As to his peculiar tenets, also, " there is great di^ ference of opinion. Some consider his system to be pure Gnosticism ; others a compound of Gnosticism, Judaism, and Christianity. Irenasus says, * Cerinthus taught that the world was not made by the supreme God, but by a certain power (Demiurge) separate from Him, and below Him, and ignorant of Him. Jesus he supposed not to be bom of a virgin, but to be the son of Joseph and Mary, bom altogether as other men are \^ but he excelled all men in virtue, knowledge, and wis- dom. At His baptism, the Christ came down upon Him, from God who is over all, in the shape of a dove ; and then He declared to the world the unknown Father, and wrought miracles. At the end, the Christ left Je- tns, and Jesus suffered and rose again, but the Christ, beiitg spiritual, was impassible.' Epiphanius says near- ly the same, but asserts that Cerinthus taught that the world was made by angels, and that he opposed the apostles in Judsa. It appears that Cerinthus consid- ered Christ an ordinary man, bom in the usual way, and devoid of miraculous powers, but distinguished from the rest of the Jews by possessing superior wis- dom, so that He was worthy to be chosen as the Mes- riah ; that he knew nothing of his high dignity till it was revealed to Him in His baptism by John, when He was consecrated to the Messiahship, and ftarnished with the necessary powers for the fhlfilment of His office by the descent of the supreme Logos or Spirit from the heavens, which hung over Him like a dove, and at length entered into His heart; that He was then raised to the dignity of the Son of God, began to perform mirades, and even angels, were now taught by His revelations ; that redemption could not be eflRact- ed by His sufferings. Jesus, in union with the mighty Spirit of God, could not sufl^, but must triumph over aU His enemies. The veiy fact of suffering was as- sumed to be a proof that the Spirit of Grod, which had been previously united to Him, was now separated from Him, and had returned to the Father. The suf- ferings were of the man Jesus, rfbw left to himself. Cerinthus denied also the resurrection of Christ He idhered in part to Judaism, and considered the Mosaic law bmding on Christians. He taught that the right- eous would enjoy a paradise of delights in Palestine, and that the man Jesus, through the power of the Lo- gos again coming upon him, as the Messiah, would reign a thousand years** (Farrar, Eccks, Did, s. v.). It is supposed that Cerinthus and his doctrines are al- luded to in John's Gospel. The tyttem of Cerinthus seems to combine Ebionitism with Gnosticism, and the Judaeo-Christian mOlenarianism. A full discus- sion of Cerinthus and his doctrines is given by Mos- bdm, Commemt. c. i, § 70. See also Gieseler, Ch. Hid, period i, § 36; Hagenbach, HUi. o/Doctrmet, i, § 28; Neander,CSI. Hut, i, 896; Neander. PkaiHng, etc, i, 825, 992; Domer, Lehre p. d. Person Chrigti, i, 810; Lard- ner,iroHb, vui, 404 sq. ; Schaff, Ch, Hiet. i, 286; Pau- las, Historia Cermthi (Jena, 1795) ; Schmidt, in BibU- (Mtfvr KrUiky etc. i, 181 sq. ; Cunningham, Histor- ieal Theology, i, 125 sq.
Certitode of Salvation. See Assurakcb.
Cemlarliui. See CjnuLABivtf.
Cesar, Cesarea, Ceaarius. See Csbab, CiS-
SABEA, CiBSABIUS.
Ceatiua Oalltts, son of C. Cestius Gallns Camero- nus, was governor (legatus) of Syria A.D. 64, 65, when the Jews broke out into the rebellion which ended in the destruction of their metropolis and Temple by Titus. Maddened by the tyranny of Gessius Floras (q. v.), they applied to Gallus for protection; but, though he sent Neapolitanus, one of his officers, to investigate the case, and received from him a report ikvorable to the Jews, he took no effectual steps either to redress their ii^uries or to prepare for any outbreak hito which their discontent might drive them. When at last he found it necessary to act, he marched from Antioch, and, hav- ing taken Ptolemais and Lydda, advanced on Jerusa- lem. There he drove the Jews into the upper part of the city and the precincts of the Temple, and might, according to Josephus, have finished the war at once, had he not been dissuaded by some of his officers from pursuing his advantage. Soon after he unaccounta- bly (comp. Matt zxiv, 15, 16) drew off his forces, and was much harassed in his retreat by the Jews, who took flx>m him a quantity of spoU. Nero was at the time in Achaia, and Gallus sent messengers to him to give an account of his afikirs as frtvorable as possible to himself. The emperor, however, much exasperated, commissioned Vespasian to oonduct the war ; and the language of Tadtus seems to imply that Gallus died before the arrival of his successor, his death being probably hastened by vexation. (Josephus, Life, 48 ; War, ii, 14, 8; 16, 1 and 2; 18, 9 and 10; 19, 1-9 ; 20, 1 ; iii, 1 ; Tacit. Bitt, v, 10 ; Sueton. Veep, 4.)— Smith, Dictionary of Biograpky, ii, 226. See Jerusalem.
Ce'^tab (Ki7ra/3, Vulg. C4itnfy, given (1 Esdr. ▼, 80) as one of the ** servants of the Temple" whose **^n8" returned from Babylon; but the Heb. lists (Ezra ii, 46 ; Neh. vii, 48) do not contain any corre- sponding name.