[2][4][6] Like other Sethian Gnostic texts Marsanes, Allogenes, and Three Steles of Seth, its ideas appear more Middle Platonic or Neoplatonic than Christian.
[7] Bentley Layton explains this apparent contradiction with the belief that Zostrianos was written by a Gnostic Christian author who was fascinated with Eastern religious heroes who had special knowledge relating to the divine, such as Zoroaster.
He experiences an initial vision of the perfect child and ponders the relationship between the ideal and phenomenal worlds, but despite diligent attempts to find answers, he is unable to do so.
In his despair, he seeks a violent death in the desert but is visited by the angel of the knowledge of eternal light, who tells him that he is a chosen person and that he can be saved.
Zostrianos departs from his earthly body with a luminous cloud, which guides him through the atmospheric realm and past the aeonic copies to the self-generated aeons.
Authrounios explains the origin of the physical cosmos, stating that the atmospheric realm was created by a rational principle to manifest generated and perishable things for the sake of the advent of great judges, lest they be enclosed in the creation.
Zostrianos responds, and the section concludes with the restoration of Sophia and the explanation of the Aeonic Copies and the illumination of souls.
The triple male child is a form of the divine Autogenes and is a power of Barbelo, and the sub-aeons are those of the knowledge of the truth.
The fourth type is the one that repents, renounces dead things, and desires immortal mind and soul, and they can receive another conception and every attainment.
Zostrianos offers up praise to God and asks Ephesech for wisdom about the dispersion of the saved type of person and who is mixed with and divided from them.
Additionally, the text describes the Self-generated Aeons as eternal lights that possess a variety of beauty, trees, plants, human beings alive with every species, immortal souls, every shape and species of intellect, gods of truth, angels dwelling in great glory with an indissoluble body, and ingenerate offspring with unchanging perception.
Zostrianos sees all the Self-generated Aeons and describes being immersed five times by several powers, including Yesseus Mazareus Yessedekeus.
Zostrianos approaches the Aeon of Protophanes, and the text mentions the appearance of Youel, who explains the crowns and seals that empower every spirit and soul.
Zostrianos is baptized in living water by Youel and receives power, form, light, and a holy spirit.
Youel tells Zostrianos that he has received all the baptisms that are fitting, and he should call upon Salamex, Semen, and the all-perfect Armê, the luminaries of the Barbelo Aeon, to reveal to him those of the invisible great perfect male Protophanes and the ingenerate Kalyptos, and teach him about the virginal Barbelo aeon and the Invisible Triple Powered Spirit.
He receives a revelation from Salamex and Semen about the One, a unity that existed prior to all things and is more powerful than any genus or species.
She is the offspring that supplements the Triple-Powered Spirit, and has a pre-potency, even the primal ingenerateness succeeding that one, because with respect to all the rest she is a first aeon.
)[8] The text describes different aspects of existence in the Kalyptos Aeon, including angels, daimons, souls, living creatures, trees, bodies, and the elements of air, water, earth, and number, among others.
Apophantes and Aphropais lead him to Protophanes, where he unites with the Kalyptos aeon, the virginal Barbelo, and the Invisible Spirit, becoming all-perfect and empowered.
He comes back down to the perceptible world and preaches the truth, empowering and nullifying a multitude of disgraces that brought him near death.
[10] The Self-Generated (Autogenes) Aeons contain most of the divine beings that are typically associated with the Sethian baptismal rite:[10] The Self-Generated Aeons also contain the Four Luminaries: The Four Luminaries established by Autogenes, from highest to lowest, are: Sophia does not give birth to the archon of creation, but shows a model of the material world, of which he sees only a dim reflection of while looking downwards.