The Path of Gnosis

The Presence of Loved Ones Lost

2011-11-02T21:26:00.000-06:00

However you celebrate/observe today and the next few days, I'd suggest spending some time with the presence of loved ones lost that remain within us. The love is still there and will outlast grief, loss, and any recriminations. For agape (loving-kindness) is a recognition, which cannot be denied, that we are deeply connected, an anamnesis (end of forgetting) that the appearances of distances and differences that separate us are a thin coating upon a deeper root. Like a growth of aspen trees, we are all connected in ways that cannot be seen.

All Saints Day

2011-11-01T21:17:00.002-06:00

Blessings on All Holy Ones / All Saints Day. The observance of All Saint's Day was established with the holy ones among the dead in mind, whether known or unknown, recognized or unrecognized. The notion of what a "saint" is has changed over the centuries. The word "saint" is the English language borrowing of the Latin word "sanctus," meaning "holy." In the Hebrew bible and the LXX, the Greek translation used by early Christians, the children of Israel are to be told that they shall become a holy people (laity) (Exd 19:6).

In the Ecclesia Gnostica, we officially use "the Holy" rather than "Saint" much of the time, for example, "the day of the Holy Thomas." That usage helps in seeing 'Saint'/'Holy' as an attribute, the apprehension of a distinct spiritual difference, rather than a title/role recognized by an institution according to its rules. That expansive view leading us to consider holy ones from other traditions and examples living examples of holiness and the long work of transformation and sacrifice required.

Occupyers of the USA

2011-10-11T17:54:00.002-06:00

Don’t let the impatience of the media mouths, or the jeers of their hollow echoes, make you feel somehow inadequate for not having “specific demands” or policies. This isn’t about politics or policies, this is about sovereignty. The sovereignty that backs the legitimacy of the Constitution of the United States the document from which all legitimacy of our federal government derives is We the People.

The Kalama Sutta

2011-10-03T22:21:00.005-06:00

The people of Kalama asked the Buddha who to believe out of all the ascetics, sages, venerables, and holy ones who, like himself, passed through their town. They complained that they were confused by the many contradictions they discovered in what they heard.

The Kalama Sutta is the Buddha's reply.

Do not believe anything on mere hearsay.

Do not believe in traditions merely because they are old and have been handed down for many generations and in many places.

Do not believe anything on account of rumors or because people talk a a great deal about it.

Do not believe anything because you are shown the written testimony of some ancient sage.

Do not believe in what you have fancied, thinking that, because it is extraordinary, it must have been inspired by a god or other wonderful being.

Do not believe anything merely because presumption is in its favor, or because the custom of many years inclines you to take it as true.

Do not believe anything merely on the authority of your teachers and priests.

Do not accept any doctrine from reverence, but first try it as gold is tried by fire

But, whatever, after thorough investigation and reflection, you find to agree with reason and experience, as conducive to the good and benefit of one and all and of the world at large, accept only that as true, and shape your life in accordance with it.

The same text, said the Buddha, must be applied to his own teachings.

Am I OK?: Four Years of Disabling Illness and Counting

2011-10-02T19:18:00.005-06:00

I have not seen anything from you on your blog in a while. You mentioned you had health problems. I hope you are well and that I will see more of your work in the future.

Thanks for inquiring,

Unfortunately, I have been in very poor and worsening health for the past 4 years, there is no end in sight and I have had to accept the fact that I am disabled. There are times when I am able to compose and write, but it is for short periods of the day on good days. Good days come and go by seeming whim, while exertion is rewarded with a month or more of deep disability. I have some hope to eventually be awarded my due disability benefits, and make what progress that can be made.

The only project I can keep going through this so far is the calendar, since I have enough time that I usually have enough good days to finish it at least before the year starts. There is much more that I really want to be able to do.

My recall is very poor when my energy is low, so when I have a bad period I usually can't recall very much of I was doing before. This has lead to times when I think of a new angle of research and only when I go to save my notes days later do I find that there already is a document named the same containing similar notes from a year or more ago. It is frustrating to say the least. I am trying to work out new strategies, when I remember to do so. Everything takes more time, and invokes layers of second guessing. I edit and rewrite something like this for days, for example, because I will post it.

The overall effect on me was summed up well by a cousin who hadn't seen me for years. She quipped, "When do you turn 60?" I replied, "You already missed it." I was 40 when this hit.

Thanks again. I share your kind hope that you will see more work from me. I'd like nothing more.

A mostly complete bibliography for the 2011 calendar

2010-12-13T02:58:00.003-07:00

Sure, it's a calendar, but I do quite a bit of research for both the images and text.

(I haven't included standard primary sources: Tanakh, New Testament, Wisdom literature, Apocrypha, Philo, etc.)

Barker, Margaret. 2008. Temple themes in Christian Worship.

Barker, Margaret. 2003. The Great High Priest: The Temple Roots of Christian Liturgy.

Barker, Margaret. 1992. The Great Angel: A study of Israel's Second God.

Binger, Tilde. 1997. Asherah: goddesses in Ugarit, Israel and the Old Testament.

Birkan, Amy. 2005. The Bronze Serpent, a Perplexing Remedy: An analysis of Num. 21.4-9 in light of Near Eastern Serpent Emblems, Archeology and Inner Biblical Exegesis. Thesis.

Burrus, Virginia. 1995. The Making of a Heretic: Gender, Authority, and the Priscillianist Controversy.

Chadwick, Henry. 1976. Priscillian of Avila: the Occult and the Charismatic in the Early Church.

Cross, Frank Moore. 1973. Canaanite myth and Hebrew epic: essays in the history of the religion of Israel.

Davies, Le Grande. 1986. Serpent Imagery in Ancient Israel: The Relationship Between the Literature and the Physical Remains.

Day, John. 2000. Yahweh and the Gods and Goddesses of Canaan.

Day, John (ed). 1995. Wisdom in ancient Israel: Essays in honour of J.A. Emerton.

Dever, William. 1984. “Asherah Consort of Yahweh: New Evidence from Kuntillet Ajrûd.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 255. (Summer, 1984), pp. 21-37.

Edersheim 1874. The Temple: Its Ministry and Services as they were at the time of Jesus Christ.

Epstein, I. 1952-61. Soncino Babylonian Talmud: Translated into English with Notes, Glossary and Indices. (Available from Halakhah.com.)

Fantalkin & Yasur-Landau (eds).2008. Bene Israel: Studies in the Archaeology of Israel and the Levant during the Bronze and Iron Ages in Honour of Israel Finkelstein.

Garfein, Susanna. 2004. Temple-Palace Conflict in Pre-exilic Judah. Dissertation.

Hoffnung, Frayda D. 1980. The Family of Jesus: A Sociological Analysis. Dissertation.

Hogan, Karina Martin. 2002. Theologies in Conflict in 4 Ezra: The wisdom debate and apocalyptic solution. Dissertation.

Karmi, Yael. 2005. The Goddess Asherah in Ancient Israel and Her Pillar Figurines. Thesis.

Meyer, M. (ed). 2007. The Nag Hammadi Scriptures: the International Edition.

Moor, Johannes Cornelis de. 1987. An Anthology of religious texts from Ugarit.

Kletter, Raz. 2010. Yavneh I: the excavation of the 'temple hill' repository pit and the cult stands.

Klingbeil, Martin. 1999. Yahweh Fighting from Heaven: God as Warrior and as God of Heaven in the Hebrew Psalter and Ancient Near Eastern Iconography.

Knohl, Israel. "Melchizedek: A Model for the Union of Kingship and Priesthood in the Hebrew Bible" in Clements & Schwartz (eds) Text, Thought, and Practice in Qumran and Early Christianity.

LeMon, Joel Marcus. 2007. Iconography of Yahweh's Winged Form in the Psalms. Dissertation.

Mason, Eric Farrel. 2005. The Concept of the Priestly Messiah in Hebrews and Second Temple Judaism. Dissertation.

Mullen, E. Theodore. 1980. The Divine Council in Canaanite and Early Hebrew Literature.

Prag, Kay. 2001. "Figurines, Figures and Contexts in Jerusalem and Regions to the East in the Seventh and Sixth Centuries BCE." in Amihai Mazar (ed) Studies in the Archaeology of the Iron Age in Israel and Jordan.

Rainbow, Paul. "Melchizedek as a Messiah at Qumran." Bulletin for Biblical Research 7 (1997) 179-194

Smith, Mark S. “Ugaritic Studies and Israelite Religion: A Retrospective View.” in Near Eastern Archaeology, Vol. 65, No. 1, (Mar., 2002), pp. 17-29.

Swain, Sally. 2003. "The Great Goddesses of the Levant" in The Journal of the Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities, v. 30, pp. 127-182.

Toorn, Karel van der. Et al. 1999. Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (2nd ed).

Torhjelm, Roger. 2003. 11QMelchizedek: Liberation, Judgment, and Kingdom. Dissertation.

Wyatt, N. 2002. Religious Texts from Ugarit (2nd ed.).

Yadin, Azzan. 2003. “קול as Hypostasis in the Hebrew Bible.” Journal of Biblical Literature, 122/4 pp. 601-626.

The 2011 Gnostic Calendar

2010-11-20T01:43:00.004-07:00

Featuring the Liturgical Calendar of the Ecclesia Gnostica
Anno Domini 2011

by the Rev. Troy Pierce

The first Calendar specifically for Gnostics is now in its sixth year!
The calendar features the Liturgical Calendar of the Ecclesia Gnostica:
the Sundays and Holy days/holidays of the year, with the liturgical
color of the day in the upper right hand corner.
The Gnostic Calendar also features many additional dates of interest.
It is an introductory outline, in calendar form, to different threads in the Gnostic Tradition. Also included are many unofficial Gnostic holidays, historical days of note, secular holidays, humorous/fun holidays, made-up holidays, Buddhist holidays, solar holidays, full and new moons--and yes, more.
Facing pages feature original art and information on Gnostic themes by a Gnostic Priest and Scholar. This year's theme is “Where can Wisdom be found?”: Gnostic roots in ancient Israelite Religion.
Printed on high-quality thick and durable acid-free paper, the Gnostic Calendar sells for only slightly more than you'd pay for a non-generic calendar at a retail outlet.
Proceeds benefit education and services in the Salt Lake City area, and programs and outreach on the internet.
Space may separate us, but time can join us. May this help serve that purpose.

Calendar price: $22 per wall calendar not including packaging and shipping. Discounted 10% from last year. Now Shipping. Order here.
General shipping costs:

US $2.50 First class Mail for 1 + $.75 per additional calendar
Canada $3.25 Airmail shipping for 1 + $1.25 per additional calendar
Overseas $7.00 Airmail Shipping for 1 + $2.50 per additional calendar
These rates may be subject to modification based on actual postage fees for a given order.
(Large quantities may qualify for free shipping.)

Levels of Interpersonal Common Ground

2010-08-30T01:04:00.004-06:00

Very unpleasant dealings that resulted from my trying to be of service to someone in a personal contradiction resulted in experiencing yet again how disturbing it is when someone doesn't interact with basic courtesy, and doesn't follow basic ethics or morals. Every time it happens I say I'll stop trying to be of service where I am not specifically asked for help. But, after enough time has passed, I try again.

So, here are some results of my ruminations, levels of common ground, such as objective systems one can appeal to arbitrate in a dispute:

4. Where there is mutual compassion, one need not appeal to an objective system, but appeals directly to the other.

3. Where there is acknowledgment of mutual social standing, one can appeal to common courtesy.

2. Where there is recognition of mutual reasonableness, one can appeal to ethics (or specific rules, such as the rules for argumentation).

1. Where there is recognition of mutual humanity, one can appeal to morality.

0. Where there is no recognition of mutuality, there is only the law to be appealed to.

We cannot change the other person, or force them to accept arbitration by any objective system other than the legal system we share in common. This is most likely why we have become such a litigious society. If you find yourself in this situation, don't feel bad if you actually need to invoke the law. That is were the other person is at, but it doesn't need to be where you are at. You can pursue necessary legal action compassionately, courteously, ethically, and morally.

Ideally, we should at least try to listen and interact with compassion in regards to others. Unfortunately, you never know when something will set someone you don't know off the deep end when you are trying to help. But, try to always have a compassionate ear open, and try to do no harm if possible.

In any case, we should not see even user's code names and silly avatars as anything other than representing people. You will not want to interact with them all, and some will take delight in going after you and yours, but there are people behind each avatar. Some may act like internet interactions are not subject to morals, ethics, or courtesy, let alone compassion. And, they may hide in places where they can isolate themselves from responses to, or consequences of, their actions. But we are all people, and compassion is the ideal.

To question all things

2010-08-07T21:29:00.003-06:00

To question all things;– never to turn away from any difficulty; to accept no doctrine either from ourselves or from other people without a rigid scrutiny by negative criticism; letting no fallacy, or incoherence, or confusion of thought step by unperceived; above all to insist upon having the meaning of a word clearly understood before using it, and the meaning of a proposition before assenting to it;– these are the lessons we learn from the ancient dialecticians.

- John Stuart Mill, Inaugural Address as Rector, University of St, Andrews, 1867.
(Quoted by Margaret Barker.)

GnosCast: the Gnostic Podcast - #15 & 16: Frameworks of Meaning

2010-06-23T00:51:00.003-06:00

Episode 15

Continuing a users guide to Gnosis, an overview in the form of "you are here." A naive view of meaning sees it as "out there," a property of the object that we perceive rather than something we participate in. Far from being "out there" meaning is something that we make in an interaction of what is "out there" and the many meaning frameworks we exist in, and the interpretations we bring to bear on what is "out there." The many ways in which we construct meaning are important to how we understand the world, ourselves, and the Gnostic tradition.

Topics include: misunderstanding that meaning is objective, early studies of meaning, portrayal of remote scenes in local contemporary terms, paradigm in Kuhn's the Structure of Scientific Revolutions, paradigm shift as change in meaning structure, assimilation versus accommodation, overuse of paradigm, valid and invalid interpretations, interpretations of Gnostic texts, misuse of interpretation by Ireneaus, Heracleon's exegetical use of interpretation, importance of interpretation in making use of Gnostic texts, modern disadvantage of not having gnosis in our meaning framework, importance of gnosis in all of its dimensions, awareness of when we do or do not have gnosis, importance of metaphors in understanding, nature of the metaphor influences the meaning of the concept conveyed, Gnostic meaning framework a part of the path of gnosis, Lakoff's work on frames, frames used to elicit a positive or negative reaction, propaganda, meaning of metaphor, study of metaphors, meaning and perception without cultural context, equivalent to gnosis lacking in language and cultural understanding, encountering the absence of gnosis in artificial intelligence design, perception of objects, limitations from cultural context, ontology as another dimension to interpretation, the ability to change perspectives, emancipatory and transformational learning.

Presented at the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 13 June 2010.

Episode 15: "You Are Here" (part 3) Making Meaning

Episode 16

Examining meaning frameworks that can blind us and keep us from liberation, and frameworks that can aid us in liberation.

Topics include: Different frameworks of meaning can be a source of blindness or aid in liberation, if we are unaware of our meaning structures we are locked within it, main source of difficulty in approaching Gnosticism is a pre-existent meaning structure, frameworks of religion, in-group out-group bias, orthodox religion framework is belief-centric, religion studied within an orthodox framework, Gnosticism is not belief-centric, Gnosticism in a belief-centric framework is inconsistent or nonexistent, over-determined view of Gnosticism when orthodox frameworks imposed upon it, evidence bias, frameworks that blind, over-determined frameworks, examples of over-determined frameworks in Elaine Pagels's account of drawing lots in the Gnostic Gospels, inappropriate frameworks, invalid conspiracy theory frameworks as predetermined conclusions in search of evidence viewed through a modern idiosyncratic framework, egocentric psychology as framework, using philosophical tools for spiritual liberation, shift from egocentric psychology as major developmental shift of meaning framework, frameworks that aid in liberation, elements of the Gnostic worldview, mythic poetic symbolic as inner-deeper meaning framework, limited imperfect framework, liberation is possible framework, dangers of ego taking over these views, individual self-transformational framework, the truth shall set us free.

Presented at the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 13 June 2010, by Gnostic priest and scholar Troy Pierce.

Episode 16: "You are Here" (part 4) in Frameworks that Blind or Aid

GnosCast: the Gnostic Podcast - #14: From the Image to the Real

2010-06-10T01:39:00.003-06:00

Continuing to explore the distinctions between the image and the real as elaborated by Plato's Analogy of the Divided Line as they appear in ancient Gnostic texts. We look at four general motifs of the relation between image and real in the Nag Hammadi Scriptures, including how to move from the image to the real. (pdf with references)

Topics covered: Understanding a system of concepts versus having gnosis of real things, the surprising encounter with the real, the motif that “names/images can deceive/enslave” with texts, the motif of “truths in symbols, types, and names” with texts, the motif of “seeds of logos/truth” with texts, the image that is presented is only the beginning point, the motif of “the visible as image of invisible/hidden” with texts, the motif that “mysteries connect the image with the real” with texts, the bridal chamber, psychic versus pneumatic understandings, misunderstanding of Gnosticism as a system of concepts/beliefs, need to connect to the reality beyond the images, trust that the image points towards the real, temptation of system building, desire to fill in the blanks, cultural images, archetypal images, Christ as image of God, experiential symbolism.

Presented at the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 06 June 2010.

Listen or Download MP3

GnosCast: the Gnostic Podcast - Episode 13: Gnosis and Meaning

2010-06-02T22:45:00.001-06:00

Exploring Meaning and Gnosis in the ancient Platonic context and in Gnostic texts; and the connection between Platonic and Gnostic understandings of meaning.

Finding a connection between Plato and Gnostic understandings of meaning, in the wee hours lead to a presentation exploring meaning in terms of gnosis in the ancient Platonic context familiar to the ancient Gnostics and terms from Gnostic texts. (Reference Handout available.)

Topics include: brief look at interpretive frameworks, projection of literalist interpretation on ancient Gnostics, Plato's framework for making distinctions between knowing with gnosis and knowing without gnosis in both the sensible and the noetic, knowing without gnosis in sensible and noetic both called images, Jewish Platonic tradition of allegorical exegesis, gnosis and meaning in three passages from the Gospel of Philip, comparison to the hymn of the pearl, uses of Plato's framework in understanding Gnostic texts, reason for emphasis on gnosis after the apostolic age.

Presented at the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 30 May 2010.

Listen or Download MP3

GnosCast: The Gnostic Podcast #12: "You are Here" (part 2) as a Social Animal

2010-05-28T15:05:00.002-06:00

Visit the new GnosCast site. (I'll cross post here for a time.)

Part of a "last lecture" series on essentials. A users guide to Gnosis continuing with an overview in the form of "you are here." As a social animal we have evolved in groups and will instinctually repeat patterns in organizing ourselves into group. The instinctual form of this and the type of hierarchy that results is discussed in the context of sociobiology. Functional pragmatic hierarchies are discussed, and contrasted with instinctually based ones.

Topics include: evolution and group organization, bio-social forms of hierarchies, examples, evidence, ways of recognizing sociobiological hierarchies, pragmatic hierarchies, formalization of pragmatic hierarchies provides opportunity for bio-soc form to take over, pattern in christian history, bio-soc hierarchies are a part of human nature no ideology, authority as a manifestation of bio-soc pattern, failed attempts to address bio-soc hierarchy issues, ways to keep a pragmatic hierarchy from being taken over, recognition of teachers in some traditions, lack of that in Western traditions, Holy Orders in that context. Followed by a discussion that includes: modern Gnostic practice, the necessity of psychological perspective, how you understand religion, religion as developmental framework, historical encounter of the West with the East, pragmatic religion.

Presented at the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 16 May 2010

Listen or Download MP3

GnosCast: the Gnostic Podcast # 11: "You Are Here" part 1 - Embodiment

2010-05-20T20:17:00.006-06:00

My segmented and somewhat fragmentary "last lecture" continues with a users guide to Gnosis. First part is a "You are Here" in a body. Evolution and its effects, towards an evolved self-gnosis.

The Description:

Continuing a series on essentials of Gnosticism. A users guide to Gnosis beginning with an overview in the form of "you are here."

Topics include: Perspectives on religion without Gnosis, tripartite division of the human and individual orientation, our evolved nature, evolution's aims and the suffering that causes, evolved capabilities, evolved mechanisms for cooperation, modeling others and self, ego, identity, self-deception, freedom through awareness, gnosis and logos, limits of knowledge, steadfast pursuit of Gnosis, religion as social control or developmental system, progressing to uncertainty, not knowing.

Presentation with discussion in the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 16 May 2010, by Gnostic priest and scholar Troy Pierce.

Direct Link for the non-podcastically inclined.

GnosCast: the Gnostic Podcast # 10: Gnosis Further Considered

2010-05-15T04:28:00.002-06:00

The second of a series on advanced essentials of Gnosticism (as opposed to basics). Further considerations on the nature of gnosis and implications for understanding and practice. Topics include: Mistaken notions of self (rational and self-controlling), irreducible nature of gnosis, gnosis in Platonic Forms, recognition of objects and concepts, gnosis of gnoses or epignosis/metagnosis as Gnosis, example of the good art critic, Gnosis as transformation, Gnosis as developmental process, Gnosis as shape of reality, misrecognition, self-gnosis of embodiment.

Health-wise I was worse off while recording this than while recording the previous week.

Presented at the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 9 May 2010.
Direct link

The science fiction story mentioned is "They're made out of meat" by Terry Bisson.

GnosCast: the Gnostic Podcast # 9: Gnosis in Context

2010-05-09T00:03:00.003-06:00

Since I have been too ill to write or plan and give a long lecture of late, I plan to use some of the time at services where I am unable to do more to have short presentations and discussions on some of the essentials.

Although it varies within a range, long-term my health isn't getting any better. While I plan and would very much like to write about the understanding I have arrived at after decades of study and practice, it may not happen. So, I hope these short talks will be of service in passing on some of what I have found that may be valuable.

Please, forgive some of the lack of composition and coherence. They are necessarily given at less than 100% ability, the fatigue effects my ability to think, speak, and recall. This podcast has been edited to reduce those effects.

Description:
The first of a planned series on essentials of Gnosticism, this one considering the nature of gnosis and implications from the ancient context. Topics include: meanings and implications of the term 'gnosis' in the context of the Greek language and philosophy and in ancient Gnostic texts, concluding with a free ranging discussion. Presentation and discussion at the Holy Gnosis of Thomas Chapel in Salt Lake City, 2 May 2010, by Gnostic priest and scholar Troy Pierce.

Here is the direct link

GnosCast: the Gnostic Podcast #8 - the Emergence of Gnosticism

2010-03-10T20:42:00.003-07:00

The first part of the Gnosticism Then and Now lecture from March 6th has been added to the GnosCast podcast feed as episode 8. It focuses on the three major traditions from which Gnosticism emerges: the Mystery traditions, Philosophical practice, and Jewish Mysticism. Unfortunately, the battery in the digital recorder failed after this part, so, it is only the first two-fifths of the talk.

The next part of the lecture was an overview of Gnostic teachers and developments after Jesus. And that was followed by what connects them all together--Gnosis. (It seems actually possible to get across what Gnosis is in the tradition that way.) I finished with a quick overview of modern history, but that was a preface to even more content that there wasn't time for.

I think I'll follow a suggestion of giving, and recording, a series of lectures covering the same ground in more detail. And also including the aspects of modern science I didn't even touch upon.

Let me know your reactions.

Direct link to the mp3 file

From an Interview with June Singer

2010-01-30T00:27:00.002-07:00

January 29th: Death of June Singer, Mystic & Guide of Souls (1920 - 2004). [from the Gnostic Calendar]

MISHLOVE: June, in your early work at the Jung Institute, you have described in Boundaries of the Soul how for your final examination you were asked to describe the process of individuation, which is the goal of Jungian therapy, as if you were talking to a street sweeper while you were waiting for a bus. I wonder if you could repeat that definition for us.

SINGER: Yes, and that was a shocker of a question, I might add, because I had studied all the parallels of the individuation process from the alchemist down to the present day. So when this question came to me, to describe this process while you're waiting for the bus and you're talking to a street sweeper, I looked out at the Lake of Zurich, and I thought, well, it's something like being in a sailing boat on the lake and utilizing the wind, understanding that the wind is something that you don't make and you can't control. But you need to understand how to live your life in the same way that you understand how you would sail a boat, taking the power of the wind and going with it and allowing your own knowledge of it and your understanding of it to help you go in the direction that you need to be headed. And so in Jungian analysis you learn how to deal with your own power, or rather the power that comes through you, and live your life in such a way that it's harmonious with that power which is above and beyond and all around.

MISHLOVE: It's as if the forces within our psyche are like the winds that might blow us about, and as we learn how to work with the winds we can direct ourselves through our lives.

SINGER: And we don't change them. We don't in Jungian analysis try to make somebody different from who they are. But what we try to do is to guide people to recognize themselves and discover themselves and find out what was always there, but hasn't been recognized or lived out.

Full interview

From the Gnostic Calendar

2010-01-08T00:18:00.002-07:00

January 6th: Feast of the Epiphany

Birthday of Alan W. Watts, Priest, Scholar, and Philosopher (1915 - 1973). "...you can only know God through an open mind just as you can only see the sky through a clear window." [from 2008 Gnostic Calendar]

Within us is the way, the truth, and the life

2009-12-22T06:20:00.005-07:00

Believe me: It is no teaching and no instruction that I give you. On what basis should I presume to teach you? I give you news of the way of this man, but not of your own way. My path is not your path, therefore I cannot teach you. The way is within us, but not in Gods, nor in teachings, nor in laws. Within us is the way, the truth, and the life.

- C. G. Jung, The Red Book (Liber Novus), [liber primus fol.i(v)/ii(r)]

Temptation of Explanation

2009-12-20T15:25:00.002-07:00

The spirit of our time spoke to me and said: "What dire urgency could be forcing you to speak all this?" This was an awful temptation. I wanted to ponder what inner or outer bind could force me into this, and because I found nothing that I could grasp, I was near to making one up. But with this the spirit of our time had almost brought it about that instead of speaking, I was thinking again about reasons and explanations. But the spirit of the depths spoke to me and said: "To understand a thing is a bridge and possibility of returning to the path. But to explain a matter is arbitrary and sometimes even murder. Have you counted the murderers among the scholars?"

- C. G. Jung, The Red Book (Liber Novus), (Liber Primus fol.i/ii)

The Gnostic Calendar 2010

2009-12-09T08:52:00.006-07:00

In its fifth year, the first Calendar specifically for Gnostics is better than ever!

The calendar features the Liturgical Calendar of the Ecclesia Gnostica: the Sundays and Holy days/holidays of the year, with the liturgical color of the day in the upper right hand corner.

