[168] See King’s “Gnostics,” pp. 91, 92; “The Genealogy of the Blessed Virgin Mary,” by Faustus, Bishop of Riez.

[169] Prinseps quotes Dubois, “Edinburgh Review,” April, 1851, p. 411.

[170] “Manu,” book I., sloka 32: Sir W. Jones, translating from the Northern “Manu,” renders this sloka as follows: “Having divided his own substance, the mighty Power became half male, half female, or nature active and passive; and from that female he produced Viraj.”

[171] “Enead,” i., book viii.

[172] “Commentary upon the Republic of Plato,” p. 380.

[173] Verses 33-41.

[174] “Phædrus,” p. 64.

[175] The Supreme Buddha is invoked with two of his acolytes of the theistic triad, Dharma and Sanga. This triad is addressed in Sanscrit in the following terms:

while the Thibetan Buddhists pronounce their invocations as follows:

See also “Journal Asiatique,” tome vii., p. 286.

[176] The body of man—his coat of skin—is an inert mass of matter, per se; it is but the sentient living body within the man that is considered as the man’s body proper, and it is that which, together with the fontal soul or purely astral body, directly connected with the immortal spirit, constitutes the trinity of man.

[177] We really think that the word “witchcraft” ought, once for all, to be understood in the sense which properly belongs to it. Witchcraft may be either conscious or unconscious. Certain wicked and dangerous results may be obtained through the mesmeric powers of a so-called sorcerer, who misuses his potential fluid; or again they may be achieved through an easy access of malicious tricky “spirits” (so much the worse if human) to the atmosphere surrounding a medium. How many thousands of such irresponsible innocent victims have met infamous deaths through the tricks of those Elementaries!

[178] “Ancient Pagan and Modern Christian Symbolism,” preface, p. 34.

[179] “The Christ of Paul,” p. 123.

[180] Gospel according to Mark, viii. 33.

[181] “Supernatural Religion,” vol. ii., p. 489.

[182] “Ancient Pagan and Modern Christian Symbolism,” p. 28.

[183] See Eusebius, “Ex. H.,” bk. iv., ch. v.; “Sulpicius Severus,” vol. ii., p. 31.

[184] It appears that the Jews attribute a very high antiquity to “Sepher Toldos Jeshu.” It was mentioned for the first time by Martin, about the beginning of the thirteenth century, for the Talmudists took great care to conceal it from the Christians. Levi says that Porchetus Salvaticus published some portions of it, which were used by Luther (see vol. viii., Jena Ed.). The Hebrew text, which was missing, was at last found by Münster and Buxtorf, and published in 1681, by Christopher Wagenseilius, in Nuremberg, and in Frankfort, in a collection entitled “Tela Ignea Satanæ,” or The Burning Darts of Satan (“See Levi’s Science des Esprits”).

[185] Theodoret: “Hæretic. Fab.,” lib. ii., 11.

[186] Jervis W. Jervis: “Genesis,” p. 324.

[187] “Lightfoot,” 501.

[188] Dunlap: “Sod, the Son of the Man,” p. x.

[189] Jeremiah vii. 29: “Cut off thine hair, O Jerusalem, and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on high places.”

[190] Genesis xlix. 26.

[191] Nazareth?

[192] Otfried Müller: “Historical Greek Literature,” pp. 230-240.

[193] See “Movers,” p. 683.

[194] “Codex Nazaræus,” ii., 305.

[195] See Lucian: “De Syria Dea.”

[196] See Psalm lxxxix. 18.

[197] “Codex Nazaræus,” i. 47.

[198] Ibid.; Norberg: “Onomasticon,” 74.

[199] Alph. de Spire: “Fortalicium Fidei,” ii., 2.

[200] Hosea ix. 10.

[201] “The Essenes considered oil as a defilement,” says Josephus: “Wars,” ii., p. 7.

[202] Luke xiii. 32.

[203] Matthew ii. We must bear in mind that the Gospel according to Matthew in the New Testament is not the original Gospel of the apostle of that name. The authentic Evangel was for centuries in the possession of the Nazarenes and the Ebionites, as we show further on the admission of St. Jerome himself, who confesses that he had to ask permission of the Nazarenes to translate it.

