Stromateis 1 part 22/42

'If you do not believe, you shall not understand' — that is, if you do not believe him who was prophesied through the law and decreed by the law, you will not understand the old covenant, which he himself expounded by his own coming.

He, then, who understands and discerns clearly — this is the gnostic.

But his work is not the mere abstinence from evils (for this is [only] a stepping-stone to the greatest advance), nor indeed the doing of some good thing out of fear (for it is written:

'Where shall I flee, and where shall I hide from your presence? If I ascend into heaven, you are there;'

'if I depart to the uttermost parts of the sea, there is your right hand;'

'if I go down into the depths, there is your Spirit') — nor yet for the sake of a hoped-for and promised honor (for it is said:

'Behold, the Lord [comes], and his reward is before his face, to render to each according to his works' — things which eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and which have not

entered [into the heart of man] — the things which God has prepared ... for those who love him) — but the sole [motive] chosen by the gnostic is well-doing for love's sake, for the sake of the good ... itself.

For instance, it has been said, from the person of God, to the Lord:

'Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance' — teaching him to ask, as the most kingly of petitions, for the salvation of men without reward, so that we ourselves might inherit and acquire the Lord [as our own].

For, on the contrary, to desire the knowledge concerning God for the sake of some need — that this or that may happen to me, and that this or that may not happen — is not proper to the gnostic; but for him the reason for contemplation is knowledge itself.

For I would venture to say that he who pursues knowledge for the sake of divine knowledge itself will not choose knowledge because he wishes to be saved.

...is extended, whereas to be always understanding is, by admixture, the very essence of the knower... having become undivided and an eternal contemplation, it remains a living hypostasis.

If, then, someone were to propose hypothetically to the Gnostic which of the two he would wish to choose—the knowledge of God, or eternal salvation—supposing these to be separated (though in truth they are altogether one and the same), he would, without any hesitation whatsoever, choose the knowledge of God, judging it to be choiceworthy for its own sake—that state which, through love, has advanced beyond faith... into the distinctive property of knowledge.

This, then, is the first well-doing of the perfect man: when it does not arise for the sake of some need bearing upon himself among the things that tend toward him, but, having judged that it is good to do good, his activity, borne along earnestly, does good in every action—not in some cases yet not in others, but having settled into a fixed habit of well-doing—no longer for the sake of glory, or, as the philosophers say, good repute, nor for the sake of reward, whether from men or even from God.

...that he might, according to the image and likeness of the Lord, fully accomplish his life.

And even if, while he is doing good, something contrary should befall him,

being free from passion, he will render the recompense without remembering the wrong, becoming just and good toward the righteous and toward the unrighteous alike,

It is to such persons that the Lord speaks:

Become ye perfect, as your Father is perfect.

He alone truly lives who has consecrated his tomb into a holy temple for the Lord, [having turned]

...the old, sin-prone soul back to God.

This man is no longer merely self-controlled, but has come to be in a settled state of freedom from passion, awaiting to be clothed with the divine form...

'If you do a work of mercy,' he says, 'let no one know.'

'And if you fast, anoint yourself,' so that God alone may know, and not a single one of men; indeed, not even the one who shows mercy ought to know that he is showing mercy;

for otherwise he will at one time be compassionate, and at another time not.

But when he has made beneficence a settled habit, he will be imitating the nature of the Good;

and his disposition and nature ... will also be [confirmed] through continual practice.

We ought not to be caught up and transported [suddenly], but to arrive where we must by walking, having passed through the whole of the narrow way;

for this is what it is to be drawn by the Father: to become worthy to receive the power of grace from God, and to run the course unhindered;

And even if some should hate the elect man, he knows their ignorance, pitying the folly of their mind.

Fittingly, then, this knowledge loves even those who are ignorant, and both teaches and trains them... to honor the whole creation of God the Almighty.

And if he has learned to love God, this man will in no way whatsoever cast away virtue—neither waking, nor in a dream, nor even in any sort of imagination;

since a settled state never departs from itself so as to cease being a settled state—whether knowledge is to be called a 'habit,' or is to be said to be a 'disposition.'

