Review:The Gnostic Faustus

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The Gnostic Faustus: The Secret Teachings behind the Classic Text (Paperback)
by Ramona Fradon

Product Details

Paperback: 384 pages

Publisher: Inner Traditions (November 25, 2007)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 1594772045

ISBN-13: 978-1594772047

Book Description
In The Gnostic Faustus, Ramona Fradon shows the legend of Doctor Faustus to be a composite Gnostic creation myth that reveals the process of spiritual salvation. Nearly every element of the original 16th-century text is a metaphor containing profound spiritual messages based on passages of Coptic and Syrian Gnostic manuscripts, including the Pistis Sophia and The Hymn of the Pearl. Fradon identifies many Hermetic, alchemical, and Tantric symbols in the Faust Book that accompany the story of Sophia, the goddess of wisdom, whose troubled journey to salvation is a model for human spiritual development. Extensive line-by-line text comparisons with these Gnostic manuscripts show that Faustus’s corruption by the Devil and his despair parallel Sophia’s transgression and fall, and that his tragic death is a simple reversal of her joyful rebirth, so written in order to make an otherwise heretical story palatable to Church authorities at that time…

About the Author
Ramona Fradon has been investigating the Faust legend since 1978 in order to decipher the mysteries of its spiritual framework. She has also practiced astrology and energy healing and studied shamanism and hypnotherapy. She is a visual artist with extensive illustration credits in the comics industry. She was the artist for Aquaman, Metamorpho, and the comic strip Brenda Starr. In 2006, she was inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame. She lives in upstate New York.

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Before reading The Gnostic Faustus by Ramona Fradon my knowledge of Doctor Faustus was sketchy at best—and primarily based on the opera by Gounod. I was vaguely aware of the connections between European alchemy & the basic Faustian storyline, but I was not at all aware of any Hindu/kundalini connections—or Gnostic correspondences with Faust/Faustus material. In addition to this, I was not a little perturbed at the subtitle of this book: The Secret Teachings, etc. My god, I’ve gotten tired of the “Secret Teaching” “Forbidden Knowledge” or esoteric “Codes” description of “New Age” material. In fact, Parallel Perspectives’ new editorial policy is to discontinue reviewing material classified under the specific New Age/Astrology genre. In addition to these reservations, with the growing public interest in Gnostics, there is a tendency to try to lump all kinds of divergent information & material under the general heading of Gnosticism. However, the alleged “Gnostic Connection” in Ramona Fradon’s work tantalized me—and the cover jacket lists the book with the Gnosticism/Philosophy tag, so I had an excuse to override what boils down to my own editorial policy.

I’m glad I did.

Ramona Fradon has the knowledge & the writing talent to describe & clarify some of the more esoteric dogmas & beliefs associated with Gnosticism. This is no slight skill considering the many convoluted philosophical twists & turns associated with the highly eclectic range of Gnostic beliefs. And, even though the author occasionally refers to astrology & draws inferences from the typically “New Age” arena, her overall style is so intelligent as to make these references at least palatable to a recovering New Age curmudgeon such as myself. In fact, it is a tribute to Ramona Fradon that her book is so engaging as to overcome ALL my admitted metaphysical prejudices.

FAUSTUS is one of those books in which every other paragraph is so illuminating that you want to jot down notes so as to not forget anything. Fradon’s style is mature & she frames these gems of insight in a way that everyone can understand.

I would like to make a few observations regarding just the Introductory Chapter: Setting the Stage.

On page 9 Ramona Fradon does wonderfully “set the stage” with a clear exposition of the role of Sophia (“Wisdom”) in the Gnostic scheme of things.

…the story of the…goddess Sophia—how she violated the laws of… the thirteen highest regions or aeons of the Light world where ideal forms or stages of awareness…dwell in timeless perfection. Sophia longed to know the unknowable Father directly, to gaze upon his Light…she pursued the Light of a jealous aeon into the darkness beyond…There she was hounded and pursued by the forces of darkness until Jesus found her in the chaos, lamenting her wrongdoing and crying to the Light of Lights to save her.