[204] Dunlap: “Sod, the Son of the Man.”

[205] “Codex Nazaræus,” vol. ii., p. 233.

[206] Preller: vol. i., p. 415.

[207] Ibid., vol. i., p. 490.

[208] The word Apocrypha was very erroneously adopted as doubtful and spurious. The word means hidden and secret; but that which is secret may be often more true than that which is revealed.

[209] The statement, if reliable, would show that Jesus was between fifty and sixty years old when baptized; for the Gospels make him but a few months younger than John. The kabalists say that Jesus was over forty years old when first appearing at the gates of Jerusalem. The present copy of the “Codex Nazaræus” is dated in the year 1042, but Dunlap finds in Irenæus (2d century) quotations from and ample references to this book. “The basis of the material common to Irenæus and the “Codex Nazaræus” must be at least as early as the first century,” says the author in his preface to “Sod, the Son of the Man,” p. i.

[210] “Codex Nazaræus,” vol. i., p. 109; Dunlap: Ibid., xxiv.

[211] Acts xxiv. 5.

[212] Ibid., 14.

[213] “Herodotus,” ii., p. 170.

[214] The Hindu High Pontiff—the Chief of the Namburis, who lives in the Cochin Land, is generally present during these festivals of “Holy Water” immersions. He travels sometimes to very great distances to preside over the ceremony.

[215] “Ant. Jud.,” xiii., p. 9; xv., p. 10.

[216] King thinks it a great exaggeration and is inclined to believe that these Essenes, who were most undoubtedly Buddhist monks, were “merely a continuation of the associations known as Sons of the Prophets.” “The Gnostics and their Remains,” p. 22.

[217] St. Jerome: “Epistles,” p. 49 (ad. Poulmam); see Dunlap’s “Spirit-History,” p. 218.

[218] “Munk,” p. 169.

[219] Bacchus and Ceres—or the mystical Wine and Bread, used during the Mysteries, become, in the “Adonia,” Adonis and Venus. Movers shows that “Iao is Bacchus,” p. 550; and his authority is Lydus de Mens (38-74); “Spir. Hist.,” p. 195. Iao is a Sun-god and the Jewish Jehovah; the intellectual or Central Sun of the kabalists. See Julian in Proclus. But this “Iao” is not the Mystery-god.

[220] Josephus: “Ant. Jud.,” iv., p. 4.

[221] Ibid., ix.; 2 Kings, i. 8.

[222] In relation to the well-known fact of Jesus wearing his hair long, and being always so represented, it becomes quite startling to find how little the unknown Editor of the “Acts” knew about the Apostle Paul, since he makes him say in 1 Corinthians xi. 14, “Doth not Nature itself teach you, that if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?” Certainly Paul could never have said such a thing! Therefore, if the passage is genuine, Paul knew nothing of the prophet whose doctrines he had embraced and for which he died; and if false—how much more reliable is what remains?

[223] Max Müller has sufficiently proved the case in his lecture on the “Zend-Avesta.” He calls Gushtasp “the mythical pupil of Zoroaster.” Mythical, perhaps, only because the period in which he lived and learned with Zoroaster is too remote to allow our modern science to speculate upon it with any certainty.

[224] Max Müller: “Zend Avesta,” 83.

[225] Philo: “De Vita. Contemp.”

[226] The real meaning of the division into ages is esoteric and Buddhistic. So little did the uninitiated Christians understand it that they accepted the words of Jesus literally and firmly believed that he meant the end of the world. There had been many prophecies about the forthcoming age. Virgil, in the fourth Eclogue, mentions the Metatron—a new offspring, with whom the iron age shall end and a golden one arise.

[227] “Palestine,” p. 525, et seq.

[228] “Sod,” vol. ii., Preface, p. xi.

[229] “Vit. Pythag.” Munk derives the name of the Iessæns or Essenes from the Syriac Asaya—the healers, or physicians, thus showing their identity with the Egyptian Therapeutæ. “Palestine,” p. 515.

