Chapter V: Book VI: Simon Magus, Valentinus, and Their Followers (4)

19. About Being[25] then enough has been said. But Being is called not only genus, species and individual; but also matter, form and privation. But there is no difference among these while the division stands. And Being being such as it is, the ordering of the cosmos came about automatically in the same way. The cosmos is according to Aristotle divided into many [and different] parts; [and] the part of the cosmos which exists from the earth as far as the moon is without providence or governance and has its rise only in its own nature. But that which is beyond the moon, is ordered with all order and providence and is (so) governed up to the surface of heaven. But the (same) surface is a certain fifth essence renewed from all the elements of nature wherefrom the cosmos is made up, and this is Aristotle’s “Quintessence,” being as it were a hypercosmic essence. And his system of philosophy is [Sidenote: p. 342.] divided so as to agree with the division of the cosmos. For there is by him a treatise on physics called _Acroasis_, wherein he has treated of the doings of Nature, not of Providence, from the Earth to the Moon. And there is also his _Metaphysics_, another special work thus entitled, concerning the things which take place beyond the Moon. And there is also his work _On the Quintessence_, wherein he theologizes.[26] Like this also is the division of the universals as they are defined by type in Aristotle’s philosophy. But his work _On the Soul_ is puzzling; for it would be impossible in three whole books to say what Aristotle thinks about the soul. For what he gives as the definition of the soul is easy to say; but what is explained by the definition is hard to find. For, he says, the soul is an entelechy of the physical organism. What this is would need many words and great enquiry. But the God who is the cause of all these fair beings [Sidenote: p. 343.] is one, even to one speculating for a very long time, more difficult to be known than is the soul. Yet the definition which Aristotle gives of God, is not hard to be known, but impossible to be understood. For He, he says, is a conception of conception which is altogether non-existent. But the cosmos is according to Aristotle imperishable and eternal; for it contains nothing faulty and is governed by Nature and Providence. And Aristotle has not only put forth books on Nature and the Cosmos and Providence and God,[27] but there is also a certain treatise by him on ethics which is called _The Ethical Books_ wherein he builds up a good ethics for his hearers out of a poor one. If, then, Basilides be found not only potentially but in the very words and names to have transferred the doctrines of Aristotle to our evangelical and soul-saving teaching, what remains but by restoring these extraneous matters to their (proper) authors to prove to Basilides’ disciples that, as they are heathenish, Christ will profit them nothing?

[Sidenote: p. 344.] 20. Now Basilides and Isidore, Basilides’ true son and disciple, say that Matthias recounted to them secret[28] discourses which he had heard from the Saviour in private teaching.[29] We see then how plainly Basilides together with Isidore and their whole band belie not only Matthias but also the Saviour. There was, he says, [a time] when Nothing was, not even the nothing of existing things, but baldly and unreservedly and without any sophism, nothing at all. But when I say, says he, that [this] _was_, I do not say that this existed, but I speak thus to signify what I wish to indicate. I say then that nothing at all existed. For, says he, that which is named is plainly not ineffable; for at any rate we call one thing ineffable, but another not ineffable. For truly that which is not even ineffable is not named ineffable, but is, he says, above every name which is named. For neither are there names enough for the cosmos, he says, so diverse is it, but there is a lack of them. Nor do [Sidenote: p. 345.] I undertake, says he, to find proper names for everything; but one must silently understand in the mind not their names, but the properties of the things named. For identity of names has made confusion and error concerning things[30] among those who hear them. And they who first made this appropriation and theft from the Peripatetic lead astray the folly of those who herd with them. For Aristotle who was born many generations earlier than Basilides, was the first to set forth in the _Categories_ a system of homonyms which these men expound as their own and as a novelty [derived] from the secret discourses of Matthias.

21. When nothing [existed], neither matter, nor essence, nor the simple nor the compound, nor [that which is conceived by the mind] nor that which cannot be [so] conceived, [nor that which is perceived by the senses][31] nor that which cannot be [so] perceived, nor man, nor angel, nor God, nor generally any of the things which are named or apprehended by sensation, or of things[32] which can be [Sidenote: p. 346.] conceived by the mind but can be thus and even more minutely described by all:--(then) [the] God-who-was-Not--whom Aristotle calls Concept of Concept, but (Basilides) Him-who-is-Not, without conception, perception, counsel, choice, passion or desire willed to create a cosmos. But I say (only) for the sake of clearness, says he, that He willed. I signify that he did this without will or conception or perception; and [the] cosmos was not that which later became established in its expanse and diversity,[33] but a Seed of a cosmos. And the Seed of the cosmos contained all things within itself, as the grain of mustard (seed) collects into the smallest space and contains within itself all things at once:--the roots, stem, branches and the numberless leaves, with the seeds begotten by the plant, and often again those grown by many other plants. Thus the God-who-was-Not made the cosmos from things which were not,[34] casting [Sidenote: p. 347.] down and planting[35] a certain single seed containing within itself the whole seed-mass[36] of the cosmos. But in order that I may make clearer what these (men) say, it was even as an egg of some gorgeous and parti-coloured bird such as a peacock of some other yet more variegated and many-coloured, contains within it, though one, many patterns[37] of multiform and many-coloured and diversely-constructed beings[38]--so, says he, the non-existent seed of the cosmos cast down by the God-who-was-Not contained (a Seed-mass) at once multiform and (the source) of many beings.[39]

