Valentinus.— Of Valentinus himself almost nothing is known. That he was an Egyptian by birth and received his education in Alexandria is probable but not certain. He came to Rome under Hyginus about 138, flourished under Pius (140-155), and was still there in the time of Anicetus (c. 155-166). This we learn from Irenaeus (iii. 4, 3), who lets us see that his main activity was in Rome. He further tells us that Polycarp during his sojourn in that city was the means of converting some Valentinians. Tertullian supplements (De Praescr., 30) Irenaeus with the information that Valentinus originally attached himself in Rome to the main body of the church, but “ob inquietam semper curiositatem qua fratres quoque vitiabat,” after having been twice temporarily suspended from communion, he was ultimately cut off. This statement shows that the Roman Church did not, to begin with, possess the standards by which to try Valentinus. The sections of the Shepherd of Hermas which treat of the Gnostics represent them as still continuing to exist within the church, although their dangerous character was already known. It was not, then, until the bishopric of Anicetus that the Roman Church succeeded in ridding itself of the Valentinian collegia. It seems very doubtful whether there is any good foundation for Tertullian’s further allegation (Adv. Valent., 4) that Valentinus was ambitious of obtaining the episcopate of Rome and that his failure in this caused him to break with the church. Hippolytus will have it (see Epiphanius and Philaster) that Valentinus afterwards went to Cyprus as a declared heretic. We are not in a position to control this statement; but the words of Irenaeus would almost lead to the conclusion that he died in Rome. At any rate there is no reason to suppose that he was alive much later than 160. Tertullian, in spite of a disposition to bring him down to as recent a period as possible, does not seem to think of him as living in the time of Marcus Aurelius. But in the school of Valentinus it was asserted that their master had been a pupil of Theodas, a γνώριμoς Π αύλου ; in that case he must have been a very old man in 160.
Valentinus was the author of several epistles, three fragments of which have been preserved by Clement; one of these was addressed to a certain Agathopus. He also composed homilies (one entitled On Friends'), of which we possess four fragments. An expression of Tertullian’s (Adv. Valent., 2) seems to imply that Valentinus was also the author of a treatise entitled Sophia. Perhaps this is the source from which Irenaeus’s systematic account of the Valentinian doctrine (i. 11, 1) was indirectly taken. Tertullian speaks of Psalms of Valentinus (De Car., xvii. 20); the author of the Muratorian Fragment seems also to refer to these; and in the Philosophumena of Hippolytus (vi. 37) a considerable fragment from them is given. The “gospel” of Valentinus is spoken of below.
Sources.— All that we possess of Valentinus and his disciples are the fragments preserved by their opponents, the fathers of the church. We cannot therefore put implicit confidence in all that they tell us, or accept as of primary importance in the doctrine of the Valentinians all that they represent as such. The extant fragments of the writings of Valentinus himself, as well as of those of his scholars (Ptolemaeus, Heracleon, Theodotus, and others), fortunately enable us to set their theology in a more worthy light than does the fantastic “system” which Irenaeus has given. Of the four ancient treatises against the Valentinians known to Tertullian we possess but one, that of Irenaeus, those of Justin, Miltiades, and Proculus being lost. The loss of Justin is most to be regretted, for he was a contemporary, and wrote his Syntagma probably in Rome at the time when Valentinus was actually labouring there. In Rome some sixty years later the author of the Muratorian Fragment also took notice of him. Proculus wrote a special polemic against him, while Miltiades wrote in the same sense in Asia Minor and Irenaeus in Gaul about 180. Tertullian’s Adversus Valentinianos was composed in Carthage some twenty years later, and Clement engaged in a work of a similar nature almost simultaneously at Alexandria. Against the Marcionite Church the fathers were equally energetic, Marcion and Valentinus during the period between 150 and 230 passing for the most dangerous heretics. Our oldest and at the same time fullest source is the work of Irenaeus, which rests upon a tract of Ptolemaeus and probably makes use of the Syntagma of Justin. In all probability he had read nothing of Valentinus himself. Tertullian’s Adversus Valentinianos is largely taken from Irenaeus, but contains some things that are original and of very great value: he had either himself read some Valentinian works, or had at least obtained authentic information as to their contents. Our best sources for Valentinus himself are the Stromata and Eclogues of Clement of Alexandria, who had read much of Valentinus and something of Heracleon, and gives extracts from both. His Excerpta ex Theodoto are also invaluable. Hippolytus in both his works against heretics has transcribed Irenaeus; yet in his Philosophumena he has followed a new source in describing the Valentinian system. Origen made a careful study of Heracleon’s Commentary on John's Gospel, and in his own Commentary he frequently refers to it both approvingly and otherwise. The numerous fragments he has preserved have very great value for the historian. Lastly, Irenaeus and Hippolytus have been transcribed by Epiphanius, who also has preserved various matters of importance, particularly the letter of Ptolemaeus to Flora.
