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05:17 pm
[alex_moma]
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Irenaeus and his "God".
Irenaeus and his “God”
By Dmitry A. Alexeyev, S.-Petersburg.
Recently I received from the person who is not close to me, but whom I respect very much, a long letter in which, beside of other things, were the following words:
“As a matter of fact, approximately from the 80s of the twentieth century, historical scholars receives more and more testimonies that the Cathars (like Bogomils too) are not the results of Gnosticism in history, but this is tradition of gnostically painted orthodoxy that has rejected both the Gnostic systems and orthodox dogmas. This is something special one. <…> This tradition follows from Origenes (obviously) and Christian monk’s mysticism (especially from the Egyptian monks – followers of Origenes). But it is not finishing there and not continuing only in the Islamic mysticism. It has its rebirth at one time both in Eastern and Western Europe”.
I am ready to suppose joyously that this man who honoured by me wrote all this without thinking, or he himself did not understand what he wrote. At least, any speculations about “gnostically painted orthodoxy” are equal to the speculations about “Christianly painted Satanism”. And what’s why:
Only tradition based on the teaching taught by Jesus Nazorean to His disciples (Apostles) during His earthly life and preserved in the Christian scriptures can be called as truly Christian tradition. We think that nobody from persons who approves historical character of Jesus Nazorean Himself will not to discuss with such evident fact. Analogically, an obvious fact: the tradition that calls himself as “Christian” one, but based on any other teachings, can, indeed, to pretend only on the title “pseudo-Christian”, or “pseudo-Apostolic” one. And the word “pseudo-Apostles” is the key for understanding.
In his Prologue to the Epistle of the Apostle Paul to Galatians, Marcion of Sinop indicates straight that Galatians, who received from the Apostle a word of truth, were, then, tempted by the false apostles (a falsis apostolis) and brought to the Law and circumcision (in legem et circumcisionem). In the Prologue to the Apostle’s Epistle to Romans, he wrote more exactly that deceived ones were brought to the Law and the prophets (in legem et prophetas), and it has been done under the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ (sub nomine domini nostri Jesu Christi). So, this speech is not about contradistinction of the Christian tradition to the Judaic one (the last, indeed, has this “Law and circumcision”), but about opposition between the two Christian traditions – true and false ones, i.e. apostolic and “falsely apostolic”. And if the authentic apostolic tradition must to have its primary source in the teaching taught by Jesus Nazorean to His disciples and arisen through Jesus to His heavenly Father, then the false tradition must to arise into absolutely another source.
However, it is probably that heresiarch Marcion has introduced these “false apostles” deliberately, with polemic objectives to justify his own heretical teaching, contradistinguishing the Law of Moses to the Gospel of Christ? Let’s consider the implacable and severe adversary of not Marcion only, but any “heretics” and “Gnostics”, Lion’s bishop Irenaeus. And what we see? It is about the preacher from Sinop, “a pilot from Pontus Euxine”, Irenaeus wrote the following words:
“But since this man is the only one who has dared openly to mutilate the Scriptures, and unblushingly above all others to inveigh against God, I purpose specially to refute him, convicting him out of his own writings; and, with the help of God, I shall overthrow him out of those discourses of the Lord and the apostles, which are of authority with him, and of which he makes use. At present, however, I have simply been led to mention him, that thou mightest know that all those who in any way corrupt the truth, and injuriously affect the preaching of the Church, are the disciples and successors of Simon Magus of Samaria. Although they do not confess the name of their master, in order all the more to seduce others, yet they do teach his doctrines. They set forth, indeed, the name of Christ Jesus as a sort of lure, but in various ways they introduce the impieties of Simon; and thus they destroy multitudes, wickedly disseminating their own doctrines by the use of a good name, and, through means of its sweetness and beauty, extending to their hearers the bitter and malignant poison of the serpent, the great author of apostasy” (Irenaeus, Adversus omnium haereses, I.27.4).
We see that ‘saint’ from Lion do not deny an existence of the two traditions – truly and falsely Christian ones. And even more of that, he indicates straight on the source of the second (false) tradition: according to his opinion, it is a Samaritan inhabitant Simon Magus, whose “wickedness” is “the bitter and malignant poison of the serpent, the great author of apostasy”, brought under “the name of Christ Jesus as a sort of lure”. Let’s take a special attention on the words “(under) the name of Christ Jesus as a sort of lure”. Yes, this is sub nomine domini nostri Jesu Christi! However, these words were wrote ab. 180, i.e. after 30 years after the death of the Sinop’s preacher. In his Adversus omnium haereses III.23.3, Irenaeus identifies straight the serpent with the devil, and he wrote, beside of other words, in the introduction to the Fourth book of his work:
“For as the serpent beguiled Eve, by promising her what he had not himself, so also do these men, by pretending [to possess] superior knowledge, and [to be acquainted with] ineffable mysteries <...>, plunge those that believe them into death, rendering them apostates from Him who made them. And at that time, indeed, the apostate angel, having effected the disobedience of mankind by means of the serpent, imagined that he escaped the notice of the Lord; wherefore God assigned him the form and name [of a serpent].”
So, Irenaeus recognizes straight an existence of the two traditions, contradistinguishing “apostolic tradition, preserved by the Church” that goes from Jesus (and, through Himself, from God), according to the heretical stories, distributed by “the disciples and successors of Simon Magus of Samaria”, who are “although… do not confess the name of their master, in order all the more to seduce others, yet they do teach his doctrines”, “the bitter and malignant poison of the serpent, the great author of apostasy”, i.e., according to the Irenaeus thought, from the devil. What is the difference, according to Irenaeus, between the two Christian traditions – the true one, arisen from God and Jesus, and the false one, arisen from the Samaritan sorcerer and devil?
Farther, what are the features of the devil’s teaching, brought “(under) the name of Christ Jesus as a sort of lure”? Shepherd from Lion writes about this subject wordy and solemnly, with the style’s beauties proper to him. These beauties were, unfortunately, transmitted in not fully adequate manner in the widely distributed Russian translation done by the archpriest Peter Preobrazhensky. In part, summarizing his own tale about heretical teachings in the first book of Adversus omnium haereses and beginning to refute them, Irenaeus writes that he himself “also related how they think and teach that creation at large was formed after the image of their invisible Pleroma, and what they hold respecting the Demiurge, declaring at the same time the doctrine of Simon Magus of Samaria, their progenitor, and of all those who succeeded him. I mentioned, too, the multitude of those Gnostics who are sprung from him, and noticed the points of difference between them, their several doctrines, and the order of their succession, while I set forth all those heresies which have been originated by them. I showed, moreover, that all these heretics, taking their rise from Simon, have introduced impious and irreligious doctrines into this life; and I explained the nature of their ‘redemption’, and their method of initiating those who are rendered ‘perfect’, along with their invocations and their mysteries. I proved also that there is one God, the Creator, and that He is not the fruit of any defect, nor is there anything either above Him, or after Him”.
Later, in the beginning of the ninth chapter of the second book of his fundamental and, more of that, the main work for catholic orthodoxy, titled as “There is but one Creator of the world, God the Father: this the constant belief of the Church”, Irenaeus wrote the following:
“That God is the Creator of the world is accepted even by those very persons who in many ways speak against Him, and yet acknowledge Him, styling Him the Creator, and an angel, not to mention that all the Scriptures call out [to the same effect], and the Lord teaches us of this Father who is in heaven, and no other, as I shall show in the sequel of this work. For the present, however, that proof which is derived from those who allege doctrines opposite to ours, is of itself sufficient, – all men, in fact, consenting to this truth: the ancients on their part preserving with special care, from the tradition of the first-formed man, this persuasion, while they celebrate the praises of one God, the Maker of heaven and earth; others, again, after them, being reminded of this fact by the prophets of God, while the very heathen learned it from creation itself. For even creation reveals Him who formed it, and the very work made suggests Him who made it, and the world manifests Him who ordered it. The Universal Church, moreover, through the whole world, has received this tradition from the apostles.”
