Gnosticism Gnosticism 1. As a result of this debate, the church was compelled to significantly develop in the range, depth and precision of its theological tradition. Yet in spite of the significance of this debate, it is difficult to clearly delineate the phenomenon of Gnosticism. Gnosticism's cultural and social setting was the urban world in which Jewish religious texts and symbols were being drawn into syncretism with popularized philosophical notions and themes drawn from Hellenistic religion.
Modern scholars do have access to a few complete works of gnostic authors.
However, the principal sources for knowledge of Gnosticism have been the works of its Christian opponents, late second and early third century writers such as Irenaeus of Lyons, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Tertullian, and Hipplytus of Rome. From such writers we have summaries of the gnostic teaching and quotations drawn from gnostic writings. Thus it was of great importance when in 1945 a small library of thirteen codices was discovered at Nag Mammadi in Egypt, on a site not far from the fourth century monastery at Chenobokion. These codices contain some 48 short tractates in Coptic translation, of which the great majority are gnostic works. From a study of the gnostic materials, two things become clear.