Halcyon
Lord of the Badgers
Why does Jesus refer to himself as the Son of Man?
This question has puzzled Christians since the dawn of the faith, and its true meaning is still debated to this day.
It is interesting to note that Jesus is the only person in the gospels to refer to himself as the Son of Man, the disciples never use the title.
They sometimes refer to Jesus as God or Son of God, titles which Jesus never uses himself, but does allow.
In this article I will attempt to explain my own Gnostic understanding of the title. It is my belief that the phrase only really makes sense when understood from the Gnostic perspective.
To understand the title we need to start at the beginning, with Adam.
In the Torah book of Genesis Adam is the name of the first man. Most people also realise that Adam also translates as man or humanity, thus as well as an individual character Adam is also representative of the entire human race.
Genesis goes onto describe the first offspring of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel. Abel was killed and Eve gave birth to a replacement Seth. It is easy to understand that all three men are the sons of Adam and thus each is literally a Son of Man.
Through the line of Seth we have Noah, and since all of mankind is descended from Noah each of us can trace our family history back to Seth and to Adam (in a mythological sense of course).
In this case all of us are the Sons and Daughters of Man, we are all human after all.
It is at this point that we discover the literal meaning of the title. Son of Man could easily be rephrased as Son of Adam, and as such is synonymous with man or even I.
We see the truth in this in the Gospel According to Matthew, chapter 16;
Jesus then rephrases the same question and directs it to Simon Peter;
So, the simplest understanding of the title is merely a roundabout why of referring to the self, a longwinded way of saying I.
The question now is, why does Jesus use the title Son of Man to refer to himself, and not simply I?
I believe the answer lies in Gnostic scripture, pre-Christian Gnostic scripture to be precise, in the texts of the Sethian Gnostics.
The Sethian Gnostics, as the name implies, followed Seth the third son of Adam an original Son of Man.
But there is a great deal more to Seth than that in Gnostic literature, and to understand Seth we must go back to the very beginning, before Adam and Eve, before Genesis and before the God of Genesis came into existence.
In Gnostic cosmology the true God, which is alien to this world of matter, is said to have emanated various aspects of Itself, thus we have Wisdom, Will, Forethought and many other aspects personified into heavenly beings known as Aeons.
The Forethought of God, the Aeon Barbelo, is commonly thought of as female and takes the role of Mother to Gods Father figure. However, it is clear from the text that Barbelo is androgynous. She is given the titles of amongst others, thrice-male and first human.
She is the creative force of God, a pure but lesser reflection of God. Where God is the Source of all things, She is the Mother of all things the creator, the literal Hand of God. Through union of Barbelo with God, all things came forth. One of the first of all things was Geradamas.
Geradamas is the archetypal human, the perfect human. Again He is androgynous, but thought of as male. Geradamas means Adam the Stranger of Heavenly Adam.
It is because of a glimpse of Geradamas, that the Demiurge was inspired to make physical man, Adam.
The son of Geradamas was Seth, the same Seth that was later born to Adam and Eve on Earth. Seth is the original saviour figure, sent to save humanity from ignorance. Hence why the sect referred to themselves as the Sethians, or the Children of Seth Gods chosen people. The Children of Seth are synonymous with the pneumatic humans the Gnostics.
What has this to do with the Son of Man title?
Well, here is where it all ties together. Barbelo is the first human, She is Man, but She is not a human being, She is an Aeon.
Geradamas is the perfect human, He is the manifestation of humanity in its purest form. When a person reaches perfection, gains Gnosis of God, they become Geradamas.
If Barbelo is Man, then Geradamas is the Son of Man.
Thus when Jesus refers to himself as the Son of Man he is telling people that he has been anointed by God (reached Gnosis/become Christ) and so has become the perfect human, Geradamas.
As an aside, it also becomes apparent that, since Barbelo is an aspect of God, She is the Hand of God She is God too. Thus Geradamas is the Son of God and the Son of Man and so is Christ Jesus.
