Elaine Pagels
Elaine Pagels has written several highly influential and widely read books on the study of religion. One such book is The Gnostic Gospels, in which she compares Gnosticism to Orthodox Christianity. She divides this book into six sections, with the first giving you background on the topic she is about to embark upon. Pagels then travels through a series of major divisions between the two religions in order to help us better understand the distinct differences between the two, as well as making other points along the way.
Pagels relevant information begins with the introduction, in which she lays the background for the argument that follows in the rest of the book. She begins by discussing the discovery of the Gnostic gospels by Muhammed Ali at Nag Hammadi in a cave. Ali found these texts and brought them back home. She also explains the fact that we don't have all of the texts to this day, as Ali's mother actually used some of the scripts to feed the fire in their home. From this point, Pagels gives an explanation of why the books were hidden in a cave at Nag Hammadi in the first place. When Emperor Constantine was converted and Christianity became the main religion, Gnosticism and it's documents were denounced as heretical. As such, all these documents were to be destroyed. It is hypothesized that some Gnostic monks put these scripts in the pot they were found in and hid them in the cave at Nag Hammadi.
From this historical background, Pagels quickly moves into a quick overview of Gnosticism. She begins by explaining the very name with which we denote this faith. Gnostics believe that the essence of their religion lies in a secret "gnosis", or knowledge, passed on to them. This gnosis is only relayed to certain chosen people as everyone is not intended to have this secret knowledge. Gnostics also consider one of the highest goals in life to be self-knowledge, because "to know oneself, at the deepest level, is simultaneously to know God; this is...
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