Quote:The label “gnostic” is used to recommend and condemn. So what is, and what was, Gnosticism? This episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, with Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon, takes a lead from a series of fascinating essays exploring the ancient movement and its modern forms by the philosopher, David Bentley Hart. Gnosticism was originally a set of cosmologies which shared the sense that the created order was blocked from the celestial spheres by angelic and demonic powers. It was remarkably widespread amongst early Christians of all kinds. They turned to Christ, in the hope of redemption or escape. Nowadays, it is used in different ways, often to express a sense of yearning or hope. As Rupert and Mark discuss, Gnosticism may offer the promise of a re-enchanted cosmos, freed from the Archons of the machine and mammon. Properly understood, it might offer a key for our times.
'Historically, we may regard materialism as a system of dogma set up to combat orthodox dogma...Accordingly we find that, as ancient orthodoxies disintegrate, materialism more and more gives way to scepticism.'
- Bertrand Russell
(2024-08-13, 03:26 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote:
Quote:The demonic cosmos-creating Demiurge is at the core of the Sethian Gnostic mythology, but how did this idea develop? From Samaria would emerge a theologian and mystic who would become, for Christians, the most fundamental of all heretics: Simon Magus. But how did Simon of Samaria's theology actual influence early Christian thought? Further, how did Menander of Samaria and Saturninus of Antioch all contribute to the Christian doctrines that would give rise to Sethian Gnosticism and the myth of the demonic Demiurge known as Ialdabaoth. Here we dive deep into ancient theologies now long lost and condemned as heresy but were actually at the heart of the development of Christianity itself.
'Historically, we may regard materialism as a system of dogma set up to combat orthodox dogma...Accordingly we find that, as ancient orthodoxies disintegrate, materialism more and more gives way to scepticism.'
- Bertrand Russell
(This post was last modified: 2024-12-11, 09:32 PM by Sciborg_S_Patel. Edited 2 times in total.)
Quote:I recently acquired an incredibly important volume of Hermetic Wisdom, the very rare 1505 edition of the Corpus Hermeticum which also includes the Crater Hermetis of Lodovico Lazzarelli, the first known text in which anyone identifies themselves as a "Hermeticist." Sadly, the volume was in a poor state of preservation and, to ensure it will survive another 500 years, I paid to have it conserved. This is the story of that conservation project.
'Historically, we may regard materialism as a system of dogma set up to combat orthodox dogma...Accordingly we find that, as ancient orthodoxies disintegrate, materialism more and more gives way to scepticism.'
- Bertrand Russell
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