The Gnostic Calendar also features many additional dates of interest. It is an introductory outline, in calendar form, to different threads in the Gnostic Tradition. Also included are many unofficial Gnostic holidays, historical days of note, secular holidays, humorous/fun holidays, made-up holidays, Buddhist holidays, solar holidays, full and new moons--and yes, more.

It includes quotes from almost all the authors noted. Facing pages feature original art and commentary on Gnostic themes by a Gnostic Priest. This year's themes include a series on the Great Guides to Gnosis, with Basilides, Valentinus, Bardesenes, Marcus the Magician, and more.

Printed on high-quality thick and durable acid-free paper, the Gnostic Calendar sells for only slightly more than you'd pay for a non-generic calendar at a retail outlet. Proceeds benefit education and services in the Salt Lake City area, and a portion aids a Gnostic Priest facing a debilitating illness.

Space may separate us, but time can join us.
May this help serve that purpose.

Illness has caused months of delay, so please help get the word out to those who may be interested.
Online Ordering is now available!

Charter for Compassion

2009-11-12T18:17:00.000-07:00

This project is the result of Karen Armstrong wining the TED prize.

charterforcompassion.org

Christianity as a Spiritual Path - Marcus Borg Video

2009-09-23T23:20:00.003-06:00

A good short introduction to the way we approach Christianity as a tradition of spiritual practice and transformation. However, I don't call the outer aspect "political" as Borg does, but as interpersonal and social transformation that is the other side of intrapersonal transformation.

A Brief History of Sexual Magic groups that call themselves Gnostics

2009-09-20T23:17:00.004-06:00

Having posted timelines of modern Gnosticism, it may be useful to include a timeline and brief history of certain sexual magic groups and the historical circumstances that lead them to call themselves Gnostics.

Selected Timeline

c. 1850 Paschal Beverly Randolph begins an eight year career as a medium, appearing as a "trance speaker" and working as a "clairvoyant physician."
c. 1857 Randolph travels through Europe and the near East. He later recounts that it is on this trip he learned "the fundamental principle of the White Magick of Love."
1858 Randolph renounces Spiritualism, ending an eight year career as a medium.
1861 Randolph travels to London, where he is inducted by Hargrave Jennings as a knight of the Order of the Rose.
- Human Love by Paschal Beverly Randolph
1870 Founding of the Brotherhood of Eulis to spread Randolph's teachings.
- The Rosicrucians: Their Rites and Mysteries by Hargrave Jennings.
1872 Randolph is arrested for distributing "free love" pamphelets, tried, and acquitted.
1873 The Ansairetic Mystery: A New Revelation Concerning Sex! by Paschal Beverly Randolph
1874 Eulis! The History of Love: Its Wondrous Magic, Chemistry, Rules, Laws, Modes, Moods and Rationale; Being the Third Revelation of Soul and Sex, and The Immortality of Love: Unveiling the Secret Arcanum of Affectional Alchemy by Paschal Beverly Randolph.
1875 Ancient Symbol Worship: Influence of the Phallic Idea in the Religions of Antiquity by Hodder M. Westropp and C. Staniland Wake (Second Edition).
1880 Phallic Worship anonymously by Hargrave Jennings. Privately Printed.
1884 The Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor goes public, offering a correspondence course on occultism including a number of selections from the writings of Hargrave Jennings and Paschal Beverly Randolph.
1889 Phallism: A Description of the Worship of Lingam-Yoni in Various Parts of the World and in Different Ages anonymously by Hargrave Jennings. Privately Printed.
1904 When visiting Egypt, Aleister Crowley engaged in sexual magic invocations of Egyptian gods that inspired his writing of the Book of the Law, a text couched in that mythology, and his philosophy of Thelema.
1906 Theodor Reuss, inspired by Carl Kellner, and assisted by Franz Hartmann, founds the OTO as an umbrella occult organization with sex magic as its core, the "key" that explains "all the riddles of nature, all the secrets of Freemasonry, and all systems of religion."
- L'Eucharistie ('the Eucharist') by Chevalier Le Clément de St.-Marcq, which puts forward a theory of "Sacred Spermatophagy." Reuss wrote to Le Clément, "I enclose two numbers of the 'Oriflamme' which will show you that the Order of the Oriental Templars is in possesion of that same knowledge contained in your L'Eucharistie."
1908 A Masonic and Spiritualist conference held by Gérard "Papus" Encausse. Theodor Reuss comes into contact with Encausse and Jean Bricaud. Reuss and Encausse exchange offices for the OTO and the Martinist Order. Bricaud receives a masonic charter from Reuss. Reuss subsequently founds Die Gnostische Katholische Kirche (GKK, 'the Gnostic Catholic Church'), under the auspices of the OTO.
1912 Reuss takes the OTO public. He recruits Aleister Crowley and quickly raises him to the then highest degree of the order.
- Bricaud begins confering the title of Gnostic Legate on many individuals in esoteric circles.
1918 Reuss refers to himself as "Sovereign Patriarch and Primate" of the GKK, now being called the Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica, and establishes Aleister Crowley's Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica Canon Missa ('the Canon Mass of the Gnostic Catholic Church', aka "the Gnostic Mass") as the central ritual of the OTO.
1919 Bricaud names Reuss as a Gnostic Legate to Switzerland.
1929 Arnoldo Krumm-Heller founds the Fraternitas Rosicruciana Antiqua (FRA, 'Fraternity of the Ancient Rosicrucians') and is subsequently called Frater Huiracocha.
1950 El Matrimonio Perfecto ('the Perfect Matrimony') by Víctor Rodríguez (Samael Aun Weor).

Paschal Beverly Randolph

Modern sexual magic was initiated through the teachings of Paschal Beverly Randolph (Deveney, 1997, p. xxi; Urban, 2006, p. 36), a "trance speaker" and "clairvoyant physician." In 1857 he traveled to Europe and from there to Epypt and Syria. It is on this trip that he writes of encounters that change the course of his career.

One night - it was in far-off Jerusalem or Bethlehem, I really forget which - I made love to, and was loved by, a dusky maiden of Arabic blood. I of her, and the experience, learned - not directly, but by suggestion - the fundamental principle of the White Magick of Love; subsequently I became affiliated with some dervishes and fakirs of who, by suggestion still, I found the road to other knowledges; and of these devout practicers of a sublime and holy magic, I obtained additional clues - little threads of suggestion, which, being persistently followed, led my soul into labyrinths of knowledge themselves did not even suspect the existence of. (Randolph, 1874, p. 48; cited in Urban, 2006, p. 66)

The essence of sexual magic in Randolph's view is as follows:

The moment when a man discharges his seed--his essential self--into a ... womb is the most solemn, energetic and powerful moment he can ever know on earth; if under the influence of mere lust it be done, the discharge is suicidal. ... At the moment his seminal glands open, his nostrils expand, and while the seed is going from his soul to her womb he breathes one of two atmospheres, either fetid damnation from the border spaces or Divine Energy from heavens. Whatsoever he shall truly will and internally pray for when Love ... is in the ascendant, that moment the prayer's response comes down. (Randolph, 1874, p. 339-40; cited in Urban, 2004, p. 68)

The association and subsequent use of, and identification with, the term 'Gnosticism' by sexual magic groups is of twentieth century origin. In his book length study of the phenomenon, Hugh Urban concludes that, "despite the very common use of sexual symbolism throughout Gnostic texts, there is little evidence (apart from the accusations of the early church) that the Gnostics engaged in any actual performance of sexual rituals, and certainly not anything resembling modern sexual magic" (Urban, 2006, p. 36, note 68).

The Ordo Templi Orientis

At first associated with the Middle East, and then with Tantric traditions of the East, the association of sexual magic with Gnosticism came by way of Theodor Reuss and his interaction with leaders of the French Gnostic Church, with its close ties to Masonry, Martinism, and the strong esoteric current of the time. It is from that highly interconnected milieu of esoteric societies and orders which the most influential of sex magic orders arose, the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO, 'Order of Oriental Templars').

The individual primarily responsible for associating sexual magic with Gnosticism was German Occultist Theodor Reuss, who was interested in the accusations of sexual impropriety made against the Gnostics and the Templars. Such charges brought against these groups were most probably politically motivated fictions, yet, "they would reappear in striking new form in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries with the foundation of a new Templar order--the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO)..." (Urban, 2006, p. 36).

The Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor (HB of L) propagated sexual magic teachings derived from Paschal Beverly Randolph through its correspondence course on occultism (Deveney, 1997, p. xxiii; Greer, 2003, p. 348). It is likely that this was the primary source on sexual magic for Theodor Reuss, a member of the HB of L. In 1906, inspired by co-member and practitioner Carl Kellner, and assisted by Franz Hartmann, Reuss founded the OTO as an umbrella occult organization with sexual magic as its core (Greer, 2003, p. 221-2). It initially consisted of nine grades, the first six being along masonic lines and the last three focusing on sexual magic. For Reuss sexual magic was the "key" that explains "all the riddles of nature, all the secrets of Freemasonry, and all systems of religion" (Urban, 2006, p. 98).

The French Gnostic Connection

In 1908 Reuss came into contact with Gerard Encause and Jean Bricaud at a Masonic and Spiritualist conference organized by Encause. Further ties were established with Reuss and Encause exchanging charters for the OTO and Martinist Orders. A similar exchange is claimed by some sources, with Reuss granting charters in the Memphis Mizarim Rite of Freemasonry to Bricaud in return for a grant concerning the Eglise Catholique Gnostique (EGC, 'the Gnostic Catholic Church'). Sources infer this because Reuss subsequently founded Die Gnostische Katholische Kirche (GKK, 'the Gnostic Catholic Church'), under the auspices of the OTO (Pearson, 2007, p. 47). However, it is unclear whether there was any formal tie to the ECG, or the nature of such a connection. It should also be noted that there is a significant difference between ecclesiastical and esoteric bodies, it would not constitute a simple reciprocal exchange like that between Reuss and Encause.

When the OTO went public 1912, Reuss recruited Aleister Crowley and quickly raised him to the then highest degree of the order.

By 1918 the GKK certainly had no ties to the EGC/EGU, as Reuss proclaimed himself "Sovereign Patriarch and Primate" of the church, having dedicated the OTO to the promulgation of Crowley's philosophy of Thelema. It is for this church body, called in Latin the Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica (EGC), that Aleister Crowley wrote the Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica Canon Missa ('the Canon Mass of the Gnostic Catholic Church'), the central ritual of the OTO that is now commonly called the "Gnostic Mass." Although it is generally referred to as the "Gnostic Mass," that name refers to its status as the official "mass" of the Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica.

In 1919 Bricaud named Reuss as a Gnostic Legate of the Eglise Gnostique Universelle (EGU) to Switzerland (Pearson, 2007, p. 47). Although it was a title conferred on many individuals in esoteric circles beginning in 1912, its conference on Reuss and his use of it at that time indicate that Reuss's church (GKK/EGC) had not officially been affiliated with, and so did not actually break away from Bricaud's (ECG/EGU). The Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica remains an active arm of the Ordo Templi Orientis, and the mass that Crowley wrote for it remains the central ritual of the OTO.

Krumm-Heller and the FRA

Arnoldo Krumm-Heller traveled in occult circles at the turn of the century where he studied with notable figures such as Gerard Encause of the Martinist Order and Franz Hartmann of the OTO.

Krumm-Heller moved back to Germany in 1920, where he made contact with Aleister Crowley. He founded the Iglesia Gnostica (Gnostic Church) in Mexico. Not finding as much success as he hoped for, he moved through Latin America before settling in Brazil. In 1929 he founded the Fraternitas Rosicruciana Antiqua (FRA, 'Fraternity of the Ancient Rosicrucians') and took the name Huiracocha.

He kept a low profile through WWII, but when he was able to travel again after the war, he resumed contact with his Latin America students. Between the end of WWII and his death in 1949, Krumm-Heller encountered and subsequently mentored Víctor Manuel Gómez Rodríguez who would subsequently take the name Samael Aun Weor (Dawson, 2007, p. 55-57). Rodríguez states that Krumm-Heller taught a form of sexual magic without ejaculation that would become the core of his own teachings.

Samael Aun Weor and the "International Gnostic Movement"

Víctor Rodríguez left the FRA after the death of Krumm-Heller. He also reports an experience of being called to his new mission by the "venerable white lodge" (associated with Theosophy). Sexual Magic without ejaculation (called the Arcanum AZF) became the core of Weor's "New Gnosis", calling it "the synthesis of all religions, schools and sects." Moving through Latin America, he finally settled in Mexico where he founded the Movimiento Gnostico Cristiano Universal (MGCU, 'Universal Gnostic Christian Movement'), then subsequently founded the Iglesia Gnostica Cristiana Universal ('Universal Gnostic Christian Church') and the Associacion Gnostica de Estudios Antropologicos Culturales y Cientificos (AGEAC, 'Gnostic Association of Scientific, Cultural and Anthropological Studies') to spread his teachings (Dawson, 2007, p. 54-60).

The MGCU became defunct by the time of Weor's death in December 1977. However, his disciples subsequently formed new organizations to spread Weor's teachings, under the umbrella term "the International Gnostic Movement". These organizations are currently very active via the Internet and have centers established in Latin America, the US, Australia, and Europe (Dawson, 2007, p. 60-65).

References:

Dawson, Andrew (2007). New era, new religions: religious transformation in contemporary Brazil. Burlington, VT: Ashgate.

Deveney, John Patrick (1997). Paschal Beverly Randolph: a nineteenth-century Black American spiritualist. Albany: State University of New York.

Greer, John Micheal (2003). The New Encyclopedia of the Occult. St. Paul: Llewellyn.

Pearson, Joanne (2007). Wicca and the Christian Heritage. New York: Routledge.

Urban, Hugh B. (2006). Magia Sexualis: Sex, Magic, and Liberation in modern Western esotericism. University of California.

Questions: Gnostic Theodicy - Last Response

2009-07-15T00:55:00.003-06:00

[Somewhat redacted for language]
Reverend, I don't see how saying that Gnosticism is mythical rather than theological answers my question. I already knew what the problem of evil is, and I have no interest in reading a scholarly discourse or in reading a bunch of mystical mumbo-jumbo, so why can't you just answer my [emphasis] question? If you don't know the answer to the question (as I don't), then just say so and I would respect that. I know what you're thinking, [personal abuse]. You're thinking that you have attained gnosis and I haven't and therefore I am not capable of understanding your incoherent [dismissive descriptor].

While I can understand frustration with a question that is itself a problem and that has vexed many theologians for many centuries, I cannot understand your personal attacks.

The "question" itself is incoherent and self-contradictory. You are demanding a simple answer when to my knowledge none has ever been given to the problem of evil in the centuries since it has been formulated within the theological system in which it arose. You expect me to force the Gnostic mythos into some theological system it won't fit, then crank out a satisfactory answer.

I have tried in good faith to show you that it is the question that is incoherent. When you complained of my first attempt, I started again. This takes time and patience, with which I have been generous. The problem is philosophical and I used some basic tools of philosophy: analogy, logic, and epistemology; to try to explain the problems with the question. Jesus could use simple and direct symbols that worked on many levels, the Buddha could hold up a flower to preach a sermon, but I have only what small skill in trying to explain these things that I have. My failure to communicate is nothing that I find pride in.

If we look at it as a story, such a story is a way of explaining and understanding the general situation that we find ourselves in that we cannot otherwise articulate. It is a mirror in which we see ourselves, our situation, and the solution to it. If it did not unfold as it did, we would not see these things within it, we could not find ourselves and our way back.

Blessings on your journey.

Gnosis & Formation

2009-06-27T04:48:00.004-06:00

[Response to an individual considering entering a distance formation program in another church.]

The best advice that I can give you is to at least travel to visit and participate for a few days in parish life (if any) and speak at length with different types of participants in any church you are seriously considering, before entering any formation program. This happens automatically in our tradition, because people either live there or are considering moving there. However, in many of these churches one generally only meets others in person for ordination, and these may be at extraordinary events (visits or conferences) disconnected from life at the parish level. Beyond being due diligence, it will also give a level of insight that will prove invaluable if you enter a distance formation program.

Geography is a serious limitation, however gnosis (first-hand knowledge and experience) is also a limitation in that a distance formation is one without the dimension of gnosis. Recently founded church bodies that have such programs don't see gnosis as part of the formation process, and in my experience that is correlated with demonstrations of an understanding of Gnosticism centered on doctrinal elements. There is a long development of an individual's understanding of gnosis, that is itself a part of the overall developmental process, and an institutional understanding narrowly focused on doctrinal elements is more likely to hinder than to aid in this.

For me, an established community of practice is a large part of what a spiritual institution has to offer. It isn't necessarily correlated to the age of a particular institutional form, but it is a matter of having significant experience and interaction in a community of practice. In all spiritual traditions an individual is first a student and is then graduated by being encouraged or approved to teach by a long established teacher. This basic system doesn't always work as intended, but its fundamental purpose is to both pass on a living tradition tied into a larger community of practice, and to ensure the development of the individual beyond a certain point before they become a teacher in that tradition. The “living” aspect and the “development” aspect are of the nature of gnosis. It is worth considering how far back a living tradition goes within an institution and its leading and teaching members.

It may also be useful to point out that at different points of development there are common “universal solutions” that one realizes are not actually solutions of any kind a bit further along. I am not just speaking of personal observations, but also of quantitative research in developmental psychology. While it is best to avoid any simple easy “universal solution” presented, the example of this that is seen far too frequently is the notion of otherwise empty empowerment. This may manifest as a desire of an individual to receive a title without formation, because the title is all that is perceived as needed. It may also manifest as someone essentially granting titles without a formation process, and thinking that doing so is the same as someone going through a formation process.

I think that to be a Gnostic is to consider gnosis to be of importance, even when it is not redemptive-gnosis (usually referred to as Gnosis). One can learn quite a bit at a distance. There is no limitation on information at a distance, but there are severe limitations on gnosis at a distance. I suggest being aware of the severity of the limitations and considering the implications before entering such a program.

For my part, although I am designing a largely distance learning program in Spiritual Ministry and have no reservations about the granting of academic degrees in such a program, I cannot imagine putting someone forward as a candidate for the priesthood who has not had significant experience of the priesthood liturgically and within the context of parish service. Which would result in becoming a Gnostic Priest without gnosis of what a Gnostic Priest does liturgically and informally. That just strikes me as something of an oxymoron.

I hope all goes well whatever path you take. Development does not end with formation, and in an open and supportive environment, where further development does not inevitably lead to conflict with the institution, much can be accomplished. All institutions have their limitations, their blind spots, their weaknesses along with their strengths. I would simply reiterate the suggestion to visit before entering any formation program—a bit of first-hand knowledge, gnosis, is worth more than thousands of words.

Lacarrière on Knowledge from Suffering

2009-06-22T22:38:00.001-06:00

Pseudo-knowledge, believed to be gained through suffering, the fallacious redemption gained through ordeal, is nothing then but a lie, a lie that fails to recognize—or pretends not to recognize—the absurd and alienating nature of evil. Gnostic soteriology is quite explicit on this point: evil is never at any moment the outcome of a divine plan; it is not a natural or inherent necessity but the product of an error or misunderstanding. - Jacques Lacarrière

Selected Timeline: Modern era to Nag Hammadi publication. Part Two: 20th Century to 1977

2009-06-09T23:25:00.002-06:00

Twentieth Century

1900 Fragments of a Faith Forgotten by G. R. S. Mead.
- Doinel readmitted to the Gnostic church as a bishop (Tau Julius).
1903 Additional material from the Gospel of Thomas discovered at Oxyrhynchus. Beginning of the text through logion 7, logion 24 and 36 and fragments of logion 36 through 39.
1904 New Sayings of Jesus and Fragments of a Lost Gospel by Bernard Grenfell and Arthur Hunt. Pre-publication abridgment of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri: Part 4.
1906 Thrice Greatest Hermes a comprehensive three volume treatise by G. R. S. Mead.
1907 Jean Bricaud, a bishop of l'Église Gnostique since 1901 with previous connections to the Eliate Church of Carmel of Eugene Vintras, the remnants of Bernard-Raymond Fabré-Palaprat's l'Église Johannites des Chretiens Primitif (Johannite Church of the Primitive Christians), and the Martinist Order, establishes the Eglise Catholique Gnostique (Gnostic Catholic Church) combining these, becoming patriarch under the name Tau Jean II. Liturgical services are based on Western Rite Christianity rather than the Cathar inspired rituals established by Doniel. Bricaud was encouraged and supported by fellow bishop Gérard "Papus" Encausse, likely to provide sacraments to excommunicated members of the Martinist Order.
1908 Eglise Gnostique Universelle (Universal Gnostic Church) becomes the name of the church lead by Bricaud. The original church body founded by Doinel continues under the name Eglise Gnostique du France (Gnostic Church of France).
1911 The close ties between Eglise Gnostique Universelle and the Martinist Order are formalized.
1917 Septem Sermones ad Mortuos (Seven Sermons To The Dead) by Carl Gustav Jung. Privately published.
1921 Pistis Sophia (Second edition, with commentary) by G. R. S. Mead.
1926 l'Église Gnostique du France (the original church body founded by Doinel) is disbanded in favor of the Eglise Gnostique Universelle.
1928 The Gnostic Society founded in Los Angeles by Theosophists James Morgan Pryse and his brother John Pryse for the study of gnosticism.
1933 First annual meeting of Eranos, an academic group inspired by Jung, focused on the study of religions. Participants include the foremost scholars of religion, subsequently called the "history of religions" school of thought.
1944 Jean Bricaud's successor in the EGU, Constant Martin Chevillon (Tau Harmonious) is executed by Nazi collaborators.
- Ronald Powell, an Australian of French decent and priest in the Liberal Catholic Church, leaves Australia for Europe, eventually settling in England. He acquires a grant of nobility in keeping with his understanding of spiritual nobility, and legally changes his name to Richard Jean Chretien Duc de Palatine.
1945 A cache of codices representing a large collection of Gnostic texts in Coptic is found near Nag Hammadi.
1949 A rare copy of Jung's Septem Sermones ad Mortuos is shown to a young student at Innsbruck by the name of Stephan Hoeller, because of his interest in Gnosticism.
1951 Gnosis als Weltreligion (Gnosis as World Religion) by Gilles Quispel.
1953 The first codex of the Nag Hammadi Library to be acquired, dubbed the Jung Codex, is formally presented to C. G. Jung.
- The Pre-Nicene Gnostic Catholic Church (now called Ecclesia Gnostica) instituted by the Most Rev. Richard Duc de Palatine, consecrated a bishop previously that year.
1954 The first translation of the Berlin Codex is published.
1955 The Jung Codex by H. Puech, Gilles Quispel, and W. Van Unnik. First publication of translations of Nag Hammadi texts.
1958 Morton Smith reports finding an ancient copy of a letter by Clement of Alexandria quoting a secret Gospel of Mark.
- The Gnostic Religion: The message of the alien God and the beginnings of Christianity by Hans Jonas, a student of Bultmann and Heidegger. Second edition 1963.
- Eglise Gnostique Apostolique instituted by Robert Amberlain.
1959 The Ante-Nicene Gnostic Catholic Church becomes active in the US through the ministry of Stephan Hoeller.
- English translation of the Gospel of Thomas.
1960 Eglise Gnostique Universelle discontinued in favor of Eglise Gnostique Apostolique by Robert Amberlain (Tau Jean III).
1967 The Institute for Antiquity and Christianity is founded. The Coptic Gnostic Library Project directed by James Robinson, is one of its six initial projects.
- Consecration of Stephan Hoeller (Tau Stephanus) as regionary bishop of the Americas for the Ante-Nicene Gnostic Catholic Church (Ecclesia Gnostica).
1973 The Gnostics By Jacques Lacarrière. English translation published in 1977.
1977 Die Gnosis: Wesen und Geschichte einer spatiken Religion (Gnosis: The Nature And History of Gnosticism) by Kurt Rudolph. Revised and expanded 1980. English translation 1983.
1977 The Nag Hammadi Library in English edited by Marvin Meyer and James Robinson.

Selected Timeline: Modern era to Nag Hammadi publication. Part One: 18th-19th Centuries

2009-06-07T22:54:00.005-06:00

Eighteenth Century

1735 Isaac de Beausobre publishes the first modern monograph on Manicheism (Rudolph, 1983, p. 30).
1738 Papal Bull In eminenti apostolatus specula issued by Pope Clement XII, banning Roman Catholics from becoming Freemasons.
1769 The Bruce Codex was brought to England from Upper Egypt by the famous Scottish traveller Bruce, and subsequently bequeathed to the care of the Bodleian Library, Oxford (Mead, 1900, p. 426).
<1785 The Askew Codex was bought by the British Museum from the heirs of Dr. Askew (Mead, 1900, p. 426).

Nineteenth Century

1835 Die Christliche Gnosis (The Christian Gnosis) by Ferdinand Christian Baur. According to Kurt Rudolph (1983, p. 31), Baur is "the real founder of research into gnosis."
1851 Pistis Sophia text and Latin translation of the Askew Codex by M. G. Schwartze.
1864 The Gnostics and Their Remains by Charles William King, an expert on, and the largest collector of, ancient gems. In it King puts forward the theory of the Eastern origins of Gnosticism, common to the period.
1875 The Theosophical Society founded by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and Col. Henry Steel Olcott.
1877 Isis Unveiled by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky. Gnostics are one of the spiritual traditions mentioned favorably. King's the Gnostics and Their Remains repeatedly cited as a source and quoted.
1884 Encyclical Humanum Genus of Pope Leo XIII against Freemasonry. This inspires the writer known as Léo Taxil to engage in an elaborate hoax claiming that Freemasonry was satanic.
1887 The Gnostics and Their Remains (Second edition) by Charles William King. Expanded, including account of the Pistis Sophia.
1886 Lerhrbuch der Dogmengeschichte (The History of Dogma) by Adolph von Harnack. According to Rudolph, Harnack "laid the basis for an assessment of Gnosis from the point of view of church history" (1983, p. 31).
1890 l'Église Gnostique (the Gnostic Church) established after discovery of Cathar documents and a series of spiritual experiences by archivist Jules-Benoît Stanislas Doinel du Val-Michel (aka Jules Doinel), becoming patriarch under the name Tau Valentin II. Teachings are based on extant Cathar documents and the Gospel of John with a strong influence of Simonian and Valentinian cosmology. The church having both male and female Clergy, such as, male bishops and female "sophias." Liturgical services are based on Cathar rituals.
- through 1891 Mead publishes a serial article on Pistis Sophia in the Theosophical magazine Lucifer, the first English translation of the Askew Codex.
1891 The Bruce Codex text and French translation with a brief introduction by E. Amélineau. Text was based on a century old copy, without knowing that it consisted of two manuscripts whose leaves were intermixed.
- The Martinist Order founded by Gérard Encausse, primarily known by his nome du plume "Papus."
1892 The Bruce Codex critical text and German translation by Carl Schmidt. First critical edition.
1895 Pistis Sophia French translation of Schwartze's text by E. Amélineau.
- Jules Doinel resigns and converts to Roman Catholicism (apparently one of many duped by Léo Taxil's anti-masonic hoax) writing Lucifer Unmasked against freemasonry.
1896 Pistis Sophia by G. R. S. Mead. Translation of the Askew Codex.
- The Coptic Berlin Codex (aka. the Akhmim Codex), unearthed in Akhmim, Egypt, wrapped in feathers, in a niche in a wall at a Christian burial site.
- through 1898 Mead publishes another serial article, "Among the Gnostics of the First Two Centuries," that laid the foundation for his monumental compendium Fragments of a Faith Forgotten.
1897 "The Acts of John" by M. R. James in Apocrypha Anecdota II. A long fragment of the Acts of John, much of which was previously unpublished.
- Two Lectures on the 'Sayings of Jesus' Recently Discovered at Oxyrhynchus by Walter Lock and William Sandy. Text, translation and lecture commentaries on first fragments of the Gospel of Thomas discovered earlier that year (fragments of logion 26 through 33).
1898 The Oxyrhynchus Papyri: Part 1 by Bernard Grenfell and Arthur Hunt. Begins with unidentified fragment of the Gospel of Thomas.

