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دراسات أبائية
علم الباترولوجي
"كتابات الآباء "
How great also is benignity! "Love your enemies," it is said, "bless
them who curse you, and pray for them who despitefully use you,"[6]
and the like; to which it is added, "that ye may be the children of
your Father who is in heaven," in allusion to resemblance to God.
Again, it is said, "Agree with thine adversary quickly, whilst thou
art in the way with him."[7] The adversary is not the body, as some
would have it, but the devil, and those assimilated to him, who
walks along with us in the person of men, who emulate his deeds in
this earthly life. It is inevitable, then, that those who confess
themselves to belong to Christ, but find themselves in the midst of
the devil's works, suffer the most hostile treatment. For it is
written, "Lost he deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver
thee to the officers of Satan's kingdom." "For I am persuaded that
neither death," through the assault of persecutors, "nor life" in
this world, "nor angels," the apostate ones, " nor powers" (and
Satan's power is the life which he chose, for such are the powers
and principalities of darkness belonging to him), "nor things
present," amid which we exist during the time of life, as the hope
entertained by the soldier, and the merchant's gain, "nor height,
nor depth, nor any other creature," in consequence of the energy
proper to a man,--opposes the faith of him who acts according to
free choice. "Creature" is synonymous with activity, being our work,
and such activity "shall not be able to separate us from the love of
God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."[8] You have got a
compendious account of the gnostic martyr.
"We know that we all have knowledge"--common knowledge in common
things, and the knowledge that there is one God. For he was writing
to believers; whence he adds, "But knowledge (gnosis) is not in
all," being communicated to few. And there are those who say that
the knowledge about things sacrificed to idols is not promulgated
among all, "lest our liberty prove a stumbling-block to the weak.
For by thy knowledge he that is weak is destroyed. "[1] Should they
say, "Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, ought that to be bought?"
adding, by way of interrogation, "asking no questions,"[2] as if
equivalent to "asking questions," they give a ridiculous
interpretation. For the apostle says, "All other things buy out of
the shambles, asking no questions," with the exception of the things
mentioned in the Catholic epistle of all the apostles,[3] "with the
consent of the Holy Ghost," which is written in the Acts of the
Apostles, and conveyed to the faithful by the hands of Paul himself.
For they intimated "that they must of necessity abstain from things
offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and
from fornication, from which keeping themselves, they should do
well." It is a different matter, then, which is expressed by the
apostle: "Have we not power to eat and to drink? Have we not power
to lead about a sister, a wife, as the rest of the apostles, as the
brethren of the Lord and Cephas? But we have not used this power,"
he says, "but bear all things, lest we should occasion hindrance to
the Gospel of Christ;" namely, by bearing about burdens, when it was
necessary to be untrammelled for all things; or to become an example
to those who wish to exercise temperance, not encouraging each other
to eat greedily of what is set before us, and not to consort
inconsiderately with woman. And especially is it incumbent on those
entrusted with such a dispensation to exhibit to disciples a pure
example. "For though I be free from all men, I have made myself
servant to all," it is said, "that I might gain all. And every one
that striveth for mastery is temperate in all things."[4] "But the
earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof."[5] For conscience'
sake, then, we are to abstain from what we ought to abstain.
"Conscience, I say, not his own," for it is endued with knowledge,
"but that of the other," lest he be trained badly, and by imitating
in ignorance what he knows not, he become a despiser instead of a
strong-minded man. "For why is my liberty judged of by another
conscience? For if I by grace am a partaker, why am I evil spoken of
for that for which I give thanks? Whatever ye do, do all to the
glory of God "[6]--what you are commanded to do by the rule of
"With the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth
confession is made unto salvation. Wherefore the Scripture saith,
Whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed; that is, the word
of faith which we preach: for if thou confess the word with thy
mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in thy heart that God hath
raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."[7] There is clearly
described the perfect righteousness, fulfilled both in practice and
contemplation. Wherefore we are "to bless those who persecute us.
Bless, and curse not."[8] " For our rejoicing is this, the testimony
of a good conscience, that in holiness and sincerity we know God" by
this inconsiderable instance exhibiting the work of love, that "not
in fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our
conversation in the world."[9] So far the apostle respecting
knowledge; and in the second Epistle to the Corinthians he calls the
common "teaching of faith" the savour of knowledge. "For unto this
day the same veil remains on many in the reading of the Old
Testament,"[10] not being uncovered by turning to the Lord.
Wherefore also to those capable of perceiving he showed
resurrection, that of the life still in the flesh, creeping on its
belly. Whence also he applied the name "brood of vipers" to the
voluptuous, who serve the belly and the pudenda, and cut off one
another's heads for the sake of worldly pleasures. "Little children,
let us not love in word, or in tongue," says John, teaching them to
be perfect, "but in deed and in truth; hereby shall we know that we
are of the truth."[11] And if "God be love," piety also is love:
"there is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear."[12]
"This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments."[13] And
again, to him who desires to become a Gnostic, it is written, "But
be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in
love, in faith, in purity."[14] For perfection in faith differs, I
think, from ordinary faith. And the divine apostle furnishes the
rule for the Gnostic in these words, writing as follows: "For I have
learned, in whatsoever state I am, to be content. I know both how to
be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere and in all things I
am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and
to lack. I can do all things through Him who strengtheneth me."[15]
And also when discussing with others in order to put them, to shame,
he does not shrink from saying, "But call to mind the former days,
in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great fight of
afflictions; partly, whilst ye were made a gazing-stock, both by
reproaches and afflictions; and partly, whilst ye became companions
of them that were so used. For ye had compassion of me in my bonds,
and took with joy the spoiling of your goods, knowing that you have
a better and enduring substance. Cast not away therefore your
confidence, which hath great recompense of reward. For ye have need
of patience, that, after doing the will of God, ye may obtain the
promise. For yet a little while, and He that cometh will come, and
will not tarry. Now the just shall live by faith: and if any man
draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. But we are not of
them that draw back unto perdition, but of them that believe to the
saving of the soul."[1] He then brings forward a swarm of divine
examples. For was it not "by faith," he says, this endurance, that
they acted nobly who "had trial of mockeries and scourgings, and,
moreover, of bonds and imprisonments? They were stoned, they were
tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in
sheep-skins and goat-skins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented,
of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts, in
mountains, in dens, and caves of the earth. And all having received
a good report, through faith, received not the promise of God" (what
is expressed by a parasiopesis is left to be understood, viz.,
"alone "). He adds accordingly, "God having provided some better
thing for us (for He was good), that they should not without us be
made perfect. Wherefore also, having encompassing us such a cloud,"
holy and transparent, "of witnesses, laying aside every weight, and
the sin which doth so easily beset us, let us run with patience the
race set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of
our faith."[2] Since, then, he specifies one salvation in Christ of
the righteous,[3] and of us he has expressed the former
unambiguously, and saying nothing less respecting Moses, adds,
"Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures
of Egypt: for he had respect to the recompense of the reward. By
faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he
endured as seeing Him who is invisible."[4] The divine Wisdom says
of the martyrs, "They seemed in the eyes of the foolish to die, and
their departure was reckoned a calamity, and their migration from us
an affliction. But they are in peace. For though in the sight of men
they were punished, their hope was full of immortality."[5] He then
adds, teaching martyrdom to be a glorious purification, "And being
chastened a little, they shall be benefited much; because God proved
them," that is, suffered them to be tried, to put them to the proof,
and to put to shame the author of their trial, "and found them
worthy of Himself," plainly to be called sons. "As gold in the
furnace He proved them, and as a whole burned-offering of sacrifice
He accepted them. And in the time of their visitation they will
shine forth, even as sparks run along the stubble. They shall judge
the nations, and rule over the peoples, and the Lord shall reign
over them forever."[6]
Moreover, in the Epistle to the Corinthians, the Apostle[7] Clement
also, drawing a picture of the Gnostic, says:[8] "For who that has
sojourned among you has not proved your perfect and firm faith? and
has not admired your sound and gentle piety? and has not celebrated
the munificent style of your hospitality? and has not felicitated
your complete and sure knowledge? For ye did all things impartially,
and walked in the ordinances of God;" and so forth.
Then more clearly: "Let us fix our eyes on those who have yielded
perfect service to His magnificent glory. Let us take Enoch, who,
being by his obedience found righteous, was translated; and Noah,
who, having believed, was saved; and Abraham, who for his faith and
hospitality was called the friend of God, and was the father of
Isaac." "For hospitality and piety, Lot was saved from Sodom." "For
faith and hospitality, Rahab the harlot was saved." "From patience
and faith they walked about in goat-skins, and sheep-skins, and
folds of camels' hair, proclaiming the kingdom of Christ. We name
His prophets Elias, and Eliseus, and Ezekiel, and John."
