For my own project (rather, to to determine any relevance thereto), I've tried to identify Gnostics at the earliest possible stages of Xianity. Like everyone else, I initially bought into the False Idea that Gnosticism came 'out of Xianity' confoundingly late. By the general assumption, Alexandria does appear to be the source or center, at least from 'Xian-preserved' sources, after about 50 AD. Yet, my nagging hunch -following Friedländer, Pearson, Stroumsa and a few others- is that 'gnosticism' is actually much older and probably comes out of Egypt - even if there's no documentation of that. How to make sense of it all???
Tracking the symbols farther back in time, I think.
Now I have just found Attilio Mastrocinque's From Jewish Magic to Gnosticism [2005]. This Italian scholar has been given short shrift by colleagues - and no one here mentions his work in any detail - because he focuses on gemstone evidence. I suspect the textualist Late Daters are insecure and dismissive of his archaeological orientation; anyway, Mastrocinque is revolutionary, unsettling the old school.
In fact, he has formulated a simple and coherent explanation for many of the difficult questions around the origin of Gnosticism. How can I say this better, more emphatically? On the (Judaic) origins of Gnosticsim, Mastrocinque's From Jewish Magic to Gnosticism is a 'Must-Read' book !!! I don't agree with all his conclusions - and I think he could have gone further, at points - but overall he has brilliantly re-oriented the discussion to the 'heretical' Judeo-Egyptian god Ialdabaoth, a major pre-Xian deity.
On another thread, I excerpted a tiny fraction of his Ialdabaoth analysis; here I want to highlight his references to the Jewish Temple at Leontopolis.
p.74: On a gem found at Sakkara and conserved in New York, the leontocephalous {i.e. snake-entwined lion-headed figure} divinity is accompanied by an inscription identifying him with the god of Leontopolis, lord of thunder, lightning and wind, whose names are Mios, Miosi, Armios, Ousinnios, Phre, Simiephe, Phnouto, Phos, Pyr and Phlox. This is the lion-headed or leontomorphic god Mios of Leontopolis, identified with Re (in the form Phre), Horus (in the form Harmios), Osiris (in the form Ousirmios), and described as Great God (in the form Phnouto), Light and Fire (Phos, Pyr and Phlox). … Given that from the 2nd century BC until the 1st century AD, not only the cult of the leonine sun-god Mios and the leonine goddess Bastet but also that of the Hebrew god flourished at Leontopolis, the figure of the lion-headed sun-god probably represented a number of deities at the same time: the leontocephalous Mios, Horus, Osiris, who were solar deities, and Yahweh, who was lord of thunder, lightning and wind. Moreover, the temple of Yahweh at Leontopolis stood on the site of the ruins of the ancient temple of ‘the fierce Bubastis’, i.e. the goddess Bastet …
pp.78-9: The lion-headed god, as we have seen, was the god of Leontopolis, a solar deity identified with Egyptian divinities. This leads to the almost inevitable conclusion that Ialdabaoth was the creation of the Jewish priests of the temple of Yahweh at Leontopolis {170 BC}. In this way the clergy were able to explain the existence of a second Temple as the result of the Egyptian Hebrews' special devotion to the first manifestation of God in a lion-headed human form; and thus it was that the Hebrew religion practised in the Heliopolitan demos merged with indigenous culture, resulting in identification of the leontocephalous lord of the cosmos with Harpocrates or Serapis.
p.131:
it is likely that in Babylonia theories had already been developed on the divine Anthropos, the Sophia of God, the angels who came down to earth, and probably also on Seth and the other more ancient beliefs underlying Gnosticism. The doctrinal system developed by these Jews no doubt included an Anthropos Son of God and (in Asia Minor) an emanation of God in the form of a snake. The system must have had numerous similarities with those of the Jews of Leontopolis. It is not clear at what stage the snake came to be perceived as be the rebellious son of Leviathan, resulting in the following perfect equation with the divine world:
God the Father Leviathan
Anthropos the Son Instructor Serpent
As a result of the Christianization of the Jews of Asia Minor, the instructor serpent was identified with the Son made flesh in Jesus Christ.
Meeting these Jewish idolaters and heretics was traumatic for the Christian preachers, who were totally unfamiliar with many of the doctrinal theories of Babylonian, Anatolian and also Egyptian Judaism. It was then that the Christians started a new kind of warfare against the devil, who was equated with the pagan snake gods also revered by diaspora Jews. The Christians gradually extended their campaign against the devil from the sphere of Jewish heresies to Greek and Roman serpentiform divinities.
