When somebody says they're a "Gnostic" today: Are they in a direct continuity from the Gnostics of early Christianity?
>>433693
It varies desu.
I consider myself gnostic but I do fuck-all research about christian gnosticism and the nag hammadi, my knowledge generally comes more from random readings of the kabbalah and the anthroposophical/rudolf steiner society
so yeah when you ask someone if they're gnostic as if they're Christian Gnostic.
>>433697
So for you Gnosticism = Occultism, in a sense?
>>433707
Gnosis, for me, means higher knowledge. A shaman doing hardcore drugs and inquiring the high spirits to grant him knowledge of "higher worlds" is a Gnostic as much as the buddhist who is meditating and trying to figure out the whole of reality is. Christian Gnosticism is less Gnosis for me and more like passing dogma and teachings down from ancient scripts.
So yeah, occultism would be gnosis in a certain way, but from what little I've read early christian Gnostics were actual Gnostics in their beginning.
>Gnosticism
Plotinus is not impressed.
>>433713
That's not Gnosticism then, you're probably thinking more about mysticism.
>>433732
It's semantics man. If you want, call it mysticism, the term was hijacked in antiquity by Christian Gnostics and as the church became stronger pagan religions died out, and today (on 4chan, mind you) a bunch of angry neckbeards only co-opted the term to get angry at existence.
Also, Plotinus would be, from my perspective, a gnostic in his own right, but I've only read a small essay on him rather than his own six Enneads.
>>433693
there was never any continuity of gnosticism, continuity wast realy a point
christians were all about continuity, because in christian discourse continuity is proof of legitimacy and truth, authority and such
but in gnostic logic things are somewhat non-linear, things are concieved and constructed and imagined and what is transfered from step to step and from mind to mind over time is not mere 'truth' but Gnosis
but it comes in parts, these are summed up here and scattered there, found in strange places bit by bit and scrap by scrap, reconstructed in ones mind as a mind itself is reformed, these are mysteries, and even if given in a straight line in some imagined chronological order, they would be ignored, unseen, misunderstood
so, continuity wast realy a big thing, since it in itself does not guarantee inner understanding, revelation, Gnosis
>>433736
He's definitely not a Gnostic. He was a Neo-Platonist and wrote an essay against the views of the Gnostics.
"Plotinus and the Neoplatonists viewed Gnosticism as a form of heresy or sectarianism to the Pythagorean and Platonic philosophy of the Mediterranean and Middle East. He accused them of using senseless jargon and being overly dramatic and insolent in their distortion of Plato's ontology. Plotinus attacks his opponents as untraditional, irrational and immoral and arrogant. He also attacks them as elitist and blasphemous to Plato for the Gnostics despising the material world and its maker."
>>433736
His second Ennead contains: Against Those That Affirm The Creator of the Kosmos and The Kosmos Itself to be Evil: [Generally Quoted as "Against the Gnostics"]
>>433758
>>433750
Again, what is Gnosis to me isn't necessarily what you think to be Gnosticism. I know this might be evoking the sensation of the humpty dumpty changing definition argument but I made it clear early in the thread.
In this context, (what I've read of) Plotinus' metaphysics strikes me as pretty gnostic, but again, I haven't read the man. What I think more than anything about him is that he was pissed at gnostic's misotheism but that's just a random guess.
>>433766
Well, they both posit the existence of a supreme transcendent reality that emanates successively imperfect grades of itself, so yeah they do have that in common.
Where they drastically diverge is their is view on matter. Obviously Gnostics believe matter is intrinsically evil, the demiurge created it etc. Plotinus isn't so harsh. He believes beauty is an (albeit dim) reflection of the One and that the principles of matter are a direct emanation of the archetypal mental realm of the One, its Intellect. So Plotinus is definitely not as harsh as the gnostics
>>433785
Both greek Gnostics and Plotinus were influenced largely by Plato, so it's possible that it's from there where their similarities occur, though I haven't bothered reading Plato either. I think Neo-Platonism is the superior to the greek Gnosticism for the same reason (matter has purpose).
>>433792
Yes, this is true. I prefer Neo Platonism for its airtight theodicy. Also there's something just kind of /b/-tier about literally believing all matter is evil. Way too strong of a statement. It just is.
>>433697
Gnosticism =/= Christianity.
It's literally the first heresy Christianity clashed with in its history...
Gnosis =/= Gnosticism anyway.
The later is a spiritual system the first
is a word to describe, revelation, divine light etc.
>>433792
Plotinus wrote an essay called 'Against the Gnostics' and it's in the Enneads. It isn't exactly clear who his Gnostics are, but it is clear that these were people who Plotinus believes misinterpreted ato really badly and had to be set straight.
>>434194
See. Right now, I suspect you're talking about manicheans when you tell me that it's the first sect christianity clashed with, but in another context saying Gnosticism would suffice if we were discussing a gnostic christian sect.
either way, I tend to identify the use of the word gnosticism as the christian, but where the confusion can arise is when you call a christian from this sect a gnostic, and a gnostic from another sect a gnostic.
Some humour for the discussion
>>434213
Some Gnostics also claimed being Christians. They were (and still are) widely seen as heretics nonetheless; "christian" gnostics weren't recognized as christians by non-gnostics. They sure were influenced by chritianism, but in some sense they were almost pagan syncretists too. Anyway, it is clear they were heretics for at least two reasons:
- The first one is really really obvious: in christianism, God is perfectly good and all-powerful. It is a definitive criterion of gnosticism that the Demiurge is either not-good or not-all powerful. That's why he's not called God but Demiurge, after all.
- In christianism, it is essential that God incarned itself in matter through the Christ. Therefore, it is impossible for matter to be inherently bad. Gnostics believe that matter is inherently bad, and thus push to its extreme limits the originally platonician dualism of spirit and matter (even though their interpretation of Plato is really exagerated and unsubtle, as it was already said). In the contrary, it is very important in christianism that the material world is a creation of God and is inherently good. The body is something to be respected and has a divine aspect. It is quite the contrary in gnosticism.
Incidentally, that's for the very same reasons that catharism was seen as an heresy during Middle Age. Catharism is basically a more recent version of the ancient "christian" gnosticism.
About your definition of gnosticism: it is acceptable as long as you don't mix it with ancient philosophy. What you call "gnosticism" is obviously something else than what is VERY WIDELY called gnosticism in history and philosophy. When the ancient thinkers talked about "gnosticism", what they were talking about was very clear, even if it is true that we don't know the names of the people they were talking against. You can say "I call myself a gnostic, meaning by that that I believe in a sacred knowledge"; but it would be absurd to call Plotinus a gnostic. Read the Enneads.
>>433697
>It varies desu.
More or less. A small handful of Gnostics claim lineal succession of hands back to Christ, while others are working academic reconstructions of what went alongside their scriptures. Others follow Crowley's EGC, while others simply follow the Apocrypha alongside their native Christism.
Someone saying "I'm a Gnostic" isn't going to tell you much without followup questions.
>>433732
I dig Plotinus but some Gnostic sects agreed that Demiurge is not malevolent.
>>434302
It's not really absurd if you can see where you're coming from, but I agree that in formal debates/texts one could and should refer to the gnostics plotinus criticized.
It becomes incredibly complicated when you begin to consider all the branches though, because not even all gnostic sects in antiquity thought matter to be evil (some french hermetic constantly said how a covenant with the demiurge was made in the first place thence redeeming "evil" in the sense that it is a necessary evil).
>>434320
where I'm coming from*
