he and Epiphanius {Hcer. p. 28) say that Cerinthus taught that the world was not made by the Most High God, but by a lower power,' or by angels, and that Je- sus was an ordinary man, whom the supreme Logos became united with at his baptism, but forsook during his last sufferings, to reunite with him in the future kingdom of Messianic glory. See Cerinthus. Here the Gnosticism becomes plainh' perceptible, and we can certainly understand a number of passages in John's Gospel and Epistles better if we suppose a refer- ence in them to these and similar errors. The Nico- laitans of the Apocalypse and the false teachers of the Epistle of Jude despised Judaism as the work of evil angels, ridiculed and trampled upon the law that they might insult these limited powers, and thus fell into a strange complication of gross licentiousness and bodily mortifications (Burton, Heresies of the Apost. Age ; Pot- ter in the old and W. L. Alexander in the new edition of Kitto's Cychp. ; Conybeare, in Conybeare and How- son's Life of St. Paul, note at the end of vol. i. Conip. C. C. Tittmann, De vestigiis Gnosticor. in N. T.frustra quwsitis, Leips. 1773 ; transl. and publ. in Cont lib ut ions to Foreign Literature, New York, 1827). No sooner had the direct influence of the apostles and their immedi- ate successors ceased than the speculative interest and numbers of the Gnostics began to increase mightily. Near the commencement of the 2d centurj', flourislied about the same time Basilides in Alexandria and his son Isidore [see Basilides], the dualistic and ascetic Saturniniis in Antioch, Carpocrates of Alexandria, and his son Epiphanes. The last two maintained that ev- ery one who could soar to the same height of contem- plation might attain the same powers with Christ, and that Christ diflered in no respect from the wise and good of all nations. About the same time we first be- come acquainted with the party commonly called Oph- ite?, tl:ough Origen saj-s that it was founded by a cer- tain Euphrates, who must have lived as early as the time of Christ. Their common appellation (Ophites, Heb. Naasenes) was given them bj' their opponents (for they always called themselves simply Gnostics), because they were said to paj"^ great honor to the ser- pent as the instrument of the temptation in Eden. As the prohibition then transgressed was designed to keep man back from knowledge, what is commonlj' called the Fall was, in fact, a transition to a higher state. Wlien first known the}' resided principally in Egypt and in Phrygia. They afterwards became numer- ous, and branched off into various subdivisions. See Ophites. Great difierences, however, are discovera- ble between those who bear the same name. In the next generation (A.D. 140-lCO) belongs Yalentinus, who flourished first in Egypt and then in Itomc, and finally died in the island of Cyprus (about A.D. IGO). The school named after him was the most influential of all the Gnostic parties, and contained a large num- ber of talented and eminent teachers. It was divided into an Oriental and an Italian branch, in both of which was inculcated a highly exalted style of relig- ion. Among its most esteemed writers may be mention- ed Ileracleon of Alexandria, who wrote a commentary on John's Gospel, some extracts from which, preserved in Origen, admirabl}' l)ring out the profound spirit of this evangelist ; Ptolemy, whose epistle to Flora has come down to us in Epiphanius, and endeavors to show that his system was not inconsistent with the Catholic faitli ; Marcus, probably a Jew of Palestine, in whose poetic and symbolical work divine reons discourse in ! liturgical forms ; and Bardesanes, an Armenian of Edessa (about 170), who, with his son Harmoiiius, was immensely popular as a writer of hymns and imi- tations of David's Psalms. (See the articles under these names.) Contemporary with Valentinus lived Cerdon, a Syrian, and his pupil Marcion of Sinope, in Pontus, who carried their zeal for Pauline and primi- tive Christianity to such an extreme that they rejected not only all secret traditions, but large portions of the
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New Testament. They opposed heathen religions as the work of the devil, and Judaism as the product of an inferior and wratliful deity, who was to be put down liy Ciirist and the revelation tiirough him of the su- j)reme God. Kindred witli him were Apelles of Alex- andria, and liis pupils Lucas and Marcus, who approx- imated still nearer a Christian orthodox}', though with singular inconsistencies. Tatian, a Syrian, a rhetori- cian in Rome, during the latter part of liis life is said to have fallen into Gnostic errors, and to have pre- scribed a svstem of extreme abstinence as the only means of disengaging ourselves from the world. A part}' of Encratites, calling themselves by his name or by that of his pupil Severus, continued as late as the 4th centmy. A class of persons represented by the Clementine Homilies at liome, and sometimes reck- oned among the Gnostics, ought rather to be classed with the Ebionites. See CLtMEXTiNES, We now come in contact with several classes of the Ophites, many of whom, according to Origen, went so far in their opposition to ordinary views that they admitted none to their assemblies who did not curse Christ (Ne- ander, i, 446 sq.). The whole system of the God of the Jews was looked upon by this sect as oppressive to man, and whoever is represented in the scriptural history as rebelling against it were regarded as saints. Hence some of the worst characters of the Old and New Testament were held in the highest honor. Even Jesus was reckoned among agents of the Jewish Jeho- vah, and his betrayal by Judas Iscariot was extolled as done with the best of motives and results. Those who maintained this position were called Cainites, while such as dissented from such extravagances were dis- tinguished as Sethites. The Perates, who have re- cently become known to us through the Philosophou- niena, appear to have approximated much nearer the Catholic doctrine. During the 3d century Gnosticism appears to have lost its power, for the orthodox party had now attained more scientific precision of thought, and their formulas of fiiith presented scriptural doc- trine in a style consistent witli the highest culture of the age. Towards the close of that century, however, arose in the distant E:tst one more attempt to combine Christianity with Oriental theosophy. Manichasism sprang up in a region where neither Hellenism nor Judaism was familiar ; and its object appears to have been to reform the corrupted Parsism of that daj' b}' incorporating with the original system of Zoroaster numerous elements taken from a gnosticized Christi- anitj' and Buddhism. To Christianity, however, it seems to have been indebted more for its names and symbols than for its essential history or characters. Personages and facts taken from scriptural records fmd in that system an entirely new significance. Its found- er (Mani or Manes, a Magian banished from Persia) discovered many points of agreement between the doc- trines of Parsism, Buddhism, and Gnostic Christianity, and endeavored to combine these three sj'stems into one universal religion. He accounted for all things on dualistic principles. His followers were soon driv- en by persecution from their earliest seats, but were numerous during the fourth century in every part of the East, and in Africa, Sicily, and Italy. IMan}' per- sons of noble spirit wore attracted by it, but it soon fell into gross licentiousness l)v its professed exaltation above outward things, and of course lost its place in common esteem, and fell into contempt. Some ves- tiges, however, both of Marcionism and Manichaeism, remained even into the Middle Ages, and by means of the Priscillianists, the Paulicians, the Bogomiles, and tlie Cathari, transmitted the leading features of Gnos- ticisnx to distant ages and countries.