What would a reverse gnosticism be like?
The material world is good and the spiritual is evil?
Reason I'm asking is that I'm trying to make an interesting religion for the civilized (and technologically superior) empire that is just about to show up on the borders of the PC's land.
they would probably be surprisingly peaceful, or at least merciful, if they are good adherents to their fate.
After all, if the spiritual is evil, you don't want t osend people back there, do you?
Make more babies, get their spirit into the material world!
>>46821201
when you say "gnosticism" you're referring to dozens of idiosyncratic systems and cults spanning from just before the time of Christ to the Manicheans in the seventh century, and even to the modern day Mandeans. Valentians, Cathars, and even the followers of Simon Magus are all considered "Gnostic". Soooo it kind of depends on what variety of Gnosticism you mean, exactly.
Really, the only thing consistent among Gnostics is an extreme penchant for elitism and seclusion.
A lot of the Gnostics who opposed the Church Father proposed that the *true* God was above understanding, immortal and infinite and made purely of light(also, in some teachings, hermaphroditic); also popular was the idea that the Old Testament God was a usurper and basically a minor petty being, the Demiurge.
Gnostic systems are, of course, notoriously inconsistent.
If you want a great, but heavy, book on the subject, read Gnosis by Kurt Rudolph.
The villains in my setting are basically extremist Gnostics who want to destroy the entire physical universe and everyone in it
>>46821201
Do they also believe that the god who created the world was good, but there is a greater, more powerful god that is an asshole?
>>46821998
Forgot pic
>>46821201
That basically sounds like a non-edgy version of theistic Satanism.
So maybe like the Yazidis?
>>46821998
Oh go with this idea OP.
The original universe is a primordial chaos of darkness and evil ruled over by a Being of Pure Darkness. One day, one of his "angels" rebels, deciding to create a world of Goodness. The dark god figure, in jealousy of the new god's creation [or anger at his rebuttal] spreads evil and darkness throughout his creation.
The main god of their religion is therefore viewed as the heroic, moralistic leader of a band of rebels, as well as King of the World of Goodness. Other gods are either viewed as servants of the One God, or else dark spirits sent by the Dark God, depending on their moral persuasion.
Basically a Norse take on Zoroastrianism
A completely rejection of spiritualism, in favor of the material world and wealth while insisting an the importance of hierarchy, blind faith and unyielding loyalty towards authority?
Maybe some kind of fascism? A cult dedicated to a dictator while rejecting anything that does not directly benefit the nation?
When I tried to play with Gnosticism, I just made the demiurge a good guy and the embodiment of spontaneous order while the universe beyond his realm was a chaotic mess and the spiritual realm was constantly destroying itself as quickly as it was creating itself.
>>46822066
>>46822139
This. This so fucking much.
>>46822168
>Demiurge a good guy
This is definitely a good way to handle it with a regular Gnostic setting. I know that just based on the premise of Gnosticism it has to be evil, but it could easily be interpreted otherwise.
And I think that a reverse gnosticism would either be a bunch of fanatic materialists attempting to destroy religion or a chill group of people trying to preserve the material world and keep people in it as long as possible. Perhaps both at the same time.
A fascist-ist empire that doesn't hesitate to kill spiritualists and take control, but once control is established is actually a really chill place as long as one isn't religious.
Perhaps, in OP's setting, the reverse gnostics could have some plan to get rid of the spiritual world or somehow destroy the not!Monad. A conflict could be that this will destabilize or destroy both worlds.
>>46822139
>>46822168
The spirit world is one of false light and comforting lies of 'true knowledge' - the only truth is that of the Great Revolutionary, who rejected the untruth of spirituality to create great material. Surely, the material world brings pain, but this the work of the Dark Overlord, and can be ameliorated through good deeds, scientific advancement, and acceptance of the material world as the only truth. Aid in the Great Revolution, and material wealth - and truth - shall be yours!We cult of communism now?
