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 here developed in the most complicated way. Valentinus has a system of thirty aeons, but we can with but little trouble recognize the simple system underlying this great superstructure. The quite shadowy plurality of ten and twelve aeons (the Dekas and the Dodekas) of the Valentinian system we may at once set aside as mere fantastical accretions. We have left only a group of eight celestial beings, the so-called Ogdoas, and of these eight figures four again are peculiar to the Valentinian system, and are probably artificial interpolations. For instance, when for the third pair of aeons we find the Logos and Zöe, figures which occur only here, and perceive, moreover, that the place of this pair of aeons is not firmly established, but that in this Valentinian tradition they occur some-times before and sometimes after the fourth pair of aeons, the Anthropos and the Ekklesia, we cannot be far wrong in suspecting that here already we find Valentinus to have been influenced by the prologue of the fourth Gospel (we also find the probably Johan-nine names Monogenes and Parakletos in the series of aeons).

(2) The first pair of aeons, Bythos and Sige, is likewise an original innovation of the Valentinian school, and clearly betrays a monistic tendency. According to Irenaeus's account of the "Gnostics" (i. 29), their theory was that Sophia casts herself into the primal sub-stratum of matter to be found outside the celestial world of aeons. In the Valentinian system, primal matter (Bythos), the original Chaos, is brought into connexion with the celestial world of aeons. And thus it is effected that matter is here not found originally and irretrievably separated from the higher celestial world, but that the latter originally exists for itself alone; the fall or disturbance is accomplished within the celestial world, and the material world first comes into existence through the fall. When we subtract from the Ogdoas the two pairs of aeons whose later introduction into the Valentinian system has been demonstrated, we are left actually with a double pair of aeons, the Father and Truth, the Anthropos and the Ekklesia. These strongly recall the Gnostic systems set forth in Irenaeus i. 29 and 30 (cf. i. 29, 3). And thus the Anthropos (man), a leading figure of primitive Gnosticism, now half-forgotten, moves back into the centre of the system and the direct vicinity of the fallen goddess. It is also clear why the Ekklesia appears together with the Anthropos. With the celestial Primal Man—of whom the myth originally relates that he has sunk into matter and then raised him-self up from it again—is associated the community of the faithful and the redeemed, who are to share the same fate with him. Similarly among the Gnostics of Irenaeus i. 29, 3, perfect Gnosis (and thus the whole body of Gnostics) is connected with the Anthropos.

(3) The fallen goddess, mentioned above, occurs in the Valentinian system, as in the Gnostic systems described by Irenaeus, and in the older systems it is again the celestial aeon himself who falls, and whose fate outside the Pleroma is related (cf. the exposition in Irenaeus i. 11, Excerpta ex Theodoto, § 31 seq., and Hippolytus, Syntagma, in the pseudo-Tertullian). In the later Valentinian systems, probably from Secundus onwards (see above), the figure appears in double guise. The higher Sophia still remains within the upper world after creating a disturbance, and after her expiation and repentance; but her premature offspring, Sophia Achamoth, is re-moved from the Pleroma, and becomes the heroine of the rest of the drama (we have dealt in the preceding section with the other conception of the fall of Sophia).

(4) In the true Valentinian system the so-called Christos is the son of the fallen Aeon, who is thus conceived as an individual. Sophia, who in a frenzy of love had sought to draw near to the unattainable Bythos, brings forth, through her longing for that higher being, an aeon who is higher and purer than-herself, and at once rises into the celestial worlds. Among the Gnostics of Irenaeus we find a kindred conception, but with a slight difference. Here Christos and Sophia appear as brother and sister, Christos representing the higher and Sophia the lower element. In the enigmatic figure of Christoswe again find hidden the original conception of the Primal Man, who sinks down into matter but rises again. (In the later Valentinian systems this origin of the Christos is entirely obscured, and Christ, together with the Holy Spirit, becomes a later offspring of the celestial world of aeons; this may be looked upon as an approximation to the Christian dogma).

(5) A figure entirely peculiar to Valentinian Gnosticism is that of Horos (the Limiter). The name is perhaps an echo of the Egyptian Horus. The peculiar task of Horos is to separate the fallen aeons from the upper world of aeons. At the same time he becomes (first, perhaps, in the later Valentinian systems) a kind of world-creative power, who in this capacity helps to construct an ordered world out of Sophia and her passions. He is also called, curiously enough, Stauros (cross), and we frequently meet with references to the figure of Stauros. But we must not be in too great a hurry to conjecture that this is a Christian figure. Speculations about the Stauros are older than Christianity, and a Platonic conception may have been at work here. Plato had already stated that the world-soul revealed itself in the form of the letter Chi ; by which he meant that figure described in the heavens by the intersecting orbits of the sun and the planetary ecliptic. Since through this double orbit all the movements of the heavenly powers are determined, so all "becoming" and all life depend on it, and thus we can understand the statement that the world-soul appears in the form of an X, or a cross. The cross can also stand for the wondrous aeon on whom depends the ordering and life of the world, and thus Horos-Stauros appears here as the first redeemer of Sophia from her passions, and as the orderer of the creation of the world which now begins. This explanation of Horos, moreover, is not a mere conjecture, but one branch of the Valentinian school, the Marcosians, have expressly so explained this figure (Irenaeus i. 17, 1). Naturally, then, the figure of Horos-Stauros was often in later days assimilated to that of the Christian Redeemer.

