13. That they are distinct and separate as persons was plainly manifested at the baptism of Jesus. On that occasion, as Jesus came up out of the water, John saw the Holy Ghost descend upon him, and at the same time the voice of the Father was heard speaking from heaven, saying: "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."[[76]] Here we have the persons of the Godhead present but distinct from each other. Stephen, the martyr, in the presence of the angry crowd which took his life, saw the heavens open and "Jesus standing on the right hand of God."[[77]] Here, too, the Father and Son are seen and, according to the testimony of the holy man, they are distinct personalities.
14. Yet Jesus said to the Jews: "I and my Father are one. * * * Believe that the Father is in me and I in him."[[78]] But this oneness cannot have reference to the persons of the Father and of the Son, which we have seen are distinct. Their oneness, therefore, must consist in a unity of attributes, purposes, glory, power. Jesus in his great prayer just previous to his betrayal, said, in praying for his disciples: "Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one. * * * That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us."[[79]] Clearly it is not the uniting of the persons of his disciples into one person or body that Jesus prayed for; but he would have them of one mind and one spirit, as he and the Father are one. So also he had no wish that the person of one of his disciples should be crowded into that of another, and so on until they all became one person or body—but "as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee." That is, while remaining distinct as persons, Messiah would have the mind or Spirit of God in his disciples as it was in him, and as his was in the Father, that God might be all in all—the Father to be honored as the head and worshiped in the name of the Son; and the Holy Ghost to be revered as the witness and messenger of both the Father and the Son[[80]]—the bond of union between God and men, as it is between the Father and the Son; in one word to be God in man.
15. Each of these persons in scripture is called God; and taken together they are God, or constitute the grand Presidency of heaven and earth, and as such are one, as well as in attributes. (See note 5, end of section).
16. The spirit of the Son had an existence with the Father before he was born in the flesh;[[81]] and indeed it was by him, and through him—under the direction of the Father—that the worlds were made;[[82]] "and without him was not anything made that was made."[[83]]
17. Such is the simple doctrine of the Godhead taught to the primitive Saints by the apostles. It was implicitly believed as God's revelation to them upon the subject, and they were content to allow the revelation to excite their reverence without arousing their curiosity to the point where men of finite minds attempt to grasp the infinite, or circumscribe God in their understandings. In a short time, however, a change came, and men sought to explain the revelation that God had given of himself by the vain babblings of pagan science; and that led not only to much contention within the church, but to the adoption in the Christian creed of erroneous ideas in respect of Deity.
18. Gnostic and "New Platonic" Philosophy.—In order to give a clear explanation of this matter, it will be necessary to invite the attention of the student to Gnosticism and the Eclectic or "New Platonic" philosophy which arose in the early Christian centuries. First, then, as to Gnosticism. The Gnostics taught there existed from eternity a Being that embodied within himself all the virtues; a Being who is the purest light and is diffused throughout boundless space, which they called Pleroma. This Being, after dwelling alone and in absolute repose for an infinite period, by an operation purely mental, or by acting upon himself, produced two spirits[[84]] of different sexes. By the marriage of these two spirits others of similar nature were produced, who, in their turn, produced others. Thus a celestial family was formed in the pleroma. These emanations from Deity, whether directly or from those spirits first begotten by Deity acting upon himself, were called Aeons, a term which was doubtless employed to signify their eternal duration, and perhaps the mode of their production.
19. Beyond this pleroma where God and his family dwelt, existed a rude and unformed mass of matter, heaving itself continually in wild commotion.[[85]] This mass of the Aeons, wandering beyond the pleroma, discovered and reduced to order and beauty and then peopled it with human beings and with animals of different species. This builder of the world the Gnostics called the Demiurge [Dem-i-urge].[[86]] Though possessed of many shining qualities, the Demiurge was by nature arrogant and domineering, hence he claims absolute authority over the new world to the exclusion altogether of the authority of the supreme God, and requires mankind to pay divine honors exclusively to him.
20. Man, according to the Gnostic philosophy, is composed of a terrestial, and therefore a vicious body; and of a celestial spirit, which in some sense is a particle of the Deity himself. The spirit is oppressed by the body, which is supposed to be the seat of all the lusts and other evils that flesh is heir to, and by the spirit of man is drawn away from the knowledge and worship of the true God, and led to pay reverence to the Demiurge and his associates. From this wretched bondage of evil God labors to rescue his offspring. But the Demiurge and his associates, eager to retain their power, resist the divine purpose and labor to efface all knowledge of the supreme Deity. The philosophy maintained, however, that God would ultimately prevail; and having restored to liberty most of the spirits now imprisoned in bodies, he will dissolve the fabric of the world. Then the primitive tranquility will return, and God will reign with the redeemed spirits in perfect happiness to all eternity.[[87]]
21. When the followers of this philosophy became converted to Christianity, they looked upon Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost as the latest Aeons or emanations from the Deity, sent forth to emancipate men from the tyranny of matter by revealing to them the true God; to fit them, though perfect knowledge to enter the sacred pleroma. In connection with this, however, some of these Christian Gnostics held that Jesus had no body at all, but was an unsubstantial phantom that constantly deceived the senses of those who thought they associated with him. Others of them said there doubtless was a man called Jesus born of human parents, upon whom one of the Aeons, called Christ, descended at his baptism, having quitted the pleroma for that purpose; but who, previous to the crucifixion of the man Jesus, withdrew from him and returned to the Deity. [See note 7, end of section.]
22. The Two Modes of Life to which Gnosticism led.—The Gnostic philosophy led to two widely different methods of life; one extremely ascetic and the other as extremely profligate. Gnostics believed matter to be utterly malignant, the source of all evil, therefore it was recommended by one party that the body should be weakened by fastings and the practice of other austerities, that the spirit might enjoy the greater liberty and be better able to contemplate heavenly things. The other party, on the contrary, maintained that men could safely indulge all their appetites and lustful desires, and that there was no moral difference in human actions. One leader of this persuasion—Carpocrates of Alexandria, who flourished in the second century—not only gave his disciples license to sin, but imposed on them the necessity of sinning, by teaching them the way to eternal salvation was open to those souls only which committed all kinds of enormity and wickedness. Such were the errors that grew out of Gnosticism, and which contributed to the corruption of the gospel soon after it was founded by the preaching of the apostles.