Demiurge

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The Demiurge, The Craftsman or Creator, in some belief systems, is the deity responsible for the creation of the physical universe.

The word derives from the ancient Greek δημιουργός (dēmiourgós, Latinized demiurgus). In Classical Greek, the word means “artisan” or “craftsman” (literally "worker in the service of the people": δήμιος (dēmios) “the people”(deriv. of dêmos the people) + ἔργον (ergon) “ worker”). It is used of a creator (of the laws or the heaven) or the creator (of the World) in Plato.

The demiurge appears in a number of different religious and philosophical systems, most notably Platonism and Gnosticism. The precise nature and character of the Demiurge however varies from system to system, being the omnibenevolent Great Architect Μέγας Αρχιτέκτων του Σύμπαντος of creation in Neoplatonism, though the word in Greek for architect would be αρχιτέκτων not δημιουργός. Finally to the creator as well as the personification of evil in Gnosticism. The Demiurge was identified with Zeus in Neoplatonism.

In Gnosticism, alternative names are used for the Demiurge, including Yaldabaoth, Yao or Iao, Ialdabaoth and several other variants, the Gnostics identified the Demiurge with the Hebrew God Jehovah (see the Sethians and Ophites). He is known as Ptahil in Mandaeanism.

Platonism & Neoplatonism

Plato refers to the Demiurge frequently in the Socratic dialogue Timaeus circa 360 BC as the entity who “fashioned and shaped” the material world. Plato describes the Demiurge as unreservedly benevolent and hence desirous of a world as good as possible. The world remains allegedly imperfect, however, because the Demiurge had to work on pre-existing chaotic matter.

However it should be remembered that in the Platonic system matter is non-being and that the word chaos literally means a void. Plato's representation of the Demiurge in the Timaeus is therefore allegorical and the Demiurge should be understood as being essentially the same as the God of theism. Plato's Demiurge is a fleshing out of Hesiod's cosmology within the realm of dialectical discourse.

Plotinus however, elucidates the equation of matter with nothing in his Enneads "Matter is therefore a non-existent" Ennead 2, Tractate 4 Section 16. This being inline with the idea that Plotinus was clarifying what was established in Platonistic tradition but not available outside the academy or in Plato's text. This idea of clarification of Plato's teachings continued through the Middle Platonists such as Numenius to the Neoplatonists such as Plotinus.

The Demiurge is not the supreme deity of Plato or Neoplatonism. He occupies a place in the celestial hierarchy of Hypercosmic and Cosmic Gods. He is to the three Cosmic hierarchies what the One is to the Hypercosmic Gods.

Plato in Timaeus states that it is "blasphemy to state that the universe was not created in the image of perfection or heaven". The Demiurge creates the Cosmos in the image of the ineffable and transcendent God, the One, the source or the Monad.

In Plato's Timaeus dialogue, the World Soul or creator spirit exists with the Demiurge they are not separate but are of one another:

Plato, Timaeus, 34 "Now God did not make the soul after the body, although we are speaking of them in this order; for having brought them together he would never have allowed that the elder should be ruled by the younger; but this is a random manner of speaking which we have, because somehow we ourselves too are very much under the dominion of chance."

Though previous to Numenius of Apamea and Plotinus' Enneads, there is no Platonic works that ontologically clarify the Demiurge from the allegory in Plato's Timaeus.

In relation to the Gods familiar from mythology the Demiurge is identified as Zeus within Plotinus' works.

In Fourth Tractate 'Problems of the Soul' The Demiurge is identified as Zeus.

10."When under the name of Zeus we are considering the Demiurge we must leave out all notions of stage and progress, and recognize one unchanging and timeless life."

