Why do Christians reject gnostic teaching?

[satay]

The freewill/destiny is a paradoxial problem isn'i it? If God is omniscient then there is no room for freewill beyond God's knowledge. If everything is destined then what is the role of prayers or worship?

In advaita, destiny alone exists from the absolute perspective. It is the inevitable destiny of the Atman to enjoy uninterrupted bliss. Freewill exist only from the phenomenal perspective, and since there is only a universal witness or experience, ie Atman, there could be no real freewill.

God must hence certainly know the biography of every soul that emanated from him and reach him in the end. The soul certainly does not know, and hence from his perspective freewill exists to a certain extent, though it is easy to verify the role of destiny in every walk of life.

If it is destiny all the way, then what is the role of prayers or meditation? Well, just like we cant leave the factory work to destiny in worldly life, spiritual work cannot be left to destiny from our perspective. So most teachers will preach only a combination of destiny and freewill, though destiny ought to be the ultimate reality. Enlightened sages know the fate of every soul, and hence never indulge in this "soul saving" business as they know it is all already planned by God.

It is all just play only, a well planned play to the finest detail. Perhaps this divine author might change his play occasionally based on audience feedback? If so, that might be a little bit of real freewill in this play.

I would like to reply to your post but don't want to hijack Tomoz's thread. Otherwise we might end up trolling this thread and you might 'warn' me eh? I am being a good poster following rules of the site...

[sm78]

Actually, we believe that God isn't winding it all up now because He is waiting for as many people to come to Him as possible. Well, that's what the Bible says anyway

But the fun begins after this winding up, ain't it??

About free will ~ if God gave us free will it must be one of his attributes.
Those who choose to deny free-will (freedom) are denying an attribute of God and in essence denying God. Slavery is not the nature of God. Being a slave is not the nature of those who seek to believe in God. What do you say??

On other points you are speaking in general terms about God taking a normal dualistic postion. Apart from the imprecise terminology and contradictions, what you say will be in partial agreement with anyone who believes in God(not necessarily father jeovah) and understands the pit-falls of materialism. What is the special thing about christianity or gnostic chiristianity w.r.t these points??

[Tomoz]

On the other hand, Augustine concluded that Matthew was written first and Mark used Matthew and peter’s teachings as his sources. However, I could not care less either way. I was just trying to see how ‘early’ are the ‘early’ writings that you guy accept as your spiritual guide.
2 Peter is estimated to be written around 100-160 a.d. by http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/

To an outsider like me…it doesn’t make sense to just ignore some writings that some scholars think are written later in the date when the same scholars are not even sure of the dates for the ‘authentic’ documents. So therefore, I do not agree with the conclusion that Gnostic writings should be rejected based on ‘time’ of writings.

Augustine was writing in the 4th/5th century, proper scholarship has been done since that time.
That date for 2 peter is one opinion. You will find that nothing is conclusive, and everyone can back up their points of view with compelling evidence.
There is controversy surrounding when different books were written. However, everyone seems to agree that Paul's epistles are the earliest Christian writings (remember that Paul, despite not knowing Jesus during his ministry, knew those people who lived intimately with Jesus for three years, and they affirmed Paul's teaching as compatible with that of Jesus). Also, scholars all agree that the canonical gospels are the earliest gospels we have.

Now, the second point you made was that Gnostic writings are rejected because they contradict with the ‘accepted’ writings. If that’s the case then we should reject both Luke and Matthew since they contradict each other on birth stories of jesus.

I'm not a Christian who states that there are no contradictions in the Bible. Of course there are - we believe the Bible to be the word of God, but it was delivered through fallible human beings.
But there are contradictions and then there are contradictions. The gospels don't always line up on history. But you'll find that the Bible doesn't contradict itself points of sgnificance for belief, and that is what really matters. What is important in the birth stories is that it was a virgin birth, concieved by the Holy Spirit. On this they agree.

The new testament contains no clue as to the time of jesus’ birth. Christmas was a pagan tradition adopted by Constantine. Birth stories of both luke and matthew contradict each other. There is no record of the census as mentioned in the gospel of luke, in the roman empire under augustus. And to make matters worst, we have no record of herod decreeing the murder of the male children of bethelhem as mentioned in matthew.

Most of the so called ‘historical’ evidence is only provided by the believers. We have absolutely no record of jesus’ existence in any historical source. If jesus was really born in the year 1 herod the great would already have been dead for four years. So either the count is off or the story of herod’s intervention is false.

All of this is nothing new to Christians - we place Jesus' birth at around the year 5 or 4 b.c.