22. All things, then, which are to be described, and those which not having yet been discovered must be left out of the account, were destined to be fitted for the cosmos which was to come into being at the proper time by the help given to it by such and so great a God, whose quality[40] the creature can neither conceive nor define. And these things existed stored within the seed, as, in a new-born [Sidenote: p. 348.] child, we see teeth and the power of fatherhood and brains accrue later; and those things which belong to the man but do not at first exist, evolve gradually out of the child. For it would be impossible to say that any projection by the God-who-was-Not became something non-existent,--since Basilides entirely shuns and has in horror [the notion of] substances of things begotten [arising] by way of projection.[41] For what, says he, is the need of projection or of any substructure of matter in order that God may fashion a cosmos as the spider makes webs, or mortal man takes brass or wood or some other portion of matter to work with?).--But He spoke, says he, and it came to pass; and this is, as these [heretics] say, what Moses spake:--“Let there be light and there was light.”[42] Whence, says he, came the light? From nothing. For it is not written says he, whence it came, but only that it came forth from the word of the speaker. For the speaker, says he, was not, nor did that which was spoken [formerly] exist. The seed of the cosmos, he says, came into being from non-existent things [and this seed is] the word which was spoken: “Let there be light.” And this, says he, is the saying in the Gospels: “This is [Sidenote: p. 349.] the true light which lighteneth every man who cometh into the world.”[43] It takes its beginnings[44] from that seed and gives light. This is the seed which contains within itself all the Seed-Mass which Aristotle says is the genus divided into boundless species, since we divide from the non-existent animal ox, horse [and] man. Further, of the underlying cosmic seed, they say, “whatever I may say came into being after this, seek not to know whence it came.” For it contained all seeds stored and shut up within itself, as it were things which were not, but which were foreordained to exist by the God-who-was-Not.

Let us see then what they say came into being in the first, second or third place from the cosmic seed. There existed (Basilides) says within the seed itself, a Sonhood, threefold throughout, of the same essence[45] with the God-who-was-Not and begotten of the things that were not. Of this triple divided Sonhood, one part was subtle, (one coarse) and one wanting purification. Now the subtle (part) [Sidenote: p. 350.] straightway and as it became the first emission of the seed by the One-who-was-Not, escaped and ascended and went on high from below with the speed described by the poet--

“like wing or thought,”[46]

and came, he says, before the One-who-was-Not. For towards him every nature strains on account of his exceeding beauty and bloom,[47] but each differently. But the coarser part still remaining in the seed, although resembling the other,[48] could not go on high, for it lacked the fineness of division which the ascending Sonhood had of itself, and was (therefore) left behind. Then the coarser Sonhood wings itself with some such wing as that wherewith Plato, Aristotle’s teacher, equips the soul in the _Phaedrus_,[49] and Basilides calls the same not a wing but Holy Spirit, clothed wherewith the Sonhood both gives and receives benefit. It gives it because a bird’s wing taken by itself and severed from the bird would neither become uplifted nor high in [Sidenote: p. 351.] air, nor would the bird be uplifted and high in air if deprived of the wing. This then is the relation which the Sonhood bears to the Spirit and the Spirit to the Sonhood. For the Sonhood borne aloft by the Spirit as by a wing bears aloft the wing, (that is the Spirit) and draws nigh to the subtler Sonhood and to the God-who-was-Not and fashions all things from the non-existent. But [the Spirit] cannot abide with the Sonhood for it is not of the same essence,[50] nor has it the same nature as the Sonhood. But just as dry and pure air is naturally fatal to fishes, so naturally to the Holy Spirit was that place, more ineffable than the ineffable ones and higher than all names, which is the seat at once of the God-who-was-Not and of the [first] Sonhood. Therefore the Sonhood left the Spirit near that blessed place which cannot be conceived nor characterized[51] by any speech, [yet] not altogether alone nor [completely] severed from the Sonhood. For just as when a sweet perfume is poured into a jar, even if the jar is carefully emptied a certain fragrance of the perfume still remains and is left behind, and although [Sidenote: p. 352.] the perfume be removed from the jar, the jar retains the fragrance, but not the perfume--so the Holy Spirit remained bereft of and severed from the Sonhood. And this is the saying: “As the perfume on Aaron’s head ran down to his beard.”[52] This is the savour carried down by the Holy Spirit from on high into the Formlessness[53] and Space of this world of ours, whence the Sonhood first went on high as on the wings of an eagle and borne on his loins. For all things, he says, strain upward from below, from the worse to the better. But there is thus nothing of those things which are among the better which is immovable, so that it cannot come below. But the third Sonhood, he says, which is in need of purification, remains in the great heap of the Seed-mass giving and receiving benefits. And in what manner it does this, we shall see later in the fitting place.[54]

