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| Further Exposition of the Heresy of the Naasseni; Profess to Follow Homer; Acknowledge a Triad of Principles; Their Technical Names of the Triad; Support These on the Authority of Greek Poets; Allegorize Our Saviour's Miracles; The Mystery of the Samothracians; Why the Lord Chose Twelve Disciples; The Name Corybas, Used by Thracians and Phrygians, Explained; Naasseni Profess to Find Their System in Scripture; Their Interpretation of Jacob's Vision; Their Idea of the “Perfect Man;” The “Perfect Man” Called “Papa” By the Phrygians; The Naasseni and Phrygians on the Resurrection; The Ecstasis of St. Paul; The Mysteries of Religion as Alluded to by Christ; Interpretation of the Parable of the Sower; Allegory of the Promised Land; Comparison of the System of the Phrygians with the Statements of Scripture; Exposition of the Meaning of the Higher and Lower Eleusinian Mysteries; The Incarnation Discoverable Here According to the Naasseni.
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Chapter III.—Further
Exposition of the Heresy of the Naasseni; Profess to Follow Homer;
Acknowledge a Triad of Principles; Their Technical Names of the Triad;
Support These on the Authority of Greek Poets; Allegorize Our
Saviour’s Miracles; The Mystery of the Samothracians; Why the
Lord Chose Twelve Disciples; The Name Corybas, Used by Thracians and
Phrygians, Explained; Naasseni Profess to Find Their System in
Scripture; Their Interpretation of Jacob’s Vision; Their Idea of
the “Perfect Man;” The “Perfect Man” Called
“Papa” By the Phrygians; The Naasseni and Phrygians on the
Resurrection; The Ecstasis of St. Paul; The Mysteries of Religion as
Alluded to by Christ; Interpretation of the Parable of the Sower;
Allegory of the Promised Land; Comparison of the System of the
Phrygians with the Statements of Scripture; Exposition of the Meaning
of the Higher and Lower Eleusinian Mysteries; The Incarnation
Discoverable Here According to the Naasseni.
Adopting these and such like (opinions), these
most marvellous Gnostics, inventors of a novel381
grammatical art, magnify Homer as their
prophet—as one, (according to them,) who, after the mode adopted
in the mysteries, announces these truths; and they mock those who are
not indoctrinated into the holy Scriptures, by betraying them into such
notions. They make, however, the following assertion: he
who says that all things derive consistence from one, is in error; but
he who says that they are of three, is in possession of the truth, and
will furnish a solution of the (phenomena of the) universe. For
there is, says (the Naassene), one blessed nature of the Blessed Man,
of him who is above, (namely) Adam; and there is one mortal nature,
that which is below; and there is one kingless generation, which is
begotten above, where, he says, is Mariam382
| 382
The Abbe Cruice considers that this is taken from verses of
Ezekiel, founding his opinion on fragments of these verses to be found
in Eusebius’ Præparat. Evang., ix. 38. | the sought-for one, and Iothor the
mighty sage, and Sephora the gazing one, and Moses whose generation is
not in Egypt, for children were born unto him in Madian; and not even
this, he says, has escaped the notice of the poets.
“Threefold was our partition; each obtained
His meed of honour due.”383
For, says he, it is necessary that the magnitudes be declared,
and that they thus be declared by all everywhere, “in order that
hearing they may not hear, and seeing they may not see.”384
For if, he says, the magnitudes
were not declared, the world could not have obtained consistence.
These are the three tumid expressions (of these heretics), Caulacau,385
| 385 The
commentators refer to Isa.
xxviii. 10.