"For Abraham, who for his free faith was called ' the friend of
God,' was not elated by glory, but modestly said, 'I am dust and
ashes.'[9] And of Job it is thus written: ' Job was just and
blameless, true and pious, abstaining from all evil.'"[10] He it was
who overcame the tempter by patience, and at once testified and was
testified to by God; who keeps hold of humility, and says, "No one
is pure from defilement, not even if his life were but for one
day."[11] "Moses, 'the servant who was faithful in all his house,'
said to Him who uttered the oracles from the bush,' Who am I, that
Thou sendest me? I am slow of speech, and of a stammering tongue,'
to minister the voice of God in human speech. And again: ' I am
smoke from a pot.'" "For God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace
to the humble."[1]
"David too, of whom the Lord, testifying, says, 'I found a man after
my own heart, David the son of Jesse. With my holy oil I anointed
him.'[2] But he also says to God, 'Pity me, O God, according to Thy
mercy; and according to the multitude of Thy tender mercies, blot
out my transgression. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and
cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgression, and my sin is
ever before me.' "[3] Then, alluding to sin which is not subject to
the law, in the exercise of the moderation of true knowledge, he
adds, "Against Thee only have I sinned, and done evil in Thy
sight."[4] For the Scripture somewhere says, "The Spirit of the Lord
is a lamp, searching the recesses of the belly."[5] And the more of
a Gnostic a man becomes by doing right, the nearer is the
illuminating Spirit to him. "Thus the Lord draws near to the
righteous, and none of the thoughts and reasonings of which we are
the authors escape Him--I mean the Lord Jesus," the scrutinizer by
His omnipotent will of our heart, "whose blood was consecrated[6]
for us. Let us therefore respect those who are over us, and
reverence the elders; let us honour the young, and let us teach the
discipline of God." For blessed is he who shah do and teach the
Lord's commands worthily; and he is of a magnanimous mind, and of a
mind contemplative of truth. "Let us direct our wives to what is
good; let them exhibit," says he, "the lovable disposition of
chastity; let them show the guileless will of their meekness; let
them manifest the gentleness of their tongue by silence; let them
give their love not according to their inclinations, but equal love
in sanctity to all i that fear God. Let our children share in the
discipline that is in Christ; let them learn what humility avails
before God; what is the power of holy love before God, how lovely
and great is the fear of the Lord, saving all that walk in it
holily; with a pure heart: for He is the Searcher of the thoughts
and sentiments, whose breath is in us, and when He wills He will
take it away."
"Now all those things are confirmed by the faith that is in Christ.
'Come, ye children,' says the Lord, ' hearken to me, and I will
teach you the fear of the Lord. Who is the man that desireth life,
that loveth to see good days?'[7] Then He subjoins the gnostic
mystery of the numbers seven and eight. 'Stop thy tongue from evil,
and thy lips from speaking guile. Depart from evil, and do good.
Seek peace, and pursue it.'[8] For in these words He alludes to
knowledge (gnosis), with abstinence from evil and the doing of what
is good, teaching that it is to be perfected by word and deed. ' The
eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are to their
prayer. But the face of God is against those thai do evil, to root
out their memory from the earth. The righteous cried, and the Lord
heard, and delivered him out of all his distresses.'[9] ' Many are
the stripes of sinners; but those who hope in the Lord, mercy shall
compass about.'"[10] "A multitude of mercy," he nobly says,
"surrounds him that trusts in the Lord."
For it is written in the Epistle to the Corinthians, "Through Jesus
Christ our foolish and darkened mind springs up to the light. By Him
the Sovereign Lord wished us to taste the knowledge that is
immortal." And, showing more expressly the peculiar nature of
knowledge, he added: "These things, then, being clear to us, looking
into the depths of divine knowledge, we ought to do all things in
order which the Sovereign Lord commanded us to perform at the
appointed seasons. Let the wise man, then, show his wisdom not in
words only, but in good deeds. Let the humble not testify to
himself, but allow testimony to be borne to him by another. Let not
him who is pure in the flesh boast, knowing that it is another who
furnishes him with continence. Ye see, brethren, that the more we
are subjected to peril, the more knowledge are we counted worthy
"The decorous tendency of our philanthropy, therefore," according to
Clement, "seeks the common good;" whether by suffering martyrdom, or
by teaching by deed and word,--the latter being twofold, unwritten
and written. This is love, to love God and our neighbour. "This
conducts to the height which is unutterable.[11] ' Love covers a
multitude of sins.[12] Love beareth all things, suffereth all
things.'[13] Love joins us to God, does all things in concord. In
love, all the chosen of God were perfected. Apart from love, nothing
is well pleasing to God." "Of its perfection there is no unfolding,"
it is said. "Who is fit to be found in it, except those whom. God
counts worthy ?" To the point the Apostle Paul speaks, "If I give my
body, and have not love, I am sounding brass, and a tinkling
cymbal."[14] If it is not from a disposition determined by gnostic
love that I shall testify, he means; but if through fear and
expected reward, moving my lips in order to testify to the Lord that
I shall confess the Lord, I am a common man, sounding the Lord's
name, not knowing Him. "For there is the people that loveth with the
lips; and there is another which gives the body to be burned." "And
if I give all my goods in alms," he says, not according to the
principle of loving communication, but on account of recompense,
either from him who has received the benefit, or the Lord who has
promised; "and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains," and
cast away obscuring passions, and be not faithful to the Lord from
love, "I am nothing," as in comparison of him who testifies as a
Gnostic, and the crowd, and being reckoned nothing better.
"Now all the generations from Adam to this day are gone. But they
who have been perfected in love, through the grace of God, hold the
place of the godly, who shall be manifested at the visitation of the
kingdom of Christ." Love permits not to sin; but if it fall into any
such case, by reason of the interference of the: adversary, in
imitation of David, it will sing: "I will confess unto the Lord, and
it will please Him above a young bullock that has horns and hoofs.
Let the poor see it, and be glad." For he says, "Sacrifice to God a
sacrifice of praise, and pay to the Lord thy vows; and call upon me
in the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee, and thou shalt
glorify me."[1] "For the sacrifice of God is a broken spirit."[2]
"God," then, being good, "is love," it is said.[3] Whose "love
worketh no ill to his neighhour,"[4] neither injuring nor revenging
ever, but, in a word, doing good to all according to the image of
God. "Love is," then, "the fulfilling of the law; "[4] like as
Christ, that is the presence of the Lord who loves us; and our
loving teaching of, and discipline according to Christ. By love,
then, the commands not to commit adultery, and not to covet one's
neighbour's wife, are fulfilled,[these sins being] formerly
prohibited by fear.
The same work, then, presents a difference, according as it is done
by fear, or accomplished by love, and is wrought by faith or by
knowledge. Rightly, therefore, their rewards are different. To the
Gnostic "are prepared what eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor
hath entered into the heart of man;" but to him who has exercised
simple faith He testifies a hundredfold in return for what he has
left,--a promise which has turned out to fall within human
comprehension. Come to this point, I recollect one who called
himself a Gnostic. For, expounding the words, "But i say unto you,
he that looketh on a woman to lust after, hath committed
adultery,"[5] he thought that it was not bare desire that was
condemned; but if through the desire the act that results from it
proceeding beyond the desire is accomplished in it. For dream
employs phantasy and the body. Accordingly, the historians relate
the following decision, of Bocchoris the just.[6] A youth, falling
in love with a courtezan, persuades the girl, for a stipulated
reward, to come to him next day. But his desire being unexpectedly
satiated, by laying hold of the girl in a dream, by anticipation,
when the object of his love came according to stipulation, he
prohibited her from coming in. But she, on learning what had taken
place, demanded the reward, saying that in this way she had sated
the lover's desire. They came accordingly to the judge. He, ordering
the youth to hold out the purse containing the reward in the sun,
bade the courtezan take hold of the shadow; facetiously bidding him
pay the image of a reward for the image of an embrace.
Accordingly one dreams, the soul assenting to the vision. But he
dreams waking, who looks so as to lust; not only, as that Gnostic
said, if along with the sight of the woman he imagine in his mind
intercourse, for this is already the act of lust, as lust; but if
one looks on beauty of person (the Word says), and the flesh seem to
him in the way of lust to be fair, looking on cam ally and sinfully,
he is judged because he admired. For, on the other hand, he who in
chaste love looks on beauty, thinks not that the flesh is beautiful,
but the spirit, admiring, as I judge, the body as an image, by whose
beauty he transports himself to the Artist, and to the true beauty;
exhibiting the sacred symbol, the bright impress of righteousness to
the angels that wait on the ascension;[7] I mean the unction of
acceptance, the quality of disposition which resides in the soul
that is gladdened by the communication of the Holy Spirit. This
glory, which Shone forth on the face of Moses, the people could not
look on. Wherefore he took a veil for the glory, to those who looked
cam ally. For those, who demand toll, detain those who bring in any
worldly things, who are burdened with their own passions. But him
that is free of all things which are subject to duty, and is full of
knowledge, and of the righteousness of works, they pass on with
their good wishes, blessing the man with his work. "And his life
shall not fall away"--the leaf of the living tree that is nourished
"by the water-courses."[8] Now the righteous is likened to
fruit-bearing trees, and not only to such as are of the nature[1] of
tall-growing ones. And in the sacrificial oblations, according to
the law, there were those who looked for blemishes in the
sacrifices. They who are skilled in such matters distinguish
propension[2] (<greek>orexis</greek>) from lust
(<greek>epiqumia</greek>); and assign the latter, as being
irrational, to pleasures and licentiousness; and propension, as
being a rational movement, they assign to the necessities of nature.
In this perfection it is possible for man and woman equally to
share. It is not only Moses, then, that heard from God, "I have
spoken to thee once, and twice, saying, I have seen this people, and
lo, it is stiff-necked. Suffer me to exterminate them, and blot out
their name from under heaven; and I will make thee into a great and
wonderful nation much greater than this;" who answers not regarding
himself, but the common salvation: "By no means, O Lord; forgive
this people their sin, or blot me out of the book of the living."[3]
How great was his perfection, in wishing to die together with the
people, rather than be saved alone !