[Sidenote: p. 353.] 23. Now when the first and second ascensions of the Sonhood[55] had come to pass, and the Holy Spirit remained by itself in the way described, being set midway between the hypercosmic firmaments and the cosmos--for Basilides divides the things that are into two first made and primary divisions, one of which is called by him an ordered world,[56] and the other hypercosmic things--and between these two [he places] the Boundary Spirit,[57] which same is at once Holy and holds abiding in it the savour of the Sonhood, it being the firmament which is above the heaven.[58] [When these ascensions had taken place], there escaped from and was engendered from the cosmical seed and the Seed-mass, the Great Ruler, the head of the cosmos, a certain beauty and greatness and power which cannot be spoken.[59] For he is, says [Basilides], more ineffable than the ineffable ones, mightier than the mighty, and better than all the fair ones you can describe. He, when engendered, burst through, soared aloft, and was borne right up on high as far as the firmament, but stayed there thinking that the firmament was the end of all ascension [Sidenote: p. 354.] and uplifting and not imagining that there was anything at all beyond this. And he became wiser, mightier, more eminent, and more luminous and everything which you can describe as excelling in beauty all the other cosmic things which lay before him, save only the Sonhood left behind in the Seed-mass. For he knew not that [this Sonhood] was wiser and mightier and better than he. Therefore he deemed himself Lord and King[60] and wise architect, and set about the creation in detail[61] of the ordered world. And in the first place he did not think it meet for him to be alone, but created for himself and engendered from the things which lay below him a Son much better and wiser than himself. For all this the God-who-was-Not had foreordained when he let fall the Seed-mass. When, therefore, [the Great Ruler] beheld his Son, he wondered, and was filled with love and astounded: for so [splendid] did the beauty of the son appear to the Great Ruler. And the Ruler seated him at his right hand. This is what is called by Basilides the Ogdoad where sits the Great Ruler. Then the Great Wise Demiurge fashioned the whole of the [Sidenote: p. 355.] heavenly, that is, the aethereal creation. But the Son begotten by him set it working and established it, being much wiser than the Demiurge himself.[62]

24. This [creation] is according to Aristotle, the “entelechy”[63] of the organic natural body, the soul activating the body, without which the body can effect nothing, a something greater and more manifest and wiser than the body. The theory therefore which Aristotle first taught regarding the soul and the body, Basilides explained as referring to the Great Ruler and his so-called son. For the Ruler according to Basilides begat a son; and Aristotle says that the soul is an entelechy, the work and result[64] of the organic natural body. As, then, the entelechy controls the body, so the son, according to Basilides, controls the more ineffable God of the Ineffables. All things soever then which are in the aether up to the Moon are foreseen and controlled by the majesty[65] of the Great Ruler; for here [_i.e._ at the Moon] the air is divided from the aether. Now when all aethereal things had been set in order, yet [Sidenote: p. 356.] another Ruler ascends from the Seed-Mass, greater than all the things which are below him, save only the Sonhood which is left behind, but much inferior to the first Ruler. And this one is called by them “able to be named.”[66] And his place is called Hebdomad, and he is the controller and Demiurge of all things lying below him, and he has created to himself from the Seed-Mass a Son who is more foreseeing and wiser than he in the same way as has been said about the first [Ruler]. And in this space,[67] he says, are the heap and the Seed-Mass, and events naturally happen as they were (ordained) to be produced in advance by Him who has calculated that which will come to pass and when and what and how it will be.[68] And of these there is no leader nor guardian nor demiurge. For that calculation which the Non-Existent One made when he created them suffices for them.

25. When, then, according to them, the whole cosmos and the hypercosmic things were completed, and nothing [Sidenote: p. 357.] was lacking, there still remained in the Seed-Mass the third Sonhood which had been left behind to give and receive benefits in the Seed. And the Sonhood left behind had to be revealed and again established on high above the Boundary Spirit in the presence of the subtler Sonhood and the one that resembles it and the Non-Existent One, as, says he, it is written, “All creation groans and is in travail in expectation of the revelation of the sons of God.”[69] We spiritual men, he say, left here below for the arrangement and perfect formation and rectification and completion of the souls which by nature have to remain in this [Middle] Space, are the “sons [of God].” “Now from Adam to Moses sin reigned”[70] as it is written. For the Great Ruler reigned who held sway up to the firmament, thinking that he alone was God, and that there was nothing higher than he. For all things were kept hidden in silence. This, says he, is the mystery which was not known to the earlier generations; but in those times the King and Lord, as it seemed to him, of the universals was [Sidenote: p. 358.] the Great Ruler, the Ogdoad. Yet of this [Middle] Space the Hebdomad was King and Lord, and the Ogdoad is ineffable but the Hebdomad may be named. This Ruler of the Hebdomad, says he, it was who spoke to Moses, saying, “I am the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the name of God was not made known to them:”[71] for thus they will have it to have been written--that is to say [the name] of the Ineffable Ogdoad, Ruler, God. All the prophets therefore who were before the Saviour, spoke from that place.[72] When then, he says, the sons of God had to be revealed to us, about whom, he says, creation groaned and travailed in expectation of the revelation, the Gospel came into the cosmos and passed through every Dominion[73] and Authority and Lordship and every name which is named. And it came indeed, although nothing descended from on high, nor did the Blessed Sonhood come forth from that Incomprehensible and Blessed God-who-was-Not. But as the Indian naphtha, when only kindled from afar off, takes fire, so from the Formlessness of the heap below do [Sidenote: p. 359.] the powers of the Sonhood extend upward. For as if he were something of naphtha, the son of the Great Ruler of the Ogdoad catches and receives the concepts from the Blessed Sonhood which is beyond the Holy Spirit. For the Power in the midst of the Holy Spirit in the Boundary of the Sonhood distributes the rushing and flowing concepts to the Son of the Great Ruler.[74]

