It is surprising, how many interpretations of Earth creation are given by various religious flows. Ancient religious stream, Gnosticism gives a very interesting version of Universe creation. With reference to a scientific definition, Gnosticism is a prominent heretical movement of the 2nd-century Christian Church, partly of pre-Christian origin. Gnostic doctrine taught that the world was created and ruled by a lesser divinity, the demiurge, and that Christ was an emissary of the remote supreme divine being, esoteric knowledge (gnosis) of whom enabled the redemption of the human spirit.

In one of Gnosticism’s theory’s all religions of the world are like pearls, on a golden string. What basically means, all religions are complementary to each other, and should never contradict. Gnosticizes believe in parallel world: second, third reality. Overall, this religious flow is closely interrelated with supernatural things and even magic.

Until the mid-20th century. Gnostics were known only from the writings of the Church Fathers, and above all - Irenaeus, Tertullian, Hippolytus, and Epiphanius. However, the reported information about them was most often taken from the second hand and based on the testimony of others, rather than on the works themselves Gnostics. Only in 1945 the library of Coptic Gnostic texts was opened, and discovered in a large earthen vessel, buried in a field near Nag Hammadi in Egypt, about 40 km south of Cairo, among which was a list of well-known works of Valentine - the gospel truth.

Although Gnosticism in its pure form has disappeared pretty early Gnostic dualism continued to be an essential component of Western spirituality. Gnostic in a broad sense can be called a religion, which expalains the world as something invisible, spiritual and seeks salvation through the divine revelation received by the knowledge of the true nature of man and the need for their deliverance from the bondage of evil world of matter. Thus, in the Gospel of truth says, "He who knows [this truth, or knows himself], belongs to the heavenly world. When he called, he listens, he answers, he turns to God who calls him to come back to Him. "

Thank you a lot for the information. I supposed Agnostic and Gnostic’s the same term. Now I see that I mistook so much.
brave пишет: That is really good thought. I fully agree with this statement.

Do you know anything about Gnostic religion nowadays? How many people are Gnostics? Do they have some religious institute like church? Thanks in advance for answering.

Wow, this is SO interesting. I can't believe how little I know about this religious belief, I like to think of myself as pretty well versed in this sort of thing. I just googled it, and discovered a couple of interesting titbits, including that Carl Jung (one of the fathers of psychonalysis, archetypes, personality theory, a close and personal friend of Freud and a generally an extremely interesting chap) subscribed to this religion. Now, I know Jung involved himself in a lot of different things, and may have believed in an amalgamation of various myths and legends, or at least respected mythology. But seemingly he most closely identified with gnosticism, so already, my interest was piqued.

It's also interesting that this religion, and the Gnostic Gospels, have apparently caused a lot of controversy due to the sexual imagery presented throughout. This reminds me a bit of Hinduism, which is often quite sexualized. I also think an interesting question is whether Gnostics can be viewed as Christians, or if the two terms are fundamentally different and being a Gnostic Christian is, in fact, an oxymoron? As delightful as I think this religion is (and I really do think it's GREAT, and plan to find out even more about it, because the core principles really appeal to me on a personal level), I don't think it's too similar to Christianity. I can see how Christians would get upset by it being lumped as the same thing. After all, Muslim people acknowledge Jesus, but nobody calls them Christian! What do you think about this issue? Can you be a Gnostic Christian?

@Jones - I'm no expert in this belief system, but I'm going to try and answer your questions based on the research I just undertook. There are currently various modern sects and interpretations of gnosticism, including the Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica and the Ecclesia Gnostica.There is also the Gnostic Society, which is apparently affiliated with the Ecclesia Gnostica. I think there aren't churches everywhere - it may be quite possible NOT to be able to find branches where you live, but because of how hugely intuitive and internalized gnosticism seems to be (I stand to be corrected of course, brave, by someone who knows this topic better), I don't think this is much of a problem or a deterrent in getting people to join the religion. Although I'm sure this isn't one of the most popular religions (perhaps because it's just not well advertised!), there are gnostics all over the world, from LA to Oslo.

Some call Gnosis an esoteric tradition, some call it a religion, the founder of which is Jesus Christ. As far as I know, there is little historical evidence of it, Christians who claimed Gnostics as heretics destroyed the historical documents. According to the tradition of esoteric Christianity, Christ told his disciples (John, James and Peter) the basis knowledge of gnosis. The term “gnosis” comes from the Greek «gnosis», means “knowledge”. Gnostic knowledge transmitted by Christ to his disciples, include the basics cabalistic teachings of the ancient Jews, hermetic Studies and experience of Buddha's enlightenment. Although Gnostic sources that we do not find any Kabbalistic nor Zen Buddhism terminology, it has the same concepts that in Kabbalah and Zen Buddhism. The language of the Gnostic tradition contain mostly ancient Greek terms, but most of them reflect the same concepts that are found in Zen and the Kabbalah . Moreover, there are also many borrowings from the Hermetic in the gnosis.
The idea that the world is full of evil and this evil could in no way be created by God lays at the core of the Gnostic myth. It followed that the world was either created by Highest Powers (not God), which were angry and evil, which the Gnostics called the Demiurge. Moreover, according to the Supreme God dwells somewhere beyond the heavens, but in mercy for humanity, he sends his messenger (or messengers) to the people to teach them, how to break free from the power of the Demiurge. Among such messengers were Jesus Christ, Buddha, Mohammed and many others.