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VALENTINUS
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VALENTINUS and THE VALENTINIANS. I. Valentinus, the most prominent See also:leader of the Gnostic See also:movement, was See also:born, according to See also:Epiphanius (Haer. 31, 2), near the See also:coast in See also:Lower See also:Egypt, and was brought up and educated in See also:Alexandria. He then went to See also:Rome, as we learn from See also:Irenaeus, Adv. haer. iii. 4, 3; Valentinus came to Rome during the episcopate of See also:Hyginus, flourished under See also:Pius and stayed till the See also:time of See also:Anicetus. The duration of the episcopates of the See also:Roman bishops at this See also:period is not absolutely established, but we can hardly go altogether wrong if, with See also:Harnack (Chronologie der altchrisllichen Literatur, i. 291), we See also:fix the period 135-6o for Valentinus's See also:residence in Rome. This is confirmed by the fact that See also:Justin See also:Martyr in his See also:Apology, i. 26, begun about 150, mentions that in his earlier See also:work against See also:heresy, the Syntagma, he attacked, among others, Valentinus; so that his heresy must have begun to appear at least as See also:early as 14o. According to Irenaeus iii. 3, 4, See also:Polycarp, during his sojourn in Rome under the episcopate of Anicetus, converted a few adherents of the Valentinian See also:sect. See also:Tertullian (Adv. Valentin. cap. 4) declares that Valentinus came to Rome as an adherent of the orthodox See also: II, 1—3, has preserved what is obviously an older document, possibly from Justin, dealing with Valentinus's own teaching and that of two of his disciples. The See also:sketch which he gives is the best See also:guide for the original form of Valentinianism. For Valentinus himself we have also to consider the fragments of his writings pre-served by Clemens Alexandrinus. The best edition of and commentary on them is See also:Hilgenfeld's Ketzergeschichte See also:des Urchristentums (pp. 293-307). Irenaeus in his See also:treatise Adv. hoer. gives a detailed See also:account of the two See also:chief See also:schools following Valentinus, the school of See also:Ptolemaeus (i. i—Io), and See also:Marcus and the Marcosians (i. 13—21). For his account of the Ptolemaeans, Irenaeus seems to have used various writings and expositions of the school, especially prominent being a collection of Scripture proofs which may have once had a See also:separate See also:literary existence (i. 1, 3; 3, 1—5 (6); 8, 2—4). To this work is appended in a somewhat disconnected See also:fashion a commentary on the See also:prologue to the See also:fourth See also:Gospel (i. 8, 5). Irenaeus himself twice prefaces his remarks by saying he is indebted to other authorities for his exposition (i. 2, 3—4; 7, 2-5). Section 6, 2—4, interrupts and disturbs the continuity, and section 5, 1—3, is a duplicate of 5, 4. We see how the account of Irenaeus is built up from small fragments. In his account o1 Marcus and the Marcosians the chapters on the sacraments (i. 13 and 20) seem originally to have formed part of the same whole. Very valuable too are the Excerpta ex Theodoto which are to be found in the See also:works of Clemens Alexandrinus, and may be looked upon as a collection made by the author with a view to the eighth See also:book of his Stromateis, which was never finished. Of these excerpts paragraphs 4, 5, 8-15, 17b—20, 27, should be distinguished as Clemens's own observations; the remaining parts are extracted from Gnostic writings (cf. Zahn, Geschichte des Kanons, ii. pp. 269 seq.). Yet the Excerpts, as their contents show, are not homogeneous, and cannot have been borrowed from one See also:writing. The question as to whether Clemens' method of quotations, which mentions sometimes Theodotus, some-times the Valentinians as his See also:sources for these excerpts, is of any use as a guide to an estimate between these sources. must be See also:left undecided. The most important sections are paragraphs 29–68, in which an See also:attempt is made at a continuous exposition of the See also:system (though here again from various sources), and section 69–86, which deals with the Gnostic See also:doctrine of the sacraments and that of the liberation of the Heimarmene. The lost Syntagma of See also:Hippolytus, which, as we know, is preserved in the works of Philastrius and the pseudo-Tertullian, seems to furnish us with valuable See also:information as to the earlier doctrines of the sect, and in his second treatise against heretics, the so-called Philosophumena (6, 29 seq.). Hippolytus gives a homogeneous and continuous exposition of a later Valentinian system, possibly connected with the school of Ptolemaeus. Important, too, are Hippolytus' references to an See also:Italic and an Anatolian See also:branch of the Valentinian sect (6, 35). Tertullian gives at the beginning of his treatise against the Valentinians a few separate notices of the See also:life and disciples of Valentinus, but his further See also:argument is closely dependent upon Irenaeus' exposition of the Ptolemaean system, which he embellishes in his usual fashion with bitterly sarcastic