But Judith too, who became perfect among women, in the siege of the
city, at the entreaty of the elders went forth into the strangers'
camp, despising all danger for her country's sake, giving herself
into the enemy's hand in faith in God; and straightway she obtained
the reward of her faith,--though a woman, prevailing over the enemy
of her faith, and gaining possession of the head of Holofernes. And
again, Esther perfect by faith, who rescued Israel from the power of
the king and the satrap's cruelty: a woman alone, afflicted with
fastings,[4] held back ten thousand armed[5] hands, annulling by her
faith the tyrant's decree; him indeed she appeased, Haman she
restrained, and Israel she preserved scathless by her perfect prayer
to God. I pass over in silence Susanna and the sister of Moses,
since the latter was the prophet's associate in commanding the host,
being superior to all the women among the Hebrews who were in repute
for their wisdom; and the former in her surpassing modesty, going
even to death condemned by licentious admirers, remained the
unwavering martyr of chastity.
Dion, too, the philosopher, tells that a certain woman Lysidica,
through excess of modesty, bathed in her clothes; and that
Philotera, when she was to enter the bath, gradually drew back her
tunic as the water covered the naked parts; and then rising by
degrees, put it on. And did not Lesena of Attica manfully bear the
torture ? She being privy to the conspiracy of Harmodius and
Aristogeiton against Hipparchus, uttered not a word, though severely
tortured. And they say that the Argolic women, under the guidance of
Telesilla the poetess, turned to flight the doughty Spartans by
merely showing themselves; and that she produced in them
fearlessness of death. Similarly speaks he who composed the Danais
respecting the daughters of Danaus:--
"And then the daughters of Danaus swiftly armed themselves,
Before the fair-flowing river, majestic Nile[4],"
and so forth.
And the rest of the poets sing of Atalanta's swiftness in the chase,
of Anticlea's love for children, of Alcestis's love for her husband,
of the courage of Makaeria and of the Hyacinthides. What shall I say
? Did not Theano the Pythagorean make such progress in philosophy,
that to him who looked intently at her, and said, "Your arm is
beautiful," she answered "Yes, but it is not public." Characterized
by the same propriety, there is also reported the following
reply.[6] When asked when a woman after being with her husband
attends the Thesmophoria, said, "From her own husband at once, from
a stranger never." Themisto too, of Lampsacus, the daughter of
Zoilus, the wife of Leontes of Lampsacus, studied the Epicurean
philosophy, as Myia the daughter of Theano the Pythagorean, and
Arignote, who wrote the history of Dionysius.
And the daughters of Diodorus, who was called Kronus, all became
dialecticians, as Philo the dialectician says in the Mrenexenus,
whose names are mentioned as follows--Menexene, Argia, Theognis,
Artemesia, Pantaclea. I also recollect a female Cynic,--she was
called Hipparchia, a Maronite, the wife of Crates,--in whose case
the so-called dog-wedding was celebrated in the Pcecile. Arete of
Cyrene, too, the daughter of Aristippus, educated her son
Aristippus, who was surnamed Mother-taught. Lastheneia of Arcis, and
Axiothea of Phlius, studied philosophy with Plato. Besides, Aspasia
of Miletus, of whom the writers of comedy write much, was trained by
Socrates in philosophy, by Pericles in rhetoric. I omit, on account
of the length of the discourse, the rest; enumerating neither the
poetesses Corinna, Telesilla, Myia, and Sappho; nor the painters, as
Irene the daughter of Cratinus, and Anaxandra the daughter of
Nealces, according to the account of Didymus in the Symposiaci. The
daughter of Cleobulus, the sage and monarch of the Lindii, was not
ashamed to wash the feet of her father's guests. Also the wife of
Abraham, the blessed Sarah, in her own person prepared the cakes
baked in the ashes for the angels; and princely maidens among the
Hebrews fed sheep. Whence also the Nausicaa of Homer went to the
The wise woman, then, win first choose to persuade her husband to be
her associate in what is conducive to happiness. And should that be
found impracticable, let her by herself earnestly aim at virtue,
gaining her husband's consent in everything, so as never to do
anything against his will, with exception of what is reckoned as
contributing to virtue and salvation. But if one keeps from such a
mode of life either wife or maid-servant, whose heart is set on it;
what such a person in that case plainly does is nothing else than
determine to drive her away from righteousness and sobriety, and to
choose to make his own house wicked and licentious.
It is not then possible that man or woman can be conversant with
anything whatever, without the advantage of education, and
application, and training; and virtue, we have said, depends not on
others, but on ourselves above all. Other things one can repress, by
waging war against them; but with what depends on one's self, this
is entirely out of the question, even with the most strenuous
persistence. For the gift is one conferred by God, and not in the
power of any other. Whence licentiousness should be regarded as the
evil of no other one than of him who is guilty of licentiousness;
and temperance, on the other hand, as the good of him who is able to
practise it.
The woman who, with propriety, loves her husband, Euripides
describes, while admonishing,--
"That when her husband says aught,
She ought to regard him as speaking well if she say nothing;
And if she will say anything, to do her endeavour to gratify her
And again he subjoins the like :--
"And that the wife should sweetly look sad with her husband,
Should aught evil befall him,
And have in common a share of sorrow and joy."
Then, describing her as gentle and kind even in misfortunes, he
"And I, when you are ill, will, sharing your sickness bear it;
And I will bear my share in your misfortunes."
"Nothing is bitter to me,
For with friends one ought to be happy,
For what else is friendship but this?"
The marriage, then, that is consummated according to the word, is
sanctified, if the union be under subjection to God, and be
conducted "with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, having
hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and the body washed with
pure water, and holding the confession of hope; for He is faithful
that promised." And the happiness of marriage ought never to be
estimated either by wealth or beauty, but by virtue.
"Beauty," says the tragedy,--
"Helps no wife with her husband;
But virtue has helped many; for every good wife
Who is attached to her husband knows how to pracise
Then, as giving admonitions, he says :--
"First, then, this is incumbent on her who is endowed with mind,
That even if her husband be ugly, he must appear good-looking;
For it is for the mind, not the eye, to judge."
And so forth.
For with perfect propriety Scripture has said that woman is given by
God as "an help" to man. It is evident, then, in my opinion, that
she will charge herself with remedying, by good sense and
persuasion, each of the annoyances that originate with her husband
in domestic economy. And if he do not yield, then she will
endeavour, as far as possible for human nature, to lead a sinless
life; whether it be necessary to die, in accordance with reason, or
to live; considering that God is her helper and associate in such a
course of conduct, her true defender and Saviour both for the
present and for the future; making Him the leader and guide of all
her actions, reckoning sobriety and righteousness her work, and
making the favour of God her end. Gracefully, therefore, the apostle
says in the Epistle to Titus, "that the eider women should be of
godly behaviour, should not be slanderers, not enslaved to much
wine; that they should counsel the young women to be lovers of their
husbands, lovers of their children, discreet, chaste, housekeepers,
good, subject to their own husbands; that the word of God be not
blasphemed."[1] But rather, he says, "Follow peace with all men, and
holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord: looking
diligently, lest there be any fornicator or profane person, as Esau,
who for one morsel surrendered his birth-right; and lest any root of
bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be
defiled."[2] And then, as putting the finishing stroke to the
question about marriage, he adds: "Marriage is honourable in all,
and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will
judge."[3] And one aim and one end, as far as regards perfection,
being demonstrated to belong to the man and the woman, Peter in his
Epistle says, "Though now for a season, if need be, ye are in
heaviness through manifold temptations; that the trial of your
faith, being much more precious than that of gold which perisheth,
though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise, and
honour, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ; whom, having
not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see Him not, yet
believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable, and full of glory,
receiving the end of your faith, the salvation of your souls."[1]
Wherefore also Paul rejoices for Christ's sake that he was "in
labours, more abundantly, in stripes above measure, in deaths
Here I find perfection apprehended variously in relation to Him who
excels in every virtue. Accordingly one is perfected as pious, and
as patient, and as continent, and as a worker, and as a martyr, and
as a Gnostic. But I know no one of men perfect in all things at
once, while still human, though according to the mere letter of the
law, except Him alone who for us clothed Himself with humanity. Who
then is perfect? He who professes abstinence from what is bad. Well,
this is the way to the Gospel and to well-doing. But gnostic
perfection in the case of the legal man is the acceptance of the
Gospel, that he that is after the law may be perfect. For so he, who
was after the law, Moses, foretold that it was necessary to hear in
order that we might, according to the apostle, receive Christ, the
fulness of the law.[3] But now in the Gospel the Gnostic attains
proficiency not only by making use of the law as a step, but by
understanding and comprehending it, as the Lord who gave the
Covenants delivered it to the apostles. And if he conduct himself
rightly (as assuredly it is impossible to attain knowledge (gnosis)
by bad conduct); and if, further, having made an eminently right
confession, he become a martyr out of love, obtaining considerable
renown as among men; not even thus will he be called perfect in the
flesh beforehand; since it is the close of life which claims this
appellation, when the gnostic martyr has first shown the perfect
work, and rightly exhibited it, and having thankfully shed his
blood, has yielded up the ghost: blessed then will he be, and truly
proclaimed perfect, "that the excellency of the power may be of God,
and not of us," as the apostle says. Only let us preserve free-will
and love: "troubled on every side, yet not distressed; perplexed,
but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not
destroyed."[4] For those who strive after perfection, according to
the same apostle, must "give no offence in anything, but in
everything approve themselves not to men, but to God." And, as a
consequence, also they ought to yield to men; for it is reasonable,
on account of abusive calumnies: Here is the specification: "in much
patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes,
in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings,
in pureness, in knowledge, in long-suffering, in kindness, in the
Holy Ghost, in love unfeigned, in the word of truth, in the power of
God,"[5] that we may be the temples of God, purified "from all
filthiness of the flesh and of the spirit." "And I," He says, "will
receive you; and I will be to you for a Father, and ye shall be to
Me for sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty."[6] "Let us
then," he says, "perfect holiness in the fear of God." For though
fear beget pain, "I rejoice," he says, "not that ye were made sorry,
but that ye showed susceptibility to repentance. For ye sorrowed
after a godly sort, that ye might receive damage by us in nothing.