For, since differing notions never at any time steal in, the ruling faculty, remaining unaltered, admits no alteration through impressions, nor does it, from the movements of the day, dream up images...

For this reason, indeed, the Lord also commands us to watch, so that our soul may never even in a dream be affected by passion, but he charges us to keep our conduct by night, carried on just as in the day, pure and unstained.

For this—to keep the mind in a condition that abides ever the same—is, so far as is possible, likeness to God;

and this is the condition of the mind qua mind, whereas the varied [changeable] disposition arises through attachment to material things.

For this reason, it seems to me, they have called the night 'euphrone' [the kindly time], since it is then that the soul, having ceased from the senses, turns inward upon itself and partakes more fully in understanding.

For these reasons, then, the [mystery] rites also take place chiefly at night, signifying the withdrawal of the soul from the body that occurs in the night.

Let us not, then, sleep, as do the rest, but let us watch and be sober.

For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night;

but let us, since we are of the day, be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation.

And whatever, again, is said concerning sleep, the same things must also be understood concerning death.

For each of the two signifies the withdrawal of the soul, the one more, the other less—which one may also gather from Heraclitus:

he is in contact with himself when he has died, his sight extinguished; but while living—

he is in contact with the dead man when asleep, his sight extinguished;

being awake, he is in contact with the one who sleeps.

For blessed are those who know the season, according to the Apostle, that it is already the hour for you to be roused out of sleep;

for now our salvation is nearer than when we [first] believed.

The night is far spent, and the day is at hand.

Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light.

And by 'day' he allegorically signifies the Son, and also 'light'; and, again, by 'the armor of light' he metaphorically signifies the commandments.

For this reason, indeed, they say that one must go to the sacred rites and to prayers having bathed, pure and radiant;

and this outward adornment and purification takes place for the sake of a symbol, whereas true purity is to think holy thoughts; and indeed the image of baptism might also be found in that [tradition] handed down from Moses to the poets, in some such fashion as this:

She, having bathed, wearing garments clean upon her skin—Penelope—comes to [her] prayer;

And Telemachus, having washed his hands in the hoary sea, prayed to Athena.

This is a custom of the Jews, as also is the frequent washing before bed.

Know that you are made pure not by washing, but by the mind.

For perfect purity, I think, is that of the mind, of deeds, and of thoughts; and, in addition, sincerity of speech; and the last degree of purity is sinlessness even with respect to dreams.

For a man, I think, a sufficient purification is exact and steadfast repentance—if, indeed, having condemned ourselves for our former deeds, we press forward, having thereafter come to understanding and having lifted our mind up out of both the pleasures according to sense and our former transgressions.

If, then, one must derive the etymology of 'knowledge' [episteme], and take its meaning from 'standing' [stasis]—because it makes our soul, which formerly was borne now one way, now another, to stand firm amid the realities—then likewise 'faith' [pistis] too must be explained by etymology as the standing of our soul with respect to that which truly is.

But we desire to learn of him who is just always and in all things—one who remains just neither because he fears the punishment that comes from the law, nor because he is wary of the hatred of wrongdoing felt by those who live with him and prosecute offenses, nor because he apprehends the danger that might come from the very persons who are wronged;

for he who abstains from doing any unjust act on account of these things is not good of his own will, ... but good through fear.

And indeed Epicurus says that the wise man, according to his teaching, does not wish to commit injustice for the sake of any gain;

for he cannot obtain assurance concerning going undetected.

so that, according to him, if he should be persuaded that he will escape notice, he will commit injustice.

Such, then, are his obscure doctrines;

And if someone should also refrain from wrongdoing on account of the hope of a reward from God for righteous deeds, neither will this man be good of his own free will;

for just as fear makes the former man just, so also reward makes this latter man just—or rather, it shows him merely to seem to be just.

But the hope after death—that it is fair for the good, and, on the contrary, for the wicked—is known not only by those who follow the barbarian philosophy, but also by the Pythagoreans;

for they too taught hope as the end for those who philosophize, seeing that Socrates himself, in the Phaedo, says that noble souls depart from this life with good hope, and again, censuring the wicked, sets them in contrast, saying that they live with evil hope.

