WAS GNOSTICISM THE SOURCE OF FIRST-CENTURY CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE?
Did This Ancient Roman Religious Movement Influence the New Testament?[1]
By Eric V. Snow
The Talmudic scholar Hyam Maccoby strongly emphasizes the influence that the ancient Hellenistic religious/philosophical movement called Gnosticism supposedly had on early Christianity. Many of his arguments are like those made by higher critics in general, not just some Jews, against Christianity’s truth are based upon the claim that first-century Christian doctrine came directly from Gnosticism. By stressing the similarities and ignoring or discounting the differences, Maccoby portrays Paul as a moderate Gnostic (such as in his view of God and Satan) who also adopted ideas from the mystery cults.[i]
Naturally enough, Maccoby here merely follows in the footsteps of such scholars as Bousset, Reitzenstein, and Bultmann in seeing Christianity as having doctrinal ideas derived from Gnosticism. But what exactly is Gnosticism? The definitional issue is foundational to determining whether Gnosticism existed before Christianity. A broad definition could allow the label of "Gnosticism" to fit such a pre-Christian philosophical movement as Platonism, which upheld a strong spirit-matter dualism. But a narrow definition makes it nearly impossible to prove "Gnosticism" emerged before Christianity. And if Gnosticism didn’t exist before Christianity, the former couldn't have determined the latter's theological content for chronological reasons alone.
JUST WHAT IS GNOSTICISM?
But what is Gnosticism, first of all? Unfortunately, this term for an ancient philosophical/religious system/movement in the Mediterranean basin has been hard to define, in part because the label covers a great variety of beliefs. Perhaps most importantly, Gnostics claimed to have an esoteric secret knowledge that the non-initiated didn’t have. They also upheld dualism: They claimed matter is evil but spirit is good. The God of the Old Testament is called stupid and evil, a god of darkness, because he created the material world (i.e., the Platonic Demiurge). But the god of the New Testament is good, a god of light. Gnosticism also taught that a series of intercessors (not just One, i.e., Jesus) between God and man exist, such as angels, demons, or other celestial beings, who all emanated from God. Jesus (in particular) was believed to be one of the higher intermediary beings who descended to earth in order to help release the divine spark imprisoned in every man and woman. Each human soul fell from the highest heavenly sphere into the material world, which caused it to be imprisoned in a material body. All these souls, divine sparks, once were part of a Primal Man. The demons tore Him apart, and then made the world out of Him. These demons (or powers of darkness) carefully imprisoned the divine sparks, the souls, in human bodies, in order to insure the material world doesn't revert back to its original chaos. The basic purpose of gnosis (special knowledge) is to free the soul from the body. A savior sent to earth by the true God imparts gnosis to men and women in order to redeem them. The special knowledge tells them about their former state, when living in the heavenly world, and how to return to it. What makes "Gnosticism" hard to define tightly, as well as difficult to trace its origins, was the Gnostics’ practice of borrowing eclectically the ideas of others, resulting in a new synthesis.[ii]
PROBLEMS WITH MACCOBY'S DEFINITION OF GNOSTICISM
Maccoby makes "acosmism," i.e., the belief that matter or the material world is evil, central to his definition. He omits both a Savior and the mystical ascent/descent motif from his definition, but emphasizes metaphysical dualism (i.e., the belief that only two fundamental kinds of substances exist in the universe, such as matter and spirit). Gonzalez would disagree, maintaining that a messenger, who brings the knowledge required to liberate humanity from bondage to the material world, “is characteristic [to] all Gnostic systems.” By using this definition, Maccoby lays the foundation for his argument that a gentile response to Judaism was the origin of Gnosticism, instead of its being a Christian heresy that originated from the rejection of the true Gospel.[iii]
By contrast, both Judaism and Christianity teach a dualism in which the material world is the intentional and good creation of the one almighty, transcendent God. As Wilson observes when commenting on attempts to trace Gnosticism's origins back to Persia, and to Manicheism and Zoroastrianism: "There are different kinds of dualism, and a dualistic system is not for that reason necessarily Gnostic."[iv] Nowhere in the New Testament, unlike the case in Gnostic teaching, is the God of the Old Testament regarded as evil, whether it is for creating the material world or for any other reason. No Gnostic could possibly teach that the Savior bringing the Gnosis (knowledge) needed to save humanity from the material world's corruption was at fault for creating that same material world to begin with (John 1:3; Col. 1:16; Eph. 3:9 (NKJV); Rev. 3:14; Heb. 1:2, 8, 10)!
