Why is Saint Paul considered gnostic? (by some)

Question

I read that these verses (over other texts that are clearly gnostic but not attributed as such) are considered gnostic:

ST. PAUL TO THE EPHESIANS - Third letter

For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness

ST. PAUL TO THE CORINTHIANS (2, 6 - 8)

Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory;

My question: Why is Saint Paul considered gnostic?

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Consider these various examples of people forwarding or confronting the idea:

• The Gnostic Paul - Book by Elaine Pagels
• Was the Apostle Paul a Gnostic?
• The Gnostic Paul - Random Blog post
• Paul the Gnostic Opponent of Peter Not an Apostle of Historic Christianity (PDF)

Answer 1

It seems as though many that assert the possibility are either looking at why the Gnostics believed that Paul was a member of such, as Pagels, they are not Christian, as Massey, or are either mysticism or on the periphery of accepted or mainstream Christianity.

Pseudo-Apocrypha like The Apocalypse of Paul and other Gnostic documents from Nag Hammadi seem to sway non-conventional or liberal leaning theologies to consider the possibility of Pauls Gnosticism.

What Muhammad 'All discovered at Nag Hammadi is, apparently, a library of writings, almost all of them gnostic. Although they claim to offer secret teaching, many of these texts refer to the Scriptures of the Old Testament, and others to the letters of Paul and the New Testament gospels. Many of them include the same dramatic personae as the New Testament--Jesus and his disciples. Yet the differences are striking.

Orthodox Jews and Christians insist that a chasm separates humanity from Its creator: God is wholly other. But some of the gnostics who wrote these gospels contradict this: self-knowledge is knowledge of God; the self and the divine are identical.
- Pagels

In the Tekton article you listed Pagel even declines to declare if Paul is or is not gnostic.

Was Paul actually a Gnostic? The idea is taken seriously by no one in NT scholarship today; even Elaine Pagels, the Gnostic-promoter premier, declines in her book The Gnostic Paul to say yea or nay to whether Paul was actually a Gnostic, instead concentrating on how the Gnostics interpreted Paul's letters.
- Tekton Apologetics

I would struggle to take Freke & Gandy, authors of 'The Jesus Mysteries: Was The Original Jesus A Pagan God?' as serious Christian theologians and would classify them more toward mysticism.

As for the Apocalypse of Paul, Augustine considered it bunk.

St. Augustine laughs at the folly of some who had forged an Apocalypse of Paul, full of fables, and pretending to contain the unutterable things which the apostle had heard. This is, I doubt not, our book.
- (Aug. on John, Tract 98.)

The 'Nazirene' seems to be in the fringe and misrepresents Origins "Gospel of God" as support for Paul's 'mysteries, of God. Origen in fact fought against the gnostic heresies.

Massey, I believe I could say is not a Christian because he believes it is a myth and our gospels as a product of Gnosticism.

It has been shown in previous lectures that the matter of our Canonical Gospels is, to a large extent, mythical, and that the Gnosis of Ancient Egypt was carried into other lands by the underground passage of the Mysteries, to emerge at last as the literalised legend of Historic Christianity.
- Massey

So, as far as the scripture verses you listed above, personally I don't see a gnostic connection with the Ephesians verse. The 1 Corinthians verse and others, if taken in context with all of Paul's writing and the totality of all of scripture, would not justify a gnostic connection either.

The answer to your question would be then that the reason 'some' believe Paul was a Gnostic is due to using non-canonical writings, non credible resources, or taking Pauls words out of context. When theologians such as Augustine, Tertullian, Origin, etc. discredit inferences of any Gnostic bent of the Apostle Paul I've yet to see credible commentary on the contrary. If I read some commentary from credible, even critical sources I may alter my answer.

Answer 2

Valentinus was a Gnostic. St. Paul was not a Gnostic. Paul simply made mention of common ideas in accordance with Greek Cosmology when writing to the people in Asia Minor. The Logos, Pleroma, epignosis, and many other ideas were taught by Plato, Heraclitus, and other Greek philosophers at least as far back as 300 B.C. Gnosticism starts on a base in the common Greek Cosmology which was the general cultural belief system throughout the Roman Empire. But, Gnostics added a mix of many other ideas and distortions too. They distorted everything... Jewish beliefs, Christian beliefs, and Classical Greek Cosmology beliefs. Not just Christian Church Fathers but also Plotinus, a Neoplatonist (about 150 A.D.) also wrote against the Gnostics for distorting Plato's teaching about the Demiurge.

