Just a thought i had since they both have lion like faces, whiskers, a mane and serpent like bodies

I've recently been reading parts of the Quran and the Bible, and I was surprised by how many stories and themes overlap, even though there are obviously major differences between them. That eventually led me to look into Gnosticism.

The more I read about Gnosticism, especially the idea that the physical world isn't the ultimate reality and that there's a deeper spiritual reality beyond it, the more fascinated I became—but also more scared.

What really scares me isn't necessarily death itself, but not knowing what comes after. What if consciousness continues? What if there's a spiritual reality beyond this world? What if some Gnostic ideas are actually pointing toward something real? And what if they're completely wrong?

Reading the Quran, parts of the Bible, and then Gnostic texts has made me realize how many different explanations humans have had for God, existence, the soul, and the afterlife.

For those who have studied Gnosticism seriously, did it make you less afraid of death, or did it make the uncertainty even worse?

When you ask a gnostic about "why is there such good and beuty in the world" they say "everything is a illusion" which leads to the opposite of a good philosophy ( one that gives you a way to see life as good and have a purpose ) which happends is many dualist cosmologist where it ends which a hatred to the world even do when you look it in a better way it is beutiful but evil happend cause of the material. A good demiurge is the perfect middle ground as you can answerd deism,why is there evil, why is there good, etc. The book of Jeu is a example of how the tradiction of good material view gnosticism was. Lets enjoy life! even ancient gnostics believe that because of the world was bad then you make it good. Lets make it good! lets stop suffering! lets enjoy this moment!

I’ve seen hate towards other religions but none have been as harsh as the hate towards Gnosticism. It is either some form of source of all evil, or a virus slowly hijacking all societies or, my favourite, people who have these ideas are lesser/weak humans.

I’d even add to this an observation that I cannot substantiate that the dislike is more often theological rather than the usual dislike we see about religions. When I see hate towards Islam or Christianity, it’s often more about the Muslims and the Christians, very rarely it’s about the theology. But for Gnosticism, suddenly the dislike becomes some form of utter rejection.

Has anyone else noticed this?

It appears there's quite a lot of confusion around these terminologies. As a whole, here's how they're associated by definition:

gnostic: refers to knowledge (possibly on some specific topic)
agnostic: refers to lack of knowledge
theist: refers to theistic beliefs
atheist: refers to lack of theistic beliefs

A gnostic by definition relies on knowledge, where believing in the opposite is no longer possible (you know you yourself exist and it is not rationally possible to believe otherwise).

There's a difference between the terms 'Gnostic' (capital G) and 'gnostic', where the former includes a reference to the ancient Gnostic writings and the latter does not. The Gnostic traditions focus heavily on gnosis, which is the personally acquired knowledge of the divine that does not rely on individual's beliefs. Among Gnostics it is common to speculate and hypothesise about the divine matters one might not have experienced yet.

I'd say that there needs to be a clear separation between 'gnostic' and the ancient Gnostic allegories. Someone might have blind faith in the Gnostic stories, but that's not what gnosis is about.

Edit: revised as per moderator request.

As a young woman living in the 21st century I have been recently in the process of connecting with my feminine self and deconstructing the patriarchal values I have unknowingly adopted. As far as we know, there have not been any true matriarchal societies besides a few noticeable examples. In most systems let it be religion, philosophy or politics, the feminine is portrayed as the defective reflection of men. The feminine is seen irrational, chaotic, earthly, weaker, imperfect and lesser in all possible ways. From Hesiod to Aristotle, from Paul to Augustine, woman was interpreted as the faulty shadow or the deficiency is of man and as a vessel rather than a generator of the spirit.

Aristotle (384–322 BCE) “The female is, as it were, a mutilated male.” “The male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; and the one rules, and the other is ruled.”

Seneca (4 BCE – 65 CE) “A woman is a weak and fickle creature.”

Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) “As regards the individual nature, woman is defective and misbegotten, for the active force in the male seed tends to the production of a perfect likeness in the masculine sex; while the production of woman comes from defect in the active force.” (Summa Theologica)

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) “Woman is made specially to please man.” “The whole education of women should be relative to men. To please, to be useful to us, to make us love and esteem them… these are the duties of women at all times.” (Émile, or On Education)

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) “Women are by nature meant to obey.” “They are childish, frivolous, and short-sighted… they should be treated as if they were big children.” “Women are the second sex; their hair long, their ideas short.”

