Misplaced Pages

#165834

50-706: Other sources mentioned that the Athinganoi were Simonians , and had nothing to do with the Manichean or Paulinic sect, and settled in the year of the East–West Schism in 1054 at Byzantium, and married Byzantine women, adopted Greek Orthodox Christianity and later assimilated in Slavic and Greek Population. In some studies the Athinganoi are described as remnants of the Indo-Greeks who left India in 400 AD during

100-778: A Gnostic sect of the 2nd century which regarded Simon Magus as its founder and traced its doctrines, known as Simonianism , back to him. The sect flourished in Syria, in various districts of Asia Minor and at Rome . In the 3rd century remnants of it still existed, which survived until the 4th century. Justin Martyr wrote in his Apology (152 AD) that the sect of the Simonians appeared to have been formidable, as he speaks four times of their founder, Simon. The Simonians are mentioned by Hegesippus ; their doctrines are quoted and opposed in connection with Simon Magus by Irenaeus , by

150-489: A Gnostic saviour. The influence of Greek philosophy resulted in a Gnostic " monistic theogony ." According to Aldo Magris, Samaritan baptist sects were an offshoot of John the Baptist . One offshoot was in turn headed by Dositheus , Simon Magus , and Menander . It was in this milieu that the idea emerged that the world was created by ignorant angels. Their baptismal ritual removed the consequences of sin, and led to

200-701: A Simonian book called the Preaching of Paul which advocated this baptism. Outside of these patristic sources, the Simonians are briefly mentioned in the Testimony of Truth (58,1-60,3) from the Nag Hammadi Library , wherein the Gnostic author seems to include them among a long list of "heretics": They do [not] agree with each other. For the Si[mo]nians get married and produce children, but

250-569: A male-female power like the preëxisting Boundless Power, which has neither beginning nor end, existing in oneness. For it is from this that the Thought in the oneness proceeded and became two. So he was one; for having her in himself, he was alone, not however first, although preëxisting, but being manifested from himself to himself, he became second. Nor was he called Father before (Thought) called him Father. As, therefore, producing himself by himself, he manifested to himself his own Thought, so also

300-797: A part in the apparent confusion between the Atzinganos (the Roma), and the Athinganoi . The exact relationship between the Athinganoi and the Roma remains uncertain. Historians, such as Rochow, have suggested three different explanations for the association: An earlier, and probably quite distinct, sect with the same name is refuted by Marcus Eremita , who seems to have been a disciple of St. John Chrysostom . They were regarded as Judaizing Heretics. About AD 600, Timotheus , Presbyter of Constantinople, in his book De receptione Haereticorum adds at

350-435: A regeneration by which natural death, which was caused by these angels, was overcome. The Samaritan leaders were viewed as "the embodiment of God's power, spirit, or wisdom, and as the redeemer and revealer of 'true knowledge'." Dositheus , a Samaritan who died from starvation, is said to have originally been the "Standing One," or leader, of John the Baptist 's sect, but stepped aside in favor of Simon Magus. Origen , who

400-415: Is a mixture of Hellenism and Hebraism , in which the same method of allegory is applied to Homer and Hesiod as to Moses . Starting from the assertion of Moses that God is "a devouring fire" ( Deuteronomy 4:24), Simon combined therewith the philosophy of Heraclitus which made fire the first principle of all things. This first principle he denominated a "Boundless Power," and he declared it to dwell in

450-482: Is commonly called by everyone the navel . . . and the two veins by which the blood flows and is carried from the Edenic region through what are called the gates [ porta ] of the liver , which nourish the foetus. And the air-ducts, which we said were channels for breath, embracing the bladder on either side in the region of the pelvis , are united at the great duct which is called the dorsal aorta . . . . The whole (of

500-417: Is envisioned as the umbilical cord . The navel [ i.e., the umbilical cord], he says, is divided into four channels, for on either side of the navel two air-ducts [ i.e., the umbilical arteries ] are stretched to convey the breath, and two [umbilical] veins to convey blood. But when, he says, the navel going forth from the region of Eden is attached to the foetus in the epigastric regions, that which