Valentinians.— The school of Valentinus soon divided into two main branches, that of Italy and that of Asia Minor. Both in turn subdivided into various sections; but the Asiatic branch on the whole preserved most faithfully the teaching of the master. His influence spread even beyond the limits of the schools. Tatian, for example, in his later period indubitably derived much from Valentinus, and the fathers of the Alexandrian school were very largely indebted to him. Even in the time of Epiphanius Valentinians still existed in some districts of Egypt. The Italian branch had as heads of its schools Secundus, another master of uncertain name (Colarbasus? Epiphanius? see Iren., i. 11, 3), Ptolemaeus, Heracleon, Theotimus, and Alexander. Secundus modified the master’s doctrine of the aeons and introduced a dualism into it. The anonymous scholar shows tokens of Pythagorean influence. But the most important, exceeding in the extent of their influence even the master himself, were Ptolemaeus and Heracleon. The former made into hypostases the aeons which Valentinus himself had regarded as impersonal powers of the one Godhead. He is the systematic and Biblical theologian par excellence of the Valentinian school, conspicuous for a powerful if also undisciplined phantasy; and in his letter to Flora he shows how thorough has been his study of the
Old Testament, and how penetrating, how carefully considered, and how pointed his criticism of it. Heracleon, mentioned also by Irenaeus, earned distinction by his Commentary (υπομνήματα) on the Gospel according to John, for it is probably the first scientific commentary that Christendom produced. Clement (Strom., iv. 9, 73) calls him the most eminent teacher of the Valentinian school. He appears to have shown much greater sobriety than Ptolemaeus, whose speculations recall those of the later Neoplatonists in a most striking manner, just as we find Valentinianism generally to have anticipated, not only the later scientific theology of the Catholic Church, but also Neoplatonism. Of Theotimus all that we know is Tertullian’s remark (Adv. Valent., 4): “multum circa imagines legis operatus est.” Tertullian is also our sole informant about Alexander (De Came, 17-20). He seems to have busied himself specially with the Christological problem, and to have written under the title of Syllogismi a treatise into which quotations from Valentinus’s Psalms were introduced as authorities.
The names mentioned as those of leaders of the Asiatic school are Axionicus, Theodotus, and above all Bardesanes; we also have some fragments of Valentinian writings belonging to the East, but of which the origin is otherwise unknown. Axionicus at Antioch was the master’s most faithful disciple. Clement of Alexandria has preserved excerpts of a very inconsecutive character and in a very corrupt text from a systematic work, and some commentaries of Theodotus (Έκ τῶv ϴϵoδότoυ κaί τής άνατ ολικής καλουμένης διδασκαλίας κατά τούς Oύαλεvτίvoυ χρόνους έπιτoμaι). These excerpts, which constitute one of the most important sources for Gnosticism generally, have not hitherto received the attention they deserve. Zahn (Forschungen, iii. p. 123 sq.) has tried to make out that Theodotus is identical with Theodas, Valentinus’s master. But from the excerpts it seems hardly probable that they should be the work of a man who must have written at latest under the emperor Trajan. Bardesanes, though originally influenced by Valentinus, ultimately took up peculiar and independent ground of his own, and through him Valentinus exercised a great influence upon the Syrian Church, which continued until the 4th century (see Syriac Literature, vol. xxii. p. 827). In Asia Minor the Valentinian collegia continued until past the middle of the 4th century (see Epp. Juliani). The church fathers bring into connexion with Valentinus the Magian Marcus, as to whose doctrine we are very adequately informed by Irenaeus, but it is questionable whether he can really be reckoned as one of the disciples of that master.
