Gnosticism: Esoteric Insight and/or Christian Heresy?

I learned today that the movie The Matrix is gnostic.

 

It certainly has Gnostic overtones.
The Matrix and Gnosticism: Is the Matrix a Gnostic Film?
Wake Up! - Gnosticism and Buddhism in The Matrix
What's lacking is the transcendence. The Matrix and Gnosticism
Kazlev explains: the Reality that Neo awakes to is not the essential blissful realm of nirvana beyond all embodied existence, or the Platonic world of pure spiritual forms, or the identity of one's own consciousness with the supreme Reality.... Instead he wakes up in another world material world, another relative reality or relative truth, but a hellish one, hooked to a machine in the grotesque womb-like fluid-filled pod in which his body has grown." Rather than liberation from a material prison, "this is a metaphor for re-embodiment and re-incarnation back in the material world." And (d)espite the constant mystical elements, it's not about inner spiritual growth, but about action and adventure, and struggle in the face of an overwhelming enemy, the mysticism being part of the sets and details, rather than the core of the character arc."

There are some professors with positions at reputable universities who actually believe our "reality" is a matrix-like virtual reality computer simulation--notably Professor .Nick Bostrom at Oxford "Are you living in a computer simulation?" Philosophical Quarterly (2003) Mathematical physicist and cosmologist Frank Tipler, professor at Tulane University, defends a version of this, rooted in the "Omega Point" Catholic mysticism of French paleontologist Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Through progress in communication and information technology, humans are being connected in an ever-expanding web of knowledge leading us eventually to the Omega Point: aka, God, who also becomes the Alpha through the wonders of time relativity..Tipler thought that the dead will be virtually resurrected throughout all alternate universes and time dimensions and will unite with the Omega point or be consigned to virtual hell by demonic robots. In The Fabric of Reality, quantum physicist David Deutsch defends the physics of Tipler's Omega Point Theory in The Fabric of Reality. But this is more a revised updated version of traditional Christianity than Gnosticism.

 

One of the things I find confusing in the discussion is that I'm more familiar with the ancient and medieval versions of Gnosticism, which seem at odds with the version Greatest I Am is presenting to us in several respects: egoism, materialism, rejection of the supernatural, and an optimistic view of worldly existence. The latter feature makes it more like the "human potential movement" of the 1960s and '70s. which was into personal growth and self-improvement by unlocking untapped human capacities.

Sounds to me like we may dealing with a varriant of the "I Am" movement that Guy and Edna Ballard and their son Donald founded back in the 1930s, which was itself a offshoot of Madame Blatavsy's highly ecclectic syncretic "Theosophy" of the 1800s, synthesizing a variety of eastern and western esoteric, occult and mystical traditions. The I Am Movement, supposedly part of the "Great White Brotherhood" of adepts in occultic wisdom, The "I Am" Religious Activity is tied to the Saint Germain Foundation SGF which Baylor religion professor J. Gordon Melton describes as an "establsihed cult". The emphasis is on secret ancient esoteric wisdom from Ascended Masters passed on to initiates.“Mighty I am presence”! charge me with the fulness of the ascended masters’ divine love! release all its qualities and attributes of perfection into dynamic action through me and my world at all times." etc., etc.
i-am-movement
The“I AM” Movement - the beginning of the modern ascended masters teaching
http://ascendedmasterindex.com/IAM.htm
The notion that we are God is central to the cult's ideology. Interestingly, a website that seems to be connected with the movement is pushing Quest, a book by neuroscientist Wai H. Tsang,
noted for the "fractal brain" theory that human consciousness is a portal for the inter-connectivity of all levels of reality from quantum to cosmic.
The Fractal Brain Theory
Fractal Brain Theory & How to start A Revolutionary Movement
He takes the fractal brain concept of Kitzbichler et al (2008) Fractal Brains: Fractal Thoughts and carries it well beyond the data into metaphysical territory.