550-434: Is practised by this most abominable heresy'. In general, they were said to regard nothing in itself as good or bad by nature: it was not good works that made men blessed, in the next world, but the grace bestowed by Simon and Helena on those who followed them. To this end, the Simonians were said to venerate Simon under the image of Zeus , and Helena under that of Athena . However, Hippolytus adds that "if any one, on seeing

SECTION 10

#1732798670166

600-745: Is the Great Power, the Universal Mind ordering all things, male, and the other, (is manifested) from below, the Great Thought, female, producing all things. Hence pairing with each other, they unite and manifest the Middle Distance, incomprehensible Air, without beginning or end. In this is the Father who sustains all things, and nourishes those things which have a beginning and end. This is He who has stood, stands and will stand,

650-643: Is yet found as two, the male-female having the female in itself. Thus Mind is in Thought—things inseparable from one another—which although being one are yet found as two. The Simonians were variously accused of using magic and theurgy , incantations and love-potions; declaring idolatry a matter of indifference that was neither good nor bad, proclaiming all sex to be perfect love, and altogether leading very disorderly, immoral lives. Eusebius of Caesarea , in his 4th century Historia Ecclesiastica , writes that 'every vile corruption that could either be done or devised,

700-477: The Philosophumena , and later by Epiphanius of Salamis . Origen also mentions that some of the sect were called Heleniani. According to John D. Turner , the Simonians originated as a local Hebrew cult in the first century CE, which centered on a Samaritan holy man. This early cult was syncretistic, but not Gnostic. In the second century, under influence of Christianity, Simon was transformed into

750-783: The Continuatio ), banned Dositheans during a ceremony on Mount Gerizim , where the Samaritans pledged not to drink or marry Dositheans. During Caliph al-Mutawakkil 's reign (847-861), Samaritans restricted Dositheans from praying with them due to Torah reading controversy. When the prominent Samaritan Yosef Iban Adhasi died, the Dositheans caused disturbance, possibly even expressing joy at the news. The Samaritan rais then decided that no one would give or take anything from them, and nobody would eat or drink with them either. [REDACTED]  This article incorporates text from

800-464: The Encratites . Origen says that the Dositheans were never in a flourishing state and that in his time, they had almost entirely disappeared, scarcely thirty of them being left. The Midrash , however, speaks of Dositheans, with whom Rabbi Meir had dealings, and two names, "Dosion and Dosthion," are also mentioned, which either refer to two Dosithean sectarians or form a double designation for

850-593: The Migration period . The etymology of the word is not certain, but a common determination is a derivation in Greek for "(the) untouchables"derived from a privative alpha prefix and the verb thingano ( θιγγάνειν , thinganein , "to touch"). The Manichean sect is mentioned in Soghdian sources. The name Athinganoi , a later variant form of which is Atsinganoi ( ἀτσίγγανοι ), came to be associated with

900-565: The Roma who first appeared in the Byzantine Empire at the time. Atsinganoi is the root word for the racial slurs "cigano", "çingene", "cigány", "zigeuner", "tzigan", "țigan", and "zingaro", words used to describe members of the Roma in various European languages. Today many of these words are still used in a derogatory sense, albeit others are the most common exonym for them in a given language. The idea of Roma as sorcerers also plays

950-477: The ...ans abstain from their ... nature ... [to passion] ... the drops of ... smear themselves ... we ... [they agree] with each other ... him ... they say ... [ about 16 lines missing ] ... [there is] no judgment ... for these because of ... them ... the heretics ... schisms ... with males ... are men ... they will belong [to the world rulers of] darkness ... of the world ... they have ... the [archons ... power] ... [ 1 line missing ] ... judge [them] .... But

