Yaldabaoth

The False Creator

## Classification

### Personality

Yaldabaoth is presented as a "God creator of the Material World" wich is varely false as he just createe his own universe but not the entire collection of them.

## Physical description

### Gender

Male

**Yaldabaoth**, otherwise known as **Jaldabaoth** or **Ialdabaoth**, is a malevolent god and "demiurge" ("creator" of the "material world") in various Gnostic sects and movements, sometimes represented as a theriomorphic, lion-headed serpent. He is identified as the false god who keeps the souls trapped in physical bodies, imprisoned in the material universe.

## History

From around 200 BCE, a tradition in the Graeco-Egyptian Ptolemaic Kingdom identified Yahweh, the god of the Jews, with the Egyptian god Seth. Seth was seen as an evil deity by the Egyptians and not commonly worshipped due to his role as the god of foreigners. The Greek practice of interpretatio graeca, ascribing the gods of another people's pantheon to corresponding ones in one's own, had been adopted by the Egyptians after their Hellenisation.

The story of the Exodus, featured in the Hebrew Bible, speaks of the Jews as a nation betrayed and subjugated by the Pharaoh. Jewish migration within the Hellenised Ptolemaic Kingdom to Greek-speaking Egyptian cities led to the creation of the Septuagint, a translation of the Hebrew Bible into Koine Greek. The story of the Exodus was adapted into the Ancient Greek by Ezekiel the Tragedian, which was widely negative in Egypt.

Some Egyptians saw similarities between Yahweh's actions and attributes and those of Seth, as well as a phonetic resemblance between Koinē Greek: Ἰαω, romanized: Iaō, Yahweh's name as used by hellenised Jews, and Coptic: ⲓⲱ, romanized: Iō, lit. 'donkey', then seen as the animal of Seth. This led to accusations of onolatry against the Jews, spreading from the Egyptian milieu to the rest of the Graeco-Roman world.

## Role in Gnosticism

Gnosticism originated in the late 1st century CE in non-rabbinical Jewish and early Christian sects. In the formation of Christianity, various sectarian groups, labeled "gnostics" by their opponents, emphasised spiritual knowledge (*gnosis*) of the divine spark within, over faith (*pistis*) in the teachings and traditions of the various communities of Christians. Gnosticism presents a distinction between the highest, unknowable God, and the Demiurge, "creator" of the material universe. Gnostics considered the most essential part of the process of salvation to be this personal knowledge, in contrast to faith as an outlook in their worldview along with faith in the ecclesiastical authority.

In Gnosticism, the biblical serpent in the Garden of Eden was praised and thanked for bringing knowledge (*gnosis*) to Adam and Eve and thereby freeing them from the malevolent Demiurge's control. Gnostic Christian doctrines rely on a dualistic cosmology that implies the eternal conflict between good and evil, and a conception of the serpent as the liberating savior and bestower of knowledge to humankind opposed to the Demiurge or creator god, identified with the Yahweh from the Hebrew Bible. Some Gnostic Christians (such as Marcionites) considered the Hebrew God of the Old Testament as the evil, false god and creator of the material universe, and the Unknown God of the Gospel, the father of Jesus Christ and creator of the spiritual world, as the true, good God. In the Archontic, Sethian, and Ophite systems, Yaldabaoth (Yahweh) is regarded as the malevolent Demiurge and false god of the Old Testament who generated the material universe and keeps the souls trapped in physical bodies, imprisoned in the world full of pain and suffering that he created.

However, not all Gnostic movements regarded the creator of the material universe as inherently evil or malevolent. For instance, Valentinians believed that the Demiurge is merely an ignorant and incompetent creator, trying to fashion the world as well as he can, but lacking the proper power to maintain its goodness. They were regarded as heretics by the proto-orthodox Early Church Fathers.

Yaldabaoth is primarily mentioned in the Archontic, Sethian, and Ophite writings of Gnostic literature, most of which have been discovered in the Nag Hammadi library. In the Apocryphon of John, "Yaldabaoth" is the first of three names of the domineering archon, along with Saklas and Samael. In *Pistis Sophia* he has lost his claim to rulership and, in the depths of Chaos, together with 49 demons, tortures sacrilegious souls in a scorching hot torrent of pitch. Here he is a lion-faced archon, half flame, half darkness. Yaldabaoth appears as a rebellious angel both in the apocryphal Gospel of Judas and the Gnostic work *Hypostasis of the Archons*. In some of these Gnostic texts, Yaldabaoth is further identified with the Ancient Roman god Saturnus.