Furthermore, the philosophy of Platonism as well as the mystery religion of Orphism could easily be labeled "Gnosticism" by Maccoby's "Savior-less" definition. The Greek philosopher Plato (c. 428-348 b.c.) advocated a number of ideas that resembled much of later Gnostic teaching. Hengel draws a sharp distinction between the common ancient (and modern!) belief in the transmigration of human immortal souls and their return to earth in various physical bodies, and Christianity’s insistence on “a unique, once-for-all happening, which is the consummation of history.”[v] A classicist could argue that Gnosticism's origins lay in Platonism and neo-Platonism! It all depends on what elements of Gnostic thinking someone cares to perceive selectively, isolate, and emphasize to the exclusion of others.
Platonism was much like Gnosticism (or many Gnostics) since it taught physical pleasures were evil and deceitful, advocated an ascetic lifestyle, exalted the pursuit and possession of knowledge of the unseen divine spiritual realities in order to obtain release from the transmigration/rebirth cycle, saw knowledge (or its pursuit) as a means of securing spiritual union with the divine, asserted the human race was indirectly created, and indulged in numerological speculations. Since the second-century A.D. Neo-Platonic school of Plotinus taught and/or expanded upon these ideas, then-contemporary Hellenistic philosophy often upheld beliefs much like those of the developed Gnostic systems of the same century. So then, do these similarities "prove" Gnosticism originated in Platonism and neo-Platonism? Since Maccoby's "Savior-less" definition of "Gnosticism" could catch Platonism philosophy in its net, its excessive generality requires its rejection.[vi]
DOES GNOSTICISM SUCCESSFULLY JUMP THE CHRONOLOGICAL HURDLE?
Attempts to derive early Christian belief from Gnosticism have to leap the same chronological hurdle that have tripped up similar efforts to trace the influence of the pagan mystery religions upon the New Testament. Now Maccoby confidently asserts: "Recent discoveries have shown that, contrary to what was previously argued, Gnosticism existed before Christianity, though it later took Christian forms." But unless documents systematically expressing Gnostic beliefs can be shown to have been written originally before c. A.D. 100, Gnosticism can’t be proven to have emerged independently before Christianity did, let alone that its teachings heavily influenced the primitive church.
Consider now the dates of writings that Maccoby himself uses when building his case. He cites The Second Treatise of the Great Seth, “a second-century Christian-Gnostic document, but it may serve as a starting-off point for discussion of earlier Gnostic attitudes too." How can a "Christian Gnostic" document written decades after all or most of the New Testament was ultimately prove anything about Christian beliefs originating in Gnosticism? Likewise, for the Testimony of Truth, he says its redaction date "is probably third century," and elsewhere describes it as “a Christian Gnostic text of the second or third century.” He confesses The Apocryphon of John is "a Christian-Gnostic work of the second century." Of course, why must Gnosticism's origins lay in a reaction by outside gentiles, including lapsed or prospective converts, against Judaism in general, as Maccoby believes? Why couldn't it be in hostile gentiles responding to Christianity's teachings? Or could it lay in gentiles who were superficially or temporarily Christian, but who soon rejected the New Testament's authority, like Simon the Sorcerer (Acts 8:9-24), who early Catholic Church writers blamed for beginning the Gnostic heresy? Since Christianity added the New Testament to the Old Testament as part of the inspired word of God, the early Gnostics could well have responded to Genesis as the church presented it to them, rather than the synagogue. Since many a skeptic has attacked Christianity (not so much Judaism) in recent centuries by blaspheming the one true God of the Old Testament as a vengeful, warlike, bloodthirsty God, could not have a similar process occurred in antiquity? The origins of Gnosticism may lay in Gentiles, having been influenced by Neo-Platonism and Stoicism, partially reacting against yet also accepting some of Christianity. Finally, Maccoby himself concedes that Gnosticism lacked a long independent existence before Christianity's birth, conceding it may have arisen no earlier than the first century b.c., and perhaps only in the first century A.D.[vii] In addition, note that mere preexistence isn't sufficient to prove causation. This is the old logical fallacy of Post hoc, ergo propter hoc, "After this, therefore because of this." Further steps in reasoning and evidence, such as sharing common causal agents, are necessary to eliminate or reduce the possibility of this logical fallacy.
SKEPTICISM ABOUT PRE-CHRISTIAN GNOSTICISM FOR CHRONOLOGICAL REASONS
All of the standard primary sources cited as evidence for a pre-Christian Gnosticism are reliably known to have been originally written after the first century A.D. As C. H. Dodd explains, “no Gnostic document known to us . . . can with any show probability be dated . . . before the period of the New Testament.” Petrement's dogmatic prediction has yet to be falsified: "The sole decisive proof, the discovery of a pagan Gnosticism in texts anterior to Christianity, has always been lacking and will always be lacking." Likewise, a critical methodological error of many searching for proof of a pre-Christian Gnosticism is to assume that any document that appears to present a non-Christian Gnosticism must have been written during or before the first century A.D., an error that both Nash and Drijvers warn against. Maccoby commits a variation of this error by assuming that if Gnosticism arose as a result of a Gentile reaction against Judaism, therefore, it must predate Christianity.[viii] But merely because paganism’s or Judaism’s antiquity far exceeds Christianity's proves nothing by itself. Clearly, the emperor ("pre-Christian Gnosticism") has no clothes! Just as chronology bars drawing parallels between the pagan mystery religions and Christianity, chronology even more securely wipes out all attempts to derive Christianity from Gnosticism.
