Hylic (from Greek (''hylē'') "matter") is the opposite of psychic (from Greek (''psychē'') "soul"). In the

gnostic Gnosticism (from grc, γνωστικός, gnōstikós, , 'having knowledge') is a collection of religious ideas and systems which coalesced in the late 1st century AD among Jewish and early Christian sects. These various groups emphasized pe ...

belief system, hylics, also called somatics (from Greek (''sōma'') "body"), were the lowest order of the three types of

human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, cultu ...

. The other two were the psychics and the pneumatics (from Gk (''pneuma'') "spirit, breath"). So humanity comprised matter-bound beings, matter-dwelling souls and the matter-free or immaterial spirits. Somatics were deemed completely bound to matter. Matter, the material world, was considered evil by the gnostics. The material world was created by a

demiurge In the Platonic, Neopythagorean, Middle Platonic, and Neoplatonic schools of philosophy, the demiurge () is an artisan-like figure responsible for fashioning and maintaining the physical universe. The Gnostics adopted the term ''demiurge'' ...

, in some instances a blind, mad God, in others an army of rebellious

angel In various theistic religious traditions an angel is a supernatural spiritual being who serves God. Abrahamic religions often depict angels as benevolent celestial intermediaries between God (or Heaven) and humanity. Other roles inclu ...

s as a trap for the spiritual Ennoia. The duty of (spiritual) man was to escape the material world by the aid of the hidden knowledge (gnosis). Somatics were human in form, but since their entire focus was on the material world, such as eating, sleeping, mating or creature comforts, they were seen as doomed. The pneumatic saw himself as escaping the doom of the material world via the secret knowledge. Somatics were thought to be incapable of understanding. For consideration of these dynamics, see for example the

Gospel of Judas The Gospel of Judas is a non-canonical Gnostic gospel. The content consists of conversations between Jesus and Judas Iscariot. Given that it includes late 2nd-century theology, it is widely thought to have been composed in the 2nd century (prio ...

, believed to be a gnostic text, where Jesus is posited as a pneumatic and the other disciples, non-gnostics, as somatics .

References

Gnosticism {{gnosticism-stub

See also

References