1000-422: The ...ians ... words ... [ about 11 lines missing ] ... speak ... [they will] become ... in [unquenchable] fire ... they are punished. Translator Birger A. Pearson notes that these passages probably deal with the practices of libertine Gnostic sects, but from the fragmentary state of the text, it is impossible to know to what groups are being referred. The staunchly ascetic author may have had no more issue with

1050-638: The Dositheans, who in fact left no traces, while the Samaritan sect certainly continued to exist. In Egypt especially, the sect was probably numerous enough to induce the Christian patriarch of Alexandria to engage in polemics against it. The Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions and Homilies tells how Dositheos, by spreading a false report of Simon Magus' death, succeeded in installing himself as head of his sect. Simon on coming back thought it better to dissemble, and, pretending friendship for Dositheus, accepted

SECTION 20

#1732798670166

1100-682: The Dostan (Dositheans; compare Δοσθήν). Al-Shahrastani calls them "Kusaniyyah" and "Dusitaniyyah." Abu al-Fatḥ says of the Dostan, the Samaritan Dositheans, that they abolished the festivals instituted by the Mosaic law, as well as the astronomical tables, counting thirty days in every month, without variation. It reminds one of the Sadducees, and is a further proof that the Dositheans were their spiritual descendants. The statement that

1150-664: The Samaritans Sabbæeus and Theodosius, of whom Josephus relates, that they defended before the Egyptian king Ptolemæus Philometor against Andronicus , the advocate of the Jews, the sanctity of Mount Gerizim . The Samaritan chronicles (the Book of Joshua and Abu al-Fath's Annales ) recount a similar discussion between Zerubbabel and Sanballat . Josephus stated that the Samaritans had two advocates, he doubtless meant

1200-521: The Simonians than their marrying and having children. However, Epiphanius also accuses the Simonians of having "enjoined mysteries of obscenity and—to set it forth more seriously—of the sheddings of bodies, emissionum virorum, feminarum menstruorum , and that they should be gathered up for mysteries in a most filthy collection; that these were the mysteries of life, and of the most perfect gnosis ." Dositheos (Samaritan) Dositheos (occasionally also known as Nathanael , both meaning "gift of God")

1250-467: The Thought that was manifested did not make the Father, but contemplating him hid him—that is to say the Power—in herself, and is male-female, Power and Thought. Hence they pair with each other being one, for there is no difference between Power and Thought. From the things above is discovered Power, and from those below Thought. In the same manner also that which was manifested from them although being one

1300-466: The death of the body. "The axe," he said, "is nigh to the roots of the tree: Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is cut down and cast into the fire" ( cf. Matthew 3:10). There is a remarkable physiological interpretation of the Garden of Eden that evinces a certain amount of anatomical knowledge on the part of Simon or his followers. Here, Paradise is the womb , and the river going out of Eden

1350-595: The end of his list of heretics who need rebaptism the Mandopolini, "now called Athingani . They live in Phrygia , and are neither Hebrews nor Gentiles. They keep the Sabbath , but are not circumcised. They will not touch any man. If food is offered to them, they ask for it to be placed on the ground; then they come and take it. They give to others with the same precautions". Simonians The Simonians were

1400-536: The festivals were abolished, probably means that the Dositheans celebrated them on other days than the Jews; but as, according to a trustworthy statement of Epiphanius, the Dositheans celebrated the festivals together with the Pharisaic Jews, an approximation may well be assumed toward the Karaites , a sect with which the Samaritans had much in common in later times. The determination of the months by means of

1450-551: The few female leaders of early Christianity in 2nd century Rome. In the Philosophumena of Hippolytus , Simon's doctrine is recorded according to his reputed work, The Great Declaration , as it existed in the 2nd century. As Hippolytus himself in more than one place points out, it is an earlier form of the Valentinian doctrine , but there are things reminiscent of Aristotelian and Stoic physics. The whole book

1500-452: The foetus) is wrapped up in an envelope, called the amnion , and is nourished through the navel and receives the essence of the breath through the dorsal duct, as I have said. The five books of Moses are made to represent the five senses: As the female side of the original being appears the "thought" or "conception" ( ennoia ), which is the mother of the Aeons . There is a mystical passage on

