So meagre is our information regarding the Ophites that it is difficult to give much of an exhibit of them or their doctrines. Their principles appear to have been a compound of the mysteries of Isis and of the involved fancies of Oriental mythology, mingled with corrupt notions of Christian historj' and doctrine. The doctrines maintained by this sect in regard to the origin and destination of man are thus described by Neander :
"The empire of Jaldabaoth is the starry world. The stars are the representatives and organs of the cosmical principle, which seeks to hold man's spirit in bondage and servitude, and to environ it with all manner of de- lusions. Jaldabaoth, and the six angels begotten by him, are the spirits of the seven planets, the bini,the Moon, Mars, Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, and Saturn. It is the en- VIL— E B
deavor of Jaldabaoth to assert himself as self-subsistent Lord and Creator, to keep his six angels from deserting their subjection, and, lest they should look up and ob- serve the higher world of light, to fix their attention npon some object in another quarter. To this end he called npon the six angels to create man, after their own com- mon image, as the crowning seal of their independent creative power. Man was created, and being in their own image, was a huge corporeal mass, but without a soul. He crept on the earth, and had not power to lift himself erect. They therefore brought the helpless creature to their Father, that he might animate it with a soul. Jaldabaoth breathed Into it a living spirit, and thus, unperceived by himself, the spiritual seed passed from his own being into the nature of man, whereby he was deprived himself of this higher principle of life. Thus had the Sophia or- dained it. In man (i. e. those men who had received some portion of this spiritual seed) was concentrated the light, the soul, the reason of the whole creation. Jalda- baoth was now seized with amazement and wrath when he beheld a being created by himself, and within the bounds of his own kingdom, rising both above himself and his kingdom. He strove therefore to prevent man from beconnng conscious of his higher natme, and of that higher order of world to which he had now become related— to keep him in a state of blind unconsciousness, and thus of slavish submission. It was the jealousy of the contracted Jaldabaoth which issued that command to the tirst man; but the mundane soul employed the ser- pent as an instrument to defeat the purpose of Jaldaba- oth by tempting the tirst man to disobedience. Accord- ing to another view, the serpent was itself a symbol or disguised appearance of the mundane soul: and, iu the strict sense, it is that part of the sect only that adopted this view which rightly received the name of Ophites, for they actually worshipped the serpent as a holy symbol ; to which they may have been led by an analogousidea in the Egyptian religion, the serpent in the latter beinr; look- ed upon as a symbol of Kneph,who resembled the Sophia of the Ophites. At all events, it was through the mun- dane soul, directly or indirectly, that the eyes of the first man were opened. The fall of man — and this presents a characteristic feature of the Ophitic system, though even in this resjiect it was perhaps not altojrether independent of the prior Valentinian theory— the fall of man was the transition point from a state of unconscious limitation to one of conscicnis freedom. Man now became wise, and renounced his allegiance to Jaldabaoth. The latter, angry at this disobedience, thrust him from the upper region of air, where until now he had dwelt in an ethereal body, down to the dark earth, and banished him into a dark body. Man found himself now placed in a situation where, on the one hand, the seven planetaiy spirits scnight to hold him under their thrall, and to suppress the hiL'her consciousness in his soul; while, on the other hand, the wicked and purely material spirits tried to tempt him into sin and idolatry, which would expose him to the venge- ance of the severe Jaldabaoth. Yet 'wisdom' never ceased to impart new strength to man's kindred nature by fresh supplies of the higher spiritual influence: and from Seth, whom the Gnostics generally regarded as a representative of the contemplative nature, slie was able to preserve throu<;h every age a race peculiarly her own, in which the seeds of the spiritual nature were saved from destruction. The doctrines of the Ophites were far from being favorable to purity of morals. Origen indeed goes so far as to exclude them from the Christian Church, and declares that they admitted none to their assemblies who did not curse Christ. Ireuajus, Theodoret, Epiphanius, and Augustine regard them as Christian heretics. Origeu gives a minute account of the Diagram of the Ophites, which appears to have been a sort of tablet on which they depicted their doctrines iu all sorts of figures, with words annexed."
The Ophites originated in Egypt, probably from some relation to the Egyptian serpent-worship, and spread thence into Syria and Asia Minor. They continued to exist as a sect after other forms of Gnosticism had died out, the emperor Justinian enacting laws against them {Cod. i, V, 1, 18, 19, 21) so late as A.D. 530. Offshoots of them are the Coinites. See Sethitks.