This question has puzzled Christians since the dawn of the faith, and its true meaning is still debated to this day.
It is interesting to note that Jesus is the only person in the gospels to refer to himself as the Son of Man, the disciples never use the title.
They sometimes refer to Jesus as God or Son of God, titles which Jesus never uses himself, but does allow.
In this article I will attempt to explain my own Gnostic understanding of the title. It is my belief that the phrase only really makes sense when understood from the Gnostic perspective.
To understand the title we need to start at the beginning, with Adam.
In the Torah book of Genesis Adam is the name of the first man. Most people also realise that Adam also translates as man or humanity, thus as well as an individual character Adam is also representative of the entire human race.
Genesis goes onto describe the first offspring of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel. Abel was killed and Eve gave birth to a replacement Seth. It is easy to understand that all three men are the sons of Adam and thus each is literally a Son of Man.
Through the line of Seth we have Noah, and since all of mankind is descended from Noah each of us can trace our family history back to Seth and to Adam (in a mythological sense of course).
In this case all of us are the Sons and Daughters of Man, we are all human after all.
It is at this point that we discover the literal meaning of the title. Son of Man could easily be rephrased as Son of Adam, and as such is synonymous with man or even I.
We see the truth in this in the Gospel According to Matthew, chapter 16;
Jesus then rephrases the same question and directs it to Simon Peter;
So, the simplest understanding of the title is merely a roundabout why of referring to the self, a longwinded way of saying I.
The question now is, why does Jesus use the title Son of Man to refer to himself, and not simply I?
I believe the answer lies in Gnostic scripture, pre-Christian Gnostic scripture to be precise, in the texts of the Sethian Gnostics.
The Sethian Gnostics, as the name implies, followed Seth the third son of Adam an original Son of Man.
But there is a great deal more to Seth than that in Gnostic literature, and to understand Seth we must go back to the very beginning, before Adam and Eve, before Genesis and before the God of Genesis came into existence.
In Gnostic cosmology the true God, which is alien to this world of matter, is said to have emanated various aspects of Itself, thus we have Wisdom, Will, Forethought and many other aspects personified into heavenly beings known as Aeons.
The Forethought of God, the Aeon Barbelo, is commonly thought of as female and takes the role of Mother to Gods Father figure. However, it is clear from the text that Barbelo is androgynous. She is given the titles of amongst others, thrice-male and first human.
She is the creative force of God, a pure but lesser reflection of God. Where God is the Source of all things, She is the Mother of all things the creator, the literal Hand of God. Through union of Barbelo with God, all things came forth. One of the first of all things was Geradamas.
Geradamas is the archetypal human, the perfect human. Again He is androgynous, but thought of as male. Geradamas means Adam the Stranger of Heavenly Adam.
It is because of a glimpse of Geradamas, that the Demiurge was inspired to make physical man, Adam.
The son of Geradamas was Seth, the same Seth that was later born to Adam and Eve on Earth. Seth is the original saviour figure, sent to save humanity from ignorance. Hence why the sect referred to themselves as the Sethians, or the Children of Seth Gods chosen people. The Children of Seth are synonymous with the pneumatic humans the Gnostics.
What has this to do with the Son of Man title?
Well, here is where it all ties together. Barbelo is the first human, She is Man, but She is not a human being, She is an Aeon.
Geradamas is the perfect human, He is the manifestation of humanity in its purest form. When a person reaches perfection, gains Gnosis of God, they become Geradamas.
If Barbelo is Man, then Geradamas is the Son of Man.
Thus when Jesus refers to himself as the Son of Man he is telling people that he has been anointed by God (reached Gnosis/become Christ) and so has become the perfect human, Geradamas.
As an aside, it also becomes apparent that, since Barbelo is an aspect of God, She is the Hand of God She is God too. Thus Geradamas is the Son of God and the Son of Man and so is Christ Jesus.
