It was in my childhood, when the comforting orthodoxies of tradition seemed to fail a world suffering the Second World War's shattering blows, that the first glimpse of Gnosticism came to me, with its disclosure of long-forgotten truths. So overwhelmingly deep was its ancient hold upon my mind that I became a relentless gatherer of information about every aspect of this ancient tradition and eventually resolved to dedicate my life to its revival and dissemination. The vision of the future that discloses itself to the view of the Gnostic is not a collective one. The future, therefore, to me is individual. It has to do with the fate of individual selfhood and only in a derivative sense with the future events taking place on the dark and sorrowful planet upon which we live at present.
Gnosis is knowledge.
I feel that I possess a certain kind of knowledge, based on my experience that disclosed to me the true character of life in this world of matter and flesh and also the destiny of my true selfhood beyond all materiality and embodied existence. Viscerally, instinctively, intuitively, I feel life in this world of matter, space, and time to be a failed and flawed work, vitiated and corrupted in its most fundamental structures. Mainstream Christianity has given recognition to this insight with its doctrine of the fall. Gautama, the Buddha, expressed it well when he said that earthly life is suffering, from which only a radical awakening of the spirit can liberate us and transport us to Nirvana. While others may debate such insights, I know them to be true.