[230] Matthew xiii. 10.

[231] “Eleusinian Mysteries,” p. 15.

[232] This descent to Hades signified the inevitable fate of each soul to be united for a time with a terrestrial body. This union, or dark prospect for the soul to find itself imprisoned within the dark tenement of a body, was considered by all the ancient philosophers and is even by the modern Buddhists, as a punishment.

[233] “Eleusinian Mysteries,” p. 49, foot-note.

[234] “The profound or esoteric doctrines of the ancients were denominated wisdom, and afterward philosophy, and also the gnosis, or knowledge. They related to the human soul, its divine parentage, its supposed degradation from its high estate by becoming connected with “generation” or the physical world, its onward progress and restoration to God by regenerations or ... transmigrations.” Ibid, p. 2, foot-note.

[235] Cyril of Jerusalem asserts it. See vi. 10.

[236] “Phædrus,” 64.

[237] “The Golden Ass,” xi.

[238] “Apocalypse,” xix. 12.

[239] See Suet. in “Vita. Eutrop.,” 7. It is neither cruelty, nor an insane indulgence in it, which shows this emperor in history as passing his time in catching flies and transpiercing them with a golden bodkin, but religious superstition. The Jewish astrologers had predicted to him that he had provoked the wrath of Beelzebub, the “Lord of the flies,” and would perish miserably through the revenge of the dark god of Ekron, and die like King Ahaziah, because he persecuted the Jews.

[240] We believe that it was the Sadducees and not the Pharisees who crucified Jesus. They were Zadokites—partisans of the house of Zadok, or the sacerdotal family. In the “Acts” the apostles were said to be persecuted by the Sadducees, but never by the Pharisees. In fact, the latter never persecuted any one. They had the scribes, rabbis, and learned men in their numbers, and were not, like the Sadducees, jealous of their order.

[241] “Dial.,” p. 69.

[242] Fabricius: “Cod. Apoc., N. T.,” i., 243; Tischendorf: “Evang. Ap.,” p. 214.

[243] Origen: “Cont. Cels.,” 11.

[244] Rabbi Iochan: “Mag.,” 51.

[245] “Origen,” 11.

[246] Cf. “August de Consans. Evang.,” i., 9; Fabric.: “Cod. Ap. N. T.,” i., p. 305, ff.

[247] “Recog.,” i. 58; cf., p. 40.

[248] King’s “Gnostics,” p. 145; the author places this sarcophagus among the earliest productions of that art which inundated later the world with mosaics and engravings, representing the events and personages of the “New Testament.”

[249] “De Pudicitia.” See “The Gnostics and their Remains,” p. 144.

[250] Ibid., plate i., p. 200.

[251] This gem is in the collection of the author of “The Gnostics and their Remains.” See p. 201.

[252] “Hæresies,” xxvii.

[253] 1 Cor. xi. 14.

[254] See the “Israelite Indeed,” vol. ii., p. 238; “Treatise Nazir.”

[255] “Epiph. ed. Petar,” vol. i., p 117.

[256] “Kabbala Denudata,” ii., 155; “Vallis Regia,” Paris edition.

[257] Psalms viii.

[258] This contradiction, which is attributed to Paul in Hebrews, by making him say of Jesus in chapter i., 4: “Being made so much better than the angels,” and then immediately stating in chapter ii. 9, “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels,” shows how unscrupulously the writings of the apostles, if they ever wrote any, were tampered with.

[259] “Codex Nazaræus,” i. 23.

[260] Ibid., preface, p. v., translated from Norberg.

[261] “According to the Nazarenes and Gnostics, the Demiurg, the creator of the material world, is not the highest God.” (See Dunlap: “Sod, the Son of the Man.”)

[262] Clemens: “Al. Strom.” vii., 7, § 106.

[263] H. E., iv. 7.

[264] The gospels interpreted by Basilides were not our present gospels, which, as it is proved by the greatest authorities, were not in his days in existence. See “Supernatural Religion,” vol.ii., chap. Basilides.