comments. Epiphanius deals with Valentinus and his school in sections 31–36 of his work. In cap. 31, 1-8, he gives an account of the Valentinians, which seems to be based on his own observation. Thus in 31, 5-6, we find yet another verbal See also:extract from a Valentinian doctrinal work. For the See also:rest he copies the See also:text of Irenaeus word for word, which has the See also:advantage of preserving for us Irenaeus' See also:Greek phraseology, which we other-See also:wise should only know in a Latin See also:translation. In his section on Ptolemaeus, cap. 33, Epiphanius has preserved for us a valuable See also:letter of Ptolemaeus to See also:Flora, which is a document of the highest importance for the understanding of See also:Gnosticism. IV. In the important section of Irenaeus (i. II) devoted to Valentinus, his teaching is definitely connected with the so-called " falsely reputed Gnostics." It will be useful, in trying to ascertain the teaching and view of life of Valentinus, to keep closely before us that of the " Gnostics " in the narrower sense of the word, as preserved in the expositions of Irenaeus (i. 29, 30) and Epiphanius (passim). The Gnostics were See also:par excellence worshippers of the supreme See also:Mother-goddess, the Milrjp, in whom we have no difficulty in recognizing the characteristics of the goddess of See also:heaven of anterior See also:Asia. This " See also:Meter " is, in the system of these Gnostics, also at one time the stern, austere goddess, the Mother, who dwells in heaven, at other times the licentious goddess of love, the great courtesan (Prunikon), who, e.g. in the Simonian system, takes the form of the prostitute See also:Helena, in whose See also:worship all kinds of obscene See also:rites were celebrated. She dwells in the eighth or_ highestheaven, whence her name Ogdoas. Next to her stands the supreme and shadowy form of the unknown and nameless See also:Father; below her in the seven lower heavens reign the seven planetary, See also:world-creating angelic See also:powers, headed by Jaldabaoth, who was later to be identified with the See also:God of the Old Testament. The Gnostics are See also:children of the supreme Mother; from her the heavenly See also:seed, the divine spark, descended in some way to this lower world, and thus the children of heaven still exist in this See also:gross material world, subject to the Heimarmene and in the See also:power of hostile See also:spirits and powers; and all their sacraments and mysteries, their formulae and symbols, must be part of her worship, in See also:order to find the way upwards, back to the highest heaven, " where the Mother dwells." This See also:idea that the Gnostics know themselves to be in a hostile and evil world reacted in the same direction upon the conception of the Mother of heaven. She became likewise a fallen goddess, who has sunk down into the material world and seeks to See also:free herself from it, receiving her liberation at the hands of a heavenly Redeemer, exactly like the Gnostics. Various myths have contributed towards this; one of these is the widespread naive See also:pagan myth of a goddess who disappears, carried off by the powers of evil, to be set free and taken back to her See also:home by a divine liberator, a See also:brother or betrothed. The See also:moon-goddess with her disappearance may have been the prototype of this mythical figure (there are, indeed, certain analogies to be remarked between the Simonian Helena and Selene). With this myth are connected certain Jewish Theologumena; the goddess who sinks down into the material may readily be identified with Ruach (Rucha), the Spirit of God, who broods over See also:Chaos, or even with the later See also:Sophia (Chokma Achamoth), who was generally conceived of as a world-creating See also:agent. Thirdly, the chief See also:influence at work here seems to have been the See also:oriental myth of the Primal See also:Man sunk in the material world, which appears in its See also:simple form in individual Gnostic systems, e.g. in Poimandres (in the Corpus henneticum) and in See also:Manichaeism. In the Gnostic systems of Irenaeus 29, 30, the Anthropos (i.e. the Primal Man) no longer appears as the world-creative power sinking down into the material world, but as a See also:celestial See also:aeon of the upper world (or even as the supreme god), who stands in a clearly defined relationship to the fallen goddess; it is possible that the role of the Anthropos is here transferred to Sophia Achamoth. The fallen Sophia next becomes, in like manner, a world creative power. And now the highest of the world-creating angels, Jaldabaoth, appears as her son, and with this whole conception are then linked up the ideas of liberation and redemption. Next to the Sophia stands a male redeeming divinity. In all the Gnostic systems known to us See also:Christ already appears as the Saviour, and so in this respect a Christianizing of Gnosticism has been carried out; but originally this Saviour-divinity had nothing in See also:common with the figure of the See also:Christian Redeemer. This is clear from Irenaeus's account of the Gnostics (i. 30). For here the redemption is actually and essentially effected through the uniting in See also:marriage of the fallen goddess with her higher celestial brother, and they are expressly described as the See also:bride and bridegroom. That is to say, we have here the purely mythical idea of the deliverance of a goddess by a god, and of the celestial marriage of a divine pair. This myth can only with difficulty be connected with the historic redemption through Jesus of See also:Nazareth, by further See also:relating that Christ, having been See also:united to the Sophia, descends into the earthly Jesus. V. This See also:primitive " Gnosticism " was very closely followed by Valentinus, who may have come to know these doctrines in Egypt. This can be seen from the fact that in Valentinianism the Mother-goddess always stands absolutely at the centre of the system. Irenaeus (i. 6, r) is very instructive on this point, characterizing the Gnostics as the pneumatici who have a perfect knowledge of God, and have been initiated into the mysteries of Achamoth. A mighty system is certainly erected here out of the modest elements of Gnosticism. (t) More especially, the superstructure of the celestial system, the celestial world of aeons, which exists above the fallen goddess, is here developed in the most complicated way. Valentinus has a system of See also:thirty aeons, but we can with but little trouble recognize the simple system underlying this great superstructure. The quite shadowy See also:plurality of ten and twelve aeons (the Dekas and the Dodekas) of the Valentinian system we may at once set aside as See also:mere fantastical accretions. We have left only a See also:group of eight celestial beings, the so-called Ogdoas, and of these eight figures four again are See also:peculiar to the' Valentinian system, and are probably artificial interpolations. For instance, when for the third pair of aeons we find the See also:Logos and Zoe, figures which occur only here, and perceive, moreover, that the See also:place of this pair of aeons is not firmly established, but that in this Valentinian tradition they occur some-times before and sometimes after the fourth pair of aeons, the Anthropos and the Ekklesia, we cannot be far wrong in suspecting that here already we find Valentinus to have been influenced by the prologue of the fourth Gospel (we also find the probably Johan-nine names Monogenes and Parakletos in the See also:series of aeons). (2) The first pair of aeons, Bythos and Sige, is likewise an original innovation of the Valentinian school, and clearly betrays a monistic tendency. According to Irenaeus's account of the " Gnostics " (i. 29), their theory was that Sophia casts herself into the primal sub-stratum of See also:matter to be found outside the celestial world of aeons. In the Valentinian system, primal matter (Bythos), the original Chaos, is brought into connexion with the celestial world of aeons. And thus it is effected that matter is here not found originally and irretrievably separated from the higher celestial world, but that the latter originally exists for itself alone; the fall or disturbance is accomplished within the celestial world, and the material world first comes into existence through the fall. When we subtract from the Ogdoas the two pairs of aeons whose later introduction into the Valentinian system has been demonstrated, we are left actually with a See also:double pair of aeons, the Father and Truth, the Anthropos and the Ekklesia. These strongly recall the Gnostic systems set forth in Irenaeus i. 29 and 30 (cf. i. 29, 3). And thus the Anthropos (man), a leading figure of primitive Gnosticism, now See also:half-forgotten, moves back into the centre of the system and the See also:direct vicinity of the fallen goddess. It is also clear why the Ekklesia appears together with the Anthropos. With the celestial Primal Man—of whom the myth originally relates that he has sunk into matter and then raised him-self up from it again—is associated the community of the faithful and the redeemed, who are to See also:share the same See also:fate with him. Similarly among the Gnostics of Irenaeus i. 29, 3, perfect Gnosis (and thus the whole See also:body of Gnostics) is connected with the Anthropos. (3) The fallen goddess, mentioned above, occurs in the Valentinian system, as in the Gnostic systems described by Irenaeus, and in the older systems it is again the celestial aeon himself who falls, and whose fate outside the Pleroma is related (cf. the exposition in Irenaeus i. 11, Excerpta ex Theodoto,, § 31 seq., and Hippolytus, Syntagma, in the pseudo-Tertullian). In the later Valentinian systems, probably from See also:Secundus onwards (see above), the figure appears in double See also:guise. The higher Sophia still remains within the upper world after creating a disturbance, and after her expiation and repentance; but her premature offspring, Sophia Achamoth, is re-moved from the Pleroma, and becomes the heroine of the rest of the See also:drama (we have dealt in the preceding section with the other conception of the fall of Sophia). (4) In the true Valentinian system the so-called Christos is the son of the fallen Aeon, who is thus conceived as an individual. Sophia, who in a frenzy of love had sought to draw near to the unattainable Bythos, brings