Heracleon
Encyclopedia
Heracleon was a Gnostic who flourished about AD 175
, probably in the south of Italy
. He is described by Clement of Alexandria
(Strom
.
iv. 9) as the most esteemed (δοκιμώτατος)
of the school of Valentinus; and, according to Origen
(Comm. in S. Joann.
t. ii. § 8, Opp. t. iv. p. 66), said to have been in personal contact (γνώριμος)
with Valentinus
himself. He is barely mentioned by Irenaeus
(ii. 41) and by Tertullian
(adv. Valent. 4). The common source of Philaster and Pseudo-Tertullian
(i.e. probably the earlier treatise of Hippolytus) contained
an article on Heracleon between those on Ptolemaeus
and Secundus, and on Marcus
and Colarbasus.
In his system he appears to have regarded the divine nature as a vast abyss in whose Pleroma
were Aeon
s of different orders and degrees, emanations
from the source of being. Midway between the supreme God and the material world was the Demiourgos, who created the latter, and under whose jurisdiction the lower, animal soul of man proceeded after death, while his higher, celestial soul returned to the Pleroma whence at first it issued.
He seems to have received the ordinary Christian scriptures; and Origen, who treats him as a notable exegete
, has preserved fragments of a commentary by him on the fourth gospel, while Clement of Alexandria quotes from him what appears to be a passage from a commentary on Luke
. These writings are remarkable for their intensely mystical and allegorical interpretations of the text.
and Cave have suggested Alexandria
as the place where Heracleon taught; but Clement's language suggests some distance
either of time or of place; for he would scarcely have thought it necessary to explain
that Heracleon was the most in repute of the Valentinians if he were at the time
the head of a rival school in the same city. Hippolytus makes Heracleon one of the
Italian school of Valentinians; but the silence of all the authorities makes it
unlikely that he taught at Rome. It seems, therefore, most likely that he taught
in one of the cities of S. Italy; or "Praedestinatus" may be right in making Sicily
the scene of his inventions about Heracleon.
The date of Heracleon is of interest on account of his use of St. John's Gospel,
which clearly had attained high authority when he wrote. The mere fact, however,
that a book was held in equal honour by the Valentinians and the orthodox seems
to prove that it must have attained its position before the separation of the Valentinians
from the church; and, if so, it is of less importance to determine the exact date
of Heracleon. The decade 170–180 may probably be fixed for the centre of his activity.
This would not be inconsistent with his having been personally instructed by Valentinus,
who continued to teach as late as 160, and would allow time for Heracleon to have
gained celebrity before Clement wrote, one of whose references to Heracleon is in
what was probably one of his earliest works. He had evidently long passed from the
scene when Origen wrote.
commentator on the N.T. of whom we have knowledge. Origen, in the still extant portion
of his commentary on St. John
, quotes Heracleon nearly 50 times, usually controverting,
occasionally accepting his expositions. We thus recover large sections of Heracleon's
commentary on cc. i. ii. iv. and viii. of St. John. There is reason to think that
he wrote commentaries on St. Luke also. Clement of Alexandria (Strom. iv.
9) expressly quotes from Heracleon's exposition of ; and another reference
(25 Eclog. ex Script. Proph. p. 995) is in connexion with ,
and so probably from an exposition of these verses.
of the Gnostic sects, that they taught that it was no sin to avoid martyrdom by
denying the faith. No exception can be taken to what Heracleon says on this subject.
In this exposition every word in the sacred text assumes
significance; and this characteristic runs equally through the fragments of Heracleon's
commentary on St. John, whether the words commented on be Jesus's own. or only
those of the Evangelist. Thus he calls attention to the facts that in the statement
"all things were made by Him," the preposition used is
διά; that Jesus is said to have gone down
to Capernaum and gone up to Jerusalem; that He found the buyers and sellers
ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ, not
ἐν τῷ ναῷ; that He said salvation is of
the Jews not in them, and again that Jesus tarried with
the Samaritans, not in them; notice is taken of the point in Jesus's discourse
with the woman of Samaria, where He first emphasizes His assertion with "Woman,
believe Me"; and though Origen occasionally accuses Heracleon of deficient accuracy,
for instance in taking the prophet as meaning no more than a prophet;
"in three days" as meaning no more than "on the third day"; yet on the
whole Heracleon's examination of the words is exceedingly minute. He attempts to
reconcile differences between the Evangelists, e.g. Jesus's ascription
to the Baptist
of the titles "Elias" and "prophet" with John's own disclaimer of
these titles. He finds mysteries in the numbers in the narrative—in the 46 years
which the temple was in building, the 6 husbands of the woman of Samaria (for such
was his reading), the 2 days Jesus abode with the people of the city, the 7th
hour at which the nobleman's son was healed.