Gnosticism

Like Plato, Gnosticism also presents a distinction between the highest, unknowable “alien God” and the demiurgic “creator” of the material. However, in contrast to Plato, several systems of Gnostic thought present the Demiurge as antagonistic to the will of the Supreme Being: his act of creation occurs in unconscious imitation of the divine model, and thus is fundamentally flawed, or else is formed with the malevolent intention of entrapping aspects of the divine in materiality. Thus, in such systems, the Demiurge acts as a solution to the problem of evil. In the Apocryphon of John circa 200AD (several versions of which are found in the Nag Hammadi library), the Demiurge has the name “Yaltabaoth,” and proclaims himself as God:

“Now the archon (ruler) who is weak has three names. The first name is Yaltabaoth, the second is Saklas (“fool”), and the third is Samael. And he is impious in his arrogance which is in him. For he said, ‘I am God and there is no other God beside me,’ for he is ignorant of his strength, the place from which he had come.”

Yaldabaoth

“Yaldabaoth” literally means “Child, come here” in a Semitic language. For example, the Hebrew word for “young girl” is “yalda,” and for “come” is “bo.” Thus, most probably “yaldabaoth” is a declension of “young girl” and “come,” together meaning “young girl, come hither” (the language’s identification as Hebrew itself is doubtful).

Gnostic myth recounts that Sophia (Greek, literally meaning “wisdom”), the Demiurge’s mother and a partial aspect of the divine Pleroma or “Fullness,” desired to create something apart from the divine totality, and without the receipt of divine assent. In this abortive act of separate creation, she gave birth to the monstrous Demiurge and, being ashamed of her deed, she wrapped him in a cloud and created a throne for him within it. The Demiurge, isolated, did not behold his mother, nor anyone else, and thus concluded that only he himself existed, being ignorant of the superior levels of reality that were his birth-place.

The Gnostic myths describing these events are full of intricate nuances portraying the declination of aspects of the divine into human form; this process occurs through the agency of the Demiurge who, having stolen a portion of power from his mother, sets about a work of creation in unconscious imitation of the superior Pleromatic realm. Thus Sophia’s power becomes enclosed within the material forms of humanity, themselves entrapped within the material universe: the goal of Gnostic movements was typically the awakening of this spark, which permitted a return by the subject to the superior, non-material realities which were its primal source. (See Sethian Gnosticism.)

Under the name of Nebro, Yaldabaoth is called an angel in the apocryphal Gospel of Judas. He is first mentioned in “The Cosmos, Chaos, and the Underworld” as one of the twelve angels to come “into being [to] rule over chaos and the [underworld].” He comes from heaven, his “face flashed with fire and whose appearance was defiled with blood.” Nebro’s name means rebel. Nebro creates six angels in addition to the angel Saklas to be his assistants. These six in turn create another twelve angels “with each one receiving a portion in the heavens.”

Samael

“Samael” literally means “Blind God” or “God of the Blind” in Aramaic (Syriac sæmʕa-ʔel). But the being is considered not only blind, or ignorant of its own origins, but may in addition be evil; its name is also found in Judaicas the Angel of Death and in Christian demonology. This leads to a further comparison with Satan.

Another alternative title for the Demiurge, “Saklas,” is Aramaic for “fool” (Syriac sækla “the foolish one”).

Yahweh

Some Gnostic philosophers (notably Marcion of Sinope and the Sethians) identify the Demiurge with Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament, in opposition and contrast to the God of the New Testament.

Still others equated the being with Satan. Catharism apparently inherited their idea of Satan as the creator of the evil world directly or indirectly from Gnosticism. Or, they may well have gotten the idea directly from the New Testament, which refers to Satan as “The God [‘ho theos’] of this age” in Second Corinthians 4:4.

Also, the New Testament asserts that the “whole world lies in the power of the evil one” in 1 John 5:19. Though nowhere in the New Testament is the creator of the world or the universe identified as Satan, although Yahweh declares in Isaiah 45:7 that He “makes light and creates darkness [Hebrew "choshekh"]. Nor in the old or New Testament is nature or earth created by the creator referred to as evil.

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15.03.2007. 09:38

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