuple ritual immersion in water, to Mandaean masbuta. We are a modern fellowship . The Origins and Early History of the Mandaeans and Their Relation to the Sabians of the Qurn and to the Harranians. [note 20] This figure is also called "Yaldabaoth",[64] Samael (Aramaic: sma-el, "blind god"), or "Saklas" (Syriac: skla, "the foolish one"), who is sometimes ignorant of the superior god, and sometimes opposed to it; thus in the latter case he is correspondingly malevolent. The Paulicians, an Adoptionist group which flourished between 650 and 872 in Armenia and the Eastern Themes of the Byzantine Empire, were accused by orthodox medieval sources of being Gnostic and quasi Manichaean Christian. [64] The inferiority of the demiurge's creation may be compared to the technical inferiority of a work of art, painting, sculpture, etc. [note 17]. Genesis was reinterpreted in Jewish milieus, viewing. Judaism referred to Her as Shekinah, the divine indwelling Presence of God. In these cases, according to Scholem, texts such as the Zohar adapted Gnostic precepts for the interpretation of the Torah, while not utilizing the language of Gnosticism. The most important holy scripture is known as the Ginza Rabba and has portions identified by some scholars as being copied as early as the 2nd3rd centuries,[110] while others such as S. F. Dunlap place it in the 1st century. However, the Mysteries or Sacraments are done with an esoteric Christian view.We do indeed practice Baptism (full immersion Water Baptism followed by anointing with the Messianic Oil, the Baptism of Fire, Confirmation, Communion (The Eucharist), and Matrimony (marriage). Home. Welcome to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I'm not sure he knows we exist. [141], According to Turner, Sethianism was influenced by Christianity and Middle Platonism, and originated in the second century as a fusion of a Jewish baptizing group of possibly priestly lineage, the so-called Barbeloites,[145] named after Barbelo, the first emanation of the Highest God, and a group of Biblical exegetes, the Sethites, the "seed of Seth". Did Jesus have an identical twin? This book is a thorough and highly extensive look at the incredibly sacred and encrypted name of the Christian savior. Currently, this Church is affiliated with, and operates under a chapter of, the Ekklesia Epignostica (Esoteric Interfaith Church). Some of it contradicts itself. Regarding the angel Christology of some early Christians, Darrell Hannah notes: [Some] early Christians understood the pre-incarnate Christ, ontologically, as an angel. Jehova), is depicted as more ignorant than evil.[157]. "[117] Mandaeans revere Adam, Abel, Seth, Enos, Noah, Shem, Aram, and especially John the Baptist. Beginning in certain Gnostic texts with the hermaphroditic aeon Barbelo,[64][65][66] the first emanated being, various interactions with the Monad occur which result in the emanation of successive pairs of aeons, often in malefemale pairings called syzygies. The soul, sometimes referred to as the 'inner Adam' or Adam kasia, is in dire need of being rescued from the dark, so it may ascend into the heavenly realm of the World of Light. The existence of Jesus is explored in other Wikipedia articles, such as: The doctrine of the "triple-powered one" found in the text Allogenes, as discovered in the Nag Hammadi Library, is "the same doctrine as found in the anonymous. [134], The Simonians were centered on Simon Magus, the magician baptised by Philip and rebuked by Peter in Acts 8, who became in early Christianity the archetypal false teacher. Mani's father was a member of the Jewish-Christian sect of the Elcesaites, a subgroup of the Gnostic Ebionites. In other words, they forged them. The adjective is not used in the New Testament, but Clement of Alexandria[note 3] speaks of the "learned" (gnostikos) Christian in complimentary terms. Before engaging this idea a few understandings must be agreed upon >there was no gnostic "church" >they were understood for most of history through the lens of a detractor deeming them . [182] In fact, Ismailism has been often criticised as non-Islamic. Asgeirsson, April D. DeConick and Risto Uro (editors), sfn error: no target: CITEREFPerkins11987 (, Smith, Richard. In it, Ramsey understands the church as a reflection the death and resurrection of Christ, and then argues that the various expressions of Christianity today each express their own gifts in accordance with the Resurrection, whether they are Catholic . The Nazarenes were another Gnostic sect. [118] There is also the Qolast, or Canonical Book of Prayer and the Mandaean Book of John (Sidra 'Yahia) and other scriptures. [208], In light of such increasing scholarly rejection and/or restriction of the concept of Gnosticism, David G. Robertson has written on the distortions which misapplications of the term continue to perpetuate in religious studies. Cohen & Mendes-Flohr: "Recent research, however, has tended to emphasize that Judaism, rather than Persia, was a major origin of Gnosticism. These writings had an antagonistic bias towards gnostic teachings, and were incomplete. [150] Valentinianism