For godly sorrow worketh repentance unto salvation not to be
regretted; but the sorrow of the world worketh death. For this same
thing that ye sorrowed after a godly sort, what earnestness it
wrought in you; yea, what clearing of yourselves; yea, what
compunction; yea, what fear; yea, what desire; yea, what zeal; yea,
revenge! In all things ye have showed yourselves clear in the
matter."[7] Such are the preparatory exercises of gnostic
discipline. And since the omnipotent God Himself "gave some
apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors
and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the
ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all attain
to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God,
to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of
Christ; "[8] we are then to strive to reach manhood as befits the
Gnostic, and to be as perfect as we can while still abiding in the
flesh, making it our study with perfect concord here to concur with
the will of God, to the restoration of what is the truly perfect
nobleness and relationship, to the fulness of Christ, that which
perfectly depends on our perfection.
And now we perceive where, and how, and when the divine apostle
mentions the perfect man, and how he shows the differences of the
perfect. And again, on the other hand: "The manifestation of the
Spirit is given for our profit. For to one is given the word of
wisdom by the Spirit; to another the word of knowledge according to
the same Spirit; to another faith through the same Spirit; to
another the gifts of healing through the same Spirit; to another the
working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discernment of
spirits; to another diversities of tongues; to another the
interpretation of tongues: and all these worketh the one and the
same Spirit, distributing to each one according as He wills."' Such
being the case, the prophets are perfect in prophecy, the righteous
in righteousness, and the martyrs in confession, and others in
preaching, not that they are not sharers in the common virtues, but
are proficient in those to which they are appointed. For what man in
his senses would say that a prophet was not righteous? For what? did
not righteous men like Abraham prophesy?
"For to one God has given warlike deeds,
To another the accomplishment of the dance,
To another the lyre and song,"[2]
says Homer. "But each has his own proper gift of God "[3]--one in
one way, another in another. But the apostles were perfected in all.
You will find, then, if you choose, in their acts and writings,
knowledge, life, preaching, righteousness, purity, prophecy. We must
know, then, that if Paul is' young in respect to time[4]--having
flourished immediately after the Lord's ascension--yet his writings
depend on the Old Testament, breathing and speaking of them. For
faith in Christ and the knowledge of the Gospel are the explanation
and fulfilment of the law; and therefore it was said to the Hebrews,
"If ye believe not, neither shall you understand;"[5] that is,
unless you believe what is prophesied in the law, and oracularly
delivered by the law, you will not understand the Old Testament,
which He by His coming expounded.
The man of understanding and perspicacity is, then, a Gnostic. And
his business is not abstinence from what is evil (for this is a step
to the highest perfection), or the doing of good out of fear. For it
is written, "Whither shall I flee, and where shall I hide myself
from Thy presence ? If I ascend into heaven, Thou art there; if I go
away to the uttermost parts of the sea, there is Thy right hand; if
I go down into the depths, there is Thy Spirit."[6] Nor any more is
he to do so from hope of promised recompense. For it is said,
"Behold the Lord, and His reward is before His face, to give to
every one according to his works; what eye hath not seen, and ear
hath not heard, and hath not entered into the heart of man what God
hath prepared for them that love Him."[7] But only the doing of good
out of love, and for the sake of its own excellence, is to be the
Gnostic's choice. Now, in the person of God it is said to the Lord,
"Ask of Me, and I will give the heathen for Thine inheritance;"[8]
teaching Him to ask a truly regal request--that is, the salvation of
men without price, that we may inherit and possess the Lord. For, on
the contrary, to desire knowledge about God for any practical
purpose, that this may be done, or that may not be done, is not
proper to the Gnostic; but the knowledge itself suffices as the
reason for contemplation. For I will dare aver that it is not
because he wishes to be saved that he, who devotes himself to
knowledge for the sake of the divine science itself, chooses
knowledge. For the exertion of the intellect by exercise is
prolonged to a perpetual exertion. And the perpetual exertion of the
intellect is the essence of an intelligent being, which results from
an uninterrupted process of admixture, and remains eternal
contemplation, a living substance. Could we, then, suppose any one
proposing to the Gnostic whether he would choose the knowledge of
God or everlasting salvation; and if these, which are entirely
identical, were separable, he would without the least hesitation
choose the knowledge of God, deeming that property of faith, which
from love ascends to knowledge, desirable, for its own sake. This,
then, is the perfect man's first form of doing good, when it is done
not for any advantage in what pertains to him, but because he judges
it right to do good; and the energy being vigorously exerted in all
things, in the very act becomes good; not, good in some things, and
not good in others; but consisting in the habit of doing good,
neither for glory, nor, as the philosophers say, for reputation, nor
from reward either from men or God; but so as to pass life after the
image and likeness of the Lord.
And if, in doing good, he be met with anything adverse, he will let
the recompense pass without resentment as if it were good, he being
just and good "to the just and the unjust." To such the Lord says,
"Be ye, as your Father is perfect."
To him the flesh is dead; but he himself lives alone, having
consecrated the sepulchre into a holy temple to the Lord, having
turned towards God the old sinful soul.
Such an one is no longer continent, but has reached a state of
passionlessness, waiting to put on the divine image. "If thou doest
alms," it is said, "let no one know it; and if thou fastest, anoint
thyself, that God alone may know,"[1] and not a single human being.
Not even he himself who shows mercy ought to know that he does show
mercy; for in this way he will be sometimes merciful, sometimes not.
And when he shall do good by habit, he will imitate the nature of
good, and his disposition will be his nature and his practice. There
is no necessity for removing those who are raised on high, but there
is necessity for those who are walking to reach the requisite goal,
by passing over the whole of the narrow way. For this is to be drawn
by the Father, to become worthy to receive the power of grace from
God, so as to run without hindrance. And if some hate the elect,
such an one knows their ignorance, and pities their minds for its
As is right, then, knowledge itself loves and teaches the ignorant,
and instructs the whole creation to honour God Almighty. And if such
an one teaches to love God, he will not hold virtue as a thing to be
lost in any case, either awake or in a dream, or in any vision;
since the habit never goes out of itself by falling from being a
habit. Whether, then, knowledge be said to be habit or disposition;
on account of diverse sentiments never obtaining access, the guiding
faculty, remaining unaltered, admits no alteration of appearances by
framing in dreams visionary conceptions out of its movements by day.
Wherefore also the Lord enjoins "to watch," so that our soul may
never be perturbed with passion, even in dreams; but also to keep
the life of the night pure and stainless, as if spent in the day.
For assimilation to God, as far as we can, is preserving the mind in
its relation to the same things. And this is the relation of mind as
But the variety of disposition arises from inordinate affection to
material things. And for this reason, as they appear to me, to have
called night Euphrone; since then the soul, released from the
perceptions of sense, turns in on itself, and has a truer hold of
intelligence (<greek>Fronhsis</greek>).[2] Wherefore the mysteries
are for the most part celebrated by night, indicating the withdrawal
of the soul from the body, which takes place by night. "Let us not
then sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they
that sleep, sleep in the night; and they that are drunken, are
drunken in the night. But let us who are of the day be sober,
putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as an helmet the
hope of salvation."[3] And as to what, again, they say of sleep, the
very same things are to be understood of death. For each exhibits
the departure of the soul, the one more, the other less; as we may
also get this in Heraclitus: "Man touches night in himself, when
dead and his light quenched; and alive, when he sleeps he touches
the dead; and awake, when he shuts his eyes, he touches the
sleeper."[4] "For blessed are those that have seen the Lord,"[5]
according to the apostle; "for it is high time to awake out of
sleep. For now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The
night is far spent, the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off
the works of darkness, and put on the armour of light."[6] By day
and light he designates figuratively the Son, and by the armour of
light metaphorically the promises.
So it is said that we ought to go washed to sacrifices and prayers,
clean and bright; and that this external adornment and purification
are practised for a sign. Now purity is to think holy thoughts.
Further, there is the image of baptism, which also was handed down
to the poets from Moses as follows:--
"And she having drawn water, and wearing on her body clean
It is Penelope that is going to prayer:--
"And Telemachus,
Having washed his hands in the hoary sea, prayed to Athene."[8]
It was a custom of the Jews to wash frequently after being in bed.
It was then well said,--
"Be pure, not by washing of water, but in the mind."
For sanctity, as I conceive it, is perfect pureness of mind, and
deeds, and thoughts, and words too, and in its last degree
sinlessness in dreams.
And sufficient purification to a man, I reckon, is thorough and sure
repentance. If, condemning ourselves for our former actions, we go
forward, after these things taking thought,[9] and divesting our
mind both of the things which please us through the senses, and of
our former transgressions.
If, then, we are to give the etymology of <greek>episthmh</greek>,
knowledge, its signification is to be derived from
<greek>stasiu</greek>, placing; for our soul, which was formerly
borne, now in one way, now in another, it settles in objects.
Similarly faith is to be explained etymologically, as the settling
(<greek>stasiu</greek>) of our soul respecting that which is.
