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 In spite of all this, during the first two centuries, a certain number of Christian communities followed the ancient principles inherent in hierarchically graded initiation. This was called ‘Gnosis’. For them, the union with Christ was a mystical phenomenon, superior to all others; it was a reality both for the individual as well as collectively. Nevertheless, when dogma affirmed itself, that is, when the ‘dogma of faith in the established Church gained ultimate control’, the principle of initiation was suppressed and blind faith replaced ‘true knowledge’. |
 Although some of the great thinkers of the Church developed a remarkable metaphysical approach, in joining the systems of Aristotle and Plato with Christianity, it was missing the basis of the modern spirit: the science of nature and the idea of psychic evolution.
Nonetheless, the wise initiates saw to it that the essence of the Mysteries was carefully safeguarded and daily the Gnosis expanded the circle of great thinkers and wise men more and more. The Middle Ages was a time of splendor and brotherhood, and the Universal Brotherhood was spreading its Temple of the Spirit far and wide. From the Cathars in Occitania, the Manicheans in Asia and Bulgaria, Rosicrucians in northern Europe and the Templars of the Middle East in Europe spread a pure Christianity – a true apostolic Christianity.
However the French Crown joined with the Pope to destroy the Temple of the Spirit; the crusade against the Cathars was called the ‘Albigensian Crusade’; there was an endless persecution of the Cathars during one hundred and twenty years; and there was the complete destruction of the Templars along with the destruction of their archives and ritual material; there were the ‘Sicilian Vespers of the absolute monarchy against Christian esotericism’.
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