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T Fool's Reviews > Gnosticism: New Light on the Ancient Tradition of Inner Knowing
Gnosticism: New Light on the Ancient Tradition of Inner Knowing
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The purpose is to give Gnosticism a 'good name'. Clean up misunderstanding, establish a valid pedigree among recognized religions.
So it proceeds historically. Documents from ancient sources are negative, but suggest why gnostic ideas were spurned. Hoeller prefers to follow Nag Hammadi texts to establish an alternative, positive case. He finds a trail of ideas through suggestive connections with Mandaean and Manichean traditions, with Templars, with Cathars, with Theosophists, up to Jung.
Let the scholars handle that.
What the book might do, what it should do, in order to vindicate the value of gnostic ideas, is show how it operates?
If the found world is indeed corrupt -- evil -- why gloss over how a gnostic practitioner might still delight over a warm, sunny day, over the pleasure of a bird's song, over any touching music? Over laughter among friends, over friendship itself? Hoeller seems to suggest a gnostic believer doesn't reject such things.
And if ceremonial, canonical, Gnostic practice brings one to the prime spiritual release -- akin to Eastern elimination of suffering -- to the point that book-understanding, rationality, cannot reach, then why not try describing how ritual behaviors transmute a disciple?
Jung may try to use 'unorthodox' ideas, religious ones, but his goal is to find its unconscious source in order to provide psychological balance. Hoeller thinks Jung stops short, is too rationalistic, too focused on 'psyche' rather than 'spirit' -- a distinction Hoeller makes often.
The book seems to leave us sitting at the temple entrance, knowing something goes on inside, but barely getting a glimpse of the accoutrements, hardly hearing the speech, not being included.
To earn Gnostic initiation would be as it would with any religious commitment -- faith first, willingness to accept teachings as true, following accepted ritual.
A good life may be attained that way, but what's left open is which of dozens of "ways" is the one to give allegiance to. And if life itself -- even what we consider 'good' -- is actually part of a grand scheme of 'evil', then . . . what sort of spiritual release is being sought?
So it proceeds historically. Documents from ancient sources are negative, but suggest why gnostic ideas were spurned. Hoeller prefers to follow Nag Hammadi texts to establish an alternative, positive case. He finds a trail of ideas through suggestive connections with Mandaean and Manichean traditions, with Templars, with Cathars, with Theosophists, up to Jung.
Let the scholars handle that.
What the book might do, what it should do, in order to vindicate the value of gnostic ideas, is show how it operates?
If the found world is indeed corrupt -- evil -- why gloss over how a gnostic practitioner might still delight over a warm, sunny day, over the pleasure of a bird's song, over any touching music? Over laughter among friends, over friendship itself? Hoeller seems to suggest a gnostic believer doesn't reject such things.
And if ceremonial, canonical, Gnostic practice brings one to the prime spiritual release -- akin to Eastern elimination of suffering -- to the point that book-understanding, rationality, cannot reach, then why not try describing how ritual behaviors transmute a disciple?
Jung may try to use 'unorthodox' ideas, religious ones, but his goal is to find its unconscious source in order to provide psychological balance. Hoeller thinks Jung stops short, is too rationalistic, too focused on 'psyche' rather than 'spirit' -- a distinction Hoeller makes often.
The book seems to leave us sitting at the temple entrance, knowing something goes on inside, but barely getting a glimpse of the accoutrements, hardly hearing the speech, not being included.
To earn Gnostic initiation would be as it would with any religious commitment -- faith first, willingness to accept teachings as true, following accepted ritual.
A good life may be attained that way, but what's left open is which of dozens of "ways" is the one to give allegiance to. And if life itself -- even what we consider 'good' -- is actually part of a grand scheme of 'evil', then . . . what sort of spiritual release is being sought?
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Started Reading
July 19, 2021
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July 19, 2021
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July 19, 2021
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