Ask a Philosopher: I often get questions in emails about my blog or books. I have been replying to these on email but decided I might also start posting answers as part of a series “ask a philosopher.” Who wouldn’t want to ask a philosopher something?
Question: Dr. Anderson, you mentioned examples of Gnosticism in popular culture. Isn’t Gnosticism the teaching that there is secret knowledge? How does that line up with the examples of dualism or hierarchies of spiritual beings you gave?
Reply: Gnosticism can be defined in three ways. One is epistemological and that seems to be the one you are thinking of. This teaches that the knowledge needed to actually understand reality is hard to get and only given to a few through secret teaching. Knowledge is not clear and not available to all in general revelation.
Another is metaphysical. So, for instance, the Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy (2nd ed) says Gnosticism is “a dualistic religious and philosophical movement in the early centuries of the Christian church. . . They taught that matter was evil, the result of cosmic disruption in which an evil archon (often associated with the god of the Old Testament, Yahweh) rebelled against the heavenly pleroma (the complete spiritual world). In the process divine sparks were unleashed from the pleroma and lodged in material human bodies. Jesus was a high-ranking archon (Logos) sent to restore those souls with divine sparks to the pleroma by imparting esoteric knowledge (gnosis) to them.” It is worth noting that in this view God is the one who fell, and the other heavenly beings (demons?) did not.
So this gives standard dualistic framework: matter is evil and spirit is good; there is a hierarchy of spiritual beings some working for humans others against humans; salvation involves imparting secret knowledge to humans. The God of the Old Testament is only one of many spiritual beings (and he is not the highest power), he rebelled and did wrong, he made the material world which is evil or imperfect, and one must be saved from this world.
The third way to define it is ethically. Because of its epistemology and metaphysics it gives a way of life or view of what is good and how to achieve it. This is some form of ascending the spiritual ladder to more pure spirit or a higher form. This is connected to how it answers the problem of evil. Matter is evil and spirit is good. Sin is due to a good spirit being stuck in an evil body. Salvation involves climbing to a higher spiritual realm. Humans have contact with these lesser spiritual beings who can be guides and give direction but God is distant and unknowable. One can see the Greek dualist influences here from both Plato and Aristotle. It would be an informative exercise to look and see how influential this is in pop culture, and how often Christianity is presented as teaching something like this rather than the historic Christian faith.
For instance, the Cambridge Dictionary says “Gnosticism profoundly influenced the early church, causing it to define its scriptural canon and to develop a set of creeds.” The Apostles’ Creed rejects the Gnostic view of Jesus. The Christian canon includes the Old Testament and affirms a unity between the two testaments. Genesis teaches that God made the world and it was very good (matter is not evil). Salvation is not an imparting of secret knowledge, but a regeneration and restoration from the condition of not seeking, not understanding, and not doing what is right.
Defining Gnosticism in these three ways helps answer your question and also helps us identify its influence and distinguish it from Christianity.