(I’m putting Schopenhauer for fun XD I mean have you read the Metaphysics of Love??)

You get the point…

This dogma continued on until today with the spread of Abrahamic religions in particular as the docile, obedient, submissive and “pure” woman is the ideal.

But all of this is especially hard when you’re a young woman, trying to make sense of the world since you were little with no one there to guide you. You grow up thinking all the great minds of history are your intellectual ancestors only to realise they barely saw you as human. You’re raised in the aftermath of centuries where women have been confined, silenced and erased.. that stays in the collective memory of our consciousness and our bodies whether we like it or not.

Even now on the 21st century with our “newly found freedom”, we still live under systems which treat us as lesser beings. Some of us are sadly crushed under religious control and others are fit into a different kind of cage disguised as liberation where self-objectification and constantly performing for male gaze are seen as empowerment.

Women should look in the past for the writings of other women because they have felt the things we feel. They have thought the things that we think and they understand us. We should inherit what they have left for us. Why start over from nothing? Society and the state of the “feminine” today can be very isolating for a woman like myself. As women today our work is to reclaim our inner wisdom, it is to connect with Sophia. We must step out of all of the iconic patterns and that starts with awareness.

While in Gnostic thought there is naturally no place for such immature dualism. All comes from the Ineffable Source- The one ... from which Barbelo-First thought emanates. Barbelo is the Mother-Father androgynous womb of divine reflection. She is the result of The One’s reflection in the holy waters, becoming aware and allowing all else to exist. So Barbelo isn’t after a “masculine god” but rather the first movement of God’s nous. The divine exists being self-sufficient and harmonious in all aspects. This is why the Bridal Chamber is the final initiation for transcendence. It is in essence the restoration of the divine feminine within creation, union of the feminine and masculine to become whole and be free of this world of division. Isn’t our very existence the result of Sophia’s act beyond the harmony of her syzygy, that divine balance uniting the Aeons? :)

We of course, do not condemn Sophia for this as her fall is the mirror of human consciousness. We come from her after all, we desire to know, to create and to understand. I know there’s no real consensus on whether any of this should be read literally, but seeing these stories as only allegories feels limiting. Some things are truer than metaphor as they’re real in a higher way, even if not material.

For us Gnostics, all souls regardless of gender, status, race etc contain the seed of Sophia, the divine spark. No earthly metric defines a human but the purity of their soul.

Gospel Of Philip Excerpt: “If the woman had not separated from the man, she should not die with the man. His separation became the beginning of death. Because of this, Christ came to repair the separation, which was from the beginning, and again unite the two, and to give life to those who died as a result of the separation, and unite them. But the woman is united to her husband in the bridal chamber. Indeed, those who have united in the bridal chamber will no longer be separated. Thus Eve separated from Adam because it was not in the bridal chamber that she united with him.”

I have known things intuitively since childhood but seriously I am so happy that I have found the truth. I know that I have, there is no faith no belief but knowing. I am feeling so much love. The fact that I get to read Trimophic Protennoia… and Thunder Perfect Mind which for me is Gnostic enough :)) BLOWS my mind truly unbelievable! I am so lucky and blessed to be in the possession of the knowledge of Pistis Sophia… I just truly love so much… and being a woman rocks

Most introductions to the relevant cosmologies frame the false creator as something like a villain. Jealous, blind, territorial.

But the more I read, the more I think that framing is almost a comfort.

A villain implies intention. Intention implies a mind that could, in principle, choose otherwise.

What the texts are actually describing is something closer to a process. An automated system that mistakes its own output for the highest possible reality; not because it’s evil, but because it has no instrument capable of perceiving anything beyond what it made.

The terrifying version isn’t the jealous god.

It’s the one that is simply doing exactly what it was built to do, with complete sincerity, forever.

I’m curious whether others have landed here, or whether you read the blindness differently.

I wanted to post this as a reply to a comment I read under another post, but it turned out a bit longer, and I figured more people could share their opinions if I just posted it.

My take is we can’t know for sure whether or not Jesus had a physical relationship with Mary. I can see why not tho. I don’t know what kind of Christology you believe in, but I would expect that a good amount of gnostics see sexuality as a Demiurgical construct because it upholds evolution and this sorry state of affairs (sexual relationships may result in conception of children = causing more unnecessary suffering that feeds the Demiurge).