He thinks it necessary to reconcile
his own doctrine with that of the sacred writer, even at the cost of some violence
of interpretation. Thus he declares that the Evangelist's assertion that all things
were made by the Logos must be understood only of the things of the visible creation,
his own doctrine being that the higher aeon world was not so made, but that the
lower creation was made by the Logos through the instrumentality of the Demiurge.
Instances of this kind where the interpreter is forced to reject the most obvious
meaning of the text are sufficiently numerous to show that the gospel was not written
in the interests of Valentinianism; but it is a book which Heracleon evidently recognized
as of such authority that he must perforce have it on his side.
Thus the nobleman (βασιλικός) is the
Demiurge, a petty prince, his kingdom being limited and temporary, the servants
are his angels, the son is the man who belongs to the Demiurge. As he finds the
ψυχικοί represented in the nobleman's son,
so again he finds the πνευματικοί in the woman
of Samaria. The water of Jacob's well which she rejected is Judaism; the husband
whom she is to call is no earthly husband, but her spiritual bridegroom from the
Pleroma; the other husbands with whom she previously had committed fornication represent
the matter with which the spiritual have been entangled; that she is no longer to
worship either in "this mountain" or in "Jerusalem" means that she is not, like
the heathen, to worship the visible creation, the Hyle, or kingdom of the devil,
nor like the Jews to worship the creator or Demiurge; her watering-pot is her good
disposition for receiving life from the Saviour.
Heracleon's method is one commonly used by orthodox Fathers,
especially by Origen. Origen even occasionally
blames Heracleon for being too easily content with more obvious interpretations.
Heracleon at first is satisfied to take "whose shoe latchet I am not worthy to loose"
as meaning no more than "for whom I am not worthy to perform menial offices," and
he has Origen's approbation when he tries, however unsuccessfully, to investigate
what the shoe represented. It does not appear that Heracleon used his method of
interpretation controversially to establish Valentinian doctrine, but, being a Valentinian,
readily found those doctrines indicated in the passages on which he commented.
of
most naturally conveys is that of the pre-Hieronymian
translation "mendax est sicut et pater ejus," and so it is generally understood
by Greek Fathers, though in various ways they escape attributing a father to the
devil. Hilgenfeld and Volkmar consider that the Evangelist shows that he embraced
the opinion of the Valentinians and some earlier Gnostic sects that the father of
the devil was the Demiurge or God of the Jews. But this idea was unknown to Heracleon,
who here interprets the father of the devil as his essentially evil nature; to which
Origen objects that if the devil be evil by the necessity of his nature, he ought
rather to be pitied than blamed.
speculative. He says nothing of the Gnostic theories as to stages in the origin
of the universe; the prologue of St. John does not tempt him into mention of the
Valentinian Aeonology. In fact he does not use the word aeon in the sense employed
by other Valentinian writers, but rather where according to their use we should
expect the word Pleroma; and this last word he uses in a special sense, describing
the spiritual husband of the Samaritan woman as her Pleroma—that is, the complement
which supplies what was lacking to perfection. We find in his system only two beings
unknown to orthodox theology, the Demiurge, and apparently a second Son of Man;
for on
he distinguishes a higher Son of Man who sows
from the Saviour Who reaps. Heracleon gives as great prominence as any orthodox
writer to Christ and His redeeming work. But all mankind are not alike in a condition
to profit by His redemption. There is a threefold order of creatures:
These are the special creation of
the Logos; they live in Him, and become one with Him. In the second class Heracleon
seems to have had the Jews specially in mind and to have regarded them with a good
deal of tenderness. They are the children of Abraham who, if they do not love God,
at least do not hate Him. Their king, the Demiurge, is represented as not hostile
to the Supreme, and though shortsighted and ignorant, yet as well disposed to faith
and ready to implore the Saviour's help for his subjects whom he had not himself
been able to deliver. When his ignorance is removed, he and his redeemed subjects
will enjoy immortality in a place raised above the material world.