forth, through her longing for that higher being, an aeon who is higher and purer than-herself, and at once rises into the celestial worlds. Among the Gnostics of Irenaeus we find a kindred conception, but with a slight difference. Here Christos and Sophia appear as brother and See also:sister, Christos representing the higher and Sophia the lower See also:element. In the enigmatic figure of Christoswe again find hidden the original conception of the Primal Man, who sinks down into matter but rises again. (In the later Valentinian systems this origin of the Christos is entirely obscured, and Christ, together with the See also:Holy Spirit, becomes a later offspring of the celestial world of aeons; this may be looked upon as an approximation to the Christian See also:dogma). (5) A figure entirely peculiar to Valentinian Gnosticism is that of Horos (the Limiter). The name is perhaps an See also:echo of the See also:Egyptian See also:Horus. The peculiar task of Horos is to separate the fallen aeons from the upper world of aeons. At the same time he becomes (first, perhaps, in the later Valentinian systems) a See also:kind of world-creative power, who in this capacity See also:helps to construct an ordered world out of Sophia and her passions. He is also called, curiously enough, Stauros (See also:cross), and we frequently meet with references to the figure of Stauros. But we must not be in too great a See also:hurry to conjecture that this is a Christian figure. Speculations about the Stauros are older than See also:Christianity, and a Platonic conception may have been at work here. See also:Plato had already stated that the world-soul revealed itself in the form of the letter Chi (X) ; by which he meant that figure described in the heavens by the intersecting orbits of the See also:sun and the planetary See also:ecliptic. Since through this double See also:orbit all the movements of the heavenly powers are determined, so all " becoming " and all life depend on it, and thus we can understand the statement that the world-soul appears in the form of an X,or a cross. Thecross can also stand for the wondrous aeon on whom depends the ordering and life of the world, and thus Horos-Stauros appears here as the first redeemer of Sophia from her passions, and as the orderer of the creation of the world which now begins. This explanation of Horos, moreover, is not a mere conjecture, but one branch of the Valentinian school, the Marcosians, have expressly so explained this figure (Irenaeus i. 17, I). Naturally, then, the figure of Horos-Stauros was often in later days assimilated to that of the Christian Redeemer. (6) Peculiarly Valentinian is the above-mentioned derivation of the material world from the passions of Sophia. Whether this already formed part of the original system of Valentinus is, indeed, questionable, but at any See also:rate it plays a prominent part in the Valentinian school, and consequently appears with the most diverse See also:variations in the account given by Irenaeus. By it is effected the See also:comparative See also:monism of the Valentinian system. The See also:dualism of the conception of two separate worlds of See also:light and darkness is over-come by the derivation of the material world from the passions of Sophia. Older myths may here have served as a See also:model; for instance, we may recall the myth of the derivation of the world from the body and limbs of the Primal Man (Bousset, Hauptprobleme der Gnosis, p. 2II). (7) This derivation of the material world from the passions of the fallen Sophia is next affected by an older theory, which probably occupied an important place in the true Valentinian system. Ac-cording to this theory the son of Sophia, whom she forms on the model of the Christos who has disappeared in the Pleroma, becomes the Demiourgos, and this Demiourgos with his angels now appears as the real world-creative power. These two conceptions had now to be combined at all See also:costs. And it is interesting to observe here what efforts were made to give the Demiourgos a better position. Ac-cording to the older conception, he was an imperfect, ignorant, half-evil and malicious offspring of his mother, who has already been deprived of any particle of light (Irenaeus i. 29, 30). In the Valentinian systems he appears as the See also:fruit of Sophia's repentance and See also:conversion. Even his name has been changed from that of the older Gnosticism. He is no longer called Jaldabaoth, but has been assigned the better name, See also:drawn from the See also:philosophy of Plato, of Demiourgos. We must not forget here that the Demiourgos of the Gnostic is known to have corresponded to the God of the Old Testament, who was the God of the Christian Church, and that we can thus See also:lay our See also:finger here on a See also:compromise with the faith of the great Christian community. (8) With the doctrine of the creation of the world is connected the subject of the creation of man. We fortunately know, from a fragment preserved by Clemens, that Valentinus here preserved the old Gnostic myth practically unaltered in his system. According to it, the world-creating angels—not one, but many—create man, but the seed of the spirit comes into their creature