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The Gnostic version of Christianity has been making a comeback inside the church, which hasn't had to deal with it for centuries. The book of Jude in the Bible is dedicated to dealing with them. All the denominations in the Americas and Europe are suffering from this attack of doctrines of demons. What is ultimate Gnostic Theology? The Gnostic secret religion began several hundred years before Christ. The Gnostic itself means "knowledge," but it assumed knowledge could be found through mysticism. But mysticism means gaining information from supernatural (demonic) experiences. A great way to be guided by Satan's forces. Without any fixed standard of truth, they morph rather quickly. It contains a lot of Hindu and Buddhist concepts. There were over 100 Gnostic groups at one point. When Christianity was born & grew, the Gnostic religion came up with syncretic collection of "Christian" splinter movements from mystic guidance. The numerous documents contradict each other, of course, because they were merely devised to mislead Christians away from own their faith toward a secret, counterfeit theology of the Gnostics. The apostle Paul had to deal with them. In Ephesians and Colossians he counters the Gnostic heresy by co-opting its jargon to express Biblical truth. "Pleroma" was a technical term used by the Gnostics to refer to the totality of angels and "aeons" that supposedly mediated between God and humanity. We learn in these letters that Paul prays for the believers be "filled with all the pleroma of God" (Eph. 3:19),, that "It pleased God to have His pleroma live in His Son" (Col. 1:19), and "in Him (the Messiah), bodily, lives the pleroma of all that God is" (Col. 2:9). Paul takes the wind out of the Gnostics' sails by proclaiming that its aim of attaining the pleroma cannot be reached by leaving the body but by joining the Body of the Messiah through trusting in and being faithful to Yeshua, the Son of Jehovah.
The Basilidian sect of Gnostics of the second century One popular story of Gnostic beginnings makes the Judeo-Christian God, Jehovah, a warped creation of one of the Immortals named Sophia. She cast it aside, but it made the universe, trapping 'spirit' in filthy matter. Jehovah and Satan are the same entity, in their theology. Man was created, but were seduced by the attractions of filthy matter into ignorance. Man can learn the hidden knowledge of the inner self (god within) and become spiritually free from this filthy matter. Those who reach 'enlightenment' become "messengers of light" (like Buddhas) and get a free ticket to integration with the great Om (like the Buddhist earth mother). The Gnostic 'immortal ones', Abraxas (or Abrasax), and Sophia sent a spiritual 'Christ', bypassing this evil Jehovah, to teach this hidden knowledge. Abraxas embraces all contradictions and is the head of all the "immortal ones." That means he embraces both truth and lies. Demons are immortal and use truth & lies to get their ends. Thus When Mary & Joseph had a son, Jesus, he became possessed by this spirit, 'Christ'. This Christ never had his own physical existence. He therefore never died on the cross for our sins and never rose again for our eternal life. Christ's purpose was not to teach faith or works as fruit of faith, but knowledge of your own 'divinity.' The Gnostics, with help from demons, put their own teachings in the mouth of this mythical Jesus. Within this hidden knowledge were beliefs for escaping the clutches of this evil Jehovah. Since it was held that this evil Jehovah had entrapped the Spirit in matter, especially in man, through creation, it was therefore believed that stopping the propagation of physical life or not prolonging it was the best way to ultimately free the Spirit. Where marriage was permitted, sexual intercourse was absolutely forbidden (no contraceptives). Many types of sexual perversions were permitted in the libertine sects. Also, to disobey the laws of this evil Jehovah was justified to the Gnostics. These beliefs are nihilistic in that they promise spiritual life, but to no end, except to enter eternal catatonia. The conclusion of this doctrine of demons would be to wipe out all human life. "We are better off dead," one Gnostic told me.
Urantia Gnosticism of 1925 Another mutation of the Gnostic religion is called Urantia, written by Dr. Sadler in 1925 thru 1935 while in trance states. He pretended that someone else got the messages, but his own books were heavily quoted in the resulting book. He has the book say it was authored by supermortal extraterrestrials from other planets and star systems. As Christians know, demons are immortal and destined for hell. These demons name the earth Urantia; they claim to have been observing and guiding the evolution of our planet. True, Satan is called the god of this world. It has been under his thrall until Jesus Christ of Nazareth came. They say Christendom has distorted the true nature and teachings of Jesus Christ, and the time is now ripe for mankind to receive this "epochal revelation." Satan is also known as the father of lies. And we have authority to cast out all these "supermortals" by Jesus Christ of Nazareth. The book gets the trinity partly right -- but says the "eternal" son sent one of 700,000 creator Sons who came to Earth (or Urantia). And he didn't have a virgin birth or a crucifixion or a resurrection. God the Father sent an eternal spirit, called a Thought Adjuster, to guide every individual toward an increased understanding of him. They receive it when they make their first moral decision. Rejecting it leads ultimately to annihilation of personality, like the Jehovah's Witnesses teach. But sin enters into our hearts at the first moral decision, and with it, demonic influence. And there really is a hell; some people come back and report this is true. If a person "makes it', that's not the end of it. The person continues as an ascending citizen in the universe and travels through numerous worlds on a long, adventurous pilgrimage of growth and learning that eventually leads to God and residence on Paradise. Once again, some people who come back from death report back that ascendance to heaven is immediate. Most miracles are dismissed. All deliverances are dismissed. "Jesus" didn't consider himself to be anything important. "Jesus" was pushed into pretending to do miracles by the apostles. Numerous stories about "Jesus" were added to reinforce Dr. Sadler's theology. A lot of science of the 1920's was attributed to "Jesus", including things that have since been proven wrong. I'm sure other people, following their Gnostic "Thought Adjuster" will modify this yet again.
