Gnosticism - 3 Valentinian and Cathar Texts - Summer Harvest, Epistle to Flora & Medieval Dualism

The discovery of hidden Gnostic texts like the Nag Hammadi Library has revolutionized our understanding of ancient Gnosticism and Christianity. But, other Gnostic texts have actually survived in the very polemical works meant to suppress them. This episode explore three such texts preserved in anti-gnostic texts: The Valentinian Hymn "Summer Harvest," the Epistle to Flora (a rare text of Gnostic ethics), and a medieval treatise which represents a fully developed metaphysical dualism attributed to 13th century Cathars. These texts are fascinating gnostic survivals, living on in the very works that sought the destruction of the movement as heresy.
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Recommended Readings:
Smith - Valentinian Christianity - 978-0520297463
Wakefield & Evans - Heresies of the High Middle Ages - 978-0231096324
Une somme anti-cathare - www.google.com/books/edition/...

[@TheEsotericaChannel]

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Funny thing is that a VPN company reached out the day I finished this episode about sponsoring! Serendipity or something more sinister? ;)

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I like my parodies of creators’s sponsorships like this: where the .01% of KZbin viewers the only ones to get it. Just another gem from ole Dr J

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Gnosticism surviving via anti gnostic texts , the cheapest of ironies . Demiurge sure has a sense of humor

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Yeah, that's the tricky part.

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@@TheEsotericaChannel I just got back from Third Century Alexandria and the shop keep was out of sacrificial ingredients so I wasn’t able to get the vpn. Fortunately, just before my flux capacitor backfired and pulled me back to 2022 I managed to grab the one true and real Holy Prepuce but it slipped off my finger like the One Ring leaving Gollum leading to multiple copies being spread out over time and space. Basically, I’m writing this to confess to all you wonderful scholars that it’s my fault for all the many, many, god awfully many divine foreskins around the world. Thanks for this great font of joke material.

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@DivineDefecation well I’m going at one second per second though at my job it feels like one year per second. Thanks for equating the divine with defecation as yeah that sums up Yahweh quite well.

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What was the bit about the silver over the heart?

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Glad you enjoyed it! Hope you are well!

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I remember you also mentioned in a previous video that the polemic writings of Irenaeus were used to fill in the holes in Gnostic texts discovered in Modern Times. And likewise, the discovery of the Gnostic texts gave us a way to evaluate the historical accuracy of the proto-orthodox polemic writings. History is like a matchmaker with a weird sense of humor.

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Totally agree, nothing is more insane than just actual history.

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i started reading Irenaeus (and Hippolytus) last week for my gnostic studies and I was blown away by his obsequious level of detail. I too found it hilariously ironic that his attempt to discredit was actually providing valuable literature to future folk like ourselves. 👍

[@PaulClermont]

@Prey R Depends on how you want to react as the reader- so far (about 35 pages in), it's mostly a well-presented exposition of certain gnostic concepts (the Pleroma, Ogdoad, 30 Aeons, etc) with intermittent critique by Irenaeus. If you were a 2nd century or modern Christian, you'd probably instantly agree with him about the silliness of it all, including their "kabbalistic" interpretation of the gospels & Paul - short of reading the texts and hearing explanations from the proponents themselves. But now that we have the 52 texts of gnostic literature, and see where the pieces fit in, it just gives interested researchers more data. Whether to scorn it or make use of it is up to the reader

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Typically when the orthodoxy attempts to rid the world of something they do very well, it almost seems as if he was a double agent for this reason

[@andythedishwasher1117]

When Valentinus speaks of one component of being clinging to another, I'm reminded of the concept of inheritance in programming where one program will inherit or "cling to" the attributes of the larger program to which it belongs, but will also add some attributes that are unique to its individual component. It almost sounds as if he is unpacking the nested layers of specificity that define a human being.

