The Sethians, whom some name Ophians or Ophites, call the God of all things “Man,” again naming him Light, calling him blessed and incorruptible, and affirming that he has his dwelling in Bythos (the Deep). His Ennoia (Thought) they call Son of Man, and a second Man. After him, they say, exists the Holy Spirit; and below these are four elements — water, darkness, abyss, and chaos. The Spirit they call female, and say that it is borne above the elements. They say that the first Man and the second fell in love with the beauty of the Spirit — the Light, whom they call Christ. But the female, unable to bear the overflowing abundance of the light, overflowed; and the Christ, together with the mother, was drawn up into the incorruptible Aeon, which they also call the true Church.
The drop of light that had overflowed, they say, fell downward and was called Sophia and Prunicus and the Male-Female. Swimming about in the waters, she took a body from them and became heavy, and was in danger of being submerged; but she rose up again, and out of the body that surrounded her the heaven was fashioned. That one they call the son of Prunicus; and he again put forth another son, and from him, they say, yet another came into being; and the emanations proceeded as far as the number seven.
By each of these, they say, one heaven was created, and each dwells in his own. They say that the others rebelled against the first; and he, in dejection, propped his thought (or fixed his mind) upon the dregs of matter, and from her begot a serpent-shaped son. Then, boasting, he said: “I am God and Father, and there is none above me.” But the mother, indignant, cried out against him: “Do not lie; for above you is the Father of all, the first Man, and Man the Son of Man.” And when, they say, the Father had heard these words of the serpent, he said: “Come, let us make man according to our image.”
Others, whom they call Cainites, say that even Cain was redeemed by the power from above, as also Esau, and Korah, and the Sodomites, and all such persons — these they confess to be their own kindred. And they say that these were hated by the Maker, yet suffered no harm; for the Wisdom snatched away out of them whatever she had in them. And they say that Judas the traitor alone of all the apostles possessed this knowledge, and that for this reason he accomplished the mystery of the betrayal. And all the elders bear witness — those throughout Asia who had associated with John the disciple of the Lord — that John handed these things down. For he remained with them until the times of Trajan.