THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
in resisting with all their might these tendencies among their congregations, even if they did not always use the right remedies.
[The Gnostics may be divided into: the Judaizing Gnostics; the Anti-Judaistic Gnostics; the Gnosticizing pagans; the Ophites; and later the Manicheans and New Manicheans. The chief among the Judaizers were the followers of Basilides (q.v.), of Yalentinus (q.v.), of Cerinthus (q.v.), and of Bardesanes (q.v.). The greatest leaders of the Anti- Judaizers were Saturninus (q.v.), Cerdo (q.v.), and Marcion (q.v.). One curious sect of them were the Archontici described by Epiphanius (Hcer., xl.). Their founder was a hermit of Palestine, named Peter, but their principal seat was in Armenia. According to their sacred books there were seven heavens each with an archon or ruler, whence came their name; there was also an eighth heaven where dwelt the " mother of light." The ruler of the seventh heaven was the God of the Jews, and the Devil was his son. They rejected baptism but anointed the dying with oil and water to protect them from the archons of the lower heavens. See also Docetism. Among the Gnosticizing pagans were the Borborites or Borborians (dirt-eaters, from Gk. borbows, mud). See also the articles on Car-
POCBATES AND THE CaEPOCHATIANS, SlMON MaGUS,
Antitact^b, Peodicians, Nicolaitans, Ophites, and Cainites. For an account of the later developments of Gnosticism see Encratites, Mand^eans, Manicheaxs and New Manicheans.]
The Gnostic writings were of all kinds: Gospels (of Eve, Mary, Jude, Thomas, Philip, etc.); Apocalypses (of Adam, Abraham, Nico- 3. Sources, theus, Zoroaster, etc.) ; Acts (of Peter, John, Thomas, Andrew, and Matthew) ; hymns (Naasseni, Bardesanes, "Books of Jeu"); odes (Basilides); psalms (Valentinus, Bardesanes, Marcionites); and homilies (Valentinus). Then, too, the Gnostics had their theological literature; dogmatic and philosophic treatises (Isidore, Valentinus, Theodotus, Bardesanes, Marcion); critical investigations (Ptolemaus, Apelles); commentaries on sacred writings and prophetic revelations (Basilides, Heracleon, Isidore); mystery books (Pistis- Sophia, " Books of Jeu," etc.). Of all these books, only a few have been preserved; but enough to apply a check to the heresy refutations (see below), and to give an insight into the Gnostic beliefs and ideas. Preserved intact are: (1) The letter of the Valentinian Ptolemeeus (see Valentinus) to Flora (Greek text edited by A. Harnack in H. Lietzmann's KleineTexte, No. 9, Bonn, 1904); (2) Pistis-Sophia, the two " Books of Jeu," and a Gnostic work of unknown origin, in Coptic (ed. C. Schmidt, Leipsic, 1905; see Ophites); there is an Eng. transl., Pistis Sophia. A Gnostic Gospel (with Extracts from the Books of the Saviour appended). Originally translated from Greek into Coptic and now for the first time Englished from Schwartze's Latin Version of the only known Coptic MS. and checked by Amelineau's French Version, with an Introduction by G. R. S. Mead (London, 1896); (3) three Gnostic writings of the second century: " Gospel according to Mary," " Wisdom of Jesus Christ," " Acts of Peter," in Coptic (not yet published. The " Gospel of Mary "
is the source which Irenseus used for his accoui the Barbelo-Gnostics : cf. C. Schmidt, in Philo^ far Kleinert, Berlin, 1907). There are also served many fragments, especially in Clement Origen, which afford much information about silides and Isidore, Valentinus and Heracleon, also about the Valentinians of the Oriental schj0i (the so-called Excerpta Theodoti). Barde'sanes quite a different aspect when he is seen not cruy by the light of the polemics of Ephraim, but also by that of his own ideas, as shown by one of his pupils in the " Book of the Laws of the Lands " (Spicilegium Syriacum, Syriac, Greek, and English, ed. Cureton, London, 1855). Again enough is known of Marcion and Apelles for a clear conception of their work.
The polemics of the ecclesiastical writers against heretics are, at best, but a secondary source, and that strongly colored by both defective knowledge and personal ill-will; although still a valuable source of our acquaintance with Gnosticism. Unfortunately the earliest writings of this kind (by Agrippa, Castor, Justin, Rhodon, Philip of Gortytia, Modestus, Hegesippus; see the separate articles) have been lost. In all probability, however, their substance was incorporated into extant writings on heresies by Irena^us, Tertullian, Hippolytus, Epiphanius, Theodoret of Cyrrhus, into the so-called " Catalogues of Heretics " of the pseudo-Tertullian and are treated in the works of Philastrius, Augustine, Pra?destinatus, etc. There is also a pagan tract on the subject: the discourse of Plot ius, Adv. gnosticos (Ennead, ii. 9).
The chief defect in all these expositions and refutations is the impossibility of adapting oneself to the opponent's platform; the eager- 4. A Relig- ness to impute to him motives and inion, not a tentions such as he either has not at Philosophy, all, or at least does not hold and pursue in the manner charged against h.rr,. The combaters of the heretics seem to maintui1 again and again that the speculative utterances of the Gnostics are merely philosophical, not religious; merely cosmological, not soteriological. This view is false. In the sense of the Gnostics, gnosis is religion; knowledge is redemption: to know, that is to be redeemed, is possible only for the spiritual man who has come from heaven and is prepared for eternity. Hence Gnostics and spiritual men become synonymous terms, and gnosis is the gift of grace which is imparted to the spiritual man in his very cradle and develops with his growth, resolving the riddles that surround him. " We y freed by the knowledge of these things: who -*e were, what we have become; where we were, and whither we were brought; whither we hasten and whence we were delivered; what birth is, and wl * regeneration" {MPG, ix. 696). The means f solving these questions varied, in each case, acco -ding to the spiritual elevation of the question*: dualistic and pantheistic, mythological and pag: a, Oriental and Hellenistic, mystical and profoum ly thoughtful, speculations contributed their seyei-al strands to the composite fabric. Yet even in so abstruse a product as the philosophy of the Book: of Jeu, redemption is still brought back t<^ the "hT J