Questions: Gnostic Theodicy – Take Two

2009-06-06T01:16:00.003-06:00

The theological problem known as 'the problem of evil,' or as 'theodicy' (the justness of God), is the result of a theological definition of God comprising of three elements: all-powerful, meaning that there are no external limits on the power of God; all-knowing, meaning that there are no external limits on the knowledge of God; and all-good, meaning that there are no external limits on the goodness of God. What flows from this definition is the difficulty of avoiding assigning some responsibility for evil to such a being who knows about the evil in advance, has the power to prevent the evil, and, being good without limit, would have to act to prevent the evil.

The problem goes like this: since there is no external limit, there is nothing other than God that can be responsible for evil, but God is all-good and so cannot allow evil that God could prevent. However, there is no limit on the knowledge and power of God so there is nothing other than God that can be responsible for evil, but God is all-good and so cannot allow evil that God could prevent... Rinse. Repeat.

If we modify the definition, the problem goes away. If God is not all-good, then God can allow evil to occur, or even cause it. (A common pragmatic belief, even if denied in theory.) If God is not all-knowing, then God cannot be expected to know each instance of evil that will occur in order to prevent it. If God is not all-powerful, then God may not be able to prevent every instance of evil. The other way out of the problem is to deny the existence of evil in various ways, and that is the usual strategy employed by theologians. (There are also self-limited and all-good arguments.)

From the Gnostic texts we see statements comparable to the all-good part of this theological definition. The other two definitional elements, all-powerful and all-knowing, are certainly not present as understood and formulated in contemporary theology. For example, in Gnostic stories the ultimate divinity emanates aspects of the divine nature rather than acting as a creator wielding power upon a separate creation. There is also the question of whether it is valid and to what extent it makes sense to re-frame ancient Gnostic stories into modern theological arguments.

One of the things that annoys some academic scholars of Gnosticism is the mythic rather than theological nature of Gnostic texts. Our culture is so used to theological ways of thinking that the mythic form seems unwieldy. Yet there is a fundamental difference between the mythic and theological in the nature of meaning.

The analogy that comes to mind is the characters of a story, be it a book or a film, being translated into a game, such as a video game or trading card game. The character is removed from the story, the context of meaning, and is then defined by attributes relative to other things in the game. It may be fun to play the game, to move outside of the story, but it is a fundamentally different enterprise from that of telling the original story. Likewise, translating the ultimate divinity from Gnostic stories into a game piece with theological attributes and moving outside of the story is a very different thing from the telling of the original stories.

Questions: Gnostic Theodicy

2009-05-28T19:07:00.005-06:00

I have a question about the Gnostic explanation for the evil in the world. If the Demiurge is responsible for this flawed creation, why would the true God create the Demiurge? If this true God is perfect, why would it allow lesser deities to emanate from it? Why does it emanate in the first place? It seems to me that the Gnostic explanation for the problem of evil comes back to the same dilemma as the other explanations.

That your formulation of it comes down to the same problem is to be expected. The 'problem of evil' (aka, theodicy, justness of God) is a result of a particular theological definition of God as: all-good, all-powerful and all-knowing. Since it is a definitional problem and not a situational one, any situation in which you place that definition will result in that same problem. The reverse is also true, if you do not have that definition then you do not have that problem. Gnosticism doesn't have that theology and so doesn't have that problem.

Mythology is not theology, and the Gnostic approach is mythological rather than theological. Also, using the term "evil" invokes a larger dualistic frame that isn't necessarily any relation to the ancient thought on the subject. The Greek word is kakos, which means: bad, ugly, ill-born, unskilled, unlucky, foul, pernicious, wretched, etc. We get 'cacophony' from kako-phonos meaning "bad/ugly sound."

The explanation for endemic kakos in Valentinian Gnostic mythology is that the half-maker (demiurge) was created apart from the emanation of the ultimate divine source, and was then hidden in a fog and so was ignorant of the divine. The half-maker as a kakon (unskilled) creator then begins to create the powers (archons) and the cosmos. This story gives an explanation for the kakos (badness, ugliness, wretchedness) that is an endemic aspect of the cosmos and also the ignorance of the powers that are a part of it--it is separated from the divine and ignorant of it. This also shows the remedy, which is the reason for, point of, the myth.

The word "perfect" is another translation that invokes an anachronistic meaning frame. The two applications of telos are "without blemish," and "end, completed." In contrast, we combine and amplify the two in our use of "perfect." However, the ultimate divinity can be without blemish and still undergo a process such as emanation.

As far as the 'why' of emanations in the myth, it is also probably best understood as descriptive of the many ways in which we experience the divine (with ourselves being an aspect of such experience), and so as showing the way back to the divine. It can also be viewed as the original divine unity going through a process of realizing its different aspects through emanating (hypostasizing) those aspects.

Linens from Catholic Linens

2009-05-16T20:42:00.002-06:00

You can tell that it is getting close to my seventh sacerdotal ordination anniversary if you look at my old altar linens. The set I had been using was an ordination gift from Fr. Michael Laferty, being both aesthetically pleasing and also of sentimental value. So, it was even more unfortunate when I wore holes along a crease of the purificator. The amice that I had been using was already well into the process of coming apart months before. It was time, that is, I was forced to get a new set of linens.

I shopped online, looking for something inexpensive that might work. Donations don't cover regular expenses and holy week was coming up. I was torn between cheap and something that would hold up to use and so last much longer. I came across catholiclinens.com that was offering 100% linen linens for about the price of 51% linen linens. The proprietor offers quality and durability rather than lace and embroidery. She also offers larger sized amices.

My order arrived much faster than I was expecting, even though I ordered a larger size amice. I have been quite pleased with them. Pure linen is much more absorbent and more durable. You really notice the absorbency when you use the lavabo towel. As someone who sweats under all the layers of vestments, the large amice is very nice. The linen absorbs more, and with the larger size there is more of it. It really helps protect stoles and chasubles.

The red crosses are very basic, five cross-stich "x"s. The linens come pressed and creased correctly, with the exception of the purificators (they are folded in half rather than a trifold).

Icy Cold Blast from the Past

2009-05-08T04:00:00.004-06:00

I would like to say, “well, now I have seen it all,” but that is a statement easily falsified by further events.

Some time ago I spent time on a forum, I said I was a Gnostic, they said they were Gnostics. There were occasional useful/non-polemical discussions at the very beginning. It seemed nice to find other Gnostics, and be Gnostics together. By now you should have guessed what the issue would become—that name-space “Gnostic.”

The problem seriously emerged when an attempt was made to define that name-space. When urged to caution, the charge was made “we have to do it to exclude the sex magic and new age groups!” Despite the many problems with that 'reason,' the push went aggressively on. Dissent is rarely popular by definition, and for such a grand scheme there was no opt out option, it was the entire name-space remember. A vocal dissenter is a persona non grata. The definition was presented as a fiat accompli, one of many such 'conclusions.' It was presented without an argument in its favor, the burden being on others to successfully convince those responsible for it that they were in error. Yes, it was that scholarly of a debate. “Here's my conclusion, convince me I'm wrong,” is not a caricature since identification with the conclusion stated was the norm, with arguments against being taken personally. Did I mention that these were the moderators of the forum?

Of course, it only got worse. In effect, if you disagreed with the definition of the name-space you were telling others that they were not Gnostics. Be part of the collective, or you are attacking the 'aggrieved' other parties. It was all about identity. It was the worst instance of identity politics. Simply not affirming the proclamations of some became “saying they weren't as good as you,” or, “saying that they were bad Gnostics.” It certainly wasn't the case that the 'aggrieved' weren't sincere, just that it was not a rational reaction by any means.

And, it got worse. The right to be a distinct individual with a different view on anything Gnostic was completely abrogated in practice. Any post making a distinction in regards to my own understanding and actual practice of Gnosticism was attacked by many respondents in ways that violated the forum rules. The only response of the moderators was to promptly close the entire discussion.

So, I was effectively silenced. Oh, the moderators did discuss me in their private forum, which they either forgot I had access to or just didn't care. Other moderators were asked to close discussions so it wouldn't seem biased on the surface that one of those involved actually closed them. Juvenile nicknames were used for me. A significant personal bias against my church and bishop was evidenced on a number of occasions. After seeing all that they were about, I left.

Yes, even after I left it got worse. I was pursued and hounded at another forum for the same sin of disagreeing. It may have done the trick of putting me off forums all together and effectively silencing me yet again. Fortunately, the moderators of that forum actually intervened to remove the personal attack made by a moderator of the first forum. There is much to be said for standards.

That was years ago, but the same people are doing the same things and whining and insinuating the same things. While about the most seriously creepy thing that I have experienced in my online dealings with those who call themselves Gnostics, I like to think that I have learned from the ordeal.

What comes most to mind is that community actually means being able to be distinct and to make distinctions. If you cannot be distinct it is not really a community, it is an identity. Dialoging is easiest with those who won't have identity-crossover with you, that is, for whom you do not play a role in their identity. When there is a similarity, caution is needed, as are perhaps new qualifiers for distinctions within your shared idea or name-space. To actually share things in common, we need to be able to share our distinctions and differences; after all, they are what we have to give each other.

One of the big lessons I learned is to actively remain agnostic about people and groups encountered online. When all you can know about them is what they say and what others say, it goes without saying that there is no gnosis involved. One can easily make a false-recognition out of a desire to either uncritically include or reject. Staying agnostic is what the ancients would have called a spiritual exercise, a practice of remaining aware of the difference between gnosis, doxa, and episteme.

I studied the scholarship on Gnosticism for years and had my own developing understanding from experience before encountering any practicing Gnostics, and I was quite skeptical about them, with many tests they had to pass both formulated and vague. Yet, somehow when this started, my policy was to accept anyone as they said they were, until proven otherwise. I had become ego-identified with being Gnostic in the usual way of such things so that I unconsciously identified with others who identified the same way. While a common and well-studied psychological effect, it is no less a failure on my part.

I also think that I have acquired more skillful means of communicating by that long exercise in not communicating. If someone misunderstands your argument, you can try to learn to argue more clearly. However, if someone twists your plain text in order to 'misunderstand' you, they are attacking you and not your argument, and that fact is all that there really is to learn.

The other lesson that gets driven home all too often is that if someone is attacking you in this medium, you probably cannot help them in any way. The reason for this is that anything you say will be twisted, and there is no “reality factor” that has to come into play. The interpretation by the individual does not have to be subjected to reason, facts, or simple reality tests—in this medium the interpretation by each isolated individual can be unassailable. However, I don't know if it will keep me from trying. After all, in the worse case, it only brings in a more personal animosity against me in particular.

TM Polemicizes (Poorly)

2009-05-06T03:34:00.007-06:00

I came across a bit of polemic while trying to find information on Ecclesia Pistis Sophia, a recent church of "Sophian Gnosticism." ("Gnostic” and “Gnosticism" are used in a vague general way by the EPS, not in reference to ancient Gnosticism.) I have no desire to speak ill of the individual I'll refer to semi-anonymously as TM or his approach. Filtering the Gnostic myths and symbols through Kabbalistic myths and symbols isn't my cup of tea, but it seems to work for some on their spiritual journeys, and I wish every sojourner the best. However, I would like to reply specifically to some mistaken views expressed by him in one of his postings, since they seem to be views of my own tradition, and because they are just bad arguments.

Of course, rather than the cosmology of the Valentinian Gnostic tradition we draw upon the Jewish Kabbalah, generating a Christian Kabbalah; but many of the basic principles remain much the same. The difficulty is that, in truth, no one really knows the Valentinian Gnostic cosmology in its original intention and context – there must be much guess work and speculation filling in the gaps. This is not the case, however, with the Kabbalah, but there are plenty of source works and it remains a living tradition, so that when we draw from its teachings we may know the original intention and context, and when we shift the teachings to form our Christian Kabbalah we can do so with this knowledge and understanding.

This statement says that the ancient Gnostic traditions are at a remove from us. While it exaggerates the difficulty in understanding the original intention and context of Valentinian cosmology, the fact that it wasn't handed down to us as a living tradition is quite obviously true. This is given as the reason for choosing to use the Kabbalah as a core tradition, it is a living tradition as opposed to the Valentinian one. This statement makes sense. I could hope for the presentation of the results of this to be called "Sophian Kabbalah" rather than "Sophian Gnosticism," but it is a valid argument for the pragmatic choice that was made to teach a Kabbalistic core rather than a Gnostic one. One can also quote such scholars as Gershom Scholem about the Kabbalah being "Jewish Gnosticism," and the resonance between the two traditions, though they remain quite distinct.

Many in my tradition study the Kabbalah quite extensively, including the tradition of Christian Kabbalah, but it is not our core tradition—for that we use the ancient Gnostic tradition. It is a situation that can result in a somewhat steep learning curve in order to understanding the ancient context and intent of ancient scriptures (there is also a steep curve in beginning to study Kabbalah), but it does not require guesswork or speculation as a basis for practicing as modern Gnostics. The reason for this is gnosis, which most often can be translated as recognition or acquaintance. We come to know our selves, our cosmos, and the teachings, myths and symbols of our scriptures, through recognition and acquaintance—through gnosis. Gnosis is not the end of the path it is the method, that is, the path itself. Following the path of Gnosis we use study and experience of the myths, symbols, and teachings of scripture, individual spiritual inquiry, and developmental spiritual practices, in particular the mysteries/sacraments. These reflect and illuminate each other through gnosis.

However, somewhat opposite reasoning from the quote above is used against us modern practitioners of plain old (as in ancient) Gnosticism.

In this regard, I’m quite amazed that often times modern schools of Gnosticism become so bound up in orthodox patterns of priesthood, the formula of the Mass and so forth, and I’m astounded that this, very often, is how “Gnosticism” is interpreted and presented...

We actually view this in similar terms outlined in the first quote. We are choosing to practice a living tradition of ancient mystery ritual practices, a majority of which were practiced by ancient Gnostics, at a time when any specifically Gnostic tradition of practice has been long lost. However, according to TM, such a choice is not possible in this context, instead we must be "bound up in orthodox patterns." Apparently, we cannot look at the ancient Gnostic sources and see that they had mystery ritual practices, that they shared some of these with the universal church, and also that Gnostic schools functioned within the universal church, then make a choice to base our practice on a living tradition, rather than make one up largely out of guesswork and speculation. We would much rather have a living tradition of practice than one of cosmology.

Of course, when speaking of others it is easy to only consider the rules applied one way. In psychology we call this an instance of the fundamental attribution error.

If this is the case, then naturally our ancient Gnostic brothers and sisters would assume that their modern counterparts would generate their schools upon actual gnosis of Christ; specifically, actual gnosis of the Risen Christ.

If that were the case, then naturally we would expect you to generate your school upon actual gnosis of Christ, rather than on the tradition of Kabbalah. (Don't you hate it when someone turns your own argument against you by replacing terms?) You see, it doesn't matter who makes them, polemical arguments are generally bad arguments.

TM does talk quite a bit of sense about gnosis, and expresses valid though misplaced concerns. For the most part he's preaching to the choir. But from my point of view, such concerns point more towards his own group. He would seem to agree that Gnosis is not some esoteric knowledge that you have but knowledge that you are. Yet, couching everything in such a complex esoteric system as Kabbalah strikes me as somewhat counter-productive. Especially if someone can come and potentially experience gnosis of the living Christ through participation in a Eucharist service, with no need to learn a system. He merely assumes that the ancient mysteries practiced by Christians were not born out of Gnosis. Yet, there are scholars who think that the sacramental aspects of Christianity are Gnostic in origin. Surely, seeking to experience the presence of Christ rather than merely be told about him is quite Gnostic, and it is also the purpose of the Eucharist as a spiritual practice, a group spiritual exercise.

In the end it is best to remain agnostic concerning that which is in the domain of gnosis and of which we have no gnosis, no direct knowledge. The questions that I have for TM that would make his position and understanding clear to me are not ones that can be answered with words. So, I remain agnostic though not antagonistic.

An unconscious is a fact of revolutionary importance

2009-04-29T00:48:00.001-06:00

"The recognition that we have to allow for the existence of an unconscious is a fact of revolutionary importance. Conscience as an ethical authority extends only as far as consciousness extends. When a man lacks self-knowledge he can do the most astonishing or terrible things without calling himself to account and without ever suspecting what he is doing. Unconscious actions are always taken for granted and are therefore not critically evaluated. One is then surprised at the incomprehensible reactions of one's neighbors, whom one holds to be responsible; that is, one fails to see what one does oneself and seeks in others the cause of all the consequences that follow from ones' own actions." [C. G. Jung, Collected Works (vol. 16), p.811; para. 1803]

"Our unwillingness to see our own faults and the projection of them on to others is the source of most quarrels, and the strongest guarantee that injustice, animosity, and persecution will not easily die out. when one remains unconscious of oneself one is frequently unaware of one's own conflicts; indeed the existence of unconscious conflicts is actually held to be impossible." [Ibid., p. 811-812; para. 1804]

Escape requires becoming like God

2009-04-28T22:45:00.001-06:00

"But it is not possible, Theodorus, that the force of evil should be utterly destroyed—for there must always be something opposed to the good; nor is it possible that it should have its seat among the gods. But is must inevitably haunt human life, and prowl about this earth. Therefore we should wholly endeavor to take flight to that place (of the gods); and such flight means becoming as like God as possible; and a man becomes like God when he becomes just and holy, through understanding. ... In God there is no sort of wrong whatsoever, he is supremely just, and the thing most like him is the man who has become as just as it lies in human nature to be." - Plato [Theaetetus 176 b-c]

New T-shirt and such Designs Available

2009-03-23T05:08:00.004-06:00

My Gallery
Zazzle is less expensive and gives more options per design than CafePress. Though I haven't ordered from them yet.

Here are the CafePress links:

Holy Thomas Gift Shop
PriestCraft: Gifts for Clergy

Plato on unwritten subjects

2009-03-22T16:10:00.001-06:00

I know indeed that certain others have written about these same subjects; but what manner of men they are not even themselves know. But thus much I can certainly declare [341c] concerning all these writers, or prospective writers, who claim to know the subjects which I seriously study, whether as hearers of mine or of other teachers, or from their own discoveries; it is impossible, in my judgment at least, that these men should understand anything about this subject.

There does not exist, nor will there ever exist, any treatise of mine dealing therewith. For it does not at all admit of verbal expression like other studies, but, as a result of continued application to the subject itself and communion therewith, it is brought to birth in the soul on a sudden, as light that is kindled [341d] by a leaping spark, and thereafter it nourishes itself.

Notwithstanding, of thus much I am certain, that the best statement of these doctrines in writing or in speech would be my own statement; and further, that if they should be badly stated in writing, it is I who would be the person most deeply pained. And if I had thought that these subjects ought to be fully stated in writing or in speech to the public, what nobler action could I have performed in my life than that of writing what is of great benefit to mankind and [341e] bringing forth to the light for all men the nature of reality?

But were I to undertake this task it would not, as I think, prove a good thing for men, save for some few who are able to discover the truth themselves with but little instruction; for as to the rest, some it would most unseasonably fill with a mistaken contempt, and others with an overweening and empty aspiration, as though they had learnt some sublime mysteries.

Plato (Epis. 7, 341b-e)

Home again. Ill again.

2009-01-28T23:54:00.000-07:00

I am grateful that I was able to make the journey to San Francisco to attend a school conference. It was an uncertain thing in multiple ways: health, accommodation, transportation. Preparations were more work and more money that was easy for me to handle.

Fortunately, it worked out with only relatively minor difficulties. Missing the conference would have been difficult as I had already missed one due to illness, and I would have paid for it since it was beyond the cancellation date.

However, the trip held much more than that, it was quite beneficial. Attending a course on the collective shadow, socializing with people with similar interests, and being exposed to a hint of the number of advanced spiritual practitioners working in the area. This latter item struck me as being a resource so rare in human history from one point of view, and from another unique in human history for the diversity of traditions that are involved. It is a resource that I hope to make more use of in my own journey.

Yet, illness has hit me very hard again. It seems to be a severe food allergy to something hard to avoid, and I was unable to avoid it despite my best efforts. So, back into the twilit world of fatigue, sleep, and frustration. Though, there is hope that it will not last for long this time.

Interview available on podcast

2009-01-14T06:57:00.004-07:00

My interview by Nick Burns on KRCL's RadioActive on Gnosticism and current Gnostic practice is now available as an mp3 file.

It was an enjoyable interview for me, speaking with an interesting and insightful interviewer.

A Christmas with(out) Mystery and Magic

2008-12-25T22:29:00.004-07:00

If, as Aleister Crowley states, a man sneezing is a magical act then this is the most magical time of the year, as they say.

What really makes the season magical in my experience is the celebration of the season grounded in ritual celebration. Sure, we have our secular traditions in which Christmas is a time of consumer sacrifice to the great god we call the economy. There are also a diversity of rich symbolic traditions, whose meanings we rarely consider, and which have primarily become a way of reaching back in time to connect in some way to Christmases past. They are a magical act in that they might conjure up memories and a feeling of breaking through the shackles of time towards an eternal longed-for moment.

I have no such traditions that work for me. No family or cultural traditions that work such magic. As a kid there were just too many expectations and obligations involved. Once I outgrew the Christmas morning toy seeking frenzy, there wasn't much that I liked about the holiday, at least as I knew it then.

For a number of years Christmas wasn't a religious holiday for me. It was a misplaced solstice celebration in worship of the consumer economy. Working in retail in a mall bookstore exposed me to the more gruesome aspects of the consumer act of sacrificial purchase. In ancient animal sacrifice the priest was essentially a sacred slaughterhouse worker: slit the throat, let it bleed out, slit the belly, toss the entrails on the fire. Working in a mall bookstore through the entire sacrificial season was somewhat similar in regards to the consumer version.

All of that was years ago (Deo Gratias), but for years after there just was no appeal for me, at least until I started attending Ecclesia Gnostica services. Even the first years of doing that, the EG didn't have its own space locally and so didn't offer a midnight mass on Christmas. So, I attended Roman Catholic services for a few years, then Eastern Orthodox. They were nice, and I appreciated them. The RC services at the Cathedral of the Magdalene were high production affairs with live music. The EO services I attended were intimate and meditative. Yet, for me they lacked, they weren't the celebration of the mystery that was closest to my soul, the form that was such an important part of my spiritual life.

After we started holding services in a century old deconsecrated RC chapel, we were able to hold midnight mass. By that time I was in advanced minor orders and had been serving for years. My dear friend and mentor Rev. Dr. Owens had a creche set up on the side altar and had us pause after the service and the homily to listen to Silent Night while contemplating the creche scene. After the deconstruction of the nativity stories, to have the myth brought to life like that was wonderful, full of wonder.

Midnight mass has since been the cornerstone of the season for me. The Sundays in Advent leading up to it, and the twelve days of Christmas ending with Epiphany are the foundations of the season. They are not merely rituals that take up a short time, they infuse the entire season with meaning, with spiritual aliveness. They add to everything. In them we encounter the timeless mystery of the Eucharist in the context of the mystery of the transcendent light, the mystery of each individual capacity to redemption, the divine spark of unimaginable potential that can be liberated within us. It is more than just having such ideas, it is seeing them come alive in symbolic form. And in this we can truly see how blessed we are to have had such a teacher and liberator as Christ among us, and to have even what little we do have of his teachings available to us.

In my conjuring up the memory of that mystery, the magic of the season returns to me. Illness may have robbed me of the ability to physically join in the timeless celebration, but the eternal is always now, always present. Even the echoes of memory can call us back to that transcendent joy and eternal gratitude, even when we cannot experience the mystery in its ritual form.

How Dare We?

2008-12-23T23:28:00.008-07:00

Ancient Gnostics clearly had ritual practices. We have some texts used in rituals, we have texts discussing rituals, and we have descriptions and references to ritual practices. Ancient Gnostics also had groups. We know of no Gnostic hermits, no solitary practitioners. These groups did distinguish between individuals, just not by outward incidentals like gender. Someone beginning the path wasn't considered as capable of helping others as someone who learned from a teacher who had spent many years in study and service and who has spent many years doing this themselves. (Obvious, yes, but somehow overlooked by some.) There were Gnostic groups who had members who were clergy in the Christian church, holding holy orders that included that of bishop. These clergy served in that capacity and celebrated the mysteries/sacraments of the Christian church. None of this is speculation or a minority opinion, it is well documented history.

Yet, with regularity, the EG becomes the target of attacks by individuals who consider themselves to be Gnostics. This is always someone who has never been to a service, and who never bothers to actually speak to someone involved before conjuring up in his imagination the unadulterated evil that just has to be any church be it Gnostic or not. That is because, in their view, obviously all organized religion is evil, and so any church must be evil. In general, such critics are very new to Gnosticism and yet know from their armchairs with a shocking level of certainty that those of us who have been involved in studying Gnosticism and engaged in spiritual ministry, actually serving others, within the Gnostic tradition for decades are evil mustache-twirling villains for having a church or for wearing the traditional vestments of Western Christianity, or pet peeve x or y. How dare we? We dare fine. How dare you?

As they seem to strain their imaginative capability in this situation in conjuring up their imaginary evil Gnostic church, I decided to help out with a little theme song ditty for them to use. To the tune of "Every Sperm is Sacred" from Monty Python's The Meaning of Life:

Every church is caustic,
Every church I hate.
If a church is Gnostic,
I get quite irate.

Every church is toxic,
Is evil unalloyed.
If a church is Gnostic,
It must be destroyed.

