High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 2727: Chapter 948: Gnostic Sect

On Monday night, Zheng Qing had another ’beautiful-terrible dream’ similar to the previous day’s.

Upon waking the next morning, he sat on his bed for a while, holding his head and seriously pondering whether he had taken too many blood-replenishing medicine pills recently, causing the material to affect his consciousness.

Originally, he wasn’t so superficial.

But to be honest, superficiality was indeed quite alluring, and no wonder everyone liked it.

The first class on Tuesday morning was Divination.

For this class, Professor Yi, for a change, didn’t have everyone sit in the classroom listening to dull lectures, but instead took everyone to the Astronomical Tower, setting up a series of oddly shaped brass telescopes.

Compared to ordinary telescopes, these appeared as if they were wearing thick tortoiseshell glasses.

”—these are filters that can assist you in observing stars during the daytime.”

The Divination professor removed a ’tortoiseshell glasses’, pointing to the semi-transparent brown lens, and simply explained, ”This is an astrological instrument refined with the eyeballs of a Fire Dragon by the Great Sorcerer Arennius from Smyrna, the capital of Asia Minor—here’s a test point, the reason Master Arennius invented these lenses was to refute the Gnostic Sect’s theory of being ’adept at distinguishing and perceiving’... Does anyone know about this sect?”

Upon hearing the word ’Gnostic’, Zheng Qing’s ears perked up. A few days ago, in that illegal laboratory, Thomas had also mentioned this name.

Perhaps because this term was somewhat obscure, no one among those present raised their hand.

Even Xiao Xiao—when the classroom atmosphere fell silent for three seconds, everyone turned to look at the ’doctor’, only to see him looking hesitant, with no intention of raising his hand.

”Does no one know?”

Professor Yi was surprised, widening his eyes, looking at Xiao Xiao, then at Zheng Qing, and asked again, ”The Gnostic Sect, don’t you even know about this?”

Still, no one raised a hand.

The professor shook his head, resting on the brass telescope beside him, and looked around with a touch of lamentation: ”No wonder Professor Qian complained to me a few days ago—today’s students aren’t like those from the past—the caliber of students and the ways of the world and people’s hearts seem to be the only two things declining in this era of progress.”

Zheng Qing didn’t know which subject the Professor Qian mentioned by Professor Yi taught.

But he knew he had the ability to slightly redeem the reputation of ’today’s students.’

So, after hesitating for a few seconds, he finally raised his hand hesitantly. A breath of relief came from the crowd. Professor Yi was also pleased to call the boy’s name.

”Student Zheng Qing?”

”I don’t know much either.”

Feeling the encouraging glances from around, the boy spoke rather awkwardly: ”As far as I know, the term ’Gnostic’ in Greek means ’knowledge’, and those in the Gnostic Sect are spiritual knowers who believe in mystical religious teachings. They refer to the knowledge or awareness gained through personal experience as ’gnosis’ or ’true knowledge’, believing that ’gnosis’ can help them escape from ignorance and the present world... This is an attempt to reconcile the dualistic worldview of material and spirit.”

Because when Nikita and Thomas talked about this term that Saturday night, Zheng Qing had just been cut, painfully awake, so his impression of the term was particularly vivid.

After returning from the school hospital, he immediately looked up the ”Wizard World Encyclopedia” and found the relevant interpretation of this entry.

Thinking about the encyclopedia entry, Zheng Qing couldn’t help but glance again at Xiao Xiao—regarding the contents of ”The Gospel of Judas”, he had still listened to Xiao Xiao talking about it, so he didn’t think Doctor Xiao didn’t know this sect.

Pausing for a moment, he withdrew his gaze, and the churning thoughts in his mind over the past few days unintentionally poured out, unable to stop: ”Atlas Academy doesn’t have beliefs about the Gnostic Sect, but there are discussions about this sect. Because many Gnostic believers use ’The Gospel of Judas’ as a theoretical basis, the records show that debates regarding this gospel at Atlas Academy appear once every few decades. Many consider it heresy. Correspondingly, no one doubts the appeal of this heresy. Because its logical foundation of origin is very solid—God is omniscient, omnipotent—the Gnostics’ ’adept at knowing, able to distinguish’ is very important for discussions about divinity, the most significant or for others, the worst topic, is about the discussion of evil.

Why does God allow evil to exist?

In the eyes of many Gnostic believers, evil is a necessary condition for the existence of good—dialectically, this view isn’t wrong, but their subsequent inference goes off track—they believe that if evil is necessary, then it is also ’good.’ Because all evil deeds highlight the preciousness and necessity of goodness, those who do evil play a necessary role in the divine plan, so committing evil is doing good.

In the words of some Gnostic believers, unless you encounter darkness, you can never truly understand light...”

Professor Yi finally couldn’t stand it anymore, raised his hand, interrupting Zheng Qing’s interminable digression.

”That’s enough, that’s enough.”

He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and smiled awkwardly: ”...If I didn’t know, I would have thought I was attending a theological debate class at Atlas.”

A light laughter echoed at the observatory in response.

Zheng Qing felt slightly embarrassed, lowered his head, and wiped his brass telescope with his sleeve.

”Uh, first, I need to emphasize one point, the view of good and evil of the Gnostic Sect isn’t as simple as what Student Zheng Qing just talked about.”

To avoid Zheng Qing’s long speech from just now causing conflict between academies or misunderstanding among students, the Divination professor had to field-patch: ”For Gnostic believers, those unable to distinguish good from evil are truly free individuals, and simultaneously they are ignorant individuals, so they must accept the pain brought by ignorance such as poverty, evil, and injustice... And the way to escape from these pains is ’gnosis’... In short, Student Zheng Qing spoke well and extensively, but the content afterward—accurately speaking, the part after his first sentence—has little relation to our class today.

As Student Zheng Qing said in his first sentence, the term ’Gnostic’ in Greek means ’knowledge’—here the ’knowledge’ in the lexical meaning actually specifically refers to astrology. This implies that astrology holds a unique position within this sect, and Gnostic wizards happen to be highly skilled in astrology. In order to fundamentally overthrow the Gnostic theory, Master Arennius particularly studied astrology and invented these lenses that allow observation of stars during the daytime... That’s enough digression, today, your task is to observe the characteristics of daytime constellations and compare them with previous nighttime observations, and hand in a report over a hundred and twenty lines before class ends... Remember what’s most important in reading star charts?”

”Following the constellations, counter the star chart!”

A clear and uniform answer came from all around.