So more accurately... did Paul accept Greek Cosmology? Maybe. Or, maybe he was willing to be all things to all men that he might save some. As an example, St. Peter makes reference to Angels and Tartarus (from Homer's writings about the Titans), common Greek myth then, but almost unknown by people today. Does this make Peter a Greek myth poet? I think not.

Paul was all about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. "To know Him and the power of His Resurrection".

Lastly, Adolf Harnack, in "Marcion: The Gospel of the Alien God" makes a good point. Marcion's antithesis... God of the OT verses that of the NT God... removes all the tension that St. Paul creates in Romans 9, 10, and 11. For Paul places both the severity and goodness of God in one and the same being for which there is no human resolve... His ways are past finding out.

Answer 3

Based on the account in The Acts of the Apostles, we could never consider Paul to be a gnostic. The mere fact that he was taught the gospel in Damascus by disciples of the centrist church means that he must have taught the same message as did James, Peter and John in Jerusalem. Although originally anonymous, Acts has been attributed to Luke, the companion of Paul, ever since later in the second century, and therefore accepted as a reliable history. It is now the consensus of almost all New Testament scholars that the author used Mark's Gospel as a major source for his own Gospel (Adam Winn, The Purpose of Mark's Gospel, page 1, says, "The theory of Markan priority is one of the few that has reached a high level of consensus among New Testament interpreters—although a handful of detractors still persists.") and that Acts must have been written around the turn of the century at the earliest. This means that the author of Acts lived too late to have known Paul and was not a witness to the events portrayed.

Scholars have long noticed irreconcilable differences between Paul’s epistles and corresponding accounts in The Acts of the Apostles, gradually leading to the conclusion that Acts does not tell us anything about the historical Paul—Bart D. Ehrman says in Forged, page 208, that at just about every point where it is possible to check what Acts says about Paul with what Paul says about himself in his authentic letters, there are discrepancies. John Dominic Crossan says, in The Birth of Christianity, page 21, that The Acts of the Apostles is theology rather than history. Therefore, we have to look in Paul's undisputed epistles to find what we can about his beliefs.

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At this stage, I should say that there is no proof that Paul was a gnostic, but I believe there is evidence that could lead some to the reasonable conclusion that he was. Here, I will look at some of this evidence.

The first thing to establish is whether it is even possible for gnostics to exist so soon after the crucifixion of Jesus. After all, one could argue that Paul's generation had too much first-hand knowledge of the historical Jesus and the gospel he taught for such divergent views to develop. The Gospel of Thomas is a sayings gospel that lacks the full theology of later gnosticism, but is nevertheless clearly gnostic and is probably at least as early as Mark's Gospel. Rex Wyler says, in The Jesus Sayings, page viii that the oldest extant Thomas fragments are from about 200 CE but, based on language style, scholars believe the originals appeared between 30 and 60 CE. Others point to remarkable similarities between GThomas and the hypothetical 'Q' document as evidence that the two traditions diverged in the early years of Christianity.

Paul speaks of 'false apostles' who opposed him, demonstrating that even at this early stage in Christian history, there were those who taught a sufficiently different gospel for Paul to need to spend a considerable part of Second Corinthians in countering their influence. Consider:

For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. (2 Corinthians 11:13)

From GThomas and 'Q', we can see that Christianity was already developing two divergent traditions, with GThomas representing the gnostic tradition. Thus, one could suggest that either Paul's opponents might have been early gnostics or that he was a gnostic and his opponents were part of what we would now call orthodox Christianity.

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If there is a definition of what it was to be a gnostic, it is that knowledge was acquired by revelation, not just from those who had known Jesus or those who faithfully passed on this knowledge. Whereas Acts says that Paul was led blind and helpless to Damascus, where he was taught the gospel, Paul says otherwise:

But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, To reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood. (Galatians 1:15-16)

But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. (Galatians 1:11-12, emphasis added)

Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also. And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to them which were of reputation, lest by any means I should run, or had run, in vain. (Galatians 2:1-2)

In Galatians, Paul first tells us that he was not taught his gospel by anyone else, then says that he went to tell the leaders of the Jerusalem church what he had been teaching all those years, to make sure that he had not been teaching in vain. This can only mean that James, Peter and John were not well acquainted with what Paul had been teaching, and that Paul was likewise not sure what gospel the Jerusalem group taught.

