>>19912559Paul was probably the first Gnostic Christian, or in any case the first Hellenistic Christian, he separate tradition from the Synoptic Gospels, which was the camp of Peter and the "Hebrew Christians". Paul comes to the scene when some Christians were, what those Christians were exactly or what they believed in dogmatically we simply don't know. The first Gospel Mark , is written some 10 to 20 years after the death of Paul. In the Acts, Paul is condemned as magician and heretic by Peter, he is identified the nickname "Simon Magus" (Paul's original name was Saul). But in reality Paul's epistles are the first written documents to write about Christianity. In them Paul professes Gnostic ideas, such as "γνωσις πιστεως".
>"Behold, I tell you a mystery." – 1 Corinthians 15.51>"Let a man so consider us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God." – I Corinthians 4.1>"We speak wisdom among them that are perfect, yet not the wisdom of this world ... We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory." – 1 Corinthians 2.6-7>"To me ... was given, that I should preach ... Christ and make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God." – Ephesians 3.8-9And more importantly:
>"The God of this Age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel." – 2 Corinthians 4.4>"Give thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins." – Colossians 1.12-13This is clearly a form of proto-Gnostic dualism. This is the closest approximation to what the first communities of the Hellenistic gentile Christians believed in. See also Marcion of Sinope.