[265] The five make mystically ten. They are androgynes. “Having divided his body in two parts, the Supreme Wisdom became male and female” (“Manu,” book i., sloka 32). There are many early Buddhistic ideas to be found in Brahmanism.

The prevalent idea that the last of the Buddhas, Gautama, is the ninth incarnation of Vishnu, or the ninth Avatar, is disclaimed partially by the Brahmans, and wholly rejected by the learned Buddhist theologians. The latter insist that the worship of Buddha possesses a far higher claim to antiquity than any of the Brahmanical deities of the Vedas, which they call secular literature. The Brahmans, they show, came from other countries, and established their heresy on the already accepted popular deities. They conquered the land by the sword, and succeeded in burying truth, by building a theology of their own on the ruins of the more ancient one of Buddha, which had prevailed for ages. They admit the divinity and spiritual existence of some of the Vedantic gods; but as in the case of the Christian angel-hierarchy they believe that all these deities are greatly subordinate, even to the incarnated Buddhas. They do not even acknowledge the creation of the physical universe. Spiritually and invisibly it has existed from all eternity, and thus it was made merely visible to the human senses. When it first appeared it was called forth from the realm of the invisible into the visible by the impulse of A’di Buddha—the “Essence.” They reckon twenty-two such visible appearances of the universe governed by Buddhas, and as many destructions of it, by fire and water in regular successions. After the last destruction by the flood, at the end of the precedent cycle—(the exact calculation, embracing several millions of years, is a secret cycle) the world, during the present age of the Kali Yug—Maha Bhadda Calpa—has been ruled successively by four Buddhas, the last of whom was Gautama, the “Holy One.” The fifth, Maitree-Buddha, is yet to come. This latter is the expected kabalistic King Messiah, the Messenger of Light, and Sosiosh, the Persian Saviour, who will come on a white horse. It is also the Christian Second Advent. See “Apocalypse” of St. John.

[266] “Irenæus,” i. 23.

[267] Tertullian reversed the table himself by rejecting, later in life, the doctrines for which he fought with such an acerbity and by becoming a Montanist.

[268] In his debate with Jacolliot upon the right spelling of the Hindu Christna, Mr. Textor de Ravisi, an ultramontane Catholic, tries to prove that the name of Christna ought to be written Krishna, for, as the latter means black, and the statues of this deity are generally black, the word is derived from the color. We refer the reader to Jacolliot’s answer in his recent work, “Christna et le Christ,” for the conclusive evidence that the name is not derived from the color.

[269] There is no equivalent for the word “miracle,” in the Christian sense, among the Brahmans or Buddhists. The only correct translation would be meipo, a wonder, something remarkable; but not a violation of natural law. The “saints” only produce meipo.

[270] “Beiträge,” vol. i., p. 40; Schleiermacher: “Sämmtl. Werke,” viii.; “Einl., N. T.,” p. 64.

[271] “Epiph. Hæra.,” xlii., p. 1.

[272] Tertullian: “Adv. Marc.,” ii. 5; cf. 9.

[273] Ibid., ii. 5.

[274] vol. ii., p. 105.

[275] Ibid., vol. ii., p. 100.

[276] “Adv. Marc.,” iv., 9, 36.

[277] “Supernatural Religion,” p. 101; Matthew v. 17.

[278] This author, vol. ii., p. 103, remarks with great justice of the “Heresiarch” Marcion, “whose high personal character exerted so powerful an influence upon his own time,” that “it was the misfortune of Marcion to live in an age when Christianity had passed out of the pure morality of its infancy; when, untroubled by complicated questions of dogma, simple faith and pious enthusiasm had been the one great bond of Christian brotherhood, into a phase of ecclesiastical development in which religion was fast degenerating into theology, and complicated doctrines were rapidly assuming the rampant attitude which led to so much bitterness, persecution, and schism. In later times Marcion might have been honored as a reformer, in his own he was denounced as a heretic. Austere and ascetic in his opinions, he aimed at superhuman purity, and, although his clerical adversaries might scoff at his impracticable doctrines regarding marriage and the subjugation of the flesh, they have had their parallels amongst those whom the Church has since most delighted to honor, and, at least, the whole tendency of his system was markedly towards the side of virtue.” These statements are based upon Credner’s “Beiträge,” i., p. 40; cf. Neander: “Allg. K. G.,” ii., p. 792, f.; Schleiermacher, Milman, etc., etc.