 

I think anyone who was informed at all about the GnostIcs of antiquity or their medieval successors would have the same problem, as Greatest I Am's version of gnosis seems not to share too many of the features of those systems to put it mildly. In fact it seems to me to go in a direction diametrically opposed to the overall milieu of gnosis, as well as most of it's tenets..

The word 'gnosis' though gets used in contexts that don't refer dircectly to the old Gnostics. For instance, some 20th century teachers such as G.I Gurdjieff and Aliester Crowley get called 'gnostic' by some commentators. Poets William Blake, W.B Yeats likewise. Movies such as 'The Matrix' and so on.

What I find a little bit annoying about G I am's comments, are things like the claim that the Cathars didn't really believe in re-incarnation, when really, without it their system crumbles. At least for the rank and file Cathar believer.

The history of the Cathars is a tragic and horrendous tale.It's clear to me anyway that they had very strong beliefs indeed, given that so many chose to go the the stake and be burned alive rather than convert to Catholicism. I would suggest that whatever those people were, they were not 'players'. They took their beliefs extremely seriously, and I'm convinced they believed literally in the entrappment of the soul in matter, re-incarnation, and salvation coming from a 'supernatural' source.
There is absolutely nothing of which I'm aware about the Cathars that would sugest a 'joyful acceptance of the world'. Nor is there anything to suggest that the Perfecti, the Cather elite, thought they were God. They thought of themselves as 'good Christians'.

Like I said before, I think that because gnosticism was wiped out in the past and isn't a living tradition, and because what is known is fragmentary and incomplete, it's open for people to reinvent it for themselves. But I don't see the point in calling yourself a gnostic if you don't have a view bearing some relation to those in the past.

 

Likely because we use Gnosis and what can be know to guide our ideology.

Almost none of the ancient intelligentsia held any supernatural beliefs and reincarnation is a part of that system.

I hope you can see how intelligent the ancients were as compared to the mental trash that modern preachers and theists are using with the literal reading of myths.

https://bigthink.com/videos/what-is-god-2-2

Further.
Bill Moyers Journal . Watch & Listen | PBS

Rabbi Hillel, the older contemporary of Jesus, said that when asked to sum up the whole of Jewish teaching, while he stood on one leg, said, "The Golden Rule. That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the Torah. And everything else is only commentary. Now, go and study it."

Please listen as to what is said about the literal reading of myths.

"Origen, the great second or third century Greek commentator on the Bible said that it is absolutely impossible to take these texts literally. You simply cannot do so. And he said, "God has put these sort of conundrums and paradoxes in so that we are forced to seek a deeper meaning."

Matt 7;12 So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

This is how early Gnostic Christians view the transition from reading myths properly to destructive literal reading and idol worship.



Regards
DL

 

So no Christian denomination, other than Gnostic ones, do not believe in a literal Christ.

A recant on your original B.S. statement would have shown more couth than your wall of text.

Regards
DL

 

Say those who believe in the supernatural.

When I speak of my apotheosis and when I define God, I always take the divine out of the definition because that definition can only be given. It cannot be taken on by ourselves.

If you look up the history of the term I am that I am, it also means I will be what I will be or some such thing.

Regards
DL.

 

I agree. That is why we are perpetual seekers instead of idol worshipers like the mainstream religions are.

We demand more from what most call God and we will not settle for a vile genocidal demiurge like Yahweh as a good God.

Regards
DL

 

Nicely put.

The moment one puts any definition to some God, we restrict that God.

Those who say God is Love, for instance, restrict God from being Hate.

The Bible says that God created all that is good and all that is evil, but Christians who say God is Love deny that God is also hate. The follow the first commandment by not putting anyone's name above God for love, but break that same commandment by putting another's name instead of God for hate.

They know not what they do.

Regards
DL

 

I follow the Moses allegory. I define God as the best rules and laws to live by.
Moses can off the mountain with rules and laws. Not some God.
We have no physical God to follow and never had or we would all know of him.
We do have what we think are the best rules and laws to live by and should, like Gnostic Christians do, continue to seek to improve them instead of idol worshiping them.

