Who were the Gnostics and what was Gnosticism?

Gnosticism is a set of religious ideas and systems which appeared in the latter part of the 1st century AD. It was mainly adhered to by certain breakaway sects of the Jewish and early Christian beliefs. Essentially Gnostics leaned heavily on personal spiritual knowledge over and above the orthodox teachings, traditions, and authority of religious institutions such as Judaism or Christianity.

Main beliefs

The main thinking that Gnostics adhered to was the belief that there are two divine beings (one good and one evil) but unlike Christianity or Judaism they see the good being as less powerful than the evil being who they claim set up and created things. As far as Christianity goes this is a reversal and a heresy of what the bible teaches. The bible teaches that God(our Good creator) created everything including the devil (an archangel who became evil) In no way can the created being be more powerful than the creator God so Gnosticism was rejected by mainstream Christianity as a heresy. A heresy is a belief that is strongly at odds with that which is the main or established belief. So much so that it is incompatible with it.

Secret Knowledge

Gnostics emphasised spiritual experience at the expense of the written word of God as handed down by the prophets, Moses and the New testament writers such as the writers of the Gospels and Paul the apostle. Today we have a modern form of Gnosis this is apparent in certain so called Christians that emphasise secret knowledge that others do not have. This so called knowledge goes against what the bible clearly teaches and leads its followers to believe that for example God is a spaceman (Erich von Däniken). Although there are many sects and religions its only those who set themselves apart from main stream Christianity with special knowledge or revelation that contradicts scripture that fall into the class of sects and cults which fulfil the criteria of being an Gnostic. (One who has special knowledge).

Some examples

Some of the ancient writings of Gnosticism include the gospel of Thomas and the Apocryphon of John but recently discovered scrolls in 1945 at Nag Hammadi in Egypt add many more books to these.

Conclusions

While its not intended in this article to refute the errors within each scroll or writing of the Gnostics the idea that an individual or group can attempt to override the authority of scripture and place additional or different theology from that which we already have within the Holy scriptures serves as a reminder of how crafty satan is in his attempts to subvert the truth of the Gospel by introducing some error that eventually leads the hearer and proponent to fall away from the truth which saves “The Gospel of Salvation by faith in Christ alone”.