The Gnostic Myth of Creation

 THE CREATION OF THE FULLNESS

Gnostic Warriors believed that God, the Father of Truth is unrestrained, and unfathomable. Therefore God cannot be given a precise description. He is immeasurable, without beginning or end and is the absolute starting point of all things. He contains all things without being contained. Everything including the world lies within the Father and continues to be part of him. God reveals himself through a process of emanations in a successive array of beings while maintaining unification.

Gnostic Warriors agree that God consists of both masculine and feminine qualities. This is in conflict to conventional Jewish and orthodox Christian depictions of God in completely masculine terms. The Father can be realized as a male-female dyad. This is linked to the view that God bestows the universe with both substance and formation .

The element through which God provides the universe with substance can be recognized as feminine. In this aspect he is called Silence,. Silence is God's original state of equanimity and consciousness. She is the dynamic inventive Thought that makes all following conditions of being significant.

The masculine facet of God which furnishes the universe with form is called by the name Bythos which means Depth. Depth is the overwhelmingly inconceivable, comprehensive feature of the divinity. He is fundamentally unchanging. Only when stirred to action by his feminine Thought, does he gives the universe structure.

Gnostic Warriors stress the unity of the Father. They point out that these two facets of the deity are not truly individual beings. They function as synchronized conditions of being inside the Godhead. They are like fire and heat or like water and wetness. They are indivisible and one cannot be conceived without the other.

The beginning of the universe is expressed as an emanation of successive states of being from God. In the beginning, there was nothing at all created and the Father rested in himself as a inert unitary entity . The universe existed only as a possibility, not in actuality. This process required self-limitation on the part of God. In order that successive states of being (Aeons) remain separate from him. God created a border or Limit. The Limit, also called the Cross, has two roles. It divides the spiritual world from God. This achieved, the Father of Truth then was able to reveal himself in a conceivable form through a series of emanations.

God emanates his only begotten son. Like God, the Son is also genderless and commonly conceived as a male-female dyad. The masculine aspect or Aeon of the Son is referred to as Only-Begotten, Mind and Father of All. His feminine aspect is called Truth and Mother of All. They represent how truth can only be grasped by the truly conscious mind. The Son is the Beginning of all things that follow. The Son is the understandable image of the unfathomable characteristics of God. It is only through the Son’s intervention that we can know the unknowable God, the connection between the Father and the Son can be compared to the correlation between the human mind and the unconscious.

Enthused by the Father, the Son sets in motion a course of action that reveals the energies inherent within his personality. He then emanates four more Aeons. The first pair comprised of Word (male) and Life (female). They were produced in the image of Depth and Silence and signify how true life stem from the divine expression. The second pair comprised of Humanity (male) and Church (female). They were created in the image of Mind and Truth and correspond to the natural state of humanity attached to the church.

The initial Four and these four lesser Aeons are jointly represented as the original Eight. These Eight are the starting place and essence of all things. All other things have their genesis from them. The Eight are comprehensive in themselves - a fullness within the Fullness. The cosmos was created and sustained by this set of forces called the Ogdoad. These are the primary channels of divine emanation. The relationship between the original Eight to the light of God is comparable to the way the Physical body relates to the soul, through the body we express the soul. The Ogdoad together comprise everything from their realm on down. Everything we imagine or think is encompassed by the original Eight. Everything we can observe was brought forth and sustained by them. Each of the Aeons that comprise the Ogdoad has its own individual role, so that Eight different functions go into the creative process. However each Aeon has various levels and is therefore an extremely complicated entity.

Consequently, eighteen less vital Aeons were brought forth, ten from Word and Life and twelve from Humanity and Church. They signify a further emanation and expression of personality within the Son.

The ten Aeons Word and Life brought forth were in reverence of Depth and Silence. Their names are:
male female
Deep------------Mingling
Unaging---------Union
Self-Begotten----Pleasure
Immovable-------Mixture
Only-Begotten--Blessed(Unity)
 

The ten Aeons embody cosmic principals which are essential as a source of ethical life. Take notice of the male terms corresponding to permanence with the female terms in relation to sexuality. This union of balancing qualities represents an idyllic state of being.