Let’s remember: this is the “tradition of the apostles” in the understanding of Irenaeus!
And this is his own retelling of another and the opposite tradition: “This God, then, being acknowledged, as I have said, and receiving testimony from all to the fact of His existence, that Father whom they conjure into existence is beyond doubt untenable, and has no witnesses [to his existence]. Simon Magus was the first who said that he himself was God over all, and that the world was formed by his angels. Then those who succeeded him, as I have shown in the first book, by their several opinions, still further depraved [his teaching] through their impious and irreligious doctrines against the Creator. These [heretics now referred to], being the disciples of those mentioned, render such as assent to them worse than the heathen. For the former ‘serve the creature rather than the Creator’, and ‘those which are not gods’, notwithstanding that they ascribe the first place in Deity to that God who was the Maker of this universe. But the latter maintain that He, [i.e., the Creator of this world], is the fruit of a defect, and describe Him as being of an animal nature, and as not knowing that Power which is above Him, while He also exclaims, ‘I am God, and besides Me there is no other God’. Affirming that He lies, they are themselves liars, attributing all sorts of wickedness to Him; and conceiving of one who is not above this Being as really having an existence, they are thus convicted by their own views of blasphemy against that God who really exists, while they conjure into existence a god who has no existence, to their own condemnation. And thus those who declare themselves ‘perfect’, and as being possessed of the knowledge of all things, are found to be worse than the heathen, and
to entertain more blasphemous opinions even against their own Creator.”
In the Intro to his fourth book, he continues: “But now, since the last times are [come upon us], evil is spread abroad among men, which not only renders them apostates, but by many machinations does [the devil] raise up blasphemers against the Creator, namely, by means of all the heretics already mentioned. For all these, although they issue forth from diverse regions, and promulgate different [opinions], do nevertheless concur in the same blasphemous design, wounding [men] unto death, by teaching blasphemy against God our Maker and Supporter, and derogating from the salvation of man. Now man is a mixed organization of soul and flesh, who was formed after the likeness of God, and moulded by His hands, that is, by the Son and Holy Spirit, to whom also He said, ‘Let Us make man’. This, then, is the aim of him who envies our life, to render men disbelievers in their own salvation, and blasphemous against God the Creator. For whatsoever all the heretics may have advanced with the utmost solemnity, they come to this at last, that they blaspheme the Creator, and disallow the salvation of God’s workmanship, which the flesh truly is; on behalf of which I have proved, in a variety of ways, that the Son of God accomplished the whole dispensation [of mercy], and have shown that there is none other called God by the Scriptures except the Father of all, and the Son, and those who possess the adoption.”
If we believe to Irenaeus, the followers of the true apostolic tradition thinks that God is the creator of our world and our flesh, for which, as he has “proved, in a variety of ways… the Son of God accomplished the whole dispensation”, while heretics – the followers of Simon Magus – “blaspheme the Creator, and disallow the salvation” of this flesh. Additionally, being a “fiction” of these heretics, he “is beyond doubt untenable, and has no witnesses…” Why we can not to believe Irenaeus? Even in our times, there are thousands and even millions of people who continue to believe him and his ideological followers. However, on the other hand, why we ought to join ourselves with these millions thoughtlessly, especially after we shall compare the words from prologues of the Epistles to Galatians and Romans about Christians “under the name of our Lord Christ Jesus led to the Law and prophets” with the “apostolic” Rule of faith (regula fidei), pathetically proclaimed by Irenaeus:
“[Church believes] in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and His [future] manifestation from heaven in the glory… He Himself uniting man through Himself to God, and having suffered under Pontius Pilate, and rising again, and having been received up in splendour, shall come in glory, the Saviour of those who are saved, and the Judge of those who are judged, and sending into eternal fire those who transform the truth, and despise His Father and His advent. Those who, in the absence of written documents, have believed this faith, are barbarians, so far as regards our language; but as regards doctrine, manner, and tenor of life, they are, because of faith, very wise indeed; and they do please God, ordering their conversation in all righteousness, chastity, and wisdom. If any one were to preach to these men the inventions of the heretics, speaking to them in their own language, they would at once stop their ears, and flee as far off as possible, not enduring even to listen to the blasphemous address. Thus, by means of that ancient tradition of the apostles, they do not suffer their mind to conceive anything of the [doctrines suggested by the] portentous language of these teachers, among whom neither Church nor doctrine has ever been established.” (Adversus omnium haereses, I.10.1 and III.4.2). As we can see, the prophets are present; and, at the same time, here we see a mention of “the new Law”, allegedly preached by Christ and implying a presence of the old Law, or, better to say, “dilapidated” Law. Maybe, Marcion gave the nickname ‘false apostles’ namely to the predecessors of Irenaeus?
Let’s put also another question: if, for Irenaeus, a serpent in the Eden Garden was a devil, who, then, was a devil for his adversaries? What blaspheme has been meant by the Lion’s ‘saint’ then he repeated persistently and time after time that heretics are blaspheming the creator of flesh? Why, after he wrote in multitude of pages his discourses about “Father and Son”, he stated suddenly that namely heretics (with Simon Magus as their head, who, additionally, was “the first who said that he himself was God over all, and that the world was formed by his angels”) have invented the God-Father? Of course, it is not easy to find out a sense in such cobwebs, but we think that the words about heretics could not to be a senselessness – that heretics ascribes to God “all sorts of wickedness… and conceiving of one who is not above this Being as really having an existence, they are thus convicted by their own views of blasphemy against that God who really exists, while they conjure into existence a god who has no existence, to their own condemnation” (Adversus omnium haereses, II.9.2).
However, the key is simple: adversaries of Irenaeus worshipped Another God, Who Is alien to created material world and Who has revealed firstly in His Son, Jesus Christ, while the deity that was the God-Creator for Lion’s shepherd, almighty Lord of Hosts and the Almighty Father was the devil (and, in the best case, a pitiful and waning Demiurge, “the fruit of a defect… of an animal nature” (II.9.2), descrbed by Irenaeus himself with internal tremor, stupid and looser protoarchon (προταρχων) Jaldabaoth or simply “arcon of this world”) according to “heretics” whom Irenaeus so hated. The two traditions, which existence was recognized both by Marcion from Sinop and his wrathful accuser Irenaeus from Lion, are totally irreconcilable and incompatible. They trust in mutually exclusive ideas of God, and even more: for Irenaeus, God, Who Is worshipped by his adversaries, is not existing (“There is no any God”) – it is totally in spirit of Emelian Yaroslavsky1, while for the Christians, who were the subject of the attacks from the side of Irenaeus, this “God” of Irenaeus is not the God, and, perhaps, even is not a god at all.
We have already discussed this topic many times, but “the good thought is ought to be repeated and repeated once more”: the “Gnostic” understanding of salvation’s history is based on the statement that the true God – for the first time in history! – has revealed Himself to the humankind in His Son, Jesus Christ, Who has descended in the material world and revealed for people a knowledge about God-Father as well as the way to salvation.
After the time when the Saviour has been crucified and got a victory, by this case, over the powers and authorities of the material world, He has come back to His Father, and Father sent the Spirit-Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, who is teaching the people about every truth.
The main adversary of the Saviour in this struggle was the ruler of the material world, «the lord of this world” and “the god of this century”. A number of fragments from the ancient texts allow us to state that he was identified, at one time, with the deity of the Old Testament, with Satan, i.e. with hypostatized Sin (η Αμαρτια). On the contrary, the understanding of that history by Irenaeus and his ideological followers is based on the three understood and clear identifications: God-Father was identified with the deity of the Old Testament, creator and lord of the material world, who revealed himself both in his revelation and in the created world; God-Son, i.e. the Saviour, Jesus Christ, was identified with Messiah, or, perhaps, with false messiah of that deity, because the only historic personage of that epoch, who was able to pretend reasonably on the Messiah's role, was militant, but not too successful infantry commander Simon Bar-Kohba; and, at least, the Holy Spirit was identified with “the spirit of the Lord”, mentioned many times in the Old Testament. As for crucifixion of this Messiah (or, perhaps, false messiah?), it has become the Eden Garden’s redeeming sacrifice for the Adam's sin, and that sacrifice has been given by the creator of our world to himself… Or something like that… We suppose that, in this case, we ought to show an elementary tolerance and to do not put captious questions to followers of the memorable shepherd from Lion: indeed, they can not to give any comprehensible answer on such questions during already the last 1.800 years.