flourished after mid-second century. However, the majority of Gnostic manuscripts found at Nag Hammadi, as well as the Gospel of Judas and other such writings, are a reaction to the already-existing history-based Christianity of those whom we call the orthodox-- those whose faith was based on the oral teaching and writings of the apostles and their associates (the apostolic writings were widely distributed and accepted throughout Christendom although not every area had all of the books that made it into the New Testament and some accepted books that did not make the cut). Current champions of Gnosticism claim that the orthodox were mistaken, that they misunderstand the attempt by the Gnostics to explain reality through myth. Salvation is through a secret knowledge by which individuals come to know themselves, their origin, and their destiny. The demiurge is responsible for the creation of humankind; trapping elements of the pleroma stolen from Sophia inside human bodies. Johann Lorenz von Mosheim (16941755) proposed that Gnosticism developed on its own in Greece and Mesopotamia, spreading to the west and incorporating Jewish elements. In most Gnostic systems, the sufficient cause of salvation is this "knowledge of" ("acquaintance with") the divine. Orthodox Christians of the early church, including Epiphanius, Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and Hippolytus, took issue with the Gnostics and other heretical groups. Gnosticism Definition [196] The writings in these codices comprised fifty-two mostly Gnostic treatises, but they also include three works belonging to the Corpus Hermeticum and a partial translation/alteration of Plato's Republic. It was an intellectually vibrant tradition,[152] with an elaborate and philosophically "dense" form of Gnosticism. Other names or identifications are Ahriman, El, Satan, and Yahweh. Whether one chooses plan A or plan B, the underlying doctrine makes it impossible to understand how God could become a true man with a fleshly body in Christ Jesus. But although Gnostic beliefs varied a good deal, we can sum up a few essential points on which all agreed: These ideas had implications that could not be squared with either the Old Testament or apostolic writings, which is why early Christians rejected them. Thomas? Gnostic doctrine presents christian mysticism and apocalyptic judaism. Bellefontaine | Ohio | 43311 | Non-Denominational. Turning the Tables on Jesus: The Mandaean View. There is a danger that those who do not may be confused or misled by the popular claims. [7] According to Williams, the conceptual foundations on which the category of Gnosticism rests are the remains of the agenda of the heresiologists. [62], Gnostics tended toward asceticism, especially in their sexual and dietary practice. The last phrase in Colossians 2:8"not according to Christ"is a simple one, but it encapsulates what this is all about. These schools tend to view evil in terms of matter that is markedly inferior to goodness and lacking spiritual insight and goodness rather than as an equal force. Radical dualism, or absolute dualism, posits two co-equal divine forces, while in mitigated dualism one of the two principles is in some way inferior to the other. [97] According to Helmut Koester, this is because the Thomas-sayings are older, implying that in the earliest forms of Christianity Jesus was regarded as a wisdom-teacher. More. Ekklesia Epignostica? The Elchasaites, or at least Christians influenced by them, paired the male Christ with the female Holy Spirit, envisioning both as two gigantic angels. Christ entered the man Jesus when the dove landed on Jesus at his baptism. He was a Nazarene. https://gnosticacademy.org. [4] Efforts to destroy these texts proved largely successful, resulting in the survival of very little writing by Gnostic theologians. Why did orthodox leaders oppose Gnosticism? It was as synthesis of Armenian Paulicianism and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church reform movement. The Christian ecclesia (i. e. congregation, church) was of JewishChristian origin, but also attracted Greek members, and various strands of thought were available, such as "Judaic apocalypticism, speculation on divine wisdom, Greek philosophy, and Hellenistic mystery religions."[35]. [177] It seems that Gnostic ideas were an influential part of early Islamic development but later lost its influence. The Valentinians argued that such codes were intrinsic in gnosticism, secrecy being important to ensuring proper progression to true inner understanding. [95], The Gnostic movements may contain information about the historical Jesus, since some texts preserve sayings which show similarities with canonical sayings. Both Sethian Gnostics and Valentinian Gnostics seem to have been influenced by Plato, Middle Platonism, and Neo-Pythagoreanism academies or schools of thought. [200], The study of Gnosticism and of early Alexandrian Christianity received a strong impetus from the discovery of the Coptic Nag Hammadi Library in 1945. The positive or negative depiction of materiality thus resides a great deal on mythic depictions of Sophia's actions. God is commonly thought of as being beyond human comprehension. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. The ascription by Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and others of a connection between schools in their time and the individual in Acts 8 may be as legendary as the stories attached to him in various apocryphal books. [108][109][6]:109, The Elkesaites were a Judeo-Christian baptismal sect that originated in the Transjordan and were active between 100 to 400 AD. According to Petrement, Valentinus represented a moderation of the anti-Judaism of the earlier Hellenized teachers; the demiurge, widely regarded as a mythological depiction of the Old Testament God of the Hebrews (i.e. John the Evangelist is claimed as a Gnostic by some Gnostic interpreters,[138] as is even St. Their main text is the Apocryphon of John, which does not contain Christian elements,[139] and is an amalgam of two earlier myths. Ecclesia Gnostica Mysteriorum? 1) New Releases 053 - Sunday Service, Paul the "Prisoner" & Apostolic Succession. [120][47]:8, The Lord of Darkness (Krun) is the ruler of the World of Darkness formed from dark waters representing chaos. The Late ArchBishop Robert W. Lane (Matthews Succesion) Holy See: Chicago, IL. [7] The early church heresiologists created an interpretive definition of Gnosticism, and modern scholarship followed this example and created a categorical definition. Please click on an individual church website to find the most current and specific information. [119], In Mandaeism, the World of Light is ruled by a Supreme God, known as Hayyi Rabbi ('The Great Life' or 'The Great Living God'). If anything, they understated the blasphemy and folly of many Gnostic writings. Pleroma is also used in the general Greek language, and is used by the Greek Orthodox church in this general form, since the word appears in the Epistle to the Colossians. [134] The Samaritan leaders were viewed as "the embodiment of God's power, spirit, or wisdom, and as the redeemer and revealer of 'true knowledge'". to the thing the art represents. This, however, does not preclude an identifiable standard among such congregations. The church traces its origins to Joseph Smith's establishment of the Church of Christ . The Gnosis Archive, gnosis.org, offers a vast collection . [161] He preached a radical difference between the God of the Old Testament, the Demiurge, the "evil creator of the material universe", and the highest God, the "loving, spiritual God who is the father of Jesus", who had sent Jesus to the earth to free mankind from the tyranny of the Jewish Law. [1][22][note 14][23] Scholars debate Gnosticism's origins as having roots in Neoplatonism and Buddhism, due to similarities in beliefs,[24] but ultimately, its origins are currently unknown. The Gnostic Church of Sophia is spiritually connected with, but not part of, the Gnostic Sanctuary (Ecclesia Gnostica Mysteriorum). The term demiurge derives from the Latinized form of the Greek term dmiourgos, , literally "public or skilled worker". [39] Adolf von Harnack (18511930), who belonged to the School of the History of Dogma and proposed a Kirchengeschichtliches Ursprungsmodell, saw Gnosticism as an internal development within the church under the influence of Greek philosophy. The Gnostic Christians were proto protestant in a sense. A 1st- or 2nd-century date of composition for the lost Greek originals has been proposed, though this is disputed; the manuscripts themselves date from the 3rd and 4th centuries. [3] Nonetheless, early Gnostic teachers such as Valentinus saw their beliefs as aligned with Christianity. With the deaths of the apostles and their immediate successors, falsehood found it easier to take root. [60] From this highest divinity emanate lower divine beings, known as Aeons. [64][73] In response, the Godhead emanates two savior aeons, Christ and the Holy Spirit; Christ then embodies itself in the form of Jesus, in order to be able to teach humans how to achieve gnosis, by which they may return to the pleroma.[74]. The greatest Gnostic find to date has been the Nag Hammadi Library, discovered in 1945. [204] It created a religion, "Gnosticism", from the "gnosis" which was a widespread element of ancient religions,[note 31] suggesting a homogeneous conception of gnosis by these Gnostic religions, which did not exist at the time. From Syria it progressed still farther, into Palestine, Asia Minor and Armenia. [6]:109. [29][45]:4[46][47][48][49][50][51] Charles Hberl, who is also a linguist specializing in Mandaic, finds Palestinian and Samaritan Aramaic influence on Mandaic and accepts Mandaeans having a "shared Palestinian history with Jews". [28] Quispel sees Gnosticism as an independent Jewish development, tracing its origins to Alexandrian Jews, to which group Valentinus was also connected. [70], In Gnostic tradition, the term Sophia (, Greek for "wisdom") refers to the final and lowest emanation of God, and is identified with the anima mundi or world-soul. We honor the Gautama Buddha as a great Teacher of Gnosis. [note 24] In the Valentinian myths, the creation of a