But we desire to learn about the man who is always and in all things
righteous; who, neither dreading the penalty proceeding from the
law, nor fearing to entertain hatred of evil in the case of those
who live with him and who prosecute the injured, nor dreading danger
at the hands of those who do wrong, remains righteous. For he who,
on account of these considerations, abstains from anything wrong, is
not voluntarily kind, but is good from fear. Even Epicurus says,
that the man who in his estimation was wise, "would not do wrong to
any one for the sake of gain; for he could not persuade himself that
he would escape detection." So that, if he knew he would not be
detected, he would, according to him, do evil. And such are the
doctrines of darkness. If, too, one shall abstain from doing wrong
from hope of the recompense given by God on account of righteous
deeds, he is not on this supposition spontaneously good. For as fear
makes that man just, so reward makes this one; or rather, makes him
appear to be just. But with the hope after death--a good hope to the
good, to the bad the reverse--not only they who follow after
Barbarian wisdom, but also the Pythagoreans, are acquainted. For the
latter also proposed hope as an end to those who philosophize.
Whereas Socrates[1] also, in the Phaedo, says "that good souls
depart hence with a good hope;" and again, denouncing the wicked, he
sets against this the assertion, "For they live with an evil hope."
With him Heraclitus manifestly agrees in his dissertations
concerning men: "There awaits man after death what they neither hope
nor think." Divinely, therefore, Paul writes expressly, "Tribulation
worketh, patience, and patience experience, and experience hope; and
hope maketh not ashamed."[2] For the patience is on account of the
hope in the future. Now hope is synonymous with the recompense and
restitution of hope; which maketh not ashamed, not being any more
But he who obeys the mere call, as he is called, neither for fear,
nor for enjoyments, is on his way to knowledge
(<greek>gnwsiu</greek>). For he does not consider whether any
extrinsic lucrative gain or enjoyment follows to him; but drawn by
the love of Him who is the true object of love, and led to what is
requisite, practises piety. So that not even were we to suppose him
to receive from God leave to do things forbidden with impunity; not
even if he were to get the promise that he would receive as a reward
the good things of the blessed; but besides, not even if he could
persuade himself that God would be hoodwinked with reference to what
he does (which is impossible), would he ever wish to do aught
contrary to right reason, having once made choice of what is truly
good and worthy of choice on its own account, and therefore to be
loved. For it is not in the food of the belly, that we have heard
good to be situated. But he has heard that "meat will not commend
us,"[3] nor marriage, nor abstinence from marriage in ignorance; but
virtuous gnostic conduct. For the dog, which is an irrational
animal, may be said to be continent, dreading as it does the
uplifted stick, and therefore keeping away from the meat. But let
the predicted promise be taken away, and the threatened dread
cancelled, and the impending danger removed, and the disposition of
such people will be revealed.
For it is not suitable to the nature of the thing itself, that they
should apprehend in the truly gnostic manner the truth, that all
things which were created for our use are good; as, for example,
marriage and procreation, when used in moderation; and that it is
better than good to i become free of passion, and virtuous by
assimilation to the divine. But in the case of external things,
agreeable or disagreeable, from some they abstain, from others not.
But in those things from which they abstain from disgust, they
plainly find fault with the creature and the Creator; and though in
appearance they walk faithfully, the opinion they maintain is
impious. That command, "Thou shall not lust," needs neither the
necessity arising from fear, which compels to keep from things that
are pleasant; nor the reward, which by promise persuades to restrain
the impulses of passion.
And those who obey God through the promise, caught by the bait of
pleasure, choose obedience not for the sake of the commandment, but
for the sake of the promise. Nor will turning away from objects of
sense, as a matter of necessary consequence, produce attachment to
intellectual objects. On the contrary, the attachment to
intellectual objects naturally becomes to the Gnostic an influence
which draws away from the objects of sense; inasmuch as he, in
virtue of the selection of what is good, has chosen what is good
according to knowledge (<greek>gnwstikwu</greek>), admiring
generation, and by sanctifying the Creator sanctifying assimilation
to the divine. But I shall free myself from lust, let him say, O
Lord, for the sake of alliance with Thee. For the economy of
creation is good, and all things are well administered: nothing
happens without a cause. I must be in what is Thine, O Omnipotent
One. And if I am there, I am near Thee. And I would be free of fear
that I may be able to draw near to Thee, and to be satisfied with
little, practising Thy just choice between things good and things
Right mystically and sacredly the apostle, teaching us the choice
which is truly gracious, not in the way of rejection of other things
as bad, but so as to do things better than what is good, has spoken,
saying, "So he that giveth his virgin in marriage doeth well; and he
that giveth her not doeth better; as far as respects seemliness and
undistracted attendance on the Lord."[1]
Now we know that things which are difficult are not essential; but
that things which are essential have been graciously made easy of
attainment by God. Wherefore Democritus well says, that "nature and
instruction" are like each other. And we have briefly assigned the
cause. For instruction harmonizes man, and by harmonizing makes him
natural; and it is no matter whether one was made such as he is by
nature, or transformed by time and education. The Lord has furnished
both; that which is by creation, and that which is by creating again
and renewal through the covenant. And that is preferable which is
advantageous to what is superior; but what is superior to everything
is mind. So, then, what is really good is seen to be most pleasant,
and of itself produces the fruit which is desired--tranquillity of
soul. "And he who hears Me," it is said, "shall rest in peace,
confident, and shall be calm without fear of any evil."[2] "Rely
with all thy heart and thy mind on God."[3]
On this wise it is possible for the Gnostic already to have become
God. "I said, Ye are gods, and[4] sons of the highest." And
Empedocles says that the souls of the wise become gods, writing as
"At last prophets, minstrels, and physicians,
And the foremost among mortal men, approach;
Whence spring gods supreme in honours."
Man, then, genetically considered, is formed in accordance with the
idea of the connate spirit. For he is not created formless and
shapeless in the workshop of nature, where mystically the production
of man is accomplished, both art and essence being common. But the
individual man is stamped according to the impression produced in
the soul by the objects of his choice. Thus we say that Adam was
perfect, as far as respects his formation; for none of the
distinctive characteristics of the idea and form of man were wanting
to him; but in the act of coming into being he received perfection.
And he was justified by obedience; this was reaching manhood, as far
as depended on him. And the cause lay in his choosing, and
especially in his choosing what was forbidden. God was not the
For production is twofold--of things procreated, and of things that
grow. And manliness in man, who is subject to perturbation, as they
say, makes him who partakes of it essentially fearless and
invincible; and anger is the mind's satellite in patience, and
endurance, and the like; and self-constraint and salutary sense are
set over desire. But God is impassible, free of anger, destitute of
desire. And He is not free of fear, in the sense of avoiding what is
terrible; or temperate, in the sense of having command of desires.
For neither can the nature of God fall in with anything terrible,
nor does God flee fear; just as He will not feel desire, so as to
rule over desires. Accordingly that Pythagorean saying was
mystically uttered respecting us, "that man ought to become one;"
for the high priest himself is one, God being one in the immutable
state of the perpetual flow[5] or good things. Now the Saviour has
taken away wrath in and with lust, wrath being lust of vengeance.
For universally liability to feeling belongs to every kind of
desire; and man, when deified purely into a passionless state,
becomes a unit. As, then, those, who at sea are held by an anchor,
pull at the anchor, but do not drag it to them, but drag themselves
to the anchor; so those who, according to the gnostic life, draw God
towards them, imperceptibly bring themselves to God: for he who
reverences God, reverences himself. In the contemplative life, then,
one in worshipping God attends to himself, and through his own
spotless purification beholds the holy God holily; for self-control,
being present, surveying and contemplating itself uninterruptedly,
is as far as possible assimilated to God.
Now that is in our power, of which equally with its opposite we are
masters,--as, say to philosophize or not, to believe or disbelieve.
In consequence, then, of our being equally masters of each of the
opposites, what depends on us is found possible. Now the
commandments may be done or not done by us, who, as is reasonable,
are liable to praise and blame. And those, again, who are punished
on account of sins committed by them, are punished for them alone;
for what is done is past, and what is done can never be undone. The
sins committed before faith are accordingly forgiven by the Lord,
not that they may be undone, but as if they had not been done. "But
not all," says Basilides,[6] "but only sins involuntary and in
ignorance, are forgiven;" as would be the case were it a man, and
not God, that conferred such a boon. To such an one Scripture says,
"Thou thoughtest that I would be like thee."[7] But if we are
punished for voluntary sins, we are punished not that the sins which
are done may be undone, but because they were done. But punishment
does not avail to him who has sinned, to undo his sin, but that he
may sin no more, and that no one else fall into the like. Therefore
the good God corrects for these three causes: First, that he who is
corrected may become better than his former self; then that those
who are capable of being saved by examples may be driven back, being
admonished; and thirdly, that he who is injured may not be readily
despised, and be apt to receive injury. And there are two methods of
correction--the instructive and the punitive, which we have called
the disciplinary. It ought to be known, then, that those who fall
into sin after baptism[1] are those who are subjected to discipline;
for the deeds done before are remitted, and those done after are
purged. It is in reference to the unbelieving that it is said, "that
they are reckoned as the chaff which the wind drives from the face
of the earth, and the drop which falls from a vessel."[2]
"Happy he who possesses the culture of knowledge, and is not moved
to the injury of the citizens or to wrong actions, but contemplates
the undecaying order of immortal nature, how and in what way and
manner it subsists. To such the practice of base deeds attaches
not," Rightly, then, Plato says, "that the man who devotes himself
to the contemplation of ideas will live as a god among men; now the
mind is the place of ideas, and God is mind." He says that be who
contemplates the unseen God lives as a god among men. And in the
Sophist, Socrates calls the stranger of Elea, who was a
dialectician, "god:" "Such are the gods who, like stranger guests,
frequent cities. For when the soul, rising above the sphere of
generation, is by itself apart, and dwells amidst ideas," like the
Coryphaeus in Theaetetus, now become as an angel, it will be with
Christ, being rapt in contemplation, ever keeping in view the will
of God; in reality "Alone wise, while these flit like shadows."[3]
For the dead bury their dead." Whence Jeremiah says: "I will fill it
with the earth-born dead whom mine anger has smitten."[4]
God, then, being not a subject for demonstration, cannot be the
object of science. But the Son is wisdom, and knowledge, and truth,
and all else that has affinity thereto. He is also susceptible of
demonstration and of description. And all the powers of the Spirit,
becoming collectively one thing, terminate in the same point--that
is, in the Son. But He is incapable of being declared, in respect of
the idea of each one of His powers. And the Son is neither simply
one thing as one thing, nor many things as parts, but one thing as
all things; whence also He is all things. For He is the circle of
all powers rolled and united into one unity. Wherefore the Word is
called the Alpha and the Omega, of whom alone the end becomes
beginning, and ends again at the original beginning without any
break. Wherefore also to believe in Him, and by Him, is to become a
unit, being indissolubly united in Him; and to disbelieve is to be
separated, disjoined, divided.
