Part 50 (2/2)

Basilides, the Christian Gnostic, taught that there were seven emanations from the Supreme Being: The First-born, Thought, the Word, Reflection, Wisdom, Power, and Righteousness.

[Greek: ???t??????, ????, ?????, F???ts??, S??a, ???a??], and [Greek: ???a??s???] Protogonos, Nous, Logos, Phronesis, Sophia, Dunamis, and Dikarosune; from whom emanated other Intelligences in succession, to the number, in all, of three hundred and sixty-five; which were G.o.d manifested, and composed the Plenitude of the Divine Emanations, or the G.o.d Abraxas; of which the Thought [or Intellect, [Greek: Nou?] ... Nous]

united itself, by baptism in the river Jordan, with the man Jesus, servant [[Greek: d???????]. Diakonos] of the human race; but did not suffer with Him; and the disciples of Basilides taught that the [Greek: ????], put on the appearance only of humanity, and that Simon of Cyrene was crucified in His stead and ascended into Heaven.

Basilides held that out of the unrevealed G.o.d, who is at the head of the world of emanations, and exalted above all conception or designation [[Greek: ? ?at???ast??, ????t??]], were evolved seven living, self-subsistent, ever-active hyposatized powers:

FIRST: THE INTELLECTUAL POWERS.

1st. NOUS [Greek: ????] The Mind.

2d. LOGOS [Greek: ?????] The Reason.

3d. Phronesis [Greek: F????s??] The Thinking Power.

4th. Sophia [Greek: S?f?a] Wisdom.

SECOND: THE ACTIVE OR OPERATIVE POWER.

5th. Dunamis [Greek: ???a??] Might, accomplis.h.i.+ng the purposes of Wisdom.

THIRD: THE MORAL ATTRIBUTES.

6th. Dikaiosune [Greek: ???a??s???] Holiness or Moral Perfection.

7th. Eirene [Greek: ??????] Inward Tranquility.

These Seven Powers ([Greek: ????e??].. Dunameis), with the Primal Ground out of which they were evolved, const.i.tuted in his scheme the [Greek: ???t? ??d???][Prote Ogdoas], or First Octave, the root of all Existence. From this point, the spiritual life proceeded to evolve out of itself continually many gradations of existence, each lower one being still the impression, the _antetype_, of the immediate higher one. He supposed there were 365 of these regions or gradations, expressed by the mystical word [Greek: ??a?a?] [Abraxas].

The [Greek: a?a?a?] is thus interpreted, by the usual method of reckoning Greek letters numerically.... [Greek: a,1..,2..?,100..a,l..?] 60..[Greek: a,l..?], 200==365: which is the whole Emanation-World, as the development of the Supreme Being.

In the system of Basilides, Light, Life, Soul, and Good were opposed to Darkness, Death, Matter, and Evil, throughout the whole course of the Universe.

According to the Gnostic view, G.o.d was represented as the immanent, incomprehensible and original source of all perfection; the unfathomable ABYSS ([Greek: ????].. buthos), according to Valentinus, exalted above all possibility of designation; of whom, properly speaking, nothing can be predicated; the [Greek: ??at???ast?] of Basilides, the [Greek: ??]

of Philo. From this incomprehensible Essence of G.o.d, an _immediate_ transition to finite things is inconceivable. _Self-limitation_ is the first beginning of a communication of life on the part of G.o.d--the first pa.s.sing of the hidden Deity into manifestation; and from this proceeds all further self-developing manifestation of the Divine Essence. From this primal link in the chain of life there are evolved, in the first place, the manifold powers or attributes inherent in the divine Essence, which, until that first self-comprehension, were all hidden in the Abyss of His Essence. Each of these attributes presents the whole divine Essence under one particular aspect; and to each, therefore, in this respect, the t.i.tle of G.o.d may appropriately be applied. These Divine Powers evolving themselves to self-subsistence, become thereupon the germs and principles of all further developments of life. The life contained in them unfolds and individualizes itself more and more, but in such a way that the successive grades of this evolution of life continually sink lower and lower; the spirits become feebler, the further they are removed from the first link in the series.

The first manifestation they termed [Greek: p??t? ?at?????? ?a?t?? prote katalepsis heautou] or [Greek: p??t?? ?ata??pt?? t?? ?e??] [_proton Katalepton tou Theou_]; which was hypostatically represented in a [Greek: ????] or [Greek: ?????], [_Nous_ or _Logos_].

In the Alexandrian Gnosis, the Platonic notion of the [Greek: ???]

