Gnosticism
Join now to read essay Gnosticism
Gnosticism is a much maligned and little understood discipline. Many believe that it is an extinct Christian heresy. In fact, it actually predates Judaism and Zoroastrianism.
The most ancient Gnostic text that is available to us today was unearthed in the excavation of the ancient cities of Sumeria in what is now Iraq. The clay tablats of cuneiform writing containing the Epic of Gilgamesh and other literature form some of the earliest evidence of Gnostic discipline predating the founding of Babylon.
The texts are written in a style that is typical of wisdom literature. They have a surface meaning for literal interpretation and a deeper meaning that is understood by the initiated scholar. There are pointers to the deeper meaning embedded within the story itself pointing the way to a higher level of understanding.
The Epic of Gilgamesh is a wisdom cycle that contains a fuller picture of the story of Adam and Eve contained in Genesis. The symbolic meaning of Adam and Eve become quite clear when that story is compared to the Gilgamesh cycle.
One of the differences between the orthodox Jesus and the Gnostic Christ is the hidden knowledge of cultural icons. In the orthodox tradition, Jesus didnt have any understanding of the deeper meaning of the symbols in Genesis. In the Gospels and in the Gnostic literature, Jesus taught