Gnosis means knowledge. The Gnostics felt that they had a superior knowledge from an inner illumination, so they felt themselves to be superior to Christians, and equal or superior to Jesus. This was a heresy to Christian leaders, and in order to offset this movement among liberal theologians, the leaders of the church met and drew up decrees stating that Jesus was “very God,” that He was God who had come down from “out there,” had put on clothes as a man and walked among men. Yet He was in no way human. To make the distinction between Jesus and other men unmistakable, the doctrine was
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