Such a view is plainly inconsistent with, if not contrary to, what we know from the history and texts of the Gnostic tradition. So, why are modern Gnostics who act like ancient Gnostics viewed as evil by neophytes who are self-identified as Gnostics? And, why are they so hell-bent to prosecute, and generally so arrogant, certain, and angered into near incoherence? We can understand it in different ways.

One way is to view it as a reaction, an hyper-vigilant self-defense. Few people get through early life without a negative encounter with a restrictive orthodox religion. In an over-generalized reaction, all of religion, or at least what reminds one of the negative encounter, becomes something to avoid and to warn others away from. Since this isn't a rational conscious process, it is an irrational unconscious one. Sure, the conclusions arrived at from this irrational unconscious process might be put forward with attempts at rationalization, but such are incomplete or incoherent—as they are added after the fact and only "convince" if one shares the prejudice.

Another way to view it is by looking at the issue of identity. When looking at identity the main psychological locus is the ego. There is an ego investment in whatever the ego identifies with. What is identified with is defended as if it were oneself. There is also a process more like ego divestment, anything seen as unacceptable to oneself is split off and projected onto something else. In depth psychology, this split off unacceptable part is called the shadow. Since the shadow cannot be accepted as a part of oneself, it is projected, like on a movie screen, and so seen as the evil or terrible other one cannot get away from because it is not an other but oneself.

This explains the choice of attacking the EG rather than any of the many denominations that might actually fit the bill as exclusive, authoritarian, and orthodox in structure. In regards to those, there is no element of identity, so the shadow is projected upon them, but there is no sense of urgency, no personal component. However, a Gnostic church has that personal component for someone identified with Gnosticism, and so it is personal for them, calling for urgent condemnation without need for any facts to support the condemnation. Seeing one's own shadow projected upon the other is enough.

Confronted with these modern heresiologists with some regularity, it is an interesting question of how to respond. Not responding is an option, of course. Since these individuals are fighting with themselves, literally shadow boxing, there is no pressing reason to become involved. Yet, having gone through this type of process myself, and having some wonderful examples that helped me free myself from vestiges of my own projections: I feel that if there is hope of aiding such individuals in a similar way, then there is an obligation to try.

Such aid should only be attempted if you are not yourself personally the recipient of the shadow projection. In that situation any direct action you can take will only make matters worse--if they can get worse. This is probably also the case when you are a member of a group that is the recipient of the shadow projection. So, I acknowledge that I have probably made a mistake recently in this regard. The only saving factor is that, as they were, matters really couldn't get any worse in that particular situation.

Radio Interview Tonight

2008-12-23T16:18:00.003-07:00

Tonight I will be interviewed on Salt Lake City's KRCL RadioActive program from 6-7 PM. The theme will be introducing Gnosticism. If you are local, you can hear it on 90.9 FM. If not local you can hear it on http://krcl.org. They also make a podcast version available on that site for about a week afterward.

Update: I enjoyed the interview and the feedback has been positive. I'll include a link to the podcast when it becomes available.

Gnostcism and the gods

2008-12-13T21:50:00.005-07:00

"I know this idea isn't central to Gnosticism and historically the gods of various pantheons (Zeus, Odin, Thor, etc.) don't play a part in Gnostic lore. But how would a Gnostic explain or interpret the gods according to their own mythology? I've been reading about aeons and archons, and it seems to me that most of them would fit in with the latter.

"From the various books and websites I've looked over, it sounds like opinions differ on whether the demiurge and archons are evil or just ignorant of what exists above them. If so, perhaps the more enlightened among the gods would be reaching for Gnosis as well?"

Aeons are emanations of the highest divinity, and so are aspects of that transcendent divinity, akin to Kabbalistic sefiroth. They often have allegorical names.

Archons are powers in the cosmos, and so are more like the classical understanding of gods and daemons. It is a distinction of genus, the nature and origin. In the generic plural form, Gnostic texts tend to view Archons as detrimental to liberation due to their ignorant exercise of power. However, in the texts that give accounts of the creation of the cosmos, there are individual archons who immediately recognize the truth when it is told to them by Sophia and leave the service of the demiurge. Even the demiurge may eventually give up his willful ignorance.

Abraxas is an interesting figure. He is described as an archon in the secondary literature, yet is a figure who unites the opposites of the cosmos and aids one in transcending the cosmos. So, there are powers in the world that not only recognize the need for Gnosis, but also aid humans in attaining it.

From a Gnostic perspective the figures of ancient pantheons are not theologically defined entities, but something that we experience as beings. They are not a matter of belief, but of encounter. We may encounter and experience what the ancient peoples who described these pantheons and deities encountered and experienced. All are not necessarily detrimental to us, and so may be beneficial to us in a limited way. The key factor is that they are limited. But this is the ancient view of such beings as well.

What are gods from a polytheist perspective may be archons from a Gnostic perspective--but they are the same beings, largely understood in the same way. The way of understanding this is similar to that in Tibetan Buddhism, in that the mission of conversion to Buddhism in Tibet is described as including the teaching and conversion of the individual deities there. And that these deities are still honored, they may even aid one in seeking enlightenment, but, they are understood within the larger framework.

2009 Gnostic Calendar

2008-12-10T03:52:00.005-07:00

Now in its fourth year, the first Calendar for Gnostics! Yet, it also appeals to others seeking spiritual liberation.

The calendar features the Liturgical Calendar of the Ecclesia Gnostica. Facing pages feature original art and commentary on Gnostic themes by a Gnostic Priest. This year's themes include a series on the Mystery traditions, Simon Magus & Helen, Lazarus, Psyche, Gnosis, and more. It also includes quotes from Gnostic texts and almost all the authors noted. It is truly a unique calendar with a great deal of more content than any other calendar.

Order your 2009 Gnostic Calendar here

2009 Gnostic Calendar

2008-09-30T16:30:00.002-06:00

The 2009 Gnostic Calendar is in the works. It will be delayed (again) due to illness (again) -- the same illness, unfortunately. This month marks one year of it.

So, hang on to your calendar money for 4-6 weeks. I'll make an announcement when it is time to order.

Phillip Pullman Quote

2008-09-30T16:20:00.001-06:00

Religion, uncontaminated by power, can be the source of a great deal of private solace, artistic inspiration, and moral wisdom. But when it gets its hands on the levers of political or social authority, it goes rotten very quickly indeed. The rank stench of oppression wafts from every authoritarian church, chapel, temple, mosque, or synagogue – from every place of worship where the priests have the power to meddle in the social and intellectual lives of their flocks, from every presidential palace or prime ministerial office where civil leaders have to pander to religious ones.

Philosophical view of Gnosis

2008-09-22T23:21:00.003-06:00

“I can find nothing on which to hang a world view. The best certainties are either too flimsy or too hard to pin down. The best reasoning is often simply wrong. All the knowledge I have is on its very best days merely provisional.”

Looking for certainty in philosophical propositions in the postmodern era isn't likely to succeed. All formulations of knowledge are provisional, but that is the nature of knowledge since it involves ourselves.

Yet, there is deeper knowledge than the formulations we can make. And while formulations and conclusions are provisional, this deeper knowledge is not. It is simply what cannot be any other way given the shape of our existence. What is certainly true is isomorphic, it cannot be any other way. It is a part of who we are, not something we can directly articulate or determine.

We come to understand more of it by living deeply, by exploring who we are. Knowing oneself in this deep way isn't a pass-time, it is a necessary pursuit -- an investigation into the nature of being. At the same time it is liberating for it frees us of false notions, non-provisional formulations of knowledge, and overreaching conclusions. It is a process of becoming who we truly are and achieving excellence. This is what I call the path of Gnosis, following an ancient understanding.

“You and I might agree, but I'd shy away from the word gnosis. I do like living deeply.”

Unfortunately, there is no equivalent word in English. It is the Greek word originating from the Proto-Indo-European root of gnō. We could use the Sanskrit jnãna, but Indian philosophy developed its terminology somewhat differently from Western philosophy. Of the four words in Greek covering the meanings of "knowledge" in English, gnosis is the most primary and direct: meaning both recognition and investigation.

In the fifth chapter of the Republic, Plato developed his epistemology of types of knowledge. It is generally impossible to make out in English translations, but he is determining what forms of systematic knowledge (epistēmē) and perceptual judgment (doxa, used as a technical term) are based on gnosis.

Whatever terminology we may use to point to this deeper form of knowingness, it is the primary form. Basing certainty at the level of a secondary type of knowing seems inherently flawed, it certainly has failed so far. One can do as Plato did, and try to move from the primary form to a secondary type, but there are severe limitations. In Plato's view one can have systematic knowledge based on gnosis only of noetic content, for example.

In general, this deeper approach takes one beyond the level of cognitive logic and mental "work space" to that which generates/encapsulates them. So, instead of considering contents, one considers the structure of the container. I would also argue that this is a way of understanding notions of no-self. There is no "self" as a being in the way in which we ordinarily understand "self". Yet there is an emulation of a "self" that is a process within a deeper structure.

Spirituality in Developmental Perspective

2008-09-02T00:31:00.004-06:00

[I thought I'd share part of a paper I wrote last term that may be of interest.]

In recent decades a developmental approach to spirituality has emerged from work in different research areas of adult development. “When investigators of human development have written about 'higher' or more adult stages of development they often indicate that such development is spiritual” (Irwin, 2002, p. 3). Due to these being emergent findings from research that was not aimed at measuring spiritual development, the developmental theories involved do not include recognizably spiritual aspects until the higher stages of development. The theories have yet to adapt their understandings of earlier stages to include this aspect of development that emerges strongly at later stages (Irwin, 2002).

These stage-based developmental theories are sometimes termed “neo-piagetian” because they are extensions of the work done by Piaget on cognitive development in children. Piaget (1950) found that children move through specific stages in how they understand the world around them in the course of their development. The general process of development he described as a process of “decentralization,” a shifting from an egocentric perspective, in which the approach to reality is inseparable from the perspective of the individual, to a more objective perspective.
While Piaget's work ended with the transition into a recognizably adult level of cognition, others have continued to research development into adulthood. Looking at a spectrum of this work, Irwin (2000) summarizes:

Whether we examine moral development or psychosocial development or midlife individuation, the descriptions of higher stages involve characteristics that we can agree are spiritual. It is as if development 'naturally' tends toward spiritual development. That is, spirituality is part of normal or optimal development, and not something unusual or even pathological. In fact, because these stages typically occur in the latter years of life, coming after the earlier stages, spirituality may be considered a higher or more evolved aspect of normal development. We may regard developmental psychology as an emerging psychology, revealing something about spirituality from a new perspective (p. 290)

Even though the higher stages of developmental theories are recognizably spiritual, there is no need to follow Wilber (2000) in treating spirituality according to various definitions as either consisting of these levels or as separate from them. Just as we do not think of cognition as consisting of various stages, nor of developing irrespective of stages, but rather as being expressed within or through the framework of a given stage. At this point in developmental theory, we may not have a term that applies to the same element across all of the stages. For example, Irwin (2002) uses the term “awareness” in the earliest stages, and in later stages the term “consciousness.” For the definition of “consciousness” does not apply in the earliest stages of development (p. 6). We must also bear in mind that developmental stages represent not so much growth, as transformation. This is in fact the distinction between development within a stage, and development to a further stage. The passive state of awareness may grow indefinitely and never attain the active properties of consciousness. If consciousness develops from awareness, then that development is a transformation from one type into another.

This transformational aspect may apply to spirituality. It may be that what is readily recognizable as spirituality in later stages, is not recognizable or definable as spirituality in earlier stages. However, in the range of stages we will be considering, we will be treating spirituality in much the same way as cognition, as something that is expressed within or through a stage, not dependent on it.

Spiritual and Ego Development

Stages can are generally considered in three major categories: preconventional, the stages identified in child development by Piaget; conventional, stages that represent psychosocial development within the range of normal adult function; and postconventional, that describe further development in awareness of the systems involved in the construction of meaning and their innate limitations. Hewlett (2002) includes a further category of transcendent stages. “In this final tier, the separate ego is simply the vehicle through which this deeper reality flows” (p. 34-35).

While there are some differences in the theories of ego development, these can largely be accounted for by differences in the focuses of the theories. For example: Loevinger (1976) and Cook-Greutner (1994, 1999, 2004) worked from measures of meaning-making such as self-understanding; Kegan (1994) focused more on unconscious epistemologies; and Washburn (2003) considered intrapsychic relations and structure as well as relations to body and world. These developmental theories, and the less-encompassing theories of reflective judgment development (King & Kitchner, 1994), moral development (Kohlberg, in King & Kitchner, 1994; & in Irwin, 2002), and faith development (Fowler, 1981), all follow the same structure of “an invariant, hierarchical sequence of distinct views of reality and subject-object integrations which comprise operative, cognitive, and emotional aspects of living” (Cook-Greuter, 1994, p. 121). These stages are not merely progressive, subsequent stages include and increase the perspectives of prior stages.

Growth is not only associated with transitioning to a higher stage. As Cook-Greuter has pointed out, most growth seems to occur within a given stage, “The current ways of viewing reality is refined, enriched, and modified” (p. 120). We can distinguish between growth as change within the framework of a stage, and as transformation in a transition from the current framework to a higher-stage framework.

----
Cook-Greuter, S. (1994). Rare forms of self-understanding in mature adults. In M. Miller & S. Cook-Greuter (Eds.), Transcendence and mature thought in adulthood: Further reaches of adult development. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
Cook-Greuter, S. R. (1999) Postautonomous ego development: A study of its nature and measurement. Ed.D. dissertation, Harvard University, United States -- Massachusetts.
Cook-Greuter, S. (2004). Making the case for a developmental perspective. Industrial and Commercial Training, 36(6/7), 275-281.
Fowler, J. (1981). Stages of faith: The psychology of human development and the quest for meaning. New York: Harper Collins.
Hewlett, D. C. (2004). A qualitative study of postautonomous ego development: The bridge between postconventional and transcendent ways of being. Ph.D. dissertation, Fielding Graduate Institute, United States -- California.
Irwin, R. (2000). Meditation and the evolution of consciousness in M. Miller & A. West (Eds.), Spirituality, ethics, and relationships in adulthood: Clinical and theoretical explorations. Madison, CT: Psychosocial Press.
Irwin, R. (2002). Human development and the spiritual life: How consciousness grows toward transformation. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers.
Kegan, R. (1994). In over our heads: The mental demands of modern life. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
King, P. & Kitchner, K. (1994). Developing reflective judgment: Understanding and promoting intellectual growth and critical thinking in adolescents and adults. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Loevinger, J. (1976). Ego development: Conceptions and theories. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Piaget, J. (1950). The psychology of intelligence. New York: Routledge.
Washburn, M. (2003). Embodied spirituality in a sacred world. Albany: SUNY Press.
Wilber, K. (2000). Integral psychology: Consciousness, spirit, psychology, therapy. Boston: Shambhala.

Pilgrimage to Heresy: A Novel of Gnostic Discovery

2008-05-27T10:25:00.003-06:00

Priscillian of Avila was the first Gnostic martyr, he was executed for heresy by the church. Ironically, he may also be at the end of one of the most famous pilgrimages in Europe since the middle ages.

A number of years ago, Lance Owens, medical doctor, historical scholar, and Gnostic priest, went on a pilgrimage in Spain--walking the Caminio de Santiago, the way of St. James. It was a journey filled with wonder and wonderful companions, from which he brought back enthralling stories. During the journey he spoke with a fellow pilgrim about Priscillian, planting the seed of an idea that has now grown into the novel Pilgrimage to Heresy.

More information is at http://pilgrimagetoheresy.com

Also see the new article on Amapedia

Cycles of Illness

2008-05-23T19:28:00.003-06:00

I had intended on getting more work done, both physically and also academically, but illness has returned in cycles. Some weeks I sleep a majority of the day and have almost no energy. Other weeks I feel better than that, but still like I have a constant cold. On rare occasions I feel almost well, and realize just how ill I have been.

It makes work quite difficult. Physical work is out of the question most of the time. Thinking can feel like pushing thoughts through a matrix of jello. What I have been researching and learning are some very interesting things that I would like to write about more, but it will continue to be slow going.

The Gospel According to Jesus: Part 1

2008-05-23T04:44:00.002-06:00

ἀπὸ τότε ἤρξατο ὁ Ἰησοῦς κηρύσσειν καὶ λέγειν μετανοεῖτε ἤγγικεν γὰρ ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν

From that time began Jesus to proclaim and say, “transform your mind, for near is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 4:17)

The good news of the present (or near) kingdom (or reign) of heaven (or God) as the reason to transform (or convert/reform) one's mind, was the primary message of Christ as reported in the NT. This is the gospel according to Jesus, the central message of his ministry, as opposed to the gospel subsequently proclaimed about Jesus.

Almost all scholars equate the “kingdom of God” and the “kingdom of heaven.” Usage varies by evangelist not by context. Matthew uses "heaven," for example.

This “kingdom” is proclaimed in contrast to the Roman Imperium and its client rulers, and by extension can be seen in contrast to human rule in general. People usually orient themselves to the current human worldly system, the way things are done, how to "get ahead" or at least to "get on" in the world. It's "the way things are," "how things are done," or even the system one might work to change from within.

The use of "heaven" in this context is in contrast to the system of Roman Imperium an ordering or system beyond the world rather than one of the world. Ouranos, "heaven" primarily means, "the heavens," as in the dome or vault of the sky. Though it can also mean the sky-abode of the gods/God. This points to the transcendent nature of this alternative kingdom, its un- or other-wordliness.

Proclaiming the current kingdom of God is a call to change not only pragmatic allegiance, but as the call to transform one's mind (metanoia) points to, a fundamental change in orientation. It is a call to comport oneself to the presence of a relationship to God and what that means in regards to one another, to live as one who is truly and wholly a citizen of that kingdom, rather than to live in a kingdom of human rulers. Such a change is a transformation, and can be considered to be a state of being, or a result of inner psycho-spiritual development.

Beyond the proclamation of this "good news," Jesus' teachings about the kingdom have the quality of the unexpected, the unworldly (non-pragmatic), and the seemingly contradictory (like a Zen koan). In this “kingdom” the seemingly fundamental acts of asserting one's rights, maintaining one's place in society, and stratagems to remain safe from misfortune are alien—the kingdom of heaven does not work that way.

The kingdom of heaven runs counter to much of accepted human psychology. There have been many variations on experiments of our concept of fairness. In one variation of these experiments, two strangers are offered one opportunity to split a sum of money. One proposes the ratio of the split, and the other only has the choice to accept what is proposed or reject it, in which case neither gets any of the money. In a strictly rational approach to this situation, the second participant should accept any split as it represents gaining money. However, if the split is significantly unfavorable to the second participant, it is rejected as unfair, resulting in loss to both. What this shows is the assumed right to half of the money (though slightly less will be accepted), leading to a feeling of loss or being cheated even when it is a net gain.

This response may seem natural in the kingdom of man, but it keeps one from entering the kingdom of heaven. Part of the metanoia is seeing through these illusionary losses to the real gain, and not just the gain for ourself, but for the other as well.

Questions: Finding a Path

2008-05-23T04:03:00.005-06:00

"How do you find a religion that's right for you? One you're happy in? Every path I've gone to, I've come away from because it hasn't fulfilled me spiritually in the end. I've been on this spiritual search of mine for ages now, and it's just not going anywhere. I can't find one I 'agree' with about 75%, much less one I totally agree with."

I would say that part of the problem is your theory/understanding of religion. This is by no means a personal criticism, as how you phrase the question shows the standard theory of religion in the modern West. And, it is the theory presented in Religious studies courses. Yet, this very model sets one up for the lack of spiritual fulfillment you have found.

I've actually put together an entire course to help people consciously approach religion, due to the length I can only share some key points.

You can "hear" religious teachings as different voices: instructions to do certain things, instructions to don't do certain things, or instructions to transform, a fundamental act of becoming. The latter is what is often hardest to see. Sometimes is is easier to see it in a distant religious tradition. For example, many in the West can see this only when they look to the East, or modern peoples when they look at premodern or indigenous traditions. Yet it is a part of all major traditions. And it is the way in which there is a spiritual path within religious traditions.

The main thing to find in a spiritual path is a means of spiritual growth and personal transformation. It needs to include spiritual exercises, things that engage oneself in something other than default habitual existence. It needs to challenge you and engage you in an expansive way, not just take up your spare time with studying what other people have said about this or that. If the mythos, scriptures, stories, or symbols don't meet with some inner resonance or "make sense" in a deep way, it is probably not the right path for the long run. (It would require a great deal of preparation, and may end up being understood in terms of one's own cultural religion anyway. This is why the Dalai Lama says to follow your culture's religion).

If you find a path that has a practice, that engages you internally/spiritually, and challenges you to grow, then you need to spend time and work discerning if indeed this path and this particular instance of this path are for you. Most often people will misapply criticisms from their cradle creed, and this occurs long after any other aspect of that religious tradition has been left behind or rejected. So, try to be aware of such issues. If your earliest religion rejected this or that, you will probably reject any path you come across for the same reasons. It doesn't matter what they are: high church, low church, bible version, starting a circle in the West, crosses, crucifixes, Statues, pews, cushions, indoor, outdoors, paid clergy, any clergy, kneeling, silence, preaching, prayer books--you name it. I have seen people try to remake an entire religious tradition to avoid internalized cradle creed criticisms. So, this is a serious issue. If it something that you don't want to take on, then include them in your conscious criteria as comfort issues.

A genuine spiritual path will offer support, comfort, and some guidance, but won't pretend they can do it for you. The metaphor that I find fits the situation best is climbing a mountain. You have to do the climb, but you don't have to do it alone without training, equipment, or guides. Ultimately, you must rely on yourself in that way, but you don't have to go it alone.

Progress on a spiritual path requires commitment and hard work. Often people will feel a certain expansiveness or have a period of spiritual experiences when starting a path, then may leave when they hit the first dry spell. Such cycles are normal, and if you have made progress on a path, continuing makes sense.

The journey is the point, if you feel comfortable, complacent, safe, then it is time to change something in your practice or approach, which doesn't necessarily mean changing paths, but it may. Some religious organizations take people through a particular transformation experience into a state of complacency, which ultimately is not useful.

"It's not about how I view religion; I just don't want to go to a religion which I don't agree with the majority of, or one where I disagree with some parts, which in turn are extremely important. An example of this is not believing in . . . .

"If I can't agree with the main points, how can I feel spiritually fulfilled? I am fulfilled when there is harmony, and the paths I have taken in my time I have not agreed with certain key areas, so I've gone away from that path."

I will still suggest that what you mean by "religion" is a very limited modern Western view of religion. You stress certain beliefs for example. In my tradition, and some others, rigidly held beliefs are a hindrance. You can then say that these aren't "religion" because they don't fit the standard modern Western model, or you can begin to expand your understanding of religion to include them. (This is an example of accommodation, making the model fit the data, as opposed to assimilation, making the data fit the model.)

Other than what William James once called the "healthy minded" personality, I honestly can't think of any serious suggestion that having particular beliefs will lead to spiritual fulfillment, and I have read widely in the subject. Or, framed another way, if it were merely a matter of comfortable or compatible beliefs, then your own beliefs right now should serve as well as any other set. I'm not trying to be glib, just trying to help you see beyond the model of religion that has been given to you, which is a very difficult thing. Many people are much more willing to literally destroy the world than attempt such a task themselves.

You have stated certain criteria of things you want to avoid, yet rejection is really a shaky way to build a religious identity, let alone engage in a spiritual path. Forget the theology, the beliefs and practices, and other aspect of the model of religion, at least for a time. What myths or symbols have resonance for you? What spiritual practice do you find rewarding? If you don't know then explore some. Attend a few services, particularly if they are group spiritual practices rather than lectures, and see what happens inside of you. Try not to think about it all so much at first.

The spiritual life is first of all a life, an experienced livingness. The abstract takes us away from the experience. Once you find one point of connection of that inner life with an outer form, once you have found others like yourself, the rest will take care of itself. For a spiritual path is first and foremost a path of lived spirit, the path you feel more spiritually alive in following. The rest is there to be of service, or to weigh you down or hinder you. Set you feet on the path of life and the rest will follow.

Blessings on your journey.

Harvesting instances of Gnosis

2008-05-07T06:07:00.005-06:00

I have been collecting instances of Gnosis, the word itself rather than what it refers to. Have you ever wondered how many times the Greek word "Gnosis" appears (with some context, and not in duplicate texts) in the Coptic Gnostic texts found at Nag Hammadi? 134 times. And that is with clear evidence showing that it was a word that was translated into Coptic. In duplicate texts it is found translated in one version and not in another.

What is much more interesting than a mere quantity is examining the usage in the surviving contexts. To which has been added instances in other texts such as the Pistis Sophia, the Bruce Codex, and so on. With the Greek Hermetica thrown in. Well over two hundred instances all together. Yes, it is a task only a scholar would do, and probably only a Graduate Student. Yet it should make for an interesting part of my monograph on Gnosis. And I can't be accused of not being exhaustive, or exhausted.

Slacker Priest

2008-04-08T23:54:00.002-06:00

I feel like a slacker. This past Sunday I was not out-of-town, not contagious, well enough to stand up through the service, and didn't hold a public Eucharist service. Not only that, I won't be holding one for a couple of months.

To put this into context, I've served the SLC parish in increasing capacities since 1995. Serving at most services before moving to California in 1998. Even while living in California, I flew back to serve at high holy days, such as Epiphany and Holy Week. Upon returning to the area in 2001, I celebrated vespers and Sophia services, occasionally filling in for the parish priest by holding other services on Sundays. After ordination to the priesthood in 2002, I frequently served as celebrant. Since being designated as pastor in early 2006, I've offered services every Sunday that I've been physically able, with additional services offered throughout the year. I even held Sunday services while I was remodeling another part of the house to provide dedicated space for a chapel.

None of this is easy. It is work, but it is good and often fulfilling work. In spite of what some assume, I don't any make money doing this, despite help from donations it still costs money. Such costs do not include time and effort, nor the health consequences of living in poverty. Additionally, spiritual service requires a great deal of time and effort to be spent on inner work and development, with an unwavering commitment to continual self-transformation. If one wants to take a selfish point of view, I do this because the services, particularly the mystery of the Eucharist, are the core of my own spiritual practice and are of invaluable benefit to me personally, it is also my vocation, a realization of my own authenticity. It is certainly not without its benefits, they just aren't monetary or material.

There are different reasons for taking a break. One of the reasons is the difficulty in trying to get work done on the chapel, the stairs, and a separate chapel entrance, while having them ready each Sunday for services. For example, oil based paint takes days to dry and needs to be allowed to air out. Also, my recent illness has caused me to fall behind on other work, most notably school-related work. Not spending a good deal of Saturdays and most of Sundays involved with preparations and services will actually help.

