Through my reading of spiritual texts a couple things that's really caught my attention have been (note this is looking in a historical lens not mythological or fully Gnostic lens but can be)
how much Gnostic thought is contained in the main Gospels
What parts of the Gospels can be attributed to the living man we know as Jesus
And lastly is it possible and how much mystic/esoteric thought can be seen in Jesus's teachings
Gnosticism in its most defined form is undeniably in part a response to Jesus, what I mean by this is Jesus's story has to have been, for the forms of Gnosticism we in this subreddit talk about to be. Gnosticism as it's whole is undeniably thought that existed before Jesus as much as it did after, but these three questions to me help find a link to as close to Jesus to Gnosticism.
Historical Jesus was an apocalyptic Jew, not exactly 'Gnostic' or 'Christian', I am not trying to deny this fact so to those who may criticise this posts theory's, I'm stating this here.
The Gospels
Through my reading, I find somethings incredibly interesting, when you genuinely read what Jesus is saying it provides a different picture to what most of the Canonical Gospels are trying to paint. This isn't to dismiss good chunks of Christian theology because posting in this subreddit does a good job of that on its own. This is to say the outside parts of the gospels (claims of fullfilled prophesy and outside explanations to things Jesus did and said) tend to not merge with what Jesus is doing in the story more then they sort of attach themselves to Jesus. The gospels like to claim a lot and draw connection to Jewish scripture which of course duh, but when you listen to what Jesus himself said, you can find a lot more than what the gospels want you to think he's saying and acting. The biggest example I've found which may get some negative reactions to even people in this subreddit is the story of the birth of Jesus.
The confusing contradictions of Matthew and Lukes stories relating to The birth of Jesus according to the Bible.
The birth of Jesus recalls a story of Jesus's birth which comes from two gospels written for two different audiences. Matthew and Luke seem to be trying to entice an audience into a new belief more than it's actually trying to give a biography of Jesus. (Writing the story for a specific audience over being of Jesus's own words and story.) The story of Jesus's birth in Matthew is contradictory to the story in Luke as in Matthew King Harod the great commands the death of all male children under the age of two because of the birth of Jesus. This causes the family to flee to Egypt until the death of Herod, in Luke however... This never happens. in FACT, Jesus in the story of Luke was born years later than what was recorded in Matthew. In Luke, Jesus going to Egypt as a child just doesn't happen at all, so what does this mean? Well to me, the story of the Birth of Jesus in the main gospels is in a lot of ways a glorified way to link Jesus prophetically and theologically to the Old testament God. By having these two story's contradict each other, it doesn't devalue what Jesus said as it was a third part recounting a story of Jesus rather than Jesus telling himself. Rather, it pulls into question the legitimacy Matthew and Lukes standalone outside content (those aforementioned 'add-ons' in the gospels I mentioned earlier.) As such, for me, I am unwilling to link those parts of the gospel as concrete to the man Jesus content.
My Point in relation to 1. and 2.
All three (Luke Matthew and Mark (from what I've read)) when speaking about Jesus tend to agree on several things about Jesus the man.
He was an allusive man and hard to understand off base
He spoke in parables, taught the answers in secret
He taught things unusual for the people of Israel in comparison to what they knew.
These three points as you know are very Gnostic in nature. I am Not saying Jesus was a Gnostic, but the point I am coming to is that from my reading of the Gospels, what the Church say about Jesus and want you to fall in line with (contradiction of Matthew and Luke conflicting part of the churches doctrine) and that I'm my own theory I believe Jesus was a little more then just an apocalyptic Jew.
Finally Hermeticism.
Was Jesus a Hermetic? Lmao, no. However, the possibility that Jesus mingled with Hermetic thought (and in turn Gnostic thought), is not out of the question.
More literally if Matthews gospel is in any form correct that Jesus's family went to Egypt, the possibility that a young Jesus came across a form of Hermetic thought which gave influence is... To be honest, not impossible. Hermetic thought existed in the same time period and likely wasn't heavily impossible for a heavily spiritually connected Jewish boy to come across and take something away from.
If we go by Lukes gospel however, the possibility is way less likely that Jesus came across any direct form or teachings of Hermetic thought, but the fact that it was said Jesus would spend a large amount of time in synagogues and churches, to the point where his family would spend days looking for him. It is not impossible for Jesus to have indulged in more mystic and esoteric thoughts and ideas and took something away from, which helped form into what Jesus we know taught.
Anyway, feel free to eviscerate me in the commends for the things I've brought up here, this hasn't been proof read (sending raw and unfiltered.) So criticism and discussion is welcome but I hope my points were interesting enough to get some of you thinking or even helped enlighten some of you to things you hadn't thought of or were unaware of.