The Gnostics of the second and third centuries taught that the soul is a spark of the divine trapped in a material world made by an ignorant creator, and is saved by gnōsis, knowledge of its origin. The Nag Hammadi library, found in Egypt in 1945, preserved many of their texts. The church fathers opposed them.
Gnosticism
A family of early Christian and related movements teaching salvation through secret knowledge of the soul’s divine origin.
Also: gnosis