Paul was the disciple of peter and never met jesus himself so I reject all his writings as hearsay.
The bottom line is that the new testament is written entirely by the believers and ‘historians’ have no evidence of even jesus’ existence let alone a reason to believe in what paul says.

Paul wasn't a disciple of Peter. We believe that Paul did meet Jesus - on the road to damascus
There isn't really a debate as to whether Jesus existed or not. That is pretty much confirmed, through the non-christian writing of people at the time such as Josephus. No credible historian questions the existence of a 1st century jewish teacher named Jesus of Nazareth. People just differ as to his nature and significance.

All this does is that person B is authentic since person A says so. This is not ‘historic’ evidence. It is hearsay.

It isn't just person A and person B. It is Paul being confirmed as an apostle by Peter, the number one Apostle who lived with Jesus for three years, new him intimately, and whom Jesus, along with the other apostles, conferred all authority.

Let’s assume for the purpose of this discussion that jesus did exist even though there is no historical evidence of him anywhere. Even if we assume that there are still some problems for me.

Who ‘baptized’ jesus? John. How come john baptized the only son of god? What was the need?

Part of Jesus ministry was showing us how to live a Godly life. He set the perfect example for us.
It also show's Jesus' humility

Jesus preached the end of the world. If taken literally, the end of the world has not come.

not yet...

Jesus’ death in itself is a very disrespectful way of dying. Why such a disrespectful death to the only son of god?

Not many people outside the church understand the passion and atonement. But this may give you an idea: "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends" John 15:13

"Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" Romans 5:7-8

No one actually saw him arise.

Well, he was seen risen. There is actually some pretty compelling evidence for the ressurection - I won't go into it now, but can tell you if you like.

The inscription on the cross was “jesus of Nazareth, king of jews”

Most of what I see with Christians is a matter of faith, not claims that can be demonstrated historically.

Well yes, faith is a big part. Ultimately, nothing can be proved beyond all doubt to everybody(though, perhaps, beyond resonable doubt) - that goes for every spiritual path. But there does come a point when you have to step out in faith.
And I think Christianity has a lot more historical backing than some other faiths.

Fair enough. But did jesus then at least verify what his disciples were writing or saying?

Yes - in the gospels

The so called scholars are all believers.

Many of them weren't when they began their investigations.

If free will is responsible for the mess and GOD is the source of free will then ultimately the buck stops with GOD and if he is omniscient then he must have known that this free will is going to create mess. If that’s the case then he himself is responsible for the mess and not man.

If we look at the nature of GOD in sri bagvatam, we find that this creation is all a play. In the grand scheme of things ‘we’ are nothing but part and parcel of him and we do have free will which activates the karmic law but ultimately GOD himself is responsible for the karmic law, free will and the whole damn mess or as we hindus call it leela (a divine play).

So, are you saying we have free will or not? A god who calls some of the things that happen in the world 'divine play' isn't really a god I would want to worship.
It doesn't matter if it is all ultimately illusion - that is no comfort if you're a starving child.

If free will is truly free then no one should be punished for ‘not choosing’ to love him.
‘disobedience’ is ‘implied’ in free will. If GOD wanted us to follow him and love him and pray to him like a robot then he should not have given us free will. But sinc e he did give us free will he should be indifferent to what we choose...in fact, he should be happy that adam rebelled as 'rebellion' is a sign that the child has grown to be a 'man' and is not a child anymore.

Adam wasn't acting like a man, he acted like a child - he saw what he wanted and he took it, regardless of the consequences. That translates into how we all operate today, unfortunately.
Christians don't really believe in the idea of 'reward' and 'punishment'.

No, my comment was in response to your comment that GOD is infinitely better than Evil. This statement assumes that there is ‘evil’ that exists separately from GOD and out of control of GOD because to compare the source i.e. GOD to evil you implied that there is another source for evil.

My question: is GOD the source of ‘everything’ or not? Please think about it before answering.

God is the source of everything. Everything God created was good (you can see this in the first chapter of genesis - "God saw it and it was good".
Evil is a corruption of Good - it doesn't exist of itself, but is a corruption of something that was originally good.
Hence the story of satan - he was originally an angel, who rebelled against God. But because he was created (God is the only uncreated 'thing') he is nowhere near God in power and will ultimately be thrown down. In fact, evil's time is already running out.

‘good time’…that doesn’t make any sense…as how can a son of god who came to take the sins of ‘all’ men have good time! What in your opinion is ‘good time’ that he was having?

Well, he turned water into wine at a wedding feast - I doubt he would have gone through the whole feast without smiling once.
also:

"Now John's disciples and the pharisees were fasting. Some people came and asked Jesus, 'how is it the John's disciples and the disciples of the pharisees are fasting, but yours are not?' Jesus answered, 'how can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them. But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast'" Mark 2:18-20

Sorry, this post is too long…

No worries!!