Again, in First Corinthians speaks of the importance of revelation:

Now, brethren, if I come unto you speaking with tongues, what shall I profit you, except I shall speak to you either by revelation, or by knowledge, or by prophesying, or by doctrine? (1 Corinthians 14:6)

Gnostics acquired knowledge in stages, going from novices to the highest level in the hierarchy. Novices were taught that which could be told to all, but as they advanced through the stages they were taught things that they could not divulge to others. Paul proudly tells us he knew a man who had passed through the third heaven and heard things he could not repeat. He admired this man above himself:

How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter. Of such an one will I glory: yet of myself I will not glory, but in mine infirmities. (2 Corinthians 12:4-5)

The passage is ambiguous, so I won't go into undue detail, but what stands out in terms of gnosticism are: i) the third heaven is an important concept in gnosticism; ii) the man had learnt things it was not lawful for him to repeat; iii) Paul seems to have held this man in such high regard that he spoke of his own infirmities in comparison—something he never suggested of James, Peter and John, the pillars of the Jerusalem church.

So, was Paul a gnostic? Elaine Pagels, a scholar of gnosticism and professor of religion at Princeton University, wrote a book entitled The Gnostic Paul. She points out (on page 1) that, far from regarding Paul as their most obstinate opponent, the second century gnostics regarded Paul's letters as the primary source of gnostic theology. Pagels does not appear to conclude whether Paul was or was not a gnostic, but on her evidence the gnostics of the second century at least saw in his epistles the source of much of their own teachings.

Like Pagels, I do not reach a conclusion either way, but the above analysis is why some would consider Paul to have been a gnostic.

Answer 4

Saint Paul is considered to be a Gnostic because he preached Gnostic doctrines in his letters which modern Christians are completely ignorant of. Paul's ideas are extremely dualistic in nature consisting of physical and spiritual elements.

It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. (1 Corinthians 15:44)

This is the first gnostic doctrine. Paul is rejecting the resurrection of the flesh and believes only in the spiritual resurrection.

I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. (1 Corinthians 15:50)

Which is in agreement with the Gospel of Philip of the Valentinians:

Those who say they will die first and then rise are in error. If they do not first receive the resurrection while they live, when they die they will receive nothing.

Paul preaches predestination in Romans which is again a gnostic doctrine and the doctrine of the mystery cults which is in agreement with the Excerpt of Theodotus, a gnostic Valentinian text:

For just as the Demiurge, secretly moved by Sophia (Wisdom), believes that he acts alone, so also with human beings.

Paul transforms the Torah Laws and preaches us that we are redeemed apart from the works of the Law which is again a gnostic doctrine because the Laws were given to us by a lesser being named Jehovah while the unmerited grace and love was given to us by another being the unknowable Holy Father of the Gnostics whoe resided in the Pleroma above Jehovah.

Ptolemy's Letter to Flora, another Valentinian text is an important read on the subject:

The Law was ordained through Moses, my dear sister Flora, has not been understood by many persons, who have accurate knowledge neither of him who ordained it nor of its commandments. I think that this will be perfectly clear to you when you have learned the contradictory opinions about it.

Some say that it is legislation given by God the Father; others, taking the contrary course, maintain stubbornly that it was ordained by the opposite, the Devil who causes destruction, just as they attribute the fashioning of the world to him, saying that he is the Father and maker of this universe. Both are completely in error; they refute each other and neither has reached the truth of the matter.

For it is evident that the Law was not ordained by the perfect God the Father, for it is secondary, being imperfect and in need of completion by another, containing commandments alien to the nature and thought of such a God. (Ptolemy's Letter to Flora)

Paul was anti-Semitic and heavily disliked the Jews just like the Gnostics:

For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of God’s churches in Judea, which are in Christ Jesus: You suffered from your own people the same things those churches suffered from the Jews who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out. They displease God and are hostile to everyone in their effort to keep us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. In this way they always heap up their sins to the limit. The wrath of God has come upon them at last. (1 Thessalonians 2:14-16)

Paul promotes ascension to various heavens as described in the Coptic Apocalypse of Paul.

