"Behold, I have told you the mysteries of the Kingdom and I have taught you about the error of the stars." "I am with you always. I am the father, I am the mother, I am the child. I am the incorruptible and the undefiled one.
- The Gospel of Judas -
The
Sethian Gnostics
The Great Invisible Spirit
"The One is the Invisible Spirit. We should not think of it as a god or like a god. For it is greater than a god, because it has nothing over it and no lord above it.
It does not exist within anything inferior to it, since everything exists within it, for it established itself. It is eternal, since it does not need anything.
For it is absolutely complete. It has never lacked anything in order to be completed by it.
Rather, it is always complete in light."
"The One is the immeasurable light, pure, holy, immaculate. It is unutterable, and is perfect in incorruptibility.
Not that it is just perfection, or blessedness, or divinity: it is much greater.
The One is not corporeal and it is not incorporeal.
The One is not large and it is not small.
It is impossible to say,
How much is it?
What kind is it?
For no one can understand it."
-The Secret Book of John-
"Three powers came forth from the Great Invisible Spirit: the Father, the Mother, and the Child."
-The Holy Book of the Great Invisible Spirit-
Father Mother Child
Now I have come to teach you what is, what was, and what is to come, that you may understand what is invisible and what is visible;
and to teach you about the unshakable race of perfect humankind."
-The Secret Book of John-
"Your souls come from above, from the indestructible light. Therefore the archons cannot approach them, because the spirit of truth dwells in them.
And you who have their gnosis of this way live without death among dying people."
-Hypostasis of the Archons-
"The seed, those who will receive his name upon the water and that of them all, will fight against the power."
-The Revelation of Adam-
Christ
"The anointed (Christ), a luminous spark, the only begotten, maker of entirety."
- Bentley Layton -
"The heavenly Autogenes, the Son in the Sethian divine triad, is identified with the preexistent Christ .."
- Birger A. Pearson -
"The role of the Gnostic savior or revealer is to awaken people who are under the spell of the demiurge -
not, as in the case of the Christ of the emerging orthodox church, to die for the salvation of people, to be a sacrifice for sins, or to rise from the dead on Easter.
The Gnostic revealer discloses knowledge that frees and awakens people,
and that helps them recall who they are."
- Marvin Meyer -
"Christ (Divine Autogenes) is a spark of infinite divine light.
From that light emerge four lights bearing specific names:
a set of beings who appear with surprising frequency in Gnostic accounts of the origin of the world.
They seem to have the role of angels..."
-Stevan Davies-
"One divine emanation leads to another, conception follows conception, and aeon follows aeon,
until the entire divine realm is filled with mental attributes and aeons of light."
-Marvin Meyer-
"Since they are aeons, the luminaries are both eternal realms and actors.
As realms, they are a dwelling place of four archetypes:
Adamas, the heavenly Adam;
Seth, heavenly prototype of Adam's son;
the heavenly posterity of Seth, prototypes of the Gnostic church on earth;
and a fourth group, whose identity varies from tale to tale."
-Bentley Layton-
Harmozel: Grace, Truth, Form
Oriael: Epinoia, Perception, Memory
Daveithai: Understanding, Love, Idea
Eleleth: Perfection, Peace, Wisdom (Sophia)
The Descent:
The Birth of the Demiurge
"Now, Sophia, who is the Wisdom of Insight and who constitutes an eternal realm, conceived of a thought from herself,
with the conception of the Invisible Spirit and Foreknowledge. She wanted to bring forth something like herself,
without the consent of the Spirit, who had not given approval,
without her partner and without his consideration."
-The Secret Book of John-
"Something came out of her that was imperfect and different in appearance from her, for she had produced it without her partner.
It did not resemble its mother, and was misshapen."
-The Secret Book of John-
"This gloomy ruler had three names:
the first name is Yaldabaoth (or 'child of chaos'), the second is Sakla (or 'fool'), the third is Samael (or 'blind god')."
-The Secret Book of John-
The Ascent:
Return to the Pleroma
"Sophia in the Secret Book of John repents her indescretion,
and the divine realm of fullness hears her prayer of repentance and offers praise on her behalf.
Her partner joins her, at last, as she awaits the restoration of the divine spirit she lost -and God lost- through the birth of her child."
-Marvin Meyer-
"This begins the process of salvation and models it for all those human beings who will follow.
As humans realize their unhappy situation and repent, they too can expect the Spirit to be poured out upon them."
-Stevan Davies-
"In Gnostic eyes the final act of the drama is still in progress. A heavenly savior has been sent to "awaken" gnostic humanity,
to give them acquaintance (gnosis) with themselves and God,
to free their souls from destiny and bondage to the material body,
and to teach them how to escape the influence of malevolent rulers."
-Bentley Layton-
Seth and Norea
"The Sethians understood themselves to be children of Adam and Eve, through Seth.
Adam and Eve were the first parents, through whom the divine light is communicated to enlightened Gnostics.
Genesis hints that Seth marked a new beginning for humanity after the violence that plagued the relationship of the brothers Cain and Abel."
- Marvin Meyer -
"Philo remarks that all lovers of virtue are descendents of Seth, in contrast to the wicked race of Cain.
Philo observes that Seth is the seed of "human virtue," sown from God. For Philo all virtuous men are the "race" of Seth.
For the Gnostics, in a similar vein, all men of gnosis are symbolically the "race" of Seth."
- Birger A. Pearson -
"Norea thus functions in the texts as a Gnostic savior figure, a revealer of gnosis.
As such, she can be seen as a female counterpart to the savior Seth."
- Birger A. Pearson -
Jesus
"In Sethian Christianity, Jesus is the last Illuminator,
who descends from the Father, provides instruction about the supreme God, and shares with his Gnostic followers
the ceremony of the "Five Seals."
- April D. DeConick -
"The message of the Gospel of Judas is that, just as Jesus is a spiritual being who has come from above and will return to glory,
so also the true followers of Jesus are people of the soul, whose being and destiny are with the divine.
- Marvin Meyer -
"We noted that Jesus is equated with Seth in some of these writings.
That Seth "puts on" (or becomes incarnate as) Jesus is also a tradition noted by some of the church fathers in their accounts of the Sethians."
- Birger A. Pearson -
Other Divine Characters:
Adam & Eve
The Snake
Sethian Gnostics
"O Lord God,
you who are above all the great eternal realms,
you who have neither beginning nor end,
bestow upon us a spirit of knowledge
for the revelation of your mysteries,
to come to a knowledge of ourselves:
where we have come from,
where we are going,
and what we should do in order to live."
- The Book of Allogenes -
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