Gnosticism vs. Kabbalism, FITE!

i.e. is culture a battlefield where the divine is given earthly form, or is culture the hunt for fragments of the divine. And are those fragments enlightening through the ecstatic instant or prolonged and serious study?

The latter. And both.

Interesting question Sterling. I'm not an expert on either, but they both have their roots in Jewish/Egyptian/Persion mysticism don't they? I think you've got to prepare for the ecstatic instant through serious study, otherwise you become lost and disoriented e.g. psychosis.

yeah if you get into that stuff @ yr age you will certainly go insane. bill fosby told me & he knew.

let's all build a GOLEM!!

I second the golem suggestion. anyone got a good shem for his forehead?

I have some friends off to Prague in a week or so, I'll get them to bring back a suitcase of clay from the river bed. Anyone got a nice big oven (gas). Then we're sorted. Or what about making lots of tiny golems instead -- then we can all have one each.

Hasn't Anthony Gormley done that already?

that was just art: this will be MAGIC!!

Mark, what do you reckon to the Royal Tenenbaums?

i larfed non-stop and so did dr vick

SIX sinker you mentalist

I like to give the Gods an earthly form. I find it easier. Anyway, that's all there is to it. Don't you see, it was all metaphors?

I give up.

Should I make a golem this weekend?

You're making a Golem at the weekend? Won't it go mad?

Anyone read Elaine Pagels' "The Gnostic Gospels?"

I have ... I don't like Pagels generally, but that's the one to read. (The problem I have with other Pagels books is that her work on gnosticism is what made her famous, so she reads it into everything, to the detriment of her scholarship.)

I see what you're saying. I've actually only read the Gnostic Gospels and part of her Satan book, which seemed to tread upon the same lines (although the historical context she's working in is one I've always been fascinated with).

The Satan book is good for what it is -- it's just not what it sounds like, if you see what I mean. The gnosticism angle tinges everything. (Granted, this is a bias I've picked up because when I read a lot of other books, I have to wade through arguments against Pagels which are necessary only because she's so well-known). If I had a better connection right now, I'd hit my Amazon wishlist to remind myself of the author of "Rethinking Gnosticism" -- which seems to be a counter-argument against Pagels et al., but I haven't read it so can't say for sure. (I know he argues that gnostics were not as common as they are sometimes portrayed, and that many texts sometimes labeled "gnostic" weren't written by gnostics but were appropriated later -- but I have no idea what his evidence is.)

That sounds worth checking out. Thanks, Tep!

The Complete Gospels, edited by Funk, have the Gospel of Thomas, among other gnostic and semignostic texts.

Is that Funk, Hoover and the Jesus Project?

(Which, by the way, is the best band name that's not really a band name EVER.)

They are the same thing!

Any of you familiar with the idea that God = Satan = Lucifer = Christ = The Serpent = Adam = Metatron, etc.?

Or whatever names you choose to use. These names above simply represent ideas, anyway.

Point is, they are all aspects (ideas) of the "One." In other words, manifestation came as a result of Reason (the Universe is mental, thought becomes Reality): Spirit -> Air -> Fire -> Water -> Earth. The One created by separation, not by multiplication. First, One differentiated Self from Other. And then Both from All. Here, we have the first occurance of "Time". The relationship between A, B and C creates "Time." This separating or limiting aspect has been attributed to Saturn, which is where the name Satan comes from. In the Bible, of course, YHVH-Elohim (Jehovah God) gets the credit for Creation. And what is this creation but the illusion of separateness? So, here we have a relationship between God and Satan. Some Gnostics consider YHVH the Devil because he imprisoned us in this illusion of earthly matter.

If Reason is the thing that is "trapped" in matter, it is also the only way to free oneself from the "trap".  What else is there? There is only matter! With Reason, we have discovered Yoga, the Wisdom to Unite and the Understanding of Union. The Serpent of Temptation is the cause of delusion which tells you to believe your 5 senses, but The Serpent of Wisdom is the redeemer by right-thought and right-action, ie. discrimination. Not discrimination in order to differentiate but to discriminate to UNITE. So, this same power of reason and discrimination is used to cause either illusion or liberation; it is 2 sides of 1 pole of the same thing. Unity causes liberation, separation causes illusion. The is the Serpent of Temptation or Wisdom in Genesis. It is the mirror of Jehovah who says, "the world is as it is-- don't touch that Tree." The Serpent says, "the world isn't how it is, go ahead and eat from the Tree." This Serpent became "Satan" in the Christian version, but without the Jews' consent.

I think what is really trying to be explained is that manifestation happened out of necessity to distinguish "self" from "other". This is the Jehovah-action, the YHVH formula that manifests Thought into Reality. A key player in this was the idea of limits and time, represented by Bina and Saturn. But, the greater Reality is that it is nothing but an illusion. And this is tied right into the illusion; it is the flipside of "reality." Christianity got it all backwards and placed all the blame of the misery of the world on an imaginary "Satan." It is all the One "being." That One is us in our co-created hologram of a reality. The Serpent has nothing to do with "Satan." The Serpent is the logic of the Universe that swallows its own tail (Oroborous) and when it finds it's own ass again it says, "Hey, there I am! Wake up!" The Serpent is the DNA, the fibonacci, the swirling of galaxies, the swirling of Reason itself which can unlock the puzzle ("the First Swirlings"). It is also the Redeemer because it created all this and it can remember itself within each of us to liberate us from bondage. 666 is Kabbalistically the number for the Christ as well as the Beast!

More details here:
http://www.wisdomworld.org/additional/christianity/Satan-Jehovah.html

union of opposites, yo.

Gnostibbalism is the syncretic truth of the ages.