The Politics of Syncretism and the Problem of Defining Gnosticism
The study of Gnosticism in the twentieth century has been plagued perennially by crises of definition. I want to argue here that one major reason concerns the role that the category of Gnosticism has played and continues to play in the identity politics of Christianity, including the ways in which ancient discourse about "heresy" is threaded through twentieth century attempts to define Gnosticism. My comments will be organized around the term "syncretism." The study of syncretism involves at least three foci for analysis: 1) evaluative discourses about syncretism; 2) the processes of syncretic appropriation and amalgamation, including the scholarly conceptualization of how such processes take place; and 3) the ends toward which syncretic practices are put, their uses, functions, deployments, strategies and modes of negotiation.