1550-410: The heretic Dositheus. Yet the fact that the patriarch Eulogius of Alexandria (who probably lived 582–603) disputed successfully against the Samaritan followers of Dostan (Δοσθήν) or Dositheus, and wrote a work expressly against them ( Photius , "Bibliotheca," cod. 230), shows that the Dositheans existed and even exercised a certain power in the sixth century. Origen possibly refers to a Christian sect of

Athinganoi - Misplaced Pages Continue

1600-528: The images either of Simon or Helen, shall call them by those names, he is cast out, as showing ignorance of the mysteries." From this it is evident that the Simonians did not allow that they actually worshipped their founders. In the Clementine Recognitions Helena is called Luna , which may mean that the images were allegorical representations of the sun and moon . The writer of the pseudo-Cyprian De Rebaptismate says that on

1650-521: The inferior place which Simon formerly occupied. Not long after this he died. In Egypt the Arabic writers may have become acquainted with the Dositheans, though some may have survived also in Syria and Palestine, as is evident from the rabbinical sources. Al-Masudi , of the tenth century, says that the Samaritans were divided into two sects, that of the Kushan, or ordinary Samaritans (="Kuthim"), and that of

1700-557: The point be enlarged to infinity. This indivisible point which existed in the body, and of which none but the spiritual knew, was the Kingdom of Heaven, and the grain of mustard-seed. But it rested with us to develop it, and it is this responsibility which is referred to in the words—"that we may not be condemned with the world" (1 Corinthians 11:32). For if the image of the Standing One were not actualized in us, it would not survive

1750-529: The resurrection by his baptism and practiced magical arts. The sect named after him, the Menandrians, continued to exist for a considerable length of time. Simonian influences continued through Menander's own followers who included Saturninus of Antioch and Basilides , the latter identified by Ireneus with the further development of his predecessors ideas. Carpocrates practised in the tradition of Basildes, and his own follower, Marcellina , became one of

1800-424: The rod seemed to pass through his body, as if it had been smoke. On which Dositheus, being astonished, says to him, 'Tell me if thou art the Standing One, that I may adore thee.' And when Simon answered that he was, then Dositheus, perceiving that he himself was not the Standing One, fell down and worshipped him, and gave up his own place as chief to Simon, ordering all the rank of thirty men to obey him; himself taking

1850-527: The same time confounding him with Simon Magus, connecting his name with Helena, and stating that he was the "being". Origen says that Dositheus pretended to be the Christ (Messiah), applying Deut 18:15 to himself, and he compares him with Theudas and Judas the Galilean . Origen also says that Dositheus' disciples pretended to possess books by him, and related concerning him that he never suffered death, but

1900-497: The second place. Soon, however, he began to hint to the thirty that Dositheus was not as well acquainted as he might be with the doctrines of the school. Dositheus, when he perceived that Simon was depreciating him, fearing lest his reputation among men might be obscured (for he himself was supposed to be the Standing One), moved with rage, when they met as usual at the school, seized a rod, and began to beat Simon; but suddenly

1950-601: The sons of men, beings born of flesh and blood. Simon distinguished between its hidden and its manifest qualities, maintaining that the former were the cause of the latter. Like the Stoics he conceived of it as an intelligent being, saying that the generated world sprang from this ungenerated being. Simon characterized the world as having six roots, having each its inner and its outer side, and arranged as follows: These six roots, Mind, Voice, Reason, Reflection, Name , and Thought , are also called six powers. Commingled with them all

2000-526: The strength of the words of John, that "we were to be baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire," the Simonians maintained that the orthodox baptism was a mere form, and that they had the real baptism, for, as soon as their neophytes went down into the water, a fire appeared on it. The writer does not dispute this claim, but questions whether it was bit of jugglery, a natural phenomenon, a piece of self-deception, or an effect of magic. The writer also mentions

