Gnostic Countercultures
Terror and Intrigue
Published on 23. July 2020
Book
Paperback/Softback
348 pages
978-90-04-43698-5 (ISBN)
Description
In Gnostic Countercultures, fourteen scholars investigate countercultural aspects associated with the gnostic which is broadly conceived with reference to the claim to have special knowledge of the divine, which either transcends or transgresses conventional religious knowledge. The papers explore the concept of the gnostic in Western culture from the ancient world to the modern New Age. Contributors trace the emergence, persistence, and disappearance of gnostic religious currents that are perceived to be countercultural, inverted, transgressive and/or subversive in their relationship to conventional religions and their claims to knowledge. The essays represent a selection of the papers delivered at the international congress Gnostic Countercultures: Terror and Intrigue convened at Rice University, March 26-28, 2015. The essays were originally published in Gnosis 1.1-2 (2016) and are available for the first time under separate cover.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Leiden
Netherlands
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Unsewn / adhesive bound
Dimensions
Height: 231 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 23 mm
Weight
476 gr
ISBN-13
978-90-04-43698-5 (9789004436985)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
April D. DeConick, Ph.D. (1994, University of Michigan), is the Isla Carroll and Percy E. Turner Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at Rice University. She has published extensively on early Christianity, esotericism, mysticism, and Gnosticism, including The Gnostic New Age: How a Countercultural Spirituality Revolutionized Religion from Antiquity to Today (Columbia University Press, 2016).
Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta, Ph.D. (1997, University Complutense; 2004, University of Groningen) is Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at the University of Groningen. He is the author of numerous studies on Greco-Roman Philosophy; Early Christianity, Early Christian Apocrypha, Gnosticism, and Plutarch of Chaeronea.
Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta, Ph.D. (1997, University Complutense; 2004, University of Groningen) is Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at the University of Groningen. He is the author of numerous studies on Greco-Roman Philosophy; Early Christianity, Early Christian Apocrypha, Gnosticism, and Plutarch of Chaeronea.
Content
Contents
Introduction
Part 1: Antiquity
The Countercultural Gnostic: Turning the World Upside Down and Inside Out
?April D. DeConick
"I Turned away from the Temple": Sethian Counterculture in the Apocryphon of John
?Grant Adamson
Transgressing Boundaries: Plotinus and the Gnostics
?John D. Turner
Forbidden Knowledge: Cognitive Transgression and "Ascent Above Intellect" in the Debate Between Plotinus and the Gnostics
?Zeke Mazur
The Apocalypse of Paul (NHC V,2): Cosmology, Anthropology, and Ethics
?Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta
Gnosis Undomesticated: Archon-Seduction, Demon Sex, and Sodomites in the Paraphrase of Shem (NHC VII,1)
?Dylan M. Burns
Gnostic Self-Deification: The Case of Simon of Samaria
?M. David Litwa
Demon est Deus Inversus: Honoring the Daemonic in Iamblichean Theurgy
?Gregory Shaw
The Coming of the Star-Child: The Reception of the Revelation of the Magi in New Age Religious Thought and Ufology
?Brent Landau
Part 2: Modernity
The Great God Pan
?Sarah Iles Johnston
Alan Moore's Promethea: Countercultural Gnosis and the End of the World
?Wouter J. Hanegraaff
Children of the Light: Gnostic Fiction and Gnostic Practice in Vladimir Sorokin's Ice Trilogy
?Victoria Nelson
Symbolic Loss, Memory, and Modernization in the Reception of Gnosticism
?Matthew J. Dillon
Gnostic and Countercultural Elements in Zora Neale Hurston's "Hoodoo in America"
?Margarita Simon Guillory
Index 317
Introduction
Part 1: Antiquity
The Countercultural Gnostic: Turning the World Upside Down and Inside Out
?April D. DeConick
"I Turned away from the Temple": Sethian Counterculture in the Apocryphon of John
?Grant Adamson
Transgressing Boundaries: Plotinus and the Gnostics
?John D. Turner
Forbidden Knowledge: Cognitive Transgression and "Ascent Above Intellect" in the Debate Between Plotinus and the Gnostics
?Zeke Mazur
The Apocalypse of Paul (NHC V,2): Cosmology, Anthropology, and Ethics
?Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta
Gnosis Undomesticated: Archon-Seduction, Demon Sex, and Sodomites in the Paraphrase of Shem (NHC VII,1)
?Dylan M. Burns
Gnostic Self-Deification: The Case of Simon of Samaria
?M. David Litwa
Demon est Deus Inversus: Honoring the Daemonic in Iamblichean Theurgy
?Gregory Shaw
The Coming of the Star-Child: The Reception of the Revelation of the Magi in New Age Religious Thought and Ufology
?Brent Landau
Part 2: Modernity
The Great God Pan
?Sarah Iles Johnston
Alan Moore's Promethea: Countercultural Gnosis and the End of the World
?Wouter J. Hanegraaff
Children of the Light: Gnostic Fiction and Gnostic Practice in Vladimir Sorokin's Ice Trilogy
?Victoria Nelson
Symbolic Loss, Memory, and Modernization in the Reception of Gnosticism
?Matthew J. Dillon
Gnostic and Countercultural Elements in Zora Neale Hurston's "Hoodoo in America"
?Margarita Simon Guillory
Index 317