"According to Gnostic teachings "the soul is a female (the Greek word for soul, psyche, is feminine). Originally she is a virgin, androgynous in form, living in the presence of the heavenly Father. When she falls into a body, however, she is defiled; after abandoning her Father's house and her virginity, she falls into sexuality and prostitution, and is abused by the wanton adulterers of this carnal world. Desolate and repentant, she prays to her Father for restoration, and he hears her prayer. She is returned to her former condition, and restored to androgynous union with her brother. This union is achieved through spiritual marriage; the bridegroom comes down to the bridal chamber, and the soul and her bridegroom 'become a single life', inseparable from each other. Thus the ascent of the soul to the Father is accomplished, and the soul is again at home in heaven."
     - William C. Robinson, Jr., in The Nag Hammadi Library

"For they were originally joined to one another when they were with the Father before the woman led astray the man, who is her brother. This marriage has brought them back together again and the soul has been joined to her true love, her real master, as it is written (cf. Genesis 3:16; 1 Corinthians 11:1; Ephesians 5:23)." "Thus when the soul had adorned herself again in her beauty [she] enjoyed her beloved, and he also loved her. And when she had intercourse with him, she got from him the seed that is the life-giving Spirit, so that by him she bears good children and rears them. For this is the great, perfect marvel of birth. And so this marriage is made perfect by the will of the Father."
     - Exegesis of the Soul

"Wisdom has built her house, she has set up her seven pillars.
She has slaughtered her beasts, she has mixed her wine, she has also set her table.
She has sent out her maids to call from the highest places in the town...
'Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed...
Live, and walk in the way of insight'."
     - Proverbs 9:1-6

Marcus, a student of Valentinus' (c. 150), says that a vision

"descended upon him...in the form of a woman...and expounded to him alone its own nature, and the origin of things, which it had never revealed to anyone, divine or human." The presence then said to him, "I wish to show you Truth herself, for I have brought her down from above, so that you may see her without a veil, and understand her beauty."
     - Irenaeus, Libros Quinque Adversus Haereses

"And that, Marcus adds, is how 'the naked Truth' came to him in a woman's form, disclosing her secrets to him. Marcus expects, in turn, that everyone whom he initiates into gnosis will also receive such experiences. In the initiation ritual, after invoking the spirit, he commands the candidate to speak in prophecy, to demonstrate that the person has received direct contact with the divine."
     - Elaine Pagels, The Gnostic Gospels

The revelation of the gnosis in the form of a woman is best represented in the Gnostic masterpiece The Thunder, Perfect Mind

A New Role for Women

"Simon Peter said to them [the disciples]: 'Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of Life.' Jesus said, she too may become a living spirit, resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the Kingdom of Heaven.'"
     - Gospel of Thomas

"...This simply states what religious rhetoric assumes: that the men for the legitimate body of the community, while women are allowed to participate only when they assimilate themselves to men. Other texts discovered at Nag Hammadi demonstrate one striking difference between these 'heretical' sources and orthodox ones; gnostic sources continually use sexual symbolism to describe God. One might expect that these texts would show the influence of archaic pagan traditions of the Mother Goddess, but for the most part, their language is specifically Christian, unmistakably related to a Jewish heritage."
     - Elaine Pagels, The Gnostic Gospels

"Longing for the night of the father, my relation and companion of my bed Sophie, anointed in the bath of Christ, with imperishable unction, you went to see the faces of the aeons, the angel of the Great Council, the true Son."
     - 3rd Century inscription (National Museum of Rome)

"Professor Gilles Quispel has said that it should be seen as 'a symbol of the love of Christ and His Church that didn't seen marriage for the progeny of children, but that there's something religious in sexual intercourse itself, longing for god...' Since the Holy spirit was regarded as feminine, sex for those Gnostics who were not ascetics, could have a sacramental aspect. This understanding was confused by orthodox writers with those gnostic extremists who held that those who had been freed from the 'god of the 'Law' were free to behave how they chose and among whom the cultic orgy was practiced. Namely the followers of the gnostic teacher Carpocrates who coined the proto-communist dictum: 'Property is theft'. The idea was that by consciously sinning one would thereby uncoil oneself from the grip of the unconscious power of sin; a corollary of the gnostic demand, 'know thyself'. Consequently, the Gnostics in general, were long regarded as infamous sexual deviants and moral libertines."
     - Tobias Churton, The Gnostics

"These heretical women - how audacious they are! They have no modesty, they are bold enough to teach, to engage in argument, to enact exorcisms, to undertake cures, and, it may be, even to baptize."
     - Tertullian, De Praescriptione Haereticorum

."By the second century A.D., the women in the Roman Empire "were everywhere involved in business, social life, such as theaters, sports events, concerts, parties, traveling - with or without their husbands. they took part in a whole range of athletics, even bore arms and went to battle..."
     - Jerome Carcopino, "Feminism and Demoralization"

"Women of the Jewish communities, on the other hand, were excluded from actively participating in public worship, in education, and in social and political life outside the family."
     - Elaine Pagels, The Gnostic Gospels

Hyperlinks

·Isis, the Black Virgin
·Jesus - The Mission Begins
·The Secret Knowledge
·Surprising Works