26. Therefore the Gospel came first from the Sonhood, he says to the Ruler, through his Son who sits beside him, and the Ruler learned that he was not the God of the universals, but was a generated [being] and had above him the outstretched Treasure-house of the Ineffable and Unnameable God-who-was-Not and of the Sonhood.[75] And he was astounded and terrified when he perceived in what ignorance he had been, and this, says [Basilides] is the saying: “The fear of [the] Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”[76] For he began to be wise when instructed by the Christ seated beside him, and learned what was the Non-Existent One, what the Sonhood, what the Holy Spirit, and what was the constitution[77] of the universals and [Sidenote: p. 360.] how these will be restored.[78] This is the wisdom spoken of in mystery, as to which, says he, the Scripture declares: “Not in the words taught by human wisdom, but in the teachings of [the] Spirit.”[79] Then, says he, the Ruler when he had been instructed and made to fear, confessed thoroughly the sin he had committed in magnifying himself. This, says he, is the saying: “I acknowledge my sin and I know my transgression; upon this I will make full confession for ever.”[80]

Now when the Great Ruler had been instructed, and every creature of the Ogdoad had been taught and had learned, and the mystery had been made known to those above the heavens, it was still necessary that the Gospel should come to the Hebdomad also, so that the Ruler of the Hebdomad might be instructed in like manner and be evangelized.[81] The Son of the Great Ruler [therefore] enlightened the Son of the Ruler of the Hebdomad, having caught the light which he had from the Sonhood on high, and the Son of the Ruler of the Hebdomad was enlightened, and the Gospel was announced to the Ruler of the Hebdomad, and he in like manner as has been said was both terrified and made confession. When then all things in the [Sidenote: p. 361.] Hebdomad had been enlightened, and the Gospel had been announced to them--for according to them, the creatures belonging to these spaces are boundless and are Dominions and Powers and Authorities, concerning whom they have a very long story told by many [authors]. [And] they imagine that there are there 365 heavens, and Habrasax is their Great Ruler, because his name comprises the cipher 365, wherefore the year consists of that number of days[82]--but when, says he, these things had come to pass, it was still necessary that our Formlessness should be enlightened and that the mystery unknown to the earlier generations should be revealed to the Sonhood left behind in the Formlessness as if he were an abortion. As, says he, it is written: “By revelation was made known to me the mystery;”[83] and again, “I heard unspeakable words which it is not lawful for man to utter.”[84] [Thus] the light came down from the [Sidenote: p. 362.] Hebdomad, which had come down from the Ogdoad on high to the Son of the Hebdomad, upon Jesus the son of Mary, and He, having caught it, was enlightened by the light shining upon Him.[85] This, says he, is the saying:--“The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee,” [that is], that which passed from the Sonhood through the Boundary Spirit into the Ogdoad and Hebdomad down to Mary, “and the Power of the Highest shall overshadow thee,”[86] [that is] the power of the unction[87] from the Height of the Demiurge on high unto the creation which is of the Son. But, he says, up till that [time] the cosmos was thus constituted, until [the time] when the whole Sonhood left behind in the Formlessness to benefit souls and [itself] to receive benefits should be transformed and follow Jesus, and should go on high and come forth purified, and should become most subtle as it might do by ascension like the First [Sonhood]. For it possesses all the power of attaching itself naturally to the light which shines downward from on high.

27. When therefore, he says, every Sonhood shall have come [forth] and shall be established above the Boundary [Sidenote: p. 363.] Spirit, the creation shall then receive pity. For up till now, he says it wails and is tortured and awaits the revelation of the sons of God, so that all the men of the Sonhood shall ascend from this place. When this shall have come to pass, he says, God shall bring upon the whole cosmos the Great Ignorance, so that all things shall remain as they are by nature, and none shall desire any of those things beyond [its] nature. For all the souls of this space which possess a nature enabling them to remain immortal in this [space] alone, will remain convinced that there is nothing different from nor better than this [space]. Nor will any tidings or knowledge of higher things abide in those below, so that the lower souls shall not be tormented by yearning after the impossible, as if a fish should desire to feed with the sheep on the hills. For, says he, such a desire should it happen to them[88] would be [their] destruction. Therefore, he says, all things which remain in their own place are imperishable; but perishable if they wish to overleap and rise above [the limits] of their nature. Thus the Ruler of the Hebdomad will know nothing of the things above him. For the Great [Sidenote: p. 364.] Ignorance will lay hold of him, so that grief and pain and sighing will stand off from him, for he will neither desire anything impossible nor will he grieve. And in like manner this Ignorance will lay hold of the Great Ruler of the Ogdoad, and similarly all the creatures subject to him, so that none of them shall grieve and mourn for anything outside his own nature. And this shall be the Restoration of all things established according to nature in the seed of the universals at the beginning, but they shall be restored [each] in their proper season. But [to prove] that everything has its proper season, it is enough to mention the saying of the Saviour:--“Mine hour is not yet come”[89] and the Magi observing the star. For, says [Basilides] He himself was foretold by the nativity[90] of the stars and of the return of the hours into the great heap. This is according to them, the spiritual inner man conceived in the natural man--which is the Sonhood who leaves the soul, not to die but to remain as it is by nature, just as the first Sonhood[91] [Sidenote: p. 365.] left the Holy Spirit which is the Boundary in its appropriate place and then did on his own special soul.[92]

