A second century dualistic heresy that stressed the importance of philosophical knowledge (Gk. gnosis) for salvation. Gnosticism taught that a series of emanations of deity come forth in which a lower god, the God of the Old Testament, created the material world and was in conflict with the higher, supreme God, who could not have association with the evil, material world.
[tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, Gnosticism, history[/tags]
