Gnosticism and The Split-Personality of Jesus Christ

"All the forces in the world are not so powerful
as an idea whose time has come"
~ Victor Hugo

Perhaps the greatest and most common error people make in attempting to interpret the Gospel of Jesus Christ, is the assumption that there is such a gospel to begin with; that Christ himself was entirely clear and consistent about his own beliefs.

On the contrary, provided we are not determined to reconcile them at the expense of reason, -- even the most intuitive and indulgent reason still worthy of the name "reason", -- we can see some glaring inconsistencies and contradictions with respect to his most fundamental conceptions of God; in particular, His Law and His Grace.

In one saying, Christ asserts that sin is sickness, for which men deserve healing, and not judgement. In another, he tells us God will only forgive us to the extent that we forgive others; and judge us to the extent that we judge them. He says God makes the sun to shine on the just and the unjust, without distinction; for He is perfect. Elsewhere, the sinner will in no wise see heaven. He warns us not to cast pearls of wisdom before swine, lest they turn and rend us. Then he tells us to take up the cross and be martyred for those very "swine". He says the least in the kingdom is greater than John the Baptist, then tells the thief on the cross that, for an instance worth of repentance, he shall be in heaven before the day's end.

Are there two Christs? Confounded as one? Was the man who went into a rage in the temple and whipped the merchants and money-changers, the same who said, "Turn the other cheek?" Or has the Church twisted the true teachings of Jesus? On purpose or through simple foolishness? What other explaination could there be, but that Christ himself was unsure of what he thought, -- and what he taught?

Could it be that Jesus was trying to reconcile the legalistic God of the Old Testament with the unconditionally loving Father in Heaven disclosed to his higher vision? Could it be that he was incapable of confessing the discrepency? Was the man, Jesus, only partially and occassionally possessed and inspired by the god, Christ?

And are not the Christians of our time equally confused by the notion of a God who would create both the Devil and the Christ; the problem and the solution?

Indeed, this dilemma is not unique to Christianity, but is found wherever men seek to proclaim the universe (which houses both good and evil) good. Wherever unconditional love is attributed to the creator, along with omnipotence and omniscience, so that he is both aware of suffering and perfectly capable of ending it, we find the infection. No religion, no spiritual vision, can be entirely healthy and pure which posits a God who simultaneously loves us and causes, or allows, us to suffer; not when He has the power to make us happy and righteous without recourse to the cruel and unusual.

How much more reasonable, and in harmony with itself, is the doctrine of the Gnostics, who attribute to the creator neither omnipotence nor omniscience, nor the virtue of an unconditionally loving nature; but, making a clear, dualistic distinction between the God The Creator and God The Father, -- between Matter and Spirit, -- conclude that Law and Grace are irreconcilable; that The God Who Creates is of a low and inferior type, while The God Who Loves dwells in a realm which utterly transcends the physical, and is anathema to it?

Here, we see a doctrine thoroughly rational, for it explains that men have access to God, and He to them, only to the extent that His Grace is present in their hearts; having withdrawn them from the trappings of the temporal realm (form and change), and aligned their attention with the formless, immutable, and eternal nature of their Father in Heaven. If He only could, He would deliver us from this prison. But His light is dim in this place, and we must seek for the source of it most carefully.

How much more faithfully does this vision correspond to the noblest impulses of the Christ; to the call for mercy, charity, healing and instruction? Compassion cannot arise in a heart that sees only good. The will is paralyzed. We cannot do good if we think God has it all in hand, and all suffering magically produces good by itself. We must have a genuine experience of horror, in order to respond with compassionate action. The Magician doesn't make way for the blind, circling will of many gods, but makes himself an instrument of the one God.