Rethinking Gnosticism: An Argument for Dismantling a Dubious Category - by Michael Allen Williams (PDF 356 pp.)

Rare is the book on gnosticism that is thoroughly grounded in the primary sources in the ancient languages, widely conversant with the secondary literature, controlled and sophisticated in its historical method--and still intelligible and interesting, not only for experts in its field, but also for religious historians and educated readers in general. Michael Williams's Rethinking `Gnosticism' is such a book. It is essential reading for scholars of ancient Christianity and for anyone who wishes to use the terms `gnostic' and `gnosticism,' but it can be read with profit by all historians concerned with issues of methodology in studying religious people of the past. (Church History )

There can hardly be a category more misused in contemporary scholarly and not-so-scholarly discourse than `gnosticism,' so it was probably inevitable that a serious scholar would come along with an argument for the abandonment of the category altogether. In this provocative book Williams does just that. (Religious Studies Review ) 

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The Gnostics: The First Christian Heretics - by Sean Martin (PDF 160 pp.)


Gnosticism is the name given to various religious schools that proliferated in the first centuries after Christ, nearly becoming the dominant form of Christianity, but eventually branded as heretical by the emerging Christian church. The long and diverse history of Gnosticism is recounted here, as well as reasons for its continued relevance today. Although some Gnostic beliefs are close to mainstream Christianity, others examined here include that the world is imperfect because it was created by an evil god who was constantly at war with the true, good God; that Christ and Satan were brothers; that reincarnation exists; and that women are the equal of men. Also covered is the influence Gnostics had on the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, the psychologist Carl Jung, the Existentialists, the New Age movement, and writers as diverse as William Blake, W. B. Yeats, Albert Camus, and Philip K. Dick.

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