It is better to ask: who, however, is the devil? Who was established on the devil’s role? Do not worry, inquiring mind of ‘saint’ Irenaeus has found, at one time, two answers on this questions amongst the Old Testament’s heroes: by identifying a “devil” with the serpent from the Eden Garden on the one hand, and, on the second hand, with Satan. And the followers of Irenaeus, thirdly, have added to this picture Dennice (Lucifer) from Isaiah 14:12, and they did not analyze absolutely the sense of the word “Lucifer” in another books of the Latin Bible. Let’s note that Irenaeus reasonably avoids the attempts to interpret the expression “lord of this world”, repeated thrice in the Gospel of John, and let’s, then, interpret the Apostle Paul’s expression “god of this century”. Indeed, this expression remains, until the present day, an unsurpassed exegetical masterwork that predetermined a development of the orthodox exegesis for centuries to come. And, as we think, our glad duty is to cite here this fragment completely:
“As to their affirming that Paul said plainly in the Second [Epistle] to the Corinthians, ‘In whom the god of this century hath blinded the minds of them that believe not’, and maintaining that there is indeed one god of this century, but another who is beyond all principality, and beginning, and power, we are not to blame if they, who give out that they do themselves know mysteries beyond God, know not how to read Paul. For if any one read the passage thus –according to Paul’s custom, as I show elsewhere, and by many examples, that he uses transposition of words – ‘In whom God’, then pointing it off, and making a slight interval, and at the same time read also the rest [of the sentence] in one [clause], ‘hath blinded the minds of them of this world that believe not’, he shall find out the true [sense]; that it is contained in the expression, ‘God hath blinded the minds of the unbelievers of this century’. And this is shown by means of the little interval [between the clause]. For Paul does not say, ‘the God of this century’, as if recognizing any other beyond Him; but he confessed God as indeed God. And he says, ‘the unbelievers of this century’, because they shall not inherit the future age of incorruption. I shall show from Paul himself, how it is that God has blinded the minds of them that believe not, in the course of this work, that we may not just at present distract our mind from the matter in hand, [by wandering] at large.” (Adversus omnium haereses, III.7.1)2.
Well, now we are forced to come back to the question which has been put in the very beginning of this article: what of the two opposing traditions is authentic, i.e. the apostolic one, and what of such traditions is created by its adversaries – “false apostles”, or even by “antichrists?” Whom we ought to believe: to ‘saint’ Irenaeus or to heresiarch Marcion?
Of course, we may cite the works of modern researchers, for example, The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine H. Pagels and The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture by Bart D. Ehrmann, as well as Synopsis of the four gospels, or the Nestle-Aland critical edition… But we do not see a large sense in it, a fortiori that, in such situations, our honoured opponents, the adepts of “catholic orthodoxy”, are used to reject any our argument without consideration, being, sometimes, like the deaf asp from the Psalm LVII who shuts up his ears and do not hear a voice of exorcist who is the most skillful in spells, sometimes like more prosaic reptile from the Russian proverb, who, in simplicity of his soul, identifies any moisture as “a god’s dew”. The right answer is, however, easier and so evident that we are really surprised that this answer has not been seen before us.
We have no any need to cite aphorisms given by Marcion and Valentinus as a wonder, preserved by heresiologists; also we have no need to consider the Nag Hammadi scriptures. A scheme, known even from the canonical Gospels, is simple and evident: “Then cried Jesus in the temple as he taught, saying, Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am: and I am not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not. But I know him: for I am from him, and he hath sent me” (John 7:28-29). And it has been happened in the temple, dedicated either to Poseidon or to Artemis, but namely to the creator – and the ruler – of the material world. It is evident that the speech is not about him. It is so evident that the people, who gathered in the temple, “sought to take him: but no man laid hands on him, because his hour not yet come” (John 7:30). The same fact was recognized also by Irenaeus, although he has not cited John, but Matthew:
“But they adduce the following passage as the highest testimony, and, as it were, the very
crown of their system: – “I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to babes. Even so, my Father; for so it seemed good in Thy sight. All things have been delivered to Me by My Father; and no one knoweth the Father but the Son, or the Son but the Father, and he to whom the Son will reveal Him.” (Matt. 11:25–27.) In these words they affirm that He clearly showed that the Father of truth, conjured into existence by them, was known to no one before His advent. And they desire to construe the passage as if teaching that the Maker and Framer [of the world] was always known by all, while the Lord spoke these words concerning the Father unknown to all, whom they now proclaim.” (Adversus omnium haereses, I.20.3).
In the light of the temptation’s scenes in the desert described by Matthew and Luke, as well as in the light of polemics with those who have believed in Him in John’s verse 8:44 that is finishing by an ontological fragment “Ye are of [father] the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and adobe not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it”, we have no any doubts: the Christians worship the Heavenly Father Who has revealed Himself in Christ; while the “false apostles” who are guiding those who believed them have confessed the ruler of this world and the creator of flesh “under the name of our Lord Jesus Christ”. I.e. they guides their believers to the devil whom they considers as God, as well as they considers the Saviour as his, i.e. devil’s, son.
Irenaeus who was exposed to the ridicule many times and who was inspired by idea, simple as a mooing – “you yourselves are worshipping the devil, damned heretics!” – did not think of (not like, meanwhile, his numerous followers and epigones) to turn out all Christian scheme and to determine God Who has been revealed by Jesus as the devil (Lucifer, etc.)
He, instead of this, composes absurd and self-contradictory fairy tale about “fictional God”, “serpent in the Eden Garden”, and Simon Magus. In fact, borrowing “heretical” material (although, in what degree we could to consider the Gospel of John as heretical?), Irenaeus even did not understand it, and that’s why the words of his heritage’s issuer A. Kukalev3 sounds especially mockingly: “Together with Meliton Sardinian, Rodon, and Maltiades, Irenaeus is mentioned as a member of the philosophers group from the Asia Minor, careful keepers of the Fourth Gospel’s author tradition”, i.e. the tradition with which Irenaeus himself argued so wrathfully, and which he called as “heretical one” in a straight manner.
Well, but what about “antichrist” Simon Samaritan? – asks the thoughtful reader. – For has he himself existed, or no? Of course, he has existed, – so we answer with no any doubts. And, indeed, «appeared among the Jews as the Son» of God (Adversus omnium haereses, I.23.1). Indeed, he walked on dusty Palestinian roads with the woman whom orthodox tradition considers as repented whore, although her name was absolutely not “Helena”. He has, indeed, preached and made wonders; he gathered huge mobs of people and once, if we believe to Luke-evangelist, he has flied in the sky (Luke 24:51). We may say yes to Irenaeus even when he wrote that Simon “had come to amend matters, and had descended, transfigured and assimilated to powers and principalities and angels, so that he might appear among men to be a man, while yet he was not a man; and that thus he was thought to have suffered in Judæa, when he had not suffered” (I.23.3) – for how God could to suffer? In other things, this fantastic writer from Lion has used sources are not credible. Probably, the same sources used later by the rabbis who have composed “Sepher Toldot Ishu”, but they are, at least, did not mix up the names and called Jesus Nazorean as “Ishu”, but not as “Shimon from Nazareth”…
And what is the conclusion? You yourselves may come to the conclusions. We have almost decided to write out some number of pages about “catholic orthodoxy” as far from truth, meaningless and false teaching to such an extent that it stole even completely justifiable statement that “the followers of false apostles worship the devil” from its adversaries! But it is excessive thing. Because everything is evidently even beside of this.
