Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/924

 these lower regions by her offspring, and not suffered to return to the Father of whom they were ignorant. In this account of Simon there is a large portion common to almost all forms of Gnostic myths, together with something special to this form. They have in common the place in the work of creation assigned to the female principle, the conception of the Deity; the ignorance of the rulers of this lower world with regard to the Supreme Power; the descent of the female (Sophia) into the lower regions, and her inability to return. Special to the Simonian tale is the identification of Simon himself with the Supreme, and of his consort Helena with the female principle, together with the doctrine of transmigration of souls, necessary to give these identifications a chance of acceptance, it not being credible that the male and female Supreme principles should first appear in the world at so late a stage in history.

It is possible that Justin's Simon was not identical with the contemporary of the Apostles, the name Simon being very common, and the Simon of the Acts being a century older than Justin. Moreover, Justin's Simon could hardly have carried his doctrine of transmigration of souls to the point of pretending that it was he himself who had appeared as Jesus of Nazareth, unless he had been born after our Lord's death. Hence it is the writer's opinion that the Simon described by Justin was his elder only by a generation; that he was a Gnostic teacher who had gained some followers at Samaria; and that Justin rashly identified him with the magician of the Acts of the Apostles.

The section on Simon in the Refutation of all Heresies, by Hippolytus, divides itself into two parts; the larger portion is founded on a work ascribed to Simon called the μεγάλη ἀπόφασις, which we do not hear of through any other source than Hippolytus. But towards the close of the art. on Simon there is a section which can be explained on the supposition that Hippolytus is drawing directly from the source used by Irenaeus, viz. the anti-heretical treatise of Justin. In connexion with this section must be considered the treatment of Simon in the lost earlier treatise of Hippolytus, which may be conjecturally gathered from the use made of it by Philaster and Epiphanius. Between these two there are verbal coincidences which prove that they are drawing from a common source. When this common matter is compared with the section in the Refutation, it is clear that Hippolytus was that source.

But one thing common to them was apparently not taken from Hippolytus. Both speak of the death of Simon, but apart from the section which contains the matter common to them and Hippolytus, and here they have no verbal coincidences. Both, however, know the story which became the received account of his death, viz. that to give the emperor a crowning proof of his magical skill he attempted to fly through the air, and, through the efficacy of the apostle's prayers, the demons who bore him were compelled to let him go, whereupon he perished miserably.

We may conclude that the story known to Philaster and Epiphanius, though earlier than the end of the 4th cent. when they wrote, is of later origin than the beginning of the 3rd cent. when Hippolytus wrote. That Hippolytus did not find his account of Simon's death in Justin may be concluded from the place it occupies in his narrative, where it is in a kind of appendix to what is borrowed from Justin; and also because this form of the story is unknown to all other writers.

The Simon of the Clementines.—The Clementines, like Justin, identify Simon of Gitta with the Simon of Acts ; but there is every reason to believe that they were merely following Justin. Justin has evidently direct knowledge of the Simonians, and regards them as formidable heretics; but in the Clementines the doctrines which Justin gives as Simonian have no prominence; and the introduction of Simon is merely a literary contrivance to bring in the theological discussions in which the author is interested.

''The Simon of 19th Cent. Criticism.''—The Clementine writings were produced in Rome early in 3rd cent. by members of the Elkesaite sect, one characteristic of which was hostility to Paul, whom they refused to recognize as an apostle. Baur first drew attention to this characteristic in the Clementines, and pointed out that in the disputations between Simon and Peter, some of the claims Simon is represented as making (e.g. that of having seen our Lord, though not in his lifetime, yet subsequently in vision) were really the claims of Paul; and urged that Peter's refutation of Simon was in some places intended as a polemic against Paul. The passages are found only in the Clementine Homilies, which may be regarded as one of the latest forms which these forgeries assumed. In the Clementine Recognitions there is abundance of anti-Paulism; but the idea does not appear to have occurred to the writer to dress up Paul under the mask of Simon. The idea started by Baur was pressed by his followers into the shape that, wherever in ancient documents Simon Magus is mentioned, Paul is meant. We are asked to believe that the Simon of Acts viii. was no real character, but only a presentation of Paul. Simon claimed to be the power of God which is called Great; and Paul calls his gospel the power of God (Rom. i. 16; I. Cor. i. 18), and claims that the power of Christ rested in himself (II. Cor. xii. 9), and that he lived by the power of God (xiii. 4). In Acts viii. the power of bestowing the Holy Ghost, which Philip does not appear to have exercised, is clearly represented as the special prerogative of the apostles. When, therefore, Simon offered money for the power of conferring the Holy Ghost, it was really to obtain the rank of apostle. We are therefore asked to detect here a covert account of the refusal of the elder apostles to admit Paul's claim to rank with them, backed though it was by a gift of money for the poor saints in Jerusalem. Peter tells him that he has no lot in the matter, i.e. no part in the lot of apostleship (see Acts i. 17, 25); that he is still in the "gall of bitterness and bond of iniquity"—i.e. full of bitter hatred against Peter (Gal. ii. 11) and not observant of the Mosaic Law. We are not to be surprised that St. Luke, Paulist though he was, should assert in his history