Heraclitus, too, appears to be in harmony with this, through what he says in discoursing about men:

There await men after they have died things which they neither hope for nor imagine.

Divinely, then, Paul writes plainly to the Romans:

tribulation works endurance, and endurance, proven character, and proven character, hope; and hope does not put to shame.

For endurance [comes] on account of the hope that is to come;

and 'hope,' by the same name, also [signifies] the fulfillment and restoration of hope—which indeed does not put to shame, being no longer reproached.

But he who obeys the bare call, simply insofar as he has been called, presses on toward knowledge neither through fear nor through [desire for] pleasures;

for he does not look about to see whether any advantageous gain or enjoyment will accrue to him from outside, but, drawn by love of the truly existing Beloved and led toward what is fitting, he worships God;

nor would he act rightly merely because he received a promise to obtain good things on such conditions; but even if he should be persuaded that he could escape God's notice in what he does—which is impossible—he would never be willing to do anything contrary to right reason, having once for all chosen that the truly good and choiceworthy, being so of itself, is for that very reason also lovable.

for we have determined that goodness does not consist in the food of the belly...

But that man has heard that food will not commend us to God, nor indeed marriage, nor yet abstinence from marriage practiced in ignorance, but rather the virtuous work that is done with knowledge; since even the dog, that irrational animal, might be called 'continent' when, fearing the one who raises the stick against it, it abstains from the meat for that reason.

Know well that in the case of such people, once the promise previously held out is taken away, the threatened fear is cut off, and the danger hanging over them is removed, what remains exposes their true purpose.

For they do not attach themselves to the very nature of the matter, so as truly to apprehend with knowledge that all things created for our use are good—marriage, for instance, and child-bearing, undertaken with self-control—while better than the good is to become, through likeness to the divine, free from passion and virtuous.

but being led by external things according to whether they are easy or hard to use, they abstain from some and not from others.

Moreover, even in the things from which they abstain, they appear to do so out of loathing, thereby slandering creation and the Creator; and even while seeming to conduct themselves faithfully, they hold an impious judgment.

But the command 'You shall not desire' requires neither the compulsion arising from fear, which forces one to abstain from pleasures, nor the wage held out by promise, which persuades one to check one's impulses;

nor do those who have obeyed God for the sake of the promise choose obedience because of the commandment, but rather because of the promise, having been captivated by the bait of pleasure; nor indeed would turning away from things perceptible by sense of itself produce affinity with things intelligible—rather, on the contrary, affinity with the intelligible becomes, according to nature, a turning of the gnostic away from things of sense, occurring by his choosing the good in accordance with a selection of what is noble, choosing it with knowledge, marveling at creation and sanctifying its Maker, and sanctifying, moreover, likeness to the divine.

'But I,' he will say, 'will free myself from desire because of my kinship with you, O Lord.'

'For fair indeed is the created order, and all things are well governed; nothing happens without cause. I must belong among your own possessions, O Almighty;

and even if I am here on earth, I am with you.

And I wish to be fearless, that I may be able to draw near to you, and to be content with little, practicing your righteous selection of the noble from among things alike.'

Teaching us in a most mystical and most holy manner, the apostle has signified that the truly grateful choice is made, not by rejecting the other things as base, but by preferring the more excellent among things already good, saying:

'So then he who gives his virgin in marriage does well, and he who does not give her in marriage does better'—with a view to what is seemly, and to attending upon the Lord without distraction.

We know that things hard to procure are not necessary, while things necessary have been made easy to procure by God out of his love for the good.

Wherefore Democritus says well that nature and teaching are closely alike, and he has briefly added the reason:

'For teaching reshapes a man, and in reshaping him it makes his nature; and it makes no difference whether one is formed such by nature, or is transformed into such a type by time and learning.'

The Lord has furnished us with both of these: the one according to creation, the other according to the re-creation and renewal that comes from the covenant.

That which is beneficial to the more sovereign part is the more choiceworthy, and of all things the most sovereign is the mind.

To whomever, then, the things that are truly good appear also most pleasant, he procures from within himself the fruit he desires—the stability of the soul.

