藥箱（駁八十異端） 第 1 章 第 6/82 段

It would belong to madmen to be persuaded to believe this seductive, insane nonsense of his; but to the intelligent, this man's argument and opinion are readily refuted and foolish—one may see how he displaced his own mind into an excessive and boundless perversity.

For he sets forth, as though this pitiable little man had been struck dumb by some poetic frenzy, names for each ruler of the heavens, propounding them so that, through the names which he poeticizes, he might be believed by those who do not have a sound mind—to the destruction of the soul of those deceived.

Moreover, this deceiver did not cease clinging to magical devices and to sorceries.

And afterward he says that this creation came to be by the angels in this heaven of ours, and by the power within it.

Of these angels, he calls one of them 'God,' whom, having separated him out, he said was the God of the Jews alone, ranking him as one, numbered together with the angels named in his fictitious tale, and he says that man was fashioned by him.

And he says that these, together with him, divided up the world by an apportionment of lots among the multitude of the angels, and that the race of the Jews fell by lot to this aforementioned god of the Jews.

And he blasphemes this same Almighty Lord, who alone truly is God and none other—for we confess this same one to be the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ—this one that man, denying, wishes to present as one of the angels spoken of by him, as I have already shown.

And he says that the Jews had come into his lot, and that he defends them; and that he is the most self-willed of all the angels, and that he brought the sons of Israel out of Egypt by the arrogance of his own arm, because he is more impetuous and more self-willed than the others.

Whence, on account of his self-will, as this sorcerer blasphemously says, this god of theirs had planned to subject all the other nations to the race of Israel, and for this reason had prepared wars.

And having loosed his tongue and opened wide his mouth against the holy God, this most pitiable man speaks many other things without shame.

'For this reason,' he says, 'the other nations also made war on this nation and displayed many evils against it, on account of the jealous rivalry of the other angels, since, being provoked as though despised by him, they too incited their own nations against the nation of Israel that was under him.'

And for this reason wars and disorders have always arisen against them.

This is the specious argumentation of the deceiver.

And he himself likewise holds the opinion that Christ appeared only in seeming.

He says that Christ was an appearance in his very appearing, and was not a man, nor did he take on flesh.

And this second mimic-storyteller stages for us another piece of theater in his account concerning the cross of Christ, asserting that it was not Jesus who suffered, but Simon of Cyrene.

For since, when the Lord was being led out from Jerusalem, as the sequence of the Gospel has it, they compelled a certain Simon of Cyrene to carry the cross.

He turns the tragedy into a piece of trickery, and says:

'While that man was carrying the cross, he transformed him into his own form, and himself into Simon, and delivered up Simon in his own place to be crucified.'

'And while that man was being crucified, Jesus stood invisibly opposite, laughing at those crucifying Simon, and he himself flew up into the heavenly realms, having handed Simon over to be impaled, and withdrew, unaffected, into heaven.'

'And Simon himself was crucified, and not Jesus.'

'For Jesus,' he says, 'having flown up into heaven, passed through all the powers, until he was restored to his own Father.'

'For this one,' he says, 'is the aforementioned Son of the Father, sent for the help of the sons of men, on account of the disorder which the Father saw both among men and among the angels.'

'And this one,' he says, 'is our salvation, who came and revealed this truth to us alone.'

Such, then, are the rhapsodies of this charlatan's myth-making.

But moreover, from this point on, as the impurity that began with Simon advanced further, he permits those who are his disciples to carry out every kind of evil contrivance and licentiousness, teaching those persuaded by him a certain promiscuous intermingling of men with women, of evil design.

As the apostle says concerning these and their like, that 'the wrath of God and righteous judgment' is revealed 'upon those who hold the truth in unrighteousness.'

For it is because of this cause of self-indulgence that many fall into the heresy, finding that they may fearlessly satisfy their own pleasure in shameful practices.

For the one who bears witness will be found without reward, since he does not bear witness on behalf of him who made man;

for he bears witness on behalf of Simon who was crucified.

Whence, then, could there be a reward for such a man, seeing that he dies on behalf of Simon the crucified, while professing to do this on behalf of Christ, whom he does not know—dying on behalf of one of whom he has no knowledge? One ought, therefore, to deny and not die rashly.

This man will be exposed as introducing a diabolical power against souls, teaching them to deny God, though the Lord himself says, 'Whoever denies me before men, him will I also deny before my Father who is in heaven.'

'We,' he says, 'are the men; but all the others are swine and dogs.'

'Do not cast your pearls before swine, nor give what is holy to the dogs.'

