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Question for gnosticism people on here

Frank Goad

Well-Known Member
Do people who believe in gnosticism believe lucid dreaming helps with spiritual enlightenment?And can help induce out of body experiences.All in the name of God?
 
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Cooky

Veteran Member
The explanation is right here:

Gnosticism - Wikipedia
Some interesting literature from New Advent
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Gnosticism

"The beginnings of Gnosticism have long been a matter of controversy and are still largely a subject of research. The more these origins are studied, the farther they seem to recede in the past.

Whereas formerly Gnosticism was considered mostly a corruption of Christianity, it now seems clear that the first traces of Gnostic systems can be discerned some centuries before the Christian Era. Its Eastern origin was already maintained by Gieseler and Neander; F. Ch. Bauer (1831) and Lassen (1858) sought to prove its relation to the religions of India; Lipsius (1860) pointed to Syria and Phoenicia as its home, and Hilgenfeld (1884) thought it was connected with later Mazdeism. Joel (1880), Weingarten (1881), Koffmane (1881), Anrich (1894), and Wobbermin (1896) sought to account for the rise of Gnosticism by the influence of Greek Platonic philosophy and the Greek mysteries, while Harnack described it as "acute Hellenization of Christianity"."

"A collective name for a large number of greatly-varying and pantheistic-idealistic sects, which flourished from some time before the Christian Era down to the fifth century, and which, while borrowing the phraseology and some of the tenets of the chief religions of the day, and especially of Christianity, held matter to be a deterioration of spirit, and the whole universe a depravation of the Deity, and taught the ultimate end of all being to be the overcoming of the grossness of matter and the return to the Parent-Spirit, which return they held to be inaugurated and facilitated by the appearance of some God-sent Saviour."​
 

Cooky

Veteran Member
...The notion of matter being the "deterioration of spirit", in gnostic thought, is a strange, yet interesting concept IMO.
 

WhyIsThatSo

Well-Known Member
...The notion of matter being the "deterioration of spirit", in gnostic thought, is a strange, yet interesting concept IMO.

While it (matter) can be said to be the "deterioration of spirit", this deterioration is also the manifestation of "form"...
or what we know as physical reality here.
"spirit" is the "archetypes" of everything that comes into being ( manifests )....
this is why "spirit" is what's REALLY real....eternal, infinite, limitless, etc.
 

WhyIsThatSo

Well-Known Member
Do people who believe in gnosticism believe lucid dreaming helps with spiritual enlightenment?And can help induce out of body experiences.All in the name of God?

"Lucid dreaming" is just the ability to be "awake" (conscious) to a certain degree while you are having a dream.
This way you are in control of the dream environment, and it is not in control of you...

The "enlightenment" part comes when you realize that when you go to sleep at night, you are having a literal
out-of-body experience. The "dream state" is just your consciousness leaving your physical body and venturing
into the "astral realm"......which is a meta-physical reality just above this physical one here.
 

Cooky

Veteran Member
While it (matter) can be said to be the "deterioration of spirit", this deterioration is also the manifestation of "form"...
or what we know as physical reality here.
"spirit" is the "archetypes" of everything that comes into being ( manifests )....
this is why "spirit" is what's REALLY real....eternal, infinite, limitless, etc.

I actually have thought something similar to that prior to this thread. Interesting.

...It's kind of like String Theory, where all that we see and touch, is merely a 3-D "projection" or "simulation" of a 9 or 10-D actual reality from somewhere far away.

I know that's actually quite different, but it seems compatible in some ways.
 
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WhyIsThatSo

Well-Known Member
I actually have believed that prior to this thread. Interesting.

...It's kind of like String Theory, where all that we see and touch, is merely a 3-D "projection" or "simulation" of a 9 or 10-D reality from somewhere far away.

I know that's actually quite different, but it seems compatible in some ways.

Actually, you "know" more than you realize...
and a "matrix" is what you are describing...….ever see the movie ?
 

WhyIsThatSo

Well-Known Member
I have. A good movie.

The first installment of The Matrix was made to intentionally put gnostic thought into mainstream thought.
It was directed by two transgender women sisters who were known "gnostics"...
There is much truth hidden in it, inconspicuously of course.
 
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Cooky

Veteran Member
The first installment of The Matrix was made to intentionally put gnostic thought into mainstream thought.
It was directed by two transgender women sisters who were known "gnostics"...
There is much truth hidden in it, inconspicuously of course.

I never knew that. It's interesting, thanks.
 

Frank Goad

Well-Known Member
"Lucid dreaming" is just the ability to be "awake" (conscious) to a certain degree while you are having a dream.
This way you are in control of the dream environment, and it is not in control of you...

The "enlightenment" part comes when you realize that when you go to sleep at night, you are having a literal
out-of-body experience. The "dream state" is just your consciousness leaving your physical body and venturing
into the "astral realm"......which is a meta-physical reality just above this physical one here.

How does this help a jehovah's witness?Because my current religion is jehovah's witness.
 

WhyIsThatSo

Well-Known Member
You're welcome.....and I'm pretty sure their target audience was people like you (open minded).


Everybody has to start somewhere. I once considered myself an "Orthodox Judeo Christian" for many years...

But somehow I always knew that something was not right here...
"LOVE" does not create a world where every living thing MUST KILL another living thing, in order to stay...."alive".
 

MonkeyFire

Well-Known Member
I believe the angel of light is the fallen embodiment of omniscience. I kind of wonder what the gnostic take on the fallen angel is.
 

WhyIsThatSo

Well-Known Member
You're welcome.....and I'm pretty sure their target audience was people like you (open minded).


Everybody has to start somewhere. I once considered myself an "Orthodox Judeo Christian" for many years...

But somehow I always knew that something was not right here...
"LOVE" does not create a world where every living thing MUST KILL another living thing, in order to stay...."alive".
I believe the angel of light is the fallen embodiment of omniscience. I kind of wonder what the gnostic take on the fallen angel is.

The gnostic take (as you say), on the "fallen angel" is understood as the "demiurge"...a "half-god" (demigod) if you will...
the one who created this physical world (realm) where every living thing must kill another living thing in order to "live".

the one who professes (arrogantly) that he is the only God, and "jealous" (envious) of anyone who questions him...
and has a penchant for "killing" and "blood"...…..perhaps you've heard of Him ?
 

WhyIsThatSo

Well-Known Member
QUOTE="Landon Caeli, post: 6546227, member: 64198"]I never knew that. It's interesting, thanks.[/QUOTE]

just FYI.….knowledge in itself is never limited, only our knowledge of ourselves is...
and Einstein was correct in that "imagination" is of supreme importance, because "imagination" is the "imaging" ( the bringing into physical manifestation ) process of matter into what we call "physical reality " .
 
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Deeje

Avid Bible Student
Premium Member
Do people who believe in gnosticism believe lucid dreaming helps with spiritual enlightenment?And can help induce out of body experiences.All in the name of God?

Lucid dreaming can be an aberration of the brain,(my grandson has lucid dreams, called night terrors when he is sick and running a fever) or it can be induced by dabbling in spiritism. It is an area of the brain that I don't believe is well understood....like hypnotism. We would steer clear of both. The demons can take over a surrendered consciousness.
 
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