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Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 10:55 am
by vbm62
"What's the difference between gnosticism and mysticism? Are they the same? Entirely different?"
A Gnostic is not a mystic for other Gnostics.
Some Gnostics were called mystics because for uninitiated people it was/is mystery what they do - from this point of view a Gnostic is mystic.

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 11:28 am
by James S Saint
vbm62 wrote:God described by Gnostics as Spirit, Uknowble Father.
Was that supposed to be "Unknowable" or "Knowable"?

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 11:47 am
by vbm62
sorry, UNknowable.

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 11:51 am
by James S Saint
Then I'm confused. :?
I thought the distinction between the Gnostic and the Agnostic was that the Gnostic proposed that God is knowable and the Agnostic proposed that God is unknowable...?

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 1:05 pm
by met
Agnostic usually refers to someone who doesn't know if THERE IS a god, not if God is knowable (in the sense of "can be experienced").

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 4:53 pm
by James S Saint
So you're saying that a Gnostic is someone who believes that there is a God, but there is no way to experience God? :?: :?
...seems amiss.
1580s, "believer in a mystical religious doctrine of spiritual knowledge," from L.L. Gnosticus, from Late Gk. Gnostikos, noun use of adj. gnostikos "knowing, able to discern," from gnostos "knowable," from gignoskein "to learn, to come to know" (see know). Applied to various early Christian sects that claimed direct personal knowledge beyond the Gospel or the Church hierarchy. The adj. meaning "relating to knowledge" (with lower-case g-) is from 1650s.

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 5:03 pm
by vbm62
"So you're saying that a Gnostic is someone who believes that there is a God, but there is no way to experience God?
...seems amiss."

It is not that, God is limitless, timeless and thus we are while we are trying to know God.
Know means to know God because one can meet God "face to face".

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 6:01 pm
by James S Saint
vbm62 wrote:Know means to know God because one can meet God "face to face".
So the claim is that a person can "meet God face to face".... "and live" (I presume)?

That would be different than Moses taught, but not really different than Jesus taught (depending on your interpretation of 'God' and 'Jesus').

So have you met God "face to face"?

Re: Hello,

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2012 8:57 pm
by vbm62
James S Saint wrote:
vbm62 wrote:Know means to know God because one can meet God "face to face".
So the claim is that a person can "meet God face to face".... "and live" (I presume)?

That would be different than Moses taught, but not really different than Jesus taught (depending on your interpretation of 'God' and 'Jesus').

So have you met God "face to face"?
10and they saw the God of Israel; and under His feet there appeared to be a pavement of sapphire, as clear as the sky itself. 11Yet He did not stretch out His hand against the nobles of the sons of Israel; and they saw God, and they ate and drank.
So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, "It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared."
12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.