Blog

“I’ve got a secret, and I’m not telling!!”

I’m sure you can picture this phrase being said in an “I’m better than you” voice by kids on an elementary school playground - and perhaps you’ve even said it!We feel special when we know something that somebody else doesn’t - whether it’s as mudane as what gift Mommy is getting for her birthday from Daddy, or as seemingly exciting as guess who so-and-so has a crush on!

Gnosticism (pronounced NOS-ti-cism) is like the child with a secret. The word gnosticism is from the Greek word gnosis, which means knowledge. Gnosticism first came on the scene in the 1st and 2nd centuries A.D., so very shortly after the time Jesus walked the earth. It has come to be known as one of the first significant challenges to the Christian faith.

Early gnostics believed that they had secret knowledge from God, and that knowledge was only given to those who were “enlightened.” This secret spiritual knowledge was very important to the gnostics, and it made them believe they were better than others because God revealed it to them, and not to the average Joe on the street. Those who followed the gnostic faith were on a quest to obtain that secretly revealed knowledge.

The gnostics believed that this special knowledge would free them (known as “the elect”) from the trappings of this world. They believed that a person’s spirit is completely separate from matter (the physical stuff of the world), and that matter is evil. With their special knowledge, they thought they could free their spirit from matter.

Because of this belief that matter is evil, they believed that Jesus was not human. Their logic goes like this: God is good, and matter is evil; therefore, if Jesus is God then He is good and He could not be matter (human) because then he would have evil in Him. They believed that Jesus was fully God, but not at all human. This goes against the Biblical belief that Jesus is fully God and fully human.

There is lots of proof in the Bible that Jesus was truly human. First of all, Jesus was born to a human woman (Luke 1:35, 2:6-7)! In John 1:14, we read that “The Word [Jesus] became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” Jesus was circumcised and grew up from a boy into a man (Luke 2:21, 52). Jesus experienced sadness (John 11:35, Luke 19:41), hunger (Matthew 4:2, 21:18), thirst (John 4:7, 19:28), and tiredness (Matthew 8:24). He also died, which is definitely a very human thing to do (John 19:30).

The gnosticism movement began when the Scriptures were still being written, so they did not have the evidence written in the Bible like we have today. However, they had something even better - Jesus himself! Even though the first gnostics were probably not alive when Jesus walked the earth, their parents’ or grandparents’ generation would have known of Jesus. It’s hard to say what happened that caused them to stop believing the truth of Jesus’ humanity.

However, gnosticism didn’t go away in those early centuries; it is still around today, though those who believe it may not call themselves by that name. This is why it is so important to be familiar with your Bible, because if the gnostics simply read any of those passages mentioned above (and many others), then they would know the Truth - the whole Truth that is available to and for everyone, not a secret to be kept!