However, aside from practical concerns I need some time to re-evaluate and regroup. Things looked very grim last December as far as mortality is concerned. Not only have I largely recovered, but what little that was determined by tests is that an unrelated condition isn't life-threatening either. So, not only have my horizons broadened beyond the next few months, but also beyond the next few years. When you do not seem likely to die in short order, sustainability becomes much more important.

In regards to ministry, after thirteen years it is safe to say that there is little interest locally in participation in the group spiritual practice of the Mysteries. While I certainly won't be giving such a valuable practice up due to external factors, it does mean re-considering how much effort to put into publicly providing these locally. Having a separate entrance and a remodeled stairway for the current basement chapel space is the most effort it makes sense to put into this aspect. Unless things change radically, building a chapel on the land that is available will not happen.

In academics, my own graduate studies have turned out to be much more rewarding and in tune with the Gnostic tradition than I ever imagined. There is so much to be excited about as a scholar, practitioner, and educator. The excitement of research runs the spectrum of my many interests of which I'll list what comes to mind: consciousness, spirituality, knowing, Gnosis, Gnostic practice and origins, Gnostic studies, psycho-spiritual development, mysticism, wisdom, transformational practices, spiritual exercises/practices, interrelations between philosophy and Gnosticism, philosophical origins and practices, Christian origins, ego development and transcendence, education and theories of knowledge, meta-cognitive systems and knowledge, nature of the ego and its transformations, comparative participatory studies of advanced spiritual practice, and on and on. For example, my research so far in psycho-spiritual development has already been invaluable for my own development, and I have a passion for sharing this insight, and many related research questions. Currently, I'm tackling a monograph on Gnosis in ancient and modern contexts, and developing a new theory of ego transformation, with a wide range of somewhat less intense research involved in developing programs and course curricula. Again, hard work, yet both good and fulfilling work.

The research relates back to providing liturgical services since such practices are integral to personal growth and transformation. Yet, even as I have accumulated research on the many benefits of spiritual practice, most of the seats in the chapel have remained empty. It may be possible to more effectively communicate the many benefits, and there is some hope of overcoming the prejudice against the Western forms of spiritual practice. Yet, the fundamental issue remains, spiritual practice is work: it takes time, patience, growth, commitment, engagement, etc. If people really were flocking to Eastern forms of practice locally, in a serious and committed way, then education on Western forms might work. But the problem seems more fundamental than that of form.

Another area of consideration that has grown more pressing with the lengthening of potential life-span, is the issue of making a living. Sure, I'd love to be able to not charge for my work: to offer courses, writing, counseling, and religious services without ever needing to even re-coup my own costs—but there is no trust fund nor expense account with my name on them. People are somehow able to assume that because you are dedicated to spiritual service that you don't need food and shelter, let alone access to scholarly books and articles, or the means of service such as indoor space, communications technology, and organizational structures. Yet it is very simple, in order to serve, you need the resources with which to serve—this includes your own life and health. As recent illness has demonstrated yet again, without one's own well-being, the rest isn't possible.

In this world we must work within limitations: limited time, effort, and lifespan in the best of circumstances, the factors that limit those better circumstances, and also limited resources in the sense of resources not existing (unless brought into being), or of limited access and ability. If it is a matter of access, the limitation can generally be summed up as money. In the case of ability, there are individual limitations such as skill, education, cognitive ability, integrated experience, and level of development; as well as, social limitations such as what can be shared with others, what can be collaborated on in a community co-practitioners, and issues of simply being allowed to work without outside hindrance.

So, a brief hiatus with few if any answers and many many questions to ponder. I don't know how much time I'll have to share the process here. The more long-term and serious work I engage in, the less time I have for things that may be useful for me to share and useful to the few who are interested, yet don't aid in sustainability. I'll keep working but more of it will be longer-term and not freely available. Yet, I'll keep posting when I can.

Questions Make Heretics ...Yet Again

2008-04-01T10:05:00.004-06:00

It was true when (pseudo)Tertulian wrote it, and is still true today, questions make heretics. If you want to look at the real differences beyond issues of identity and doctrine between those considered "heretics" and those considered "orthodox" in any social grouping, not just religion, see who is asking the pertinent fundamental questions and who is trying to shut them up. And, yes, there are both stupid questions and pointless questions, in addition to many varieties of verbalizations in question form that are not really questions.

It is not formulating statements with question marks, but a fundamental and general attitude of inquiry unsatisfied with dismissive answers that is always the real heresy. Answers are much more comfortable, even "wrong" answers, there are no surprises, no open possibilities. To say that people in general, and the powers-that-be in particular, don't like questions is a truly subterranean understatement.

Even most people who identify with ancient movements declared heretical, such as Gnosticism, don't care for questions beyond the "how can I join your group?" or, "where can I buy your book?" variety. Sadly, common questions in academia such as, "how did you come to that conclusion?" and, "why don't you consider this alternative conclusion?" are somehow greeted as personal attacks by many people, and result in long-held animosities.

With this fear of questions, is it any wonder that those trying to dismiss the questioners do so by creating answers for them? What better way to avoid the questions, than by disputing a straw-man created from made up answers? This is species of the fallacy I've called assuming the argument (see this article), which is attributing an entire argument to someone without basis for doing so. For example, someone asks a question such as, “how did you come to that conclusion?” Rather than taking it at face value and answering the question, the respondent assumes that an argument is being made against the conclusion and attacks the imaginary argument. This type of interaction has become so common that answering questions directly or asking clarifying questions to see if an argument is intended, are now the exception.

What brought on this meditation is the forced resignation of Bible teacher Kent Dobson. Dobson was fired for hosting a documentary where his role was to literally pose questions in interviews with experts. He didn't state any conclusions himself. This doesn't seem to be because he was restraining himself, keeping his mouth shut to protect his job, but that the questions interested him because he didn't have answers and wasn't satisfied with dismissive ones either. There don't seem to be any “heretical” beliefs lurking beneath the surface, nor any reason to assume that there are. Yet, questions make heretics in the eyes of the school board, and Dobson is out of a job. I wish him well as a fellow questioner.

Teacher Ousted for Hosting Documentary

Socially Engaged Spirituality

2008-03-31T21:05:00.006-06:00

I've been intending on writing about this for months now. When I returned to graduate school it was primarily to pursue my research interests in psycho-spiritual development. However, I found myself quite drawn to the certificate program in Socially Engaged Spirituality despite reservations about relevancy, time, and additional cost. Long story short, I followed my intuition and applied for the program. Since starting, I've gained a great deal of insight into spirituality and spiritual practice by approaching from this outer form of mysticism, directly connecting inner and outer transformation.

The program director is Donald Rothberg, who has recently written The Engaged Spiritual Life exploring engaged spirituality from a Buddhist perspective. You can also listen to a radio interview with Donald Rothberg on KPFA's Living Room. Interview begins about twenty minutes into the program.

In my coursework so far, I have not only made connections and gained insight into Gnostic practice, but in the process have developed a theory on psycho-spiritual transformation. So, the program has directly benefited what I had thought was an unrelated research interest. Score another one for intuition. And, yes, Engaged Gnosticism will have its place in the Gnostic Studies program at the Gnosis Institute.

Following the Path of Gnosis: The Spiritual Exercise of Attention

2008-03-26T04:48:00.008-06:00

Gnosticism can be seen as flowing from the joining of three major streams of Western practice and thought: the philosophical traditions, particularly the practices of Platonism; the mystery traditions (aka “schools” or “cults”) of mythic and symbolic experiential religious transformative practices; and, the “apocalyptic” (in the sense of visionary) traditions, principally those within Judaism. Because of our modern understanding and modern practice of philosophy, we often view ancient philosophy through a modern lens, seeing it as an abstract, theoretical, or system-bound way of thinking. However, in the ancient world philosophy was primarily a way of life, a practice of self-transformation.

The philosophical act is not situated merely on the cognitive level, but on that of the self and of being. It is a progress which causes us to be more fully, and makes us better. It is a conversion which turns our entire life upside down, changing the life of the person who goes through it. It raises the individual from an inauthentic condition of life, darkened by unconsciousness and harassed by worry, to an authentic state of life, in which he attains self-consciousness, and exact vision of the world, inner peace, and freedom. (Hadot, 1995, p. 83)

The means of achieving these goals of living out a philosophy were spiritual exercises. When there is mention of “spiritual exercises,” there is a strong association with the work by Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus (aka Jesuits). However, Ignatius is not the originator of the concept, but a later exemplar of a long tradition that predates Christianity.

Spiritual exercises are essentially intentional techniques for growth and transformation that include: modifying consciousness, training the mind, preparing/preempting reactions to experiences, developing mental and emotional capabilities, focusing attention, etc. Pierre Hadot (1995) has traced the use of spiritual exercises in the philosophical practices of antiquity at least as far back as Plato. And, similar types of practices are a hallmark of religious and spiritual practice.

Attention (prosoche) is named in both of Philo of Alexandria's lists of spiritual exercises. This is the focus on the present moment, a vigilance and readiness to act and react to what is present. This is a practical emancipation of ourselves from being caught up in past or future, or any other dissociated state, through applied attention. The present is the only situation in which we have the freedom to act, in considerations of the past and future we can only be reactive. We are more familiar with this exercise from the Buddhist tradition where it is called “mindfulness.”

As a meditation teacher instructed a group I was in, “We often say that it is very easy to be mindful. The difficulty is remembering to be mindful.” This points us to the core of the exercise: it is not simply having the capacity for attention or mindfulness, but applying attention that is the spiritual exercise and that application is were the difficulty lay and where some discipline is required. The description of this as an “exercise” is apt, for just like a physical exercise, one has to actually perform it to gain any benefit. Knowing how to exercise, being capable of exercise, and knowing that exercise is beneficial, isn't enough—it must be performed regularly. This failure to exercise is a particular danger in the case of spiritual exercises, as we may have a tendency to dismiss them as merely “mental” exercises. And in a sense think that thinking about them is somehow equivalent to doing them.

Attention is also like a physical exercise in that it is more difficult when beginning, and that one encounters resistance and may discontinue after trying it a few times when immediate dramatic results do not manifest. A number of strategies will help with this. One is making a commitment to a mindfulness meditation class or group. These can be found almost everywhere. An experienced and knowledgeable instructor can greatly aid in getting started and save you time in developing skill as you progress. However, the benefits of committing to a class or group can almost be replicated on your own by having a specific place, a specific time, and a conducive environment to work through the issues in beginning the practice of attention. The “technique” is simple yet there are a lot of skills that can help. The usual method of beginning is to focus your attention on your breathing for a set amount of time. There are many variations possible, such as different targets of the focus of your attention, the main thing is to find a focus that works for you. When you catch yourself having drifted in your focus, re-focus and continue. Over time you become capable of maintaining focus for longer, and catching your mind wandering more quickly. When you have performed this basic focusing exercise for long enough, you can begin the actual exercise of maintaining attention in more circumstances and for longer in your life.

The most frequent excuse or complaint concerning any exercise is that you don't have enough time. However, as you practice mindfulness you will realize that it is the only time when you are really living. So, it isn't that you don't have time in your life, but this is when you actually get to live your life. The indirect benefits also vastly outweigh the cost in time spent, as research shows that even a little mindfulness exercise improves focus and performance (University of Pennsylvania, 2007). Furthermore, as you progress you can exercise in more situations. Being mindful while washing dishes, for example, makes washing dishes a spiritual exercise. It is something of great value that can be added to many situations. Such as, enjoying the time spent waiting, instead of feeling frustration. Or, being able to give our full attention to someone as the precious gift that it is.

This exercise of attention is exercising and developing consciousness of awareness itself. And, every situation we can exercise attention in, it another situation where we are now free not only to act, but to be. This is not only a basic skill and a place to start on the path of Gnosis, it is a very powerful tool in its own right, for it is the ability to focus, to shine, the light within. As the Gospel of Thomas says, "within the person of light there is light. If it shines, the world is illumined. If it does not shine, there is darkness."

Hadot, P. (1995). Philosophy as a way of life: Spiritual exercises from Socrates to Foucault. Cambridge: Blackwell.

University of Pennsylvania (2007, June 26). Meditate to concentrate. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 24, 2008, from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070625193240.htm

Spirituality: Flat or Multi-level?

2008-03-06T23:12:00.007-07:00

Two basic views of spirituality are developed as the fundamental framework for understanding individual spiritual experience in William James' classic the Varieties of Religious Experience. “The result is two different conceptions of the universe of our experience.” (James, 1902/1982, p. 166) James terms this difference as the difference between the “once-born” individual and the “twice-born” individual.

In the religion of the once-born the world is a sort of rectilinear or one-storied affair, whose accounts are kept in one denomination, whose parts have just the values which naturally they appear to have, and of which a simple algebraic sum of pluses and minuses will give the total worth. Happiness and religious peace consist in living on the plus side of the account. (p. 166)

The “once-born” understanding is a horizontal or “flat” understanding of spirituality. “Flat” meaning that in this view, spirituality is something understood within a single framework of meaning. For example, if one text or teacher says the opposite of another text or teacher, then by necessity there is a contradiction. As a single framework for meaning, literalism is an example of a flat understanding of spirituality, however, a flat understanding need not be literal. A flat understanding can be nuanced or complex, but that nuance or complexity is external and general. The framework doesn't change, from person to person, or as one learns or increases in understanding—everything makes sense within it, or makes no sense at all.

In contrast, in the “twice-born” understanding there is more than one framework. This does not mean that all the frameworks are understood, for that would be a flat understanding, though perhaps categorized or compartmentalized. Rather there is an awareness of at least one more framework, even if it is largely unknown.

In the religion of the twice-born, on the other hand, the world is a double-storied mystery. Peace cannot be reached by the simple addition of pluses and elimination of minuses from life. ... There are two lives, the natural and the spiritual, and we must lose the one before we can participate in the other. (p. 166)

From the “flat” understanding of the “once-born” that James uses to describe this to his audience, the multi-level view of the “twice-born” is the illness of a “sick soul” that requires an individual process of growth or transformation. Yet even after this process these individuals have “drunk too deeply of the cup of bitterness ever to forget its taste, and their redemption is into a universe two stories deep.” (p. 187) This is an example of the incommensurability of these two frameworks for understanding spirituality.

James, W. (1902/1982). The varieties of religious experience: a study in human nature. New York: Penguin.

Questions: Practices for Gnosis

2008-02-23T21:49:00.003-07:00

...since (some forms) Buddhism uses vipassana and shamatha to attain enlightenment and liberation (also Nirvana) Gnosticism uses (insert method here) to attain enlightenment and liberation (also called Gnosis). ...does the EG teach a specific method to allow the user to obtain enlightenment, or in this case, Gnosis?

It is a mistake to simply equate Gnosis with enlightenment. Gnosis is the method/means of liberation, not the liberated state. The state of redemption or liberation would be more equivalent to the enlightened state. The one who is liberated has Gnosis, it being the means of liberation, and the texts use it in that way as well, but it is not the only way that the term is used.

In short, Gnosis is not in itself a state of being (though you can use it to indirectly refer to that), it is a way to refer to a fundamental spiritual growth/transformation/liberation process.

The methods for progressing in Gnosis that are referred to in ancient scriptures, and that we use today in the EG, are richly poetic and symbolic forms of personal transformational experiences that are either focused upon an individual or are generally participated in by a group. They produce changes in consciousness, and have both initiatory (pivotal) transformative effects, and also gradual transformative effects from regular participation (such as meditation has).

They involve participating in the sacred stories (myths) of the tradition and applying them directly to yourself through having a form to experience them in, so one can gain gnosis of them. In our practice, many aspects of these are revisited every year. There are also times in one's life when there is a more direct need/use of a deeper application/experience of some of them. And there are traditional methods for this as well.

One can also go through a long process of learning how to offer these methods in service to others, which involves participation at gradually higher levels of responsibility, while undergoing a further transformative process. They are not something you can try on your own without training and experience.

These methods are what we do as a church. They are richly symbolic liturgical services, that primarily consist of the mysteries/sacraments that are listed in the Gospel of Philip. The regular transformational method we use is the Holy Gnostic Eucharist. The methods we employ as a church are the mysteries/sacraments and other liturgical rituals.

I know Christian churches generally use striped-down versions of the sacraments and largely understand them in a theological manner that is quite different from their origin as mystery practices in the ancient world. But that is not our approach. We take care to follow the traditional forms and traditional requirements for conveying the mysteries. And, in my own experience and experiences of others reported to me—these forms serve that purpose. And that is the purpose and function of the EG as a church. It isn't that we hold services and then do the real transformational work later on, the services are real transformational methods—our services are public group spiritual practice.

Individual spiritual practice is also encouraged. Contemplation, prayer, meditation, active imagination, and dream work, are among practices commonly used by individuals in our tradition. Education in the tradition and related topics is also a part of our ministry through the Gnostic Society. All of these activities fit under the ancient understanding of spiritual exercises and aid our personal development, as well as preparation and integration of the mysteries. Yet, the spiritual practices that are more oriented towards attaining Gnosis are the mysteries instituted by Christ.

The 2008 Gnostic Calendar is Available!

2007-12-14T22:32:00.000-07:00

The 2008 Gnostic Calendar features a focus on the Hermetic tradition, all new quotes from almost all of the people listed, and more holidays and days of interest than previous years. The price hasn't increased from last year at $22.

Gnostic prints from this and previous years are also available as a fund raising effort.

Continuing illness has delayed the Gnostic Calendar this year. The illness is, unfortunately, serious and it is possible that this will be the last year the Gnostic Calendar will be produced. Your purchases will aid with medical expenses, and are greatly appreciated.

Order at http://gnosis.org/calendar

Also, please spread the word about the Gnostic Calendar on your website, blog, email list, etc.

Questions: Gnostic, Christian, and Difference

2007-12-14T22:24:00.002-07:00

"When I first saw the term Gnostic I thought it was something similar to atheism or agnosticism."

In Greek agnostic is "gnostic" with the privative alpha, which just means that the beginning "a-" is the equivalent of the English "un-" So it means someone without gnosis, or in English without gnosis of God.

Despite their being opposite terms literally, they are similar in reality. One has to be an agnostic before they can become a Gnostic. And, in as much as one has limited gnosis, a Gnostic remains agnostic where they don't have gnosis.

"Are Gnotics Christians? That seems to be the case?"

There are both Christian and non-Christian Gnostic traditions. And remember, this was at the very beginnings of Christianity, so much of what one thinks of as "Christian" in a modern context doesn't apply.

Gnostic traditions follow a similar form whether or not the central teacher/initiator/mystagogue is Christ, or John the baptist, or Seth, or Hermes trismegistus. So, it is somewhat akin to "mysticism" in that the form of mysticism can be Christian, or Muslim, or Jewish, etc. Gershom Scholem pointed out that mystics have more in common with mystics of other traditions than they do with other followers of their own tradition. This is even more true of the various Gnostic groups/sects/traditions.

The majority of Coptic Gnostic texts that have been recovered are Christian. There was also a Jewish Gnostic sect called the Sethians, which appear to have accepted Christ as equivalent (or even identical) to Seth. In later Manichaean tradition, the prophet Mani became revered as a teacher/initiator in his role as apostle of Christ.

The majority of Gnostics today are Christian Gnostics, people who approach Gnosis primarily through the Christian mythos and forms of worship. (Or, they are Gnostic Christians, who take more of a Gnostic approach to Christianity.)

"What is the single greatest difference between it and Christianity, if so?"

The difference between ancient Gnostic and proto-orthodox movements wasn't doctrinal, it was on the most basic and fundamental level, a radical difference in the very understanding of the teachings of Christ, and the practice of Christianity. There are fundamental or paradigmatic differences. One is in the nature of certainty, and the other lies in the relation of the individual to the religion.

There is an orthodox paradigm (or strategy) for religion and also a gnostic paradigm (or strategy) for religion. Both terms refer to their general meanings in Greek and not to specific religious traditions.

In the orthodox strategy, truth is sought in authoritative statements which is literally "ortho-doxia" in Greek. In general, it establishes a collection of such statements from teachers or sources that are considered authoritative. An example being the collection we call the Bible. Over time when contradictory teachings arise or contact with distant groups occurs, these are refined and debated, and the trusted body of statements is expanded or contracted.

This is not to say that this is the whole of such religions or that it limits the religious and spiritual experiences or practices of its followers. It is the collective strategy for establishing truth. It is their quest for certainty.

The results of such a strategy are the necessity to determine what is and isn't orthodox. What isn't is heresy and is dangerous in this view because it has been shown to be wrong. When the stakes are made great with eternal salvation or damnation, not to mention the historically important socio-political aspects, then "protecting" people from heresy can get very ugly.

The alternative strategy seeks certainty not in authoritative statements, but within oneself. This is the strategy used by the Buddha, who instructed people not to take any statement on authority, but to test it to see if it was true. This is also the strategy used by the ancient Gnostics, since this type of knowledge, gnosis, is only found within oneself for oneself.

Having one's religious certainty founded upon inner realization has practical difficulties. One is that it isn't the default human way of going about things. So, these traditions have always had an outer preparatory aspect that functions more in terms of an orthodox approach in order to prepare people to undertake a gnostic approach. In early forms of Christian Gnosticism, this took place within the Christian church.

This can be a dangerous strategy in that the orthodox approach can overwhelm the gnostic one, and this is what seems to have happened in Christianity. After all, all it takes is people who gain positions of authority in this preparatory aspect who don't understand the further development within the tradition to derail the whole thing by saying that is all there is to it.

The other fundamental difference is in the relationship of the individual to the religious tradition. The Gnostic approach to religion is individually transformative rather than primarily collectively proscriptive and prescriptive.

In the orthodox paradigm the relationship of the individual to the religious tradition is complex, but is primarily through proscriptive statements, "don't ___", and through prescriptive statements, "do ___", that are authoritative in that they are commanded. These have external ramifications that are detrimental or beneficial, such as "sin" and "forgiveness of sin," for example. There is also an inner spiritual developmental and transformitive dimension, but this is not ones primary relationship to the religious tradition, unless you are a mystic.

In the gnostic paradigm the relationship of the individual to the religious tradition is more pragmatic: the tradition is an aid and guide to personal spiritual development and transformation. It is a path of gnosis, which is internal and is a knowledge that you are, that comes from spiritual development and transformation. Instead of reading a text that reports a spiritual experience as a source for authoritative information, a Gnostic reads such a text for personal transformation, to gain insight, or may explore it by creatively retelling it, or seek a similar spiritual experience.

Critical Approaches to Religion & Gnosticism

2007-12-01T19:54:00.000-07:00

Use the skills and tools to multi-dimensionally examine, contextualize understandings, and articulate findings, in the study of religion in general and the Gnostic tradition in particular. This course is required for most Gnosis Institute programs and is suggested for everyone interested in exploring religious traditions and the Gnostic tradition.

Course begins April 24th at the Gnosis Institute.

Course Description

Gnosis, Episteme, and Doxia, Oh My!

2007-11-28T21:14:00.001-07:00

One of the biggest misconceptions concerning Gnosticism is the oft repeated phrase: “Gnosis is the Greek word for knowledge.” This is then frequently followed by the claim that “Gnostics thought they were saved by possessing secret knowledge,” or some variation thereof. It is also a common mistake to view Gnosis as if it either were information, or could be summarized as information.

The reason these are false is that Classical Greek had more than one word for knowledge: there are essentially four words for different types of knowledge, and there are additional words having to do with the source or origin of the knowledge. As the title suggests, we will be considering three of them.

Doxia: Opinion or Statement, with the connotation of mere opinion. It is part of the word “orthodox”, with “ortho” meaning: straight. correct, or right. As in orthopedic ('leg straightener'), or orthodontist ('teeth straightener'). A less frequently used sense of doxia as 'praise' is preserved the the “Great Doxology.”

In English: Doxia corresponds to statements of either fact or opinion. For example: “green is a color” or “green is the best color.” Doxia is a type of knowledge that may or may not be the real case, that is, it may not correspond to what we can test by reason or measurement, or may include what cannot be tested.

Cognitively: this type of knowledge can be thought of as one type of memory. If someone asks you a question and you remember the answer, then that one example of doxia as knowledge. A piece of doxastic knowledge can be isolated, or unrelated to other knowledge. It can also co-exist with a contradictory piece of knowledge.

In Learning: Learning doxia is often referred to derogatorily as “regurgitation” in the sense that one memorizes (ingests) then demonstrates memorization (regurgitates). However, essentially all education begins by learning doxia, as the other types of knowledge occur within the individual.

In Argumentation: Staying at level of opinion or statements of “truth.” Or, considering everything to be a matter of opinion. Such as, “My opinion is as good as anyone else's.”

Episteme: Systematic or interrelated knowledge, or Understanding. Also, professional or practical skill. Episteme is a compound word in Greek, literally meaning: “to stand or erect upon.” It is constructed upon previous knowledge and can in turn be constructed upon itself, hence the systematic or interrelated nature. Classical philosophers referred to the understanding they gained from reasoning about it as episteme. For example, the Socratic Method is one that examines doxia through reasoning in dialog. Part of the word “epistemology”, with “logos” meaning speech, account, or reason.

In English: episteme corresponds to most of what is meant by the word “knowledge”. It is also the term that described professional skill, such as the practice of: science, law, and philosophy. It is the type of knowledge or understanding that would qualify someone as an expert witness in a court of law, for example. This knowledge may not already exist within the knower as doxia, but can be derived from the system of existing knowledge. Someone who is knowledgeable in the sense of episteme, can not only present a conclusion (which would be doxia), but can derive or explain the conclusion as well, that is, take someone through a process to gain episteme of their own.

Cognitively: episteme is much more complex and uses more than one type of memory. It involves agentic cognition (from “agent”), that is, the active use of and direction of thought. This thought utilizes skills in reasoning, already established system of related knowledge, and a general understanding of the situation or framework for meaning (a paradigm).

In Learning: This is the level where a student not only remembers the facts, but has developed an understanding. The knowledge has been internalized and can be considered in part, as a whole, and in relationship. It remains theoretical or abstract knowledge in many ways. The limitations of episteme can be seen in such contrasts as “knowing versus know-how,” and in “education versus experience.”

In Argumentation: Justifying statements and deriving conclusions using valid reasoning demonstrates some level of episteme. However, there is a difference between systematic knowledge and simply related knowledge. Merely giving a reason for a statement that is only another statement, whereas episteme is demonstrated in a way that someone could follow in constructing their own episteme. Often following such demonstrations requires a great deal of prior knowledge, skill, or even experience.

In the Republic, Plato uses the distinction between a doxastic cognition and an epistemic cognition as the justification for the statement that “philosophers should be rulers, or rulers philosophers.” The philosopher is better suited to rule because he uses epistemic cognition as the basis for judgment.