>>46822168
Maybe more like communism. A huge boner for industry, free education and space exploration.. Industrial iconography, hammers, anvils, gears, furnaces,flames etc everywhere proudly disclaming themselves as the Demiurge, the creators of the world.
>>46821201
Reverse gnosticism is regular Christianity, aka your Tolkien, your Lewis, your JMS and your Mass Effect
>>46822139
Orlanth Stronk!
>>46824779
Not quite. Gnostics tend to believe in Christ as the incarnation of the good, spiritual "God" and the teachings of Christ's disciples will help adherents reach salvation/enlightenment.
It would probably make more sense to compare reverse Gnosticism to Judaism. Or, if Allah is comparable to the demiurge, Islam is pretty much reverse Gnosticism.
>>46824594
I'm thinking something like the Hammerites from the Thief series. Worshiping a distant creator deity and valuing industry and societal progress above individual salvation.
>>46825628
Why worship a distant god when WE are the creators? We create more humans, we create cities, we create civilization. We are the demiurge, not some mythic being living in make-believe land!
Also, I think they would be really heavy on authory, hierarchy, and order. These inherently appeal to many people IRL and I think translating that correctly into the faction would be essential to making it click.
>>46821201
"Does mere might confer right? Do we, the civilized people of the world, still yet believe that a barbarian brute is more fit to rule those he terrorizes than a king, merely because of the threat he may pose? NO! So why then should men be made to grovel and cower before these unnatural monsters, these so-called 'gods' of the barbarian world, or the ancestor spirits of our enemies, the heathen fae? Or the brute titans who are forces of nature given living shape to make the already fearsome disasters of the air, land and sea more hateful countenance? Do we not shape the formless earth to provide bedding for our crops? Do we not put the trees of the chaotic forests into order to shelter us from storms, and to carry us across the seas? So then should it be our own hands which produce that which is said to be good for us, and that which was here before to be set beneath our yoke! Craft your spirits! Build your gods! Take from the primeval and giveth unto it the works of men! Let not the spiritual frighten the mortal, but make the immortal fear the true Creators!"
Ehn, these ideas don't really work. Just about any take you can have on Gnosticism a Gnostic sect has already done.
Look into Dwemer from the Elder Scrolls setting.
>>46825779
love it.
Perhaps the empire has a ruling body less like a Senate and more like an oligarchical council of philanthropists, those who have done the most to advance the great causes, Science, Alms, and the Arts.
>>46821881
>(also, in some teachings, hermaphroditic)
>feeling compelled to point this out
hello tumblr welcome to /tg/ let us make it a safe space for you :)
The Matrix?
>>46821201
One word, anthropodeism.
Depending on how much of a role the spiritual plays in your campaign, that is to say, if it exists or not:
If it exists, have them stress that man/mortal is greater than any God or spirit, for man/mortal may move mountains, unfettered by metaphysical laws and constrictions; only man/mortal is of free will, he who may burn a forest one day and replant it the next.
If it doesn't exist, stress that the only thing worthy of the title of God is man/mortals (as a collective), with the same reasoning as above.
Have them stress the importance of knowledge and reason, being a trait entirely unique to man/mortals, and the utter neutrality of nature, a blank canvas upon which man/mortal may make his will manifest.
Being that nature is neutral, it follows that man/mortal may either make it good or evil, and that those who concern themselves with the spiritual beyond the world of nature and artifice are actively NOT making it good.
Perhaps even go so far to make it a categorical imperative of their religion for man/mortal to devote his life to seeking knowledge and making the world good (before they are taken by oblivion), or to support the nation/empire so as to better provide for those who are capable of astounding reason or good.
Also, imperialism, lots of imperialism; while other religions and nations may incidentally create good in accordance with these people's notions of it, they are not driven by this imperative purpose and thus may just as easily create evil.
Start by cutting out what "gnosticism" really means.
The Romans and Greeks were big on defining and giving specific words to different types of knowledge. "Gnosis" is specifically first-hand knowledge of a matter: you may know who Stalin is, but you've never met or talked to him, so all your knowledge of him is through believing in the tales of others. Gnosis in spiritual matters is a belief that higher powers can be experienced and known in the same way you could meet a celebrity or politician - different than pistis, a belief that higher powers are immaterial and only experienced through faith and belief.
