The Things Hidden in Silence...

I struggled to come up with a title for this thread... but after a bit of thought i decided to use a line from the opening verse of the book this thread will be based around.

The Apocryphon of John

www.gnosis.org...

Now unlike what the gnostic belief system will tell you... this information is NOT required knowledge.

The story given in the book was meant to give the reader an "idea" of what is hidden from us at birth... As i've said it is a metaphysical story not something that should be taken as things that actually happened

I didn't write this thread to explain the Apocryphon of John... Or even suggest that you read it... The idea behind this thread was to point out some interesting similarities within the book when compared to some of the belief systems we have today...

As anyone who has read my threads will know, i personally believe the God of the OT is a false God.

An Imposter posing as the true Father of creation

As Jesus said... "All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them"

I am not the sheep... Nor am i the shepard... I am but the shepards lowly Dog... And the dog hears his shepards voice... and bites at the ankles of the sheep. (Thats my quote by the way!! )

Please keep in mind this is ONLY a STORY.... as many of my threads are.

And so it begins





There are three names that are usually associated with God from the Abrahamic religions of the world... Im sure theres a few more but i only need to focus on these three for this thread...

Elohim

Elohim (אֱלֹהִ֔ים) is a grammatically singular or plural noun for "god" or "gods" in both modern and ancient Hebrew language. When used with singular verbs and adjectives elohim is usually singular, "god" or especially, the God. When used with plural verbs and adjectives elohim is usually plural, "gods" or "powers".[1][2] It is generally thought that Elohim is a formation from eloah, the latter being an expanded form of the Northwest Semitic noun il (אֱל, ʾēl [3]). It is usually translated as "God" in the Hebrew Bible, referring with singular verbs both to the one God of Israel

Adonai

Which basically means "lord"...

And of course...

YHWH, YAH, YE-HO-VAH... Im sure theres more versions of it, but you get the idea...

Now if one reads The Apocryphon of John... the story is an explaination of the progression from the orignal Creator, the Father...Who is indescribable, unimagineable perfection.

..............

"He is immeasurable light, which is pure, holy (and) immaculate. He is ineffable, being perfect in incorruptibility. (He is) not in perfection, nor in blessedness, nor in divinity, but he is far superior. He is not corporeal nor is he incorporeal. He is neither large nor is he small. There is no way to say, 'What is his quantity?' or, 'What is his quality?', for no one can know him. He is not someone among (other) beings, rather he is far superior. Not that he is (simply) superior, but his essence does not partake in the aeons nor in time. For he who partakes in an aeon was prepared beforehand. Time was not apportioned to him, since he does not receive anything from another, for it would be received on loan. For he who precedes someone does not lack, that he may receive from him. For rather, it is the latter that looks expectantly at him in his light.

.........

And he created beings from a thought...

.........

And his thought performed a deed and she came forth, namely she who had appeared before him in the shine of his light. This is the first power which was before all of them (and) which came forth from his mind

.........

And thus, the only begotten Son was created, the one you know as "The annointed one" even Christ...

.........

And he looked at Barbelo with the pure light which surrounds the invisible Spirit, and (with) his spark, and she conceived from him. He begot a spark of light with a light resembling blessedness. But it does not equal his greatness. This was an only-begotten child of the Mother-Father which had come forth; it is the only offspring, the only-begotten one of the Father, the pure Light.

.........

Notice HE is not equal to the Father...

John 13:16
Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him.

John 14:28
Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I.


Continuing on with the story....

Many other beings are created under the "consent" of God... and one of these beings decided to create a being that was not "under consent" of the Father....

.....

She wanted to bring forth a likeness out of herself without the consent of the Spirit, - he had not approved -

......

This is where the story gets interesting....

This being that was not approved by God Changes to the form of a "lion faced serpent"... And she was ashamed of her creation, and she cast it down to a place where no "imortal beings" would see it...

Luke 10
18 And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.

And the name of this being was....Yaltabaoth

........

And its eyes were like lightning fires which flash.... And He became strong and created for himself other aeons with a flame of luminous fire which (still) exists now.
........

Psalm 18

6 In my distress I called upon the Lord, and cried unto my God: he heard my voice out of his temple, and my cry came before him, even into his ears.7 Then the earth shook and trembled; the foundations also of the hills moved and were shaken, because he was wroth.8 There went up a smoke out of his nostrils, and fire out of his mouth devoured: coals were kindled by it.9 He bowed the heavens also, and came down: and darkness was under his feet.
.....