[279] Justin’s “Die Evv.,” p. 446, sup. B.

[280] But, on the other hand, this antagonism is very strongly marked in the “Clementine Homilies,” in which Peter unequivocally denies that Paul, whom he calls Simon the Magician, has ever had a vision of Christ, and calls him “an enemy.” Canon Westcott says: “There can be no doubt that St. Paul is referred to as ‘the enemy’” (“On the Canon,” p. 252, note 2; “Supernatural Religion,” vol. ii., p 35). But this antagonism, which rages unto the present day, we find even in St. Paul’s “Epistles.” What can be more energetic than such like sentences: “Such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.... I suppose I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostle” (2 Corinthians, xi.). “Paul, an apostle not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead ... but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the Gospel of Christ ... false brethren.... When Peter came to Antioch I withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed. For before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles, but when they were come he withdrew, fearing them which were of the circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled ... insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation,” etc., etc. (Galat. i. and ii.). On the other hand, we find Peter in the “Homilies,” indulging in various complaints which, although alleged to be addressed to Simon Magus, are evidently all direct answers to the above-quoted sentences from the Pauline Epistles, and cannot have anything to do with Simon. So, for instance, Peter said: “For some among the Gentiles have rejected my lawful preaching, and accepted certain lawless and foolish teaching of the hostile men (enemy)”—Epist. of Peter to James, § 2. He says further: “Simon (Paul) ... who came before me to the Gentiles ... and I have followed him as light upon darkness, as knowledge upon ignorance, as health upon disease” (“Homil.,” ii. 17). Still further, he calls him Death and a deceiver (Ibid., ii. 18). He warns the Gentiles that “our Lord and Prophet (?) (Jesus) announced that he would send from among his followers, apostles to deceive. “Therefore, above all, remember to avoid every apostle, or teacher, or prophet, who first does not accurately compare his teaching with that of James, called the brother of our Lord” (see the difference between Paul and James on faith, Epist. to Hebrews, xi., xii., and Epist.. of James, ii.). “Lest the Evil One should send a false preacher ... as he has sent to us Simon (?) preaching a counterfeit of truth in the name of our Lord, and disseminating error” (“Hom.” xi., 35; see above quotation from Gal. 1, 5). He then denies Paul’s assertion, in the following words: “If, therefore, our Jesus indeed appeared in a vision to you, it was only as an irritated adversary.... But how can any one through visions become wise in teaching? And if you say, ‘it is possible,’ then I ask, wherefore did the Teacher remain for a whole year and discourse to those who were attentive? And how can we believe your story that he appeared to you? And in what manner did he appear to you, when you hold opinions contrary to his teaching?... For you now set yourself up against me, who am a firm rock, the foundation of the Church. If you were not an opponent, you would not calumniate me, you would not revile my teaching ... (circumcision?) in order that, in declaring what I have myself heard from the Lord, I may not be believed, as though I were condemned.... But if you say that I am condemned, you blame God who revealed Christ to me.” “This last phrase,” observes the author of “Supernatural Religion,” “‘if you say that I am condemned,’ is an evident allusion to Galat. ii, 11, ‘I withstood him to the face, because he was condemned’” (“Supernatural Religion,” p. 37). “There cannot be a doubt,” adds the just-quoted author, “that the Apostle Paul is attacked in this religious romance as the great enemy of the true faith, under the hated name of Simon the Magician, whom Peter follows everywhere for the purpose of unmasking and confuting him” (p. 34). And if so, then we must believe that it was St. Paul who broke both his legs in Rome when flying in the air.

[281] “Prâtimoksha Sûtra,” Pali Burmese copy; see also “Lotus de la Bonne Loi,” translated by Burnouf, p. 444.