"Wherefore thus saith the Lord, Every alien son is uncircumcised in
heart, and uncircumcised in flesh" (that is, unclean in body and
soul): "there shall not enter one of the strangers into the midst of
the house of Israel, but the Lerites."[5] He calls those that would
not believe, but would disbelieve, strangers. Only those who live
purely being true priests of God. Wherefore, of all the circumcised
tribes, those anointed to be high priests, and kings, and prophets,
were reckoned more holy. Whence He commands them not to touch dead
bodies, or approach the dead; not that the body was polluted, but
that sin and disobedience were incarnate, and embodied, and dead,
and therefore abominable. It was only, then, when a father and
mother, a son and daughter died, that the priest was allowed to
enter, because these were related only by flesh and seed, to whom
the priest was indebted for the immediate cause of his entrance into
life. And they purify themselves seven days, the period in which
Creation was consummated. For on the seventh day the rest is
celebrated; and on the eighth he brings a propitiation, as is
written in Ezekiel, according to which propitiation the promise is
to be received.[6] And the perfect propitiation, I take it, is that
propitious faith in the Gospel which is by the law and the prophets,
and the purity which shows itself in universal obedience, with the
abandonment of the things of the world; in order to that grateful
surrender of the tabernacle, which results from the enjoyment of the
soul. Whether, then, the time be that which through the seven
periods enumerated returns to the chiefest rest,[7] or the seven
heavens, which some reckon one above the other; or whether also the
fixed sphere which borders on the intellectual world be called the
eighth, the expression denotes that the Gnostic ought to rise out of
the sphere of creation and of sin. After these seven days,
sacrifices are offered for sins. For there is still fear of change,
and it touches the seventh circle. The righteous Job says: "Naked
came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there;"[1]
not naked of possessions, for that were a trivial and common thing;
but, as a just man, he departs naked of evil and sin, and of the
unsightly shape which follows those who have led bad lives. For this
was what was said, "Unless ye be converted, and become as
children,"[2] pure in flesh, holy in soul by abstinence from evil
deeds; showing that He would have us to be such as also He generated
us from our mother--the water.[3] For the intent of one generation
succeeding another is to immortalize by progress. "But the lamp of
the wicked shall be put out."[4] That purity in body and soul which
the Gnostic partakes of, the all-wise Moses indicated, by employing
repetition in describing the incorruptibility of body and of soul in
the person of Rebecca, thus: "Now the virgin was fair, and man had
not known her."[5] And Rebecca, interpreted, means "glory of God;"
and the glory of God is immortality.[6] This is in reality
righteousness, not to desire other things, but to be entirely the
consecrated temple of the Lord. Righteousness is peace of life and a
well-conditioned state, to which the Lord dismissed her when He
said, "Depart into peace."[7] For Salem is, by interpretation,
peace; of which our Saviour is enrolled King, as Moses says,
Melchizedek king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who gave
bread and wine, furnishing consecrated food for a type of the
Eucharist. And Melchizedek is interpreted "righteous king;" and the
name is a synonym for righteousness and peace. Basilides however,
supposes that Righteousness and her daughter Peace dwell stationed
in the eighth sphere.
But we must pass from physics to ethics, which are clearer; for the
discourse concerning these will follow after the treatise in hand.
The Saviour Himself, then, plainly initiates us into the mysteries,
according to the words of the tragedy:[8]--
"Seeing those who see, he also gives the orgies."
And if you ask,
"These orgies, what is their nature ?"
You will hear again:--
"It is forbidden to mortals uninitiated in the Bacchic rites to
And if any one will inquire curiously what they are, let him hear:--
"It is not lawful for thee to hear, but they are worth knowing;
The rites of the God detest him who practises impiety."
Now God, who is without beginning, is the perfect beginning of the
universe, and the producer of the beginning. As, then, He is being,
He is the first principle of the department of action, as He is
good, of morals; as He is mind, on the other hand, He is the first
principle of reasoning and of judgment. Whence also He alone is
Teacher, who is the only Son of the Most High Father, the Instructor
of men.
Those, then, who run down created existence and vilify the body are
wrong; not considering that the frame of man was formed erect for
the contemplation of heaven, and that the organization of the senses
tends to knowledge; and that the members and parts are arranged for
good, not for pleasure. Whence this abode becomes receptive of the
soul which is most precious to God; and is dignified with the Holy
Spirit through the sanctification of soul and body, perfected with
the perfection of the Saviour. And the succession of the three
virtues is found in the Gnostic, who morally, physically, and
logically occupies himself with God. For wisdom is the knowledge of
things divine and human; and righteousness is the concord of the
parts of the soul; and holiness is the service of God. But if one
were to say that he disparaged the flesh, and generation on account
of it, by quoting Isaiah, who says, "All flesh is grass, and all the
glory of man as the flower of grass: the grass is withered, and the
flower has fallen; but the word of the Lord endureth for ever; "[9]
let him hear the Spirit interpreting the matter in question by
Jeremiah, "And I scattered them like dry sticks, that are made to
fly by the wind into the desert. This is the lot and portion of your
disobedience, saith the Lord. As thou hast forgotten Me, and hast
trusted in lies, so will I discover thy hinder parts to thy face;
and thy disgrace shall be seen, thy adultery, and thy neighing," and
so on.[10] For "the flower of grass," and "walking after the flesh,"
and "being carnal," according to the apostle, are those who are in
their sins. The soul of man is confessedly the better part of man,
and the body the inferior. But neither is the soul good by nature,
nor, on the other hand, is the body bad by nature. Nor is that which
is not good straightway bad. For there are things which occupy a
middle place, and among them are things to be preferred, and things
to be rejected. The constitution of man, then, which has its place
among things of sense, was necessarily composed of things diverse,
but not opposite--body and soul.
Always therefore the good actions, as better, attach to the better
and ruling spirit; and voluptuous and sinful actions are attributed
to the worse, the sinful one.
Now the soul of the wise man and Gnostic, as sojourning in the body,
conducts itself towards it gravely and respectfully, not with
inordinate affections, as about to leave the tabernacle if the time
of departure summon. "I am a stranger in the earth, and a sojourner
with you," it is said.[1] And hence Basilides says, that he
apprehends that the election are strangers to the world, being
supramundane by nature. But this is not the case. For all things are
of one God. And no one is a stranger to the world by nature, their
essence being one, and God one. But the elect man dwells as a
sojourner, knowing all things to be possessed and disposed of; and
he makes use of the things which the Pythagoreans make out to be the
threefold good things. The body, too, as one sent on a distant
pilgrimage, uses inns and dwellings by the way, having care of the
things of the world, of the places where he halts; but leaving his
dwelling-place and property without excessive emotion; readily
following him that leads him away from life; by no means and on no
occasion turning back; giving thanks for his sojourn, and blessing
[God] for his departure, embracing the mansion that is in heaven·
"For we know, that, if the earthly house of our tabernacle be
dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands,
eternal in the heavens. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan,
desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven: if
so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked. For we as the
apostle says; "walk by faith, not by sight,"[2] "and we are willing
rather to be absent from the body, and present with God." The rather
is in comparison. And comparison obtains in the case of things that
fall under resemblance; as the more valiant man is more valiant
among the valiant, and most valiant among cowards. Whence he adds,
"Wherefore we strive, whether present or absent, to be accepted with
Him,"[3] that is, God, whose work and creation are all things, both
the world and things supramundane. I admire Epicharmus, who clearly
"Endowed with pious mind, you will not, in dying,
Suffer aught evil. The spirit will dwell in heaven above;"
and the minstrel[4] who sings:--
"The souls of the wicked flit about below the skies on earth,
In murderous pains beneath inevitable yokes of evils;
But those of the pious dwell in the heavens,
Hymning in songs the Great, the Blessed One."