p.156, n.698:
…M. Smith, The Jewish Elements in the Magical Papyri, in: Studies in the Cult of Yahweh, II (n. 3), 242-56, bas examined the Judaic or Judaizing elements in magical papyri, and has concluded that they date back to the time when the Jews of Elephantine and then those of Leontopolis did not scruple to venerate certain Egyptian gods alongside Yahweh, and when the Egyptians were not yet so hostile to the Jews. The lion-headed appearance of the Jewish god has been connected with the beliefs of the Jews of Leontopolis by S. Davies, The Lion-Headed Yaldabaoth, JRH 11, 1980-81, 495-500. On the temple of Chnum at Elephantine: W. Niederberger, Elephantine XX. Der Chnumtempel Nektanebos' 11., Mainz 1999.
p.158: The cycles of Nile flood celebrations were the high point of the religious life of the peoples of Egypt. The flood brought benefits for everyone, including the Jews, and so they too must have devised cults that allowed them to take part in the common thanksgiving to the god who had blessed the earth. This is why Chnoubis/Chnoumis came to be equated with the Jewish god and, later, Serapis with Joseph. Towards the end of repression of Judaism in Egypt {c.140 AD - I think ApJohn is older} the Apocryphon of John was composed, in which the lion-headed serpent was seen as the evil creator. This phenomenon marks a clear separation from Egyptian Hebraism and an acceptance of certain forms of Christianity.
Forms of veneration of the snake as the manifestation of the Jewish god must also have occurred in Anatolia, perhaps in imitation of the Egyptian example, though other influences are not to be ruled out; for example, worshippers of the god of Leontopolis, who were exiled after the closure of the temple by Vespasian {73 AD}, could have played a part.
pp.78-9: The lion-headed god, as we have seen, was the god of Leontopolis, a solar deity identified with Egyptian divinities. This leads to the almost inevitable conclusion that Ialdabaoth was the creation of the Jewish priests of the temple of Yahweh at Leontopolis {170 BC}. In this way the clergy were able to explain the existence of a second Temple as the result of the Egyptian Hebrews' special devotion to the first manifestation of God in a lion-headed human form; and thus it was that the Hebrew religion practised in the Heliopolitan demos merged with indigenous culture, resulting in identification of the leontocephalous lord of the cosmos with Harpocrates or Serapis.
p.131:
it is likely that in Babylonia theories had already been developed on the divine Anthropos, the Sophia of God, the angels who came down to earth, and probably also on Seth and the other more ancient beliefs underlying Gnosticism. The doctrinal system developed by these Jews no doubt included an Anthropos Son of God and (in Asia Minor) an emanation of God in the form of a snake. The system must have had numerous similarities with those of the Jews of Leontopolis. It is not clear at what stage the snake came to be perceived as be the rebellious son of Leviathan, resulting in the following perfect equation with the divine world:
God the Father Leviathan
Anthropos the Son Instructor Serpent
As a result of the Christianization of the Jews of Asia Minor, the instructor serpent was identified with the Son made flesh in Jesus Christ.
Meeting these Jewish idolaters and heretics was traumatic for the Christian preachers, who were totally unfamiliar with many of the doctrinal theories of Babylonian, Anatolian and also Egyptian Judaism. It was then that the Christians started a new kind of warfare against the devil, who was equated with the pagan snake gods also revered by diaspora Jews. The Christians gradually extended their campaign against the devil from the sphere of Jewish heresies to Greek and Roman serpentiform divinities.
p.156, n.698:
…M. Smith, The Jewish Elements in the Magical Papyri, in: Studies in the Cult of Yahweh, II (n. 3), 242-56, bas examined the Judaic or Judaizing elements in magical papyri, and has concluded that they date back to the time when the Jews of Elephantine and then those of Leontopolis did not scruple to venerate certain Egyptian gods alongside Yahweh, and when the Egyptians were not yet so hostile to the Jews. The lion-headed appearance of the Jewish god has been connected with the beliefs of the Jews of Leontopolis by S. Davies, The Lion-Headed Yaldabaoth, JRH 11, 1980-81, 495-500. On the temple of Chnum at Elephantine: W. Niederberger, Elephantine XX. Der Chnumtempel Nektanebos' 11., Mainz 1999.
p.158: The cycles of Nile flood celebrations were the high point of the religious life of the peoples of Egypt. The flood brought benefits for everyone, including the Jews, and so they too must have devised cults that allowed them to take part in the common thanksgiving to the god who had blessed the earth. This is why Chnoubis/Chnoumis came to be equated with the Jewish god and, later, Serapis with Joseph. Towards the end of repression of Judaism in Egypt {c.140 AD - I think ApJohn is older} the Apocryphon of John was composed, in which the lion-headed serpent was seen as the evil creator. This phenomenon marks a clear separation from Egyptian Hebraism and an acceptance of certain forms of Christianity.
Forms of veneration of the snake as the manifestation of the Jewish god must also have occurred in Anatolia, perhaps in imitation of the Egyptian example, though other influences are not to be ruled out; for example, worshippers of the god of Leontopolis, who were exiled after the closure of the temple by Vespasian {73 AD}, could have played a part.
An Ialdabaoth/Chnoubis gem:
