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| Chapter XII.—Human Nature Possesses an Adaptation for Perfection; The Gnostic Alone Attains It.
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Chapter XII.—Human Nature Possesses an Adaptation for Perfection; The Gnostic Alone Attains It.
By which consideration3364
| 3364 i.e., that mentioned in the last sentence of chap xi.,
which would more appropriately be transferred to chap. xii. |
is solved the question propounded to us by the heretics, Whether Adam
was created perfect or imperfect? Well, if imperfect, how could the
work of a perfect God—above all, that work being man—be
imperfect? And if perfect, how did he transgress the commandments? For
they shall hear from us that he was not perfect in his creation, but
adapted to the reception of virtue. For it is of great importance in
regard to virtue to be made fit for its attainment. And it is intended
that we should be saved by ourselves. This, then, is the nature of the
soul, to move of itself. Then, as we are rational, and philosophy being
rational, we have some affinity with it. Now an aptitude is a movement
towards virtue, not virtue itself. All, then, as I said, are naturally
constituted for the acquisition of virtue.
But one man applies less, one more, to learning
and training. Wherefore also some have been competent to attain to
perfect virtue, and others have attained to a kind of it. And some,
on the other hand, through negligence, although in other respects of
good dispositions, have turned to the opposite. Now much more is that
knowledge which excels all branches of culture in greatness and in truth,
most difficult to acquire, and is attained with much toil. “But,
as seems, they know not the mysteries of God. For God created man
for immortality, and made him an image of His own nature;”3365
according to which nature of Him who knows all, he who is a Gnostic,
and righteous, and holy with prudence, hastes to reach the measure of
perfect manhood. For not only are actions and thoughts, but words also,
pure in the case of the Gnostic: “Thou hast proved mine heart; Thou
hast visited me by night,” it is said; “Thou hast subjected
me to the fire, and unrighteousness was not found in me: so that my mouth
shall not speak the works of men.”3366
And why do I say the works of men? He recognises
sin itself, which is not brought forward in order to repentance (for this
is common to all believers); but what sin is. Nor does he condemn this
or that sin, but simply all sin; nor is it what one has done ill that
he brings up, but what ought not to be done. Whence also repentance is
twofold: that which is common, on account of having transgressed; and
that which, from learning the nature of sin, persuades, in the first
instance, to keep from sinning, the result of which is not sinning.
Let them not then say, that he who does wrong
and sins transgresses through the agency of demons; for then he would
be guiltless. But by choosing the same things as demons, by sinning;
being unstable, and light, and fickle in his desires, like a demon,
he becomes a demoniac man. Now he who is bad, having become, through
evil, sinful by nature, becomes depraved, having what he has chosen;
and being sinful, sins also in his actions. And again, the good man does
right. Wherefore we call not only the virtues, but also right actions,
good. And of things that are
good we know that some are desirable
for themselves, as knowledge; for we hunt for nothing from it when we have
it, but only [seek] that it be with us, and that we be in uninterrupted
contemplation, and strive to reach it for its own sake. But other things
are desirable for other considerations, such as faith, for escape from
punishment, and the advantage arising from reward, which accrue from
it. For, in the case of many, fear is the cause of their not sinning;
and the promise is the means of pursuing obedience, by which comes
salvation. Knowledge, then, desirable as it is for its own sake, is the
most perfect good; and consequently the things which follow by means
of it are good. And punishment is the cause of correction to him who
is punished; and to those who are able to see before them he becomes an
example, to prevent them falling into the like.
Let us then receive knowledge, not desiring
its results, but embracing itself for the sake of knowing. For the
first advantage is the habit of knowledge (γνωστική),
which furnishes harmless pleasures and exultation both for the
present and the future. And exultation is said to be gladness,
being a reflection of the virtue which is according to truth,
through a kind of exhilaration and relaxation of soul. And the
acts which partake of knowledge are good and fair actions. For
abundance in the actions that are according to virtue, is the true
riches, and destitution in decorous3367
| 3367 Sylburgius proposes κοσμικάς,
worldly, instead of κοσμίας,
decorous; in which case the sentence would read: “and
[true] poverty, destitution in worldly desires.” |
desires is poverty. For the use and enjoyment of necessaries
are not injurious in quality, but in quantity, when in
excess. Wherefore the Gnostic circumscribes his desires in
reference both to possession and to enjoyment, not exceeding the
limit of necessity. Therefore, regarding life in this world as
necessary for the increase of science (ἐπιστήμη)
and the acquisition of knowledge (γνῶσις),
he will value highest, not living, but living well. He will therefore
prefer neither children, nor marriage, nor parents, to love for God, and
righteousness in life. To such an one, his wife, after conception, is as
a sister, and is judged as if of the same father; then only recollecting
her husband, when she looks on the children; as being destined to
become a sister in reality after putting off the flesh, which separates
and limits the knowledge of those who are spiritual by the peculiar
characteristics of the sexes. For souls, themselves by themselves, are
equal. Souls are neither male nor female, when they no longer marry nor
are given in marriage. And is not woman translated into man, when she
is become equally unfeminine, and manly, and perfect? Such, then, was
the laughter of Sarah3368
when she received the good news of the birth
of a son; not, in my opinion, that she disbelieved the angel, but that
she felt ashamed of the intercourse by means of which she was destined
to become the mother of a son.