For he hides his own wickedness from those who have understanding, but reveals it to his own faction and to those he has deceived.

For since what is said and done among them is truly shameful even to mention, he says that the truth must be confessed before men—

'for we are the men, and the others are swine and dogs,' as I said before.

He declares altogether that concerning the Father and his own mystery, one must reveal it to no one, but keep it in silence among themselves, disclosing it to one out of a thousand and two out of ten thousand; and he instructs his disciples, saying, 'You are to know all, but let no one know you.'

He himself, and those who follow him, when questioned, declare that they are no longer Jews, yet have not yet become Christians, but always deny it, keeping their faith silently within themselves and showing it to no one—being wary of their own shame on account of the shamelessness of their shameful practice and their evil teaching.

The origin of this evil pretext had its cause in inquiring and asking whence evil comes.

But everyone will be shown, by his own dealings, for what sort of person he is.

These men are merchants of evils, lovers of evil and not of good, as scripture also says: 'Evils shall overtake those who seek evils.'

It has become a root of wickedness, yet evil is not something possessed of independent existence (hypostasis).

For evil never existed [of itself], but is something brought in from outside through pretext, present in each one who does evil;

but in the one who does not do it, it does not exist, as has already been shown above in the preceding argument.

For the Lord says, after having made all things, 'Behold, all things are very good,' showing that evil is not of ancient standing, nor did it exist from the beginning before it took its rise from man;

For it comes to be through us, and through us it does not come to be.

Therefore, since every man is able both not to do evil and to do evil, when he does it, evil exists; but when he does not do it, evil does not exist.

Where, then, is the root of evil, or the substantial existence of wickedness?

He says that the power and principle above these is Abrasax, because the numerical value of 'Abrasax' amounts to the number three hundred and sixty-five, so that from this he attempts to establish confirmation for his myth-making concerning the three hundred and sixty-five heavens,

for these heavens he busies himself contriving, with no small artifice, divisions and locations equal in number to those of the astrologers, dividing and constructing them.

For, taking the vain speculations of those men as his own peculiar stamp, he and his followers carried them over to serve as the basis of their own idol-fashioning, erroneous, and counterfeit teaching.

And they wish, as I said before, to base the constitution of these upon similar numerical values, since 'Abrasax' has the number three hundred and sixty-five, thereby pretending to show that for this reason the year, in its cycle, has a number of three hundred and sixty-five days.

But his nonsensical account has collapsed.

For the year is found to consist of three hundred and sixty-five days and three hours.

Then, he says, from this man also has three hundred and sixty-five members, so that one member is assigned to each of the powers.

Hence, in this point too, his contrived and spurious teaching has collapsed;

for in man there are three hundred and sixty-four members.

Wonderfully did the blessed Irenaeus, the successor of the apostles, in his precise treatment of this matter, expose this man's folly.

One must ask this same man: by what reasoning do you lead us up to so great a multitude, fellow, and not rather to the first principle—that is, to the one almighty God—seeing that, in whichever way one speaks, one must in every case confess the one cause of all things as Master?

But also concerning your hypothesis about Christ, answer, you fashioner of this myth-making contrivance:

If it was Simon of Cyrene who was crucified, then our salvation has come about not through Jesus but through Simon, and the world could no longer hope to be saved through Jesus Christ, who did not suffer on our behalf.

For Simon cannot save, being a mere man and nothing more.

At the same time, you also bring a slanderous charge against the only-begotten Son of God, as though the good God, under compulsion, handed over another in his place to be murdered—

as though the Lord, by some sleight of hand, concealed himself and handed over another in his stead.

And your foolish talk will be found to be slandering the truth, yet powerless to prevail,

but will be refuted by the truth itself, having introduced this fiction without any coherence.

For in every way the truth refutes this heresiarch, both in the Old and in the New Testament.

For it is plain to everyone that Christ came to his passion willingly, by his own will, by the will of his own Father, and by the good pleasure of the Holy Spirit; that he took flesh, becoming man among us, being in perfection God from the beginning, begotten of the Father without beginning and without time, yet in the last of days deigned to come to be in the womb of a virgin, fashioning for himself a body, and being born in truth and becoming man in reality, so that in it he might suffer on our behalf in the flesh, and give his soul on behalf of his own sheep;

as he refutes them when he says, 'Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered up and killed, and on the third day he will rise'; and when he said to the sons of Zebedee, 'Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?'; as also the apostle Peter says, 'put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit,' and again, 'who suffered on our behalf in the flesh';

and again John says, 'whoever does not confess that Christ has come in the flesh, this one is antichrist'; and holy Paul says, '[Christ] tasted death'—the death of the cross; as also Moses foretold when he said, 'you will see your life hanging upon a tree.'