[Hule] predominates. This is the dead, the unsubstantial--the boundary that limits from without the evolution of life in its gradually advancing progression, whereby the Perfect is ever evolving itself into the less Perfect. This [Greek: ???] again, is represented under various images;--at one time as the darkness that exists alongside of the light; at another, as the void [Greek: ????a, ?e???] ....Kenoma, Kenon, in opposition to the Fullness, [Greek: ?????a ...Pleroma] of the Divine Life; or as the shadow that accompanies the light; or as the chaos, or the sluggish, stagnant, dark water. This matter, dead in itself, possesses by its own nature no inherent tendency; as life of every sort is foreign to it, itself makes no encroachment on the Divine. As, however, the evolutions of the Divine Life (the essences developing themselves out of the progressive emanation) become feebler, the further they are removed from the first link in the series; and as their connection with the first becomes looser at each successive step, there arises at the last step of the evolution, an imperfect, defective product, which, unable to retain its connection with the chain of Divine Life, sinks from the World of Eons into the material chaos: or, according to the same notion, somewhat differently expressed [according to the Ophites and to Bardesanes], a drop from the fullness of the Divine life bubbles over into the bordering void. Hereupon the dead matter, by commixture with the living principle, which it wanted, first of all receives animation. But, at the same time, also, the divine, the living, becomes corrupted by mingling with the chaotic ma.s.s. Existence now multiplies itself. There arises a subordinate, defective life; there is ground for a new world; a creation starts into being, beyond the confines of the world of emanation. But on the other hand, since the chaotic principle of matter has acquired vitality, there now arises a more distinct and more active opposition to the G.o.d-like--a barely negative, blind, unG.o.dly nature-power, which obstinately resists all influence of the Divine; hence, as products, of the spirit of the [Greek: ???], (of the [Greek: p?e?a ??????].. Pneuma Hulikon), are Satan, malignant spirits, wicked men, in none of whom is there any reasonable or moral principle, or any principle of a rational will; but blind pa.s.sions alone have the ascendency. In them there is the same conflict, as the scheme of Platonism supposes, between the soul under the guidance of Divine reason the [Greek: ????... Nous], and the soul blindly resisting reason--between the [Greek: p?????a] [p.r.o.noia] and the [Greek: a?a??] [anage], the Divine Principle and the natural.

The Syrian Gnosis a.s.sured the existence of an active, turbulent kingdom of evil, or of darkness, which, by its encroachments on the kingdom of light, brought about a commixture of the light with the darkness, of the G.o.d-like with the unG.o.dlike.

Even among the Platonists, some thought that along with an organized, inert matter, the substratum of the corporeal world, there existed from the beginning a blind, lawless motive power, an unG.o.dlike soul, as its original motive and active principle. As the inorganic matter was organized into a corporeal world, by the plastic power of the Deity, so, by the same power, law and reason were communicated to that turbulent, irrational soul. Thus the chaos of the [Greek: ???] was transformed into an organized world, and that blind soul into a rational principle, a mundane soul, animating the Universe. As from the latter proceeds all rational, spiritual life in humanity, so from the former proceeds all that is irrational, all that is under the blind sway of pa.s.sion and appet.i.te; and all malignant spirits are its progeny.

In one respect _all_ the Gnostics agreed: they _all_ held, that there was a world purely emanating out of the vital development of G.o.d, a creation evolved directly out of the Divine Essence, far exalted above any outward creation produced by G.o.d's plastic power, and conditioned by pre-existing matter. They agreed in holding that the framer of _this lower world_ was not the Father of _that higher world_ of emanation; but the Demiurge [[Greek: ?e???????]], a being of a kindred nature with the Universe framed and governed by him, and far inferior to that higher system and the Father of it.

But some, setting out from ideas which had long prevailed among certain Jews of Alexandria, supposed that the Supreme G.o.d created and governed the world by His ministering spirits, by the angels. At the head of these angels stood one who had the direction and control of all; therefore called the Artificer and Governor of the World. This Demiurge they compared with the plastic, animating mundane spirit of Plato and Platonists, the [Greek: de?te??? ?e??].. Deuteros Theos; the [Greek: ?e?? ?e??t??]..., Theos Genetos, who, moreover, according to the Timaeus of Plato, strives to represent the IDEA of the Divine Reason, in that which is _becoming_ (as contradistinguished from that which _is_) and temporal. This angel is a representative of the Supreme G.o.d, on the lower stage of existence: he does not act independently, but merely according to the ideas inspired in him by the Supreme G.o.d; just as the plastic, mundane soul of the Platonists creates all things after the pattern of the ideas communicated by the Supreme Reason [[Greek: ????]

... Nous--the [Greek: ? ?st? ????].... ho esti zoon--the [Greek: pa??de??a]. paradeigma, of the Divine Reason hypostatized]. But these ideas transcend his limited essence; he cannot understand them; he is merely their unconscious organ; and therefore is unable himself to comprehend the whole scope and meaning of the work which he performs. As an organ under the guidance of a higher inspiration, he reveals higher truths than he himself can comprehend. The ma.s.s of the Jews, they held, recognized not the angel, by whom, in all the Theophanies of the Old Testament, G.o.d _revealed_ Himself; they knew not the Demiurge in his true relation to the hidden Supreme G.o.d, _who never reveals Himself_ in the sensible world. They confounded the type and the archetype, the symbol and the idea. They rose no higher than the Demiurge; they took him to be the Supreme G.o.d Himself. But the spiritual men among them, on the contrary, clearly perceived, or at least _divined_, the ideas veiled under Judaism; they rose beyond the Demiurge, to a knowledge of the Supreme G.o.d; and are therefore properly His wors.h.i.+ppers [[Greek ?e?ape?ta?].. Therapeutai].

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