Gnosticism

Last update: 21 Apr 2025 21:17
First version: 9 July 2022

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Yet Another Inadequate Placeholder

I feel a bit dubious creating this notebook, because I find Williams's argument that there was no such thing persuasive. (Not that I have any qualifications to an opinion on the matter!) But I am also interested in "religious movements of late antiquity which look really weird in retrospect, particularly those close to what we would recognize as 'Christianity' or 'Judaism'," which is a bit of a mouthful.

Update, 12 April 2025: Thanks to Lukasz Lamza for pointing me at a number of resources on post-Williams scholarship which rehabilitate the concept. (The volume edited by Trompf et al. includes a contribution from Williams.)

Also: whether or not there was something worth calling "Gnosticism" in antiquity, the idea that there was has been an important and influential part of modern thinking about history, religion, and (especially) esotericism...

See also:
• Classical Era (Mediterranean)
• Reception and Appropriations of Classical Culture
• Religion

Recommended:
• Michael Allen Williams, Rethinking "Gnosticism": An Argument for Dismantling a Dubious Category

To read:
• David Brakke, The Gnostics: Myth, Ritual, and Diversity in Early Christianity/cite>
• Dylan M. Burns, Apocalypse of the Alien God: Platonism and the Exile of Sethian Gnosticism
• April D. DeConick, The Gnostic New Age: How a Countercultural Spirituality Revolutionized Religion from Antiquity to Today
• Hans-Joachim Klimkeit, Gnosis on the Silk Road
• Bentley Layton and David Brakke (ed. and trans.), The Gnostic Scriptures
• M. David Litwa, The Evil Creator: Origins of an Early Christian Idea
• Garry W. Trompf, Gunner B. Mikkelsen and Jay Johnston (eds.), The Gnostic Worldszubok, collapse