The twelve Aeons engendered by Humanity and Church were in tribute of Mind and Truth . Their names are given as:
male female
Consoler---------Faith
Paternal---------Hope
Maternal---------Love
Ever-flowing-----Understanding
Ecclesiastical---Blessedness
The Ordained-----Wisdom(Sophia)

The Twelve personify the features of an ideal humanity which Christianity is intended to generate.

This process of emanation of the divine Fullness can be compared to the growth of a plant from a seed or to the sending forth of rays of light from the stars . Gnostics conceived of the universe in terms of a series of spheres having a common center . The Son is encompassed by the Father, the Fullness of Aeons is encompassed by the Son.

Thus, even in the assortment of Aeons, the union of the Godhead is preserved. Individually they are incomplete ; only together do the Aeons constitute the complete Fullness of the Godhead.

Each of the thirty Aeons contain further Aeons and each of these further Aeons contain further Aeons to form an inifinite number of Aeons.

Each Aeon possesses infinite power , certainly in terms of our understanding of power. However it is essential to understand that an Aeon never should act alone . It is similar to the human body , one organ never acts separately of the others. There is an elementary equilibrium that exists. Even if one organ is overactive or underactive, somehow it is linked to everything else in the body that is going on. Surely the organ does not act entirely by itself.

This spiritual realm signifies a Christian model for the life of this world. The Eight correspond to the great inspirations which lie beneath all rational life. The Ten personify the permanence and unanimity of the Godhead. The Twelve symbolize the virtues shaped by the perfected humanity through unification with the Church. The life of each of the Aeons is enhanced only through membership in the Fullness as a whole. At this point, the 26 Aeons produced by the Son are psychologically distinct entities. They represent nintegrated elements of the Son's personality.

The Son alone had perfect knowledge of the supreme Father . To all of the other Aeons the Father remained unseen and unfathomable.. Saint Paul refers to this when he discusses "the mystery hidden from the ages (Aeons) in God". This situation is a natural conclusion of the process of self-limitation by which the Aeons were created. They could not continue to exist otherwise. The Aeons can only know the Father through the intervention of the Son.

All of the Aeons wished to know their source. According to Gnostics, the search of the Aeons for the Father led inescapably to ruin ignorance of the Father caused anxiety and dread. And the tension grew thick like a fog, so that none could see. Thus error found power...Without having learned to know the truth, she entered a material body, preparing by means of the power, in beauty, a substitute for the truth. This "substitute for the truth" is the material universe and mankind are the Aeons who have descended into error and taken up residence in a human body.

Gnostics use the myth of Wisdom (Sophia) as a metaphor to describe this degeneration into error. According to this myth, the yearning to know the Father passed to Wisdom, the youngest of the Twelve. For the benefit of the entire Fullness, she took up the pursuit to know the Father of Truth. However, she endeavor to know God without the intervention of the Son , something that is unachievable. As a result of this flawed way of thinking, she became alienated from her consort and fell into a state of error and anguish. Wisdom's faulty Thinking is depicted as an abortion which she created because she yearned to experience the Father. In her effort to be acquainted with the Father, she was, in a way, trying to beckon him forth. However, all she brought forth was the substandard Thinking which is described as an "abortion". In her lack of knowledge, Wisdom suffered sorrow, dread and bewilderment.

In her anguish, she ask forgiveness and began to pray for help. The other Aeons were also distraught and joined her petition. By means of a second Limit, she was divided into a superior and lesser self. Her lower self (the "abortion") along with the suffering were barred from the Fullness. The higher Wisdom was cured and restored to her consort persuaded that God is beyond understanding.

Wisdom's trial proved to isolate the imperfection inherent in the Fullness. The "abortion" is an expression of the longing shared by all of the Aeons for knowledge of the Father. The consequence of this course of action is that the lower Wisdom (i.e. the aborted Thinking) was ensnared outside the Fullness in a lower dominion of lack of knowledge and affliction. This process is in accord with what is ordained by the Father. This the reason Wisdom's consort is called the Ordained.