The soul is not then sent down from heaven to what is worse. For God
works all things up to what is better. But the soul which has chosen
the best life--the life that is from God and
righteousness--exchanges earth for heaven. With reason therefore,
Job, who had attained to knowledge, said, "Now I know that thou
canst do all things; and nothing is impossible to Thee. For who
tells me of what I know not, great and wonderful things with which I
was unacquainted ? And I felt myself vile, considering myself to be
earth and ashes."[5] For he who, being in a state of ignorance, is
sinful, "is earth and ashes; "while he who is in a state of
knowledge, being assimilated as far as possible to God, is already
spiritual, and so elect. And that Scripture calls the senseless and
disobedient "earth," will be made clear by Jeremiah the prophet,
saying, in reference to Joachim and his brethren "Earth, earth, hear
the word of the Lord; Write this man, as man excommunicated."[6] And
another prophet says again, "Hear, O heaven; and give ear, O
earth,"[7] calling understanding "ear," and the soul of the Gnostic,
that of the man who has applied himself to the contemplation of
heaven and divine things, and in this way has become an Israelite,
"heaven." For again he calls him who has made ignorance and hardness
of heart his choice, "earth."And the expression" give ear" he
derives from the "organs of hearing, the ears," attributing carnal
things to those who cleave to the things of sense. Such are they of
whom Micah the prophet says, "Hear the word of the Lord, ye peoples
who dwell with pangs."[8] And Abraham said, "By no means. The Lord
is He who judgeth the earth; "[9] "since he that believeth not, is,"
according to the utterance of the Saviour, "condemned already."[10]
And there is written in the Kings[11] the judgment and sentence of
the Lord, which stands thus: "The Lord hears the righteous, but the
wicked He saveth not, because they do not desire to know God." For
the Almighty will not accomplish what is absurd. What do the
heresies say to this utterance, seeing Scripture proclaims the
Almighty God to be good, and not the author of evil and wrong, if
indeed ignorance arises from one not knowing? But God does nothing
absurd. "For this God," it is said, "is our God, and there is none
to save besides Him."[12] "For there is no unrighteousness with
God,"[1] according to the apostle. And clearly yet the prophet
teaches the will of God, and the gnostic proficiency, in these
words: "And now, Israel, what doth the Lord God require of thee, but
to fear the Lord thy God, and walk in all His ways, and love Him,
and serve Him alone?"[2] He asks of thee, who hast the power of
choosing salvation. What is it, then, that the Pythagoreans mean
when they bid us "pray with the voice"? As seems to me, not that
they thought the Divinity could not hear those who speak silently,
but because they wished prayers tO be right, which no one would be
ashamed to make in the knowledge of many. We shall, however, treat
of prayer in due course by and by. But we ought to have works that
cry aloud, as becoming "those who walk in the day."[3] "Let thy
works shine,"[4] and behold a man and his works before his face.
"For behold God and His works."[5] For the gnostic must, as far as
is possible, imitate God. And the poets call the elect in their
pages godlike and gods, and equal to the gods, and equal in sagacity
to Zeus, and having counsels like the gods, and resembling the
gods,--nibbling, as seems to me, at the expression, "in the image
and likeness."[6]
Euripides accordingly says, "Golden wings are round my back, and I
am shod with the winged sandals of the Sirens; and I shall go aloft
into the wide ether, to hold convene with Zeus."
But I shall pray the Spirit of Christ to wing me to my Jerusalem.
For the Stoics say that heaven is properly a city, but places here
on earth are not cities; for they are called so, but are not. For a
city is an important thing, and the people a decorous body, and a
multitude of men regulated by law as the church by the word--a city
on earth impregnable--free from tyranny; a product of the divine
will on earth as in heaven. Images of this city the poets create
with their pen. For the Hyperboreans, and the Arimaspian cities, and
the Elysian plains, are commonwealths of just men. And we know
Plato's city placed as a pattern in heaven.[7]
I. (The Lord's Discipline, book iv. cap. vi. p. 413.)
<greek>h</greek> <greek>kuriakh</greek> <greek>askhsiu</greek>.
Casaubon explains this as Dominica exercitatia (the religion which
Lord taught), and quotes the apostolic canons (li. and lii.), which,
using this word (<greek>askhsiu</greek>), ordain certain fasts on
account of pious exercise. Baronius, more suo, grasps at this word
<greek>askhsiu</greek>, as a peg to hang the system of monkery upon.
Casaubon answers: "If so, then all the early Christians were monks
and nuns; as this word is always used by the Fathers for the
Christian discipline, or Christianity itself." Such are the original
ascetics, nothing more. The Christian Fathers transferred the word
from heathen use to that of the Church, to signify the training to
which all the faithful should subject themselves, in obedience to
St. Paul (I Cor. ix. 24-27). See Isaaci Casauboni, De Annalibus
Baronianis Exercitationes, p. 171.
II. (Theano, cap. xix. p. 431.)
The translator has not been happy in this rendering, but I retain it
as in the Edinburgh Edition, which leaves one in doubt whether this
second saying was Theano's; for, possibly, the translator meant to
leave it so. But the Migne note is very good: "Jamblichus mentions
two Theanos, one the wife of Brontinus, or Brotinus, and the other
of Pythagoras. Both alike were devoted to the Pythagorean
philosophy; and it is not certain, therefore, to which of them these
dicta belong." Theodoret quotes both, but decides not this doubt.
Hoffman says, "There were many of the name;" and he mentions five
different ones. Suidas makes mention of Theano of Crotona as the
wife of Pythagoras, "the first woman who philosophized and wrote
poetry;" and Hoffman doubts not this lady is the one quoted by
Clement. She seems to have presided over the school of her husband
after his death. Of the beauty and morality of the second dictum, I
have spoken already (p. 348, Elucidation XI.); and I think it worth
whole volumes of casuistry on a subject which (natura duce, sub lege
Logi) the Gospel modestly leaves to natural decency and enlightened
conscience. (See Clement's fine remarks, on p. 455.)
III. (St. Paul, note 4, p. 434.)
Better rendered, "Paul is more recent (or later) in respect of
time." This seems a strangely apologetic way to speak of this
glorious apostle; though the reference may be to his own words (I
Cor. xv. 8), "as of one born out of due time." And it suggests to
me, that, among the Alexandrian Christians, there were many Jewish
converts who said, "I am of Apollos," and with whom the name of the
great apostle of the Gentiles was still unsavoury. This goes to
confirm the Pauline origin of the Epistle to the Hebrews, so far as
it accounts for (what is testified by Eusebius, vi. 14) his omission
of his own name from his treatise, lest it should prejudice his
argument with his Hebrew kinsmen. Apollos may have sent it to
IV. (Socrates, cap. xxii. p. 436.)
Who can read the Phaedo, and think of Plato and Socrates, without
hope that the mystery of redemption applies to them in some
effectual way, under St. Paul's maxims (Rom. ii. 26, 27)? It would
torture me in reading such sayings as are quoted here, were I not
able reverently to indulge such hope, and then to desist from
speculation. Cannot we be silent where Scripture is silent, and
leave all to Him who loved the Gentiles, and died for them on the
cross? I suspect the itch of our times, on this and like subjects,
to be presumption (2 Cor. x. 5) "against the obedience of Christ."
As if our own concern for the heathen were greater than His who died
for the unjust, praying for His murderers! Why not leave the
ransomed world to the world's Redeemer? The cross bore the
inscription in Greek, and Latin also; for the Jews scorned it in
Hebrew: and who can doubt that those outstretched arms embraced all
V. (Basilides answered, cap. xxiv. p. 437.)
Note the pith and point of this chapter, and the beauty of Clement's
dictum, "So it would be, were it a man and not God that justifies!
As it is written, Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one
as thyself." (Compare Matt. xx. 14.) But let us not overlook his
exposition of the ends and purposes of chastisement. The great
principle which he lays down destroys the whole Trent theology about
penance, and annihilates the logical base of its figment about
"Purgatory." "Punishment does not avail to him who has sinned, to
undo his sin." The precious blood of Christ "speaketh better
VI. (Sin after Baptism, cap. xxiv. p. 438.)
Not to broach any opinion of my own, it is enough to remark, that
this reference to primitive discipline shows that a defined
penitential system in the early Church was aimed at by the
Montanists, and inspired their deadly animosity, not merely as a
theory, but as a system. Although differing on many points with Dr.
Bunsen (he is both Baron and Doctor, and I give him the more
honourable title of the two), I feel it due to my contract with the
reader of this series to refer him to what he says of the baptismal
vow, etc. (Hippol., iii. p. 187), as furnishing a valuable
commentary on the text, and on the whole plan of Alexandrian
teaching and discipline.
VII. (Jubilee, cap. xxv. p. 438.)
Here the reader may feel that an Elucidation is requisite to any
intelligent idea of what Clement means to say. "We wish he would
explain his explanation" of Ezekiel. Let me give a brief rendering
of the annotations in Migne, as all that can here be furnished. (I)
The tabernacle is the body, as St. Paul uses the word (2 Cor. v.
1-4), and St. Peter (2 Ep. i. 13, 14). (2) The seven periods are the
Sabbatical weeks of years leading up to the year of Jubilee. (3) The
<greek>aplanhu</greek> <greek>kwra</greek> refers to the old system
of astronomy, and its division of the heavens into an octave of
spheres, of which the seven inner spheres are those of the seven
planets; the fist stars being in the eighth, which "borders on the
intellectual world,"--the abode of spirits, according to Clement.
The Miltonic student will recall the perplexity with which, perhaps,
in early years, he first read:--
"They pass the planets seven, and pass the fist,
And that crystalline sphere whose balance weighs
The trepidation talked, and that first moved.
Paradise Lost, book iii. 481.
The Copernican system was, even in Milton's time, not generally
accepted; but, for one who had personally conversed with Galileo,
this seems incorrigibly bad. The true system would have given
greater dignity, and in fact a better topography, to his great poem.