Our life is not Simon, but the Lord who suffered on our behalf, that he might dissolve our sufferings; and having died in the flesh, death was made dead by death, that he might break the sting of death; he descended into the netherworld, that he might shatter its adamantine bars;

and having done this, he led up the captivity of souls and emptied Hades.

Christ, therefore, did not become the cause of Simon's death, having handed over his own self.

For what do you mean, you accursed pest of a man? Was he not able to speak with freedom and withdraw from them, had he not willed to be crucified? But did the Son of God, God the Word, make a mere sport of trickery, handing over another in his own place to die and be crucified—he who says, 'I am the truth'?

'For I am,' he says, 'the truth and the life'; and life would not procure death for another, nor would truth conceal what is truly done by it and present other things in place of the truth.

For truth will no longer be found to be truth, if it works deception and hides its own work, dealing instead in a contrary sophistry.

And, in short—to put it simply from all this, lest I prolong the discourse—'Woe to the world because of stumbling blocks,' and to those who work lawlessness.

How many have procured darkness for themselves, and for others afterward who are persuaded by their darkness!

But to the discerning the truth will be manifest, and the enterprise of Basilides and such men will be exposed as a work of error.

And let this much, then, be said by me concerning this heresy and this myth;

and from here I shall proceed to another heresy.

For to whom will such a heresy not be exposed—being a kind of myth, hidden in the sand after the manner of the horned viper, yet protruding into the air by means of its horn, and working destruction for those who happen upon it? But the Lord has broken the horn of sinners, whereas only the horn of the righteous shall be exalted—which is the faith of the truth.

Wherefore, having crushed this heresy as well with the teaching of the truth, let us move on to those that follow, calling upon God as our helper, to whom be glory and honor and worship unto the ages of ages. Amen.

Against the Nicolaitans, [Heresy] 5, but 25th in the series.

of the apostles, along with Stephen the holy protomartyr, and Prochorus and Parmenas and the rest,

This man, hailing from Antioch, became a proselyte;

but afterward, having accepted the word of the preaching concerning Christ, he too was joined to the disciples, and was numbered among the foremost of those examined for office;

hence he was also numbered among those chosen at that time for the care of the widows.

But later the devil crept into this man and deceived his heart with the same error as those aforementioned ancients, wounding him even more grievously than those before him.

For this man had a comely little wife, and, practicing continence in regard to her, in imitation of those whom he saw devoted to God, he persevered for a time; yet he did not carry through to the end in mastering his own incontinence, but, wishing, like a dog, to return to his own vomit, and hunting up for himself certain unwholesome pretexts, he contrived a defense for his own passion of licentiousness;

then, having fallen away from his purpose, he cohabited with his own wife without restraint.

But this man, ashamed of his own defeat and wary of being found out, dared to say that unless a man indulges in lechery every single day, he cannot partake of eternal life.

For he passed from one pretext to another.

For seeing his own wife excelling in beauty, yet marked by humility, he grew jealous of her, and, supposing others to be like himself in his own licentiousness, at first he persisted in drunken abuse toward his own wife and brought certain slanders against her by his words; but in the end he dragged himself down, not only into the use of the flesh according to the nature of men, but also into blasphemous suspicion, the harm of depravity, and the insidious infiltration of wickedness.

And from here those of the falsely named 'knowledge' begin to attach themselves wickedly to the world—I mean those called Gnostics, and Phibionites, and those called followers of Epiphanes, and the Stratiotics, and Levitics, and Borborites, and the rest.

For each of these, dragging his own sect along by his own passions, has devised countless ways of wickedness.

For some of them glorify a certain Barbelo, whom they claim to be above, in the eighth heaven, and they say that she was put forth from the Father.

Some say that she is the mother of Ialdabaoth, others that she is the mother of Sabaoth.

[They say] that her son took possession of the seventh heaven with a certain insolence and tyranny, and said to those below him, 'I am,' he says, 'the first and the one after these, and besides me there is no other god.'

And Barbelo, hearing this word, wept.

And [they say] that she continually appears to the rulers in a certain beautiful form, and steals away their seed through pleasure and effusion, in order, supposedly, to gather back again her own power that had been sown into various beings.

And thus, from such a premise, he stealthily introduced into the world the mystery of his own filthy talk.

And some of those aforesaid, as I said, through much evil contrivance, taught men to conduct themselves — in a manner not lawful to speak of — in promiscuous intercourse with women and in incurable acts of shame, just as the most holy apostle says somewhere: 'For the things done by them in secret are shameful even to speak of.'