[Tomoz]

Everyone I'll try to answer your questions ASAP. I have assignments and the like though, so please bear with me!!

[Ablaze]

Namaste all,

Gnosticism basically = Jnana Yoga. The ancient gnostic groups sought enlightenment thru the experience of transcendental knowledge and the unfoldment of awareness in their higher chakra-centers. There were many such groups, some were Christian mystics, others worked with Egyptian and Hermetic mysticism and symbolism. It's important to note, they communicated with esoteric symbols and language, and their writings can never be understood by historians or orthodox Christians, who read their writings literally, without any esoteric or metaphysical understanding. You have to be initiated into the gnostic symbolism and have some esoteric understanding, to understand their writings.

There is a modern Gnostic Christian group, the Sophians:

http://www.sophian.org

They speak about reincarnation, and other things that closely tie them in with "Hindu" beliefs. Their teachings and practices are most closely tied to Shakta and Tantric beliefs, although they use the language of Jewish mysticism (Kabbalah) and Christian Gnosticism.

They do not believe in a literal Demiurge, but see the Demiurge as the influence of cosmic ignorance on the physical and astral levels. The Demiurge in that sect, is what we would call Tamas-guna.

Anyway, they are an interesting sect, and very different from the exoteric, hell-fire and brimstone, one life to live, Orthodox Christian sects.

[satay]

Everyone I'll try to answer your questions ASAP. I have assignments and the like though, so please bear with me!!

hey tomoz,
appreciate your post...we all have lives outside this forum so please take your time...we are not going anywhere.

In return, I also ask that you bare with me...I have many more questions that I want to clarify for my own understanding of christian concept of god...but my there are so many things going on that I won't be able to reply right away...

[satay]

namaste tomoz,

Augustine was writing in the 4th/5th century, proper scholarship has been done since that time.

I was under the impression that Augustine’s contribution to Christian theology are second to on other post apostolic author. However, since you are implying that Augustine was not a proper scholar okay I accept your implication as it is and we will not discuss any of augustine’s contributions in our dialogue.

That date for 2 peter is one opinion.

As a matter of fact, all dates suggested by the so called scholars are ‘opinions’ isn’t it?

You will find that nothing is conclusive, and everyone can back up their points of view with compelling evidence.

Yes, I am beginning to see that about the Christian ‘historic’ proof. If anyone can make up something and then make something else up to back up the claim then that is not proper historic evidence. Historic evidence should stand the scrutiny of an independent source not just the ‘faithful’.

There is controversy surrounding when different books were written. However, everyone seems to agree that Paul's epistles are the earliest Christian writings (remember that Paul, despite not knowing Jesus during his ministry, knew those people who lived intimately with Jesus for three years, and they affirmed Paul's teaching as compatible with that of Jesus). Also, scholars all agree that the canonical gospels are the earliest gospels we have.

That doesn’t make any logical sense as far as historic evidence is concerned. First you said that everyone can backup their points of view with compelling evidence now you are saying that ‘all’ scholars agree.

Who are these ‘all’ scholars? I bet they are ‘all’ Christians also. Since ‘all’ these scholars are just making up their own points and then making up some more points to back up their own points and all these scholars are agreeing on some of these points…There findings can not be taken seriously. Again these are tenets of faith since nothing can be demonstrated historically by an independent third party.

I'm not a Christian who states that there are no contradictions in the Bible. Of course there are - we believe the Bible to be the word of God, but it was delivered through fallible human beings.

Oh? Words of my friend nirotu echo in my mind, “bible is the inerrant word of god”
Anyway, if you agree that there are contradictions in the bible due to human authorship then how do you verify which parts are the word of god and which parts ‘word of man’? What is your personal criterion of verifying this?

But there are contradictions and then there are contradictions.

No. all contradictions are contradictions. You are just playing with gymnastics of words.

The gospels don't always line up on history.

But in your first post you wanted us believe that Gnostic scriptures are rejected based on ‘time’. Since that time is in the past and thus a history now to us…then that implies that the history is also important to Christians. It is history that tells Christians which scriptures are authentic and which are Gnostic. Isn’t it?

Since now, you are saying that gospels don’t always line up on history…what an outsider or a student of comparative religion like me to believe?

You have already admitted that not all scholars agree on all points of history. And now you say that even gospels i.e. the writings of the followers don’t agree on all points based on history. So then, How to decide which scripture is authentic? Which scholars are authentic? Which authors are authentic? What is your method of verification? What is your reasoning in deciding who is right and who is wrong? Please share with me so that I can try to apply that for myself.