Gnosticism in the church today Carl Jung, a secret Gnostic, was led to use "decknamen" or Christian & scientific jargon for concepts in Gnostic teachings, to make them palatable to these audiences, while teaching his initiates what his terminology actually referred to. This tradition is carried on by "Christian" Gnostics today. For instance, the past presiding bishop of the Episcopal church, John Griswold, wrote,
A Gnostic interpretation of this follows. When the bishop speaks of "the divine" who is able to contain disparities and contradictions, he is referring to the Gnostic 'god', Abraxas. That's its description. The real Jehovah is not schizophrenic. The bishop speaks of the incarnation as having a "shadow side." In Gnosticism, all matter is filthy, including the poor man that the Gnostic 'Jesus' possessed. The bishop considers anyone who holds to only the one truth to be a negative epithet. In another incident, this same bishop wrote,
Again, a Gnostic interpretation is presented. He says that holding to only one answer (or truth) will fail us until the Gnostic spirit (collective unconscious) leads us into "truth", that all contradictions and divergent perspectives (definition of Abraxas) are "reconciled" (are encapsulated in, not brought to one) in the Gnostic "Christ" who is the expression of Abraxas. We must also contain all "truths" (contradictions) to become like Abraxas. Does it fit? For Gnostics, since disobeying an evil Jehovah is okay and the god, Abraxas, doesn't care, anything goes. Lying, hypocrisy, cheating and stealing are acceptable, so long as you don't get caught. And Christians with no sense of spiritual discernment just assume the best of these people, despite Jesus' warning to "Be ye wise as serpents, yet as innocent as doves." From the Gnostic perspective, the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer both have such sick, one-sided things to say. They need to be edited to be more accepting of the new Gnostic Knowledge. One obvious example is in the Episcopal baptismal Covenant on page 305: "Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons...?" We know from 1 John 5:11,12 that our Christ is not in all persons. In the Gnostic doctrine, the "Christ spirit" is in all persons in the form of the "collective unconscious." Inner knowledge (from demons that infest one) leads to "freedom." Fundamentalism and the concept of heresy are anathema. Gnostic doctrine teaches going for spiritual (read occult) power is acceptable and good. Everything 'spiritual' is good. That includes witchcraft, shamanism, Spiritism, New Age and occult. Amazing things can be done in the church with curses, hexes and spells. Votes can be thrown at conventions. Troublesome people can be gotten out of the way with a little curse or hex. Promotions are easy with spells. And we Christians are so materialistic, we don't think to watch for such things. According to Carl Jung, demons don't exist; they are merely manifestations of our personal unconscious. There are many ways to open your soul to inner knowledge (from the demons who come in). There's centering prayer, mind-blanking meditation, labyrinth walking, chanting, drumming, dancing, etc. Yoga (sun worship) makes you feel relaxed. Feng Shui increases the spiritual energy of your space. Etc, ad nauseum.
The Christian Response to this attack These doctrines of demons have power unto themselves to create a spiritual bondage. As we submit to advice, we are also submitting to the origin of that advice. This is how Satan took control of the world -- through control of Adam. The first temptation of Christ was good-sounding advice from Satan. The Christians need become spiritually aware or they will be run over by spirituality from Satan. Greater is He who is in us than he that is in the world -- if we employ Him through prayer and deliverance. We need to do a regular spiritual cleanup of those in the church and its grounds. We need to educate them about spiritual counterfeits from our perspective or they will hear about these things from Satan's perspective. Smoking them out is tough. They believe that since Jehovah is part Satan, there are no rules of behavior. Dishonesty, hypocrisy, sexual perversion and witchcraft are all permissible, even in the churches. If you don't have a gift of Prophecy, Word of Knowledge or Discerning of Spirits, you need to be a little tricky. The Gnostic liars would have a hard time publicly renouncing the foundations of their faith. I tried to get a resolution into the Florida Episcopal convention 2006 which said, "The Gnostic literature is anti-Christian works of fiction that contradict itself and should be given no credence at all." The Christians would have voted for it -- and then would have wondered about the people who voted against it or abstained. Unfortunately, it was suppressed on a technicality. Only we Christians have authority from the true Jesus of Nazareth to cast out demons. That includes the whole Gnostic pantheon, the false 'Jehovah', the false 'Jesus', the false 'Christ', the false 'Holy Spirit', the Babylonian pantheon, the ancient Egyptian pantheon, the Hindu pantheon, the Buddhist pantheon, etc. Jesus of Nazareth who came in the flesh truly is Lord of all! I have a spiritual cleanup webpage available out here that is very effective. Also, see my bookshelf for topics on true divine guidance and analysis of alternative medicine.
The above material was researched from:
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