For anyone who wishes to see the refutation of this heresy, set in opposition by the Holy Spirit, one must know it from the Revelation of holy John, where, writing to one of the churches in the person of the Lord — that is, to the bishop appointed there, together with the power of the holy angel who is over the altar — he says: 'But you have this good thing, that you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.'

But others, honoring a certain Prounikos, likewise fulfilling their own passions again in this mythical notion of shameful deeds, say:

'We gather the power of Prounikos from bodies, through the fluids — I mean, seed and menstrual blood.'

Later, when I undertake to speak of them one by one, I will set it forth in detail — not so as to defile the ears of those who hear or read, but rather to work in the discerning a greater hatred toward them and an aversion to the practice of such evils; not slandering these wretches, but publicly exposing in truth what is done by them.

Others glorify the aforesaid Ialdabaoth, claiming him to be, as I said, the firstborn son of Barbelo.

And for this reason, he says, honor must be paid to him, because he revealed many things.

Hence certain books are also composed in the name of Ialdabaoth, in which they fashion countless barbarous names of rulers, as they say, and of authorities in each heaven who are opposed to the soul of man.

And, simply put, great is the harm inflicted on the human race through their error.

Others likewise glorify Kaulakau, calling him a certain ruler by this name, eagerly striving to dazzle the inexperienced through the astonishment produced by these names and by the contrived barbarous sound of the name.

But to those who are experienced and have received from God the grace of true knowledge concerning each name and premise, how are the untrustworthy teachings of their myth and error not easily refuted?

For if they speak of Prounikos, the whole thing is a belching forth of self-indulgence and incontinence.

For everything called 'prounikeuomenon' carries in its name a suggestion of lust, and in its undertaking a work of corruption.

For concerning those who deflower bodies, there is a certain Greek expression: 'he prounikeused this woman.'

Hence also, in their myths, the Greek deceivers who wrote erotic tales record it, speaking of beauty in this way: 'beauty is prounikon.'

But also concerning Kaulakau, who among those who know would not laugh, that words rightly spoken in Hebrew and rightly translated into Greek, and even now plainly read by those who read Hebrew and containing nothing crooked, they twist into idol-making, into shapes, into hypostatic principles, and, so to speak, into statue-fashioning — sowing error covertly among the simple through fantasy — and refashion for the sowing of their own shameful and mythical craft? For 'kaulakau' is written in Isaiah, a word occurring in the twelfth vision, where he says: 'affliction upon affliction, hope upon hope, yet a little, yet a little, wait.'

So that I may here set forth the Hebrew words themselves most fully, in their very forms, just as they are written:

For 'saulasau saulasau' is translated 'affliction upon affliction'; 'kaulakau kaulakau' is 'hope upon hope'; 'zeer sham zeer sham' is 'yet a little, yet a little, wait.'

Where then is their mythology? Where is the craving conception of their fantasy-mongering? Whence come these tares into the world? Who compelled men to draw destruction upon themselves? For if, knowing the truth, they nevertheless transformed the names into fantasy, they have plainly become the authors of their own ruin.

But if in ignorance they asserted things they did not know, nothing is more pitiable than they.

For these things are truly foolish, as anyone who possesses understanding in God can plainly see.

For the sake of self-indulgence they have destroyed both themselves and those who obey them, and they continue to destroy them.

For it is a spirit of error, like a breath in a flute, moving each of the foolish with various motions against the truth.

For the flute itself is an imitation of the serpent, through whom the evil one spoke and deceived Eve.

For after that pattern, in imitation, the flute was fashioned for men, unto their deception.

And observe the pattern which the flute-player himself makes with the flute.

For as he plays, he tosses his head back upward and nods it down, and inclines to the right and likewise to the left, just like that serpent.

...that it might bring the earth to utter disappearance and together engulf the whole inhabited world, ravaging on the right hand and on the left those who are persuaded by and enchanted with the error, as though by a musical instrument, through its counterfeit voices.

But some others among them fashion certain new names, saying that there was darkness, and the deep, and water, and that the Spirit made a division between them, in their midst.

And the darkness was enraged and harbored malice against the Spirit; and this darkness, rushing up, entwined itself with the Spirit and, he says, begot a certain being called Matrix, who, once born, conceived within the Spirit itself.

And from the Matrix four aeons were put forth, and from these four aeons another fourteen, and there came to be right and left, light and darkness.

And afterward, after all these, a certain shameful aeon was put forth, and this one mingled with the Matrix mentioned above, and from this shameful aeon and the Matrix there came to be gods and angels and demons and seven spirits.