Teaching of Valentinus.— Valentinus made his appearance at a time when the Christian communities were still destitute of any fixed doctrinal system: they were still associations pledged to a holy life on the ground of their faith in the one spiritual God and in His Son Jesus Christ, closely held together by the bonds of brotherly love, and strictly separated from the world and from them that are without by the consciousness of having received the Holy Ghost. But an enormous volume of facts, of sayings, and of thoughts had by this time become current within the church, material drawn from the Old Testament, from the Gospel history, from the Pauline epistles, from other early Christian writings, and from the Hellenistic and apocalyptic literature of the Jews. How this material was to be arranged, how it was to be kept within bounds, and with what degree of authority it was to be invested were questions still unsettled. But one thing was certain—Paul had declared it, and every Christian apostle, prophet, and teacher had repeated it—that the Christian faith guaranteed knowledge supreme and complete, and led on from truth to truth. Another thing was sure—that all human wisdom was but folly in presence of this new “divine” wisdom, which was inclusive of all human knowledge. The means, moreover, by which every saying, every fact was to be turned into a profound thought had for long been known and in use in the Christian communities,—that of allegory. But as yet there was no settled principle fixing the manner in which the allegorical method was to be applied, or determining what were the ruling thoughts of Scripture. The attitude of Christian teachers towards the Jewish wisdom was as indeterminate as it was towards Greek philosophy. The Pauline theology was intelligible only to a very few, and the Old Testament was as it were a veritable sphinx. It was understood to be a superhuman book, but it was also understood that much of its contents, if taken literally, was valueless. In what sense was it to be understood? How much of it was to be taken literally and how much spiritually? Was everything to be taken spiritually? According to what principle was it on this assumption to be interpreted? Was the whole of it the revealed word of the Most High, or were various authors to be recognized? Might it possibly be that part of it was divine, part heroical, part genial, part natural, part false, and part devilish? Or was it perhaps true that no part of the book proceeded from the Most High God, that nothing was pneumatic, but all psychical or carnal? And, if the Old Testament was to be allegorized, must not the narratives and the sayings of the Gospels be also treated in the same way? Was not allegory here also the pathway to the thought? If the opening chapters of Genesis and the histories of the patriarchs and of the people of Israel were a profound philosophical poem, why should not also the life of Jesus Christ be only the veil of a cosmic mystery? All these questions had within the period from 60 to 130 exercised, not indeed the great mass of believers, for these were uneducated, but thinking Christians; and the more the Christian preaching enlarged its scope, the more Christians came into contact with Syrian, Samaritan, Egyptian, and Greek wisdom, and the more they found themselves called upon to make comparisons and to bring into clearness that which is peculiar to and distinctive of Christianity, it was inevitable that these questions should stir the minds of educated Christians all the more intensely. Upon the one basis of faith in Jesus Christ accordingly there were about the year 130 a great variety of groups, differing from one another in doctrine, worship, organization, and the like, but differing also in their attitude to Christianity at large, some keeping themselves aloof from it because they regarded it as wholly perverted, others being driven out from it, others again, while remaining within the main body, yet forming special schools, or " mystery” unions, and so on. In Syria, as also in other portions of the Roman empire, the gospel was associated with Semitic “cultus wisdom” and with the abstruse speculations of a physical science still in its childhood; the entire Old Testament was rejected and an attitude of opposition assumed towards fellow-members in the great Christian union.
