Page:Early Christianity outside the Roman empire.djvu/69

Rh Parable of the Sower we might have supposed that the author was ignorant of the New Testament. But the almost Jewish tone of parts of the dialogue is of more than passing interest, when we remember the Jewish culture of Aphraates. Though the form of the dialogue is borrowed from Plato, the spirit is Semitic: the hands may be the hands of Esau, but the voice is the voice of Jacob.

The other point which I wish to notice here is the very curious doctrine of the composition of the Cosmos, a doctrine certainly rare in Christian writings and perhaps due to Bardaisan himself. According to this doctrine the Universe is compounded of what the author calls Îthyê or Elemental Beings. These, if not eternal, were at least pre-existent to the present order of things, and the work of creation consisted above all in arranging the Elements out of Chaos into an Order, whereby the Elements could neither do serious injury to