Now the archon who is weak has three names. The first name is Yaltabaoth, the second is Saklas, and the third is Samael. And he is impious in his arrogance which is in him. For he said, 'I am God and there is no other God beside me,' for he is ignorant of his strength, the place from which he had come

Deuteronomy 5

6 I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage.

7 Thou shalt have none other gods before me.
......

And the "angels" that followed Yaltabaoth were many... 365 in total...

And one of these angels which was the sixth created....ironically?
......

the sixth is Adonin, he had a monkey's face;
.....

And so we procede to the story of the Garden of life...

Yes i skipped a lot but to get a full understanding of the story, you have to read the book...
......

And the chief archon seduced her (Eve) and he begot in her two sons; the first and the second (are) Eloim and Yave

......

And so the world was... and as it says...

the Devil, and Satan, deceiveth the whole world

The End

Or is it the beginning?

LOL, of course there is much much more to this story... the link is at the top of this thread, and if you happen to enjoy Gnostic scripture, this book is worth the read.

I cut my story short to open the floor to discussion...

Lets keep it civil please

Thanks for reading

reply to post by Akragon


There is a complete description Here .

reply to post by Akragon

I'm glad that you said this isn't all required knowledge. My eyes were glazing over while reading some portions. I even had to take a nap halfway through.

But this is a significant theme here:

And they said to Yaltabaoth, 'Blow into his face something of your spirit and his body will arise.' And he blew into his face the spirit which is the power of his mother; he did not know (this), for he exists in ignorance. And the power of the mother went out of Yaltabaoth into the natural body, which they had fashioned after the image of the one who exists from the beginning. The body moved and gained strength, and it was luminous.

"And in that moment the rest of the powers became jealous, because he had come into being through all of them and they had given their power to the man, and his intelligence was greater than that of those who had made him, and greater than that of the chief archon. And when they recognized that he was luminous, and that he could think better than they, and that he was free from wickedness, they took him and threw him into the lowest region of all matter.

The theme that the man could think better than the ignorant god is a theme which appears in many mythologies. The jealous rage is actually directed against humanity then. A cruel instrument invented by which to suppress human knowledge is the notion of monotheism.

I will have to think about possible reasons why the author used the name Sophia for the mother of the ignorant one instead of Nyx.

Pergamonmuseum - Antikensammlung - Pergamonaltar 29

This picture is captioned as Aether in battle with a lion-headed Giant in the wikipedia article for Aether

"Aether is the personification and elemental god of "the bright, glowing upper air of heaven - the substance of light". He was the son of Nyx (primordial night) from her union with her consort.

Yaltabaoth, the lionheaded serpent was born without consort according to the Apocryphon of John. Here we see them fighting. Sometimes, mythologies merge in interesting ways.

The Pergamon Museum was built between 1910 and 1930 under the supervision of Ludwig Hoffmann, working from designs by Alfred Messel. A smaller building had previously stood on the site, from 1901 to 1909. This building originally accommodated the important excavation finds of the Berlin Museums, such as the frieze of the Pergamon Altar which was recovered between 1878 and 1886.
Pergamon Museum

Im actually supprized this thread got any replies...

i kinda butchered what is actually a very interesting book...

Thanks for reading guys

reply to post by Akragon


Thanks for the thread. I love these Gnostic texts, they are so beautiful and mysterious.

When I read this stuff I feel like I'm back in the 1970's still reeling from the acid I did at that full moon, drum party!


This is from Enochwasright's link.

In his arrogance, Yaldabaoth boasted to the other archons that:

"I am God and there is no other God beside me!"
– The Apocryphon of John (II 11:20)

Yaldabaoth was weak and ignorant, because he didn't realise that were any power greater than him. He thought he was the First. Yaldabaoth had sinned for saying these words, which was why he was called Samael – "the blind god". He has another name – Saklas, a name usually assigned to Satan.

According to The Hypostasis of the Archons and On the Origin of the World, it was Sophia, who rebuked him and gave him this name, Samael.

"You are mistaken, Samael"
– The Hypostasis of the Archons (II 87:2)

According to The Hypostasis of the Archons, after this boast, he challenged the voice:

"If any other thing exists before me, let it be shown forth to me!"
– The Hypostasis of the Archons (II 94:25)

So Sophia stretch forth her finger and brought limitless light into matter and the region of chaos. The chief archon trembled in fear.

When Yaldabaoth and the other archons heard the voice. They sought this voice and traced the voice to the abyss, where the chief archon saw the reflection of his mother in the water. They want take hold of the image but could not. They were ignorant and weak, because they didn't understand that the image was reflected from above.