Gnosis: what enables recognition, an ingrained familiarity, experientially derived (as opposed to sensed), structural or irreducible “being” knowledge. The word gnosis is used to describe knowing someone, or knowing a landscape. It is a part of “diagnosis,” the process of recognizing an illness.

In English: there is no corresponding term. We can see echoes of it in notions like “hands-on experience,” but they fall short. Usually we are reduced to analogies, like the “difference between knowing the path and walking the path.” Or, “the map is not the territory.” Some aspects of an eye-witness refer to gnosis, such as recognizing a perpetrator. Yet, the circumstances may limit the process of gnosis, and this has been demonstrated to be susceptible to recognition of the suspect rather than the perpetrator. A better example in the use of gnosis is the practice of having a body identified by the next of kin.

Cognitively: Gnosis is outside of the range of agentic cognition. It is developed through an experiential process in the individual, but not directly through consciously directed thought. While derived from and related to experience, it is not simply sensory in nature. It isn't a memory of the senses, for example. This can be seen in the process of recognition. We are able to recognize people after dramatic changes, or written text that is fuzzy, scrambled, or misspelled.

In the general sense particular types of gnosis are related to particular regions of the brain. This can be seen in cases such as facial agnosia, where a brain lesion leaves someone unable to recognize faces. They still have the sensory data from looking at someone's face, but there is no recognition. It takes an epistemic process of deduction to determine who someone is. In general, gnosis is a type of meta-knowledge that is fundamental to who we are in the world.

In Argumentation: Difficulties in using gnosis in argumentation go back at least as far as Plato. Early dialogs that use dialectical reasoning to examine a matter of opinion or statements of definition (doxia), end without a firm resolution of whether what was examined was mere opinion or merely inadequately expressed. In later works Plato introduced the notion of Forms as a way to include aspects of gnosis.

When it appears in English, particularly when it is capitalized, Gnosis refers to a particular type of gnosis: the redemptive or liberating gnosis that was sought by the ancient Gnostics, and mentioned frequently in their scriptures. In these scriptures Gnosis is related to a particular mythological/symbolic framework. This reflects some kind of participatory view, an understanding that this framework was a vital (if not necessary) tool for attaining liberating gnosis. However, this framework does not exhibit the hallmarks of episteme, it isn't consistent, and has many variations—it just isn't systematic. What these stories reflect is efforts to express Gnosis in a way that might lead someone to their own gnosis to some limited extent.

We've all read gripping stories that made us feel like we were “there.” The Gnostic scriptures, as we have them, don't have the narrative qualities that might engage us as a modern reader. The New Testament, for example, is very terse. There are no rich descriptions of events, for example, just the bare bones. They are more in the line of “seeds” of a full narrative that a contemporary storyteller might give. We see this particularly in the Gospel of Thomas, where the longest story is only a few sentences. Yet, they are still stories, and the type of gnosis that they were seeking to lead one towards isn't gnosis of the scenes or of how the characters looked.

Gnosis is also developmental. One seeks it. One attains it. Yet, one already has it in some way, but it isn't manifest. In the Hymn of the Pearl there is the recognition of the truth of the letter (or call to awaken), because the letter was written in his heart.

Gnosis is also transformational. Descriptions of the transformation of the individual through attaining Gnosis in ancient texts include: rebirth, resurrection, redemption, liberation, and awakening.

Gnosis was not the goal of Gnostics, but rather the means. Gnosis was the path. As GRS Meade wrote:

They are now generally referred to in Church history as the Gnostics, those whose goal was the Gnosis,—if indeed that be the right meaning; for one of their earliest existing documents expressly declares that Gnosis is not the end—it is the beginning of the path, the end is God--and hence the Gnostics would be those who used the Gnosis as the means to set their feet upon the Way to God.

Mandeans and their Current Struggle

2007-10-28T00:03:00.000-06:00

A nice short film clip on YouTube that gives an introduction both to the Mandeans, and to their current situation.

The 2008 Gnostic Calendar

2007-10-20T21:26:00.001-06:00

There will be a 2008 Gnostic Calendar, it is just running behind schedule. They will be available for order early in November.

Fortunately, costs have not increased significantly, so they will be available for the same price as last year. Postage costs have increased so there will be some increase in shipping costs.

GnosCast: The Gnostic Podcast - Episode 6

2007-09-08T21:38:00.000-06:00

Episode 6: Illuminating the Da Vinci Code Seminar 3

Pulling Back the Veil: The Spiral Sacred Quest

Our Sacred Stories as Experiences, Guides, and Quests

This seminar explored what directions these particular stories lead us, and what lies beneath and beyond them.

Recorded: Sept. 26, 2006

Diagrams displayed on overhead projector during seminars

I've been catching up on recorded audio lately. This last of the Illuminating the Da Vinci Code Seminars has been waiting quite some time, but not quite a year. After a continuous reduction in computer time and time online, I've been able to get a laptop and wireless connection. Editing audio always takes longer than I think it will, and I've been recording and editing for over two years now.
I've been wanting to produce more of the main GnosCast podcasts, so look for more in the not to distant future.

I've also gotten a number of homilies finished for the GnosCast-Reflections podcasts. If you are looking for Gnostic content, they are a great resource. Averaging around 20 minutes, they are reflections on holidays, scriptures, and themes important for spiritual life. They are not planned out before hand, and I don't know what all I'm going to say. Delivered in the altered state of consciousness after participating in the Eucharist, I find it useful to listen to them myself.

Sebastian

2007-09-01T22:27:00.001-06:00

After returning from the Shakespearean festival, I ended up being adopted by a cat. He and I were somewhat acquainted when he lived with a young couple next door. He used to prefer our back yard, and make his way to and fro through a gap in the front yard.

Some weeks back I noticed him hanging around some of the time, long after the couple had moved. When I let him inside, he was quite skinny, showing his ribs through his coat. For some reason this reminded me of the poster-child for why you don't want to be a saint, saint Sebastian, who is always portrayed as a skinny archery target. Thinking of the cat-goddess Bast, cinched the deal.

Sebastian is not afraid to say whatever is on his mind, and is a friendly cat, wanting to meet everyone who visits.

Questions: becoming a Gnostic & Baptism

2007-09-01T21:55:00.001-06:00

Sometimes questions come in around the same time whose answers are interrelated.

I want to become a Gnostic officially in the Gnostic Church. How do I do this?

I have been thinking about baptism for the last three weeks. ... In thinking through this I had to ask myself what happened. The answer is that I am aware that my ego has to die in order to be reborn. ... I would like to be baptized.

A Gnostic is someone who is following the path of Gnosis: someone with Gnosis and who is seeking Gnosis. There isn't really an official membership status in the Ecclesia Gnostica, no membership lists, it is more a matter of participation.

While we do not become a Gnostic through any external means, the ancient mystery of baptism can initiate and solemnize a personal commitment to attaining Gnosis. As such, it is a rebirth and an initiation (a beginning). The conscious choosing of a baptismal name (whether new or reaffirming one's current name), and the conscious choosing to solemnly begin (again) a process of transformation and liberation can have a profound effect. Being willing to begin yet again, is a willingness to be transformed. We are always beginning. Yet, many people refuse to begin, which is in a way a refusal to really live.

Approaching transformation often looks like death. The caterpillar is broken down into goo before it becomes a butterfly. It seems like death, it may even feel like death, but it is a re-constellation a restructuring of a living being. In the spiritual path the ego does not really die while the body lives. What happens is a process of decentering and disidentification. The ego continues to perform its function, but it moves from the center of our inner experience and we identify with it less and less. The first movement from the center is a big work, and the next movements are almost as big. It is not a process of ego death, per se, but a process of the ego taking up its rightful place as a faithful servant to that which is worthy of devotion and service.

In this there is a sense of compassion and respect for the ego. For if it has done its job well, then it is firmly rooted in the center of our inner experience when we begin the path. It will resist each act of shifting it, and the closer it is to the center, the stronger it is at resisting. It is a servant who thinks itself sovereign. Yet beneath this false order is a true and transcendent one. There is a true sovereign that the ego will serve. It needs to recognize, to have Gnosis of, our true center that is connected with the transcendent; and the ego needs to recognize that it is separate from that center.

If the ego can be thought of as a tree, the true center might be thought of as a bubbling spring whose depths are deeper than the world. The tree grows over and protects the spring, but also believes that it is the spring as well, the source of the water. Moving it meets with resistance. But once moved, gradually more of us is nourished by this transcendent center and the whole inner garden is transformed.

We hold open services and offer open communion. There are no requirements for attending or participating, services are offered as a service to those who wish to participate, to the extent that they wish to participate. There is no pressure to participate, and there is no mechanism of membership. So, those considering baptism will need to make inquiries of their own initiative, and eventually ask to be baptized. As you will not be asked under most circumstances, though you may be presented with the possibility.

In the Ecclesia Gnostica, baptism is offered as an initiatory mystery and isn't thought of as replacing or rectifying a previous baptism. It is an opportunity to consciously chose and consciously undergo this ancient mystery/sacrament. There are no requirements as such, just a deep affinity for the Gnostic tradition, and a sense that it is the "right time" to undergo the mystery. Familiarizing yourself with the Gnostic Catechism, to see if you are in general agreement or have a general affinity, is highly recommended and a good indicator to your officiating priest that you know what you are doing. An interview with the officiating priest is required, but this doesn't have to be in person. It is not uncommon for people to contact a parish, then travel there to be baptized.

Traditionally, baptisms take place on Holy Saturday, or alternatively on the Epiphany. There are also times when baptisms are not traditionally performed. We tend to view these as secondary to kairos which is Greek for "the right time." It is the candidate's sense that it is the "right time" for baptism that is most important.

As for scheduling, take a look at the liturgical calendar and see if any particular holiday makes particular sense as the right time. Usually it is best to have a few weeks before the decision and the event. Another consideration is a baptismal name. It is optional, but can be symbolic of one's intention of transformation, and also of devotion or affinity either to a figure such as a saint, or even something more general or abstract, as seen in such ancient names of Epiphaneus and Theophilus. This is usually stated as a middle name by the priest in the baptismal ceremony, but it can be "said" silently and kept as a private intention.

I should note that I have used the term "priest" as the officiant of the baptismal ceremony as this is the usual case. However, by tradition, baptism does not require a priest, although a priest is preferred. In cases of emergency or extreme need, any baptized person may perform a baptism. A case of offering an initiatory mystery they themselves have already received. There is a beautiful account of a simple yet moving baptism performed by Philip K. Dick for his son in the novel VALIS. Yet, for the full experience of the mystery of baptism in all it's symbolic beauty and transformational symbolism, seek out a parish and make arrangements.

Living in Gnosis from the Gospel of Truth

2007-08-15T04:10:00.000-06:00

Understand the inner meaning, for you are the children of inner meaning. ... Speak from the heart, for you are the perfect day and within you dwells the light that does not fail. Speak of truth for those who seek it and of gnosis to those who have sinned in their error.

Steady the feet of those who stumble and extend your hands to the sick. Feed the hungry and give rest to the weary. Awaken those who wish to arise and rouse those who sleep, for you embody vigorous understanding. If what is strong acts like this, it becomes stronger.

Focus your attention upon yourselves. Do not focus your attention upon other things—that is, what you have cast away from yourselves. Do not return to eat what you have vomited. Do not be moth-eaten, do not be worm-eaten, for you have already gotten rid of that. Do not be a place for the devil, for you have already destroyed him. Do not strengthen what stands in your way, what is collapsing, support it. One who is lawless is nothing. Treat the lawless one more harshly than the just one, for the lawless does what he does because he is lawless, but the just does what he does because he is righteous. Do the Father's will, then, for you are from him.

The Gospel of Truth in The Nag Hammadi Scriptures (p. 43 [32-33])

Iraqi religious minorities continue to suffer

2007-08-10T02:29:00.000-06:00

The persecution also affects such communities as the Sabean Mandaeans, who follow the teachings of John the Baptist; Yazidis, whose rituals include worship of a fallen angel who repented; and Jews. More than 80 percent of Mandaeans have left Iraq since 2003.

The Inner Experience by Thomas Merton

2007-08-04T12:08:00.000-06:00

The first thing that you have to do, before you even start thinking about such a thing as contemplation, is to try to recover your basic natural unity, to reintegrate your compartmentalized being into a coordinated and simple whole and learn to live as a unified human person. This means that you have to bring back together the fragments of your distracted existence so that when you say “I,” there is really someone present to support the pronoun you have uttered.

Reflect, sometimes, on the disquieting fact that most of your statements of opinions, tastes, deeds, desires, hopes, and fears are statements about someone who is not really present. When you say “I think,” it is often not you who think, but “they”—it is the anonymous authority of the collectivity speaking through your mask. When you say “I want,” you are sometimes simply making an automatic gesture of accepting, paying for, what has been forced upon you. That is to say, you reach out for what you have been made to want.

Who is this “I” that you imagine yourself to be? An easy and pragmatic branch of psychological thought will tell you that if you can hook up your pronoun with your proper name and declare that you are the bearer of that name, you know who you are. You are “aware of yourself as a person.” Perhaps there is a beginning of truth in this: it is better to describe yourself with a name that is yours alone than with a noun that applies to a whole species. For then you are evidently aware of yourself as an individual subject, and not just as an object, or as a nameless unit in a multitude. It is true that for modern man even to be able to call himself by his own proper name is an achievement that evokes wonder both in himself and in others. But this is only a beginning, and a beginning that primitive man would perhaps have been able to laugh at. For when a person appears to know his own name, it is still no guarantee that he is aware of the name as representing a real person. On the contrary, it may be the name of a fictitious character occupied in very active self-impersonation in the world of business, of politics, of scholarship, or of religion.

This, however, is not the “I” who can stand in the presence of God and be aware of Him as a “Thou.” For this “I” there is perhaps no clear “Thou” at all. Perhaps even other people are merely extensions of the “I,” reflections of it, modifications of it, aspects of it. Perhaps for this “I” there is no clear distinction between itself and other objects: it may find itself immersed in the world of objects and to have lost its own subjectivity, even though it may be very conscious and even aggressively definite in saying “I.”

If such an “I” one day hears about “contemplation,” he will perhaps set himself to “become contemplative.” That is, he will wish to admire, in himself, something called contemplation. And in order to see it, he will reflect on his alienated self. He will make contemplative faces at himself like a child in front of a mirror. He will cultivate the contemplative look that seems appropriate to him and that he likes to see in himself. And the fact that his busy narcissism is turned within and feeds upon itself in stillness and secret love will make him believe that his experience of himself is an experience of God.

But the exterior “I,” the “I” of projects, of temporal finalities, the “I” that manipulates objects in order to take possession of them, is alien from the hidden, interior “I” who has no projects and seeks to accomplish nothing, even contemplation. He seeks only to be, and to move (for he is dynamic) according to the secret laws of Being itself and according to the promptings of a Superior Freedom (that is, of God), rather than to plan and to achieve according to his own desires.

It will be ironical, indeed, if the exterior self seizes upon something within himself and slyly manipulates it as if to take possession of some inner contemplative secret, imagining that this manipulation can somehow lead to the emergence of an inner self. The inner self is precisely that self which cannot be tricked or manipulated by anyone, even by the devil. He is like a very shy wild animal that never appears at all whenever an alien presence is at hand, and comes out only when all is perfectly peaceful, in silence, when he is untroubled and alone. He cannot be lured by anyone or anything, because he responds to no lure except that of the divine freedom.

Sad is the case of that exterior self that imagines himself contemplative, and seeks to achieve contemplation as the fruit of planned effort and of spiritual ambition. He will assume varied attitudes, meditate on the inner significance of his own postures, and try to fabricate for himself a contemplative identity: and all the while there is nobody there. There is only an illusory, fictional “I” which seeks itself, struggles to create itself out of nothing, maintained in being by its own compulsion and the prisoner of his private illusion.

The call to contemplation is not, and cannot, be addressed to such an “I.”

From The Inner Experience: Notes on Contemplation by Thomas Merton (pp. 3-5)

Questions: Approaching Gnosticism

2007-08-02T14:16:00.001-06:00

I prefer an inquirer who is interested and a bit cautious as opposed to (overly) enthusiastic ones. As there is a process of discernment and orientation that really needs to take place and needs to be grounded in the real situation both within and without.

The basic concerns expressed, understandings of, and assumptions about religion in the world today have little to do with individual spiritual life—individuals following their own spiritual path, and taking it seriously by taking responsibility for it.

The path of Gnosis is an individual path, your path. Making use of the Gnostic tradition in following your path doesn't change the nature of this: that it is your path, your responsibility, your life in the deepest sense. This can be very difficult for people to even understand in this culture of collective religious identity. There is also a tendency to imagine that having a connection with others who are on a similar path, making use of the same tradition, will mean some fundamental change in the nature of our own spiritual path with the result that the path itself will be easier. Yet, what is really possible from such interactions is aid, sometimes profound aid, in walking your own path.

From the perspective of the Gnostic tradition, personal growth and transformation is what it is all about, expressed as Gnosis—knowing through growing, growing through knowing. But a very deep and sure knowing, a knowing that you are, rather than a knowing that you posses. It is a true knowing that is liberating. Gnosis is this way of knowing, and with it comes a deep understanding of who we are, and where we are, and what sets us free.

Just as their is no collective substitute for the individual spiritual path, there is no collective substitute for Gnosis. No amount or type of information will satisfy. And, the Gnostic tradition itself can only be a guide and aid. One can take ancient Gnostic texts and create systems of thought interwoven with beliefs, this has happened in the past and takes place more frequently now that we have such a rich treasure of ancient texts, but that will not substitute for Gnosis—and Gnosis is your individual responsibility and path.

I hope this has provided a basic orientation or confirmation of our general approach.

Questions: Liturgical Participation & Spiritual Practice

2007-07-12T13:20:00.001-06:00

In your opinion, would you think it would be counterproductive to be active in the Roman Catholic Church while retaining a Gnostic point of view in my worship? Is there some other more optimal way to explore the path of Gnostic Christianity?

There are a number of people I know who participate in Roman Catholic, Episcopalian, and other forms of worship, and are Gnostic at heart. This is something that goes back to the dawn of the tradition. Gnosticism didn't start out as a denomination with distinct liturgical practices, and an identification as “Gnostic” has never been the point. Of course, in their earlier forms the mysteries were more direct and experiential everywhere they were celebrated. And, they didn't include elements designed to be barriers to Gnostics either. Yet, the barriers depend on us to make them work, so they have never really worked.

In many churches, the Roman Catholic most recently, the Eucharist has gone through a process of rationalization. Every element has had to be defended only on grounds such as biblical mention and theological argument. This has left most with outer forms that are stripped down at best, and with inner forms that make them harder to use as spiritual practice. Yet, even a difficult spiritual practice is better than no practice. There is no substitute for experiencing the rich symbolism and participating inwardly in the mystery of transformation. Yet, even going to a service where you are given space to consider and are directed towards spiritual participation regularly, is helpful. It serves as an anchor point for other aspects of spiritual practice.

Just know why you are there. Participate as deeply as you can, participate inwardly. Don't get caught up in participating outwardly in the political nature of a church. I've seen people get lost in the process of seeking to recreate an orthodoxy to be more in line with their views. Yet, the best one could hope from that would be the same system with a slightly different policy. Be a passerby, be a guest, a thoughtful and polite guest. People are people, they come to church for different reasons, and some will be similar to yours. There are others with some Gnosis that you may connect with, though they may shrink from being considered “gnostic” or stop short of making Gnosis their path.

Liturgy, public worship, is central but not the only aspect of spiritual practice. Finding other practices that work for you, that aid and perhaps add balance or fill in gaps in liturgical practice, is key. It doesn't have to be of a particular form, or even something that you think of as spiritual practice. What turns us towards the life of the spirit, towards God, will serve—if it has purpose and intention, and is done with regularity. Traditional forms of spiritual practice have proven valuable to many people over the centuries, and having community aspects of practice is valuable. As is having a guide with some experience when starting out. This is generally more readily available through Buddhist practice groups and many have benefited from such training and practice. Contemplative practice is more in line with the Gnostic approach, but is usually hard to come by.

Questions: Children and Liberation

2007-07-12T12:44:00.001-06:00

If Gnosticism sees the world as a kind of prison from which one seeks liberation then how should a person view his children? It seems on one level a rejection of the world should involve a rejection of those things which bind oneself to the world. Is it consistent with Gnosticism to love one's children and still be on the path to Gnosis and ultimate liberation?

There is a current that goes against having children in the history of Gnosticism. However, there isn't any such current opposed to loving and caring for the children that you have. And, neither of these short statements is all that meaningful without more context—for Gnostics, the answer doesn't lie at the level of the physical.

In one view, if humans are imprisoned here then we shouldn't take part in that imprisonment. "I have sown no children to the rulers of the world," is in keeping with this view. The world is an often harsh place, and at times and places is much more so. If bringing about more people will perpetuate misery and slavery, it is certainly something to consider. In general, acting consciously and with consideration is a good thing all around. I think the main issues Gnostics have taken with bearing children, is that we often do so unconsciously, perpetuating unconsciousness, and we focus on physical reproduction that is often seen in an egoistic way. Either in seeing the child as the parent's property, as the parent's immortality or legacy, or fulfillment of the parent's hopes and dreams.

However, it is not human bodies or human forms that are imprisoned, but rather human spirits--sparks of the divine. And, depending on how the story is told, we could take another view in which being incarnated, even in a prison, can be an opportunity for a spark of the divine to seek liberation. Yet, there is a greater responsibility, a responsibility towards the divine within the child. It is a responsibility to nurture not only a child, but if at all possible, a conscious human being capable of self-determination.

Love, duty, and affection can be manipulated into chains that bind. Parents also have their responsibility to follow the path to their own liberation, in addition to responsibilities towards children. And, the same is true for children, they must seek their own path even if it is quite different from what their parents wish. In a larger deeper sense, as scriptures continually tell us, ultimately we are not parents and children of each other, but are all children of God. This is a model for nurturing each other in loving-kindness, and treating one another as self-determining individuals with a deep kinship.

The tension between ties as binding us together or of being bound up in them, is one that runs through all human relationships. Yet it is not a quality of our relationship with God. In developing that relationship, we gain gnosis that helps us with our other relationships.

People often fear that if those they love were to be free in their love, then they wouldn't choose to love them back. Yet love without freedom isn't really love. In Gnostic tales it is the Demiurge who commands love and obedience. While the highest unknowable God does not force our love, but loves us freely and completely.

Just as we shouldn't serve the Archons (Powers) blindly in any other circumstance, we shouldn't serve someone else's inner-archons blindly, even out of love for that person. For in doing so, we bind not only ourselves, but them as well. Indeed, serving the divine within someone else may require uncompromising determination against being manipulated by the other forces within them. We can see this clearly in addictions and self-destructive behaviors, but it runs deeper than that. To not be a slave nor enslave on a psychological level can be a difficult attitude to maintain.

So, I would say the Gnostic attitude towards conception is less clear, and would certainly involve consciously considering the deeper responsibilities. While the attitude toward children is to value them. Love them deeply, care for them as children of God, and aid them towards growing into people capable of being free to seek their own liberation. To not fall into the trap of feeling that we own them, or that we are owned by them.

We must always seek to follow our own path, it is a vital part of who we are, we cannot put it off. If we are on a path of growth and transformation it has effects on those around us. Change may be perceived as dangerous and sometimes freedom is scary for others. We must be mindful of this, but not try to stop our growth for anyone else. We must also be mindful that it can take time for us to integrate the changes we go through, and so not make decisions that effect those around us before we can grow into a change—before we attain gnosis from it.

Home

2007-07-04T05:39:00.000-06:00

I am back home again. I actually arrived back over a week ago. Yet, traveling back to Utah from California requires a longer mental decompression or social quarantine than the eleven hours it generally takes to drive back.

It really is like one of those novels where someone is split between two worlds, when you are in one world the other fades and doesn't make sense. Combine that with the usual surreal atmosphere I most often feel here, and it makes for some difficult transitions.

Yes, I was born here and have spent most of my life here, but that doesn't cancel out the oddness. Mostly what experience does is help you cope by muting your expectations. You learn to not expect things to make sense in any direct correlative way. You get used to “the look.” So, you are only disoriented for a moment by a family on television looking so recognizably Mormon that they couldn't look more so by singing LDS kids songs in front of an LDS temple with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir accompanying.

I'm not saying that conformity is a common occurrence here, I'm saying it's ubiquitous. Even non-conformists tend to conform to a narrow range of non-conformist conformity. That's why some people joke that to set your clock to local time, you need to set it back fifty years.

Let's call it chronic culture shock. Sure, I can help minimize it by not watching local news, or leaving the house. And, yes, if I look out my window a sad number of my actual neighbors could serve as extras in a low budget film set in the deep south, but that effect is ruined when they talk and sound like the kids I grew up with.

I understand that I'm especially sensitive to the peculiarities of the locals right now, that I'm giving in to stereotyping, and that there are other people here with lifelines that stretch out across the vast deserts and mountain ranges of the continental divide that separate us from the rest of the world. There are others that aren't too deeply entrenched in the psychological cultural social religious divide that morphs just about everything here. Yes, there are such people. Mostly, they hide it well.

So, although I arrived back at my place of residence four days before Sunday, I didn't arrive back to anything approximating home. I arrived back to dead and dying plants, the proliferation of weeds, an ambitious gopher, a small insect invasion in the chapel, aches and stiffness from so much time spent on the road, and many more tasks and chores I could bore you with. There was so much to do that I hardly slept Saturday night, only catching a couple of hours between tasks to get the chapel ready. I thought about canceling the service, I had little chance of getting things done, along with the little sleep.

But, the Eucharist is very important to me. It is my central spiritual practice. And offering it to people here is the most important thing I can do for them, although they most often don't see it that way. So, I managed to make it, barely—hopping out of the shower as the first person arrived.

I was celebrating the Eucharist not in the lovely chapel in LA with assistants and a full house of people deeply participating, but in my poor thinly attended chapel here in this odd region. And then it happened. As the service moved towards the consecration, I was finally home. Offering myself, my life here and now, to be a conveyance of transformation just as the bread and wine are offered.

There is nothing particularly special about the bread and wine. Non-fermented wheat flour and fermented grape juice. Yet in the offering they are given up to be transformed. In the consecration they embody that transformation. And, in the communion we incorporate that transformation.

Where the Eucharist is celebrated, there is home. That is the reality that bridges and transcends both irreconcilable worlds.

The Chat Website that Saved the World

2007-06-29T13:21:00.000-06:00

It really is amazing how easy it seems to be to think what you have set out to do is actually being accomplished, if only someone else agrees. If a dozen people agree, then you have ultimate confirmation—you are saving the world by chatting on the Internet. Who you are chatting with is those dozen other people who agree with you. And how you are saving the world is by chatting with the same dozen people and the occasional interloper, who generally either needs to be asked to leave, or leaves of their own accord shortly thereafter.

