"In the ' the ascent is described as a series of progressive subtractions which leaves the "naked" true self, an instance of Primal Man as he was before his cosmic fall, free to enter the divine realm and to become one again with God. ...[W]hat begins the ascent is already the pure disengaged from its earthly encumbrances... the rulers of the spheres are hostile powers trying to bar its passage... Wherever we hear of the doffing of garments, the slipping of knots, the loosing of bonds in the course of the upward journey, we have analogies to the Poimandres passage. The sum of the knots, etc., is called "psyche": thus it is the soul that is put off by the pneuma... In this way the ascent is... putting off the worldly nature. ...[T]he mysteries of the Mithras had for their initiates the ceremonial passing through seven gates arranged on ascending steps representing the seven planets... in those of we find successive putting on and off of seven (or twelve) garments or animal disguises. The result... was called rebirth (palingenesia): the initiate himself was supposed to have been reborn as the god. The terminology of "rebirth," "reformation" (metamorphosis), "transfiguration" was coined in the context of these rituals as part of the language of the mystery cults. The meanings and applications... were wide enough to make them fit into various theological systems... But... they were eminently suited to gnostic purposes."