Desirous of making the words of St. Paul,1"Every creature groaneth and is in labor even till now, and not only it, but we ourselves also, waiting for the adoption of the sons of God, the redemption of our body," fall in with his peculiar views, he set himself about devising a means of introducing the second and third sons into the Pleroma. When the fullness of time came, in which a revelation should be made to the children of God, the Gospel was given to man. The son of the Supreme God revealed, through the medium of the Holy Ghost, the scheme of salvation to the son of the Great Archon. The latter, being now called Christ, revealed the plan to his father, who bowed in fear before the majesty of the Ineffable and Supreme Being. The news, which had come from the Ineffable Being, was now spread throughout the entire upper heaven, or Ogdoas, and the Blessed Son was taught by the Holy Ghost what was the origin of all things, and informed that everything would again return whence it came. Christ next communicated the knowledge he had received to the son of the Archon of the Hebdomas, who began to announce the Gospel in this realm, where it was accepted with as much readiness as in the Ogdoas. After all the realms, as well as the infinite apɣai, dvváμss, ¿ŝovoia, and the three hundred and sixty-five heavens, whose great Archon is Abraxas, had been illumined by the light of the Gospel, the unknown mystery was then revealed to the son who had remained behind in the lowest world. The lowest Archon held sway here until the time of Moses. The latter revealed the Great Archon, who sent the Prophets into the world. Jesus, the son of Mary, was the first man who received the light of the Gospel in the lowest world after it had been announced in the Ogdoas and the Hebdomas. Mary was over 1 Rom. viii. 19 sq. 2 Εὐαγγέλιόν ἐστι κατ ̓ αὐτοὺς ἡ τῶν ὑπερκοσμίων γνῶσις, ὡς δεδήλωται, ἣν ὁ μέγας ČрXWV оvк ýπÍσTαTо.-The Gospel is, according to them, the revealed knowledge of things supermundane, which the Great Creator Himself did not believe. 3 Prov. i. 5. and Ps. xxxi. 5. shadowed by the Most High, and Jesus became His Power. His office was to purify the son who had been left behind in the lowest world, and who personifies the sonship of his race, by announcing the Gospel to him, that he too, with his whole people, might gain entrance into the Pleroma; to separate all the elements and adjust them in their proper places, for in this arrangement consists the añоxaτáσταos, or reëstablishment of all things. Nay, more; the sole object Christ had in view in suffering was to separate in this way the different elements of which His person was composed. The material body, or suffering part of Him, returned to matter (apopcia); the animal, or psychical parts belonging to the Hebdomas, returned again to this realm of the second Archon, and the spiritual parts entered into Pleroma, where they continue to exercise a purifying influence upon the world, the realm of the third son, who was left behind, and the elements of which being united take their flight to abodes in the regions above. When all this had been done, the Ineffable God spread a great ignorance (τὴν μεγάλην ἄγνοια»), and cut off the people of one realm from all knowledge of the others, that there might be no desire in any being to seek for anything beyond that which corresponded with its own nature. The accounts given of the system of Basilides by St. Irenaeus and Epiphanius, who till, within a very recent period, were the principal sources whence a knowledge of his teaching was derived, though differing in many particulars from that contained in the Philosophumena, also agrees with it in many points. According to these two writers, Basilides admitted a Primitive Being, incomprehensible and ineffable (veòs äßßytos, or àzatovópaσtos). Seven powers (duváμss) proceeded from this First Being, viz., vous, Understanding; kóros, the Word; φρόνησις, Prudence; σοφία, Wisdom; δύναμις, Power; δικαιοσύνη, Justice; and ɛ¿phy, Peace; who constituted the First Heaven, or realm of spirits. From this realm a second is formed, from this again a third, and so on, each successive realm being more imperfect than that which preceded it, till finally they reach the mystic number 365, and altogether are designated by the name 'Aßpasas. The numbers corresponding to the Greek letters of which this name is composed, if added together, will give the number 365.1 The last emanation brought the perfection of the Pleroma on the confines of chaos. The chaotic powers then entered the Pleroma by force, and having taken some particles of light, confined them in matter. Afterward, the first (ó doywv) of the seven angels of the lowest order, the God of the Jews, created an imperfect world of matter and sense. The Primitive Being sent an Eon, His First Born (vo~5), to raise man from his imperfect state, teach him the knowledge of the true God, and restore him to the Kingdom of Light (àлozatáσtαois). This spirit descended on the man Jesus at the moment of His baptism, and dwelt in Him as an Eon till the time of His death approached, when, The Word (voŨ5) having separated from Him, the man Jesus suffered alone. The Basilidians were very particular to celebrate the anniversary of this baptism (3ñçáve‹α) with great solemnity. After the death of Jesus, those who acknowledged and confessed the Crucified were regarded as the slaves of the Creator of the world and the God of the Jews; while, on the con trary, those who confessed