In order that this kind of catastrophe would never occur again, the Son revealed himself to the other Aeons in the form of Christ (male) and the Holy Spirit (female). Their actions amid the Aeons signifys an archetype of the ministry of Jesus and the Spirit to the earthly church.

As Christ, the Son exposed to the other Aeons that the Father is unfathomable and that the truth can only be recognized through him. The Holy Spirit taught them to give thanks and made them all equivalent.

This is baptism in the fullest sense of the word. It applies both to the Aeons and to the human Church. All of the Aeons then united together and became integrated in the Son who is also called Savior. The Son who revealed himself as the wealth and diversity of divine energies is thereby reconciled and unified. All of the various aspects of the Son are integrated into a single personality.

The Savior is fated to be the bridegroom of the lower Wisdom expelled outside of the Limit who is end result of the dismay of the Aeons. The Savior is connected with an entourage of angels who are the archetype of the spiritual element present in every Christian. Like rays of the sun, they are not separate or self-reliant entities. To a certain extent, they represent the vibrant intensity of Jesus.

Consequently the fall, of the lower Wisdom was confined in a lower realm along with the imperfection and agony. This lower dominion or "deficiency" is the material universe. Just as the Fullness is a design of the Son and lies within him, so also the material universe is a creation of the Fullness and lies within it . The material universe is external in relation to the Fullness only with regard to Gnosis . Just as the material universe developed as an outcome of ignorance, it will be dissolved through Gnosis.

The lower Wisdom is often called "Achamoth" from the Hebrew word for wisdom and "Holy Spirit" after the one with Christ. She is the heavenly Jerusalem and the lost sheep of the parable (Matthew 18:11-14). Confined in a lower realm and unaware of her true origin, she is the representation of the individual person.

She was persistent with her pointless pursuit to know God without knowing Christ but she was barred from rising to the Fullness by the Limit. As a result of her lack of understanding, she persisted to go through emotional sufferings of grief, fear and confusion. She experienced the world as an existence of delusion and she was incapable to differentiate truth from her own imagination. This state of false impressions and distress is the fundamental nature of the world experienced by all those who are unaware of God.

Then Wisdom (Sophia) experienced a transformation and contemplated about the ones who had given her life. Consequently she became joyful. She began to implore them for help. Her pleading are a state of being intermediate between ignorance and spiritual understanding. Since they signify the yearning for the divine, the beseeching and transformation became incarnate as an entity labeled the "Demiurge". He symbolizes the flawed image that those who are ignorant erroneously deify as "God".

In reply to Wisdom's beseeching, the Savior came outside the Fullness into the material world with his group of angels. He and Wisdom (Sophia) were united together as a pair of Aeons. Through knowledge of the everlasting Pleroma she was freed of delusion and misery.

Wisdom (Sophia) express joy at the vision of the Savior and his angels, and brought forth spiritual seeds in their likeness. These seeds are the spiritual ingredient implanted in every Christian. For this reason the seeds are associated with the Church. They correspond to the pre-existent Church in the Fullness. The feminine seeds and the male guardian angel are what is referred to by the statement, "In the image of God he created them, male and female he created them". Just as the Savior is the bridegroom of Wisdom (Sophia), so also the angels will be the bridegrooms of the seeds at the end of the days.

Three substances came into existence from Wisdom (Sophia) as a consequence of her pursuit to know God. First the delusion which characterizes everyday existence came from lack of knowledge and affliction. Second came transformation and beseeching which characterizes a transitional stage between unawareness and gnosis. Last the spiritual seed arrived from her knowledge (gnosis).

The myth of Wisdom's torment and eventual deliverance can be recognized as an allegory of an individual's spiritual maturity. The seeking of God through Thoughts alone, without knowing Christ leads to anguish and a flawed conception of God as an anthropomorphic creator and lawgiver. It is only through the participation of the Savior, that these flawed thoughts can be forgotten and true knowledge can be realized.

 

  

CIRCLE with a DOT in the center: In the complex symbolic system of Gnosticism, the dot represents the Savior. Together, the circle and the dot symbolize the unification of the Aeons.