'But he who hears me,' it says, 'shall rest, trusting in peace, and shall be at ease without fear of any evil.'

'Know that you are to trust in God with your whole heart and your understanding.'

In this way it is possible for the gnostic already to become god.

'You are gods, and sons of the Most High.'

Empedocles too says that the souls of the wise become gods, writing somewhat as follows:

'They become leaders among earthly men,'

'whence spring up gods, foremost in honors.'

Man, then, is simply thus formed according to the pattern of the spirit that is connate with him;

for he is not fashioned without shape or form in the workshop of nature, where the generation of man is mysteriously accomplished, both the craft and the substance being common to all; but each particular man is characterized according to the impression formed in his soul from whatever he may choose.

In this respect we say that Adam was made perfect as regards his formation;

for nothing of what characterizes the form and shape of man was lacking to him.

But that which he was to receive as perfection in the process of coming-to-be, and by which he was to be justified through obedience—this was the part resting upon him, still needing to be brought to full manhood.

But God is without blame for the cause that lies in the one who has chosen, and still more for the one who has chosen the very thing forbidden.

For coming-into-being is twofold: the one of things that are begotten, the other of things that come to be by their own action.

And man's courage, being, they say, a quality of one subject to passion, makes the one who partakes of it fearless and unconquered in his essence; and spiritedness is the bodyguard of the mind in endurance and steadfastness and the like, while over desire are set self-control and saving prudence; but God is without passion, without spiritedness, and without desire.

And he is not fearless in the sense that he does not shrink from things terrible, nor indeed is he temperate in the sense that he rules over his desires;

for the nature of God could never fall into anything terrible, nor does God flee out of cowardice, just as he will not first desire, in order then to rule over desire.

Mystically, then, the Pythagorean saying too was spoken with reference to us, that man must become one, since the high priest himself is one, God being one, in accordance with the unchangeable habit of ever running toward the good.

Accordingly the Savior, through dealing with desire, also abolished spiritedness along with it, spiritedness being a desire for vengeance;

for universally what is passible belongs to every kind of desire, whereas the man who is deified into impassibility becomes, in undefiled fashion, unique and one.

Just as those at sea, held taut by an anchor, pull on the anchor but do not draw it toward themselves—rather they draw themselves toward the anchor—so also those who, living the gnostic life, seem to be drawing God toward themselves, without realizing it are drawing themselves toward God.

For he who serves God serves himself.

In the contemplative life, then, one cares for oneself by worshiping God, and through one's own sincere purification beholds God, the Holy One, in a holy manner;

for self-control, understood as an ever-present watchfulness, continually overseeing and contemplating itself, is made like God so far as its power allows.

Accordingly, that which is 'up to us' is that of which we are equally masters, both of it and of its opposite—as, for instance, to philosophize or not, and to believe or disbelieve.

Indeed, because we are equally masters of each of two opposites, that which is 'up to us' is thereby found to be possible.

And indeed the commandments are of such a kind as can either be fulfilled or not fulfilled by us—things to which praise and blame reasonably follow; and those, again, who are punished on account of the sins committed by them, are punished for those sins alone.

For things that have happened have passed away, and that which has happened could never become something that has not happened.

Accordingly, the sins committed before faith are forgiven by the Lord—not so that they may not have happened, but so that they are treated as though they had not happened.

Yet Basilides says that not all sins are forgiven, but only the involuntary ones and those committed out of ignorance—as though it were some man, and not God, who bestowed so great a gift.

'You supposed, lawless one, that I would be like you.'

But even if we are punished for voluntary sins, it is not so that they may not have happened, but because they did happen, that we are punished.

But punishment does not benefit the one who has sinned with a view to his not having done the deed, but with a view to his no longer sinning, nor indeed any other falling into similar sins.

Here, then, the good God chastens for these three reasons:

first, that the one being disciplined may himself become better than he was; then, that those who can be saved through examples may be forewarned by admonition; and third, that the one who is wronged may not be held in contempt and thus liable to be wronged again.

One kind of chastisement is instructive, another is punitive, which we have also called disciplinary.

It must be understood, however, that those who fall into sins after the washing are the ones subject to this discipline;

for the sins previously committed have been forgiven, while those that occur afterward are being purged.