These developments, however, could reckon on only a relatively small degree of encouragement within the Graeco-Roman world. The barbaric elements they contained were too conspicuous, and on the other hand they were too far removed from Jewish-Christian tradition and from Christian common sense. But the attractiveness must have been very great when, on the basis of Christian tradition and the mysterious traditions of Oriental peoples, a system was set up with the aids of Greek philosophical science for a school of “knowing ones” or “Gnostics,” and a cultus organized for a community of the “initiated.” This was what Basilides and Valentinus achieved. The importance of Valentinus lies in the facts, firstly, that he recognized the relationship (for such a relationship really existed) between the theogonic-cosmogonic myth-wisdom of western Asia and the Neopythagorean, Platonic, and Philonic philosophy; secondly, that he touched all this rich and varied material which he had appropriated with the magic wand of the Platonic conception of the universe, and thus transmuted the whole into entities of a purely spiritual character; and thirdly, that he gave a decisive part to the appearance of Jesus Christ in that great drama which the history of the higher and the lower cosmos presented to his mind. In all this he had no design of setting up a new “confession,” and still less any notion (as Marcion had) of utterly remodelling Christianity. He was prevented from cherishing any such ideas by his conviction that men were divided by the inalterable constitution of their natures into three classes,—the “pneumatic,” men of the spirit, genial natures, in whom sparks of the divinity are found; the “psychical,” moral men, who can if they choose be ethically good; and " hylic ” or carnal, hopelessly chained to that which is perceived by the senses. The ordinary members of Christendom at large he held to be “psychical,” and esteemed them as such. But he did not regard their Christianity as the Christianity, rather only as its exoteric form. Alongside of the exoteric there had all along, according to him, existed an esoteric. The apostles did not say out everything to everybody, but on the contrary communicated to the “spiritual ones” a secret doctrine into which only select persons might be initiated, and that not until after long and careful probation. This secret teaching included a special dogmatic, a special ethic, and a special worship. But it was not out of all connexion with the Christianity that was publicly taught. We can observe in the history of the Valentinian schools the zeal with which they strove to adapt themselves to the Christianity publicly professed, and to follow it in all its developments. The Valentinians always, so far as they possibly could, accepted such things as the development of the canon (agitated for by themselves) within the church at large, the building up of a tradition, the symbols framed, and the like; to this Irenaeus, Tertullian, and the Alexandrians all bear witness. In this they present the strongest possible contrast to Marcion and his church, who from the outset took up an attitude of the utmost hostility to the main body of Christians. Hence they expressly even controverted Marcionitism, as the letter of Ptolemaeus to Flora and the polemic of Bardesanes against the Marcionite Prepon show. If such was the unvarying attitude of Valentinus’s scholars, it is fair to attribute it also to Valentinus himself. In his day indeed the dogmatic, ethical, and legal advances of Christendom at large were still in their most rudimentary stage, but what there was of them must have been valued by him even then as the exoteric form of Christianity, to which he superadded his own Gnostic esoteric form. In this respect he was the forerunner of Clement and Origen, who likewise distinguish Gnostic from common Christianity, and very probably learned the distinction from Valentinus and his scholars. But his connexion with both was of a still more intimate character. They are related not only by virtue of the fact that they all regarded the gospel as the religion of the perfect Hellenically - cultured spiritual man, but also by the large-hearted disposition they cherished, and the settled purpose they manifested, to appropriate everything noble and great in the history of humanity, to rank it according to its proper value, and to find a place for it in the edifice of Christian philosophy. And it is very interesting to notice that they completely set aside the Greek and Roman mythologies, regarding them as worthless and devilish. The formal peculiarity of the Valentinian Gnosis is that it places all moral and intellectual ideas, possessions, and entities in a descending scheme of genetic development. With Valentinus himself they figure as “motus et affectus” of the Godhead, the ultimate cause of all things, the alone Good; by his scholars they are hypostatized. This descending development (self-revelation) of the Godhead takes place with a holy rhythm. At this point the...