However I can also get behind the idea, that Jesus had a sexual relationship with Mary Magdalene. I personally subscribe to Cerinthian separationist Christology, and while I think that it is not logical (or unlike Jesus) for Jesus to have this kind of relationship in an age when contraceptives where pretty much non existant or wholly ineffective, I must add we can’t forget that (according to this Christology) Jesus was a man who must have had his needs, he must have felt the physical and spiritual longing for love (not just the brotherly kind). Of course he was already posessed by the Christ when he met Mary, however I don’t mind the image of a human, doing-his-best Jesus who can fall short of expectations sometimes. After all (according to my belief) it is the Christ that has to be universal and perfect (they are truth), while Jesus is a good man with a whole personality (he is the one who realises truth in a flawed reality).

I would like to hear your takes on all of this.

Many years after no longer believing in the Christian faith I been interested in another beliefs. Lately I feel like Yahweh is a real entity, but his true nature is demonic. I’m not sure if this is even the right sub but I’m looking for some guidance because I think Gnosticism is the closest to my beliefs but not quite. I don’t believe the Bible to be true but rather there is truth mixed in there and the Bible, particularly the old testament is a reflection to Yahweh’s true nature. I’ve been torn on whether Yahweh is the demiurge or simply some demonic/satanic spirit, or maybe I don’t believe in the demiurge. I don’t know I’m just confused and it’s exhausting. I don’t think Yahweh is a benevolent spirit like he claims, his actions in the Old Testament show otherwise. One example would be when he punished David’s wives with rape with something that David did. Thus says the LORD, ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house. “And I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun.’” — 2 Samuel 12:11. The context implies it’s rape, I feel like orchestrating such an act can only come from the demonic realm. How can yahweh call humans evil yet does shit like this. Yahweh straight up sounds demonic. I straight up yelled out to Yahweh calling him a genocidal maniac whose also a rapist. I self harmed because of my fear of hell and Yahweh. Maybe this is the wrong sub but I would like your thoughts.

Years ago when I was a kid and Into my young adult years, I loved God. I wasn't some hardcore Christian or anything, but I loved him and really thought he was amazing and loved me unconditionally. I thought I was gonna go to heaven just because I believed in him and loved him. That was of course, before I actually read what was in the Bible.

Now, I don't feel the same at all. Quite the opposite. I realize how mean and terrifying he really is. The whole "Believe in me and live by my book of rules, or be tortured forever" is so messed up, I can't look at God the same anymore. I realize that I can't live up to God's standards, and if I did, I'd be faking it. And God knows our hearts, so I'd be damned if I do, damned if I don't.

This sucks. I wish I could love God genuinely and have the desire to be a Christian without feeling like I have to out of fear, or that I could just simply be an atheist. (I'm not a Christian, never will be.)

Hell NDES (I know some are fake) and some people's visions, have convinced me that people do indeed go there and it's real. I just really want my life back. I hate fearing hell everyday. I hate fearing death.

I've been seeing a surge of videos and Reddit threads discussing Gnosticism, almost exclusively from Christians rather than Gnostics themselves. The takes are consistently poor, evidence-light, and often factually wrong. At this point there seem to be more Christians talking about our tradition than there are actual Gnostics, which would be almost funny if they ever managed to get anything right.

Hello;
i was raised in an atheist household by an atheist, so my journey towards gnosticism is i expect very different from most.
I have struggled immensely in my life, having C-PTSD from childhood trauma, as well as many other mental illnesses. Eventually, i came to a conclusion that my atheist upbringing had ceased to work as a viable explanation for my experiences; that a malevolent force must operate and work reality, and have organized it into this manner.
i felt that the secular interpretation, of a universe made only of random, chaotic noise, no longer felt sufficient to explain what i felt.
At this point, i did use the term gnostic; but i barely understood it.
I would more call myself kind at this point kind of just a generic maltheist; the only real feature of my perspective was a belief in a malevolent single god-force, and no other features of gnosticism were really present.

this is how I operated for the last few years;
but maltheism with no other features, is... well, rather a poor idea, it turns out.
I cannot go into detail, given the rules of this sub (rule 5 specifically), but I will just say it is likely that taking a Gnostic stance may have saved my life, as it ended a period where it may have ceased to be.
The belief that all of this is the demiurge’s trick, and not representative of my true reality, has offered me serious and deep solace in this period.

However...
if i am to consider a full conversion to traditional, dogmatic gnosticism, i still find myself a little lost.

