Gnosis

Gnosis (Greek for 'knowledge') means, in the esoteric traditions, no ordinary discursive learning but a direct, transformative, experiential knowing — of God, and of the soul's own divine source and destiny. It is not information about the divine but participation in it, an awakening that of itself redeems.

In Gnosticism and the Hermetica this saving knowledge is the very means of salvation: the soul, recognizing its true origin, is freed from forgetfulness and ascends to God. It is the Delphic 'know thyself' raised to a redemptive mystery — close in spirit to the Platonic recollection and the union sought by the mystics, and sharply distinct from mere discursive knowledge.