Secret Book Of John

through a lapse in wisdom, Sophia, some of the brilliance of the divine realm is lost. The child of Sophia, the creator or demiurge, who is named Yaldabaoth, or Sakla, or Samael, fashions a world of mortality that snares human beings

Meyer offers a synoptic narrative of the Secret Book of John's cosmogony, centering on Sophia's fall, the demiurge Yaldabaoth's creation of the material world, and the entrapment of divine light within humanity.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005thesis

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The Secret Book intends this story to show that we have a latent capacity within our hearts and minds that links us to the divine — not in our ordinary state of mind but when this hidden capacity awakens.

Meyer, citing Pagels, argues that the Secret Book of John's mythological narrative is fundamentally a psychological claim about dormant inner divinity awakened through gnosis.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005thesis

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Part Six The Secret Book of John Part Seven The Secret Book of James Part Eight The Book of Thomas Part Nine The Dialogue of the Savior

Meyer positions the Secret Book of John as a discrete canonical unit within his definitive collection of gnostic gospels, affirming its centrality to the Nag Hammadi literary tradition.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005supporting

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Yaldabaoth organized everything after the pattern of the first realms that had come into being, so that he might create everything in an incorruptible form. Not that he had seen the incorruptible ones.

This passage from the Secret Book of John dramatizes the demiurge's blind mimicry of the divine pleroma, establishing the structural irony — ignorant creation aping transcendent reality — central to Sethian cosmogony.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005supporting

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The mother-father is great in mercy, the holy spirit, who in every way is compassionate, who sympathizes with you, the insight of enlightened forethought. This one raised up the offspring of the perfect generation

This extended dialogue from the Secret Book of John articulates the salvific role of the divine Mother-Father and forethought in rescuing souls trapped in ignorance and matter.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005supporting

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On five seals, here and below, compare the baptismal reference in Secret Book of John II, 31. On forethought, compare the Secret Book of John.

Meyer's annotation cross-references the Secret Book of John as the authoritative source for the Sethian concepts of the five seals and forethought appearing throughout related Nag Hammadi texts.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005supporting

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Or, 'afterthought,' epinoia (from Greek), here and throughout. On pronoia and epinoia, compare, in Greek mythology, the Titans Prometheos ('forethought') and Epimetheos ('afterthought'), who create human beings

Meyer's annotation to the Secret Book of John maps its technical theological vocabulary — pronoia and epinoia — onto Greek mythological antecedents, situating the text within a broader cosmogonic tradition.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005supporting

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The Secret Book of James contains themes that are typical of gnostic literature (knowledge, fullness, deficiency). More specifically, the text may be considered a Valentinian document.

Meyer distinguishes the Secret Book of James from the Secret Book of John by assigning the former to Valentinian rather than Sethian gnosis, clarifying the distinct literary and theological identities of the two texts.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005aside

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Here begins creation by the word, as in Gen. 1 and John 1, as well as in the Egyptian creation text, the Memphite cosmogony, in which Ptah is described creating by means of the spoken word.

Meyer's annotation situates the Secret Book of John's creation-by-logos motif within a comparative framework spanning Genesis, the Johannine Prologue, and Egyptian cosmogony.

Marvin W. Meyer, The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus: The Definitive Collection of Mystical Gospels and Secret Books about Jesus of Nazareth, 2005aside

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