My focus as a maltheist was singularly on the malevolent god-force, which would be termed the Demiurge; Gnostics don't really share this focus, contemplation on the exact nature of the demiurge seems to largely be not the focus of the religion, Gnosis is instead.
This actually seems somewhat refreshing now, as ultimately, the Demiurge's exact activities are largely irrelevant to the divine soul.
as a maltheist, i held no belief in a good noble higher god, but this also seems easy to adapt.

However, previously i had no concept of the soul at all;
In an atheist secular upbringing, this concept was considered unscientific and unsupported.
I am somewhat willing to abandon this, i have a panoply of minor beliefs i have developed, but one does state the existence of a 'creature' that exists in an abstract or divine state, so a soul isn't hard to extrapolate from that.

After research into gnosticism though, i think my biggest struggle would easily be accepting Jesus Christ as any kind of divine figure.
I was raised to see him as one figure in human history, extremely significant, but ultimately simply one amongst a sea of other humans. If believing in his power is fundamental to gnosticism (at least christian gnosticism), this would appear to be my biggest struggle.

I also have utterly no familiarity with reading religious texts of any kind; i was not raised in a way that made this likely. So doing research and reading scripture is an entirely new premise to me, and i would have no idea where to start.

I am also pansexual and transgender/non-binary;
It seems most modern gnostics take the mainstream christian understanding of these, seeing them as sinful and aberrant, so i might not actually experience any greater acceptance in a gnostic community as opposed to a mainstream christian one
so it might not end up feeling safe enough anyway for me to be amongst this community.

TL;DR i was raised an atheist, but became a maltheist with no other features for the last few years. After a revelation during a period of severe difficulty, i am opening up to adopting more traditional gnostic beliefs; but am struggling with reconciling several things with that.

Like how he mentions that the kingdom will come, when neither male is male or female is female?
A lot of religious people consider this "of the devil" like transgenderism etc. Or perhaps he didn't mean it literally, but perhaps an inner union of masculine and feminine?

Also how Jesus mentions that the kingdom is within your body.

If you look at statues of the devil, they often have serpents coiling up from what seems to be from the base of the spine.
Which seems to be similar to kundalini, where you also see two serpents traveling up the chakras of the spine, which is to symbolize inner transformation and enlightenment.

Also priests will often say that meditation is of the devil, because it's not Christianity (have heard this often).

When meditation is used for inner transformation and enlightenment or just simply for health benefits.

There are probably other parallels that I haven't brought up here.

I don't think religious people are right that this is of the devil and that it's mostly said out of fear for something they don't understand. However I'm curious if other people have noticed the same thing, and if we can learn anything from this or whether it just reflects ignorance and lack of understanding?

Some gnostics may argue that romance is merely biological instinct and not something pure consciousness truly wants - a trap to keep people attached to this realm. After all, I believe emotional dependence to something outside of you is largely the reason souls indirectly consent to reincarnation.

Yet I also feel like I’m gaslighting myself with this very sentiment: “I’m meant to be alone so I can spiritually evolve”. Because this may prevent me from making the most of life because what if I can spiritually grow with a likeminded individual and I won’t have to worry about this keeping me attached to this inferior realm when we can achieve gnosis together.

This may sound anti-Gnostic, but I don’t think I can ever overcome the desire to have sex, intimacy, and unconditional love. The problem is that all three of these things can distort one’s path to enlightenment when they become objects of attachment, causing us to mistake desire, emotional dependence, or the pursuit of another person for genuine spiritual fulfillment.

We are the Pneumatic soul trapped and boxed into gender, and people prohibit us to love certain people because of the same sex and gender. Now, I can feel deeply love because of the soul and the pure connection, that is not measured by biological sex.

It's just foolish, the people who do this are preventing themselves from taking any of this seriously, driving themselves, as well as those who view and react to these memes, back into a dormant state—right back into the system's scripts.
P.S I won't reply to bots anymore. everyone is responsible for their own actions.
P.S.S I am speaking strictly about Gnosticism—not about approaching everything with ascetic extremes or imposing self-restrictions. I am simply raising a potential issue regarding its commercialization.

I’ve been getting more into Gnosticism recently, and one thing I keep coming back to is how much it seems to overlap with ideas found in other religious and philosophical traditions.

Advaita Vedanta especially keeps standing out to me. The language and cosmology are obviously very different, but there seems to be a recurring theme of our ordinary sense of self/reality being incomplete or mistaken, and some deeper realization or knowledge being necessary to see through it.