Eventually Sophia finds salvation and she in turn becomes a Redeemer.

There are definite parallels between Sophia’s mythology with the earlier legends of Isis, Horus, Osiris & Set(h). We won’t go into those aspects that we (Gnostic Pagans & our other associate readers of Parallel Perspectives) are already familiar. The new ground Fradon breaks in The Gnostic Faustus is to convincingly show connections between the Sophia story with central ideas also found in Faustus, Early Gnosticism, Hermetic & alchemical symbols, and Hindu spirituality.

…the story of Sophia’s enlightenment takes place in the context of…human spiritual initiation…There are also suggestions of Yantric diagrams (linear geometric figures designed to focus consciousness on the inner planes), parodies of sacred sexual acts…and other features peculiar to the transforming spiritual practice of Vajrayama Tantra, the yoga of sex. [Pgs. 16-17]

See also,

Is Tantra The Yoga of Sex?

This information segues into some rather intimate (and very interesting) specifics of Tantric practice.

Ramona Fradon also includes further pertinent information regarding Goddess Worship, alchemy, and Kundalini Yoga.

On pages 26-27 the author states:

The blending of these systems occurred in the early Christian centuries in and around Alexandria, Egypt, where many religions and cultic practices converged to create new forms of worship. Gnostic “serpent worshippers” or tantrists mingled with Jewish mystics, Egyptian alchemists, magicians, Hermetics, and devotees of Isis, the… goddess of the Moon (& Magic –ed). The Gnostics identified Isis with their Sophia, whose sojourn in matter as a “whore,” and her subsequent enlightenment, resonated with the sacred sexual rituals of Isian priestesses in which participants were transformed into androgynous gods. Sophia’s all-encompassing being—associated with alchemical prima material, the source of all physical forms—further identified her with the fertile moon mother, Isis.

We found this passage of particular interest because it dovetails quite neatly the introductory remarks of the 1966 Founding Document of the Gnostic Pagan Tradition.

We are in obvious agreement with Fardon’s equation uniting Isis and Sophia. However, many “modern Gnostics” (and the validity of that designation is open to debate) and even "non-Gnostic" academic researchers adamantly negate this formulation. Some people define Sophia as being a principle rather than a goddess or other personality type entity. Gnostic Pagans can counter, well then, Sophia equates with Maat, Goddess of Cosmic Law & Order who many researches claim is similarly more a cosmic principle than a goddess.

And so on, and so forth…

In the pursuit of Gnosis all roads invariably lead back to John the Baptist, and almost all to Simon Magus. Fradon too acknowledges this:

Simon’s reputation as a sex magician survived the concealing of such practices when the worship of the goddess went underground…references to Simon…and…his female companion, Helen…As a reformed prostitute she was a wisdom figure in the manner of Isis or Sophia…it is assumed that she and Simon performed the goddess’s sacraments together, perhaps as priest and priestess…Simon was a disciple of John the Baptist…leading…to speculate that the Baptist was also a follower of the goddess…[Page 28]

On the following page, Ramona Fradan draws some interesting parallels relating to The Feminine in western occult imagery(and by inference the Shekinah role in Kabbalah):

…images of Salome…carrying John’s decapitated head on a platter are found in churches located in areas of southern France where the Templars were quartered. There are often statues of the Black Madonna in those or churches dedicated to Mary Magdalene, which cover ancient Isis shrines.

Text Box: To formulate:

Sophia = Isis = Mary, Mother of God = Black Madonna = Mary M.

You can go further:

Black = The Primordial Mound (Pyramid) of Egypt/Earth = Isis = Vulva/Yoni
= Shakti = Anima Mundi/The World Soul
= The Virgin Mary = Mary Magdalene
= The Holy Grail
= Sophia