flawed materiality is not due to any moral failing on the part of the Demiurge, but due to the fact that he is less perfect than the superior entities from which he emanated. Three periods can be discerned in the development of Gnosticism:[85], During the first period, three types of tradition developed:[85]. [125][6][126] Others claim a southwestern Mesopotamia origin. The Bible consists of scriptures chosen by men. Their names include Second, Third, and Fourth Life (i.e. [98] The Apocryphon of John contains a scheme of three descendants from the heavenly realm, the third one being Jesus, just as in the Gospel of John. Search by country or state. [43], In the 1880s, Gnosticism was placed within Greek philosophy, especially neo-Platonism. [35], Alexandria was of central importance for the birth of Gnosticism. From The Gnostic Gospels. The SyrianEgyptian traditions postulate a remote, supreme Godhead, the Monad. The Gnostic Christ will span twelve lectures on the initiatic life of Jesus, specifically the Annunciation, Nativity . [69], Two of the most commonly paired ons were Christ and Sophia (Greek: "Wisdom"); the latter refers to Christ as her "consort" in A Valentinian Exposition. E.J. All rights reserved. It would be impossible that both light and darkness were created from one source, since they were regarded as two different eternal principles. [106][note 22] However, his revelation was different from the gnostic revelations. Hans Jonas discerned two main currents of Gnosticism, namely Syrian-Egyptian, and Persian, which includes Manicheanism and Mandaeism. The Gnostic Church is the authentic primeval Christian Church whose first Pope was the Gnostic initiate called Peter. Writings from the second through fourth centuries either make these claims outright or suggest them to modern readers. The Thomasine Traditions refers to a group of texts which are attributed to the apostle Thomas. In some cases, indeed, a violent rejection of the Jewish God, or of Judaism, seems to stand at the basis of these texts. The GCOC was founded in 2002 in Atlanta, Georgia, and is one of the first if not the first denominations, or spiritual traditions, to have been founded through the Internet. [191] Jules Doinel "re-established" a Gnostic church in France in 1890, which altered its form as it passed through various direct successors (Fabre des Essarts as Tau Synsius and Joanny Bricaud as Tau Jean II most notably), and, though small, is still active today. GNOSTIC CHURCH OF CHRIST is located at 140 EAST SANDUSKY AVENUE in the city of Bellefontaine. The English Qabala is a system of numerical correspondences developed in the 1970s by British thelemite Jim Lees and a small group of associates with whom he shared his original . Since the "Christian" Gnostics accepted Christ as, in some sense, the savior, they were prone to a heresy called docetism, which taught that Christ only appeared to have a man's body. These various groups emphasized personal spiritual knowledge above the orthodox teachings, traditions, and authority of religious institutions. Ritualistic behaviour was not important unless it was based on a personal, internal motivation. Twelve leather-bound papyrus codices buried in a sealed jar were found by a local farmer named Muhammed al-Samman. Those Gnostics who avoided docetism and allowed Christ a real material body taught that the Christ spirit entered into Jesus' body at some point and was later withdrawn. 010 - Sunday Service, The Compasses & Square and the Eternal Story of . Jonas emphasized the duality between God and the world, and concluded that Gnosticism cannot be derived from Platonism. According to Layton, "the lack of uniformity in ancient Christian scripture in the early period is very striking, and it points to the substantial diversity within the Christian religion. Several heresiological writers, such as Hippolytus, made little effort to exactly record the nature of the sects they reported on, or transcribe their sacred texts. The demiurge creates the physical universe and the physical aspect of humanity. The founder of "Christian" Gnosticism was Valentinus, born in Carthage in about 100 A.D. From: The Secret Teachings That the Living Jesus Taught And that Didymos Judas Thomas recorded. Likewise, they had a dualist view of the cosmos, in which the lower world was corrupted by meddling divine beings and the upper world's God was awaiting a chance to destroy it and start over, thereby helping humanity to escape its corrupt bodies and locations by fleeing into celestial ones. Oh God no! [84] Still other traditions identify Mani, the founder of Manichaeism, and Seth, third son of Adam and Eve, as salvific figures. ] however, does not preclude an identifiable standard among such congregations Gautama Buddha as a category. Its influence but not part of, the sufficient cause of salvation is a! Sandusky AVENUE in the late 1980s scholars voiced concerns about the broadness of `` Gnosticism '' as meaningful... Eight have been influenced by Plato, Middle Platonism, gnostic church of christ authority of religious.. 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