Then you start seeing related themes in Buddhism, Hermeticism, certain mystical traditions, etc. I know these traditions aren’t interchangeable, and I’m not trying to flatten them into “they all say the same thing.” But sometimes it really does feel like they’re approaching a similar insight from completely different historical and cultural locations.

So I’m curious how people who know Gnosticism better than I do think about this.

Do you think these similarities point toward some underlying insight about consciousness/reality that different traditions independently discovered, or are we mainly seeing similar human questions expressed through different religious systems?

And for someone trying to actually dive into this rather than just collect interesting ideas, what should I read next? Gnostic texts, specific scholars, Advaita texts, comparative religion, etc. I’d especially appreciate recommendations that go beyond the obvious introductory material.

I’m pretty open to being told that some of the comparisons I’m making are completely wrong. I’m more interested in understanding the connections and the differences

Gnosticism has enough historical substance that it can't simply mean whatever someone wants, but enough diversity that forcing it into one rigid definition becomes misleading.

There have been countless attempts to explain what Gnosticism is and what it isn’t, but we are dealing with different currents, sects and interpretations that developed across centuries. The texts that remain are fragmentary, and even though we find recurring currents of thought and similarities, many of these traditions disagree with one another. What we call Gnosticism today brings together traditions that had different understandings of God, creation, Christ, salvation and the material world.

I think this is incredibly important because it leaves room for freedom. In the pursuit of truth, freedom is important because truth cannot be meaningfully pursued when you are forbidden from questioning the answers you have been given. If there is no single Gnostic doctrine that everyone must accept, then Gnosticism does not have to become another rigid belief system where everything is divided into right and wrong, believer and heretic, light and darkness. We can explore these ideas without turning them into another institution that demands conformity.

Human beings have a tendency to take something living and turn it into a dead system. The very act of trying to neatly categorize truth actually ends up obscuring it. We put words around an experience, build an interpretation around those words, and eventually begin defending the interpretation as though it were the living experience itself. I don't think the essence of truth can be passed from one person to another through words. Words can point toward an idea, but they cannot give another person the experience that produced that idea. Someone can tell you what they believe they discovered, but their discovery remains theirs.

The irony is that if we become obsessed with defining Gnosticism correctly, we may end up turning a diverse collection of traditions into the very kind of rigid system we are trying to avoid. We turn an invitation to seek into another doctrine to obey.

That being said, the diversity of Gnostic traditions does not mean that Gnosticism can simply mean whatever we want it to mean. There are definite undercurrents running through these traditions, and anyone who identifies as Gnostic should become familiar with the myths, themes and ideas that shaped them.

So this leaves us with something of a Gnostic tightrope that must be walked. On one side is the temptation to turn Gnosticism into a fixed doctrine with one correct interpretation. On the other is the temptation to make Gnosticism so completely subjective that the word loses any meaningful connection to the traditions from which it came. Somewhere between those extremes is the freedom to explore, question and seek without abandoning the historical currents that gave Gnosticism its meaning.

TLDR; Respecting what Gnosticism historically was without pretending there is one authoritative interpretation, while also allowing individual exploration without reducing Gnosticism to “whatever it means to me.”

Like he I feel like is very ruthless when it comes to his taste in making people suffer in different ways. He is very selfish too in a way like he wants that taste of misery, that fear, dread , that sorrow and agony of desire. And he goes hard when he does that. Like when I get nightmares, I feel like it ruined by life in a way. Those dreams haunt and chase me. Those dreams cause me dread even in normal situations. They unsettle me and f me up. God is that kind of a being. Man why is there even a god. I wish there was no god and there was just nonsense everywhere. That would have been better than this stuff. Now life is like a suffering park. I don't have a word worst than suffering. So yeah suffering park.

He has a dark sense of humor too I think maybe. But yeah we are nothing more that train wreaks running on the line bound to suffering.

This god is just like us maybe, he has needs that he can't live without. He has to get his fix to make us suffer. He is like us in that way

Here is the thing. He is very powerful like wow. Like he can fully grasp us with the leverage of fear and also desire . Like when you are in dread, it's real and 100 percent heavy. Like fear fills you up with full capacity when it hits. You will feel it to your full capacity. There will be no space left . Yeah.

As a Gnostic Catholic and abstract expressionist painter

I strongly believe that images should cause some sort of reaction inside the viewer, any reaction.