Besides the passages on which he comments Heracleon refers to
;
;
,
;
;
,
;
;
.
175
Year 175 was a common year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Piso and Iulianus...
, probably in the south of Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. He is described by Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria
Titus Flavius Clemens , known as Clement of Alexandria , was a Christian theologian and the head of the noted Catechetical School of Alexandria. Clement is best remembered as the teacher of Origen...
(Strom
Stromata
The Stromata is the third in Clement of Alexandria's trilogy of works on the Christian life. Clement titled this work Stromateis, "patchwork," because it dealt with such a variety of matters...
.
iv. 9) as the most esteemed (δοκιμώτατος)
of the school of Valentinus; and, according to Origen
Origen
Origen , or Origen Adamantius, 184/5–253/4, was an early Christian Alexandrian scholar and theologian, and one of the most distinguished writers of the early Church. As early as the fourth century, his orthodoxy was suspect, in part because he believed in the pre-existence of souls...
(Comm. in S. Joann.
t. ii. § 8, Opp. t. iv. p. 66), said to have been in personal contact (γνώριμος)
with Valentinus
Valentinus (Gnostic)
Valentinus was the best known and for a time most successful early Christian gnostic theologian. He founded his school in Rome...
himself. He is barely mentioned by Irenaeus
Irenaeus
Saint Irenaeus , was Bishop of Lugdunum in Gaul, then a part of the Roman Empire . He was an early church father and apologist, and his writings were formative in the early development of Christian theology...
(ii. 41) and by Tertullian
Tertullian
Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, anglicised as Tertullian , was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He is the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of Latin Christian literature. He also was a notable early Christian apologist and...
(adv. Valent. 4). The common source of Philaster and Pseudo-Tertullian
(i.e. probably the earlier treatise of Hippolytus) contained
an article on Heracleon between those on Ptolemaeus
Ptolemy (gnostic)
Ptolemy the Gnostic, or Ptolemaeus Gnosticus was a disciple of the Gnostic teacher Valentinius, and is known to us for an epistle he wrote to a wealthy woman named Flora, herself not a gnostic....
and Secundus, and on Marcus
Marcus (Marcosian)
Marcus was the founder of the Marcosian Gnostic sect in the 2nd century AD. He was a disciple of Valentinus, with whom his system mainly agrees. His doctrines are almost exclusively known to us through a long polemic in Adversus Haereses, in which Irenaeus gives an account of his teaching and his...
and Colarbasus.
In his system he appears to have regarded the divine nature as a vast abyss in whose Pleroma
Pleroma
Pleroma generally refers to the totality of divine powers. The word means fullness from comparable to πλήρης which means "full", and is used in Christian theological contexts: both in Gnosticism generally, and by Paul of Tarsus in Colossians Colossians 2:9 KJV .Gnosticism holds that the...
were Aeon
Aeon
The word aeon, also spelled eon or æon , originally means "life", and/or "being", though it then tended to mean "age", "forever" or "for eternity". It is a Latin transliteration from the koine Greek word , from the archaic . In Homer it typically refers to life or lifespan...
s of different orders and degrees, emanations
Emanationism
Emanationism is an idea in the cosmology or cosmogony of certain religious or philosophical systems. Emanation, from the Latin emanare meaning "to flow from" or "to pour forth or out of", is the mode by which all things are derived from the First Reality, or Principle...
from the source of being. Midway between the supreme God and the material world was the Demiourgos, who created the latter, and under whose jurisdiction the lower, animal soul of man proceeded after death, while his higher, celestial soul returned to the Pleroma whence at first it issued.
He seems to have received the ordinary Christian scriptures; and Origen, who treats him as a notable exegete
Exegesis
Exegesis is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text, especially a religious text. Traditionally the term was used primarily for exegesis of the Bible; however, in contemporary usage it has broadened to mean a critical explanation of any text, and the term "Biblical exegesis" is used...
, has preserved fragments of a commentary by him on the fourth gospel, while Clement of Alexandria quotes from him what appears to be a passage from a commentary on Luke
Gospel of Luke
The Gospel According to Luke , commonly shortened to the Gospel of Luke or simply Luke, is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. It details his story from the events of his birth to his Ascension.The...
. These writings are remarkable for their intensely mystical and allegorical interpretations of the text.