In order that we may omit nothing of their [doctrines], I will set forth what they say also about (a) Gospel.[93] Gospel is according to them the knowledge of hypercosmic things, as has been made plain, which the Great Ruler[94] did not understand. When then there was manifested to him what are the Holy Spirit that is the Boundary, and the Sonhood and the God-who-is-Not the cause of all these, he rejoiced at the words and exulted,[95] and this according to them is the Gospel. But Jesus according to them was born as we have before said. And He having come into being by the Birth before explained, all those things likewise came to pass with regard to the Saviour as it is written in the Gospels. And these things came to pass [Basilides] says, so that Jesus might become the first-fruits of the sorting-out of the things of the Confusion.[96] For when the Cosmos was divided into an Ogdoad which is the head of the whole ordered world, [the head whereof is] the Great Ruler, and into a Hebdomad which is the head of the Hebdomad, the [Sidenote: p. 366.] Demiurge of the things below him, and into this space of ours, which is the Formlessness, it was necessary that the things of the Confusion should be sorted out by the discrimination of Jesus.

That which was His bodily part[97] which was from the Formlessness, therefore suffered[98] and returned to the Formlessness. And that which was His psychic part which was from the Hebdomad also returned to the Hebdomad. But that which was peculiar to the Height of the Great Ruler ascended and remained with the Great Ruler. And He bore aloft as far as the Boundary Spirit that which was from the Boundary Spirit and it remained with the Boundary Spirit. But the third Sonhood which had been left behind to give and receive benefits was purified by Him, and traversing all these places went on high to the Blessed Sonhood.[99] For this is the whole theory,[100] as it were a Confusion of the Seed-Mass and the discrimination [into classes] and the Restoration of the things confused into their proper places. Therefore Jesus became the first-fruits of the discrimination, and the Passion came to pass for no other reason than this discrimination.[101] For in this manner, he says, all the Sonhood left behind in the Formlessness to [Sidenote: p. 367.] give and receive benefits separated into its components in the same way as [the person] of Jesus was separated. This is what Basilides fables after having lingered in Egypt, and having learned from them [of Egypt] such great wisdom, he brought forth such fruits.[102]

2. _Satornilus._[103]

28. And a certain Satornilus who flourished at the same time as Basilides, but passed his life in Antioch of Syria, taught the same things as Menander.[104] He says that one father exists unknown to all, who made Angels, Archangels, Powers [and] Authorities. And that from a certain seven angels the cosmos and all things therein came into being. And that man was [the] creation of angels, there having [Sidenote: p. 368.] appeared on high from the Absolute One[105] a shining image which they could not detain, says Saturnilus, because of its immediate return on high. [Wherefore] they exhorted one another, saying: “Let us make man according to image and resemblance.”[106] Which, he says, having come to pass, the image could not stand upright by reason of the lack of power among the angels, but grovelled like a worm. Then the Power on high having pity on it, because it had come into being in his likeness, sent forth a spark of life which raised up the man and made him live.[107] Therefore, says he, the spark of life returns at death to its own kindred and the rest of [man’s] compound parts is resolved into its original elements.[108] And he supposed the unknown Father[109] to be unbegotten, bodiless, and formless. But he says that He showed Himself as a phantom in human shape, and that the God of the Jews is one of the angels. And, because the Father wished to depose all the angels, Christ came for the putting-down of the God of the Jews and for the salvation of those who believe on him; and that these [believers] [Sidenote: p. 369.] have the spark of life within them. For he says that two races of men were formed by the angels, one bad and one good. And that since the demons help the bad, the Saviour came for the destruction of the bad men and demons, but for the salvation of the good. And he says that to marry and beget [children] is from Satan. Many of this man’s adherents abstain from things that have had life, through this pretended abstinence (leading astray many).[110] And they say that the Prophecies were uttered, some by the world-creators, some by Satan whom he supposes to be an angel who works against the world-creators and especially (against) the God of the Jews.[111] Thus then Satornilus.

3. _Concerning Marcion._[112]

[Sidenote: p. 370.] 29. Marcion of Pontus, much madder than these, passing over many opinions of the majority and pressing on to the more shameless, supposed that there were two principles of the All,[113] one good and the other bad. And he, thinking that he was bringing in some new [doctrine], manufactured a school filled with folly and of Cynic life, being himself a lewd one.[114] He thought that the multitude would not notice that he chanced to be a disciple not of Christ, but of Empedocles, who was very much earlier, and he laid down and taught that there were two causes of the All, [_i. e._] Strife and Love.[115] For what says Empedocles on the conduct of the cosmos? If we have said it before,[116] yet I will not now keep silence, if only for the sake of comparing [Sidenote: p. 371.] the heresy of this plagiarist[117] [with the source]. He says that all the elements of which the cosmos was compounded and consists are six, to wit:--two material, [viz.] Air and Water; two instruments, whereby the material elements are arranged[118] and changed about, [viz.] Fire and Air; and two which work with the instruments and fashion matter, [viz.] Strife and Love. He says something like this:--

Hear first the four roots of all things:
Shining Zeus and life-bearing Here and Aïdoneus.
And Nestis who wets with tears the source of mortals.[119]