without their knowledge, by the agency of a higher celestial aeon, and they are then terrified by the See also:faculty of speech by which their creature rises above them, and try to destroy him. In the Valentinian system known to us this myth has practically lost its original freshness and See also:colour, and can only be arrived at from allusions. On the other See also:hand, the speculations of the Valentinians delight in accounts of the artificial and complicated putting together of the first man out of the various elements. And a specifically Valentinian idea is here added in that of the threefold nature of man, who is represented as at once spiritual, psychical and material. In accordance with this there also arise three classes of men, the pneumatici, the psychici and the hylici (See also:van, matter). It is significant that Valentinus himself is credited with having written a treatise upon the three natures (Schwartz, Aporien, i. 292). Here we have another instance of the theological compromise of the Valentinians. All the other Gnostic systems recognize only a dual See also:division, the children of light and the children of darkness. That the Valentinians should have placed the psychici between the pneumatici and hylici signifies a certain recognition of the Christian Church and its adherents. They are not numbered simply among the outcasts, but considered as an intermediate class, to whom is left the choice between the higher celestial nature and the lower and earthly. (9) At the centre of the whole Valentinian system naturally stands the idea of redemption, and so we find here developed particularly clearly the myth of the heavenly marriage already known from Irenaeus i. 30 to be Gnostic. Redemption is essentially accomplished through the See also:union of the heavenly See also:Soter with the fallen goddess. There is great uncertainty in the Valentinian system as to who this celestial Soter is. In the Gnostic systems of Irenaeus i. 30 he is the Christos, the celestial brother who turns back to the fallen sister. In the Valentinian system the redeemer is likewise sometimes brought into relation with the Christos, sometimes, in a significant way, with the Anthropos, and sometimes again with Horos-Stauros. In the fully developed Ptolemaean system he appears as the common off-See also:spring of the whole Pleroma, upon whom all the aeons confer their best and most wonderful qualities (we may compare here the See also:Marduk myth, in which it is related that all the gods See also:transfer their qualities and powers to the See also:young god Marduk, who is recognized as their leader). And this celestial redeemer-aeon now enters into a marriage with the fallen goddess; they are the " bride and bridegroom." It is boldly stated in the exposition in Hippolytus's See also:Philo'sophzcmena that they produce between them 70 celestial sons (angels). (In the other accounts these angels no longer appear as the sons of the celestial pair, but as the heavenly attendants accompanied by whom the Soter approaches Sophia.) It is obvious from the number 70 that we have here a marriage between a celestial and divine pair. This marriage relation between the Soter and Sophia is expounded in quite a material way even in Irenaeus See also:ill. 3, 4, where the Old Testament phrase irav &ppev Siava-yov o rpav is translated, " the See also:Pan (the all, a name for the Soter), the masculinity which opens the mother's womb." This myth of the redeemer, as we shall see more fully below, and as inay be mentioned here, is of great significance for the See also:practical piety of the Valentinian Gnostics. It is the chief idea of their pious practices mystically to repeat the experience of this celestial union of the Soter with Sophia. In this respect, consequently, the myth underwent yet wider development. Just as the Soter is the bridegroom of Sophia, so the heavenly angels, who some-times appear as the sons of the Soter and Sophia, sometimes as the escort of the Soter, are the See also:males betrothed to the souls of the Gnostics, which are looked upon as feminine. Thus every Gnostic had his See also:angel standing in the presence of God, and the See also:object of a pious life was to bring about and experience this inner union with the celestial abstract personage. This leads us straight to the sacra-See also:mental ideas of this branch of Gnosticism (see below). And it also explains the expression used of the Gnostics in Irenaeus i. 6, 4, that they always meditate upon the See also:secret of the heavenly union (the Syzygia). (to) With this celestial Soter of the Valentinians and the redemption of Sophia through him is connected, in a way which is now not quite intelligible to us, the figure of Jesus of Nazareth and the See also:historical redemption connected with his name. The Soter, the bridegroom of Sophia, and the earthly Jesus See also:answer to each other as in some way identical. Here again we recognize the entirely artificial compromise between Gnosticism and Christianity. It is characteristic of this that in one passage in the account of Irenaeus it is directly stated that the redeemer came specially on account of the psychici, for the pneumatici (the Gnostics) already belong by nature to the