"I am a jealous God, and there is no other God beside me."
But by announcing this he indicated to the angels who attended him that there exists another God. For if there were no other one, of whom would he be jealous?
– The Apocryphon of John (II 13:9-12)

If there are no other gods then why would he be jealous?

It was at this point that Sophia realised what she have done, and repented. She prayed to her Father for her deliverance, and the restoration of the power that her son (Yaldabaoth) had stolen from her. Her light was diminishing, since the theft of her power. She was moving about, back and forth.

It was at this point that the voice of the invisible Spirit was heard, rebuking Yaldabaoth and the archons. They trembled in fear, and saw reflected on the water, the image of God (Spirit), in human form.

Yaldabaoth sounds an awful lot like Yahweh of the Old Testament.

This story seems to me to echo the sentiment of Deuteronomy 32 When the "Most High" assigned Yahweh the duty of tending to the people of Jacob, and assigned other earthly populations to other "sons of God,"

Yahweh grew angry with his charge and said this.

26 I would have said, “I will cut them to pieces;
I will wipe them from human memory,”
27 had I not feared provocation by the enemy,
lest their adversaries should misunderstand,
lest they should say, “Our hand is triumphant,
it was not the Lord who did all this.”’

He wanted to destroy the people whom he was charged with, but was afraid that his enemies would take the credit and presume to have defeated Yahweh, rather than acknowledge the fact that he kicked down his own sand castle in frustration, on purpose!

Clearly he wasn't lying when he said:

39 See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand.

40 For I lift up my hand to heaven, and say, I live for ever.

This is where Yahweh denounces the "Most High" GOD. But he is wrong that he will live forever. Psalms 82 promised that he will die like Adam.

Psalms 82
1 God standeth in the congregation of the mighty;
he judgeth among the gods.
2 How long will ye judge unjustly,
and accept the persons of the wicked?


3 Defend the poor and fatherless:
do justice to the afflicted and needy.
4 Deliver the poor and needy:
rid them out of the hand of the wicked.
5 They know not, neither will they understand;
they walk on in darkness:
all the foundations of the earth are out of course.
6 I have said, Ye are gods;
and all of you are children of the Most High.


7 But ye shall die like Adam,
and fall like the princes.

Yahweh fails to live up the mandate of Most High to protect the poor and needy and becomes the wickedness he was charged to protect them from, in the first place. As a result he is destined to die, if he's not dead already.

reply to post by windword

On Psalm 82:

This assembly scene could have been taken right from Balaam's own writings, which also relates to why I wonder about the Sophia/Nyx/Shagar personage, they seem to be related or the same, or at least fulfill the same job description.

The Deir Alla Inscription (or Bala'am Son of Be'or Inscription) dated 840-760 BCE; it was painted in inks on fragments of a plastered wall: speak of such a gathering. One of the leading characters is Shagar.

(1) [VACAT] The sa]ying[s of Bala]am, [son of Be]or, the man who was a seer of the gods. Lo! Gods came to him in the night [and spoke to] him (2) according to these w[ord]s. Then they said to [Bala]am, son of Beor, thus: Let someone make a [ ] hearafter, so that [what] you have hea[rd may be se]en!" (3) And Balaam rose in the morning [ ] right hand [ ] and could not [eat] and wept (4) aloud. Then his people came in to him [and said] to Balaam, son of Beor, "Do you fast? [ ] Do you weep?" And he (5) said to them, "Si[t] do]wn! I shall inform you what the Shad[daying have done]. Now come, see the deeds of the g[ o ]ds!. The g[ o ]ds have gathered (6) and the Shaddayin have taken their places in the assembly and said to Sh[ , thus:] 'Sew the skies shut with your thick cloud! There let there be darkness and no (7) perpetual shining and n[ o ] radiance! For you will put a sea[l upon the thick] cloud of darkness and you will not remove it forever! For the swift has (8) reproached the eagle, the voice of vultures resounds. The st[ork has ] the young of the NHS-bird and ripped up the chicks of the heron. The swallow has belittled (9) the dove, and the sparrow [ ] and [ ] the staff. Instead of ewes the stick is driven along. Hares have eaten (10) [ ]. Freemen [] have drunk wine, and hyenas have listened to instruction. The whelps of the (11) f[ox] laughs at wise men, and the poor woman has mixed myrhh, and the priestess (12) [ ] to the one who wears a girdle of threads. The esteemed esteems and the esteemer is es[teemed. ] and everyone has seen those things that decree offspring and young. (15) [ ] to the leopard. The piglet has chased the young (16) [of] those who are girded and the eye ....'"