Epiphanius,Hæres., xxv., mentions these expressions, but
assigns them a different meaning. Saulasau is
tribulation,Caulacau hope, and Zeesar “hope, as
yet, little.” [See my note on Irenæus, p. 350,
this series, and see Elucidation II.] |
Saulasau, Zeesar, i.e., Adam, who is farthest
above; Saulasau, that is, the mortal one below;
Zeesar, that is, Jordan that flows
upwards. This, he says, is the hermaphrodite man (present) in
all. But those who are ignorant of him, call him Geryon with the
threefold body—Geryon, i.e., as if (in the sense of) flowing from
earth—but (whom) the Greeks by common consent (style)
“celestial horn of the moon,” because he mixed and blended
all things in all. “For all things,” he says,
“were made by him, and not even one thing was made without him,
and what was made in him is life.”386
This, says he, is the life, the
ineffable generation of perfect men, which was not known by preceding
generations. But the passage, “nothing was made without
him,” refers to the formal world, for it was created without his
instrumentality by the third and fourth (of the quaternion named
above). For says he, this is the cup “Condy, out of which the king, while he quaffs, draws his
omens.”387
This, he
says, has been discovered hid in the beauteous seeds of Benjamin.
And the Greeks likewise, he
says, speak of this in the following terms:—
“Water to the raging mouth bring; thou slave,
bring wine;
Intoxicate and plunge me into stupor.
My tankard tells me
The sort I must become.”388
This, says he, was alone sufficient for its being understood
by men; (I mean) the cup of Anacreon declaring, (albeit) mutely, an
ineffable mystery. For dumb, says he, is Anacreon’s cup;
and (yet) Anacreon affirms that it speaks to himself, in language mute,
as to what sort he must become—that is spiritual, not
carnal—if he shall listen in silence to the concealed
mystery. And this is the water in those fair nuptials which Jesus
changing made into wine. This, he says, is the mighty and true
beginning of miracles389
which Jesus performed in Cana of Galilee, and (thus) manifested the
kingdom of heaven. This, says he, is the kingdom of heaven that
reposes within us as a treasure, as leaven hid in the three measures of
meal.390
This is, he says, the great and ineffable mystery of the
Samothracians, which it is allowable, he says, for us only who are
initiated to know. For the Samothracians expressly hand down, in
the mysteries that are celebrated among them, that (same) Adam as the
primal man. And habitually there stand in the temple of the
Samothracians two images of naked men, having both hands stretched
aloft towards heaven, and their pudenda erecta, as with
the statue of Mercury on Mount Cyllene. And the aforesaid
images are figures of the primal man, and of that spiritual one that is
born again, in every respect of the same substance with that man.
This, he says, is what is spoken by the Saviour: “If ye do
not drink my blood, and eat my flesh, ye will not enter into the
kingdom of heaven; but even though,” He says, “ye drink of
the cup which I drink of, whither I go, ye cannot enter
there.”391
For He says
He was aware of what sort of nature each of His disciples was, and that
there was a necessity that each of them should attain unto His own
peculiar nature. For He says He chose twelve disciples from the
twelve tribes, and spoke by them to each tribe. On this account,
He says, the preachings of the twelve disciples neither did all hear,
nor, if they heard, could they receive. For the things that are
not according to nature, are with them contrary to nature.
This, he says, the Thracians who dwell around
Hæmus, and the Phrygians similarly with the Thracians, denominate
Corybas, because, (though) deriving the beginning of his descent from
the head above and from the unportrayed brain, and (though) permeating
all the principles of the existing state of things, (yet) we do not
perceive how and in what manner he comes down. This, says he, is
what is spoken: “We have heard his voice, no doubt, but we
have not seen his shape.”392
For the voice of him that is set
apart393
| 393
ἀποτεταγμένου:
some read ἀποτεταμένου. | and portrayed is
heard; but (his) shape, which descends from above from the unportrayed
one,—what sort it is, nobody knows. It resides, however, in
an earthly mould, yet no one recognises it. This, he says, is
“the god that inhabiteth the flood,” according to the
Psalter, “and who speaketh and crieth from many
waters.”394
The
“many waters,” he says, are the diversified generation of
mortal men, from which (generation) he cries and vociferates to the
unportrayed man, saying, “Preserve my only-begotten from the
lions.”395
In reply to
him, it has, says he, been declared, “Israel, thou art my
child: fear not; even though thou passest through rivers, they
shall not drown thee; even though thou passest through fire, it shall
not scorch thee.”396
By rivers he means, says he, the
moist substance of generation, and by fire the impulsive principle and
desire for generation. “Thou art mine; fear
not.” And again, he says, “If a mother forget her
children, so as not to have pity on them and give them food, I also
will forget you.”397
Adam, he says, speaks to his own
men: “But even though a woman forget these things, yet I
will not forget you. I have painted you on my hands.”
