Thanks, Nick, for sharing your understanding. I'm pondering the idea these days that we may need to rethink this approach to Gnosticism. Gnosis itself, regardless as to who has it, reveals varying levels and dimensions, aspects of and perspectives within the many worlds. We can learn more about why we are here, how we got here, where it is that we are headed ... and in terms of mythology & symbolism, we can even speak a bit about the various hierarchies of Lives (Greater and lesser) Whom and which - in their & our totality - occupy Cosmos.
The Gnosis that is experienced is meant to assist us as we work our way Heavenward, yet as so well characterized in the various branches of Buddhism, there are a multitude of Nirmanakayas, or helpers ... from the humblest co-disciple and human or Deva server up to Buddha status and beyond, all learning to cooperate as part of something (and Someone, if we like) that is truly, Infinitely Greater.
Our Journey is a shared one, as we come to
Know in ways which may not immediately be apparent to the five senses (or even to the everyday insights of intellect), and part of our Dharma -- our Sacred Responsibility to all life and to all beings in Cosmos -- is to assist others (both
above and
below on Jacob's Laddeer, the Great Chain of Being) as we travel the Path of learning and enlightenment.
The Demiurgos, literally meaning
artisan, or "one with special skill" according to Webster, was described by Plato as a "subordinate deity who fashions the sensible world in the light of eternal ideas" (
Webster). This does not sound like an evil being, or the work of one either appointed to do evil or choosing to do evil. This is a wonderful Angel (or Deva) Hierarchy, serving the direct WILL of God, and faithfully so by bringing LIGHT to the very worlds which have all been created. So when we speak of an evil demiurge, or when we suggest that the material worlds have been created
for or by "evil," we are making no different a mistake than has evolved within conventional, mainstream western religion whereby God's world is taught as
unredeemed ... or unreemable! 
This is where I think we have misinterpreted the
real discoveries of the Gnostics, just as contemporary western religion misinterpets the nature of God, or Godhead. What we had foisted upon us in the latter case is the false image of an angry, wrathful tribal deity of pettiness and jealously, instead of a Loving, Compassionate caretaker -- a Gardener, Whose beautiful garden contains billions upon billions of living, growing
Flowers, all unfolding towards a perfection that
can be known, and
can be attained.
The same distortions and misunderstanding of
Gnosis seem to have left us with confusion regarding the worlds of form (where materiality prevails over Spirit, instead of
vice versa). Esoterically, the Redemption process that I have come to understand involves
manifesting the Kingdom of Heaven upon Earth, which is what Christ, other Christs, the Buddha, other Buddhas, and so many great Sages have taught us from time immemorial. This cannot be done without performing our Sacred DUTY here, the Dharma of Eastern Traditions, and that which the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas (Christs) have embodied for us
precisely.
There is Christ, crucified upon the Cross of matter Cosmically speaking, or the same exact process mirrored into our own psyche as the individual Soul or Higher Self of an Esoteric Christianity (perhaps even spoken of loosely as
"Christ consciousness")
... yet the worlds of material being have been
created, just as have the "Higher" worlds, by
Devas -- these being Servers, just as ourselves, of Light Itself ... the 3rd Person or Aspect of God. Even the
least of the deva-lives that serves to create the material worlds is deserving of respect ... of the same
Namaskar (a salute to the Divinity within) which we should properly give whenever we meet another human being.
The Redeemer, in my understanding, is actually the First Person, working through the Second, yet we are more occupied on the whole with learning to work thorugh the 2nd as we
literally occupy the
3rd Aspect as our vehicle(s) -- being on a large scale the world and Great Life
"in Whom we live and move and have our being." Deity, just as ourselves, consists of Spirit, expressing through an evolving (and conditionally Immortal) SOUL, using a threefold or fourfold
personality instrument (lower mind, emotions, vital soul & dense body). The difference is scale, or
quantitative, rather than qualitative. Even Christ, as we are taught Biblically, is presented as
"the Eldest in a vast family of brothers" (Romans 8:29)... and not some kind of carrot on a stick whom or which will always
beckon us, while never quite being approachable.
Perhaps the Gayatri of Hinduism is a good summary of what you're saying, Nick, about our emergence
from the Godhead (or
Brahman), our Journey through the worlds of form, and our gradual approach or
ascent of the `stairway to Heaven' that we find ourselves upon:
O Thou Who givest sustenance to the universe,
From Whom all things proceed,
To Whom all things return,
Unveil to us the face of the true Spiritual Sun
Hidden by a disc of golden Light
That we may know the truth
And do our whole duty
As we journey to Thy sacred feet.
Namaskara,
andrew
