Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

...and neither that a bad tree bears good fruit.

But to you, my friends, I say: Do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul and also have nothing they can do beyond that. But I show you whom you shall fear: him who has the authority after death to cast into hell. Indeed, I say: Him you shall fear!

For when you go with your adversary to court, make an effort while still on the way to be released from him; else, he sues you before the judge, and the judge hands you over to the bailiff, and the bailiff throws you in prison. I say to you: You will never get out from there until you have paid even the last quadrans.

No slave can serve two masters. For he will either hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and the mammon.

From carvings on Gnostic gems ike the Ophian gem pictured in chapter 7 and descriptions of the gods in their literature, we know that Gnostics imagined the dark lords of the heavens as brutal monsters, animal-human hybrids dressed in Roman military uniforms. Most often the monsters had the heads of ferocious lions or hissing asps. They carried the sceptres of kings in their hands, and sometimes even displayed the heads of theis slain enemeies to terrorize their sujects.

There is a revolutionary edge to the Gnostic vision of the gods, one with political implications. Traditionally, kings and emperors were representatives of the gods, tasked with maintaining cosmic and civil order. When Gnostics characterize the traditional gods as demonic monsters in Roman military uniform, they are implying that their political leaders, the Roman power brokers, are demonic too. In Gnostic thought, the royals and their officials are the bad guys, terrorizing the rest of us, lying to us, and keeping us in servitude in the interests of their demonic overlords.