In regard, however, of his ascension, that is his regeneration, that he
may become spiritual, not carnal, the Scripture, he says, speaks
(thus): “Open the gates, ye who are your rulers; and be ye
lift up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of glory shall come
in,” that is a wonder of wonders.398
“For who,” he says,
“is this King of glory? A worm, and not a man; a reproach
of man, and an outcast of the people; himself is the King of glory, and
powerful in war.”399
And by war he means the war that is in the body,
because its frame has been made out of hostile elements; as it has been
written, he says, “Remember the conflict that exists in the
body.”400
| 400 This is a
quotation from the Septuagint, Job xl. 27. The reference to the authorized
(English) version would be xli. 8. | Jacob, he says,
saw this entrance and this gate in his journey into Mesopotamia,
that is, when from a child he was now becoming a youth and a man; that
is, (the entrance and gate) were made known unto him as he journeyed
into Mesopotamia. But Mesopotamia, he says, is the current of the great ocean
flowing from the midst of the Perfect Man; and he was astonished at the
celestial gate, exclaiming, “How terrible is this place! it is
nought else than the house of God, and this (is) the gate of
heaven.”401
On account of
this, he says, Jesus uses the words, “I am the true
gate.”402
Now he who
makes these statements is, he says, the Perfect Man that is imaged from
the unportrayable one from above. The Perfect Man therefore
cannot, he says, be saved, unless, entering in through this gate, he be
born again. But this very one the Phrygians, he says, call also
Papa, because he tranquillized all things
which, prior to his manifestation, were confusedly and dissonantly
moved. For the name, he says, of Papa
belongs simultaneously to all creatures403
| 403 [A
strange amplifying of the word, which is now claimed exclusively for
one. Elucidation III.] | —celestial, and terrestrial, and
infernal—who exclaim, Cause to cease, cause to cease the
discord of the world, and make “peace for those that
are afar off,” that is, for material and earthly beings; and
“peace for those that are near,”404
that is, for perfect men that are spiritual
and endued with reason. But the Phrygians denominate this same
also “corpse”—buried in the body, as it were, in a
mausoleum and tomb. This, he says, is what has been declared,
“Ye are whited sepulchres, full,” he says, “of dead
men’s bones within,”405
because there is not in you the living man. And again he
exclaims, “The dead shall start forth from the
graves,”406
that is, from the
earthly bodies, being born again spiritual, not carnal. For this,
he says, is the Resurrection that takes place through the gate of
heaven, through which, he says, all those that do not enter remain
dead. These same Phrygians, however, he says, affirm again that
this very (man), as a consequence of the change, (becomes) a god.
For, he says, he becomes a god when, having risen from the dead, he
will enter into heaven through a gate of this kind. Paul the
apostle, he says, knew of this gate, partially opening it in a mystery,
and stating “that he was caught up by an angel, and ascended as
far as the second and third heaven into paradise itself; and that he
beheld sights and heard unspeakable words which it would not be
possible for man to declare.”407
These are, he says, what are by all called the
secret mysteries, “which (also we speak), not in words taught of
human wisdom, but in those taught of the Spirit, comparing spiritual
things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not the
things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto
him.”408
And these
are, he says, the ineffable mysteries of the Spirit, which we alone are
acquainted with. Concerning these, he says, the Saviour has
declared, “No one can come unto me, except my heavenly Father
draw some one unto me.”409
For it is very difficult, he says, to
accept and receive this great and ineffable mystery. And again,
it is said, the Saviour has declared, “Not every one that saith
unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he
that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.”410
And it is necessary that they who
perform this (will), not hear it merely, should enter into the kingdom
of heaven. And again, he says, the Saviour has declared,
“The publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of heaven
before you.”411
For
“the publicans,” he says, are those who receive the
revenues412
| 412 The word
translated “revenues” and “ends” is the
same—τέλη | of all
things;413
| 413
Τῶν
ὅλων: some read τῶν ὠνίων | but we, he says,
are the publicans, “unto whom the ends of the ages have
come.”414
For
“the ends,” he says, are the seeds scattered from the
unportrayable one upon the world, through which the whole cosmical
system is completed; for through these also it began to exist.
