twalsh@midway.uchicago.edu wrote:
: Steve Lamont <spl@pitstop.ucsd.edu> wrote:
: >[Found in alt.humor.best-of-usenet --- header crap bobbited]
: >Newsgroups: soc.religion.unitarian-univ
: >From: Bertram Eljon Holubek <100101.1673@CompuServe.COM>
: >Subject: About Religion:The Secret of Belief
: >
: >The Secret of Belief / by Bertram Eljon
: >Short version 3.2 west, March 1995
: >
: >In the succession of Abel, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Arjuna, Buddha,
: >Rama, Jesus, Mohammed and many others more I would like to bring
: >to you the final explanation, the scientific religion.
: >
: >With us, there is a divine person called Sophia.
:
: Gnosticism is delightfully convoluted, and deserves to be on
: alt.slack even more than the sc**nt*l*g*sts
Jesus on rye with extra mayo! Why didn't you say so two microseconds
ago? Here's the first few paragraphs of _The_ _Trimorphic_ _Protennoias_
(author unknown...) An epinoia is a thought: "upon the mind" I'm
not sure, but maybe a protennoia is a "proto thought" or "first thought."
Yes, the Gnostics had a complex complicated convoluted difficult to
understand cosmology/theogony. And every Gnostic was free to create
his/or/her own. Ask in the newsgroup alt.religion.gnostic for more
info. Basically, they try to explain how a perfect god could create
an imperfect world. Simple, god didn't. God creates the Pleroma
("Heaven") but then something akin to radioactive decay occurs and
there's a flash of light and a shower of "GOD-DECAY-PARTICLES" including
Ialdaboeth who is the actual world creating Demiurge (from the greek
word for "public worker" or "civil servant") Clearly, the job was
a given to an incompetent. Christianity retains the trace of this
aspect of Gnosticism in the "Fallen Angel" myth.
Here 'tis:
TRIMORPHIC PROTENNOIAS
"I am Protennoia, the Thought that
dwells in the Light. I am the movement
that dwells in the All, she in whom the
All takes the Son of God! It is he who is!
The Aeon of Aeons! He beholds the Aeons
which he begot. For it is you who
has begotten by your own desire! Therefore
we glorify you: ma mo o o o eia ei on
ei! The Aeon of Aeons! The Aeon which
he gave!"
Then, moreover, the God who was begotten
gave the Aeons a power of life for
them to rely on and he established them.
The first Aeon he established over the
first: Armedon, Nousanios, Armoze; the
second he established over the second
Aeon: Phaionios, Ainios, Oroiael; the
third over the third Aeon: Mellephaneus,
Loios, Daveithai; the fourth over the
fourth: Mousanios, Amethes, Eleleth.
Now those Aeons are the ones begotten
by the God who was begotten -- the
Christ -- and these Aeons received as
well as gave glory. They were the first to
appear, exalted in their thought, and
each of the Aeons gave ten thousand glories
within great unsearchable lights and
they all together blessed the perfect Son,
the God who was begotten.
Then there came forth a word from the
great Light, Eleleth, and said, "I am
King! Who belongs to chaos and who belongs
to the underworld?" And at that
instant his Light appeared, shining forth,
endowed with the Epinoia. The Powers
of the Powers did not entreat him and
immediately there appeared the great
Demon who rules over the lowest part of
the underworld and chaos. He has
neither form nor perfection, but, on the
contrary, possesses the form of the glory
of those begotten in the darkness. Now
he is called "Saclas," that is, "Samael,"
"Ialdabaoth," he who had taken power;
who had snatched it away from the
guileless one, Sophia; who had at first
overpowered her who is the Light's
Epinoia who had descended, her from
whom the great Demon had come forth
from the first.
Now the Epinoia of the Light knew
that she had begged him, Eleleth, for
another order different from hers, and she
said, "Give me another order so that you
may become for me a dwelling place lest
I become disorderly forever." And the
order of the entire house of glory was
agreed upon her word. A blessing was
conveyed to her and the higher order
yielded to her.
And the great Demon began to produce
aeons in the likeness of the real Aeons,
except that he produced them out of
his own power.
Then I too revealed my Voice secretly,
saying, "Cease! Desist, you who tread on
matter, for behold! I am coming down to
the world of mortals for the sake of my
portion that was in that place from the
time when the guileless Sophia was conquered,
she who descended, so that I
might thwart their aim which the one
who reveals himself through her appoints."
And everyone who dwelt in the
house of the unknowable Light was disturbed,
and the abyss trembled. And the
Archigenetor of ignorance reigned over
Chaos and the underworld and produced
a man in my likeness. But he
--More--(17%)
....................TEAR.ALONG.THE.DOTTED.LINE.....................
Epopt of the Exploding Head of JFK. Lincesed to blaspheme the Gods
My skull is bigger on the inside than the outside!
Send $1 to SubGenius Foundation, P.O. Box 140306, Dallas TX 75214
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