celestial world, and no longer require any historical redemption, while the hylici have fallen beforehand into damnation, so that with the psychici only is there any question as to whether they will turn to redemption or damnation, and for them the historical redeemer is of efficacy (Irenaeus i. 6, 1). This assertion is in thorough agreement with the fundamental tendency of Gnostic piety; for the Gnostics individual redemption has actually been accomplished in the union between the Soter and Sophia, and is effected for the individual Gnostics in repeating the experience of this union. So that in effect they no longer require the historical redemption through Jesus. (II) Among the manifold confusion of opinions as to the nature and characteristics of the Redeemer Jesus of Nazareth, certain explanations stand out as characteristically Valentinian, especially those in which it is laid down that even the redeemer has a threefold nature; from his mother, Sophia, he derived his nature as a pneumaticos, in the world of the Demiourgos he was united with the Christos, and finally a wonderful bodily nature was formed for him from celestial elements, which was yet not of earthly material. As such he was miraculously born of the Virgin, as through a See also:canal (Mt o's X vos). The compromises with the See also:Catholic Church are here obvious. According to this theory Jesus, having an element of the psychical nature, can appear in virtue of this as the son of the Demiourgos, i.e. of the Old Testament God, and as the Redeemer of the psychici; and when we read of this miraculous bodily nature, which is not composed of earthly material, there is an obvious compromise between the fundamental heresy of Gnosticism, Docetism and the dogma of the Christian Church as to the true bodily nature of the Redeemer. Into this already complicated Christology is now introduced by an obscure See also:combination, in the systems known to us, the idea that upon this Jesus, so constituted, yet another celestial nature, the Christos or the Soter, has descended at his See also:baptism. This is the older and peculiar Gnostic conception of Irenaeus i. 30, which appears to have been introduced into Valentinianism at a See also:late See also:stage of its development. The See also:express statement is Hippolytus 6, 35, that this doctrine was shared only by the Italic branch of the Valentinians, but disclaimed by the Anatolian branch, also bears on the point. (12) The See also:close of the drama and the final accomplishment of the redemption is also depicted by the Valentinian writings in accordance with the old Gnosticism. A See also:general ascent takes place, the Soter returns with the liberated Sophia into the Pleroma, and likewise the Gnostics with the angels with whom they are connected. But it is characteristic of the Valentinian system that the Demiourgos and the psychici who are connected with him also ascend to the eighth or highest heaven of Achamoth, while the remaining material world sinks into flames. VI. The first survey of these confused speculations, these myths gathered together and preserved from the See also:ancient world, this marshalling together of the most varied traditions, and above all, these artificial attempts at compromise dictated by practical prudence, makes us inclined to doubt whether it was possible for any true piety to coexist with all this. Yet suchpiety existed, indeed we have here a set of See also:regular mystics. It is not, indeed, a purely spiritual and mystical piety, but a See also:mysticism much distorted and over-grown with sacramental additions and a mysterious cult. But all this is not without an inner value and an attractive See also:atmosphere. Our information, it is true, is scant; most of it is to be found in the fragments of the letters and homilies of the master of the school preserved for us by Clemens. The central point of the piety of Valentinus seems to have been tha mystical contemplation of God; in a letter preserved in Clemens ii. 20, 114, he sets forth that the soul of man is like an See also:inn, which is inhabited by many evil spirits. " But when the Father, who alone is See also:good, looks down and around him, then the soul is hallowed and lies in full light, and so he who has such a See also:heart as this is to be called happy, for he shall behold God." But this contemplation of God, as Valentinus, closely and deliberately following the doctrines of the Church, and with him the compiler of the Gospel of See also: The See also:ritual of this sacrament is briefly indicated by Irenaeus i. 21, 3: " A few of them prepare a bridal chamber and in it go through a form of See also:consecration, employing certain fixed formulae, which are repeated over the See also:person to be initiated, and stating that a spiritual marriage is to be performed after the See also:pattern of the higher Syzygia." Through a fortunate See also:chance, a liturgical See also:formula which was used at this sacrament appears to be preserved, though in a garbled form and in an entirely different connexion, the author seeming to have been uncertain as to its original meaning. It runs: " I will confer my favour upon thee, for the father of all See also:sees thine angel ever before his