[282] Matthew xix. 16-18.

[283] “Pittakatayan,” book iii., Pali Version.

[284] See Judges xiii. 18, “And the angel of the Lord said unto him: Why askest thou after my name, seeing it is SECRET?”

[285] Vol. ii., p. 106.

[286] Emmanuel was doubtless the son of the prophet himself, as described in the sixth chapter; what was predicted, can only be interpreted on that hypothesis. The prophet had also announced to Ahaz the extinction of his line. “If ye will not believe, surely ye shall not be established.” Next comes the prediction of the placing of a new prince on the throne—Hezekiah of Bethlehem, said to have been Isaiah’s son-in-law, under whom the captives should return from the uttermost parts of the earth. Assyria should be humbled, and peace overspread the Israelitish country, compare Isaiah vii. 14-16; viii. 3, 4; ix. 6, 7; x. 12, 20, 21; xi.; Micah v., 2-7. The popular party, the party of the prophets, always opposed to the Zadokite priesthood, had resolved to set aside Ahaz and his time-serving policy, which had let in Assyria upon Palestine, and to set up Hezekiah, a man of their own, who should rebel against Assyria and overthrow the Assur-worship and Baalim (2 Kings xv. 11). Though only the prophets hint this, it being cut out from the historical books, it is noticeable that Ahaz offered his own child to Moloch, also that he died at the age of thirty-six, and Hezekiah took the throne at twenty-five, in full adult age.

[287] Tertullian: “Adv. Marci,” iii. 8 ff.

[288] “Sup. Rel.,” vol. ii., p. 107; “Adv. Marci,” iii. 2, § 2; cf. iii. 12, § 12.

[289] “Sup. Relig.,” vol. ii., p. 126.

[290] We give the systems according to an old diagram preserved among some Kopts and the Druses of Mount Lebanon. Irenæus had perhaps some good reasons to disfigure their doctrines.

[291] Sophia is the highest prototype of woman—the first spiritual Eve. In the Bible the system is reversed and the intervening emanation being omitted, Eve is degraded to simple humanity.

[292] See “Irenæus,” book i., chap. 31-33.

[293] In King’s “Gnostics,” we find the system a little incorrect. The author tells us that he followed Bellermann’s “Drei Programmen über die Abraxas gemmen.”

[294] See “Idra Magna.”

[295] “Codex Nazaræns,” part i., p. 9.

[296] See “Codex Nazaræns,” i., 181. Fetahil, sent to frame the world, finds himself immersed in the abyss of mud, and soliloquizes in dismay until the Spiritus (Sophia-Achamoth) unites herself completely with matter, and so creates the material world.

[297] “Irenæus,” 37, and Theodoret, quoted in the same page.

[298] Ibid., i. xxv.

[299] See preface to the “Apocryphal New Testament,” London, printed for W. Hone, Ludgate Hill, 1820.

[300] “It is first cited by Virgilius Tapsensis, a Latin writer of no credit, in the latter end of the fifth century, and by him it is suspected to have been forged.”

[301] “Elements of Theology,” vol. ii., p. 90, note.

[302] Parson’s “Letters to Travis,” 8vo., p. 402.

[303] The term “Paganism” is properly used by many modern writers with hesitation. Professor Alexander Wilder, in his edition of Payne Knight’s “Symbolical Language of Ancient Art and Mythology,” says: “It (‘Paganism’) has degenerated into slang, and is generally employed with more or less of an opprobrious meaning. The correcter expression would have been ‘the ancient ethnical worships,’ but it would be hardly understood in its true sense, and we accordingly have adopted the term in popular use, but not disrespectfully. A religion which can develop a Plato, an Epictetus, and an Anaxagoras, is not gross, superficial, or totally unworthy of candid attention. Besides, many of the rites and doctrines included in the Christian as well as in the Jewish Institute, appeared first in the other systems. Zoroastrianism anticipated far more than has been imagined. The cross, the priestly robes and symbols, the sacraments, the Sabbath, the festivals and anniversaries, are all anterior to the Christian era by thousands of years. The ancient worship, after it had been excluded from its former shrines, and from the metropolitan towns, was maintained for a long time by the inhabitants of humble localities. To this fact it owes its later designation. From being kept up in the Pagi, or rural districts, its votaries were denominated Pagans, or provincials.”

