[393]. Hippolytus, op. cit. Bk VI. c. 31, p. 290, Cruice: Ἐὰν ἐξομοιωθῇ τοῖς ἄνω ἐν Ὀγδοάδι, ἀθάνατος ἐγένετο καὶ ἦλθεν εἰς τὴν Ὀγδοάδα ἥτις ἐστί, φησίν, Ἰερουσαλὴμ ἐπουράνιος· ἐὰν δὲ ἐξομοιωθῇ τῇ ὕλῃ, τουτέστι τοῖς πάθεσι τοῖς ὑλικοῖς, φθαρτή ἐστι καὶ ἀπώλετο. “If [the soul] be of the likeness of those on high in the Ogdoad, it is born deathless and goes to the Ogdoad which is, he says, the heavenly Jerusalem; but if it be of the likeness of matter, that is, if it belongs to the material passions, it is corruptible and is utterly destroyed.”
[394]. ψυχικὸς ἄνθρωπος translated in the A.V. by “natural man” evidently means in the Valentinian sense those who are animated or have had breathed into them the breath of life merely. It has nothing to do with soul as we understand the term.
[395]. Amélineau, Gnost. Ég. p. 225.
[396]. Hippolytus, op. cit. Bk VI. c. 36, pp. 297, 298, Cruice: Ἔδει οὖν διορθωμένων τῶν ἄνω κατὰ τὴν αὐτὴν ἀκολουθίαν καὶ τὰ ἐνθάδε τυχεῖν διωρθώσεως. “Wherefore when things on high had been put straight, it had to be according to the law of sequences that those here below should be put straight also.”
[397]. Hippolytus, op. cit. p. 297, Cruice: ἐδιδάχθη γὰρ ὑπὸ τῆς Σοφίας ὁ Δημιουργός, ὅτι οὐκ ἔστιν αὐτὸς Θεὸς μόνος ὡς ἐνόμιζε, καὶ πλὴν αὐτοῦ ἕτερος (οὐκ) ἔστιν· ἀλλ’ ἔγνω διδαχθεὶς ὑπὸ τῆς Σοφίας τὸν κρείττονα· κατηχήθη γὰρ ὑπ’ αὐτῆς, καὶ ἐμυήθη καὶ ἐδιδάχθη τὸ μέγα τοῦ Πατρὸς καὶ τῶν Αἰώνων μυστήριον, καὶ ἐξεῖπεν αὐτὸ οὐδενί, κ.τ.λ. “For the Demiurge had been taught by Sophia that he was not the only God and that beside him there was none other, as he had thought; but through Sophia’s teaching he knew better. For he had been instructed and initiated by Sophia, and had been taught the great mystery of the Father and of the Aeons, and had declared it to none”—in support of which the statement in Exodus (vi. 2, 3) about being the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but “by my name Jehovah was I not known unto them” is quoted. The identification by Valentinus of the Demiurge with the God of the Jews is therefore complete.
[398]. σφάλματα “stumblings,” Hippolytus, loc. cit.
[399]. Hippolytus, op. cit. Bk vi. c. 35, p. 295, Cruice. I have taken what seems on comparison to be the original form of Valentinus’ teaching. In the same chapter, Hippolytus tells us that his followers were divided on the question of the composition of the body of Jesus—the Italic School led by Heracleon and Ptolemy averring that it was psychic and that at His baptism only the πνεῦμα came upon Him as a dove, while the Oriental School of Axionicus and Bardesanes maintained that it was pneumatic from the first. Cf. n. 2, p. [116] infra.
[400]. Amélineau, Gnost. Ég. p. 226. The Excerpta Theodoti, on which he relies, says (fr. 78): Μέχρι τοῦ βαπτίσματος οὖν ἡ εἱμαρμένη, φασίν, ἀληθής· μετὰ δὲ τοῦτο οὐκ ἔτι ἀληθεύουσιν οἱ ἀστρολόγοι. Ἔστι δὲ οὐ τὸ λουτρὸν μόνον τὸ ἐλευθεροῦν, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἡ γνῶσις τίνες ἦμεν, τί γεγόναμεν, ποῦ ἦμεν, ἢ ποῦ ἐνεβλήθημεν, ποῦ σπεύδομεν, πόθεν λυτρούμεθα, τί γέννησις τί ἀναγέννησις. “Until baptism then, they say the destiny [he is talking of that which is foretold by the stars] holds good; but thereafter the astrologers’ predictions are no longer unerring. For the [baptismal] font not only sets us free, but is also the Gnosis which teaches us what we are, why we have come into being, where we are, or whither we have been cast up, whither we are hastening, from what we have been redeemed, why there is birth, and why re-birth.” For baptism was to the Valentinian initiation, and a mystagogue of Eleusis would have expressed himself no differently.
[401]. Irenaeus, Bk I. c. 1, § 13, pp. 60-62, Harvey; Amélineau, Gnost. Ég. p. 226, and Excerpta Theodoti there quoted.
[402]. Hippolytus, op. cit. Bk VI. c. 35, pp. 295, 296, Cruice: Ὁ δὲ Ἰησοῦς, ὁ καινὸς ἄνθρωπος, ἀπὸ Πνεύματος Ἁγίου [καὶ τοῦ Ὑψίστου], τουτέστι τῆς Σοφίας καὶ τοῦ Δημιουργοῦ, ἵνα τὴν μὲν πλάσιν καὶ κατασκευὴν τοῦ σώματος αὐτοῦ ὁ Δημιουργὸς καταρτίσῃ, τὴν δὲ οὐσίαν αὐτοῦ τὸ Πνεῦμα παράσχῃ τὸ Ἅγιον, καὶ γένηται Λόγος ἐπουράνιος ἀπὸ τῆς Ὀγδοάδος γεννηθεὶς διὰ Μαρίας. “But Jesus, the new man, [has come into being] by the Holy Spirit and by the Highest, that is by Sophia and the Demiurge, so that the Demiurge might put together the mould and constitution of His body and that the Holy Spirit might provide its substance; and that He might become the Heavenly Logos ... when born of Mary.” According to this, the body of Jesus was a “psychic” or animal one; yet Hippolytus says immediately afterwards (p. 296, Cruice), that it was on this that there was a division between the Italic and the Oriental Schools of Valentinians, the former with Heracleon and Ptolemy saying that the body of Jesus was an animal one, the Holy Spirit coming on Him as a dove at His baptism, while the Orientals with Axionicus and Bardesanes maintained that the body of the Saviour was pneumatic or spiritual, “the Holy Spirit or Sophia and the power of the Highest or Demiurgic art having come upon Mary, in order that what was given to Mary might be put into form.” Apparently Valentinus was willing to call the God of the Jews Ὕψιστος or “Highest,” which M. Cumont thinks was his name in Asia Minor.