See also:face . . we must now become as one; receive now this See also:grace from me and through me; See also:deck thyself as a bride who awaits her bridegroom, that See also:thou mayest become as I am, and I as thou See also:art. Let the seed of light descend into thy bridal chamber; receive the bridegroom and give place to him, and open thine arms to embrace him. Behold, grace has descended upon thee." Besides this the Gnostics already practised baptism, using the same form in all essentials as that of the Christian Church. The name given to baptism, at least among certain bodies, was apolytrosis (liberation) ; the baptismal formulae have been mentioned above. Great importance attaches in the Gnostic sacramental speculations to invocation (of the name). The Gnostics are baptized in the mysterious name which also descended upon Jesus at his baptism. The angels of the Gnostics have also had to be baptized in this name, in order to bring about redemption for themselves and the souls belonging to them (excerpla ex Theodoto, 22). In this connexion we also find the formula X&rpmoev G.yatXuoiv (for the angelic redemption, Irenaeus i. 21, 3). In the baptismal formulae the sacred name of the Redeemer is mentioned over and over again. In one of the formulae occur the words: " I would enjoy thy name, Saviour of Truth." The concluding formula of the baptismal ceremony is: " See also:Peace over all upon whom the Name rests " (Irenaeus i. 21, 3). This name pronounced at baptism over the faithful has above all the significance that the name will protect the soul in its ascent through the heavens, conduct it safely through all hostile powers to the lower heavens, and procure it See also:access to Horos, who frightens back the lower souls by his magic word (exc. ex Theodoto, 22). And for this life also baptism, in consequence of the pronouncing of the protecting name over the baptized person, accomplishes his liberation from the lower daemonic powers. Before baptism the Heirmarmene is supreme, but after baptism the soul is free from her (exc. ex Theod. 97). With baptism was also connected the See also:anointing with oil, and hence we can also understand the death sacrament occurring among the Valentinians consisting in an anointing with a mixture of oil and See also:water (Irenaeus i. 21, 4). This death sacrament has naturally the express object of assuring the soul the way to the highest heaven " so that the soul may be intangible and invisible to the higher mights and powers " (Irenaeus, loc. cit.). In this connexion we also find a few formulae which are entrusted to the faithful, so that their souls may pronounce them on their See also:journey upwards. One of these formulae runs: " I am a son of the Father, the Father who was before the whole world—I came to see everything, that which is See also:strange and that which is my own; and deep down there is nothing strange, but only that which belongs to Achamoth. For she is the feminine aeon, and she has made all things. I draw my See also:sex from that which was before the world, and take back to it the See also:property from which I came " (Irenaeus i. 21, 5). Another formula is appended, in which there is a distinction in the invocation between the higher and lower Sophia. Another See also:prayer of the same See also:style is to be found in Irenaeus i. 13, and it is expressly stated that after prayer is pronounced the Mother throws the Homeric helm:t (cf. the Tarnkappe) over the faithful soul, and so makes him invisible to the mights and powers which surround and attack him. On the other hand, we see how here and there a reaction took place against the absurdity of this sacramental superstition. Thus Irenaeus (i. 2I, 4) tells us of certain Gnostics who would admit no See also:external holy practices as efficacious: " The completed apolytrosis is the actual knowledge of the inexpressible See also:majesty (of God), for through See also:ignorance arose all faultiness and suffering, and through knowledge will be removed all the conditions which arose from ignorance; and therefore knowledge (gnosis) is the perfecting of the inner man." A pure piety, rising above mere sacramentalism, breathes in the words of the Gnostics preserved in excerpta ex Theodoto, 78, 2: " But not baptism alone sets us free, but knowledge (gnosis) : who we were, what we have become, where we were, whither we have sunk, whither we hasten, whence we are redeemed, what is See also:birth and what rebirth." Catholic Church. Valentinus's own life indicates that he for a long time sought to remain within the See also:official Church, and had at first no idea of See also:founding a community of his own. Many compromises in his theories point the same way. The Johannine tendencies of his doctrine of the aeons (Logos, Zoe, Aletheia, Parakletos) ; the attempt to modify the See also:sharp dualism of Gnosticism in a monistic direction; the derivation of the world from the fallen Sophia; the favourable See also:judgment of the Demiourgos, and his origin in the repentance and conversion of Sophia, which are peculiar to the Valentinian system; the triple division of mankind into pneunzatici, psychici and hylici, which is obviously contrived for the benefit of the psychici; the inclusion