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Originally Posted by BigJohn
But wasn't it the Aeon Sophia who created Yaldabaoth?
So, shouldn't Sophia be held accountable?
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Some gnostics did and some didn't
An example of those who did "First of all concerning the deficiency of the aeons, this is the deficiency, when the disobedience and the foolishness of the mother appeared without the commandment of the majesty of the Father. She wanted to raise up aeons. And when she spoke, the Arrogant One followed"
From the Letter of Peter to Phillip
An example of those who didn't
"Now he is called 'Saklas', that is, 'Samael', 'Yaltabaoth', he who had taken power; who had snatched it away from the innocent one (Sophia); who had earlier overpowered her who is the Light`s Epinoia who had descended, her from whom he had come forth from originally"
Trimorphic Protennoia
Sophia is involved in these tellings but understood differently. If I was to take a side and engage in this myth i would defend Sophia I think and reject attempts to blame her for anything. I mean... it's some attribute of the divine that's being rejected, her innocence or guilelessness or immanence. All the blame can then be laid on the bandit in the story
The basic idea as far as i can tell is that God was innocent of evil thus when evil arose was unable to stop being overpowered. Thats the only way i can make sense of gnostic myth anyway, and its an attractive one, what i find hard is that i'm drawn to non-dualism so i always try to see this myth as non-dualistically as possible, rightly or wrongly
ps i'm not disagreeing with anything Ghaleon wrote, only as an outsider to gnostics how i see it