I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know--God knows. (2 Corinthians 12:2)

Paul reveals the greatest mystery of all the gnostic doctrines that the totality of divine powers i.e the 30 odd Aeons of the Pleroma dwells in Christ in bodily form.

In Christ dwells the pleroma of deity in bodily form. (Colossian 2:9)

Which is in agreement with what is said in the Gospel of Truth, a Valentinian text:

It was quite amazing that Aeons were in the Father without being acquainted with him and that they alone were able to emanate, inasmuch as they were not able to perceive and recognize the one in whom they were. (Gospel of Truth 22:27-32)

Paul taught realized eschatology which was the eschatology of the Gnostics that Christ can be received here and now through gnosis.

Christ in you, the hope of glory.

Saint Paul is considered a gnostic because of countless reasons like these.

Miss Pagels is an academic scholar and hence she cannot take a personal stance on this issue and if she did then people would raise doubts about her credibility and hence she plays safe by saying Gnosticism is an open question but it is quite self evident to any lay reader that Paul was undoubtedly a Gnostic of a par excellent nature.

This YouTube video provides further quotes and documentation from a Gnostic perspective:

Was Paul a Gnostic?

Answer 5

I can think of many examples from the letters of Paul which support him being a gnostic, not least, his very own words asserting that he taught a secret knowledge:

“But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory.” (1 Corinthians 2:7).

One of many verses that comes to mind, because it supports a basic tenet of gnosticism, is when Paul writes that, “the God (Theos) of this world has blinded the mind of unbelievers” (2 Corinthians 4:4).

This so-called God that Paul refers to, was inferior to the supreme God and Father, which is a basic tenet of gnosticism, that is, our material world was framed by an inferior God, namely, the demiurge. Thus, Paul taught in his letter to the Corinthians a basic tenet of gnosticism. He then qualifies his statement about the so-called God, versus the Supreme God, with the following:

“For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth—as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”— yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist.” (1 Corinthians 8:5)

Addendum.

Paul also taught that flesh is at the very least, sick, wounded, and corrupted, if not evil, as gnostics taught, for example, when Paul writes, “For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other,” (Galatians 5:17)

Jesus taught along a similar line when he said that the flesh is useless, it is the Spirit that gives life. (John 6:63).

John wrote that material things are not to be loved because they are passing away, rather they are to be used to perform good.

“Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.” (1 John 2:15)

Answer 6

"Paul" is unquestionably a gnostic in my view. I began reading the Bible, Authorized King James Version, as a young child. I received a call from the Lord in my salvation. I was called to read the Bible for myself with one of the goals to see the eternal whole counsel plan of God for myself through my own Bible study. So, this was my vocation from salvation before I was of age to read.

With a reading gift given me, I read perhaps 5x the speed of average. With my life dedicated to my vocation: I have literally read the Bible thousands of times cover to cover.

These are my qualifications. They're not the credentials man gives.

"Paul's" systematic theology declares that he is God and Christ; and all men are Gods and Christs. This is gnosticism. "Paul" declares that Adam was God and Christ whom Eve was created to subject to and worship as God and Christ. "Paul's" entire "headship" doctrine is GNOSTICISM: declaring men are "in the office" of "God and Christ" and women are to subject to and worship men as Gods and Christs.

The "blind spot" of men is pride in relation to women; and a desire by sin to be worshipped by women as Gods and Christs.

It is this weakness that blinds the whole church to the GNOSTICISM of "Paul".

Men have a real "skin in the game" to desire for "Paul's" false characterization of the relationship dynamic he teaches of same "to be true". Because it elevates them as "the rulers" over women. Which gives men a real turn on of the feeling of sexual power.

So, for Jesus Christ to "break that power": it's akin to taking a bone from the mouth of a dog with jaw clenched.

"Paul" states that men are the image and glory of God whileas women are the glory of man.

1 Corinthians 11:7 For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.

That's full fabrication.

