So, to explain this, all I need to explain is what the Monad is (the one). The Monad is the one god, as there is just one god. All else is considered non eternal. This is the non dual mechanics or metaphysics. In the creation myth, it says god looked into the waters of spirit, and in his self-awareness, the Epinoia (conscious awareness) came into being from its reflection. This is the Barbelo and later Sophia. So what happened here is that god produced duality from looking at his own form. This is actually a hint at what god truly is. Reflection is a classic code for oneness substance. The barbelo is both male and female, hinting at a union (union being a code word for oneness). The Christ is brought into being and the four realms (lights) which come from the Christ. According to some later Gnostic schools, Christ and Sophia form a divine couple again hinting at a union (oneness). It was because of Sophia from the conceptual realm that she decided to create her own child without her partner, thus creating the demiurge (public builder in Greek).All of this so far explains how duality began and hints at a uniting essence (i refer to as a substance). Sophia casts the demiurge out of the top heavens, and he begins to fashion his own creation modeled on the above.
Hidden meaning - The hidden meaning to all this is to know that there is the Monad and the duality, demiurge. The demiurge hides the Monad from man and is ignorant of its true nature, the oneness. In Plato’s concepts, the oneness is called Henosis, and nature is called the ousia. It is because the ousia has been forgotten that the man is kept enslaved in the lowest realm. The main point of all this is that the Monad is eternal, timeless, and superior to thought (beyond thought), and the demiurge is temporal and always in a state of change. The demiurge created the universe and hid the oneness (it forgot about it). This is why we are confused and in a state of thoughtlessness of the ousia.
Valentinus - Valentinus in his sermons said this – “Perfect redemption is the cognition itself of the ineffable greatness; for since through ignorance came about the defect. The whole system springing from ignorance is dissolved in Gnosis.” Gnosis is the redemption of the inner man, not the body or the spirit. Even the soul is a product of the defect. It is the Gnosis of a universal being that is the inner redemption. This universal being is the ousia. The whole creation chain of the heavens and universe is a product of defect. Valentinus had an excellent grasp of oneness and duality. Valentinus says this in another sermon “Ye are children of eternal life. If ye dissolve the world and are not yourselves dissolved, then you are lords over creation and all that passes away.”. Duality is the problem and cause of the material universe within us, and thus without, we remain as the one. Where is the soul?Where is the soul? Can you find it? If we can’t find a soul, then how can we say one exists? If there is no soul, then what is this all about? The non-I non dual view is that there is only the god nature and the temporal universe. This is the world soul or one soul view. We are all parts of the universe that are coming and going. Only the one (Monad) is unchanging.
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