[We ought to mention that we absolutely do not want to consider the sacred texts of Judaism and its religious practice in this article, because Judaism as religious faith, from our point of view, is not friendly and not enemy to us, but only alien, wholly and completely, to the teaching preached by Jesus Nazorean and His apostles. Moreover, when we speak about “the Old Testament” we do not speak about Tan-ah at all, but only about “the Old Testament” as not Judaic document – because how Judaism that do not know any “new testament” could to bear an “old testament”? Also we do not consider “the Old Testament” as the Christian document, because even the most thorough search did not allow us to find out in this document something resembles, even from far and even very mediatory, the teaching of Jesus Nazorean and His apostles. On the contrary, this is a document of syncretized “catholic orthodoxy” that has adapted for its own needs badly translated and much worse understood sacred text of the Judaic tradition, which followers, as we think, were not glad to this fact.
Especially joyously, in this connection, we would like to cite the propositions of the two Jews who lived in the last century. One of them was quite authoritative, and the second one also was very witty. So, first of them said: “The Holy Scripture of Jews is neither ‘old’ nor ‘testament’”. Being in solidarity with the first speaker, the second one said the following: “The Christians considers the Jewish books as sacred ones. It is difficult to disagree with them. But we would like that they have understood the content of the books”.
Moreover, laughing over “the Demiurge” and his worshippers, we, in no sense, do not want to outrage religious senses of Judaism and Islam followers, or to doubt the image of God revealed in their Sacred Scriptures and traditions. Because even such a few thing that we know about the traditions forces us to abstain categorically from calling the above mentioned religions as “demiurgic ones”. “Demiurge” for us is not the LORD of Moses, and not ALLAH of Muhammad, but it is a syncretic deity, “god” of Irenaeus and Epiphaneus, Augustine and Tertullianus, Tommazo Torquemada and Robert le-Bugre, “the almighty creator (der Schupfer Almochtiger)” in the “Mein Kampf”, and “Loooord” by importunate and hysterical TV-preachers. While we abstain from any propositions about non-Christian religions and cults, we call as “demiurgists” the worshippers of this artificial deity, who dares, in absurd self-insanely, to call themselves as “the Christians” – with no any foundations on it, as we have just demonstrated here.]
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Translator’s notes:
1) The head of the Soviet official atheistic movement of the pre-war Stalin’s era.
2) In the quotation above Irenaeus translated the Greek ‘aeon’ as ‘the world’, but not as ‘century’.
3) See: http://biblicalstudies.ru
Translated from Russian by Alex Moma.
Moscow, copyleft 2011.
All the Biblical cites were given here according to the King James Holy Bible.
Original source in Russian see here:
http://bogomilos.livejournal.com/55794.html
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03:06 pm
[alex_moma]
[Link] |
I need your help.
Dear friends, who knows the full contents of this book? -
H. J. Spierenburg, ed., H. P. Blavatsky: On the Gnostics (San Diego, CA: Point Loma Publication, 1994).
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06:16 pm
[alex_moma]
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"The Dark Twin"
"The Dark Twin" By Dmitry A. Alexeyev, S.-Petersburg.
Probably, the three following below mysterious and confusing passages from the Seventh Codex of the Nag Hammadi Library have to do with the concept of "the dark twin" of the Savior, who has been anointed by the demiurge.
The Second Treatise of the Great Seth VII, 51–52: “I visited a bodily dwelling. I cast out the one who was in it first, and I went in. And the whole multitude of the archons became troubled. And all the matter of the archons as well as all the begotten powers of the earth were shaken when it saw the likeness of the Image, since it was mixed. And I am the one who was in it, not resembling him who was in it first. For he was an earthly man, but I, I am from above the heavens. I did not refuse them even to become a Christ, but I did not reveal myself to them in the love which was coming forth from me. I revealed that I am a stranger to the regions below”;
VII, 55-56: “For my death which they think happened (happened) to them in their error and blindness, since they nailed their man unto their death. For their Ennoias did not see me, for they have deaf and blind. But in doing these things, they condemn themselves. Yes, they saw me; they punished me. It was another, their father, who drank the gall and the vinegar; it was not I. They struck me with the reed; it was another, Simon, who bore the cross on their shoulder. It was another upon whom they placed the crown of thorns. But I was rejoicing in the height over all the wealth of the archons and the offspring of their error, of their empty glory. And I was laughing at their ignorance”;
The Apocalypse of Peter VII, 82: “For the son of their glory instead of my servant they have put to shame. <…> And they said to me: ‘Be strong, for you are the one to whom these mysteries have been given, to know them through revelation, that he whom they crucified is the first-born, and the home of demons, and the vessel in which they dwell, of Elochim, of the cross which is under the Law. But he who stands near him is the living Savior, the first (part) in him, whom they seized and released, who stands joyfully looking at those who did him violence…”
Cf. also: On the Origin of the World II, 105: “Afterward he created an angelic church – thousands and myriads, without number, (belong to her) – being like a church which is in the eighth. And a first-born called ‘Israel’, i.e. ‘the man who sees god’, and also having another name, ‘Jesus the Christ’, who is like the Savior who is above the eighth, sits at his right upon an excellent throne”, although phrase “and also having another name, ‘Jesus the Christ’”, is, probably, the latest interpolation.
And if we shall remember additionally that even in the context of the New Testament ‘flesh’ (σάρξ) is not only a special case of the substance (υλη), but a negative principle, possessing its own will ("lust" – η επιθυμία τής σαρκός), opposing the will of God; and if we shall also remember the term ‘kingdom of flesh’ from the Gospel of Mary… An interesting mosaic may arise.
These passages I cited implies that the man Joshua from Nazareth (if the mention of Nazareth is not only clumsy interpretation of the nickname Nazorean) was an offspring of Jewish kings, legitimate messiah of Jews and the son of their deity – the Creator and the Lord (δημιουργός & κύριος) of this world. Bringing the conflict to its logical conclusion and forcing the priests of the Creator to crucify His body on the tree (let’s remember that it was not only painful and shameful death penalty, but also a ritual sacrifice, stipulated in the Torah against those who has committed sacral crimes against Yahweh – sacrifice for the sake of the warding a rage of the offended deity from the tribesmen of the defaulter), heavenly Savior Jesus Christ has killed the messiah of Jews. So, the worldwide conqueror and ruler, who has been sent to establish the lordship of the ‘elected people’ all over the world (later, namely this image was perceived as ‘Antichrist’ by the orthodoxy) was neutralized from the very beginning. One way or another, this plot is present in many conceptions. In particular: According to the Christian Gnostics, the Savior was incorporeal, but the Jewish messiah was ‘the dark twin’ and, at the same time, the flesh of the Savior; and this concept is fully consistent to the Gnostic understanding of flesh.
According to the orthodoxy, ‘Simon Magus’ became the dark twin. This was a literary personage who has been assigned by heresiologists not only as ‘the founder of Gnosticism’ and all the heresies at all, but namely as ‘the dark twin’ of Christ, who ‘came to Samaria as Father, to Judea as Son, and to the rest of the people as Spirit’ and ‘has died and has not resurrected three days later’. Let’s remember also the history of Helena, who accompanied Simon just like some Mary accompanied Another Thaumaturge of that time.
Nazoreans, the followers of John the Baptist, named the Savior as ‘Manda d’Hayye’, but this term means ‘Knowledge (Gnosis) of Life’, but not an ordinary human name according to our understanding. While, in the sacred books of the Nazoreans, the description of the acts of Manda d’Hayye coincides with the Christ’s description in the Gospels, and ‘churchly Jesus’ Ishu Mshiha, ‘messiah of the forgeries’ (forgeries, but not Jews), is depicted as ‘the dark twin’.
