How can you not think of this as being a religion of the perfect and imperfect, the cognoscenti and the non-cognoscenti, those who had obtained the special knowledge (gnosis) and those who hadn't.
Well wait a second here, which type of gnosticism are you even trying to accuse the Paulicians, etc. of? The reason I ask is because, while the typical charge is that they were Manichaeans, the things YOU are arguing for are typical of the Syro-Alexandrian family of gnosticism, not Mani's doctrine.
I'm unsure of where you are even getting this whole notion of cognoscenti vs. non-cognoscenti out of the terms "perfect" vs. "imperfect" to begin with. Your terms don't apply. They are terms dealing with "knowledge" while "perfect" and "imperfect" carry moral overtones to them. You're simply lumping "gnosticism" together as if it were just one big happy family, without knowing the subject matter.
In Manichaeanism, the distinction between "classes" of believers was moral, and it was based primarily upon whether one followed a close adherence to the extreme asceticism of Mani. If you did, you were "True", if you didn't but were just a "normal" believer, then you were a "soldier" or "hearer." This notion of "cognoscenti" vs. "non-cognoscenti" doesn't really apply to Manichaeanism. Nevertheless, the fact of moral distinction in later medieval groups STILL doesn't show relation to the Manichaeans. After all, in none of the information we have about the Bogomils, Paulicians, Albigenses, etc. do we see anything about "the imperfect" (to use your term) being called "soldiers" or "hearers", nor do we see any of the distinctive doctrines peculiar to Manichaeanism, nor do we see any particular evidence of the extreme asceticism that Mani advocated. In short, there is a gross absence of any actual evidence - aside from the testimony of their enemies - that these groups had any actual Manichaean traits.
To the extent that there was any actual division of believers, it most likely was moral - the same sort of "carnal" vs. "spiritual" Christians that was made by none other than the Apostle Paul, if you will remember.
Your point about One can credibly make the same type of argument about Catholicism - the division between laity and clergy and the granting of different levels of "spirituality" to the one over the other sounds a lot like just this type of division. is incorrect as there is no such division of knowledge or spirituality or holiness between the laity and the clergy. In contrast, the gnostics had a very distinct, knowledge based idea of salvation, akin to the Freemasons.
Well, yes there is, that's why the priesthood in Catholicism is given exclusive right to conduct the sacraments from a spiritual and moral standpoint, as opposed to the mere positional distinction that appears in Baptist and Evangelical groups.
And yes, the gnostics DID have a "knowledge-based" idea of salvation - which is completely absent from the Paulician and Cathari source documents we have available.
Do Baptists believe in something like that? From what I've heard from Baptists, they don't. Seeking to make Baptists inheritors to Manichaenism is quite wrong for that reason
Since, as has been conclusively shown, the Paulicians, Bogomils, Catharis, Albigenses, and other medieval groups were in no way, shape, or form Manichaean, this is a moot point.
Back to your statement that However, since we know that the Cathari and other medieval groups considered adult baptism as a way of entering into the group, and since baptism was done to those considered "perfect" in this perfect/imperfect dichotomy, it would logically seem that the dichotomy divides "believers" from "nonbelievers", not two separate classes of believers, as Christian wrongly states. remember that the majority did not become baptised unless they had obtained the "knowledge" -- quite different from what Baptists now do -- the baptised don't have some secret "knowledge" separate from the unbaptised, rather the baptised Baptised are consciously accepting Christ as their savior. This is a completely different idea from what the Cathars had.
Exactly. Baptists baptise someone who has consciously taken Christ as their Saviour. But guess what? The Paulician Key of Truth, which is a primary source document and which basically contains their entire baptismal formula, says exactly the same thing. You were baptised after trusting in Christ - there's nothing in it about any esoteric "knowledge." The same can be said for the Cathari document known as the Lyon Manuscript. Nothing about "knowledge", everything about trusting in Christ.
I'm not sure of where you're getting your information that these groups baptised on the basis of "knowledge", but it's incorrect. These groups THEMSELVES said otherwise - so who cares what their enemies had to say?