[304] “Super. Relig.,” vol. ii., p. 5.

[305] Norberg: Preface to “Cod. Naz.,” p. v.

[306] Epiph.: “Contra Ebionitas.”

[307] See preface, from page 1 to 34.

[308] Ibid., p. 7, preface.

[309] Hieronymus: “De Virus.,” illust., cap. 3. “It is remarkable that, while all church fathers say that Matthew wrote in Hebrew, the whole of them use the Greek text as the genuine apostolic writing, without mentioning what relation the Hebrew Matthew has to our Greek one! It had many peculiar additions which are wanting in our evangel.” (Olshausen: “Nachweis der Echtheit der sämmtlichen Schriften des Neuen Test.,” p. 32; Dunlap: “Sod, the Son of the Man,” p. 44.)

[310] Hieronymus: “Commen. to Matthew,” book ii., ch. xii., 13. Jerome adds that it was written in the Chaldaic language, but with Hebrew letters.

[311] “St. Jerome,” v., 445; “Sod, the Son of the Man,” p. 46.

[312] This accounts also for the rejection of the works of Justin Martyr, who used only this “Gospel according to the Hebrews,” as also did most probably Titian, his disciple. At what late period was fully established the divinity of Christ we can judge by the mere fact that even in the fourth century Eusebius did not denounce this book as spurious, but only classed it with such as the Apocalypse of John; and Credner (“Zur Gesch. Des Kan.,” p. 120) shows Nicephorus inserting it, together with the Revelation, in his “Stichometry,” among the Antilegomena. The Ebionites, the genuine primitive Christians, rejecting the rest of the apostolic writings, made use only of this Gospel (“Adv. Hær.” i., 26), and the Ebionites, as Epiphanius declares, firmly believed, with the Nazarenes, that Jesus was but a man “of the seed of a man.”

[313] See King’s “Gnostics,” p. 31.

[314] This Iove, Iao, or Jehovah is quite distinct from the God of the Mysteries, Iao, held sacred by all the nations of antiquity. We will show the difference presently.

[315] King’s “Gnostics.”

[316] Iurbo and Adunai, according to the Ophites, are names of Iao-Jehovah, one of the emanations of Ilda-Baoth. “Iurbo is called by the Abortions (the Jews) Adunai” (“Codex Nazaræus,” vol. iii., p. 73).

[317] King: “The Gnostics and their Remains,” p. 31.

[318] In the “Gospel of Nicodemus,” Ilda-Baoth is called Satan by the pious and anonymous author;—evidently, one of the final flings at the half-crushed enemy. “As for me,” says Satan, excusing himself to the prince of hell, “I tempted him (Jesus), and stirred up my old people, the Jews, against him” (chap. xv. 9). Of all examples of Christian ingratitude this seems almost the most conspicuous. The poor Jews are first robbed of their sacred books, and then, in a spurious “Gospel,” are insulted by the representation of Satan claiming them as his “old people.” If they were his people, and at the same time are “God’s chosen people,” then the name of this God must be written Satan and not Jehovah. This is logic, but we doubt if it can be regarded as complimentary to the “Lord God of Israel.”

[319] This is the Nazarene system; the Spiritus, after uniting herself with Karabtanos (matter, turbulent and senseless), brings forth seven badly-disposed stellars, in the Orcus; “Seven Figures,” which she bore “witless” (“Codex Nazaræus,” i., p. 118). Justin Martyr evidently adopts this idea, for he tells us of “the sacred prophets, who say that one and the same spirit is divided into seven spirits (pneumata). “Justin ad Græcos;” “Sod,” vol. ii., p. 52. In the Apocalypse the Holy Spirit is subdivided into “seven spirits before the throne,” from the Persian Mithraic mode of classifying.