Let’s describe a little more the theology of Nazoreans. ‘Adonai (אדונאי), god of Jews " is equalized in their system with Babylonian deity of the Sun, Shamish. Accordingly, the reflection of the catholic Trinity (and parody on it) is the trinity Adonai (Shamish = the Sun), Ruha d’Kudsha (‘the holy spirit, רוח + קדש; Dlibat = Venus), and Ishu Mshiha (Nbu = Mercury). While we have no any reason to assert that the Mandaean reflection of the image of ‘historical Jesus’ is namely Ishu Mshiha, but not Manda d’Hayye. It is because the image of Ishu reflects late polemics of Nazoreans with the institutional church of the Universal Councils epoch. Characteristically that sometimes Nazorean polemists have used the term ‘Ishu Rumaia’ – ‘Byzantine Man’ instead of ‘Ishu Mshiha’.
Even in the Talmudic tractate Sepher Toldot Ishu (the name is a translation of the initial words from the Gospel of Matthew), Jesus is depicted not only as adulterate (as a parody on the ‘immaculate conception’ doctrine) charlatan and a sorcerer (as a parody on Gospel’s miracles), but namely as unsuccessful messianic candidate, ‘the dark twin’ of Judaic messiah who delays already 2.000 years. Above we have explained fully and clearly why he delays.
Translated from Russian by (copyleft) Alex Moma, 2011. Original source in Russian see here: http://ru-gnostik.livejournal.com/156179.html
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The Endless Genealogies.
The Endless Genealogies By Dmitry A. Alexeyev, S.-Petersburg.
1 Tim. 1:3-4: “As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine, neither give heed to fables (μυθοις) and endless genealogies (γενεαλογιαις απεραντοις), which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: [so do].”
So, what are the ‘myths and endless genealogies’ against which the objection of the 1 Timothy’s author is directed? It goes without saying, this author is not the Apostle Paul, because Paul could not to know anything about ‘antithesis of the false-named gnosis’ (αντιθεσεις της ψευδονυμου γνωσεως – 1 Tim. 6:20), i.e. the compilation of the quotations from the Septuagint and the Gospel, published by Marcion not earlier than in 140. However, against what ‘myths and genealogies’ he calls his addressee to ‘exhort to some people’?
Well, they are here!
Matt. 1:1-17: “The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his brethren; and Judas begat Phares and Zara of Thamar; and Phares begat Esrom; and Esrom begat Aram; and Aram begat Aminadab; and Aminadab begat Naasson; and Naasson begat Salmon; and Salmon begat Booz of Rachab; and Booz begat Obed of Ruth; and Obed begat Jesse; and Jesse begat David the king; and David the king begat Solomon of her [that had been the wife] of Urias; and Solomon begat Roboam; and Roboam begat Abia; and Abia begat Asa; and Asa begat Josaphat; and Josaphat begat Joram; and Joram begat Ozias; And Ozias begat Joatham; and Joatham begat Achaz; and Achaz begat Ezekias; and Ezekias begat Manasses; and Manasses begat Amon; and Amon begat Josias; and Josias begat Jechonias and his brethren, about the time they were carried away to Babylon: and after they were brought to Babylon, Jechonias begat Salathiel; and Salathiel begat Zorobabel; and Zorobabel begat Abiud; and Abiud begat Eliakim; and Eliakim begat Azor; and Azor begat Sadoc; and Sadoc begat Achim; and Achim begat Eliud; and Eliud begat Eleazar; and Eleazar begat Matthan; and Matthan begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ. So all the generations from Abraham to David [are] fourteen generations; and from David until the carrying away into Babylon [are] fourteen generations; and from the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ [are] fourteen generations.”
Genealogy, indeed, is endless. And totally mythological one.
Luke 3:23-38: “And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was [the son] of Heli, which was [the son] of Matthat, which was [the son] of Levi, which was [the son] of Melchi, which was [the son] of Janna, which was [the son] of Joseph, which was [the son] of Mattathias, which was [the son] of Amos, which was [the son] of Naum, which was [the son] of Esli, which was [the son] of Nagge, which was [the son] of Maath, which was [the son] of Mattathias, which was [the son] of Semei, which was [the son] of Joseph, which was [the son] of Juda, which was [the son] of Joanna, which was [the son] of Rhesa, which was [the son] of Zorobabel, which was [the son] of Salathiel, which was [the son] of Neri, which was [the son] of Melchi, which was [the son] of Addi, which was [the son] of Cosam, which was [the son] of Elmodam, which was [the son] of Er, which was [the son] of Jose, which was [the son] of Eliezer, which was [the son] of Jorim, which was [the son] of Matthat, which was [the son] of Levi, which was [the son] of Simeon, which was [the son] of Juda, which was [the son] of Joseph, which was [the son] of Jonan, which was [the son] of Eliakim, which was [the son] of Melea, which was [the son] of Menan, which was [the son] of Mattatha, which was [the son] of Nathan, which was [the son] of David, which was [the son] of Jesse, which was [the son] of Obed, which was [the son] of Booz, which was [the son] of Salmon, which was [the son] of Naasson, which was [the son] of Aminadab, which was [the son] of Aram, which was [the son] of Esrom, which was [the son] of Phares, which was [the son] of Juda, which was [the son] of Jacob, which was [the son] of Isaac, which was [the son] of Abraham, which was [the son] of Thara, which was [the son] of Nachor, which was [the son] of Saruch, which was [the son] of Ragau, which was [the son] of Phalec, which was [the son] of Heber, which was [the son] of Sala, which was [the son] of Cainan, which was [the son] of Arphaxad, which was [the son] of Sem, which was [the son] of Noe, which was [the son] of Lamech, which was [the son] of Mathusala, which was [the son] of Enoch, which was [the son] of Jared, which was [the son] of Maleleel, which was [the son] of Cainan, which was [the son] of Enos, which was [the son] of Seth, which was [the son] of Adam, which was [the son] of God.”
And this genealogy is also mythological, although, of course, is not so endless, as the first one.
We must to note that the ‘endless genealogies’ in the Gospel of Matthew is the imitation of the Septuagint:
Gen. 5:1 : αυτη η βιβλος γενεσεως ανθρωπων
Matt. 1:1 : βιβλος γενεσεως Ιησου Χριστου
Gospel’s author Matthew, who wrote in the second century and who, in any case, should not to be falsely identified with the Apostle Levi Matthew, was, generally, very impressed with the Septuagint’s style. But the genealogies have also another and very important significance: they allow us to reject firmly an “…Jerome D. Quinn's proposal that the author of Luke-Acts was the author of the Pastoral Epistles and that he intended a tripartite work, on the pattern of contemporary collections of documents about or by a famous figure and concluding with a letter or collection of letters by the great man. Luke-Acts-Pastorals would then be a "tripartite tractate" to counter Marcion's scripture, the Pastorals meaning to supplant the earlier letters.” (Robert M. Price. The Evolution of the Pauline Canon // Hervormde Teologiese Studies, Number 1&2 June 1997, 36-67.) Evangelist Luke, who wrote in the second century and who should not to be confused with ‘beloved physician’ mentioned only at once (in Col. 4:14) in the Paul’s Epistles collection, of course, could not at one time to fabricate myths and genealogies (Luke 3:23-38) and to ascribe the exhortations against these myths and genealogies to the Apostle (1 Tim. 1:3-4).
