THE EGYPTIAN FOUNDATIONS OF GNOSTIC THOUGHT

The “Seth-principle” also pertains to the duration of destiny 24
, hence his fusion
with the Greek Typhon in the late phase. A study by Jan Assmann’s depicts nhheternity
pertaining to the king, the state, the forces of nature, “the perpetuity of
discontinuity, the unities of countable aspects of time” on this side (Diesseits). 25
Nhheternity,
as we shall examine in Chapter 15, is essentially demiurgic and denotes a
realm that has become threatened from within by its own theogonic process,
embodied in Seth. For Seth also limits the undisturbed functioning of Horus and the
entire theogonic process extending down from above:
Seth also limits the existence of Horus and his mother. The child Horus is
brought forth by Isis in solitude. In the difficulties and dangers mother and child
have to endure, not in ordered society, but in the inhospitable marshes of
Khemmis, the glorious, original divine life is almost lost. Not only is the
cosmos surrounded by primeval chaos, the cosmos itself proves to be fissured at
Seth’s first stirring. 26
In Gnostic myth, especially the “Valentinian”, Isis/Sophia and Horus maintain
themselves in the higher supernal realm with Horus establishing a limit; below this
the Seth/Demiurge is left to rule over the abortive underworld.
The limiting of Seth in Egyptian and Gnostic myth is the key dramatic
development in both, for Seth and the Gnostic demiurgic realm are not to be crushed
or overthrown, rather they are destined to fulfil their destiny in terms of nhh-time. 27
The critical nature of Seth and the Gnostic demiurge is equivocal, embodying boastful
arrogance and capriciousness, but not quintessentially evil; Seth aids Re daily against
Apophis, and the Gnostic demiurge in many systems is enlightened by Sophia and
attempts to do the best he can. Both figures fulfil their role in the theogonic process
and their eradication because of their perceived negative qualities is not at issue. At
the beginning of this study we defined emanationist thought as placing its emphasis
upon the need for theogonic process, for differentiation arising out of the
Undifferentiated. This need, we maintained, is one of distancing. Thus the Seth
principle represents a polarity, a remove, an apogee from the Source that,
paradoxically, takes one into its deepest mysteries. Seth for the ancient Egyptian
theologians, and the Demiurge/Sophia for the Gnostics, was an active principle
embodying all the dysteliological phenomena in human life – war, famine, plague,
disease, abortion, flood, and earthquake – all that which is allowed to occur, in the
larger mystery of things, upon the outermost rims of justice, fullness, and order.
and water from which came the womb, which produced four aeons etc., all of which depicts
the usual Egyptian Heh-god characteristics.
24
Bianchi, “Seth, Osiris, et l’ethnographie,” 135.
25
Assman, Zeit und Ewigkeit im Alten Ägypten, 12.
26
te Velde, Seth, God of Confusion., 32.
27
Anthes notes this distinctive feature of Egyptian theology: “Egyptian religion is, I think,
completely free of those logics which eliminate one of two contradictory concepts and press
religious ideas into a system of dogmas.” “Egyptian Theology in the 3rd millenium B.C.,”
170.