And did not Abraham, when he was in danger on
account of Sarah’s beauty, with the king of Egypt, properly call
her sister, being of the same father, but not of the same mother?3369
| 3369 The reading of the text has,
“not of the same mother, much less of the same father,”
which contradicts Gen. xx. 12, and has been therefore amended as
above. |
To those, then, who have repented and not firmly
believed, God grants their requests through their supplications. But
to those who live sinlessly and gnostically, He gives, when they
have but merely entertained the thought. For example, to Anna,
on her merely conceiving the thought, conception was vouchsafed of
the child Samuel.3370
“Ask,” says the Scripture, “and I
will do. Think, and I will give.” For we have heard that God knows
the heart, not judging3371
| 3371
Or, “judging from the motion of the soul;” the text reading
here οὐ
κινήματος
ψυχῆς, for which, as above, is proposed,
οὐκ
ἐκ κινήματος
ψυχῆν. | the soul from
[external] movement, as we men; nor yet from the event. For it is
ridiculous to think so. Nor was it as the architect praises the work
when accomplished that God, on making the light and then seeing it,
called it good. But He, knowing before He made it what it would be,
praised that which was made, He having potentially made good, from the
first by His purpose that had no beginning, what was destined to be good
actually. Now that which has future He already said beforehand was good,
the phrase concealing the truth by hyperbaton. Therefore the Gnostic prays
in thought during every hour, being by love allied to God. And first
he will ask forgiveness of sins; and after, that he may sin no more;
and further, the power of well-doing and of comprehending the whole
creation and administration by the Lord, that, becoming pure in heart
through the knowledge, which is by the Son of God, he may be initiated
into the beatific vision face to face, having heard the Scripture
which says, “Fasting with prayer is a good thing.”3372
Now fastings signify abstinence from all
evils whatsoever, both in action and in word, and in thought
itself. As appears, then, righteousness is quadrangular;3373
| 3373 Metaphorical expression
for perfect. The phrase “a quadrangular man” is found
in Plato and Aristotle. [The proverbial τετρἀγονος
ἄνευ ψόγου, of the
Nicomach. Ethics, i. 10, and of Plato in the Protagoras,
p. 154. Ed. Bipont, 1782.] | on all sides equal and like
in word, in deed, in abstinence from evils, in beneficence, in gnostic
perfection; nowhere, and in no respect halting, so that he does not appear
unjust and unequal. As one, then, is righteous, so certainly is he a
believer. But as he is a believer, he is not yet also righteous—I
mean according
to the righteousness of progress
and perfection, according to which the Gnostic is called righteous.
For instance, on Abraham becoming a believer, it was
reckoned to him for righteousness, he having advanced to the greater and
more perfect degree of faith. For he who merely abstains from evil conduct
is not just, unless he also attain besides beneficence and knowledge;
and for this reason some things are to be abstained from, others are
to be done. “By the armour of righteousness on the right hand and
on the left,”3374
the apostle says, the righteous man is sent on to
the inheritance above,—by some [arms] defended, by others putting
forth his might. For the defence of his panoply alone, and abstinence
from sins, are not sufficient for perfection, unless he assume in addition
the work of righteousness—activity in doing good.
Then our dexterous man and Gnostic is revealed
in righteousness already even here, as Moses, glorified in the
face of the soul,3375
as we have formerly said, the body bears the
stamp of the righteous soul. For as the mordant of the dyeing process,
remaining in the wool, produces in it a certain quality and diversity
from other wool; so also in the soul the pain is gone, but the good
remains; and the sweet is left, but the base is wiped away. For these
are two qualities characteristic of each soul, by which is known that
which is glorified, and that which is condemned.
And as in the case of Moses, from his righteous
conduct, and from his uninterrupted intercourse with God, who spoke
to him, a kind of glorified hue settled on his face; so also a divine
power of goodness clinging to the righteous soul in contemplation and in
prophecy, and in the exercise of the function of governing, impresses
on it something, as it were, of intellectual radiance, like the solar
ray, as a visible sign of righteousness, uniting the soul with light,
through unbroken love, which is God-bearing and God-borne. Thence
assimilation to God the Saviour arises to the Gnostic, as far as
permitted to human nature, he being made perfect “as the Father
who is in heaven.”3376
It is He Himself who says, “Little children,
a little while I am still with you.”3377
Since also God Himself
remains blessed and immortal, neither molested nor molesting another;3378
| 3378 This is cited by Diogenes
Laertius as the first dictum of Epicurus. It is also referred to as such
by Cicero, De Natura Deorum, and by others. | not in
consequence of being by nature good, but in consequence of doing good in
a manner peculiar to Himself. God being essentially, and proving Himself
actually, both Father and good, continues immutably in the self-same
goodness. For what is the use of good that does not act and do good?E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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