Also we must to note that the name of the medieval parody on the Gospel, Sepher Toldot Ishu (ספר תולדת ישו), copied with love on some anti-Christian web-sites, is a literally translation of the words βιβλος γενεσεως Ιησου in the very beginning of Gospel of Matthew and the New Testament as a whole. In this context, it is quite interesting point of view by the early medieval theologian Faustus Numidian: “For our part, while no one can alter our conviction that the Son of God comes from God, we might indulge a credulous disposition, to the extent of admitting the fiction, that Jesus became the Son of God at Jordan, but not that the Son of God was born of a woman. Then, again, the son said to have been born of Mary cannot properly be called the son of David, unless it is ascertained that he was begotten by Joseph. You say he was not, and therefore you must allow him not to have been the son of David, even though he were the son of Mary. The genealogy proceeds in the line of Hebrew fathers from Abraham to David, and from David to Joseph; and as we are told that Joseph was not the real father of Jesus, Jesus cannot be said to be the son of David. To begin with calling Jesus the son of David, and then to go on to tell of his being born of Mary before the consummation of her marriage with Joseph, is pure madness. And if the son of Mary cannot be called the son of David, on account of his not being the son of Joseph, still less can the name be given to the Son of God. Moreover, the Virgin herself appears to have belonged not to the tribe of Judah, to which the Jewish kings belonged, and which all agree was David's tribe, but to the priestly tribe of Levi. This appears from the fact that the Virgin's father Joachim was a priest; and his name does not occur in the genealogy. How, then, can Mary be brought within the pale of relationship to David, when she has neither father nor husband belonging to it? Consequently, Mary's son cannot possibly be the son of David, unless you can bring the mother into some connection with Joseph, so as to be either his wife or his daughter.” See: Augustin, Contra Faustum, 23, 3-4.
Further, what the Russian religious philosophers of the beginning of the XXth century thought about the ‘endless genealogies’? Lev P. Karsavin wrote, for example, the following words in his work ‘Saint Fathers and Teachers of the Church’ (Л.П. Карсавин, «Святые отцы и учители церкви»): “In the Minor Asian churches from the times of the Apostle Paul, strolling and imposter apostles called for extreme asceticism and sowed ‘Judaic fables’, however, not only Judaic ones. Reasoning ‘according to the human tradition and the elements of this world, which were the subject of astrology, they rejected this world and disdained all fleshly things. But, at the same time, they sought to bridge through a gaping abyss between Incomprehensible One and the world, fabricating ‘endless genealogies’ of gods, opening multitudes of ‘angels’, world-organizers and world-rulers (demiurges). And instead of God-Man as the only Mediator between God and people, an immense number of intermediaries (sometimes semi-divine, sometimes – the created ones) appeared like angels, whose cult and magical intercourses with whom began to develop quickly.”
What a pity! We have already understood everything about ‘however, not only Judaic’ fables (μυθοις). Well, now we have to understand the Judaic myths and, at the same time, the human legends and the elements of this world (στοιχεια του κοσμου τουτου)...
Translated from Russian by (copyleft) Alex Moma, 2011. All the Biblical quotations given according to the King James Holy Bible. Original source in Russian see here: http://ru-gnostik.livejournal.com/182247.html
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The Definition of "Gnosticism".
The Definition of “Gnosticism”. By Dmitry A. Alexeyev, St.-Petersburg. Melchisedec is an Old Testament’s hero, King of Salem (or Sodom*), a priest of the Highest God, mentioned in Gen., 14:17-24. The most important question for us is why one of the Old Testament’s positive heroes, priest of Biblical God, who blessed Abraham, becomes a wearer of a Gnostic revelation? I mean namely Gnostic revelation, because “Gnostic”, or, even more exactly, “Sethianic” character of the tractate, named “Melchisedec”, is evident, even although it is very badly preserved.
For the answer on this question, it is necessary to research a content of quite numerous tractates from the Coptic Library, and first of all – tractates from Nag Hammadi, accounted to so-called “Sethianic branch of Gnosticism” by the most researchers. Although it is commonly accepted that “the Gnostics rejected the Old Testament and God of the Old Testament”, numerous “Sethianic” manuscripts (The Apocryphon of John, The Revelation of Adam, The Hypostasis of the Archons) or texts that near-standing to them (for example, On the Origin of the World) develops Old Testament’s plots at the same degree as, for example, the Books of Enoch. At the same time, it is difficult to agree with the understanding of “Gnostic” interpretation of Biblical stories as “protest exegesis” (term of Kurt Rudolph) or as “revaluation of values” and “metaphysical anti-Semitism” (terms of Hans Jonas), because a base of such interpretation is absolutely Judaic, being, although, non-normative for traditional Judaic understanding of the initial chapters of Genesis.
We may meet the understanding of “Elochist” (Gen., 1:1–2:3) and “Yahwist” (Gen., 2:4 ff.) fragments as two tales, that describes two different sequents of events, in the texts of Philo from Alexandria. In his writing “A Treatise on Account of The Creation of the World”, he has contradistinguished two Adams: the first Adam, created by the image and likeness of God (Gen., 1) and the second one, fashioned from the dust of the earth (Gen., 2):
“(XXIII) So, then after all the other things, as has been said before, Moses says that man was made in the image and likeness of God (Gen., 1:26). And he says well; for nothing that is born on the earth is more resembling God than man. And let no one think that he is able to judge of this likeness from the character of the body: for neither is God a being with the form of a man, nor is the human body like the form of God; but the resemblance is spoken of with reference to the most important part of the soul, namely, the mind: for the mind which exists in each individual has been created after the likeness of that one mind which is in the universe as its primitive model, being in some sort the God of that body which carries it about and bears its image within it. In the same rank that the great Governor occupies in the universal world, that same as it seems does the mind of man occupy in man; for it is invisible, though it sees everything itself; and it has an essence which is undiscernible, though it can discern the essences of all other things, and making for itself by art and science all sorts of roads leading in divers directions, and all plain; it traverses land and sea, investigating everything which is contained in either element. And again, being raised up on wings, and so surveying and contemplating the air, and all the commotions to which it is subject, it is borne upwards to the higher firmament, and to revolutions of the heavenly bodies. And also being itself involved in the revolutions of the planets and fixed stars according to the perfect laws of music, and being led on by love, which is the guide of wisdom, it proceeds onwards till, having surmounted all essence intelligible by the external senses, it comes to aspire to such as is perceptible only by the intellect: and perceiving in that, the original models and ideas of those things intelligible by the external senses which it saw here full of surpassing beauty, it becomes seized with a sort of sober intoxication like the zealots engaged in the Corybantian festivals, and yields to enthusiasm, becoming filled of another desire, and a more excellent longing, by which it is conducted onwards to the very summit of such things as are perceptible only to the intellect, till it appears to be reaching the great King himself. And while it is eagerly longing to behold him pure and unmingled, rays of divine light are poured forth upon it like a torrent, so as to bewilder the eyes of its intelligence by their splendour. But as it is not every image that resembles its archetypal model, since many are unlike, Moses has shown this by adding to the words “after his image”, the expression “in his likeness”, to prove that it means an accurate impression, having a clear and evident resemblance in form.”
“(XLVI) After this, Moses says that “God made man, having taking clay from the earth, and he breathed into his face the breath of life” (Gen., 2:7). And by this expression he shows most clearly that there is a vast difference between man as generated now, and the first man who was made according to the image of God. For man as formed now is perceptible to the external senses, partaking of qualities, consisting of body and soul, man or woman, by nature mortal. But man, made according to the image of God, was an idea, or a genus, or a seal, perceptible only by the intellect, incorporeal, neither male nor female, imperishable by nature. But he asserts that the formation of the individual man, perceptible by the external senses is a composition of earthly substance, and divine spirit. For that the body was created by the Creator taking a lump of clay, and fashioning the human form out of it; but that the soul proceeds from no created thing at all, but from the Father and Ruler of all things. For when he uses the expression, “he breathed into”, & c., he means nothing else than the divine spirit proceeding from that happy and blessed nature, sent to take up its habitation here on earth, for the advantage of our race, in order that, even if man is mortal according to that portion of him which is visible, he may at all events be immortal according to that portion which is invisible; and for this reason, one may properly say that man is on the boundaries of a better and an immortal nature, partaking of each as far as it necessary for him; and that he was born at the same time, both mortal and immortal. Mortal as to his body, but immortal as to his intellect.” 1
So, Philo clearly differentiates these two tales, although he doesn’t contradistinguish two Creators, but two creations – intelligible human, who has been created “by the image and by likeness”, and human from flesh, fashioned “from the dust of the earth”. At the same time, Philo accurately follows such Septuagint terms as “God” and “God the Lord”, and he doesn’t ascribe creation of intelligible human to the “God the Lord”.