And this, he says, is what has been declared: “The sower
went forth to sow. And some fell by the wayside, and was trodden
down; and some on the rocky places, and sprang up,” he says,
“and on account of its having no depth (of soil), it withered and
died; and some,” he says, “fell on fair and good ground,
and brought forth fruit, some a hundred, some sixty, and some thirty
fold. Who hath ears,” he says, “to hear, let him
hear.”415
| 415
Matt. xiii. 3–9; Mark
iv. 3–9; Luke viii. 5–8. | The meaning of
this, he says, is as follows, that none becomes a hearer of these
mysteries, unless only the perfect Gnostics. This, he says, is
the fair and good land which Moses speaks of: “I will bring
you into a fair and good land, into a land flowing with milk and
honey.”416
This, he
says, is the honey and the milk, by tasting which those that are
perfect become kingless, and share in the Pleroma. This, he says,
is the Pleroma, through which all existent things that are
produced417
have from the
ingenerable one been both produced and completed.
And this same (one) is styled also by418
| 418
ὐπὸ: Miller reads ἀπὸ | the Phrygians
“unfruitful.” For he is unfruitful when he is carnal,
and causes the desire of the flesh. This, he says, is what is
spoken: “Every tree not producing good fruit, is cut down
and cast into the
fire.”419
For these
fruits, he says, are only rational living men, who enter in through the
third gate. They say, forsooth, “Ye devour the dead, and
make the living; (but) if ye eat the living, what will ye
do?” They assert, however, that the living “are
rational faculties and minds, and men—pearls of that
unportrayable one cast before the creature below.”420
| 420
κάτω:
some read κάρπου | This, he says, is what (Jesus)
asserts: “Throw not that which is holy unto the dogs, nor
pearls unto the swine.”421
Now they allege that the work of
swine and dogs is the intercourse of the woman with a man. And
the Phrygians, he says, call this very one “goat-herd”
(Aipolis), not because, he says, he is accustomed to feed the goats
female and male, as the natural (men) use the name, but because, he
says, he is “Aipolis”—that is, always ranging
over,—who both revolves and carries around the entire cosmical
system by his revolutionary motion. For the word
“Polein” signifies to turn and change things; whence, he
says, they all call the twos centre of the heaven poles (Poloi).
And the poet says:—
“What sea-born sinless sage comes hither,
Undying Egyptian Proteus?”422
He is not undone,423
| 423
πιπράσκεται;
literally, bought and sold, i.e., ruined. | he says,424
| 424
λέγει: some
read ἀμέλει, i.e., doubtless, of
course. | but revolves as it were, and goes round
himself. Moreover, also, cities in which we dwell, because we
turn and go round in them, are denominated “Poleis.”