Life
NeanderAugust Neander
Johann August Wilhelm Neander , was a German theologian and church historian.-Biography:Neander was born at Göttingen as David Mendel. His father, Emmanuel Mendel, is said to have been a Jewish pedlar, but August adopted the name of Neander on his baptism as a Protestant Christian...
and Cave have suggested Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
as the place where Heracleon taught; but Clement's language suggests some distance
either of time or of place; for he would scarcely have thought it necessary to explain
that Heracleon was the most in repute of the Valentinians if he were at the time
the head of a rival school in the same city. Hippolytus makes Heracleon one of the
Italian school of Valentinians; but the silence of all the authorities makes it
unlikely that he taught at Rome. It seems, therefore, most likely that he taught
in one of the cities of S. Italy; or "Praedestinatus" may be right in making Sicily
the scene of his inventions about Heracleon.
The date of Heracleon is of interest on account of his use of St. John's Gospel,
which clearly had attained high authority when he wrote. The mere fact, however,
that a book was held in equal honour by the Valentinians and the orthodox seems
to prove that it must have attained its position before the separation of the Valentinians
from the church; and, if so, it is of less importance to determine the exact date
of Heracleon. The decade 170–180 may probably be fixed for the centre of his activity.
This would not be inconsistent with his having been personally instructed by Valentinus,
who continued to teach as late as 160, and would allow time for Heracleon to have
gained celebrity before Clement wrote, one of whose references to Heracleon is in
what was probably one of his earliest works. He had evidently long passed from the
scene when Origen wrote.
Commentary
The chief interest that now attaches to Heracleon is that he is the earliestcommentator on the N.T. of whom we have knowledge. Origen, in the still extant portion
of his commentary on St. John
Gospel of John
The Gospel According to John , commonly referred to as the Gospel of John or simply John, and often referred to in New Testament scholarship as the Fourth Gospel, is an account of the public ministry of Jesus...
, quotes Heracleon nearly 50 times, usually controverting,
occasionally accepting his expositions. We thus recover large sections of Heracleon's
commentary on cc. i. ii. iv. and viii. of St. John. There is reason to think that
he wrote commentaries on St. Luke also. Clement of Alexandria (Strom. iv.
9) expressly quotes from Heracleon's exposition of ; and another reference
(25 Eclog. ex Script. Proph. p. 995) is in connexion with ,
and so probably from an exposition of these verses.
Martyrdom
The first passage quoted by Clement bears on an accusation brought against someof the Gnostic sects, that they taught that it was no sin to avoid martyrdom by
denying the faith. No exception can be taken to what Heracleon says on this subject.
Exposition
significance; and this characteristic runs equally through the fragments of Heracleon's
commentary on St. John, whether the words commented on be Jesus's own. or only
those of the Evangelist. Thus he calls attention to the facts that in the statement
"all things were made by Him," the preposition used is
διά; that Jesus is said to have gone down
to Capernaum and gone up to Jerusalem; that He found the buyers and sellers
ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ, not
ἐν τῷ ναῷ; that He said salvation is of
the Jews not in them, and again that Jesus tarried with
the Samaritans, not in them; notice is taken of the point in Jesus's discourse
with the woman of Samaria, where He first emphasizes His assertion with "Woman,
believe Me"; and though Origen occasionally accuses Heracleon of deficient accuracy,
for instance in taking the prophet as meaning no more than a prophet;
"in three days" as meaning no more than "on the third day"; yet on the
whole Heracleon's examination of the words is exceedingly minute. He attempts to
reconcile differences between the Evangelists, e.g. Jesus's ascription
to the Baptist
John the Baptist
John the Baptist was an itinerant preacher and a major religious figure mentioned in the Canonical gospels. He is described in the Gospel of Luke as a relative of Jesus, who led a movement of baptism at the Jordan River...
of the titles "Elias" and "prophet" with John's own disclaimer of
these titles. He finds mysteries in the numbers in the narrative—in the 46 years
which the temple was in building, the 6 husbands of the woman of Samaria (for such
was his reading), the 2 days Jesus abode with the people of the city, the 7th
hour at which the nobleman's son was healed.
He thinks it necessary to reconcile
his own doctrine with that of the sacred writer, even at the cost of some violence
of interpretation. Thus he declares that the Evangelist's assertion that all things
were made by the Logos must be understood only of the things of the visible creation,
his own doctrine being that the higher aeon world was not so made, but that the
lower creation was made by the Logos through the instrumentality of the Demiurge.