[320] This certainly looks like the “jealous God” of the Jews.

[321] It is the Elohim (plural) who create Adam, and do not wish man to become “as one of US.”

[322] Theodoret: “Hæret.;” King’s “Gnostics.”

[323] “Gnostics and their Remains,” p. 78.

[324] Some persons hold that he was Bishop of Rome; others, of Carthage.

[325] His polemical work addressed against the so-called orthodox Church—the Catholic—notwithstanding its bitterness and usual style of vituperation, is far more fair, considering that the “great African” is said to have been expelled from the Church of Rome. If we believe St. Jerome, it is but the envy and the unmerited calumnies of the early Roman clergy against Tertullian which forced him to renounce the Catholic Church and become a Montanist. However, were the unlimited admiration of St. Cyprian, who terms Tertullian “The Master,” and his estimate of him merited, we would see less error and paganism in the Church of Rome. The expression of Vincent of Lerius, “that every word of Tertullian was a sentence, and every sentence a triumph over error,” does not seem very happy when we think of the respect paid to Tertullian by the Church of Rome, notwithstanding his partial apostasy and the errors in which the latter still abides and has even enforced upon the world as infallible dogmas.

[326] Were not the views of the Phrygian Bishop Montanus, also deemed a HERESY by the Church of Rome? It is quite extraordinary to see how easily the Vatican encourages the abuse of one heretic Tertullian, against another heretic Basilides, when the abuse happens to further her own object.

[327] Does not Paul himself speak of “Principalities and Powers in heavenly places” (Ephesians iii. 10; i. 21), and confess that there be gods many and Lords many (Kurioi)? And angels, powers (Dunameis), and Principalities? (See 1 Corinthians, viii. 5; and Epistle to Romans, viii. 38.)

[328] Tertullian: “Præscript.”

[329] Baur; Credner; Hilgenfeld; Kirchhofer; Lechler; Nicolas; Ritschl; Schwegler; Westcott, and Zeller; see “Supernatural Religion,” vol. ii., p. 2.

[330] See Epiphanius: “Contra Ebionitas.”

[331] The Ophites, for instance, made of Adonai the third son of Ilda-Baoth, a malignant genius, and, like his other five brothers, a constant enemy and adversary of man, whose divine and immortal spirit gave man the means of becoming the rival of these genii.

[332] The Bishop of Salamis died A.D. 403.

[333] “Epiphanius,” i., 122, 123.

[334] The “Clementines” are composed of three parts—to wit: the Homilies, the Recognitions, and an Epitome.

[335] “Supernatural Religion,” vol. ii., p. 2.

[336] “Homilies,” xviii., 1-15.

[337] “Clementine Homilies;” “Supernatural Religion,” vol. ii.

[338] “Supernatural Religion,” p. 11.

[339] Hieron.: “Opp.,” vii., p. 270, ff.; “Supernatural Religion,” p. 11.

[340] Ibid.

[341] Theodoret: “Hæret. Fab.,” ii., vii.

[342] See “Irenæus,” I., xii., p. 86.

[343] “Auszüge aus dem Sohar,” p. 12.

[344] “Cod. Naz.,” vol. ii., p. 149.

[345] Theodoret: “Hæret. Fab.,” ii., vii.

[346] “Homilies,” xvi., 15 ff.; ii., 12; iii., 57-59; x., 19. Schliemann: “Die Clementinem,” p. 134 ff., “Supernatural Religion,” vol. ii., p. 349.

[347] “Homilies,” iii., 20 f; ii., 16-18, etc.

[348] Ibid., iii., 20 ff.

[349] Schliemann: “Die Clementinem,” pp. 130-176; quoted also in “Supernatural Religion,” p. 342.

[350] We will speak of this doctrine further on.

[351] “Kabbala Denudata,” vol. ii., p. 155; “Vallis Regia.”

[352] “Hermes,” X., iv., 21-23.

[353] Idra Magna: “Kabbala Denudata.”

[354] Justin Martyr: “Apol.,” vol. ii., p. 74.