the Savior (ph 'p, kav lakav2), were destined to be elevated above Angels and Principalities and Powers. This doctrine, the knowledge of which was confined to only a few of the elect, was capable of disengaging man from all physical and material restraints, so that the soul, thus brought into immediate contact with the Supreme Being, enjoyed an intuitive knowledge of the Deity, and the will, set free from the bonds of the body, naturally inclined to 1 The letters of the word "Mithras," the Persian sun-god, will do the same, whence it has been inferred that Basilides spent some time in Persia. The word "Abraxas" itself is Coptic, and means "Hallowed be The Name." King's Gnostics, p. 36. (Tr.) Bellermann, Essay on the Gems of the Ancients, with the figure of Abraxas, Berlin, 1817-19, three pieces; and Gieseler, in his Researches and Criticisms, No. 2. This spiritist arithmetic is, perhaps, founded on the astronomy of the Egyptian priests, but more certainly to be reduced to the Pythagorean doctrine of numbers. Conf. Iren. II. 14, n. 6. 2 According to Isaias xxviii. 10. good without being impelled by any external law (zarókqıs νοητική). But in order to arrive at the perfect purity characteristic of the Realm of Light, Basilides held, that a series of transmigrations, or a metempsychosis, was necessary, a doctrine which gave rise to a code of morality among his followers of an extremely severe and ascetical nature, but which, in the course of time, became very much relaxed. The causes which conduced to such relaxation were principally two: first, a desire to excuse a denial of the Crucified when persecution threatened, for the Christian martyrs were supported during their sufferings by the hope of rising again in the body, which would not be the case if the doctrine of transmigration were true; and second, a wish to gratify their unbridled passions. These degenerate Basilidians are mentioned as late as the fourth century. 2. THE ANTI-JEWISH OPHITES. Iren. I. 30. Clement. Alex. Stromata, lib. VII., c. 27. Orig. ctr. Cels. VI. 3. Philosophum., lib. V., c. 6, and VIII., c. 20. Epiphan. haer. 37. Theodoret. haeret., fabb. I. 14. Augustin. de haeresib., c. 17. Lipsius, The Ophite Systems (Periodical of Scientific Theol., 1863, No. 4; 1864, No. 1). Gruber, The Ophites, Würzbg. 1864. C. W. King, The Gnostics and their Remains, London, 1864. The sect of the Ophites, called also Naasseni, or serpent worshipers, from oq, a serpent, or —nachash—was probably derived from the Egyptian worship of animals, and particularly of the snake. They afterward adopted Christian ideas, and, in fact, based their whole system upon a distorted meaning of a passage from Genesis. It so closely resembles the system of Valentinus (vide n. 3), that many have conjectured that both had one common origin, and that the system of Valentinus is only a more elaborate development of the simpler form of the Ophites. 1 According to the Ophitic system, there was a series of emanations, the first of which started from Bythus, also called the First Man (ó πрãτós ävсρшñоç), as an image of himself and Silence, evvoia, or, and being the first creative act of man, 1 C. iii. was also called the Second Man (ó deúrspor avdрwлos), and the Son of Man (υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, or 'Αδάμας). From this emanation proceeded яvõμɑ åɣrov, or the Holy Spirit, who became the mother of life and wisdom (μήτηρ τῶν ζώντων, ἡ ἄνω oogia). The union of Heaven and Wisdom (σogia) with the two former beings gave rise to two others, the first of which was a perfect male and the Heavenly Christ (ó ávw Xpiótós), and the second a perfect female and the Sophia-Achamoth (po'Vazo-the violated). The latter, unable to ascend to the Deity, attempted to form an independent world of her own by imparting her own vitalizing power to matter, during which the consciousness of her former high origin and estate became obscured. The Heavenly Christ and His mother ascended into primeval light, and while there, endeavoring, with the aid of the first two Beings, to form a Holy Church, Sophia-Achamoth, because of her hatred of God, gave birth to the tyrannical Jaldabaoth (-Son of Chaos), the God of the Jews. He, in turn, begot six beings, who, together with himself, became the spirits of the seven planets. These six beings created man as a crude mass of matter, without a soul, which Jaldabaoth breathed into him, but, while doing so, a ray of light passed from his mother, and, contrary to his will, into human nature. Man having got this far along, appropriated to himself all the light of creation, so that he was no longer a reflection of his Creator, but was in the image of the First Man. Jaldabaoth, envious of this superiority, gazed into the depths of the sea, and while looking upon his image, which he saw reflected there, created Satan under the form of a serpent (¿çroμópyos), who was at enmity with everything above, and even with Jaldabaoth himself, from whom, though his creator, he labored to estrange all things. Sophia-Achamoth, now stricken with grief on account of her former conduct, made an attempt to frustrate the designs of the Serpent. After she had earnestly pursued her purpose for some time, she was strengthened by congenial light, and enabled to ascend to her former high estate. At a certain intermediate point (tóños tãs μsoórqτos), penetrated by a purer light, she was enabled to free herself almost entirely from the shackles of the body. She had herself sug |