Instances of this kind where the interpreter is forced to reject the most obvious
meaning of the text are sufficiently numerous to show that the gospel was not written
in the interests of Valentinianism; but it is a book which Heracleon evidently recognized
as of such authority that he must perforce have it on his side.
Valentinianism
He strives to find Valentinianism in the Gospel by a method of spiritual interpretation.Thus the nobleman (βασιλικός) is the
Demiurge, a petty prince, his kingdom being limited and temporary, the servants
are his angels, the son is the man who belongs to the Demiurge. As he finds the
ψυχικοί represented in the nobleman's son,
so again he finds the πνευματικοί in the woman
of Samaria. The water of Jacob's well which she rejected is Judaism; the husband
whom she is to call is no earthly husband, but her spiritual bridegroom from the
Pleroma; the other husbands with whom she previously had committed fornication represent
the matter with which the spiritual have been entangled; that she is no longer to
worship either in "this mountain" or in "Jerusalem" means that she is not, like
the heathen, to worship the visible creation, the Hyle, or kingdom of the devil,
nor like the Jews to worship the creator or Demiurge; her watering-pot is her good
disposition for receiving life from the Saviour.
Heracleon's method is one commonly used by orthodox Fathers,
especially by Origen. Origen even occasionally
blames Heracleon for being too easily content with more obvious interpretations.
Heracleon at first is satisfied to take "whose shoe latchet I am not worthy to loose"
as meaning no more than "for whom I am not worthy to perform menial offices," and
he has Origen's approbation when he tries, however unsuccessfully, to investigate
what the shoe represented. It does not appear that Heracleon used his method of
interpretation controversially to establish Valentinian doctrine, but, being a Valentinian,
readily found those doctrines indicated in the passages on which he commented.
The devil
One other of his interpretations deserves mention. The meaning which the Greekof
most naturally conveys is that of the pre-Hieronymian
translation "mendax est sicut et pater ejus," and so it is generally understood
by Greek Fathers, though in various ways they escape attributing a father to the
devil. Hilgenfeld and Volkmar consider that the Evangelist shows that he embraced
the opinion of the Valentinians and some earlier Gnostic sects that the father of
the devil was the Demiurge or God of the Jews. But this idea was unknown to Heracleon,
who here interprets the father of the devil as his essentially evil nature; to which
Origen objects that if the devil be evil by the necessity of his nature, he ought
rather to be pitied than blamed.
Redemption
To judge from the fragments we have, Heracleon's bent was rather practical thanspeculative. He says nothing of the Gnostic theories as to stages in the origin
of the universe; the prologue of St. John does not tempt him into mention of the
Valentinian Aeonology. In fact he does not use the word aeon in the sense employed
by other Valentinian writers, but rather where according to their use we should
expect the word Pleroma; and this last word he uses in a special sense, describing
the spiritual husband of the Samaritan woman as her Pleroma—that is, the complement
which supplies what was lacking to perfection. We find in his system only two beings
unknown to orthodox theology, the Demiurge, and apparently a second Son of Man;
for on
he distinguishes a higher Son of Man who sows
from the Saviour Who reaps. Heracleon gives as great prominence as any orthodox
writer to Christ and His redeeming work. But all mankind are not alike in a condition
to profit by His redemption. There is a threefold order of creatures:
- The Hylic or material, formed of the ὕλη, which is the substance of the devil, incapable of immortality.
- The psychic or animal belonging to the kingdom of the Demiurge; their ψυχή is naturally mortal, but capable of being clothed with immortality, and it depends on their disposition (θέσις) whether they become sons of God or children of the devil.
- The pneumatic or spiritual, who are by nature of the divine essence, though entangled with matter and needing redemption to be delivered from it.
These are the special creation of
the Logos; they live in Him, and become one with Him. In the second class Heracleon
seems to have had the Jews specially in mind and to have regarded them with a good
deal of tenderness. They are the children of Abraham who, if they do not love God,
at least do not hate Him. Their king, the Demiurge, is represented as not hostile
to the Supreme, and though shortsighted and ignorant, yet as well disposed to faith
and ready to implore the Saviour's help for his subjects whom he had not himself
been able to deliver. When his ignorance is removed, he and his redeemed subjects
will enjoy immortality in a place raised above the material world.
Besides the passages on which he comments Heracleon refers to
;
;
,
;
;
,
;
;
.