If "reverse" means the opposite of the knowledge component, reverse gnosis would be pistis. Such a culture would value mental harmony and philosophy above material pursuits. Unshakable faith through reason being the mark of a true believer, understanding and following the structure of the powers that be being the purest worship.
If "reverse" means replacing spiritual with physical and physical with spiritual, it would be no different than gnosticism. The physical world can be known first hand, so there is no journey or belief involved.
If "reverse" means an opposition to spiritualism as a whole, it would be a denial of higher powers, rejecting their existence on the grounds of them being unprovable. There would be no faith or religious component, though perhaps a veneration of what has been proven as sacred.
>>46821910
So, the Thalmor from Elder Scrolls?
Descendants of Gods who were tricked into giving up their divinity to make the material world, they want to undo creation (and particularly Humans, descendants of the trickster God who pulled that original con) so that their souls can return to the Godhead.
>>46824359
I've been trying to homebrew a post-apocalyptic Central European setting for ages now, and I think you just invented my villains.
Is one of their prophets Erich Honecker?
>>46825931
Holy shit that's good. Like, Bioshock good.
>>46825931
I demand more, because I'm feeling the pulse of zeal already.
>>46825779
This; this this this.
Stress the value of artifice over the natural/in-human, in every facet of life.
Master planned cities, rigid hierarchy, designed economy, everything almost scientific in it's approach; show the hand of man in nearly every facet of their civilization, with a distaste for anything organic or natural.
Sharp angles and geometric constructions, at once both practical and venrating the power of man; an economy designed to seamlessly marry the utility of the collective and the drive of the individual; a government utterly enlightened in its design, redundant and simple in either measure to take into account both efficacy, and the (possibly less likely) tendency for corruption; a cellular, decentralized central government, power not only separated between leaders and legislators, but with multiple redundant and equally powerful councils and legislators at every level of government.
Make their entire civilization seem like the wet dream of every political science student, every civil engineer, every scientist and every artist; the entirety of society given over to perpetually reaching perfection through artifice.
Whether this means they are dull and cold, or whether the embrace that little bit of chaos and natural spark in men and seek to best utilize and tend it in the interest of artifice, is up to you.
went to bed yesterday.
Love how the thread turned out you guys!
You've been a lot of help.
speacially that guy: >>46825931
>>46821201
In Akutagawa Ryuunosuke's Kappa, it was called Viverism. Read the book since it's pretty much everything you described.
>>46829809
>>46825931
I am lovign this already. one question though, how would such materialist deal with the concept of the afterlife? Do they think it doesn't exsist (even tough it's proven fact in a lot of settings),? Or do they have some sort of ritual that wards the spirit off from these awful fates after death, and let it pass into nothing?
>>46830840
what, with fetuses aborting themselves if they cant be bothered with living and the gassing and eating of unemployed people?
>>46829809
So, just ape Constructivism and Brutalism?
So we just spiralled back to the Communism argument earlier in the thread?
>>46830879
they could value reincarnation, since it brings you back into the physical world
kind of like opposite buddhism, where the goal is to remain within the cycle of reincarnation rather than breaking out
>>46832805
which would make it easier on the conscience of their soldiers to gun down savages.
>>46821201
>for the civilized empire
Fairly certain all empires are civilized, what with being civilizations and all.
>>46827640
Try to be less stupid in the future.
>>46828918
>So, the Thalmor from Elder Scrolls?
There's more than that to the Thalmor. Sure, it's their main goal and the main difference between their organization and regular Summerset culture, which is mostly just immensely elitist, but they're still more than that one goal.
>>46821201
Hardline pragmatism/empiricism, I guess. Acceptance that abstract ideas have no value unless they have some kind of bearing on reality, and that bearing on reality must constantly be put to the test. If crops are failing, don't pray for rain; figure out a better way to raise crops.