Zeus is fire and life-bearing Here the earth which bears fruits for the support of life. But Aïdoneus is the air, because while beholding all things through it, it alone we do not see. And Nestis is water, since it is the only vehicle of food, and therefore the becoming cause of all growing things,[120] yet cannot nourish them by itself. For if it could so give nourishment, he says, living things[121] could never die of hunger, for there is always abundance of water in the cosmos.[122] Whence he calls water Nestis, because it is a becoming cause of nourishment, yet cannot itself nourish growing things. These things then are, to sum them up in outline, those which comprise the foundation[123] of the cosmos [_i. e._] water and Earth from which all things come, [Sidenote: p. 372.] Fire and Spirit[124] the tools and agents, and Strife and Love which fashion all things with skill. And Love is a certain peace and even mindedness and natural affection,[125] which determines that the cosmos shall be perfect and complete; but Strife ever rends asunder that which is one and divides it and makes many things out of one. Therefore the cause of the whole creation is Strife, which [cause] he calls baneful, that is deadly.[126] For it takes care that through every aeon, its creation persists. And Strife the deadly is the Demiurge and maker of all things which have come into being by birth; but Love, of their leading-forth from the cosmos and transformation and return to unity.[127] Concerning which, Empedocles [says] that there are two immortal and unbegotten things which have never yet had a source of existence. He speaks, however, somehow like this:--

For it was aforetime and will be; never, I ween,
Will the unquenchable aeon lack these two.[128]

[Sidenote: p. 373.] But what are these two? Strife and Love. For they had no source of existence, but pre-existed and ever were, being through their unbegotten nature incorruptible. But Fire [and Water] and Earth and Air die and again come to life. For when the things which have come into being through Strife die, Love takes them and leads them and adds and attaches them to the All,[129] so that the All may remain _One_, being ever marshalled by Love in one fashion and form. Yet when Love creates the One from many things, and arranges the things which have been scattered in the One, Strife again rends them away from the One, and makes them [into] many, that is, Fire, Water, Earth [and] Air, whence are produced animals and plants and whatever parts of the cosmos we perceive. And concerning the form[130] of the cosmos as ordered by Love, he speaks somehow like this:--

For not from the back do two arms[131] spring
[Sidenote: p. 374.] Nor feet nor active knees, nor hairy genitals.
But it was a sphere and everywhere alike.[132]

Such things [does] Love, and turns out the most beautiful form of the world as One from many; but Strife rends gradually from that One the principle of its arrangement, and again makes it [into] many. This is what Empedocles says of his own birth:--

Of whom I also am now a fugitive and an exile from the gods.[133]

That is, he calls the One divine, and says that the unity formerly existing in the One was rent asunder by Strife and came into being in these many things, existing according to Strife’s ordering. For, says he, Strife is the furious and troublous and unresting Demiurge of this cosmos, whose [Sidenote: p. 375.] [fashioner] Empedocles calls it. For this is the judgment and compulsion of the souls which Strife rends away from the One and fashions and works up, which process [Empedocles] describes somehow like this:--

Who having sinned swore falsely
And demons are allotted long-drawn out life.[134]

calling the long-lived souls “demons” because they are immortal and live through long ages.

For three myriad seasons they wandered from the blessed,[135]

calling “blessed” those whom Love has made from the many into the oneness of the intelligible[136] cosmos. Therefore, says [Empedocles] they wandered

Putting on in time all mortal forms[137]
[Sidenote: p. 376.]Interchanging the hard ways of life.[138]

He says that the transmigrations and transmutations of the souls into bodies are “hard ways.” This is what he says:--

Interchanging the hard ways of life.

For [the souls pass from body to body] being changed about and punished by Strife and are not allowed to remain in the One, but are punished in all punishments by Strife. This is what he says:--

For aetherial might drives souls seawards.
And sea spits them upon Earth’s surface; and Earth into the beams
Of the radiant Sun, and he casts them into the whirls of aether
Each takes them from the other, but all hate them.[139]

[Sidenote: p. 377.] This is the punishment wherewith the Demiurge punishes, just as a smith forging iron, taking it from the fire, dips it in water. For Fire is the aether, whence the Demiurge casts the souls into the Sea; and the Earth is the ground. Whence he says, from water to Earth, from Earth to Air. This is what he says:--

into the beams
Of the radiant Sun, and he casts them into the whirls of aether
Each takes them from the other, but all hate them.

Therefore, according to Empedocles, Love gathers the hated and tortured and punished souls together into this world. For [Love] is good and has pity on their wailing and the disorder and wickedness created by furious Strife. And she hastens and toils to lead them forth quickly out of the world and to settle them in the One, so that all things brought together by her may come to oneness. It [Sidenote: p. 378.] is then by reason of this arrangement of this much-divided[140] world by deadly Strife, that Empedocles exhorts his disciples to abstain from all things which have life. For he says that the bodies of animals which are eaten are the dwellings of punished souls, and he teaches those who hear such [his] words to refrain[141] from companying with women, so that they may not cooperate and help in the deeds which Strife effects, ever undoing and rending asunder the work of Love.