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Cybergnosticism reference? ehhehe

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@@vallewabbel9690 Cybergnosticism has been poorly represented outside the community that studies and practices it. However, I think that's more a matter of indifference on the part of practitioners than it is a matter of actual secrecy. If you're willing to dig deep into understanding computers, the people who already do will start to open up to you about their spiritual beliefs because they will start to feel like you can understand them. Otherwise, they are just going to ignore you and continue their work. They understand knowledge has dependency chains, and it takes time and effort to forge those chains. They won't do it for you, but they will recognize when you have done it.

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This channel is my favorite place on the internet! Thank you, Justin!

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There's nothing more fun and gratifying than seeing genuine academic love for a subject, and the purest way to show love for a subject is humor! This episode was as fascinating as it was hilarious! Thanks, as always!

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I was delighted with the message from your VPN sponsor . Thanks for this presentation. It was helpfully informative!

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The Waldensians “were”? The Waldensians are still alive and thriving, they have a whole town in the mountains of North Carolina called Valdese that they founded in the 1800s after the King of Sardinia let them immigrate to America. They’re wonderful, have a strong understanding of their history and are good to talk to, I went to seminary with one of their leaders

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My dad was born and raised in Valdese! His side of my family has been in that area (Burke County) for around 200 years, in fact. They attended the Waldensian Presbyterian Church. The town has Weldensian annual festivals. Etc etc. So cool, glad you mentioned it!!

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This is very cool, but I wouldn’t consider 1 tiny mountain town to be thriving. Similarly we talk about Manichaeans in the past tense even though there is a Manichaean-buddhist syncretic movement in a village in southern China with 1 temple

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@@bobmcbob9856 there are also significant Waldensian communities in Brazil and still in the Alps of Italy and Austria

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Congratulations on the new job!

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Hi Justin - I would be really interested to see a video comparing/contrasting Gnosticism & Neoplatonism, I feel like there’s interesting correlations. Anyway, this is a great video as always. Thanks again - James

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I agree

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Wonderfully researched content as ever Dr Sledge! I love this subject, although most of my limited knowledge comes from the Nag Hamadi, I guess you could say the Books of Enoch and a little from books about the Cathars This Triple Bill is a real treat, especially the Gnostic song. 🌛🌝🌜🕸️

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I would but I have to be careful - my April fool's episode got a little out of hand so...

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People find Gnosticism weird, but it's weird that it's ignored how close to Gnosticism Paul was. In various epistles he uses categorization of pneumatics, psychics (lol) and sarkics, he talks how heavenly spheres are ruled by archons (and powers and principalities), talks about a god of this age, he says flesh and blood cant inherit the kingdom but that people will have 'spiritual bodies' instead of physical ones, he even clearly says (in Galatians 3) that the Mosaic Law was not from God, but from angels, and from the context (that the Law is a curse, that God's covenant with and promise to Abraham had nothing to do with the Law) he seems to be referring to rebellious angels.

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Most academic scholars appreciate this fact

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Secular religious studies probably (which are not a thing in my country unfortunately). I went to a seminary and we never learned anything about it. After seminary when I went to another college to major in (analytic) philosophy we didn't go in that direction with theology, we did things like the cosmological argument, theodicy, etc.. The only theologian I came across to mention it was David Bentley Hart, who is famous for being a 'heretic' in theological circles, and I read such things on my own..

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This is more of a testament to how nebulous and ill-defined Gnosticism really was, especially in the earliest centuries of Christianity. While not necessary the elaborate cosmology, many "Gnostic" ideas seemed to be be widely present among syncretic religious landscape of Rome in the first few centures C.E. Even Augustine in his Confessions, when praying for his dead mother, asks for protection for her soul from "the lion and the dragon," and other entities which were believed to exist in the spheres who could attack or otherwise accost the souls of deceased on their ascent into heaven.

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Nice content! Can you make an episode on the 42 commandments of Ma'at that may have inspired the Mosaic laws?

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Hmm I’d love to learn more from you about Enoch if you’ve made any vids on the book