>>46832906
Keep telling yourself that Mongolian.
>>46833287
Please respect us, or else we might invade you as well.
>>46833322
Okay.Have fun with the tornado (actually a typhoon).
>>46833322
Have you learned how to boat yet?
>>46830879
>>46832805
>>46832892
To expand upon this, what if the spiritual world was a chaotic place. Perhaps a hellscape, perhaps an abyss, perhaps just a lingering void of white nothingness. After all, if the physical world is vibrant because it has form, the spiritual world is so because it has nothingness in abundance.
Demons, angels, spirits- many orders have given what creatures dwell in the spiritual many more names. Each of these using differing methods to inspire false faith, offer deals or else to ultimately lead a soul into the spiritual world, to be devoured by these entities for in their world food is lacking and they are so very hungry.
Eventually, a soul found the will to fight back. And through their courage, souls walking toward utter destruction found the opportunity to walk back to the material plane, reincarnating into a new form. That champion is unknown, but their sacrifice- to fight on, has inspired a legion of particularly devoted crusaders and paladins that use their lifetime to train for a true, endless battle in the spiritual realm, so that more mortals may reincarnate and that the creatures beyond do not stand unopposed, lest all souls fall into their grasp..
(I'm no writefag, but the concept in this thread seemed really cool and I wanted to try and contribute something to it.)
I feel like a lot of posts focusing on mankind as god and veneration of artifice is just reverse religion in general, not reverse Gnosticism specifically.
The one thing I didn't see touched upon is the whole idea of having to experience everything to free the soul, or experiencing the least amount of anything material possible to free the soul. If in reverse, Material Realm = Good, Spiritual Realm = Bad, then I'd see humanity needing to moderate experience to keep the soul curious and bound to the material world. But excessive asceticism drives the soul away, too. The goal is to keep reincarnating, so people are probably driven to have lots of kids, and create new works of art and science to make new things to experience.
I like the idea of a rebellious Demiurge who created the one stable, evolving flow in the seething stagnant chaos of the universe, that the material realm is a haven instead of a prison. The Demiurge's Archons routinely protect the material realm from spiritual chaos, drawing out incoherent souls from the spirit realm and giving them form in the material. As for the Demiurge, I think maybe it incarnated AS the material plane, or some backbone for it (a little like the Aedra in TES). That's why the Archons are about, once the material base was formed, they set about making the world and firmament to guard the incarnate souls from the chaos of outside. I think they manifest as constellations or planets, that's what the Hebdomad was, seven world-creating archons identified as planets or stars. Maybe each of their incarnate forms dwell within these stars/planets.
>>46833287
Mongolians are always the exception in everything.
>>46834531
Materialism is not reverse religion. People can revere or highly respect concepts without being religious.
>>46833287
Are you really implying that the mongol empire wasn't civilized? Once they expanded to include non-nomadics and incorporated persianate or chinese government styles and cultures, they were the pinnacle of culture, trade and power in the world for quite a while, even as they fractured and declined.
>>46830890
No, it's more like everyone being a nihilistic hedonist who are obsessed with materialism and fame, even after death.
>>46838641
so...the norse?
>>46838641
A cold and calculating scientist methodically working on the Next Big Thing so his name will go down in history can be just as hedonistic as someone eating grapes while being fanned by slaves. It just shows differently.
>>46834531
>I like the idea of a rebellious Demiurge
So, just like the backstory of Kamen Rider Agito?
>>46834531
>As for the Demiurge, I think maybe it incarnated AS the material plane,
What is Bionis from Xenoblade for 300, Alex.
>>46828507
That's basically standard Gnosticism with imperialism added.
>>46839469
>>46839615
Never seen/played them
>>46840388
Now you should.
>>46821201
The empire believes that world is an awful place, and most deaths are followed up by reincarnation.
The reincarnation is usually into more awfulness, but the sufficiently righteous go to the afterlife.
The empire also believes in a far, far less awful afterlife; death there can lead back to the world, but is often true death.They also believe that the world they are in /is/ the afterlife.