Genesis 1:26-27 declares Adam and Eve/male and female created in the image of God; jointly blessed equally as one given shared dominion over the rest of creation.

"Paul" rewrites the story stripping from Eve her creation in the image of God. Thus denying that woman is personally indwelt by the Holy Spirit. That's utter, complete denunciation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ: making woman a "lower being" who has no direct personal relationship with God. Which effectually strips women of personal salvation in personal direct relationship with Jesus Christ.

In other words, "Paul" denies throughout his "epistles" that women have the same salvation as men.

Perhaps some "think" that "Paul" said women and men "have the same salvation" as they read letters they imagine were written to both women and men. However, all of "Paul's" letters are written addressed specifically and exclusively to men. In those letters, he assigns "salvation" in status of Gods and Christs solely to men.

Because in "Paul's" gnostic theological system: all men are Gods and Christs; and women are body parts created to worship men as Gods and Christs.

When, for example "Paul" declares men are the image and glory of God: he does not say men are "created in" the image and glory of God; but rather that men "ARE" the image and glory of God. This makes men equal to God and Christ. This declares men to be God and Christ.

1 Corinthians 11:7 For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.

Jesus Christ in born again faith is God Incarnate in Spirit: meaning that Jesus Christ is literally the Image and Glory of God as God in Spirit in Person made a man. Image and Glory is Personhood. God is Spirit. To say that Jesus Christ is, for example, the Express Image of God the Father is to declare that Jesus Christ is God the Son. To declare that Jesus Christ is the Express Image of God the Father is to declare Jesus to be God; and to thus declare the Trinity of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit.

When we say "Jesus is the Express Image and Glory of God" we are saying, "Jesus is God". We don't have to say "Express" because if we say, "Jesus is the Image and Glory of God" Personally Himself, we are declaring Jesus Christ Himself to be God Himself in Person made a man.

"Paul" is using sophistry when he speaks of his hidden knowledge of gnosticism. If persons do not read carefully, they will "read in" what they "expected" a born again saint to say doctrinally; rather than reading what "Paul" actually communicated as a gnostic in doctrine.

When "Paul" said man is the image and glory of God, "Paul" literally declared all men to be God and Christ in Person in Spirit even as Jesus Christ is God and Christ in Person.

Aka. Jesus is the Image and Glory of God as God Incarnate in Spirit Being Christ; and man is, all men are, equally the Image and Glory of God as God Incarnate in Spirit Being Christ.

This is gnosticism.

Gnosticism can be defined at one level as denying the Exclusivity of Jesus Christ Being the only man who is God Incarnate in Spirit made flesh = Christ (or as "Paul" in gnostic docetism declares "in the form of") and instead declares all men to be God Incarnate in Spirit in human form = Christs.

This is the basis and foundation of all of "Paul's" declaration of the spiritual inferiority of women and the necessity of women to subject to and worship men as Gods and Christs.

We are not dealing with "just a few" gnostic books forged and implanted into the New Testament.

We are dealing with mostly gnostic epistles, books, and forgeries whose mission is to exalt "Paul" and promote the gnostic heresy and apostacy that men are Gods and Christs whom women were created to subject to and worship as Gods and Christs.

The very core of the sinful nature of man in fall is to exalt himself in the place of God falsely believing he is a God and Christ entitled to the worship and subjection of women.

The temptation, seduction, and deception of "Paul's" gnosticism is aimed at and grounded in the greatest temptation and seduction and deception man faces: the root and core of original sin.

"Paul's" entire systematic theology in foundation is gnosticism.

And the flattery that men are "just like Jesus" in the role of false gods ruling over women.

When, really, it's narcissism, the spiritual and narcissist abuse of women, and sin. It takes true growth by the Holy Spirit for men to outgrow the deception that their self-centeredness and self-exaltation in relation to women is "noble" rather than the sinful nature justifying pride while degrading, oppressing, using and abusing women in motives much less than pure.

And nothing like Jesus.

So, it's throughout all "Paul's" epistles. The systematic theology.

Much more I could point out.

But, how willing are men to see the truth? That they are abusive to women? Not chivalrous? Following 'Paul'? Receiving "Paul's" double standard salvation and spiritual state lies? That declare men the spiritual superiors of women?