Disgusted by the Rulers’ antics, Sophia sent a slithering spirit to help the hapless humans: a divine messenger known as the “Instructor” or the “female spiritual principle.”
This slithering spirit (also known as “the serpent” in the Old Testament) descended to the earth and took residence in the Garden of Eden – not on the ground or in a tree, but right inside Adam and Eve themselves, wriggling and twisting just below their stomachs:
“Some of them say that the serpent was Sophia herself; for this reason it was opposed to the maker of Adam and gave knowledge to men, and therefore is called the wisest of all [Gen. 3:1]. And the position of our intestines through which food is taken in, and their shape, shows that the hidden Mother of the shape of the serpent is a substance within us.”1
NOTES
In yogic thought, this inner serpent is called the kundalini – a sleeping goddess who lies coiled up and concealed at the base of the human spine.
Through meditation and breathing exercises, the kundalini serpent is aroused and made to climb through the body’s energy channels until she finally reaches the dome of the skull.
There she opens the third eye, connecting the practitioner to the hidden world of the gods and bestowing spiritual liberation.
“A Tantric yogi sees the great Mother present within his human body as the Kundalini. She lies hidden by her self-created ignorance, like a snake, coiled and fast asleep…at the bottom of the spinal cord. Through [meditation], the Tantric awakens the Mother and rouses her to go upward… the Tantric experiences such supreme bliss that his mind cannot contain the small ego-consciousness and [he] becomes illumined…”2