DID PAUL AND THE GNOSTICS USE THE SAME WORDS WITH THE SAME MEANINGS?
One trap Maccoby and others arguing Christian doctrines originated in Gnosticism have fallen into comes from concluding that if the Gnostics and the New Testament used the same motifs or words, such as logos, they must have had the same meanings. For example, Maccoby asserts that when Paul said the Galatians "were held in bondage under the elemental things of the world" (Gal. 4:3) that "this is pure Gnostic language" because Paul in this passage supposedly meant "obedience to the Torah [is] a worship of inferior powers." Importantly, the immediate context rules this meaning out, since Paul pointedly reminds the Galatians of their pagan background when he uses stoicheia again (Gal. 4:8-10). Wilson warns against reading back into first century texts the connotations and associations that the same terminology had in the second century. Furthermore, the similarities in vocabulary could actually be the result of the second-century Gnostics taking the New Testament, including Paul’s Letters, as their point of departure, which the already raised issue of chronology addresses.[ix]
IS THE GOSPEL OF JOHN GNOSTIC AND/OR UNJEWISH IN ITS THOUGHT?
Maccoby dismisses the Fourth Gospel as "the latest and least authentic of the Gospels." Conspicuously, he draws no specific comparisons between John and Hellenistic philosophy or religion in order to bolster his claims. John, supposedly the New Testament writer that Gnosticism influenced the most, spends considerable time attacking, directly or indirectly, certain Gnostic ideas (cf. John 1:14; I John 1:1). In particular, Docetism, the teaching that Jesus Christ did not have a body of flesh and blood while He was on earth, is clearly denied (John 1:14; I John 1:1) and strongly attacked elsewhere (II John 7; I John 4:2-3). The Dead Sea Scroll discoveries of (most likely) the Jewish Essene sect's writings show ideas like John's appeared in first-century Judaism, as Ladd notes. Albright notes the similarities that appear between the Gospel of John and the Qumran sect’s Scroll of Discipline. Such terms as "spirit of truth," "the sons of light," "the light of life," and "in ways of darkness they continue to walk," resemble those found in the Fourth Gospel (see John 14:17; 15:26; 16:13; 12:36; 8:12.[x]
Because Pharisaical Judaism became the rabbinical Judaism of succeeding centuries, dissident interpretations of Judaism promoted by other groups, such as the Essenes (who presumably made up the members of the Qumran sect) and the Sadducees, were ignored or misrepresented in the records that survived, all written by the party that won. The lack of Jewish flavoring Maccoby detects in John results from his comparing it with what the Pharisees and their spiritual descendents wrote as found in the two Talmuds, the Mishnah, and various Midrashim. By ignoring other forms of Judaism when making comparisons between Christianity and Judaism, he’s actually assuming what he wishes to prove.
WAS PAUL A MODERATE GNOSTIC?
Maccoby suggests "it may be useful to consider Paul's views as a kind of moderate Gnosticism." In order to paint Paul as a (moderate) Gnostic, Maccoby plays up any possible similarities between Paul's thought and Gnosticism while discounting any contrary evidence of parallels between Paul's beliefs and Judaism. For example, Maccoby interprets Paul's metaphor about Satan being "the god of this world" (II Cor. 4:4) all too literally, implying Paul here had a near miss with polytheism. But in I Cor. 8:5-6, Paul reveals that any evil spirit beings who would like to be called "God" aren't really so. Because of what Paul says about Satan and the demons in such passages as Eph. 2:2, Maccoby claims "the Pauline view of Satan went far beyond that of the Jewish dualistic writings." But is this yet another exaggeration falling from Maccoby’s pen? Consider the following remarkable extract from the Qumran Community Rule (IQS 3:19-23): “All the children of falsehood are ruled by the Angel of Darkness [Beliar, i.e., Satan] and walk in the ways of darkness.” How does this differ from the Christian portrayal of Satan as an evil angel who tempts men to sin (Matt. 4:3; I Thess. 3:5) and deceives the whole world (Rev. 12:9)? According to D.E. Aune, the later post-Biblical Jewish writings mention the fallen angels time and time again, such as in the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds.[xi] No radical discontinuity emerges between Paul’s thought and the intertestamental literature in their portrayal of Satan, unlike what Maccoby believes.