In the “Sethianic” context, it was taken, logically, only one next step, and good God the Creator from the “Elochist” tale, who created Adam by his own image and likeness, has been contradistinguished to the god from the “Yahwist” tale, who fashioned from the dust second Adam, from flesh, or Adam earthy, i.e. this Adam is a parody on divine First Image. It is this typology (with minor distortions, came to be in the Hellenistic midst as a result of the process of literary adaptations and further development) is in the foundation of not only “Sethianic” or “Gnostic” manuscripts, but also of some New Testament’s texts. Of course, at the monotheistic context, in any case, there is no speech about “two Gods”, so many times described by the Fathers-heresiologists, but there’s a speech only about God and his adversary, devil or “Jaldabaoth, the archon”.
At the same time, in contradistinction with outlived imaginations that Gnostic Christians has had somebody like a different “Gnostic God”, another than Biblical God-Creator, it is evidently, that the role of God, at the Sethianic context, plays namely Elochim (God) from Gen., 1 or El El’on (The Most High God) from Gen., 14, and just Melchisedec was His priest.
We must to note, that, at the same place, in Gen., 14:22, the Most High One is equalized to Yahweh, according to the Abraham’s speech. Both movements, Christian and Judaic Orthodoxies, has their ideological basis namely in this equalization (but not equation!) Irenaeus’ statement that the heretics invented God – “and conceiving of the one who is not above this Being as really having an existence, they are thus convicted by their own views of blasphemy against that God who really exists, while they conjure into existence a God who has no existence, to their own condemnation. And thus those who declare themselves “perfect”, and as being possessed of the knowledge of all things, are found to be worse than heathen, and no entertain more blasphemous opinions even against their own Creator.” (Adv. haer., 2.9.2)2 – was brought to the point of absurdity by such writers-fantasts as Rudolph Bultmann and Hans Jonas in their books about “Gnostic religion”.
Let’s consider the Apocryphon of John as an illustration to the above mentioned. First of all, let’s note that significant part of the dialog between Jesus and John was dedicated to the commentaries on Genesis, beginning from its Second chapter, and further. The First Archon, Jaldabaoth, who directly equates to Yahweh, creates, with his archons, the Adam’s flesh, then he breaths to him a spirit of life, puts Adam into sleep and creates Eva, expels Adam and Eva from Paradise, puts damnation on Eva, establishes her husband as a lord over her, violates Eva and bores Cain and Abel from her, sends flood on the earth, and later he sends his angels, and these angels fornicates with the humans daughters. It is important to remember, that the versions of the Apocryphon of John, accessed to us, were finally edited later, in the midst of the Christians from the Pagans, but typology, that has been put in its foundation, is evident.
A plot of the Seth’s birth repeats in the Apocryphon of John twice. At first, there is a mention of heavenly Seth, “in the second aeon, near the second luminary Oroiail”, then, above, there’s a mention about earthly Adam and his son: “Adam bored Seth like posterity at the height, in the aeons”.
Let’s consider the “Sethian” conception on the examples of the two sons of Adam – Cain and Seth. Seth, as all this conception has been called “Sethian”, is extremely important for us, although he was mentioned only once, at the genealogy of Jesus in Luke: “Which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God” – Luke, 3:38. Genesis describes the birth of Seth as follows: “And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew” (Gen., 4:25). We must to mention here two facts: 1) The text says explicitly that Adam was a physical father of Seth; 2) Eva states that this God (Elochim) included a sperm into her. And this fact became a reason of equalization of Seth (as a “son of man” and a “son of God”) with Christ. Cain is described at the 1 John (3.11–12) as follows: “For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother.” V.N. Kuznetsova, author of the New Testament’s Russian translation, called “Glad Tidings”3, translates this verse as follows: “We would not like to be such as Cain, who was born by Villain and slaughtered his brother”, and then she comments: “At the latest Rabbinistic literature Cain was called a son of Eva, and devil”. I have some doubt about this statement concerning Rabbinistic literature, but I would like to mention, that she has also commented a famous expression (from John, 8:44) “a murderer from the beginning”: “Probably, it was said here about murdering Abel by Cain, who, according to some ancient Jewish legends, was a son of both, Eva and evil angel Samael, or devil”. I think she was right in this case, because Sethian legends are both ancient and, undoubtedly, Jewish in their origin, but it is the Biblical verse (Gen., 4:1) underlies in their foundation: ”And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the Lord” (originally – from Yahweh). Here, like in the verse about birth of Seth, Adam is a physical father of a child, but Eva states, that she has had a son from Yahweh. And we know, that this equalization (in Sethian context) of Yahweh with Samael (as also with Jaldabaoth and Sakla), Yahweh, but not with an abstract “god of the Old Testament”, was witnessed many times.
In the light of Johannine dichotomies of “light and darkness”, “life and death”, “Spirit and flesh”, “truth and false”, this parallel between 1 John, 3:12 and Gen., 4:1 demonstrates evidently that the fourth Evangelist, speaking about “lord of this world” and devil, surely, speaks about the Creator of the flesh. And dichotomy of “Spirit and flesh” needs our particularly close attention. The most consistent expression of it we may find in the Johannine doctrine of “Children of God and children of devil” – children of God, born from above, from God and Spirit (see the dialog of Jesus and Nicodemus, John, 3) and children of devil, born according to the flesh. In the light of above mentioned, John’s (8:44) verse have had a new sounding. In this verse, Jesus says to Judaic people, who came to believe in Him: “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do.” This was not a speech about their religious worshipping or moral qualities; little above (John, 8:41), these men called God as their Father. There Jesus mentioned to them, that, staying as fleshly, and not being born from God and Spirit, they are the children of devil, creator of flesh, and that’s why they have no right to call God as their Father; and it is from this passage we can found a direct reference to “spiritual people” and “fleshly people” according to St. Paul, and also to the heresiological speculations about “Pneumatics” and “Choics”.