What is important in the birth stories is that it was a virgin birth, concieved by the Holy Spirit. On this they agree.

Is this a reasonable thing to believe? How do you verify it was virgin birth? Did marry or her husband or any of her family leave any written document, a diary or script or something like that historians can verify?

You said, “on this they agree”. What’s the criterion used to decide this?
I am beginning to wonder if you really are using reason to decipher all this information. In your own words, “bible has contradictions”.

All of this is nothing new to Christians - we place Jesus' birth at around the year 5 or 4 b.c.

Okay.

Paul wasn't a disciple of Peter. We believe that Paul did meet Jesus - on the road to damascus

Could you please provide me with the source or reference? I am a new student and have not read most of your scriptures.

There isn't really a debate as to whether Jesus existed or not. That is pretty much confirmed, through the non-christian writing of people at the time such as Josephus. No credible historian questions the existence of a 1st century jewish teacher named Jesus of Nazareth. People just differ as to his nature and significance.

Sine we both agree that scholars are making up their points and backing up their own points by evidence it means that there is not really any credible ‘historic’ evidence of anything.

However, as I said before, let us assume that Jesus of Nazareth did exist.

It isn't just person A and person B. It is Paul being confirmed as an apostle by Peter, the number one Apostle who lived with Jesus for three years, new him intimately, and whom Jesus, along with the other apostles, conferred all authority.

But since they were all persons my example still stands. It is merely person A saying person B is authentic. This is not historic evidence. It doesn’t stand the scrutiny of independent parties so it is just a hearsay.

Part of Jesus ministry was showing us how to live a Godly life. He set the perfect example for us.
It also show's Jesus' humility

Yes, okay, that makes sense to me. Even when GOD himself came and lived in vrindavan and gokul he had human teachers…

not yet...

I would say that 2000 years (give and take 5 years for discrepancy of your scholars ‘historic evidence’) is a long time for a prophecy to be fulfilled. If it was going to take thousands of years to fulfill the prophecy why make it at all? Doesn’t make sense.

Not many people outside the church understand the passion and atonement. But this may give you an idea: "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends" John 15:13

There are a number of ordinary men who have given up their lives for other ordinary men or an entity called ‘their country’, their religion etc. John’s quote doesn’t explain why jesus had to die a humiliating and disrespectful death.

"Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" Romans 5:7-8

If christ is the son of god then he couldn’t have “died” and if he died then he couldn’t have been the son of god. In that case, it was all a drama or as tao masters call it a parable.
You can see that his death and reincarnation (or resurrection if you insist) was a parable and not a literal death. That is the only thing that makes reasonable sense.

Well, he was seen risen. There is actually some pretty compelling evidence for the ressurection - I won't go into it now, but can tell you if you like.

Yes, let’s go in to evidence that can be verified by independent parties like me a student of comparative religion.

Well yes, faith is a big part. Ultimately, nothing can be proved beyond all doubt to everybody(though, perhaps, beyond resonable doubt) - that goes for every spiritual path. But there does come a point when you have to step out in faith.

Ahh…yes…faith. I have no problem with faith. But if faith is what I must step into then I am already sitting in faith and why should I step circle in your faith? Any reason?

And I think Christianity has a lot more historical backing than some other faiths.

Wrong! Buddha has more historical backing any day!
But we are leaving all this ‘historic evidence’ alone are we not?

Yes - in the gospels

I don’t understand. This is like saying…bible is the truth because it says so. This kind of logic only works on the ‘faithful’.

Many of them weren't when they began their investigations.

Are you contending that any comparative religion student that starts studying Christianity becomes a beliver? I can produce at least one person that I know who probably knows more about Judaism and Christianity than the both of us combined.

The fact remains, all ‘historic’ evidence, all ‘scholars’ are all believers. There ‘evidence’ doesn’t stand the scrutiny of independent parties otherwise the whole world would already be Christian!

So, are you saying we have free will or not?

I don’t know. You tell me. What does your scripture say about free will.

A god who calls some of the things that happen in the world 'divine play' isn't really a god I would want to worship.

That is of no concern to me. Hindus couldn’t care less if you believe or don’t believe worship or don’t worship.

It doesn't matter if it is all ultimately illusion - that is no comfort if you're a starving child.

You seem to be stuck in illusion of ‘historic evidence’ and ‘contradictions of the scriptures’ yourself.

Do you want to talk about a ‘starving child’ now or later in our discussion. What does your scripture say about a ‘starving child’? Why is he starving while another is born with a silver spoon in his mouth?