VIII. (Rebecca, p. 439.)
Le Nourry, as well as Barbeyrac (see Kaye, pp. 109 and 473), regards
Clement as ignorant of the Hebrew language. Kaye, though he shows
that some of the attempts to demonstrate this are fanciful, inclines
to the same opinion; remarking that he borrows his interpretations
from Philo. On the passage here under consideration, he observes,
that, "having said repeatedly[1] that Rebekah in Hebrew is
equivalent to <greek>upomonh</greek> in Greek, he now makes it
equivalent to <greek>Qeou</greek> <greek>doxa</greek>. He elsewhere
refers our Saviour's exclamation, Eli, Eli, etc., to the Greek word
<greek>hliou</greek>, and the name Jesus to <greek>iasqai</greek>."
IX. (Plato's City, cap. xxvi. p. 441.)
This is worth quoting from the Republic (book ix. p. 423, Jowett):
"In heaven there is laid up a pattern of such a city; and he who
desires may behold this, and, beholding, govern himself accordingly;
He will act according to the laws of that city, and of no other."
Sublime old Gentile! Did not the apostle of the Gentiles think of
Socrates, when he wrote Heb. xii. 28, and xiii. 14? On this noble
passage, of which Clement has evidently thought very seriously,
Schleiermacher's remarks seem to me cold and unsatisfactory. (See
his Introductions, translated by Dobson; ed. Cambridge, 1836.)


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When we aren't using up government resources to try and rescue him from the far reaches of outer space, Matt Damon is capable of a whole lot of things. We've seen him rob casinos, fall in love with Liberace, and run really fast from a wildly shaking camera. He's so good that one of his
Ten Number-Titled Movies That Are Sexier Than the Fifty Shades Films
The sequel to Fifty Shades of Grey opens this weekend, and while you'd think Fifty Shades Darker than grey would be black it's actually just the same white couple pretending to be kinky. They have their fans, and I'll admit there are laughs to be found, but the movies aren't nearly as sexy as they
What to Expect in 2017-2025, According to Movies
We have begun a new era in American history. On Jan. 20, reality TV star, sexual-assault perpetrator, and all-around garbage human being Donald Trump was sworn in as President of the United States. The future has never looked so bleak! And so, in these uncertain times, we look to movies to show us what our
A Memo from the Umbrella Corporation
To: Umbrella Corp Employees From: Albert Wesker CC: Infected Date: 1/27/17 Re: Sident Evil First off, I would like to issue my sincere thanks for your loyalty and dedication. This dedication is especially touching considering the recent, completely unfounded allegations that the Umbrella Corporation literally murdered an entire facility full of workers in an effort
Presidential Movies, According to Amazon Users
Donald Trump's cameo in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York was the greatest ever appearance by a president, fictional or otherwise, by any actor in the history of cinema. Everyone agrees. I had a whole bunch of people look in to it and they all said Trump was the best, he has terrific ability
Eric D. Snider's 2017 Sundance Diary: Day 3-4
Day 3: Saturday, Jan. 21 As you probably heard (unless Fox News is your only source of information), there were numerous large protest marches throughout the world today, as people took to the streets to register their dissatisfaction with the latest Underworld movie. No, I kid, it was about Trump. Chelsea Handler helped organize a
Eric D. Snider's 2017 Sundance Diary: Day 1-2
Listen! Do you smell that? It's the Sundance Film Festival, back for another year of showcasing new independent films and terrorizing the helpless town of Park City, Utah. The mood is slightly muted this year, partly because there wasn't much pre-festival buzz about any of the films, partly because Park City is a wintry hellscape,
Will Smith's Bad Choices: A Fake Oral History
A few days ago, a picture from Will Smith's upcoming film Bright surfaced. Smith is on set, smiling with a cop's handlebar mustache and uniform with a medal draped over his chest. Next to him is a similarly-dressed being with mottled green-yellow skin and inhuman features. Yes, Smith's new film is a buddy cop movie
The Underworld Movies: What Is the Deal with Them?
It's a common problem. In fact, it happened to so many of you just last weekend. A quiet moment at a particularly raucous New Year's Eve party created the perfect occasion for that familiar conversation. Your best friend rhetorically jabs: "So we're all in agreement that Rise of the Lycans is the worst Underworld movie,
Your 2017 Movie Preview
Exciting news, movie fans! Remember how there were movies in 2016? Well, if the rumors we're hearing are true, there are also going to be movies in 2017. A lot of them — maybe even 30. To help prepare your body and mind for this eventuality, we have compiled a schedule of the highlights. All


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Antitrust and Trade Regulation laws aim to promote free competition in the marketplace. Agreements or cooperative efforts by two or more entities that affects or restrains competitors is illegal under these laws. The Sherman Act makes illegal any contract, combination, or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce and makes monopolies and attempts, combinations, or conspiracies to monopolize illegal. The Clayton Act regulate price discrimination, tying and exclusive dealing contracts, stock acquisition and interlocking directorates.
Yeso is an unincorporated community in De Baca County, New Mexico, United States. Yeso is located along U.S. Route 60 west of Fort Sumner.
Antitrust And Trade Regulation Law Lawyers In Yeso New Mexico


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CYBERDATA GIGABIT SWITCH 2-PORT (011187A)Item#: 13444707 | Model#: 011187A
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Option to add baby's measurements (height/weight) as they grow.
Would love to be able to add measurements from doctor check-ups like I can add a photo or story. And be able to filter for these down the road so I can quickly access all measurements and compare children. :) Thanks for this app. Our whole family loves it.37 votes
Please, please stop saying "guess what" on every email I receive....very annoying...I like the site, but I am ready to opt out of the email5 votes
4 votes
Please do an APP icon that we can just tap. I'm having a hard time getting to the site and staying in it. I was on the site...and thennit va
Please do an APP button where we can just tap and enter. And while we're on the site, please make it operate more smoothly and more efficiently. And perhaps have an American write the directions for use in the US? Your directions are a bit off-putting and are NOT clear. You REALly have a great idea here; but it needs to be easier to use.4 votes
4 votes
Allow search by date
Allow a search option to find photos on each month or date, on app and on computer.4 votes
Allow comments in email alerts as you used to!
I miss being able to comment in an email alert!
Don't want to always have to go to the app...liked old format better...4 votes
Preserve the daily view
I have a goal of putting up one photo every day, but I sometimes let a month or more go by and with the old view it was easy to see which days I missed! Now if I miss a month or a couple random days it's a huge pain to figure out which days I still need to add pictures to cause I can't see the date under the photo. While I like your new view better, I wish I could switch back to the old view when adding photos. I have been using this for over a year now, and it used to not be a problem going back and figuring out the dates I need photos for. But I let the summer slip by and I need to add a ton, but it seems twice as hard as it used to!
*silently crying to myself*
I have a goal of putting up one photo every day, but I sometimes let a month or more go by and with the old view it was easy to see which days I missed! Now if I miss a month or a couple random days it's a huge pain to figure out which days I still need to add pictures to cause I can't see the date under the photo. While I like your new view better, I wish I could switch back to the old view when adding photos. I have been using this for over a year…4 votes
create a troubleshooting guide
I keep getting a "cannot upload your moments" message when trying to upload video.
This message offers no way of resolving this or even an inkling as to why. Extremely frustrating.
Make a guide or an FAQ so people can try to fix this issue on their own; and not have to wait for customer support.2 votes
Make the photos searchable by keyword
It would help if I can search pictures by keywords for when I want to show people a specific picture, especially if it's an older picture.2 votes
Allow photos to be taken from inside the app
Create ability to take photos from inside the app. You can do this inside whatsapp etc.2 votes
Flashbacks could be made available for browser version of lifecake
I cant find flashbacks available for browser version of lifecake. Hope they can be made available for the same2 votes
put back the dates when uploading photos on iphone
ahhhh!!!! I can't see the dates any more when I up load photos!!! I am so annoyed with life cake right now, that if all my photos weren't already here I would switch immediately to a different service. Now I have to switch back and forth between the photo viewer on my phone and the life cake app to see which date is which!!! this is going to take forever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 vote
making book
I can only select pictures through November 2016, I would like to select pictures through december 2016 when creating my book. How do I go about doing this, those are the dates I selected when the book was set up.1 vote
Either use "like"or "love" in emails
When someone likes a photo or video I post, the email subject line says they like it, the first line of the email says they like it, and the main part of the email says they love it. It would be nice if it was consistent.1 vote
add back scrolling between preview photos on iphone
I use to be able to quickly scroll between photos previews my swiping my finger (when adding photos), now I have to hold my finger over each one!! This SUCKS!!!!
this is the 3rd entry I have had tonight over various changes to the app and web experience, I am so annoyed with life cake that I give up and I'm going to bed. this isn't worth it.1 vote
change the message on a password reset. "It happens to the best of us." is annoying, insulting, and patronising.
It is especially annoying if you need to do a password reset after installing the app on a new iPhone, when you haven't entered the password for two years.1 vote
Show the age of twins when both are tagged
My twins are in a lot of photos together, so they are both tagged, but because 2 children are tagged it doesn't show their age at the bottom of the photo. Where 2 children have the same date of birth it could show the age on the photo when they are both tagged. (Since the age is the same!)1 vote
Create themes matching progress, achievements and celebrations
It would we awesome if you could provide tasteful backgrounds, icons, stickers that we could incorporate into the timeline, such as sucking thumbs, grabbing, crawling, smiling, monthly/annual backgrounds, Mother's Day, Father's Day etc...1 vote
Send only most recent photos by date submitted by poster. Loading time for photo history takes to long.
Just send most recent photos by submitted date. History of past photos along with most recent photos takes to much time to load on computer. Thank you in this issue.1 vote
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