The word of the Pistis Sophia: Revealed in the order of Jeu

by John van den Berg, Pam Wattie (Editor)

Every discovery of a scripture from late antiquity is a new opportunity to find out more about what moved man inwardly during that time. The Codex Askewianus, often called the Gospel of the Pistis Sophia, is such a scripture. At first glance, it is a report of a dialogue between Jesus and his disciples. However, nothing is what it seems in the Gospel of the Pistis Sophia. Modern research shows that the writing comes from a community from late antiquity, along with a second the Bruce Codex. They are apparently the testimonies of a mystery school, which are recorded in a very specific form. What distinguishes them from many other mystery schools is their own characteristic spiritual Jeu. In the books of Jeu, which are part of the Bruce Codex, this spiritual power creates an important basis for the work of the the Treasury of the Light. There, light is collected for the Mystery School, for the illumination of its members. Light that awakens the spiritual potential in man. The Gospel of the Pistis Sophia consists of four books, which together form a whole. In the first book the saviour and his disciples are on the Mount of Olives. This is a mythical representation of what takes place during the meetings of the an interaction between a redeeming spiritual power and the growing awareness of the members of the community. They are the candidates on the path of initiation who have opened their consciousness to the saviour. When he has initiated the dialogue, a threefold light comes to him. It surrounds him and shines from him. At that moment he receives the garment of light from the Treasury of Light. This contains all the mysteries, which the saviour explains to the disciples. As a result, they come to a deeper consciousness and, as candidates of the mystery school, are initiated step by step into the mysteries, which are hidden in the garment of light. To reveal these mysteries is the spiritual activity of the mystery school. After this the saviour starts telling the story of the Pistis Sophia. How he finds her under the Treasury of Light, because she has been robbed of her light by the light-robbers of the world below that treasury. The Pistis Sophia begs for the light, but loses it over and over again. In this way she learns to know repentance as an expression of the desire for the light of lights. The saviour intervenes by disrupting the influence of the light robbers in favour of the Pistis Sophia. Everything is accurately described in a dialogue between the saviour and the disciples. Within the dialogue, Maria Magdalene is the sincere soul who understands and explains the repentance of the Pistis Sophia. Through her statements, the other disciples also gain access to consciousness so that they too can help explain the mysteries. The true meaning of life is therefore, that ultimately every person receives the mysteries during life on earth. That's what the writing is about. After all, the soul can receive light garments that contain all the mysteries, because the saviour comes with powers that man cannot perceive. They are hidden from humans, as if behind a veil. If the veil is taken away or lifted up a little, the spiritual power can become active in human life again. He then receives the mystery, in the language of the Gospel of the Pistis Sophia. The man of light, born again from a single spark of light, then reveals himself again to make all the mysteries of the creator concrete in life itself. In late antiquity, in Egypt, the Jeuians write their inscrutable texts. In the 21st century there is again interest in the story of the Pistis Sophia among people who want to go the path of initiation. It is a late invitation to go aboard the heavenly ship of the Jeuians. The modern Egyptian mysteries of Osiris, Isis and Horus then become alive again for modern humans, because nothing is hidden that cannot be revealed to those who really want to comprehend.

137 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 10, 2020

Reviews

[Fred Kohn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fairly quick read, if you can stomach it, and if you have a fairly strong background in Gnosticism. The author introduces certain Gnostic terms (monad, Barbelo) with no explanation, which I imagine can be disconcerting for someone unfamiliar with those terms as used in Gnosticism. I was hoping that this would be a sort of commentary on Pistis Sophia, which it was not. Rather, it was an eclectic mix of various sources, including other Gnostic works, Egyptian myth, and even Hindu chakras and the collective subconscious.

The goal of the author, I suppose, was to weave together a coherent Gnostic system for those modern readers who wish to practice Gnosticism. For this reason, I suppose, he proposes two different Adamases, the good Adamas (who appears in the Apocryphon of John) and the evil Adamas (who appears in the Pistis Sophia). I’m guessing this is an invention of the author in order to reconcile conflicting text. I suspect he is doing the same thing when he posits that Sabaoth the "son" of the evil Yaltabaoth rebels against his father and becomes good. This looks like a device to explain how the archon Sabaoth from the Apocryphon of John can be a good figure in Pistis Sophia.

A defect of this book is that it does not cite sources. I recognized many of the references as being from Pistis Sophia, but he introduces ideas not included in that work, such as the idea that Pistis Sophia was the "mother" of Yaldabaoth. This idea comes from the Apocryphon of John, and I was able to trace other ideas in this book to that work.

I am indebted to the author for introducing me to Jeuian Gnosticism. According to a website I found, Jeuian Gnosticism is a fairly late system which takes influences from Sethianism, Valentinianisn, Manichaeism, orthodox Christianity, and classical Egyptian mysticism. That sounds about right based on what this book says.

Edit: reading Erin Evans's commentary on Pistis Sophia clarified a lot for me. Confusingly, PS has three separate figures named Sabaoth, two of which are good and one is evil. None of these correspond to the Sabaoth in the Apocryphon of John. In PS, Sabaoth Adamas, who is an evil archon, has a brother named Jabraoth, who repents and becomes good. This figure seems to correspond to van den Berg's Sabaoth, although van den Berg may, of course, be drawing on material that I am unfamiliar with.