The stuff of fantasy? Of course. But I would hate to try to guess how many places on this world wide web are following this pattern today.

It is easy to fool yourself, and some situations make it easier than others. We often ask our friends about what we are doing. Some people actually use the phrase that they are making “a reality check” in doing so. By this we hope to get another perspective, one more objective about ourselves than we can be by ourself. Real friends help each other, caution against destructive unconscious behaviors, deflate egos, put things in perspective, and so on. They often risk the friendship by doing so with things we are not willing to see. Their ability to do so comes from their knowing us—this is the type of knowing that in Greek is gnosis.

What happens when you only know someone through their self-representations? For one thing, you probably won't be able to help them see what they are unable to see for themselves. You probably will not see it, because you only have a self-representation to go on. Or, if you do see it, there is no other knowledge about them that you might use to help them come to the realization for themselves. Simply telling someone that they seem to have a major problem with an inferiority complex, is generally not beneficial. If you know more about them (gnosis again) you might be able to help them to see a pattern in behavior that may lead them to learn about themselves (gain self-gnosis).

What is generally missing in the vast array of connections on the Internet is gnosis. And in the absence of gnosis we don't generally assume that we don't know, we generally construct a fantasy in which we do know. This can be seen in the image we construct of others that is never even close to the real person. We automatically construct an image, for example, with people whose work we read, or whose voice we hear. It requires conscious effort to try not to mistake this imagination for knowledge.

Therefore, you have the situation first described above. Interaction with a few others who agree that what we are doing is not only terribly important, but is changing the world. When you check your circle of friends about what you are doing, those are the circle of friends and they are people you “know” and who “know” you without much if any gnosis, and who already agree with you. You can then construct your own social (un)reality and support each other in your mutual importance, regardless of the lack of facts or facts to the contrary. You will, of course, check with each other over such things as facts or results and reinforce your current situation. It is an almost perfect closed system.

The reason for the “almost” is gnosis. Gnosis provides the means to escape from any false cosmos. That is what our ancient ancestors in Gnosis knew and practiced. They stress the urgency to seek self-gnosis, to wake up from both dreams and nightmares. If we seek real liberation, then it isn't to be found in creating a false cosmos within the larger cosmos and fooling ourselves that we are accomplishing something there. Such a path leads to ego inflation, or respite from feelings of inferiority or inadequacy, but it isn't a path to liberation.

We must seek not to fool ourselves either individually or in groups, but seek the Gnosis that liberates us, that frees us to truly act, that enables us to really change the world to some extent through being free and awake in it.

A Fine Edition that makes a Fine Addition

2007-06-27T16:24:00.000-06:00

If you already own the previous edition of the Nag Hammadi Library in translation, and are wondering if it is worth it to buy the new edition—it is.

The Nag Hammadi Scriptures is more than simply a new edition of the old work, it is in many ways a different book altogether. The contents will be familiar from previous translations, though more readable and less technical in many word choices. Many of the names familiar from the previous edition where involved with this edition.

The formatting in the new edition is a vast improvement. It makes the text more readable, and it is easier to find the passage you are looking for. It includes actual footnotes, a very useful formatting feature too often replaced by pernicious endnotes. The end commentary material now consists of short overview essays on the various traditions within the larger Gnostic tradition.

The new edition also includes Coptic texts found after Nag Hammadi, such as the Gospels of Judas and Mary Magdalene. Although for texts found before Nag Hammadi you will need to refer to the older editions by G. R. S. Mead. (Perhaps I should say “the venerable Mead.”)

Unlike some other collections of scriptures that you may read through and then shelve, this edition is the one you will keep close at hand. My copy has already become a frequent companion.

Questions: Matter and the Cosmos

2007-06-26T17:02:00.001-06:00

Does gnosticism hold that matter is evil? This seems to be the view of one particular writer... that even the beauty in the world, such as a sunrise or a rose, is a deceptive, thin patina that the demiurge uses to cover over the ugly reality of this world.

Do you think that the aim is to realize gnosis and then leave this cosmos entirely (when we die), or do you think that the purpose is to realize gnosis and thus bring the light and love of the pleroma into this cosmos to transform it? In other words can this reality be redeemed or is it so inherently flawed that this is not possible and that the only way is out (so to speak).

The flat statement "matter is evil" comes from the heresiologists not the Gnostics and is intended to be a polemical statement. There are differences in the way that various Gnostics viewed matter from the writings that we have. In some they do seem to view it as a very bad if not terrible condition to be in or a part of. This is different than viewing it in the polemical dualism of matter equals evil, the immaterial (spirit) equals good.

The majority view from Gnostic texts seems to be more of equating matter and material things with ignorance, or lack of consciousness, or distance from the divine. It is not a black or white or binary understanding, but rather a continuum—a more spiritually-oriented condition being far better than a more materially-oriented one. I really have a hard time with the notion that ancient Gnostics were all that concerned about matter itself, or of the physical world playing such an important role for them in and of itself. In scriptures it is more one's attitudes, goals, consciousness, participation, and most importantly Gnosis that are the concern. Liberation does not requires the end of material existence, but rather individual transformation through Gnosis.

To only judge the ugly as real and so judge the beautiful to be an illusion seems as big of a mistake as doing the opposite. Beauty occurs. It can be found even in the midst of the darkest tragedy, and also just where you expect it to be. It is better to simply see what is in front of our faces, as Jesus says in Thomas, than try to make it into evidence of some kind. An aesthetic experience is simply an aesthetic experience. We are always a part of such experiences whether they take place as a result of human action or as a result of natural action. Is there a need for a creative artist of nature? The photographer creates art by seeing it and capturing what is seen. We as conscious beings are able to see and experience deeply. In Jung's view, consciousness is the means by which all that is comes at last to know itself. When we experience beauty we are not mere observers, we are participants.

The way that seems to sum up the Gnostic attitude is viewing the cosmos as a mixture or mixing of spirit and matter or of light and darkness. In this realm the sparks of the divine are within the limitations of matter and the danger is that they remain in ignorance of that divine reality and their connection to it. The precosmic creation stories tell how this situation came to be, and the salvation stories tell of how this ignorance can be remedied.

Your articulation of bringing light into the cosmos is correct, and we are to do this in our lives here and now. There is no indication in any of the texts, and nothing from modern experience to suggest that a spirit attaining liberation upon death would return to the Fullness and then come back into the cosmos. My thought about it is that any return would not be possible, being something like trying to fit your grown self into the same crib you slept in when first born. Part of the specialness of Christ is his being able to make the sacrifice to come into the limitations of matter for our sakes.

However, there is good evidence from scripture and modern experience that we as Gnostics are to bring light into the cosmos through our own growth in Gnosis. The resurrection is an inner spiritual event that occurs in this life, and all of the mysteries including the redemption/liberation and the bridal chamber are intended to be accomplished here. This is our highest task as Gnostics. The awakening of an individual is a cosmic event. Within the person of light there is a light that illumines the cosmos, as Jesus says in the Gospel of Thomas.

However, there is no indication that I am aware of where this leads to some complete transformation of the cosmos. Ultimately, the cosmos is a system with the limitations of a system. Some of those limitations are the nature of time itself, and the constant increase of entropy. To have the cosmos be otherwise would mean it isn't the cosmos or wouldn't be the same place we live now. It is something like wishing someone you love had no flaws and no limitations and so on, so that they would not be the same person that you love anymore. The cosmos is in so many ways simply different than the Fullness. But I think that it too will continue in some way having had its interaction with the spirit here and now, that coming to a fuller consciousness here means that we will return something of it as a part of ourselves when we return. It is like the Hymn of the Pearl, there is something that has been transformed here that will be returned with us. The transformation itself may be thought of as the treasure sought after here and returned with us to our true home.

On the Road

2007-06-07T21:27:00.000-06:00

I'll be on the road tracing a vaguely triangular path through the South Western United States. First, a little over a week in San Francisco for a conference, then about a week in Los Angeles. All together adding about 2000 miles to the odometer.

See some of you along the way, and some of you later.

PS: I will have a few prints of Gnostic "iconic" art from the 2007 Gnostic Calendar for sale.

Questions: Seeking Certainty, Finding Gnosis

2007-06-04T12:17:00.001-06:00

What does it mean to "achieve Gnosis"? I gave up all things on the basis of a series of very powerful spiritual conversion experiences. Are you suggesting that Gnosis is a permanent state of this spiritual state? I don't know If I could survive such a level for a long period. ... There is a God, or there is not. There is a hierarchy of Gods or there is One. If all beliefs are in some way "true", even when contradictory, ideas must in some way be reconciled.

If you are seeking certainty, you will not find it at the level of doxa, of opinions, beliefs, or assertions. Although there is a long tradition of clinging to such things and acting as if they were certain as means to convince ourselves that they are. This is the strategy of "faith" as it is generally understood. Even while it seems to close the question and give that desired certainty, it never really does. It requires the construction of a system of constantly reinforcing beliefs, or an unconsciousness of the process. Once we are aware of, conscious of, the process involved, it usually cannot satisfy. The exception seems to be the construction of the elaborate and rigid systems of modern fundamentalist movements. We all seek certainty, and this is not to denigrate those who try this strategy, who are many, just to point out its fundamental limitations. It has its price and its remaining elements of uncertainty. But that is a struggle and path that most have been on to some degree and so know. It is like the line from the Matrix, you've been down that road, you know exactly where it goes.

Rather than tying to find certainty, it seems more possible to find trustworthiness. And that requires a different type of approach. In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus says, "do not cease seeking until you find. When you find you will be troubled. When you are troubled you will marvel and will reign over all."

Gnosis is not a mental state, or any set of mental states. Such things change. If we feel happy today, we may feel sad tomorrow. If we feel an epiphany today, we may feel half-asleep tomorrow. That is the medieval wheel of fortune. It goes round and round. There is a tendency to use the term "Gnosis" as an "acceptable alternative" for terms like mystic or spiritual, for example; but, that isn't the proper use of the term.

At a recent conference I was at dinner with a group of people who where mainly of an Eastern spiritual orientation. One of the individuals was Buddhist clergy as well as a psychologist. He was trying to describe the process of enlightenment, saying that the focus wasn't on the enlightenment experiences, the higher states of consciousness that are experienced, but was rather on the time in-between of day-to-day life. I told them that this was the difference of emphasis in the Gnostic tradition, that Gnosis is the knowledge that is psycho-spiritual development in that day-to-day life. When people compare the two traditions, they want to equate Gnosis with these higher states, when it is focused upon the overall growth that is seen in-between these spiritual experiences. These states and transformative experiences are a part of the journey, but Gnosis is knowledge that is knowledge that we are, that we have gained by being on the journey. Often when we go on journeys in the world, what we bring back is a greater knowledge and understanding of ourselves and the world. That is the type of knowledge that is gnosis.

When you find, you will be troubled. It is a part of the process. When we truly seek, we find the limitations and failings of the answers we have been given, the strategies we have tried. External authority claims to offer certainty, but it is a certainty that requires belief, that is, it requires certainty. It is supposed to work, yet it doesn't. And this same strategy is to be found in many places once one recognizes the pattern, has gnosis of it. It feels like the foundations have been pulled out from under you. It is disturbing and troubling. There is a hope that, maybe, if there were a different source of authority, the same strategy could be tried again. A hope that, maybe, it would work this time. Probably (almost certainly) not.

Yet we do not stay in such a state. All states are transitory. There is another strategy, and this one is very different. It involves a big shift in perspective. We can find trustworthiness in something other than doxa with the backing of authority. Rather than base the trustworthiness on something external, or upon something internal but changeable, we can base it upon our Gnosis. In that way we might say that we know God because we have experienced God, our spiritual growth is towards God, and we have been transformed by God. But this "God" is not an idea, not an abstract entity that we can logically construct, but rather is what we know from our own limited Gnosis.

While one can create a long list of positive attributes for the God of theology, the God of Gnosis is generally a negative list, a list of things you can't say about God. Yet there is no doubt of existence, anymore than you doubt the existence of anyone else you know in the world. The interpretation, the understanding is provisional and incomplete. It is not an idea we can hold in our minds, but a reality we know from our deepest experience of being.

While this may not be intellectually satisfying, it is not subject to doubt. We can doubt the expressions of Gnosis, and recognize that all expressions are preliminary rather than final. But Gnosis is a part of who we are, not something we need to be convinced about. And in that way we reign over all, our Gnosis is the ordering principle of our approach to everything.

By its nature, Gnosis is difficult to communicate. We can only tell stories and use symbols even about Gnosis itself. Yet we all have Gnosis to some degree, and we may recognize it in these stories. I would suggest that you are passing through a state of being troubled, as in the passage from Thomas. If you refrain from seeking certainty among the opposites, you will find the trustworthy and the truth that frees—because they are within you. It requires a metanoia, a turning about of the mind. Be patient with yourself, and trust in your own process when things seem unclear. No state is permanent, yet one can cycle through states without apparent end. Seek the center.

Questions: Myth, Meaning, & Gnosis

2007-06-04T01:04:00.001-06:00

I have been reading "Gnosticism" and it seemed to be completely weird since my paradigm was that of doxa. I was scoffing: "I am expected to believe in a lion-headed god who has sufficient understanding to organize worlds and yet does not ask where he/it comes from?" Even humans ask that question. Now understanding that the myth is illustrative, not realistic, accurate, but not precise, has put a whole new face on it.

Seeing myths as literal is how the heresiologists completely misunderstood the Gnostic approach. Ireneaus has endless scorn for myths that he viewed with a physical literalism. And, such an approach would make for a very weird if not downright kooky religion. (Of which there are a few contemporary examples, unfortunately.)

Even though we have only a smattering of ancient Gnostic materials, we have examples of exegesis (commentary) on the Gospel of John by Heracleon. From quotes preserved by a later commenter, we can see that for Heracleon there were three ways to consider scripture: physical, psychological, and spiritual. The physical, or historical, approach was considered the least useful if not actually misleading, and this was the relatively straight-forward story of the Gospel of John taken by many people today to be the literal historical truth. He saw the spiritual meaning of the Gospel as being a means to liberation. As essentially being realized within the spiritual development of the seeking reader. So, there is a strong tradition of viewing myths/stories as tools for gaining insight or moving towards Gnosis, rather than statements of fact or literal/physical histories.

Not only can we consider myths on multiple levels, we are not stuck with a single interpretation or understanding. So, the demiurge can be seen in the contradictions of the cosmos, in the limitations and grandiosity of the human ego, as the way of understanding the limitations placed on a "God" by most believers, as a way to separate the notion of a God-image from the experience of the divine, as a pattern of human development, and so on. The element of divided or compartmentalized consciousness you've described is a part of that. It is a pattern that aids in recognition or diagnosis, a tool for developing Gnosis. With that Gnosis, we can then recognize it in different contexts, leading to a growth of insight into the original descriptions as well as into the contexts. 'Recognition' being a common translation of gnosis.

Can myths mean anything at all? There must, in the end, taken to a logical (or even illogical) conclusion, by analysis, by synthesis, by any systematic way, be a real truth.

Heraclitus wrote of the tendency to "run to the opposite,” enantiodromia in Greek. (I don't think it was the opposite he frowned upon so much as the haste.) It isn't the case that myth has to either mean one thing or mean anything and nothing. Looking at it that way evades the meaning of myth itself. Rather than seeking one meaning, or any meaning, it is more useful to consider it as a pattern with many applications.

A deep understanding can be expressed as a myth, as a story, and we can learn from the deeper lessons than merely learning the story itself. This is the value of literature, for example. We experience King Lear not so we can take a quiz on its contents, but so we can understand something about ourselves, and also our world.

To say that something has many applications, or even innumerable/infinite ones, is not to say that it can have any meaning. An example of this is number. We can apply number to any type of thing by counting whatever it is. Yet, regardless of what it is we are counting, from the concrete to the abstract, the application of numbers and of arithmetic will apply in an entirely non-arbitrary way. Because we can count literally anything doesn't mean that the numbers mean anything or nothing. They remain the same regardless.

It is this type of insight into numbers and their relationships that was at the core of the Pythagorean tradition. Numbers were the archetypes, or "primal shapes/patterns" of the system of the world. It is a bit hard to get to the profundity of that with our modern minds. We think of numbers as the most rational of our tools, and they often are. We are also usually presented them in an abstract way, as a system of rules. But looking at the world itself and seeing the universal application and validity of these patterns of numbers and their relationships is amazing. It is a leap from the particular to the universal. Newton could have accounted for the level of mechanics he was working on with a limited theory of gravitation, but he saw it not as a way to account for forces, but as a part of the order of the cosmos, and his theory of gravitation was a universal one.

One shouldn't "run to the opposite" here either. (A gentle stroll gives a better view.) Jumping from a particular to a universal is a really big jump and in general is just not recommended. Describing mythic patterns in this deeper sense is a part of what the ancient Gnostics were doing with their myth-making. Gnosis is that type of knowledge, we can translate it as recognition or acquaintanceship. A knowledge of such things as these patterns. Though not limited to them. That type of knowledge can only be transmitted indirectly through story and symbol. So that, becoming familiar with the story or symbol might help to recognize that pattern in our own experience.

Questions: Personal Gnosis & Religion

2007-06-03T20:01:00.001-06:00

If all that we need is personal gnosis, and that is signified by a "life changing" experience, then why do we need to move to a gnostic tradition, except for sociality? ... The reason we have left our previous traditions were doctrines that supported a religious dictatorship, and problems with overbearing leadership.

The "life changing experience" or conversion experience is how religion is approached as a system of beliefs or opinion. That is, a little experience or gnosis, to accept a lot of doxa (opinion, belief). This is one of many differences between approaching religion with a paradigm of gnosis and the standard paradigm of doxa. You can find religious groups using the terms “Gnosis” and “Gnostic” that operate in the usual doxastic paradigm, or approach and framework, of religion. However, in doing so they divorce themselves from the foundation of gnosis. We are not one of them. If someone is seeking a pre-made system to adopt, it isn't Gnosticism they are seeking.

Gnosis isn't a "one time event" and it isn't such experiences as epiphanies or apocalypses. Those are spiritual experiences and may lead to Gnosis, however Gnosis is a transformative or spiritually developmental knowledge. It is knowledge that you are, rather than knowledge that you have. It is also a spiritual knowing through spiritual growing. Remembering an epiphany or a conversion experience is not Gnosis. Asserting a memory or a remembered lesson from an experience is actually doxa.

Doxa (belief, opinion) is what most of what we call religion is made up of, either held individually or collectively as a group or society. However, as a method of spiritual inquiry and growth, doxa is very limited. It is one way a tradition is passed on, (other ways are myth/story and symbolism), it can provide a starting point, it can aid with gnosis indirectly, by learning categories of recognition or diagnosis. But it will always remain doxa: opinion, belief, assertion.

The difference in paradigm is the main difference of Gnosticism. In essence, it is this difference that is Gnosticism, a radical change in the foundation of spiritual knowledge. It may be that I am misreading your questions, but you seem to want an orthodoxy, a correct opinion or belief that is simply different from those held by other religious groups. If that is the case, we won't be of much help. We do not follow the paradigm or structure of orthodoxy because we are concerned with gnosis not doxa.

Completely shifting perspectives (paradigms) in such a radical fashion can take some time. That is to say it can take quite a while before the new perspective becomes the natural or default one in new situations.

The hierarchical portion of the EG is liturgical, that is, the church services themselves. This is on the order of what is an official EG service, going through proper training and formation to celebrate liturgical services, and serving in a mindful and ethical manner. In contrast to other religious groups, there is as little control and collective determination of the individual as possible. The all-encompassing framework of most churches is completely alien to us. Liturgical services are provided as a service, there are no requirements to participate. For example: you do not need to profess any belief, complete some form of membership, or renounce any prior or continued membership or participation in any ethical spiritual path. Formation is available for those called to serve as clergy. It requires a higher level of involvement, and eventually, of commitment to this spiritual path and tradition. Obviously, to expect otherwise would be to disrespect this path and tradition, to treat is as an esoteric merit badge rather than a process of personal transformation that leads to being able to serve others in their personal transformation. The spiritual path is walked alone, and in the Gnostic paradigm, religion exists to serve and support that process.

If you are looking for support, insight, and some companionship in your journey, then we may be of service. However, if you are looking for a group with a correct opinion or belief on some issues, we are probably not what you are looking for. What we do is not based on correctness of belief, but on what pragmatically aids in spiritual growth rooted in the ancient tradition of Gnosis.

None of this is intended as a criticism, and I may be wrong in how I am understanding your questions. My intention is merely to aid you in discernment in regards to Gnostic tradition and practices. It is a tradition that rests upon continual inner growth and development that is manifest as Gnosis. And so is founded and centered on that individual Gnosis, rather than on any correct beliefs or ortho-doxia.

Questions: The Catholic/Anglican Uniform

2007-06-03T01:25:00.001-06:00

Your uniform looks quite Catholic/Anglican. What is the basis of this? The Cathars (at least) seemed to be very simple in their approach, as did Christ. I thought this type of ecclesiastical clothing only began after Nicea.

Bear in mind that everything we do has a form. The Gospel of Philip says that "Truth did not come into the world naked, but came in types and images."

The style of clericals and liturgical vestments we use is that of the Western Christian tradition. The Gnostic Eucharist follows the structure of the Eucharist in the West, as well. All of which had a long development until it reached its zenith in the eleventh century. The other main style or form of high Christian liturgy is Eastern Orthodox. While we do incorporate some elements of that style on occasion, we primarily follow the Western forms.

Gnostics of all times are primarily pragmatic in that they work with what they have and use what works. The Eucharist form has developed over centuries as a richly symbolic experience—a mystery of transformation. Since the Gnostic approach is to learn from spiritual experience, it makes sense to use a highly developed and symbolic form to evoke inner experience. We are not re-enactors of ancient history, but contemporary seekers of Gnosis. Our general view is that all of this isn't strictly necessary, but it really does help. The first time I attended a service I wasn't expecting much and had largely dismissed it intellectually, yet the experience was such that here I am over a decade later providing opportunities for others to regularly experience it also.

"Gnostic" wasn't an ancient denomination, but rather a very different approach to religion and living spiritually. An approach founded upon inner spiritual knowing and growing (gnosis) rather than upon conforming to correct belief or opinion (ortho-doxia). A separate ecclesiastical structure wasn't necessary for the Valentinians to follow the Gnostic approach. Yet, it was for the Cathars.

The focus on Gnosis, the radical difference of basing religious and spiritual knowing upon Gnosis, is what makes an approach gnostic. Focusing upon correct belief and opinion, and basing religious knowing upon that body of correct belief and opinion, is what makes an approach orthodox. To be grounded in the Christian expression of the Gnostic tradition you really only have the two choices, Eastern or Western Christianity. For historical and practical reasons our tradition follows the Western form.

Questions: Gnostic Hell

2007-06-01T19:13:00.002-06:00

I've been reading about Gnosticism and I'm confused. Do Gnostics believe in Hell or do they believe that Hell is on this earth? Do they believe that it's temporary or permanent?

This is one of the areas where there is a unity of thought in the Gnostic tradition. There is no literal hell in the Gnostic tradition. It is a state that exists for people here. No state of being is permanent here. Hell is a state of ignorance and suffering from being subject to the forces and powers of the world. Ancient texts use metaphors of being a slave, being asleep in a nightmare, of being drunk, and even of being dead. They saw that one could be redeemed from that state to some extent while in the world. That is why it isn't accurate to say that being in the world is being in hell. One of the sacraments/mysteries listed in the Gospel of Philip is the Apolytrosis, a word meaning to be redeemed, to be bought out of slavery. There are also texts that speak of the resurrection as something we experience here and now.

It is a good question as to whether any of the early Christians believed in hell. Certainly, they did not believe in anything similar to the concept as it exists today. It had a long development in Christian culture both in art and literature, and in preaching and theology.

Back to San Francisco, then hopefully Los Angeles

2007-06-01T03:23:00.000-06:00

Next week I'll be driving back to San Francisco for a conference. From now on it will be at least a twice a year trip. I am more ambivalent this time. For one, it seems like I was just there. It had been the better part of a decade before my last trip, it will be only be a couple of months this trip. For another, money has actually been tighter since starting school again, despite the vast sums I am borrowing to finance it. Having to pay for two conferences in one term just makes it all the tighter.

I also plan on making this trip into a triangular one by heading to Los Angeles after the conference. Yes, it is still tentative, which, is another source of ambivalence. I really want to go to LA. And if I could only chose one, that's the one I'd choose right now. Hopefully, I'll still make it. That's the good part about driving — plans remain flexible.

So, for local folks, after this Sunday I'll see you when I get back in a few weeks. I plan on being back in time for the celebration of a Mandean Vespers service in honor of John the baptizer on the 28th. For folks in SF, I'll have a few days before and after the conference (11-17th) if there is interest in getting together for a chat. I may make it to the EGM service on the 10th. For the LA crowd, I plan on being there for the service on the 24th, and a few days before and after. Also, if you are interested in purchasing Gnostic silverwork, prints of Gnostic icons, or Gnovena candles, let me know.

GnosCast-Homilies: Gnostic Audio Homilies

2007-06-01T01:56:00.000-06:00

I've put in a lot of hours to get almost caught up on podcasting the homilies I've delivered in the past few months. There are currently 62 homilies of good quality in the archive (with seven recorded earlier on a somewhat broken mp3 player), totaling over 19 hours of actual content. So, yes, you could spend almost an entire revolution of the earth just listening to homilies I've delivered, recorded, edited and made available for free. But, I don't think the homilies podcast gets as much traffic as the two other podcasts, and I'm not sure why this is so.

What is a homily? You may ask. Why isn't it a sermon? You may also ask. The practical difference between a homily and a sermon is generally one of focus and one of brevity, the larger difference comes from a difference in liturgical practice and focus.

The Eucharist consists of two larger parts, like acts in a play. The first is the liturgy of the word, or the mass of the catechumins. Anciently, it was the portion that could be attended by those who weren't initiated. Eastern Orthodox liturgy still includes the command to the catechumins to depart. The second part of the Eucharist consists of the mystery of communion, and this was only attended by those who had been baptized, had been initiated into the mystery.

What happened at the extreme ends of the Protestant Reformation, was a complete break with the ancient mystery elements of Christianity. The Eucharist was striped down to the first portion only, and the mystery was replaced by biblical commentary.

People are more familiar with sermons, and many equate religious services with sermons, maybe with some music thrown in. Sermons are given as the central focus of religious services in many traditions. They are, reportedly, why people go to these services. A sermon is a prepared speech that follows a theme. As such it may include many passages of scripture as focal points.

