FINISHED READING - The Gnostics by Sean Martin

Hubby found this book on the charity table in Tesco.So it cost all of a pound. However, if you are looking for a basic, yet clear exposition of what Gnosticism is and how this has manifested through out human history, then you could do no worse than read Sean Martin's book. It begins in the early centuries of the Christian era. What was to become Roman Catholicism was only one of many ways of interpreting the message of Jesus. Martin believes what became Gnosticism originated in the cross fertilisation between the message of Jesus and the Jewish Kabbala. Many early teachers such as Basilides and Marcion. and movements such as the Valentinians, Mandaens and Manichaeism arose and surged in popularity until they were declared heretical and suppressed. The eradication of The Cathars being just one example in history where alternative beliefs on the nature of Jesus's message, were so to speak 'taken out' by order of the Pope.

In recent years there has been a good deal of academic push back on the whole notion that anything as coherent as a 'Gnostic faith' ever existed. And its clear from reading this book, that it was really a multiplicity of diverse approaches that had a shared theme of the personal pursuit of 'gnosis'. The search for spiritual knowledge largely seen as an individual endeavour. There was also a distinctly non-hierarchical structure to its institutions, and a belief that the search for 'gnosis', and the offering of religious leadership, should be open to both men and women. Though it is true that what we refer to today as Gnosticism, was a real rag bag of cults and anti-establishment, reactionary movements. Ranging from belief systems that are frankly barking when viewed individually, to an unbelievably radical alternative lifestyle.

Though 'Gnosticism' was mostly eradicated by medieval times, its basic principles lingered on in a wide variety of individuals and movements. So 'gnosis' can be detected in early alchemy and more broadly Hermeticism. It was very definitely foundational to the work of William Blake, Goethe and the writings of Madam Blavatsky. As we move into the 20th century and the rediscovery of many 'Gnostic' texts in 1945 in Nag Hammadhi, it began seeping into pop culture through the writings of Carl Jung, Philip K Dick, and films such as The Matrix. As a consequence its gained quite a lot of undeserving 'alternative' kudos.

Martin's assertion at the end of this book that Gnosticism's re-emergence pre-war was in order to save the world from political and religious fundamentalism, is, to be frank, the most wishful of wishful thinking. It owes a lot of its present day appeal to it chiming in with modern prejudices - its trenchant individualism, anti-establishment non hierarchical nature, also its permissive and egalitarian, and also romanticised, by being seen as saintly for being martyred and violently suppressed. The problem so far as practicing Gnosticism goes, is that it lacks theological coherence, ranging vaguely across far too many wildly differing viewpoints to really be that useful as a complete philosophy for living. 

CARROT REVIEW - 5/8