Gnosis
The word gnosis (from the Greek word for knowledge, γνώσις) has several uses:
- Among the gnostics, gnosis was the privileged "knowledge of the heart" or "insight" about the spiritual nature of the cosmos, that brought about salvation to the pneumatics - people who believed they could achieve this insight.
- Among heresiologists gnosis denotes different Christian belief systems of esoteric nature, such as, first and foremost, gnosticism and other dualist systems from the 1st and 2nd centuries A.D., but also rosicrucianism, Christian kabbalah etc.
- Gnosis is the name of magazine published between 1985 and 1999 in California as a "Journal of the Western Inner Traditions" covering traditions of spirituality and mysticism. It was a project of the Lumen Foundation.
- Among certain modern occult movements, esp. chaos magic, gnosis refers to an altered state of awareness in which the will is "magickally" effective.