An easier to follow translation is here: Deir 'Alla Inscription

.7 "The gods have banded together;
i.8 The Shaddai gods have established a council,
And they have said to [the goddess] Shagar:
'Sew up, close up the heavens with dense cloud,
That darkness exist there, not brilliance;
Obscurity and not clarity;
i.9 So that you instill dread in dense darkness.
And - never utter a sound again!'

I'll have to look into this closer, I haven't looked at it for a couple of years. The Apocryphon says Sophia repented. The Deir Alla has Shagar warning Balaam, the Sumerian flood stories have a god warning the hero secretly. All in an attempt to thwart the decisions of the council of the lesser gods.

Especially notice that Shagar is the one to go to for dense cloud work. From the Apocryphon Sophia used thick cloud to hide her monster son from view. Yahweh is the one in thick clouds in Torah and in the Solomon myth.

II Chronicles 5:the house was filled with a cloud, even the house of Yahweh, 14 so that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud: for the glory of Yahweh filled the house of God.
Chapter 6
1 Then Solomon said, “Yahweh has said that he would dwell in the thick darkness. 2 But I have built you a house of habitation, and a place for you to dwell in forever.”

reply to post by pthena


Very cool find.
Fascinating stuff!

I'm going to do a little reading on this, thanks.

reply to post by windword

Of course, one of the immediate implications is that Balaam had no real part in the mythological mass exodus from Egypt. The writers of that myth inserted the name of their current rival retroactively into the fabricated story of a mass exodus in the past. Was Moses a contemporary of Balaam, or is Moses a made up character?

WOW!!!! AWESOME THREAD!!!!!!!! STAR AND FLAG.

These stories go hand in hand with various lower gods accounts and the ancient aliens accounts.

Also interesting is the accounts of Buddha's discussions with the lower gods after having attained enlightenment, these lower gods did not remember their own origins and take themselves to be true god.

reply to post by dominicus


LOL... thanks

I ripped the actual story apart to show a few similarities in the names found in the texts...

I would have made my "story" a bit longer... but i was short on time

Thanks again though... read the actual scripture i linked...

its a much better story then what i threw together

I am tagging on here to read later...

Originally posted by dominicus
WOW!!!! AWESOME THREAD!!!!!!!! STAR AND FLAG.

These stories go hand in hand with various lower gods accounts and the ancient aliens accounts.

Also interesting is the accounts of Buddha's discussions with the lower gods after having attained enlightenment, these lower gods did not remember their own origins and take themselves to be true god.

Interesting that these gods forgot their own origins!

wow..... makes some sense! I am flabbergasted! Thank you.

abeverage
I am tagging on here to read later...

Same Same.

I find it hard to believe in God because im yet to see a Miracle which restores dead to life.

1nf1del

Originally posted by dominicus
WOW!!!! AWESOME THREAD!!!!!!!! STAR AND FLAG.

These stories go hand in hand with various lower gods accounts and the ancient aliens accounts.
Also interesting is the accounts of Buddha's discussions with the lower gods after having attained enlightenment, these lower gods did not remember their own origins and take themselves to be true god.

Interesting that these gods forgot their own origins!

Not only the gods; we ourselves forget the purpose of reincarnating as humans on earth (all of the classes regarding soul progression); being told "YOU WONT REMEMBER YOUR PAST LIVES once encarnated AAGGAIN!" (yes I will, no you wont; the obstainant bickering). Somewhere somehow a suggestion from the higher self insists (information crack appears in ones belief system, as a human newly incarnated and allows better information to seep in) "you are more than just a body". Its a criminal joke played upon all of us not just the Gods (which begs the question IF this is possible IAM must be a partical/peice of god too). NOOO cant be! Yes it can, no it cant.

AthlonSavage
I find it hard to believe in God because im yet to see a Miracle which restores dead to life.

Dead flesh to life? Only if in the crock pot or on the grill further nurishing the live body that picked it from your grocers meat section. Ive yet to see the miracle of soul regeneration/spirit transformation. Im told it happens as its eternal and cannot be snuffed out (what drives its purpetual existance); radiation? Its all such a puzzle and no one is talking. Akragons OP point actually "what IS being hidden in the silence?"

reply to post by vethumanbeing


blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.

Akragon
reply to post by vethumanbeing

 

blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.

Faith, hope, and a huge dose of solid cynisim; (reluctance to dive in head first) goes a long way. Backwards thinking for the christian/buddhist idea of 'surrender'. If some were to actually see/witness a transformation wouldnt believe it anyway. Im copacetic enough to just trust in the wisdom of higher beings (they must be there they must exist no they dont yes they do). LOL