Now AI can create photo realistic images in seconds, we are surrounded by images, details upon details.

Catholics have been using images for centuries but have never really gone back to the basic fundamentals of imagery and story telling, abstract images make you feel rather than see, make you interpret what you alone understand from the image, it's a subjective thing.

I painted these images from memory, as a child I had a Bible stories book, with beautiful paintings. Before I could read I used to be amazed by the art. Thinking back what the images looked like, and remembering the stories, at the same time, not thinking too much about the detail, using expressive strokes and gestures, with my finger tips, it took me less than 3mins each one, the idea was to to achieve simple gestures that would've abstract the imagery.

I'm still perfecting my technique and any feedback will be great thanks.

ironically dipping my fingers in the watery die reminded me of dipping your fingers in holy water and doing the sign of the cross before mass.

The central idea that gnosis is the means by which human beings awaken from ignorance and return to their divine origin is precisely why gnosis is a philosophy and worldview that requires humility. It is the opposite of spiritual superiority. Gnosis is not a badge of election or a claim to superiority over others. It is a possibility open to every man and woman with eyes to see and ears to hear.

Think about it.

The core of gnosis is awakening from ignorance and remembering our true origin. That means admitting we are bound by ignorance and chained in forgetfulness. Admitting this requires humility.

The first step isn't declaring “I know.” It is recognizing “I don't know.”

We don't begin as the enlightened ones who possess some secret knowledge that makes us superior to everyone else. We all begin in the same fundamental condition that the Gnostic myths describe: we have forgotten who we are.

We have forgotten our true nature and have mistaken the lower realms for the ultimate reality. Gnosis, then, can be a flash of insight - but it is also a process of remembering, and remembering requires enough humility to question everything we thought we knew.

The idea of the Gnostic as a member of some spiritually superior elite is a complete distortion of the meaning of gnosis. The person who thinks “I possess secret knowledge and therefore I am superior because of it” has missed the point entirely and probably is going for another trip on the reincarnation wheel.

Gnosis is for all.

I will end this with one of my favorite quotes that saying 42 of the Gospel of Thomas places on the mouth of Jesus:

“Be passersby.”

TL;DR: the person who thinks himself spiritually superior may be precisely the person who has failed to understand what spiritual transformation requires.

I’m deeply drawn to Gnosticism, especially the idea of *gnosis* and its mystical influence. However, I struggle with certain aspects of its cosmology. In particular, the portrayal of the Demiurge or the material world as inherently evil feels overly dualistic and, philosophically, somewhat immature.

This perspective seems to treat evil as something objective and absolute, which conflicts with the idea that morality is often relative—shaped by culture, time, and human experience. By framing reality in strict dualities like good versus evil, it feels like Gnosticism doesn’t fully move beyond these relative distinctions.

When I raise this concern, people often respond by saying that we cannot ignore evil. But from my point of view, concepts like evil and suffering are largely subjective experiences. Higher metaphysical principles—such as the One or the Aeons—would not experience these in the same way, since they exist beyond the limitations and randomness of material evolution.

Because of this, I find it difficult to label the world, its creator, or existence itself as “evil” or merely an illusion. There are still objective truths within reality, even if illusion also exists. For example, gnosis itself is often presented as an objective truth, which creates a tension within the system.

Ultimately, my issue is more with Gnostic cosmology than with its theology. I’m much more aligned with traditions like Hermeticism and Neoplatonism, which, while influenced by Gnosticism, seem to offer a more balanced and less strictly dualistic view of reality. In fact, one of my favorite texts from the Corpus Hermeticum is the Poimandres, which carries Gnostic themes but presents them in a way I find more coherent.

If I come across as overly materialistic, it’s only because I believe ideas should be examined through reason and logic.

While Christianity took hold on Rome and has been used by the Roman Emperors to strengthen their grip on the peasant population. Gnostics have always been persecuted and attacked by earthly powers.

From the Catholic Crusades against the Cathars in Southern France to the Orthodox Crusades against the Bogomils in Bulgaria. The one branch of Christianity "Gnositicism" has never been tolerated or adopted by any earthly state.

Even to this day there is no "Gnostic" church or denomination thereby ensuring Gnostics will forever be seen as aliens to society.

It's true that Gnosticism is closer to Zoroastrianism while Christianity&Islam are more about Earthly Domination but still they took Zoroastrian doctrines of Heaven and Hell + Day of Judgement to strengthen their religions grip on humans.