here, reason and chaos, the intelligent and the material world, stand opposed; and between them is the human soul, belonging to both spheres, yet striving toward the higher and the spiritual. the soul is unable to ascend by its own power; therefore, a heavenly being, concordant with the will of the supreme principle, descends into the human world and redeems the soul by showing it the way through the spheres which sunder it from the world divine. it is not mere thirst for knowledge that impels the gnostics, but essentially a concern of salvation; because the gnostic's salvation depends on the possession of the "gnosis" respecting these things.