Rise of Gnosticism

A detailed Summary of Rise of Gnosticism

In the beginning of the second century the early church was forced to take a stance so as to justify their very existence. With Gnosticism on the rise and already posing as a threat that would confuse the public as to who the Church was and what they stood for, the Church had some decisions to make. Their decision about creating criteria, a canon, a creed, and justifying that they had authority because of apostolic succession, would separate them from similar religions, such as Gnosticism, which was the defining moment of the early Church.

To understand why the Church took the position that it did we must first under stand the threat that it was posed. This threat was an unorganized band of people who were called Gnostics. The word Gnostic is from the Greek word gnosis, which means knowledge. The Gnostics believed that, "a human being is in reality an eternal spirit that somehow has been imprisoned in a body and since the body is a prison to the spirit, and since it misguides us as to our true nature, it is evil."(Gonzalez, 59) Since our guide is evil we must therefore try to get out of our body and find our spirit, which can guide us out of our exile, into salvation. They see the

The early church had a serious problem on their hands because people could easily be confused about which sect believed what. So the church made a decision that would end up defining the Christian religion as far as the present day.

The Church's reactions to the Gnosticism movement were valid when you think about what the Church had a stake. If they had not done what they did then there might not be Christianity. The Church would just be another religion or god for the Romans to worship. The fact that the Church had historical evidence, (in the Hebrew Scriptures) eyewitness accounts, (from the gospels) and apostolic succession passed on from generation to generation, was all the Church needed to refute the Gnostic movement. In doing so the Church transformed the way that Christians address their faith even today.

The action that was taken was to refute the Gnostics by developing a "canon" or a group of writings that specify their religion. This canon included the old Hebrew Scriptures, four different accounts of the gospel, the book of Acts, and the Pauline epistles. The reason that four accounts of the gospels were accumulated was because each of the accounts was a little bit different in getting across the message, but all four agreed when it came down to the important details of the resurrection, crucifixion, and death. The Gnostics claimed that the heavenly messenger had given his secret knowledge to a particular disciple. This was instantly refuted

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Approximate Word count = 998
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Religion