Gnosticism, or mainstream Catholic/Orthodox/Anglican/Protestant Christianity?

[Mopsus]

Also, dang, that's pretty impressive for a faith that originated with a fairly uneducated farmboy.

As a non-Mormon, one must assume that the Freemasons possess(ed) a far more impressive cache of esoteric knowledge than they've ever officially been given credit for. That's the only way to make it make sense.

[Mopsus]

Joseph Smith only joined the Freemasons in 1842 or thereabouts. Most of what he was teaching was already there before any affiliation with Freemasonry.

That's true. However, Hyrum Smith joined a Palmyra lodge in the 1820s, and several members of the Cowdery family were Masons, William (Oliver's father) becoming a Junior Warden in 1807.

[Mopsus]

As to the opening question... Borges's "Defense of Basilides the False" is good.

[Mopsus]

As to the opening question... Borges's "Defense of Basilides the False" is good.

I have not read that one. Why do you think it good?

Because its cosmogony is one where the creation of our world is one brief scene in an epochal drama. In this vision, man doesn't endure evil in the hope of becoming good, but endures obscurity in the hope of becoming significant.

[Mopsus]

Sounds a lot like a Gnostic Christian who gains Gnosis.

More accurately, a proto-post-modern disciple of Schopenhauer, who found the one religion that is overbearingly dark, rather than overbearingly light.

[Mopsus]

I have no idea who you refer to with your, "a proto-post-modern disciple of Schopenhauer,"

Of course not: when communicating knowledge, one must employ the symbols of the learned.

[Mopsus]

The learned explain what they mean and do not just throw labels around, but you have show  that my "Perhaps that was not your intent." was right on the mark.

Perhaps if your intention was to learn, you would read a book (or a Wikipedia article) once in a while, rather than begging someone with authority to spoonfeed you via YouTube video.