a-Gnosticism and q-Gnosticism

We have to distinguish between historic gnostic theology and worldview, and contemporary adaptations of Gnosticism that is informed more by hermetic and theosophical magickal teachings of the late 19th / early 20th centuries (this is the strain of ‘direct experience‘ knowledge which does carry through some of the anti-authoritarianism of ancient gnostic resistance to church and state. But I think it’s really valuable to unpack classic Gnosticism, which does have real world inheritance today in many perspectives including conspiracy thinking. It’s not all ‘bad’ either! But the inversion of contemporary values, the innate hatred of material reality (today sublimated in the wellness world’s constant injunctions to purify, detox, wake up, be liberated etc), and the fundamental distrust of worldly authority… these are all important through-lines to trace which aren’t really accessible through the more epistemological read of Gnosticism as direct experience of truth.