2050-572: The testimony of witnesses may also have been a Karaite custom although that practise may go back to a time before the opposite view of the Pharisees existed. Under the Abbasid khalifs the Samaritans persecuted the Dositheans, although they themselves had to suffer much. Under Ibrahim (218–227 of the Hijrah) the synagogue of the Samaritans and Dositheans at Nablus was burned by heretics, but it

Athinganoi - Misplaced Pages Continue

2100-520: The two apostles Dositheus and Sabbæus, whose doctrine, including the sanctity of Mount Gerizim, rejection of the prophetical books of the Old Testament and denial of the resurrection, was on the whole identical with that of the Samaritans. According to Hegesippus , Dositheus lived later than Simon Magus, the first heresiarch of the Church; other authors speak of him as the teacher of Simon, at

2150-564: The two early patristic authors Justin Martyr or Irenaeus . The Samaritan chronicler Abu al-Fatḥ of the fourteenth century, who used reliable native sources, places the origin of the Dosithean sect in the time before Alexander the Great . The rabbinical sources also contain obscure references to Dositheos and Sabbæus as the two founders respectively of the Samaritan sects of the Dositheans and Sabuæans . These have been identified with

2200-531: The unity of all things, suggestive of the Emerald Tablet . Its language seems to throw light on the story about Helen. To you, therefore, I say what I say, and write what I write. And the writing is this. Of the universal Aeons there are two shoots, without beginning or end, springing from one Root, which is the Power invisible, inapprehensible Silence. Of these shoots one is manifested from above, which

2250-514: Was a Samaritan religious leader. He was the founder of a Samaritan sect often assumed to be Gnostic in nature, and is reputed to have known John the Baptist , and been either a teacher or a rival of Simon Magus . Dositheos probably lived in the first century CE. Eusebius and the Pseudo-Clementines portray Dositheus as Jewish , while Pseudo-Tertullian and Philastrius describe him as Samaritan . According to Epiphanius , he

2300-458: Was an ambitious Jew who later allied himself with the Samaritans. According to Pseudo-Tertullian, he was the first to deny the Nevi'im (Prophets). Jerome gives the same account. Hippolytus begins his enumeration of the 32 heresies by mentioning Dositheos; hence the sect is made to appear older than the Sadducees, and on the heresy is based the system of Philaster . He was not mentioned by

2350-556: Was ordained priest in AD 231, speaks of Dositheus, and also mentions Simon Magus. As late as the beginning of the 7th century, Eulogius of Alexandria opposed Dositheans, who regarded Dositheus as the great prophet foretold by Moses. Like Simon, Menander , who was a pupil and, after Simon's death, his most important successor, taught the creation of the world by angels who were sent by the Ennoia . He asserted that men received immortality and

2400-502: Was still alive. To this must be compared the story of Epiphanius regarding his death by starvation in a cave. Epiphanius adds that while some of the Dositheans lead loose lives, others preserve a rigid morality, refrain from the use of meat, observe the rite of circumcision , and are very strict in keeping the Sabbath and in observing the laws of Levitical purity . These statements may, however, refer to another Dositheus, who belonged to

2450-553: Was subsequently rebuilt. Yusuf ibn Dasi , governor of Palestine, entirely forbade the worship of the Dositheans; and the sect may in consequence have been absorbed by the Samaritans. The Samaritan Continuatio to the Chronicle of Abu'l-Fath sheds more light on Samaritans' relations with Dositheans during the Abbasid period. In the 840s rebellion of Abu Harb , Asasbi, Samaritan community leader (referred to as "King of Israel" in

2500-495: Was the great power, the "Boundless Power." This was that which "has stood, stands, and will stand," the seventh power (root) corresponding to the seventh day after the six days of creation. This seventh power existed before the world, it is the Spirit of God that moved upon the face of the waters (Genesis 1:2). It existed potentially in every child of man, and might be developed in each to its own immensity. The small might become great,

#165834