Glossary of Spiritual and Religious Words

B

Basilides

(Gnostic) A Gnostic teacher and philosopher. From The Theosophical Glossary: "A celebrated Alexandrian Gnostic of about 120 AD, probably born in Syria, whose teachings included a system of emanations and hierarchies of powers; founder of the Basilidian Gnostics, declared an heretical sect. Basilides claimed to have derived his teachings from an original Gospel of Matthew and from Glaucus, a disciple of Peter."

"The Patriarch Basilides belonged to the Gnostic church. He was the celebrated alchemist who left a seven page book of lead, which, according to Master Krumm- Heller, is preserved in the Kiercher Museum of the Vatican. This book cannot be understood by archaeologists because it is a book of occult science. Basilides was a disciple of Saint Matthias." - Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony (1950)

"The School of Gnosticism was divided into two major parts, commonly called the Syrian Cult and the Alexandrian Cult. These schools agreed in essentials, but the latter division was more inclined to be pantheistic, while the former was dualistic. While the Syrian cult was largely Simonian, the Alexandrian School was the outgrowth of the philosophical deductions of a clever Egyptian Christian, Basilides by name, who claimed to have received his instructions from the Apostle Matthew. Like Simon Magus, he was an emanationist, with Neo-Platonic inclinations. In fact, the entire Gnostic Mystery is based upon the hypothesis of emanations as being the logical connection between the irreconcilable opposites Absolute Spirit and Absolute Substance, which the Gnostics believed to have been coexistent in Eternity." - Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages (1928)