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| The System of the Peratæ; Their Tritheism; Explanation of the Incarnation.
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Chapter VII.—The
System of the Peratæ; Their Tritheism; Explanation of the
Incarnation.
There is also unquestionably a certain other (head
of the hydra,454
| 454 Something
is wanting after Περατική in the
text. Miller supplies the deficiency, and his conjecture is
adopted above. Literally, it should be rendered—“the
Peratic heresy, the blasphemy of which (heretics),” etc. | namely, the heresy)
of the Peratæ,455
| 455 Most
of what is mentioned by Hippolytus concerning this sect is new, as the
chief writers on the early heresies are comparatively silent concerning
the Peratæ; indeed, Irenæus, Tertullian, and Epiphanius
completely so. Clemens Alexandrinus, Strom., vii.; (vol.
ii. p. 555), mentions the Peratics, and Theodoret more fully than the
rest speaks of them (Hæret. fabul., i. 17).
Theodoret, however, as the Abbe Cruice thinks, has appropriated his
remarks from Hippolytus. | whose blasphemy
against Christ has for many years escaped notice. And the present
is a fitting opportunity for bringing to light the secret mysteries of
such (heretics). These allege that the world is one, triply
divided. And of the triple division with them, one portion is a
certain single originating principle, just as it were a huge fountain,
which can be divided mentally into infinite segments. Now the
first segment, and that which, according to them, is (a segment) in
preference (to others),456
| 456
προεχεστέρα
or προσεχεστέρα,
contiguous. This is Miller’s reading, but is devoid of
sense. Προεχεστέρα, adopted by Schneidewin and Cruice, might bear the meaning of the
expression par excellence. | is
a triad, and it is called a Perfect Good, (and) a Paternal
Magnitude. And the second portion of the triad of these is, as it
were, a certain infinite crowd of potentialities that are
generated457
| 457
γεγεννημένων:
Miller reads γεγεννημένον,
agreeing with πλῆθος.
Bernays, in his Epistola Critica addressed to Bunsen, proposes
the former reading. | from themselves,
(while) the third is formal.458
| 458
εἰδικοῦ: some
read ἰδικοῦ. This term,
adopted from the Platonic philosophy, is translated specialis by
logicians, and transcendentalis by metaphysicians. It
expresses the pre-existent form in the divine mind, according to which
material objects were fashioned. The term seems out of place as
used by the Peratics to denominate a corruptible and perishing
world. We should rather expect ὐλικοῦ, i.e., material.
(See Aristotle’s masterly exposition of the subject of the
εἶδος and
ὕλη in his Metaphysics book vi., and
p. 64 of the analysis prefixed to the translation in Bohn’s
Library.) | And the first, which is good, is
unbegotten, and the second is a self-producing good, and the third is
created; and hence it is that they expressly declare that there are
three Gods, three Logoi, three Minds, three Men. For to each
portion of the world, after the division has been made, they assign
both Gods, and Logoi, and Minds, and Men, and the rest; but that from
unorigination and the first segment459
| 459
πρώτης or πρὸ τῆς,
“antecedent to the segment.” | of the world, when afterwards the world had
attained unto its completion, there came down from above, for causes
that we shall afterwards declare, in the time of Herod a certain man called Christ, with a
threefold nature, and a threefold body, and a threefold power, (and)
having in himself all (species of) concretions and potentialities
(derivable) from the three divisions of the world; and that this, says
(the Peratic), is what is spoken: “It pleased him that in
him should dwell all fulness bodily,”460
and in Him the entire Divinity resides of
the triad as thus divided. For, he says, that from the two
superjacent worlds—namely, from that (portion of the triad) which
is unbegotten, and from that which is self-producing—there have
been conveyed down into this world in which we are, seeds of all sorts
of potentialities. What, however, the mode of the descent is, we
shall afterwards declare.
(The Peratic) then says that Christ descended from
above from unorigination, that by His descent all things triply divided
might be saved. For some things, he says, being borne down from
above, will ascend through Him, whereas whatever (beings) form plots
against those which are carried down from above are cast off,461
| 461
ἀφίεται: some read
ἀφιει, i.e., dismisses; some
ἀφιεῖ
εἰκῆ, i.e., heedlessly casts
off. Hippolytus, in his Summary of the Peratic Heresy in
book x., has αφιεται
εἰκῆ, which Cruice translates
temere absolvuntur. Schneidewin has in the same
passage ἀφίεται
merely, and translates it abjiciuntur. In both
places Bernays suggests ὀφιοειδῆ, i.e., those
of the nature of the Serpent. | and being placed in a state of punishment,
are renounced. This, he says, is what is spoken: “For
the Son of man came not into the world to destroy the world, but that
the world through Him might be saved.” The world, he says,
he denominates those two parts that are situated above, viz., both the
unbegotten (portion of the triad), and the self-produced one. And
when Scripture, he says, uses the words, “that we may not be
condemned with the world,” it alludes to the third portion of
(the triad, that is) the formal world. For the third portion,
which he styles the world (in which we are), must perish; but the two
(remaining portions), which are situated above, must be rescued from
corruption.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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