Concerning unbelievers it has been said that they are reckoned as chaff, which the wind drives away from the face of the earth, and as a drop from a bucket.

'Blessed is he who has gained learning through inquiry, neither rushing upon citizens to bring them harm, nor into unjust deeds, but beholding the ageless order of immortal nature—how it was composed, and in what way, and how.'

'To such men the practice of shameful deeds never clings.'

Reasonably, then, Plato too says that he who contemplates the Ideas will live as a god among men;

'Mind is the place of the Ideas, and mind is God.'

He has therefore called the one who contemplates the invisible God a god living among men... and in the Sophist, too, Socrates named the Eleatic Stranger, being a dialectician, a god—such as the gods 'who, resembling strangers from foreign lands, visit the cities.'

For when the soul, having risen above the realm of becoming, exists by itself and consorts with the forms—such as is the leading figure in the Theaetetus—having already become, as it were, an angel, he will be together with Christ, being contemplative, ever gazing upon the will of God, truly 'a man of understanding,' while 'the rest flit about like shadows.'

'For the dead bury their own dead.'

'I will fill her with the earth-born dead, whom my wrath has struck down.'

God, then, being incapable of demonstration, is not an object of demonstrative knowledge; but the Son is wisdom and knowledge and truth and whatever else is akin to these, and indeed he admits of demonstration and discursive exposition.

But all the powers of the Spirit, taken together, becoming one single reality, converge upon that same one, the Son; yet he is not exhausted by the concept concerning each one of his powers individually.

And indeed the Son does not simply become one as a bare unit, nor many as parts, but as all things being one.

For he is the same circle, all the powers being rolled together and united into one.

For this reason the Word is called Alpha and Omega, since of him alone the end becomes the beginning, and it comes to an end again in the beginning from above, admitting no separation anywhere...

Wherefore also to believe in him and through him is to become one and single, being united to him without distraction, whereas to disbelieve is to doubt, and to be separated, and to be divided.

For this reason the Lord speaks thus:

'Every son of a foreigner, uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh, that is, unclean in both body and spirit, shall not enter into the holy places from among the foreigners in the midst of the house of Israel, but only the Levites.'

By 'foreigners' he means those who did not wish to believe, but who chose to disbelieve.

Only those, then, who live purely are in truth priests of God.

For this reason, though all the tribes were circumcised alike, those tribes which furnish the anointing of high priests, kings, and prophets were reckoned holier.

Hence he commands them neither to touch the dead nor to go in to those who have departed, not because the body is defiled, but because sin and disobedience are fleshly, embodied, dead, and therefore abominable.

Only for a father and mother, a son and a daughter who has died, is the priest permitted to go in, because these alone are kindred by flesh and seed, from whom the priest himself has also received the proximate cause of his entrance into life.

And these too are purified for seven days, the same number of days in which creation is brought to completion.

For on the seventh day rest is observed as a sacred rite, and on the eighth he offers propitiation, as it is written in Ezekiel—a propitiation by which it is possible to receive the promise.

But perfect purification, I think, is the faith that comes through the law and the prophets unto the gospel.

And propitiation is the purity that comes through complete obedience, together with the laying aside of worldly things, leading to the grateful surrender of the bodily tent that arises from the soul's enjoyment.

Or if the region of the fixed stars, which draws near to the intelligible world, should be called 'the Ogdoad'—still he says that the gnostic must emerge from both generation and sin.

At any rate, during the seven days sacrificial victims are still offered for sins, for a wary caution against relapse touches even the seventh cycle.

And Job the righteous himself says, 'Naked I came forth from my mother's womb, and naked shall I depart thither'—not naked of possessions (for that is a small and common thing), but as a righteous man he departs naked of wickedness and sin, and of the formless phantom that follows those who have lived unjustly.

For this was what was said: 'Unless you turn and become as little children'—pure in flesh and holy in soul through abstinence from evil deeds—God showing that he wishes us to be such as he has begotten us to be from the womb of water.

For generation, succeeding generation by way of progress, seeks to make immortal; but the lamp of the impious shall be put out.