of an element of the psychici in the See also:composition of the Redeemer; the theory that Jesus possessed a miraculous body formed in the upper world; the emphasis on the fact that the redemption of Jesus was primarily for the psychici; the doctrine that by the final redemption the Demiourgos and the psychici find a place in the Ogdoas; the See also:adoption of Christian baptism—all this, and perhaps more, indicates a definite and deliberate approach towards the doctrine of the Church. These Gnostics, as in the See also:case of most of the other Gnostic sects, possessed their own peculiar holy writings and books, but they also made a great use in their own circle of the See also:canon of the Christian Church, especially the canon of the New Testament and—though with a few reservations—of the Old Testament. Irenaeus in his account of the Ptolemaean sects has used a source which contained a detailed scriptural ex-position of the Valentinian doctrines based on the New Testament. We can even—and this is of great See also:interest and significance for the See also:history of the canon—establish the contents of the Gnostic canon. It included the three first gospels and the apostle Paul. The proofs are constantly drawn firstly from the utterances of the Saviour, and then from the Epistles of Paul. The Gospel of John does not seem to have yet found a place in this canon, for the very good See also:reason that it was not yet widely known and circulated. Later Valentinian Gnosticism delighted in making use of the Johannine Gospel as a crowning testimony. Thus to the older and ancient scriptural evidences which we mentioned above, Irenaeus (i. 8, 5) directly appends a commentary on the Gospel of John, which is ascribed to Ptolemaeus himself., And in the excerpla ex Theodoto, 6 seq., we also find a commentary on the prologue to this Gospel. And we know that the later Valentinian Herakleon wrote a detailed exposition of the whole Gospel. But the Old Testament too was a sacred book of these Gnostics, and its statements were used as See also:evidence and proofs. This was done with some diffidence and caution. The attitude, at least of the later Valentinians, is best indicated by the letter of Ptolemaeus to Flora, which is preserved in Epiphanius 33, 3-7. Ptolemaeus here openly attacks the doctrine that the Old Testament is the work of the See also:devil, or that it cannot at least be ascribed unconditionally, to the Supreme God. The Old Testament he considers to contain a system of See also:laws given by God himself, a system of laws given by See also:Moses according to his own ideas, and precepts interpolated by the elders of the See also:people. The laws of God himself fall then into three classes: the true See also:law, which is not interwoven with evil; the law permeated with unrighteousness, which the Redeemer has dissolved; and the typical and symbolical law, which the Redeemer has translated from the material into the spiritual. Thus there is a See also:gradual approach to the Christian Church's conception of the Old Testament. (It should indeed be remarked that Ptolemaeus in the above-mentioned letter has purposely expounded the exoteric doctrine in See also:special approximation with the Catholic Church, while for the actual difficult questions as to the nature of the Demiourgos and his relation with the unity of the Divine nature he consoles Flora with a further and more intimate instruction.) And yet this reconciliation of Gnosticism was a fruitless and henceforward a purposeless undertaking. Oriental dualism and wildly intemperate Oriental See also:mythology had grown into so See also:radical and essential a part of Gnosticism that they could not be separated from it to make way for a purer and more spiritual view of See also:religion. And at a time when the prevailing tendency of Christianity was a struggle out of the darkness of Oriental mythology and See also:eschatology into clearness, and an effort towards union with the lucid simplicity of the Hellenic spirit, these Gnostics, for all their efforts, and even the most See also:noble of them, had come too late. They are not the men of a forward movement, but they are, and remain, in spite of all clearer insight, the See also:rear-guard in the history of piety, who have gone under and disappeared in a struggle with the impossible. None the less we cannot omit the observation that the Christian Church in later centuries to a certain extent travelled again over Gnostic ground in its sacra-mental theories and fully developed Christological speculations. See Bibliography to See also:article GNOSTICISM. Also A. Harnack, Dogmengeschichte, vol. i. (4th ed,, 1909) ; W. Bousset, Haupiprobleme der Gnosis (1907). See also Pauly-Wissowa, Realencyklopadie des klassischen Altertums, s.v. Gnosticismus, Gnostiker. More particularly devoted to Valentinianism are: G. Heinrici, Die Valentinianische Gnosis and die heiligen Schriften (1871) ; E. Schwartz, " Aporien int 4 Evangelium " in Nachrichien der Gott. Gesellsch. der Wissensch. (1908), ii. 127—41; A. Harnack, Brief des Ptolemaeus an die Flora, Sitaungsber. der Berl. Akademie (1909). (W. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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