Christ Conspiracy_ The Greatest Story Ever Sold - Acharya S [38]
In fact, Bishop Irenaeus was a Gnostic and had a zodiac on the floor of his church at Lyons.12 Furthermore, the great "Christian" saint Augustine was originally a Mandaean, i.e., a Gnostic, until after the Council of Nicea, when he was "converted," i.e., promised a prominent place in the newly formed Catholic Church, such that he then excoriated his former sect.
Concerning this confusion between the Christians and Gnostics, Waite relates, "Most of the Christian writers of the second century who immediately succeeded the apostolic fathers, advocated doctrines which were afterward considered heretical."13 Yet, the orthodox Christians used whatever doctrine they could to benefit their cause, exalting these same "heretics," including Origen (@ 185-254) and Tertullian, as founding fathers.
Many "Christian" concepts are in fact "Gnostic," such as the disdain for the flesh and for matter in general. In actuality, the Gnostic-Christian ideology deemed as evil both matter and the god of the material world, the "Demiurge," also called the "god of this world," or the "prince of this world," as well as "Ialdabaoth," the jealous god. Jesus's own Gnosticism is revealed at John 7:7: "The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify of it that its works are evil." And Paul's Gnostic thought appears where he reveals his abhorrence of the flesh and at 2 Corinthians 4:4, for example, where he speaks gnostically about the "god of this world" being evil. In this passage, the apostle also reveals that the scriptures were tampered with and suggests that he and his cohorts themselves were at some point guilty of "underhanded ways," apparently including such mutilation of texts, which they were thereafter giving up:
We have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways; we refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word . . . And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ ...
Concerning these sentiments, Massey comments:
Speaking from his Gnostic standpoint, Paul declared to the historic Christians who followed John and Peter, that God had sent them a working of error, that they should believe a lie, because they rejected the truth as it was according to his spiritual Gospel! 14
Not only was Paul propounding a "veiled" or "spiritual" gospel, he was a classic Gnostic, called, in fact, the "Apostle of the Gnostics," in that he did not acknowledge a historical Christ. As Massey further says:
. . . Paul opposed the setting up of a Christ carnalized, and fought the Sarkolaters Icarnalizersj tooth and nail. . . . If the writings of Paul were retouched by the carnalizers, that will account for the two voices heard at times in his Epistles and the apparent duplicity of his doctrine ... Paul passed away and his writings remained with the enemy, to be withheld, tampered with, reindoctrinated, and turned to account by his old opponents who preached the gospel of Christ carnalized.15
The Gnostic Christ of Paul is also reflected at Galatians 3:27- 8: "For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus." Regarding this concept, Massey says:
The Christ of the Gnostics was a mystical type continued from mythology to portray a spiritual reality of the interior life. Hence the Christ in this human phase could be female as well as male; for such to become historical, or be made so, except by ignorantly mistaking a mythical Impersonation for a Hermaphrodite in Person! 11i
The Gnostic focus on attaining gnosis, or the "kingdom of God within," is also a concept that made it into the Christian religion and bible but that is widely