Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
John2
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Post by John2 »

rgprice wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 12:10 pm I don't think Paul and the first Gospels were created by Gnostics. I wonder why they took any interest in them, at a time when they were apparently more interested in them than anyone else? I think that even if you read a reconstruction of Marcion's Gospel and Pauline letters, the Judaism in them still shines through. So why were they bothering with these works at all?

To me that's like asking why were any gentiles "bothering" with Judaism and Jewish writings in Greco-Roman times. For various reasons, gentiles in Greco-Roman times were interested in Judaism and Jewish writings (including by extension NT writings), among whom were Gnostics. Was it Plotinus (who I haven't thought about in ages) who criticized Gnostics for misusing Plato? To me that looks like a similar thing. Gnostics were "weirdos" who interpreted the religious and philosophical writings of their time in "weird" ways. Why did they bother to do that? Because they were weird.
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billd89
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Re: Gnostic Timeline

Post by billd89 »

John2 wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 2:29 pmTo me that's like asking why were any gentiles "bothering" with Judaism and Jewish writings in Greco-Roman times. For various reasons, gentiles in Greco-Roman times were interested in Judaism and Jewish writings (including by extension NT writings), among whom were Gnostics. Was it Plotinus (who I haven't thought about in ages) who criticized Gnostics for misusing Plato? To me that looks like a similar thing. Gnostics were "weirdos" who interpreted the religious and philosophical writings of their time in "weird" ways. Why did they bother to do that? Because they were weird.
Porphyry on Plotinus, YES. Even in Rome, they were reading & debating material two generations older.
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MrMacSon
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Post by MrMacSon »

rgprice wrote: Tue Oct 12, 2021 2:25 pm It seems that even Marcion's Gospel and Marcion's version of the Pauline letters still deal with the Jewish scriptures and still present a Jesus who is at least tangentially tied to Judaism. Given the teachings of the Gnostics, why did they deal with these materials at all?
I'm not sure Marcion was 'Gnostic' like 'the Gnostics' ie. the Sethians and the Valentinians ...

How did the canon that Marcion put forward inspire or support his teachings?
Not sure what you're asking here (though I'm still not sure how people can say attempted reconstructions of Marcion's Gospel don't represent Marcionism)
davidmartin
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Re: Logically...

Post by davidmartin »

billd89 wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 12:13 pm I reject the limiting definition of an Ialdaboath Demiurge for ALL Gnostics, although it is a typus for flourishing Classical Gnosticism c.125 AD. I agree with B. Pearson (1973) and follow Friedländer (1889), mostly: Gnosticism pre-dates Christianity.

1) The Logos Myth precedes Philo Judaeus by several generations (probably). The Christos myth has appeared (from somewhere) before Philo's day, but hadn't yet spread widely. By Apollos c.55 AD, it is taught in Alexandria and it widely disperses.
2) 'Gnostics' (Jewish mystics) spread certain allegorical teachings of Jewish Alexandrian radicals (Apocalytics) in heterodox communities, probably 2-4 generations before Philo.
3) Of course the Xian Gospels preached in these communities are born of and against competing Gnostic Christos ideas/variations.
4) The very particular strain of Essene/Therapeut Judaism first represented by the tiny Jesus Circle grew and morphed, and was imposed upon a much larger and older ideological matrix over generations, not overnight and not consistently.

True Proto-Gnostics? The 'first' Jews who entered the Temples of Aesculapius and Thoth, or more likely Serapis, seeking healing, wisdom, etc. c.200 BC. I'm comfortable calling them 'Hermeticists' in Egypt, and I agree 'Gnosticism' likely originates there.

