Gnostics
First I want to thank all those who responded to my first blog posting. Publishing a book is like sending a child into the world; there's this feeling of wanting to protect it yet needing to let it go, knowing full well that the child will be both bullied and praised and hoping that after it all it will survive and be of some value to others. For those of you with questions about the parent (me) you might glance at the essay “In Her Own Words” on the Author section of the site. It will tell you a bit more about me and how I came to write RESURRECTION.
I want to address some of the topics you brought up and tell those of you who have not read the book, some of the things I learned while researching RESURRECTION. I'll make this as quick as I can. (I promise I'm not always this serious). While the material I studied is potentially controversial, I want to assure you that my intent in writing the book was not to tear anything down, but to add information that has been lost and could enrich the spiritual dialogue our country is currently engaged in. I'm sorry if it makes some of you uncomfortable and/or angry.
You may or may not know that Christianity did not start out as a unified movement. It was a wide collection of disparate groups all trying to make sense of Jesus and his teachings. Some groups focused on the event of Jesus' death, some on the teachings of Jesus himself, the words of the gospels of those who followed him, some based their interpretations on the teachings of the Torah. Some saw Jesus' resurrection as symbolic, others saw it as actual. But for hundreds of years there was no fixed formula of what Christianity should be, no set rituals or doctrine. There was also great competition between the various centers of Christianity - in Palestine, Asia Minor, Samaria, Galilee, Greece, Rome. In the end, Rome won after Constantine converted and put his army behind the Roman Catholic Church. This is the Christian faith we are familiar with today.
Nearly half way through the serious stuff. Now, a word on Gnosticism. (What the heck is it, anyway?)
Gnosticism was one of the widest spread forms of Christianity in the first few centuries. Because it was a complex and varied movement, it's hard to make generalizations about what the Gnostics did or did not believe. While I do not profess to be an expert, I will share some of the understandings I have about the basic tenets of this faith that has since disappeared.
Gnostics believed that there were two gods - one transcendent and enlightened, the other less competent and well-meaning. It was this lesser god who created the world we humans live in, with all its imperfections and injustices. The Gnostics (like the Buddhists) believed that the material world was full of suffering and they questioned the god that created such a world. But they also believed that inside everyone was the spark of the divine that could be awakened - by knowledge and wisdom - and united with the enlightened God. So Gnostics were at once pessimistic and optimistic.
Some of you raised the issue of Gnosticism and the feminine. It's my understanding that the most influential Gnostic groups saw the male and female as profoundly connected, even on a divine level. A popular Gnostic view described God as a “dyad,” or pair that was both masculine and feminine. This supposition was reflected in their social practices, where women held positions of leadership and equality (and were healers, teachers, priests and prophets). This was true of the Valentinians, Marcionites, Carponcratians, and Montanists. Jesus himself included women in his teachings. Women were also his companions. Until the mid-second century, men and women sat together in places of worship, when Orthodox leaders like Bishop Iranaeus and Tertullian lay down a different law. Tertullian wrote: “It is not permitted for a woman to speak in the church… nor to claim for herself a share in any masculine function - least of all, in priestly office.” So in the second century the position of women changed dramatically.
As my protagonist, Gemma Bastian, comes across fragments of the texts from Nag Hammadi, she finds she knows little about early Christianity. She also finds that the Gnostic Gospels tell a different story than the Gospels of the New Testament. This is both disturbing and confusing. But Gemma is a nurse who has survived the Blitz and the Second World War. She has lost both parents and many loved ones. When we meet her, she is empty in the way only grief can empty you. But the amazing thing about loss is how it wipes your slate clean. You have to start over. In the ending is also a beginning. And when you begin again, anything can happen. RESURRECTION is the story of a new beginning, of a woman finding herself wounded but very much alive. The foundation of her personal resurrection are knowledge and understanding, love and - yes - faith.
For those of you who would like to know more about the complicated subject of Gnosticism, I suggest The Gnostic Bible, edited by Willis Barnstone and Marvin Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels, by Elaine Pagels (I particularly want to credit the chapter, God the Father/God the Mother), and the Gnostic Library, edited by James Robinson.
Next time I'm going to tell a joke.