Regards
DL

 

My, my, such invective. Not really a substitute for logical argument. It's hard to tell from you post just what your beef is. When you're able to explain it better, I might respond to it.

 

Not officially, but a fair bit of the bible is thought to have Gnostic Christian origins and one of the Jesus' is clearly more of an eastern mystic than a western savior.

I think we were once using the brad of Chrestian, as it's ideology fits ours to a T, while not fitting Christianity at all, even though they plagiarized our books.



That is only my opinion as there are too many of the holy books that did not survive the various inquisitions.

Christians and Hitler were quite eager to burn books so as to keep the population as dumbed down as some Christians remain today.

Regards
DL

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Can you define the thing called God?

 

Handy that you have a poor memory.

I am not petty enough to bother getting the quote as I think we both let little jabs roll of us, as we should.

That is a trait that the better debaters have.

Jordan Peterson
In order to be able to think, you have to risk being offensive.

I think you and I have that. We try to insult with class.

Regards
DL

 

Not precisely, since God is ineffable. But Webster's gives us three general definitions that seem applicable:1. "the supreme or ultimate reality"; 2. a being or object believed to have more than natural attributes and powers and to require human worship;and a person or thing of supreme value; and (3) "a person or thing of supreme value" . I tend to use the first and third definitions of the term, but the second is probably the most widely used among believers. If "more than natural attributes" means attributes that are currently outside the paradigms of science, I can live with that as well.Definition of GOD

 

That reads like gobbledegook.

 

This is irrelevant.

The Cathars, so far as we know, used only one book of the Bible, the Gospel of John. That doesn't mention anything about reincarnation. So they obviously weren't taking that book literally in that sense. On the other hand, where Christ says 'love one another' they very probably did take it literally, unlike so many other kinds of 'Christian' through the ages down to today.

Truth is we don't know where their beliefs in re-incarnation originated. Some say possibly in post-gnostic cults in eastern Europe. However, there's absolutely no reason to think they didn't regard it as a literal process.Quite likely, the origin of their belief may have come from the East, where as already discussed, many millions believe literally in re-incarnation.

If you think otherwise, try to explain in clear english how they interpreted their belief in the soul's entrappment and re-incarnation. Not someone else's video.

 

I think that's exactly what happened. People of esoteric inclination used "Gnostic" as a cool-sounding label for ancient wisdom. In the nineteenth century, Mme. Blatavsky put together a syncretic brew of occult, hermetic, eastern and Gnostic ideas and popularized them as "Theosophy". Among her disciples were the Ballards who went off to found their own cult in California (where else?) based on alleged revelations from an Ascended Master, Saint Germain, whom Mr. Ballard claimed to have encountered on Mount Shasta, kinda like Moses on Mount Sinai. The particular cult they founded was the I Am movement with the very un-Gnostic features we've noticed: self-deification, friendliness to worldly values, and rejection of the supernatural. Heady stuff! Why don't we hear more about traditional Gnostic schools and teachings from their advocate on this forum. Because he doesn't know much about them? That would be my guess.

 

Seems simple enough to me.

Divine is a subjective label. Right?

If so, do you think it proper to apply it to yourself, or is it more proper to label others that way should you find what you would call divine traits in a person?

Regards
DL

 

It is relevant as it shows where our thinking comes from. The intelligentsia. That is why the inquisitions were used on us. Intelligent and free thinking were outlawed.

Entrapment is the wrong word. We see the world and all in it as revolving perfection including man and his soul or spark of God. That is a concept of oneness is older than most religions. Ask any native.

If you can't see God in all, you can't see God at all. -Anon

Reincarnation belongs to supernatural thinking and we hold no supernatural beliefs.

The only thing (trapped) or withheld, is the knowledge that we are the Gods and there are no other above us.



Regards
DL