Empedocles says that this is the greatest law of the government of the All, speaking somehow thus:--

There is a thing of Necessity, an ancient decree of the gods.
Eternal and sealed with broad oaths.[142]

thus calling Necessity the change by Strife of the One into many and that by Love of many into the One. He says, indeed, that there are four mortal gods, Fire, Water, Earth and Air; and two immortal unbegotten and enemies one to the other for ever [viz.] Strife and Love; and that Strife is ever unjust and grasping and rends asunder what belongs [Sidenote: p. 379.] to Love and takes it to itself; and that Love is ever good and anxious for unity and calls back to herself and leads and makes one the things rent asunder from the All and tortured and punished in creation by the Demiurge. In some such way does Empedocles philosophize for us on the genesis of the Cosmos and its destruction and its constitution established from good and evil.

And he says that there is a certain conceivable[143] third power which may be conceived[144] from these, speaking somehow like this:--

For if having fixed these things with knowing mind[145]
You behold them favourably with pure attention
They all will be present with you throughout the age
But many others will come forth from these. For they will increase
Each into a habit as is the nature of each.[146]
And if you desire such other things as are among men
A myriad woes arise and dull the edge of care
[Sidenote: p. 380.] Take heed lest they leave you suddenly as time rolls on.
Yearning to join their own beloved race
For know that all things have perception and an allotted share of mind.[147]

30. When therefore Marcion or any of his dogs shall bay against the Demiurge, bringing forward arguments from the comparison of good and evil, they should be told that neither the Apostle Paul nor Mark of the maimed finger[148] reported these things. For none of them is written in the Gospel [according] to Mark; [and] Marcion, having stolen them from Empedocles of Agrigentum, the son of Meto, thought until now to conceal the fact that he had taken the whole arrangement of his heresy from Sicily, [after] having transferred the actual words of Empedocles to the Gospel discourses. For now, O Marcion, since you have [Sidenote: p. 381.] made antithesis[149] of good and evil, I also to-day, following up the teachings you have secretly borrowed[150] set them over against [the originals]. Thou sayest that the Demiurge of the cosmos is wicked.[151] Dost thou not then feel shame in teaching to the Church the words of Empedocles? Thou sayest that there is a good God who destroys the creations of the Demiurge. Dost thou not then clearly preach as good news[152] to thy hearers the good Love of Empedocles? Thou dost forbid marriage and the begetting of children and [dost order thy hearers] to abstain from the meats which God has created for the participation of the faithful and of those who know the truth,[153] having purposely forgotten that thou art teaching the purifications of Empedocles. For, following him as you truly do throughout, you teach your own disciples[154] to avoid meats, lest they should eat some body covering a soul punished by the Demiurge. You dissolve marriages joined by God, [thus] following the teachings of Empedocles so that you may preserve the work of Love undissevered. For marriage according to Empedocles dissevers the One and creates many as we have shown.[155]

[Sidenote: p. 382.] 31. The earliest and least altered[156] heresy of Marcion, comprising the mingling of good and evil, has been shown by us to be that of Empedocles. But since in our own time, a certain Prepon the Assyrian,[157] a Marcionite, in a book addressed to Bardesianes the Armenian, has undertaken discourses on this heresy, I will not keep silence about this either. Considering that there is a third principle, just and set between good and evil, Prepon also does not thus succeed in escaping the teaching of Empedocles. For Empedocles says that the cosmos is governed by wicked Strife, and the other conceivable [world] by Love, while between the two opposed[158] principles is a just Logos, by whom the things severed by Strife are brought together and are attached by Love to the One. But this same just Logos, [Sidenote: p. 383.] who fights on the side of Love, Empedocles proclaims as a Muse and invokes her to fight on his side, speaking somehow thus:--

If for creatures of a day, O deathless Muse,
Thou art pleased to relieve our cares by thought,
Be propitious once more to my prayer, Calliope!
For I show forth a pious discourse of [the] blessed gods.[159]

Following this up, Marcion repudiates altogether our Saviour’s Birth, thinking it out of the question that a creature[160] of destructive Strife should become the Logos fighting on the side of Love, that is of the Good. But he said that without birth, in the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius Cæsar, He came down from on high to teach in the synagogues, being between evil and good. For if He is [Sidenote: p. 384.] a Mediator,[161] he says, He is freed from all nature of evil, for evil, as he says, is the Demiurge and all his works. But He was freed also, he says, from the nature of good, so that He might be a Mediator, as Paul says,[162] which he himself confessed [in the saying] “Why callest thou me good? there is one Good.”

These then are Marcion’s doctrines, whereby he has caused many to err by making use of the words of Empedocles and transferring the philosophy stolen from that person to his own teaching. [Thus] he has compounded a godless heresy which I think has been sufficiently refuted by us. Nor [do we think] that we have omitted anything of those who, having stolen [opinions] from the Greeks, insolently oppose the disciples of Christ, as if these last had become their teachers of these things. But since it seems to us that the opinions of this [Marcion] have been sufficiently exposed,[163] let us see what Carpocrates says.

[Sidenote: p. 385.] 4. _Carpocrates._[164]

32. Carpocrates says that the cosmos and the things which are therein, came into being by angels much below the unbegotten Father, but that Jesus was begotten by Joseph and was born like other men, though more just than the rest. And that His soul having been born strong and pure remembered what it had seen in the sphere of the unbegotten God;[165] and that therefore a power was sent down to it from that [Deity], so that by its means it might escape from the world-making angels. And that this [soul][166] having passed through them all and having been freed from them went on high to the presence of the unbegotten Father, and so will the souls[167] [go] who cleave to similar things. And they say that the soul of Jesus, although lawfully trained in Jewish customs, disdained them and therefore received the powers whereby He made of none effect[168] the passions attached to men for their punishment. [Sidenote: p. 386.] And that therefore the soul which like that of Christ can disdain the world-making rulers, receives in the same way power to do like things. Whence also they reach such [a pitch of] vanity as to say they are like unto Jesus, and even that they are mightier than man, and some of them more excellent than His disciples, such as Peter and Paul and the rest of the Apostles, and that they are in nothing behind Jesus. But that their souls having come from the Transcendent Authority[169] and therefore similarly disdaining the world-makers, are worthy of the same power [as He] and will go to the same place. But that if anyone should disdain more than He the things below, he might become more excellent than He.