Marcion (c.140) is a provincial 'Turkish' book collector, he possessed multiple versions of The Gospel (probably +60yrs older). Valentinus is a syncretist, merging the 60-80 year old Jesus Myth(s) with the leading Gnostic Thought of Alexandria (130 AD). Both big contenders for the prize, but both were losers in The Struggle @ Rome. Also, 4th Generation Gnostics; imagining them as 'the beginning' (error) naturally leads to befuddlement.
Bild this is insightful. I would ask if transition from a Jewish to Gentile milieu might impact as well. A true gentile gnostic would have no problems adopting an Ialdabaoth demiurge. Is there any evidence of a previous iteration of gnostic thought in the surviving texts? I think there is. Numerous of these texts lack a demiurge like Thomas, Eugnostos the blessed, apparently the gospel of Mary, Thunder, and a few others with earlier layers. Not only that the Simonians are presented as using Hebrew scriptures - highly allegorically but still using them and they are supposed to be the origin of the gnostics by the church fathers. Also the 'gnostic-like' opponents in say 1 John are attacked for denying Jesus is the Christ or having a fleshly body - not for anything said about God (which is found in the later Jude/2 Peter)
So plenty of evidence to argue for an earlier and different phase of gnosticism that wasn't so cosmically dualistic as what came later!
Maybe the example of Hermeticism gives a clue what that might have been like
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Irish1975
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Post by Irish1975 »

rgprice wrote: Tue Oct 12, 2021 2:25 pm It seems that even Marcion's Gospel and Marcion's version of the Pauline letters still deal with the Jewish scriptures and still present a Jesus who is at least tangentially tied to Judaism. Given the teachings of the Gnostics, why did they deal with these materials at all? How did the canon that Marcion put forward inspire or support his teachings?

It seems that if one were going to simply fabricate a set of scriptures to promote the idea that an unknown god had come to earth to reveal himself, and that this god was not god of the Jews, that Paul's letters wouldn't have been the ideal candidates for this.
rgprice wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 12:10 pm I think that even if you read a reconstruction of Marcion's Gospel and Pauline letters, the Judaism in them still shines through. So why were they bothering with these works at all?
Isn't the obvious answer to these questions that all of these people were either raised in some type of Judaism or wavering proselytes or something of the sort? Analogy: modern "Satanists" (or Deists, or pantheists) were once Christians or raised in a Christian culture.

Is there a misconception about the 1st century and earlier that "Judaism" was something determinate and also mostly similar to medieval and modern Rabbinic Judaism? But in our period gnosticism was Jewish, and Judaism was gnostic, and also many other things, i.e., syncretistic. Philo, the Odes, etc.
John2 wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 2:29 pm To me that's like asking why were any gentiles "bothering" with Judaism and Jewish writings in Greco-Roman times. For various reasons, gentiles in Greco-Roman times were interested in Judaism and Jewish writings (including by extension NT writings), among whom were Gnostics.
How do you know they were "gentiles"? Are you defining gentiles to include first or second generation converts to Judaism, who might still have one foot in the other culture?
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Irish1975
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Post by Irish1975 »

John2 wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 2:29 pm Gnostics were "weirdos" who interpreted the religious and philosophical writings of their time in "weird" ways. Why did they bother to do that? Because they were weird.
As opposed to Nicene Christianity?
John2
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Post by John2 »

Irish1975 wrote: Fri Oct 15, 2021 9:11 am
John2 wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 2:29 pm Gnostics were "weirdos" who interpreted the religious and philosophical writings of their time in "weird" ways. Why did they bother to do that? Because they were weird.
As opposed to Nicene Christianity?

It's a matter of degree.
Secret Alias
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Post by Secret Alias »

They weren't weird Steve. They were typical Jewish mystics only developing tradition from the gospel and traditional Jewish writings.
Secret Alias
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

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Read Scholem or Idel on the parallels. Nothing "strange." What's strange is taking these silly books literally. Never were meant to be that way. Moses and the Israelites taking cows and sheep into the desert for two generations. Silly.
Secret Alias
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Re: Why did the Gnostics use Paul and Gospels?

Post by Secret Alias »

Humanity developing from incest. Silly.

People living to 900. Silly.
Creation taking place over 6 days. Silly.
God being tired. Silly
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