Adam wasn't acting like a man, he acted like a child - he saw what he wanted and he took it, regardless of the consequences. That translates into how we all operate today, unfortunately.

Actually careful now…we don’t want to change the history! It was not adam actually it was Eve wasn’t it? Eve compelled him to take from the tree of knowledge and god of the bible got angry that adam listened to his wife instead of his instructions! So it was a matter of ego for the god of the bible.

“And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life” Genesis chapter 3.17

Christians don't really believe in the idea of 'reward' and 'punishment'.

This is new to me. Then why do you care to convert?

God is the source of everything. Everything God created was good (you can see this in the first chapter of genesis - "God saw it and it was good".
Evil is a corruption of Good - it doesn't exist of itself, but is a corruption of something that was originally good.

This doesn’t make any logical sense! If GOD is the source of everything then he must also be the source of ‘everything’ including ‘corruption’ as you say.

Now on to corruption. What is this corruption you speak of? How can something that is GOOD can get corrupted? E.g. let’s say you have a large piece of white cloth…how is that piece or part of it can become black by itself?

It is logical impossibility to prove that something ‘bad’ or ‘corrupt’ or ‘unholy’ can come out of ‘good’.

So based on reason I reject what you are saying. Clearly, an unholy thing can not come out of holiness.

If GOD is the source of everything then all things come from him including what seems to us as corruption or what seems to us as unholy.

Hence the story of satan - he was originally an angel, who rebelled against God. But because he was created (God is the only uncreated 'thing') he is nowhere near God in power and will ultimately be thrown down. In fact, evil's time is already running out.

Let’s leave satan for another thread for now. Is that okay?

Well, he turned water into wine at a wedding feast - I doubt he would have gone through the whole feast without smiling once.

Yes, in the movie john the Baptists too jesus smiles at that occasion. Okay let’s say that he smiled once in a while.

[nekozuki]

Tomoz, I am an ex Christian. Christianity has never been for me so I started to researching other faiths. I was surprised about the lies that my Sunday school teachers taught us about other faiths. That's when I realized I didn't want to be Christian at all anymore. Of course I have great respect for Jesus, he may or may not be God in the flesh I found Hinduism to be the religion for me as it agrees with me of what God could actually be like.

I've never believed Satan to be a literal figure but a personification of the evils of human beings. I personally believe humans are responsible for evil.

One of the reasons why the Satan story makes no sense is because I learned that angels have no free will, if they have no free will then how can this angel called Lucifer rebel against his Creator?

I believe that the Gnostics' demiurge is similar to the Hindu concept of Maya also.

[saidevo]

God must hence certainly know the biography of every soul that emanated from him and reach him in the end. The soul certainly does not know, and hence from his perspective freewill exists to a certain extent, though it is easy to verify the role of destiny in every walk of life.

Based on the Law of Karma, Destiny or Fate is the past karma of a soul and free will is the ability to create present karma. The final Destination of every soul is God, the source it emanated from. The journey to this Destination is delayed by Destiny, the accumulated past karma of a soul, and Freewill, the ability to add more karma.

[TruthSeeker]

Based on the Law of Karma, Destiny or Fate is the past karma of a soul and free will is the ability to create present karma. The final Destination of every soul is God, the source it emanated from. The journey to this Destination is delayed by Destiny, the accumulated past karma of a soul, and Freewill, the ability to add more karma.

You are right - from the perspective of man, freewill "seems" to exist. However, the individual soul being his own projected consciousness - there is nothing that the Lord does not know, in the past, present and future. If God does not know the future, it challenges his omniscience. This is a paradox.

The universe(matter) follows a well defined law and it has no unpredictability. The unpredictability(freewill) is introduced by the two false egos of mind and intellect. however both these are not self luminous, and insentient, and cannot cause any absolute unpredictability. The universal soul is aware of every smallest event that is happening or will happen in future.

The example is right there in Bhagavad Gita itself. When Arjuna beholds the universal form, he is instantly able to know the future too - the death of Bhisma, Drona all stand as inevitable destinies, whether Arjuna chooses to act or not. The concept of "I am the doer" makes one imagine that there is freewill, but in reality the Lord is the doer. When your consciousness transcends the three states of time, you will find that all this is only a big planned show. For those contained within the constrants of time, it raises a number of questions and logical problems - the paradox or freewill and destiny, which no one is able to understand properly. Outside it, there is none - that is only one divine law and one universal soul that operates, what could happen without its knowledge? If freewill beyond the knowledge(approval) of God is possible, then you will be forced to admit the realities of concepts like eternal damnation, just like Christianity.