This form of religious service grew out of the Protestant Reformation, and the subsequent exclusive focus on the texts of the Bible. Since the only thing important in their view was learning the text and interpretation of the Bible, religious services essentially changed to become bible classes with prayers and maybe some singing.

A homily is different in that it isn't the central focus of the religious service, it focuses upon the scriptural readings for that particular service, and is generally much briefer. It is also not essential to the service, you can have the service without a homily being given at all.

The place of the homily within the larger service varies with tradition. Many place it at the end of the liturgy of the word portion of the Eucharist, perhaps for that reason, though I suspect it is more so that you can't sneak out after communion and skip the homily.

In our own tradition, we deliver homilies at the end of the service. As such, it doesn't break up the flow of the service. Yes, there is a flow, a deep transformative aspect of liturgy that works on a psychological level and on deeper levels than that. As people of Gnosis, we don't see the point of liturgy as being a repetition or a ceremonial observation, it is an opportunity for personal transformation through deep participation. As such, the setting, the structure, the aesthetic, and the flow of liturgy are very important. We also emphasize inner experience, and switching to a discursive mode in the midst of a service, really at the point where you are prepared to go deeper, isn't conducive to that.

The other main reason is so that the homily comes from the service itself. Sure, you need to prepare before the service. You need to read and reflect on the passages of scripture that are the readings for that service, and consider the intent of the service. Relate them to your own considerations, to your own history. Perhaps, remember how you thought about them in previous years when you came across them in reading or in a service. You also need to prepare what you plan on saying. Work out a narrative structure or two, remember or look up a rusty reference or two. Yes, you need to do all of that. But, it is only an aid to delivering a homily. The homily you give is not the homily you planned: often they share some elements, sometimes they are completely different.

Giving a homily at the end of the service means that you are in an altered state of consciousness from the transformative effects of the service. It also means that your most immediate experience is the service you just participated in. In my experience, you actually prepare a homily not so you can deliver what you've prepared, but so you can take that with you through the process of transformation. You can gain different insight from the liturgy and its symbolism by approaching it with something in mind. New insights come, and previous insights are momentarily forgotten in the process.

The homily is then delivered in relation to the participants. This is a post-communion atmosphere, and there is a felt sense of communion. This can allow for a deeper wisdom to emerge, though in my experience it doesn't always happen. However, often in the act of speaking, of not really knowing what I'm going to say next or where all of this is going, things come together with a focus I never expected. And, since I have been recording and listening again in the editing process, I have found the homilies I've delivered to be valuable for myself, they contain insight that, if it is mine, I don't connect to directly.

If you haven't listened to the homilies because you didn't know what they were, or the first ones had poor quality, or because you didn't know they existed, I invite you to listen to a few and see if they are of use to you. I would like to be able to continue to make them available regularly at no direct cost, I just don't see that as a possibility. The sad facts of life are, I either need to spend a lot less time on them, or get some money for them to support the parish. So, at the time I'm writing this, there are 62 or so homilies, with 19 or so hours of content freely available. The future will probably change that.

Some Fallacies, Biases, & Tendencies towards Error in Argumentation

2007-04-28T14:51:00.000-06:00

Argumentation

Argumentation is integral to communication. Without argumentation, we are left with mere assertions and opinions. It isn't just that there is a lack of valid argumentation in online discussions, but a general lack of any argumentation, good or bad, valid or invalid.

When most people think of arguments, they think of the emotionally charged shouting matches that are not only not arguments in the formal sense, but are antithetical to them. Rather, those types of exchanges lack the qualities that make something an argument: clear thinking, valid reasoning, and a valid conclusion reached through the application of these. Argumentation makes the reasoning involved explicit. Communication is dependent on argumentation in that it is the only way to communicate with someone who does not share our assumptions, schema, and methodology.

In his book A Rulebook for Arguments, Anthony Westin describes argumentation as a form of inquiry. This is central to the philosophical tradition, and can be viewed as an initial inquiry, that is determining if a conclusion can be supported. It can also be an inquiry into an accepted conclusion or belief, to see if or how it may be a valid belief, and what such a conclusion rests upon.

Argumentation is much more a form of inquiry than it is a form of persuasion. It is as a form of persuasion that it most often looses its way, because a well-constructed argument is by no means the most effective means of persuasion. Fallacies continually crop up because they are often more effective ways to persuade, even while they fail as arguments. However, a valid argument does more than persuade, it adds to knowledge and understanding. An argument is a careful construction that explicitly shows relationships between thought and data otherwise obscured. Thus argumentation is the way much of scholarship is done.

This brief consideration is not meant to cover argumentation or all of the fallacies and tendencies to error in argumentation. We will consider only some that seem particularly relevant to our context. Readers are directed to the works cited and other works on argumentation and critical thinking for more information.

Summaries & “Antidotes”

The following quotes are from Tools for critical thinking: Metathoughts for psychology by David Levy which, features not only logical fallacies, but also tendencies to bias and error known from psychological research. It also offers “antidotes” or active ways to resist these tendencies in our own thinking and arguments.

Differentiating Dichotomous and Continuous Variables: Dichotomous phenomena can be classified into either of two, mutually exclusive categories. Continuous phenomena, in contrast, can be placed somewhere along a particular dimension, depending on their frequency and magnitude.

Antidotes: Remember that most person-related phenomena (especially psychological constructs) lie along a continuum; thus, it is both artificial and inaccurate to group them into categories. (Levy, 1997, p. 212)

This helps us to avoid the all-too-common mistake of false dichotomies. A false dichotomy imposes a logical “exclusive or” on phenomena—only one or the other is the case, with no nuances or overlap. This is sometimes characterized as “black and white thinking.” An example is “you are either for us, or against us.” Such a position excludes a nuanced view in which someone might be in favor of some parts of an agenda, not in favor of others, and indifferent about the rest.

This view is often imposed by means of assuming the argument, where the proponent of a false dichotomy assumes that anything they associate with one side of the dichotomy indicates an argument for that side and against the other. For example, someone who believes in a false dichotomy between institutions of religion and individually pursued spirituality may encounter someone who makes a statement in support of an institution of religion and then assumes that the statement or individual is opposing individually pursued spirituality. This is a position conjured out of the expectations of the reader without any basis in the original statement itself.

The Consequence-Intentionality Fallacy: We have a propensity to assume that the effect of people's behavior reflects the intent of their behavior. However, consequences alone are not sufficient proof of intentionality. That is, we cannot determine others' intentions solely by the effects of their actions.

Antidotes: Make an active effort to consider other plausible causes or pathways of behavior in addition to the ones implied directly by its consequences; in short, consider alternative intents. (Levy, 1997, p. 217)

This fallacy shows a very common tendency to try to demonstrate intention from effect. This ignores not only our own experience, but also the lyrics of the Rolling Stones “you can't always get what you want.” In day-to-day life actually having only the consequences we intend is a seemingly rare thing, and when writ large it is rare indeed.

To go back to the previous example: the existence of instances of religious or spiritual oppression resulting from institutions of religion does not indicate an intent to do so.

There is an opposite application of this fallacy is the claim that since a result was not intended as a consequence of an action, the action cannot have that result. Although obviously flawed,such a defense is by no means rare in online discourse.

The “If I feel it, it must be true” Fallacy: One's experience of emotional comfort or discomfort is not necessarily a valid gage for differentiating what is true from what is false.

Antidotes: Do not rely on your emotions as the sole barometer for distinguishing truths from falsehoods. There may be certainty in what you are feeling, just not in what it “proves.” (Levy, 1997, p. 217)

There are many variations of this fallacy. A common one is the identification fallacy that goes “I identify with x, I do not identify with y therefore y cannot be x.” We see this as a common method of argument in the online “Gnostic scene.” In that context the argument has the explicit or underlying form of: “I am a Gnostic” that is to say, the individual identifies with Gnosticism. “I do not like/agree with/embrace _____” that is, the person does not identify with what is being considered. “Therefore, ______ is not Gnostic” or, if the person identifies with one thing and not the other they have been “proven” to be essentially different in nature.

This fallacy also reminds us not to think of Gnosis in terms of personal preferences, ego-identity, or emotional comfort. While Gnosis may effect all of these things, they are not in and of themselves indicators of validity and should never be equated with Gnosis. Gnostic scripture bid us to attain self-gnosis. The path of Gnosis is a process of transforming oneself not a process of trying to make the world conform to oneself. It is not a path of identification nor of psychological comfort or reassurance.

The Spectacular Explanation Fallacy: the tendency to seek extraordinary explanations for extraordinary events.

Antidotes: Keep in mind that very ordinary causes are capable of producing very extraordinary effects. Whenever you are confronted with instances of human behavior that are particularly unusual, rare, spectacular, or odd make a deliberate effort to consider ordinary, commonplace, or mundane causes or explanations. (Levy, 1997, p. 218)

This is a tendency that often shows up around spiritual experiences. For example, instead of considering a spiritual experience to be a part of human experience, an explanation is invoked with the physical presence of a supernatural being, or perhaps an extraterrestrial one. Alternatively, an extraordinary explanation involving psychopathology might be invoked to account for spiritual experience, that the person experiencing it is mentally ill. Another variation on this theme is looking for extraordinary explanations like extraterrestrials for extraordinary things like Stonehenge or the Great Pyramids.

The Assimilation Bias: A schema is a mental structure that organizes our preconceptions, thereby providing a framework for understanding new events and future experiences. Accommodation means to modify our schema to fit incoming data; assimilation, in contrast, means to fit incoming data into our schema. In general, we are more prone to assimilate than to accommodate, even if this entails altering or distorting the data. Thus, assimilation can profoundly bias our perceptions of reality.

Antidotes: Don't underestimate the extent to which your prior beliefs, knowledge, and expectations (schemata) can affect your current experience, impressions, and perceptions. Try to become as aware as possible of schemata that are important to you; awareness of schemata increases your ability to modify them. Experiment with temporarily lowering or altering your “perceptual filters” or “schema-colored glasses” by attempting to understand someone else's subjective (phenomenological) experience. Learn to differentiate your use of assimilation versus accommodation, particularly when you are faced with a discrepancy between your beliefs (schemas) and the information (data). Beware of the general tendency to assimilate, rather than to accommodate. Prod yourself to accommodate when, out of habit, reflex, or just sheer laziness, you would typically be inclined to automatically assimilate. Strive toward flexibility; guard against “hardening of the categories.” (Levy, 1997, p.220)

This is a very big issue because it involves the nature of how we go about making sense of the world. Assumptions about this are rarely explicit, rarely even conscious, and there is a natural resistance to making them conscious so that they can be examined or stated explicitly. This is the psychological mechanism that lies behind the often overused phrase of “paradigm shift.” However, we often focus on the accepted paradigm or schemata to the extent of ignoring data. If we really seek to understand we must be willing to change our schema when holding on to it means choosing an idea over the reality.

The Confirmation Bias: We more actively seek out information that will confirm our prior beliefs and expectations than information that might refute them.

Antidotes: Be aware of the ways in which you search for evidence, such as the questions that you ask, may lead you to arrive selectively only at those conclusions that corroborate your initial beliefs. Make it a point to seek out evidence that could, in principal, disconfirm your prior expectations. (Levy, 1997, pp. 220-221)

This is a ubiquitous tendency that not only serves as a filter for the evidence that we seek out, but it also shapes the sources of evidence, and more, the sources of data we use for understanding the world as a whole. So that we can see this both as a bias in actively seeking and also in the types of information we may be exposed to through various channels of information. One of the reasons for the extreme political polarization in the US are the many sources of information that are "pre-biased" in that they only present information that confirms their intended audience's beliefs and expectations. The recent influence of the neo-conservative movement grew out of plans that take advantage of this bias. Think-tanks were funded to provide content, various channels of information were turned into soapboxes for this viewpoint and for information and opinion that confirmed it. This ended up doing the disservice of effectively undermining serious considerations of disconfirming and critical information.

This bias takes us back to the consideration of Gnosis as transformative, as it is another tendency to try to avoid data and information that may lead to or require a transformation if only of our beliefs.

The Belief Perseverance Effect: We have a tendency to stubbornly cling to our beliefs, sometimes even in the face of disconfirming evidence. This is especially likely to occur when we feel personally invested in our beliefs. Thus, when these beliefs are challenged, we feel impelled to protect them, almost as if we were protecting ourselves. One consequence of this phenomenon is that it generally requires much more compelling evidence to change our beliefs than it did to create them in the first place.

Antidotes: Keep an open mind to different, and especially challenging, points of view. Remind yourself (and others as well) to think carefully about how you evaluate evidence and to monitor your biases closely as you formulate your conclusions. Make it a point to actively counterargue your preexisting beliefs. That is, ask yourself directly in what ways your beliefs might be wrong. When faced with a discrepancy between your beliefs and the facts, resist the natural tendency to assume that your beliefs are right and the facts must somehow be wrong. (Levy, 1997, p. 221)

A vast preponderance of evidence against a belief or position is rarely enough to provoke serious reconsideration by those who hold it. The reason is often that of identity, we identify with a belief or position and thereafter defend it as if it were ourselves. This can be used strategically as a type of fallacy by a pretense of acknowledging a belief or position as established as a part of a communal identity. This can be seen in accepting the statements of authority as if we were convinced by them as arguments. So we need to be careful not only in the beliefs or positions we may hold individually, but also those we may hold by virtue of our identification with, or participation in, a communal identity.

A further technique for resisting this bias is not to base our identity upon belonging to a group and participating in that communal identity. Even basing one's identity of being an independent or non-conformist evokes this bias.

Also bear in mind that this effect involves more than consciously adopted or considered beliefs. We can see it in the strong influences of cradle creeds on subsequent religious considerations. This is the effect of one's original religious upbringing or culture on both of the contents of religious beliefs, and beliefs about religion. These survive in many respects regardless of whether or not the original religion was rejected—shaping the way any religion is approached.

The most compelling and frequent evidence one is likely to encounter is the holding of positions critical of religious groups that where rivals of the cradle creed, or of religious aspects rejected by it. One example is that of someone opposed to official clergy in a neo-pagan setting, not realizing that this is due to the rejection of official clergy in their Quaker upbringing. Another is that of someone rejecting the use of statues and incense in a Buddhist temple, not realizing that this is due to a protestant rejection of such things as they were associated with Roman Catholic practice in another culture and religion altogether, but remaining as a personal belief from childhood. A way to recognize when this is happening is when the reasons given for the beliefs are the same as those of the cradle creed. For if it were the result of an independent consideration, why would it have such ties to the reasoning of another religious tradition?

Remember that the “truth” of a belief is only one reason for holding a belief, and is often less compelling than other reasons for maintaining it. Be careful about what you choose to believe and how you choose to believe it. Having a provisional or pragmatic attitude towards knowledge can aid in the “costs” of maintaining a belief. Rather than being “true” in some absolute sense, a belief may be “the best account” of the situation and therefore subject to improvement.

Also remember the limitations of context on constructing knowledge. A “truth” in one area does not make a universal “Truth,” for example.

Conclusions

Hopefully, these brief considerations show not only the importance of critical thinking and sound argumentation, but also its real power of emancipation. For its real purpose isn't to “win” arguments or to not appear to be intellectually lazy, but its real purpose is as a tool for liberation. To avoid fallacies and counteract biases isn't just to have good form, it is to be free from their traps. Gnostic texts speak of the Archons, Greek for “the powers,” that keep us ignorant and serving them. What they meant by this was much broader, but we can also see it in this context. If we do not set ourselves free from outworn beliefs, from schemata that blind us, from what defends us from change and transformation, and from other errors of thought and judgment—we are under their power, and are more easily kept ignorant.

We may attempt to not be persuaded by the beliefs and arguments of others, but even then, we are still under the influence of our own. The freeing of our thinking minds is aided in arming ourselves with tools such as those outlined above, and consciously considering our schemata (paradigms or frameworks for understanding) and our beliefs. It is only a part of who we are, and for some of us it is more central to the living of our lives than for others. Thinking is one of four functions identified by Jung. It is one way to assess and to judge. So, if we are one of those who are more guided by it, we must be all the more diligent in obtaining what freedom we can for it.

Levy, D. A. (1997). Tools for critical thinking: Metathoughts for psychology. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press.

Weston, A. (2000). A Rulebook for Arguments. (Third edition). Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing.
Highly recommended. An affordable, well-written, and concise book that covers the construction and forms of arguments, as well as, logical fallacies.

Gnostic Church Signs #3

2007-04-25T02:53:00.000-06:00

On Theology

2007-04-13T02:33:00.000-06:00

"It is one thing to speak of God; it is quite another thing to know God."

- Staretz Silouan of Mount Athos (1866-1938)

The Challenge

2007-04-12T13:22:00.000-06:00

Our hope for this special issue is that the field of Religious Studies may take guidance from the field of Consciousness Studies. This will entail a renewed emphasis on religious experience in the study of religion, which seems only appropriate considering the significant degree to which traditions themselves stress the importance of these experiences. The meditative schools of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Taoism, not to mention Kabbalah and mystical Christianity, all stress direct experience of the profound. Figures such as Sankara, Meister Eckhart, Nagarjuna and countless others all have stressed the necessity of integrating experience along side conceptuality, and using it to sharpen one's views. To do justice to these traditions and inspirational figures, we must give full attention to the description and analysis of experiential realities.

It is time for the field of scholarship to remove the barriers that have constrained our vision. A range of approaches illuminate reality, which itself reflects interactive and reflexive causes, requiring a range of methodological glasses. It is time to look through all of them, and to see religion and human life in the richly complex hues that they are. (Andresen & Forman, 2000)

Andresen, J. & Forman, R. K. C. (eds.) (2000). Cognitive models and spiritual maps. Thorverton, UK: Imprint Academic.
A book reprinting the Journal of Consciousness Studies, 7, No. 11-12, 2000

Gathering a Circle

2007-03-24T17:26:00.000-06:00

Thanks to everyone who attended the Inner Sea Gnostic Circle gathering on the 22^nd. Nine people at one gathering is a new record. There were a number of new faces, although a majority had attended a gathering before.

It was an interesting and diverse group. With so many people multiple conversions start and I didn't get a chance to spend as much time as I'd like with everyone. So, after Holy Week, I'll try to schedule time with all of you individually, or in pairs as the case may be.

Gatherings will be scheduled monthly, as well as, movie nights and other activities. Thanks again, I look forward to seeing you all soon.

Last Chance for 2007 Gnostic Calendars

2007-03-17T18:04:00.000-06:00

There will be one last opportunity to order a 2007 Gnostic calendar. Holy Week begins on April 1^st this year so orders will be taken only through March 31^st.

Each year's calendar is quite unique, and will not be offered at a discount at a latter time. If you would like a copy of the 2007 calendar, make sure you order it before March 31^st.

Walk on the Ocean

2007-03-08T00:30:00.000-07:00

Today the conference started. Yesterday I walked out the front door of my friend's apartment building in the Sunset area of San Francisco, crossed the street, and walked onto the beach. I miss the ocean when I am away from it for too long. Which is odd, because I had only been to the ocean once in my childhood, something I can barely remember.

The first time I really remember was riding with two other reservists from summer camp at Fort Lewis in Washington out to the ocean, almost two decades ago. My experience then really was sublime. Raised in a valley, my mind is not used to seeing expansive horizons. It likes to turn distant fog and mist into distant hills and mountains. When I lived down the coast in Pacifica I finally got to a point where my mind wasn't filling in the blanks like that, but it took months. Yesterday when I wasn't thinking about it, there they were, mirages of land on the distant horizon.

In a famous experiment, subjects were shown playing cards and asked to name them. The trick was that there where odd cards, like red spades. Most often the card was reported without hesitation, yet given more time there was uncertainty, and given even more time most subjects could point out the oddity. Some subjects, however, simply could not see the oddities in the cards. Instead they experienced anxiety and felt that they didn't know what a playing card was anymore.

Our minds work like that, we don't notice it very often. Sometimes they simply can't handle something so far beyond the familiar. As Gnostics we often are beyond the edge of the familiar, and perhaps we most often see what we expect to see rather than what is there before our eyes. We must be careful and flexible. In our desire to see and to know, we must not merely 'see' what we expect to see, or 'know' what we merely think we know.

Back to School, Back to San Francisco

2007-02-21T12:21:00.000-07:00

I'm heading back to graduate school, the one I wanted to attend originally. I'll also be going back to San Francisco for the first time since I moved back to Salt Lake six years ago.

The school I'll be attending is primarily distance learning, but includes conferences twice a year. This has always struck me as a good model, and is one of the models that has influenced the Gnosis Institute (with annual conferences planed). The school is Saybrook Graduate School, and it has been using this model for 35 years. It was founded as an institute for humanistic psychology in a time when academic psychology was much more influenced by behaviorism.

What kept me from attending Saybrook years ago were concerns about becoming licensed as a therapist. I had once planned on pursuing my interest in C. G. Jung's work to the point of becoming a Jungian Analyst, a process of study and formation that begins after one is a licensed and practicing therapist. However, the American Psychological Association had been working for years reforming licensing, seeking more of a medical model than an academic one. This resulted in Doctor of Psychology and Marriage and Family Therapy programs to follow the new models and meet the new requirements. This was a factor in my moving to the bay area years ago, to get employment and eventually to attend a school there.

I found employment there. I tend to do well when the work is the emphasis of the job, and not so well when it is on perception and company politics. At that point in the bay area in the technical field, it was mostly about the work, and I succeeded and excelled. So much so, that I stayed with a pioneering and (momentarily) successful company in silicon valley, which lead me to take the graveyard shift to avoid the traffic (and to use more than two gears), leaving me out of sync and far from campus. When my father's health worsened, and an opportunity to transfer in my company opened up, I didn't even think about not being able to attend the school after I moved, because I hadn't been able to do so anyway.

I considered Saybrook a few times after I moved back to Salt Lake, but it didn't seem like a viable option. Using my technical credentials to satisfy requirements for a technical degree appealed for a short time, and, as my circumstances changed, I considered things I hadn't considered before, like Law school, and a combination of Law and Social Work. Perhaps, if I hadn't spent the previous years learning so many systems—systems of networking, computer operating systems, programing systems—I may have gotten further when I decided to try some of it out. But, I was impatient to get beyond all of these partly arbitrary, partly logical, almost entirely artificial systems, not spend more years learning even more systems, only to then work within their confines.

After I had some time to recover from one of the worst and most cult-like companies I've ever worked for, I started approaching all of this afresh. I had been thinking in terms of professional credentials, but having earned some of the highest and most respected in the technical field, the main result was being essentially unemployable in the area I lived in. Facing mortality also helps with considerations of “what do I want to do in the short term, or eventually, or before I die?” I most enjoy learning and exploring, the process of inquiry, which also includes teaching and writing to further explore, consider, and share. These paralleled considerations that lead to the Gnosis institute: a nexus for a learning community, exploring unimaginably valuable and relatively undeveloped fields.

So, I'm back in school. The book I'm working on will be broken down into smaller projects along the way, and probably have it's first incarnation as a dissertation. The program is one you can do at your own pace, and I plan to pick up the pace. The first year will probably be the hardest. So, I don't know how much time I will have for other things. I plan on producing a calendar for next year, and to still record homilies. The podcasts will have less editing for certain, as that is a task that always takes far longer than I anticipate.

The journey begins with a journey back to San Francisco. Not only is it my first time back, it will be the first trip I've taken in quite a while. The Salt Lake area really is a nice place to visit. But it can be a downright strange place to work, and a fairly odd place to live at times. Visiting other areas regularly has been my strategy for living here, to regularly re-center outside of the isolating tendency of local geography and culture. With this practice, and an unusual employer or self-employment, living in Salt Lake can be quite nice, if still a bit odd. This trip is the first of regular visits to San Francisco while I'm in school, and I hope the first of a few other trips that may be possible.

Anniversary Weekend in Portland, 3/24-25

2007-02-05T23:48:00.000-07:00

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the ordination of Rev. Fr. Steven Marshall, pastor of the Queen of Heaven Gnostic Church, the Portland parish of the Ecclesia Gnostica. Many of you will know him as the author of the many homilies on the Gnosistic Society's Gnosis.org website.

This year marks another landmark anniversary as this April marks the 40th anniversary of the consecration of Most Rev. Stephan Hoeller, presiding bishop of the Ecclesia Gnostica.

The dedication required to do this work is laudable in itself, but the dedication to continue this work for decades is hard to imagine. Going through the long and difficult work to become a priest, and then really just beginning. Holding liturgical services when only a few may attend, and doing so year after year. Working with all kinds of people with all kinds of expectations about what Gnosticism, a church, or a priest should be. Being there for people mostly through difficult times, presiding at more funerals than weddings. Seeing many more people start the formation process to become clergy than finish it. Going on after the inevitable conflicts, through the inevitable cycles. Continuing when there is little support, and rising to the greater demands that come with a larger congregation. So that you can be there for those who may benefit from your service. This is not an easy path, and bears little if any resemblance to what people expect it to be. And, it is not a paid job, not a source of income, it costs and you have to do other things to pay for it.

Join the celebration in Portland if you are able. Anniversary Weekend will be held on March 24th and 25th in Portland. Dr. Stephan Hoeller, in town for the celebration, will give a lecture Saturday on the Gospel of Judas. This will be followed by a buffet dinner at a Thai restaurant. On Sunday morning, Bishop Hoeller will celebrate the Eucharist service.

Please, send your donation towards an anniversary gift, as a token of appreciation for such service, to:

S. Poe
QOHGC Secretary
P. O. Box 418,
Gladstone, OR 97027

Make Checks payable to “Queen of Heaven Gnostic Church.”

Death and Gnosis

2007-01-08T13:33:00.000-07:00

To know that someone you love is going to die is one thing. It is in many ways provisional. Not that they or we won't die at some point, but the details are uncertain. I have known people who have outlived their diagnoses for decades, for example. It is also a different type of knowledge, in Greek this is episteme. You know it like a fact. It may change things, but it doesn't necessitate a change in you.

When that someone does die it is another thing. It is not provisional, not uncertain. There is no going back. There is the fact of it, but there is also more. It is a different type of knowledge, in Greek this is gnosis. It changes you. It is knowledge that changes you.

You cannot explain this to someone who has not gone through it. For them there is only the fact, not the change. Yet for those who have been through this, it is a profound example of the profound difference that is Gnosis.

This Night your Soul is required of You

Gnoscast the Gnostic Podcast Episode 5

2006-12-18T03:31:00.000-07:00

Illuminating the Da Vinci Code Seminar 2

Our Stories of Stories: The Nature of Sacred Stories

What stories do we tell about stories, and what do they tell about us?

Stories, and particularly, sacred stories shape our lives. Yet we also shape them. This seminar considered their nature and our relationship to them

Recorded: Sept. 19, 2006

Happy Birthday Philip K. Dick!

2006-12-15T02:50:00.000-07:00

His birthday is Saturday the 16th, but why not start early?

Kindred in Spirit

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