And, in this connection, it is necessary to cite another Antic author, who has understood the New Testament much better than Fathers-heresiologists: “We are asked the reason, but we do not assert that man is in no sense for our denial that man is made by God, made by God; we only ask in what sense, and when, and how. For, according to the apostle, there are two men, one of whom he calls sometimes the outer man, generally the earthy, sometimes, too, the old man; the other he calls the inner or heavenly or new man. The question is, Which of these is made by God? For there are likewise two times of our nativity; one when nature brought us forth into this light, binding us in the bonds of flesh; and the other, when the truth regenerated us on our conversion from error and our entrance into the faith. It is this second birth of which Jesus speaks in the Gospel, when He says, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus, not knowing what Christ meant, was at a loss, and inquired how this could be, for an old man could not enter into his mother's womb and be born a second time. Jesus said in reply, Except a man be born of water and of the Holy Spirit, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Then He adds, That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Hence, as the birth in which our bodies originate is not the only birth, but there is another in which we are born again in spirit, an important question arises from this distinction as to which of those births it is in which God makes us. The manner of birth also is twofold. In the humiliating process of ordinary generation, we spring from the heat of animal passion; but when we are brought into the faith, we are formed under good instruction in honor and purity in Jesus Christ, by the Holy Spirit. <…> The question, then, is not whether God makes man, but what man He makes, and when, and how. For if it is when we are fashioned in the womb that God forms us after His own image, which is the common belief of Gentiles and Jews, and which is also your belief, then God makes the old man, and produces us by means of sensual passion, which does not seem suitable to His divine nature. But if it is when we are converted and brought to a better life that we are formed by God, which is the general doctrine of Christ and His apostles, and which is also our doctrine, in this case God makes us new men, and produces us in honor and purity, which would agree perfectly with His sacred and adorable majesty. If you do not reject Paul's authority, we will prove to you from him what man God makes, and when, and how. He says to the Ephesians, That ye put off according to your former conversation the old man, which is corrupt through deceitful lusts; and be renewed in the spirit of your mind; and put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and holiness of truth. This shows that in the creation of man after the image of God, it is another man that is spoken of, and another birth, and another manner of birth. The putting off and putting on of which he speaks, point to the time of the reception of the truth; and the assertion that the new man is created by God implies that the old man is created neither by God nor after God. And when he adds, that this new man is made in holiness and righteousness and truth, he thus points to another manner of birth of which this is the character, and which, as I have said, differs widely from the manner in which bodily generation is effected. And as he declares that only the former is of God, it follows that the latter is not. Again, writing to the Colossians, he uses words to the same effect: Put off the old man with his deeds, and put on the new man, which is renewed in the knowledge of God according to the image of Him who created Him in you. Here he not only shows that iris the new man that God makes, but he declares the time and manner of the formation, for the words in the knowledge of God point to the time of believing. Then he adds, according to the image of Him who created him, to make it clear that the old man is not the image of God, nor formed by God. Moreover, the following words, Where there is neither male nor female, Jew nor Greek, Barbarian nor Scythian, show more plainly still that the birth by which we are made male and female, Greeks and Jews, Scythians and Barbarians, is not the birth in which God effects the formation of man; but that the birth with which God has to do is that in which we lose the difference of nation and sex and condition, and become one like Him who is one, that is, Christ. <…> It is plain that everywhere he speaks of the second or spiritual birth as that in which we are made by God, as distinct from the indecency of the first birth, in which we are on a level with other animals as regards dignity and purity, as we are conceived in the maternal womb, and are formed, and brought forth. You may observe that in this matter the dispute between us is not so much about a question of doctrine as of interpretation. For you think that it is the old or outer or earthy man that is said to have been made by God; while we apply this to the heavenly man, giving the superiority to the inner or new man. And our opinion is not rash or groundless, for we have learned it from Christ and His apostles, who are proved to have been the first in the world who thus taught.” It was a fragment of Capitula of Faustus the Numidian, preserved by St. Augustinus in his “Contra Faustum Manichaeum”4, 24.1.
According to the above mentioned, I would like to return to the question, that has been initiated by the people from scientific world many times. I mean a definition of such phenomenon as “Gnosticism”. And I would like to cite two definitions of it, as examples. The first definition was given by Alexander L. Khosroev:
“Almost in full compliance with the Final Document of the International Colloquium in Messina (1966), I understand under the term “Gnosticism” absolutely specific religious phenomenon, i.e.: definitive, the Christian from the beginning, movements of the first centuries A.D. (previously dualistic in their theology, although, sometimes most monistic ones), proceeds from such common characteristics as: 1) pretending on the exclusive possession of knowledge, that was received, as a rule, in the result of revelation, and, as a result, a contradistinction of itself to all other Christians, who have not such knowledge; 2) non-recognition of the Church’s hierarchy; their own, different from one group to another, understanding of principle of community’s organization, and, as a result, an absence of their own, united Church; 3) usage of the different, and often non-Biblical, traditions for their speculations, and, as a result, a true individualism in the creative process, etc. I call these Christians not Gnostics (for the avoiding of confusion with different non-Christians, who also pretended on the possessing of Knowledge, or with such Christian Gnostic, as Climent of Alexandria), but I call them Gnosticists.”
And the second definition has been given to “Gnosticism” by the out-standing Russian philosopher Alexey F. Losev:
“Namely, Gnosticism is 1) occult, 2) pneumatic, and 3) cosmologically-humanly limited 4) Personalism, naturalistic, and quite constrainedly bring out 5) soteriological aims with the help of 6) myphologically constructed system of the term’s categories. The main here is, as we can see, this limited natutalistic Personalism, that reaches not only to cosmic-material categories, but even to human-everyday and tragic dramaturgy.” It is easy to note, that A. Khosroev gives in his definition secondary, and unimportant, and often conflicting attributes: he undertakes it absolutely in the spirit of the Messina’s Colloquium, but he says nothing about essential and unique attributes of “Gnosticism”. But the Losev’s definition is even funnier, because Alexey Losev fights against his own fantasies, just like Don Quixote with the windmills. From my point of view, such definitions are the results of mistakable opinions about “Gnosticism” as something like “Gnostic religion”, or, at least, “Universal heresy”. And, because of this, I would like to offer to my readers my own definition of “Gnosticism”: “Gnosticism” is a complex of ideas, based on differentiation and even contradistinction, at the initial chapters of the Book of Genesis, of God (Elochim, in Gen., 1:1–2:3), and god Yahweh (in Gen., 2:4 ff.). This complex of ideas has founded its various expressions and development both in canonic and apocryphal Christian and in non-Christian literature, in religious imaginations of some groups beginning from Late Antiquity, Middle Ages and the New Times until the present day”. And that’s all.
According to this definition, “gnosis’, i.e. “knowledge”, is a knowledge about non-equality of God and “Yahweh the god”, and “ignorance” (αγνοια) is an equalization of them. That’s why our Orthodox brothers even have no right to resent: ignorance is the essence of their teaching. January, 2011. Translated from Russian (copyleft) by Alex Moma (February, 2011). Original source: http://community.livejournal.com/ru_gnostik/347756.html 1 Cited according to: “The Works of Philo Judaeus, the Contemporary of Josephus”, Translated from the Greek by C.D. Yonge, B.A. Vol. 1. London: George Bell and Sons, York Street, Covent Garden, 1890. 2 Cited according to: “The Writings of Irenaeus”. Translated by Rev. Alexander Roberts, D.D., and Rev. W.H. Rambaut, A.B. Vol. I. (Ante-Nicene Christian Library: Translations of the Writings of the Fathers down to A.D. 325. Vol. V.) Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 38, George Street, London: Hamilton & Co., Dublin: John Robertson & Co., MDCCCLXVIII. 3 The original title of the book: Радостная Весть: Новый Завет в переводе с древнегреческого. Москва: Российское Библейское общество, 2005. 4 Or “Against Faustus the Manichaean”. Cited according to: Augustine. Reply to Faustus the Manichaean // St. Augustine. The Writings against the Manichaeans and against the Donatists (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 4). Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1887. All the Biblical cites were given here according to the “King James Holy Bible” (re-issued in 2009). * Concerning Melchisedec as the King of SODOM see the article: http://sodomdiscovery.site40.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=19&Itemid=38
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09:15 am
[alex_moma]
[Link] |
Partly accessed on GoogleBooks since last week.
http://books.google.com/books?id=t0M3aesnIhsC&printsec=frontcover&dq=nag+hammadi+bibliography&hl=ru&ei=1b-7TLjYI4fb4gaEsrjwDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAQ
Nag Hammadi Bibliography 1995-2006 by David M. Scholer.
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08:31 am
[xaliavschik]
[Link] |
A Man Of Wide Interests
The New York Times, April 28, 1912
MR. MORGAN SEEKS MORE COPTIC MANUSCRIPTS IN EGYPT
(mirror: link)
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11:50 pm
[peacerabbit]
[Link] |
Survey
Hello everyone. Although I myself am not a follower of Gnosticism, I am currently doing a project on it for my Comparative Religions class. I was hoping you could answer a few questions for me. I'd like to get as many answers as possible, and it would be great if I could get them as soon as possible. Please answer in as much or as little detail as you'd like, and if you don't feel like answering every question don't worry about it. Thank you.
( Click here for the questions. )
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01:35 pm
[alex_moma]
[Link] |
The Gnostic Radio:
http://thegodabovegod.com
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04:33 pm
[sophia_sadek]
[Link] |
Lupercalia event
The Sophia Community will hold the second annual open Lupercalia event this coming Monday at the same venue as last year. Last year's posting has details.
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