But the mimic fable of their error stands exposed.

For, though at the beginning speaking of and defining one Father, they afterward brought forth many gods — so as to show that error, by the very falsehoods it utters, arms itself against itself and dissolves itself, while the truth is always found on every side.

What then shall I say to you, O Nicolaus? What shall I argue? Whence, O fellow, do you come to us bringing a shameful aeon, and a root of wickedness, and a begetting Matrix, and many gods and demons? For the apostle, by saying 'even if there are so-called gods,' thereby implies that these are not truly gods.

For in saying 'so-called,' he showed that they exist only in being spoken of, not existing in reality according to hypostasis, but through the supposition of certain persons.

'But to us,' he says, 'there is one God' — clearly meaning to those who know the knowledge of the truth.

And he did not say 'a so-called god,' but 'a God who truly is.'

But if to us there is one God, then there are no longer many gods.

And the Lord says in the Gospel, 'that they may know you, the only true God,' in order to overturn the reasoning of those who speak mythical things and suppose that there is a plurality of gods.

For our God is one — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; three hypostases, one lordship, one Godhead, one doxology, and not many gods.

And where, O Nicolaus, according to you, is fulfilled what was said by the Savior, that 'there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who were born so from the womb, and there are eunuchs who made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven'?

If then there are eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven, how have you led yourself and those who obey you astray, holding down the truth of God in unrighteousness and teaching it through lust and shameful deeds? And where among you is fulfilled that which is said concerning virgins: 'I have no commandment of the Lord, but I give my judgment, as one who has obtained mercy, that it is good to remain so'; and again: 'the virgin cares for the things of the Lord, how she may please the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit'?

And how many things could be said about chastity, self-control, and virginity? For from you, shamelessly established as law, comes the whole filth of impurity.

But let my purpose here rest content with these two or three sayings, for the refutation of this ridiculous heresy, for the benefit of those who come upon it.

Proceeding next in order, I shall point out the heresy yoked together with this one, like a mass of overgrown weeds, or a thicket of thorns bound together on every side, or a great quantity of dried wood and brushwood in a field, prepared for burning, because it belongs to the same heresy of the pitiable Nicolaus.

I mean those who, before him, took their pretexts from Simon and from the others — called Gnostics, but altogether worthy of condemnation because of the depravity and shameful practice of their unclean deeds.

For truly, since he too practiced self-control for a little while and then fell away from it — after the manner of the creature called the water-snake, which comes up out of the water onto the land and then turns back again into the water — let us strike and destroy him with the reed placed in our hand by Christ, and proceed on to the heresies that follow.

Against the Gnostics, who are also called Borborites — Heresy 26, being the twentieth in the series.

Again, these Gnostics, sprouting up in various ways from this same root, are deceived men — like fruits growing out of dung — as is evident and detectable to everyone in the testing of truth; I would say, not only to the faithful but perhaps even to unbelievers — they have sprung up in the world.

For how would speaking of a 'Matrix' and of 'shamefulness' and the rest not appear ridiculous to all men, both Greeks and barbarians, both the wise and the foolish? And it is a great calamity, and, so to speak, the greatest misery, that the ringleaders of the heresies, who lie under condemnation and in error, should brandish themselves against us and rise up like a swarm of noxious beasts, causing us disturbances and foul odors, itches and irritations, through the error of their myth-making.

These men, yoked together with this Nicolaus, sprung again from him — like scorpions from a rotten serpent's egg, or offspring born of vipers — bring in to us certain names of empty talk, and fabricate books, calling a certain book 'Noria,' and, transforming, on the basis of a notion drawn from Greek superstition, the mythical rhapsody and fantasy current among the Greeks, in this way they weave falsehood together with truth.

For they say that this Noria is the wife of Noah.

And they call her Noria so that, by transforming into barbarous names what was rhapsodized in Greek fashion among the Greeks, they might produce an illusion in those deceived by them — in order, indeed, that they might also make an interpretation of the name Pyrrha, calling her by this name, Noria.

For since 'noura' means 'fire,' not in the true Hebrew tongue, but in the Syriac dialect — for fire is called 'esath' among the Hebrews in the true tongue — for this reason it has happened to them, out of ignorance and inexperience, to make use of this name.

For neither was it Pyrrha, as among the Greeks, nor Noria, as fabled among these people, but Barthenos who became Noah's wife.

Then these men, again bringing forward for us the tales of Philistion, propose the reason: that although she often wished to be with Noah in the ark, she was not permitted, since the ruler who made the world, he says, wanted to destroy her along with all the others in the flood.