Indeed, the all-wise Moses, employing repetition in a striking manner, has disclosed the purity of body and soul alike, which the gnostic pursues, describing the incorruption of both body and soul in the case of Rebecca thus:

'And the maiden was fair; she was a virgin; no man had known her.'

Now Rebecca is interpreted 'the glory of God,' and the glory of God is incorruption.

This is righteousness in reality: not to have the advantage in the one at the expense of the other, but to be wholly a sanctified temple of the Lord.

Righteousness, then, is the peace and stability of life, unto which the Lord used to dismiss people, saying:

For Salem is interpreted 'peace,' of which our Savior is recorded as king, whom Moses calls 'Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of God Most High,' who gives the wine and the bread, the sanctified food, as a type of the Eucharist.

And indeed Melchizedek is interpreted 'righteous king,' and there is a kinship of names between righteousness and peace.

But Basilides supposes Righteousness and her daughter Peace to be hypostatic beings, remaining assigned within the Ogdoad.

We must now pass from the more physical/natural matters to the more manifest, ethical ones.

For the discussion of those matters will follow after the treatise now in hand.

The Savior himself, then, truly initiates us into the mysteries just as in the tragedy—watching those who watch—and he grants the sacred rites.

'But what form do these sacred rites have for you?' You shall hear again:

'Unspeakable for mortals uninitiated in the Bacchic rites to know'... and even if someone should inquire curiously what they are like, let him hear again:

'It is not lawful for you to hear, yet they are worth knowing.'

'The one who practices impiety detests the sacred rites of god.'

But God is without beginning, the all-perfect origin of all things, the maker of every beginning.

In that he is being/substance, he is the principle of the physical realm;

insofar as he is the Good, he is the principle of the ethical realm;

and in that he is Mind, he is the principle of the rational and judicial realm.

Whence also the Word alone is Teacher, Son of the Father who is Mind, he who instructs mankind.

Not reasonably, then, do those who run down the divine formation and vilify the body, failing to perceive that the constitution of man was made upright for the contemplation of heaven, and that the fashioning of the senses tends toward knowledge, and that the members and parts are well suited for what is good, not for pleasure.

Hence this dwelling place becomes capable of receiving the soul most precious to God, and is deemed worthy of the Holy Spirit according to the sanctification of both soul and body, being brought to perfection by the Savior's restoring work.

And indeed, the mutual interconnection of the three virtues is found in the man—the gnostic—who deals with the divine ethically, physically, and rationally.

For wisdom is the knowledge of things divine and human; righteousness is the concord of the parts of the soul; and holiness is the service of God.

But if someone should claim that the flesh is disparaged, and through it generation also, citing Isaiah who says, 'All flesh is grass, and all the glory of man is as the flower of grass;'

'the grass withers, and the flower falls;'

'but the word of the Lord endures forever'—let him hear the Spirit, through Jeremiah, interpreting the point at issue:

'This is your lot and portion for your disobedience, says the Lord:'

'Because you forgot me and trusted in falsehoods, I also will uncover your skirts over your face, and your disgrace shall be seen, your adultery and your neighing,' and so forth.

For this is the flower of the grass—namely, to walk according to the flesh and to be fleshly, according to the apostle, being in sins.

The soul is acknowledged to be the better part of man, the body the lesser.

But neither is the soul good by nature, nor again is the body evil by nature; nor indeed is that which is not good therefore immediately evil.

For there are also certain intermediate states, and things preferred and things dispreferred, among the things that are indifferent.

It was therefore necessary that the composition of man, having come to be among sensible things, should consist of different elements, and not of contraries—namely, body and soul.

Good actions, then, being better, are always attributed to the better, spiritual part, whereas actions of pleasure-seeking and sin are assigned to the lesser, sin-prone part.

For instance, the soul of the wise and gnostic man, as though lodging as a guest in the body, conducts itself toward it with dignity and honor, but without attachment—ready, the moment the time of departure calls, to leave the tent behind.

'I am a sojourner on the earth,' he says, 'and a stranger dwelling with you.'

And from this Basilides has taken occasion to call the elect a stranger to the world, as being by nature supra-mundane.