[Sidenote: p. 387.] They practise, then, magic arts, and incantations and [use] philtres and love-feasts, and familiar spirits and dream-senders and other evil works, thinking that they already have authority to lord it over the rulers and makers of this world, nay even over all created in it. Who have themselves been sent forth by Satan for the dishonour[170] of the divine name of the Church before the Gentiles, so that men hearing in one way or another of their doctrines and thinking that we are all even as they, may turn away their ears from the preaching of the Truth, [or] beholding their deeds, may speak evil of us all.

And they consider that [their] souls will change their bodies until they have fulfilled all their transgressions; but that when nothing is left undone, they will be set free to depart to the presence of the God who is above the world-making angels, and that thus all souls will be saved. But if any anticipating matters should combine all transgressions [Sidenote: p. 388.] in one advent,[171] they will no longer change their bodies, but as having paid all penalties at once, will be freed from further birth in a body. Some of them also brand their disciples in the back part of the lobe of the right ear. And they make [172] images of Christ saying that they were made [in the time] of Pilate.[173]

5. _Cerinthus._[174]

33. But a certain Cerinthus, having been trained in the schooling of the Egyptians, said that the cosmos did not come into being by the First God, but by a certain Power derived from the Authority set over the universals, which is yet ignorant of the God who is over all. And he supposed Jesus not to have been begotten from a virgin, but to have been born the son of Joseph and Mary like all other men, [Sidenote: p. 389.] and to have been more wise and just than they. And that, at the Baptism, the Christ in the form of a dove descended upon Him from the Absolute Power[175] which is over the universals. And that then He announced[176] the unknown Father and perfected His own powers; but that in the end the Christ stood away from Jesus, and Jesus suffered and rose again;[177] but that the Christ being spiritual remained impassible.

6. _Ebionæi._[178]

34. But the Ebionæi admit that the cosmos came into being by the God who is; and concerning Christ they invent[179] the same things as Cerinthus and Carpocrates. They live according to Jewish customs, thinking that they will be justified by the Law and saying that Jesus was justified in practising[180] the Law. Wherefore He was named by God Christ and Jesus, since none of them has fulfilled [Sidenote: p. 390.] the Law. For if any other had practised the commandments which are in the Law, he would be the Christ. And they say it is possible for them if they do likewise to become Christs; and that He was a man like unto all [men].

7. _Theodotus the Byzantian._[181]

35. But a certain Byzantine named Theodotus brought in a new heresy, asserting things about the beginning of the All which partly agree with [the account of] the True Church, since he admits that all things came into being by God. But having taken[182] his [idea of] Christ from the school of the Gnostics and from Cerinthus and Ebion,[183] he considers He appeared in some such fashion as this:--Jesus was a man begotten from a virgin according to the Father’s will, living the common life of all men. And having become most pious,[184] He at length on His baptism in Jordan received the Christ from on high, who descended in the [Sidenote: p. 391.] form of a dove. Wherefore the powers within Him did not become active, until the Spirit which came down was manifested in Him, which [Spirit] declared Him to be the Christ. But some will have it that He did not become God on the descent of the Spirit; and others that [this took place] on His resurrection from the dead.

8. _Another Theodotus._

36. But while different enquiries were taking place among them[185] a certain man who was also called Theodotus, a money-changer by trade, undertook to say that a certain Melchizedek was the greatest power, and that he was greater than Christ. After the image of whom they allege that Christ happened [to come]. And they like the Theodotians before mentioned say that Jesus was a man, and in the same words [declare] that the Christ descended upon Him.

[Sidenote: p. 392.] But the opinions[186] of Gnostics are varied, and we do not deem it worth while to recount in detail their foolish doctrines, composed of much absurdity and charged with blasphemy, the most respectable of which those Greeks who philosophized on the Divine have refuted. But one cause of the great conspiracy of these wicked ones was Nicolaus, one of the seven appointed to the diaconate by the Apostles.[187] He, having fallen away from the right doctrine, taught that it was indifferent how men lived and ate: whose disciples having waxed insolent, the Holy Spirit exposed in the Apocalypse as fornicators and eaters of things offered to idols.[188]

9. _Cerdo and Lucian._[189]

37. But a certain Cerdo taking in like manner his starting-point from these [heretics] and from Simon, says that the [Sidenote: p. 393.] God announced by Moses and [the] Prophets was not the Father of Jesus Christ. For that this God was known, but the Father of the Christ unknowable; and that the first-named was [only] just, but the other, good. The doctrine of this [Cerdo] Marcion confirmed when he took in hand the _Antitheses_[190] and everything which seemed to him to speak against the Demiurge of all things. And so did Lucian his disciple.

10. _Apelles._[191]