Next Wednesday 14 December we will have the pleasure of hosting Paolo Riberi again on our YouTube channel, for the third time in just under two years, for the presentation of his book The serpent and the cross (Lindau 2021). Live streaming starting at 21:30.
LIVE VIDEO
ABSTRACT
Two thousand years ago some Middle Eastern sects claimed to be custodians of a secret esoteric teaching, imparted by Jesus himself to a few chosen ones such as Mary Magdalene, James, Thomas and Judas: thus the Gnostic gospels were born, which radically revolutionized the doctrines of official Christianity. The symbol of this movement was not the cross, but the snake, mythical bearer of Knowledge. In the following centuries the Gnostic serpent managed to shed its skin and survive the affirmation of the Catholic Church, assuming new forms and inspiring religious movements such as that of the Cathars, works such as the Faust, poets like William Blake and thinkers like Carl Gustav Jung. Particularly after the discovery of the apocryphal gospels of Nag Hammadi in 1945, Gnosticism has continued to exert a powerful and often secret fascination on the contemporary imagination. Unbeknownst to the general public - and even to many commentators - Gnostic ideas indeed permeate various areas of pop culture, from the science fiction of Philip K. Dick to metal music, from the comics of Alan Moore and Grant Morrison to the poignant songs of Leonard Cohen, from the cinema (Matrix) to TV series (Dark, Westworld). In short, the serpent of Knowledge, far from having become extinct centuries ago, still continues on its path.
PAUL RIBERI
Paolo Riberi graduated in Philology and Ancient Literature and in Economics at the University of Turin. Scholar of ancient history and literature of Christian origins, he is a member of the Italian Society of History of Religions (SISR), and is the author of some essays dedicated to the world of the apocryphal gospels and to the thought of the Gnostics, including "The Apocalypse of Adam โ (2013), โMary Magdalene and the othersโ (2015), โRed pill or black lodge?โ (2017), โThe Gnostic Apocalypse of Lightโ (2019) and โAbraxas: the magic of the drumโ (2021). He also recently published "The awakening of Neoโ (2022). For the Lindau editions he is also the author, together with prof. Giancarlo Genta, of "Beyond the horizon" (2019), a study on the historical-philosophical legacy of Western scientific technology.
PREVIOUS LIVE VIDEOS WITH PAOLO RIBERI:
