Page 65 - Gnosis volume 2

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cal progress in the context of the prophecies that appear in the Scriptures:

So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the
7
doors .
Or again:

For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying

and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark; and knew not until
8
the flood came, and took them all away .
Likewise:

Also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they

planted, they builded; but the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and
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brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all .
The warning is clear. However, the source of the danger is to be found in man himself
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rather than in the circumstances, as we are told by St. Peter in a text , which offers an

alternative, for, on the one hand, it is said:
But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store,

reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly man... But the

day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in which the heavens shall melt with
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fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up .

7
Matthew, XXIV, 33; Mark, XIII, 29. It is the translation of the Slavonic text which also
corresponds with the Greek text and that appearing in the Vulgate: Ita et vos cum videritis haec
omnia, scitote qui prope est in ianuis. Contemporary texts, especially that of Louis Second,
translate the phrase "it is near" loosely, replacing the pronoun 'it' by the expression "Son of
man". The Slavonic, Greek and Latin texts do not support this change. Cf. also: II Peter, III, 10
already quoted [missing sentence, taken from Amis, Gnosis II, p. 3, note 9].
8 Matthew, XXIV, 38-39; Luke, XVII, 27.
9
Luke, XVII, 28-29.
10
Already discussed in the first volume: Ref. T.1, pp. 216, 258 in French original version; pp.
231-232; 282-283 in English manuscript.
11
II Peter, III, 7 & 10; also 11 & 12.