In this manner, he says, the Phrygians call this one
“Aipolis,” inasmuch as he everywhere ceaselessly turns all
things, and changes them into their own peculiar (functions). And
the Phrygians style him, he says, “very fruitful” likewise,
“because,” says he, “more numerous are the children
of the desolate one, than those of her which hath an
husband;”425
that is, things by
being born again become immortal and abide for ever in great numbers,
even though the things that are produced may be few; whereas things
carnal, he says, are all corruptible, even though very many things (of
this type) are produced. For this reason, he says, “Rachel
wept426
| 426
ἔκλαιε: this is in the
margin; ἔλαβε is in the ms. The marginal reading is the proper correction of
that of the ms. | for her children,
and would not,” says (the prophet), “be comforted;
sorrowing for them, for she knew,” says he, “that they are
not.”427
But
Jeremiah likewise utters lamentation for Jerusalem below,
not the city in Phœnicia, but the corruptible generation
below. For Jeremiah likewise, he says, was aware of the Perfect
Man, of him that is born again—of water and the Spirit not
carnal. At least Jeremiah himself remarked: “He is a
man, and who shall know him?”428
In this manner, (the Naassene)
says, the knowledge of the Perfect Man is exceedingly profound, and
difficult of comprehension. For, he says, the beginning of
perfection is a knowledge of man, whereas knowledge of God is absolute
perfection.
The Phrygians, however, assert, he says, that he
is likewise “a green ear of corn reaped.” And after
the Phrygians, the Athenians, while initiating people into the
Eleusinian rites, likewise display to those who are being admitted to
the highest grade at these mysteries, the mighty, and marvellous, and
most perfect secret suitable for one initiated into the highest mystic
truths: (I allude to) an ear of corn in silence reaped. But
this ear of corn is also (considered) among the Athenians to constitute
the perfect enormous illumination (that has descended) from the
unportrayable one, just as the Hierophant himself (declares); not,
indeed, emasculated like Attis,429
| 429
[The Phrygian Atys (see cap. iv. infra), whose history
should have saved Origen from an imitation of heathenism.] |
but made a eunuch by means of hemlock, and despising430
| 430
παρῃτημένος
: some read ἀπηρτισμένος,
i.e., perfecting. | all carnal generation. (Now) by night
in Eleusis, beneath a huge fire, (the Celebrant) enacting the
great and secret mysteries, vociferates and cries aloud, saying,
“August Brimo has brought forth a consecrated son, Brimus;”
that is, a potent (mother has been delivered of) a potent child.
But revered, he says, is the generation that is spiritual, heavenly,
from above, and potent is he that is so born. For the mystery is
called “Eleusin” and “Anactorium.”
“Eleusin,” because, he says, we who are spiritual come
flowing down from Adam above; for the word “eleusesthai” is, he says, of the same import
with the expression “to come.” But
“Anactorium” is of the same import with the expression
“to ascend upwards.” This, he says, is what they
affirm who have been initiated in the mysteries of the
Eleusinians. It is, however, a regulation of law, that those who
have been admitted into the lesser should again be initiated into the
Great Mysteries. For greater destinies obtain greater
portions. But the inferior mysteries, he says, are those of
Proserpine below; in regard of which mysteries, and the path which
leads thither, which is wide and spacious, and conducts those that are
perishing to Proserpine, the poet likewise says:—
“But under her a fearful path extends,
Hollow, miry, yet best guide to
Highly-honoured Aphrodite’s lovely
grove.”431
| 431 These
verses have been ascribed to Parmenides. |
These, he says, are the inferior mysteries, those
appertaining to carnal generation. Now, those men who are initiated into these inferior
(mysteries) ought to pause, and (then) be admitted into the great (and)
heavenly (ones). For they, he says, who obtain their shares (in
this mystery), receive greater portions. For this, he says, is
the gate of heaven; and this a house of God, where the Good Deity
dwells alone. And into this (gate), he says, no unclean person
shall enter, nor one that is natural or carnal; but it is reserved for
the spiritual only. And those who come hither ought to cast
off432
their garments,
and become all of them bridegrooms, emasculated through the virginal
spirit. For this is the virgin433
who carries in her womb and conceives
and brings forth a son, not animal, not corporeal, but blessed for
evermore. Concerning these, it is said, the Saviour has expressly
declared that “straight and narrow is the way that leadeth unto
life, and few there are that enter upon it; whereas broad and spacious
is the way that leadeth unto destruction, and many there are that pass
through it.”434
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