(6) Peculiarly Valentinian is the above-mentioned derivation of the material world from the passions of Sophia. Whether this already formed part of the original system of Valentinus is, indeed, questionable, but at any rate it plays a prominent part in the Valentinian school, and consequently appears with the most diverse variations in the account given by Irenaeus. By it is effected the comparative monism of the Valentinian system. The dualism of the conception of two separate worlds of light and darkness is over-come by the derivation of the material world from the passions of Sophia. Older myths may here have served as a model; for instance, we may recall the myth of the derivation of the world from the body and limbs of the Primal Man (Bousset, Hauptprobleme der Gnosis, p. 211).

(7) This derivation of the material world from the passions of the fallen Sophia is next affected by an older theory, which probably occupied an important place in the true Valentinian system. According to this theory the son of Sophia, whom she forms on the model of the Christos who has disappeared in the Pleroma, becomes the Demiourgos, and this Demiourgos with his angels now appears as the real world-creative power. These two conceptions had now to be combined at all costs. And it is interesting to observe here what efforts were made to give the Demiourgos a better position. According to the older conception, he was an imperfect, ignorant, half-evil and malicious offspring of his mother, who has already been deprived of any particle of light (Irenaeus i. 29, 30). In the Valentinian systems he appears as the fruit of Sophia's repentance and conversion. Even his name has been changed from that of the older Gnosticism. He is no longer called Jaldabaoth, but has been assigned the better name, drawn from the philosophy of Plato, of Demiourgos. We must not forget here that the Demiourgos of the Gnostic is known to have corresponded to the God of the Old Testament, who was the God of the Christian Church, and that we can thus lay our finger here on a compromise with the faith of the great Christian community.

(8) With the doctrine of the creation of the world is connected the subject of the creation of man. We fortunately know, from a fragment preserved by Clemens, that Valentinus here preserved the old Gnostic myth practically unaltered in his system. According to it, the world-creating angels—not one, but many—create man, but the seed of the spirit comes into their creature without their knowledge, by the agency of a higher celestial aeon, and they are then terrified by the faculty of speech by which their creature rises above them, and try to destroy him. In the Valentinian system known to us this myth has practically lost its original freshness and colour, and can only be arrived at from allusions. On the other hand, the speculations of the Valentinians delight in accounts of the artificial and complicated putting together of the first man out of the various elements. And a specifically Valentinian idea is here added in that of the threefold nature of man, who is represented as at once spiritual, psychical and material. In accordance with this there also arise three classes of men, the pneumatici, the psychici and the hylici (van, matter). It is significant that Valentinus himself is credited with having written a treatise upon the three natures (Schwartz, A porien, i. 292). Here we have another instance of the theological compromise of the Valentinians. All the other Gnostic systems recognize only a dual division, the children of light and the children of darkness. That the Valentinians should have placed the psychici between the pneumatici and hylici signifies a certain recognition of the Christian Church and its adherents. They are not numbered simply among the outcasts, but considered as an intermediate class, to whom is left the choice between the higher celestial nature and the lower and earthly.

(9) At the centre of the whole Valentinian system naturally stands the idea of redemption, and so we find here developed particularly clearly the myth of the heavenly marriage already known from Irenaeus i. 30 to be Gnostic. Redemption is essentially accomplished through the union of the heavenly Soter with the fallen goddess. There is great uncertainty in the Valentinian system as to who this celestial Soter is. In the Gnostic systems of Irenaeus i. 30 he is the Christos, the celestial brother who turns back to the fallen sister. In the Valentinian system the redeemer is likewise sometimes brought into relation with the Christos, sometimes, in a significant way, with the Anthropos, and sometimes again with Horos-Stauros. In the fully developed Ptolemaean system he appears as the common off-spring of the whole Pleroma, upon whom all the aeons confer their best and most wonderful qualities (we may compare here the Marduk myth, in which it is related that all the gods transfer their qualities and powers to the young god Marduk, who is recognized as their leader). And this celestial redeemer-aeon now enters into a marriage with the fallen goddess; they are the "bride and bridegroom." It is boldly stated in the exposition in Hippolytus’s Philosophumena that