Two great heresies plagued the early church as it was trying to go forth with the gospel as Jesus had commanded. The two heresies I speak of were the teaching of the Judaizers, live according to Jewish customs, and then there were the Gnostics. Gnosticism teaches that the realization of Gnosis (esoteric or intuitive knowledge) is the way to salvation of the soul from the material world.
Satan has introduced and reintroduced these two teachings in one form or another throughout history, yet man keeps falling for them because they appeal to the flesh. He is slick in his approach in that he continuously repackages them with different leaders, different names and different catch phrases. However, they are both some form of proving one’s self worthy of salvation by some means other than Jesus’ free gift that He paid for on the cross.
Dennis Tolar
Word of Promise Ministries' Blog 