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Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies Editors Johannes van Oort & Einar Thomassen Editorial Board j.d. beduhn – a.d. deconick – w.-p. funk i. gardner – s.n.c. lieu – a. marjanen p. nagel – l. painchaud – b.a. pearson n.a. pedersen – s.g. richter – j.m. robinson m. scopello – j.d. turner – g. wurst VOLUME 82 The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/nhms Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World Essays in Honour of John D. Turner Edited by Kevin Corrigan Tuomas Rasimus In collaboration with Dylan M. Burns Lance Jenott Zeke Mazur LEIDEN • BOSTON 2013 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Gnosticism, Platonism and the late ancient world : essays in honour of John D. Turner / edited by Kevin Corrigan, Tuomas Rasimus ; in collaboration with Dylan M. Burns, Lance Jenott, Zeke Mazur. pages cm – (Nag Hammadi and Manichaean studies ; volume 82) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-22383-7 (hardback) : alk. paper) – ISBN 978-90-04-25476-3 (e-book) 1. Gnosticism. 2. Platonists. 3. Philosophy, Ancient. I. Turner, John Douglas. II. Corrigan, Kevin. III. Rasimus, Tuomas. IV. Series: Nag Hammadi and Manichaean studies ; v. 82. B638.G595 2013 299'.932–dc23 2013015170 This publication has been typeset in the multilingual “Brill” typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, IPA, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. For more information, please see www.brill.com/brill-typeface. ISSN 0929-2470 ISBN 978-90-04-22383-7 (hardback) ISBN 978-90-04-25476-3 (e-book) Copyright 2013 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Global Oriental, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers and Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper. CONTENTS Preface............................................................... xi Abbreviations. xix Illustrations . xxvii Contributors . xxix John D. Turner: An Appreciation . xxxix Sidnie White Crawford PART I GNOSTICISM AND OTHER RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS OF ANTIQUITY A Distinctive Intertextuality: Genesis and Platonizing Philosophy in The Secret Revelation of John ........................................ 3 Karen L. King The Three Forms of First Thought (NHC XIII,1), and the Secret Book of John (NHC II,1 and par.) . 23 Paul-Hubert Poirier Emissaries of Truth and Justice: The Seed of Seth as Agents of Divine Providence . 43 Lance Jenott Sethian Names in Magical Texts: Protophanes and Meirotheos . 63 Einar Thomassen “Third Ones and Fourth Ones”: Some Reflections on the Use of Indefinite Ordinals in Zostrianos ................................... 79 Wolf-Peter Funk Le quatrième écrit du codex Tchacos: les livres d’Allogène et la tradition littéraire séthienne . 89 Louis Painchaud The Book of Allogenes (CT,4) and Sethian Gnosticism . 105 Birger A. Pearson viii contents The Temptation of Allogenes (Codex Tchacos, Tractate IV) . 117 Madeleine Scopello Martin Hengel and the Origins of Gnosticism . 139 Volker Henning Drecoll Arithmos and Kosmos: Arithmology as an Exegetical Tool in the De Opificio Mundi of Philo of Alexandria . 167 Robert M. Berchman Parole intérieure et parole proférée chez Philon d’Alexandrie et dans l’Évangile de la Vérité (NH I,3) ......................................199 Anne Pasquier Remarques sur la cohérence des Extraits de Théodote . 209 Jean-Daniel Dubois Evidence of “Valentinian” Ritual Practice? The Liturgical Fragments of Nag Hammadi Codex XI (NHC XI,2a–e) . 225 Hugo Lundhaug A Salvific Act of Transformation or a Symbol of Defilement? Baptism in Valentinian Liturgical Readings (NHC XI,2) and in the Testimony of Truth (NHC IX,3) . 245 Antti Marjanen “The Garment Poured its Entire Self over Me”: Christian Baptismal Traditions and the Origins of the Hymn of the Pearl . 261 Dylan M. Burns Alexander of Lycopolis, Manichaeism and Neoplatonism . 275 Johannes van Oort Crafting Gnosis: Gnostic Spirituality in the Ancient New Age . 285 April D. DeConick PART II CROSSING BOUNDARIES: GNOSTICISM AND PLATONISM The Symposium and Republic in the Mystical Thought of Plotinus and the Sethian Gnostics. 309 Kevin Corrigan contents ix “Those Who Ascend to the Sanctuaries of the Temples”: The Gnostic Context of Plotinus’ First Treatise, 1.6 [1], On Beauty . 329 Zeke Mazur Johannine Background of the Being-Life-Mind Triad . 369 Tuomas Rasimus The Neopythagorean Backdrop to the Fall (σφάλμα/νεῦσις) of the Soul in Gnosticism and its Echo in the Plotinian Treatises 33 and 34 . 411 Jean-Marc Narbonne Écho et les antitypes . 427 Michel Tardieu Plotinus and the Magical Rites Practiced by the Gnostics . 443 Luc Brisson Where Did Matter Appear From? A Syntactic Problem in a Plotinian anti-Gnostic Treatise . 459 Lorenzo Ferroni Plotinus, Epicurus, and the Gnostics: On Plotinian Classification of Philosophies . 465 Andrei Cornea Plotinus and the Vehicle of the Soul . 485 John Dillon Life and Happiness in the “Platonic Underworld” . 497 Michael A. Williams Trial by Fire: An Ontological Reading of Katharsis . 525 Svetla Slaveva-Griffin “Harmonizing” Aristotle’s Categories and Plato’s Parmenides before the Background of Natural Philosophy . 543 Gerald Bechtle Christians against Matter: A Bouquet for Bishop Berkeley . 569 Mark Edwards Proclus against the Gnostics? Some Remarks on a Subtle Allusion in the Timaeus-Commentary concerning Caves and Cages . 581 Benjamin Gleede x contents Imagination and Psychic Body: Apparitions of the Divine and Geometric Imagination according to Proclus . 595 Alain Lernould Neoplatonizing Gnosticism and Gnosticizing Neoplatonism in the “American Baroque” . 609 Jay Bregman Index of Modern Authors . 631 Index of Subjects . 640 Index of Ancient Sources . 656 1. Old Testament . 656 2. Old Testament Apocrypha . 657 3. Old Testament Pseudepigrapha . 657 4. Jewish Authors . 657 5. New Testament. 659 6. New Testament Apocrypha . 662 7. Apostolic Fathers. 662 8. Patristic Literature . 663 9. Valentinian Fragments . 669 10. Nag Hammadi and Related Coptic Codices . 669 11. Mandaean Sources . 683 12. Manichaean Sources . 683 13. Greco-Roman Authors and Works . 684 14. Hermetica . 699 15. Orphica . 699 16. Magica . 699 17. Ancient Egyptian Texts. 700 18. Key to French References . 700 PREFACE It is with great pleasure that we offer this Festschrift to John D. Turner on the occasion of his seventy-fifth birthday. This volume celebrates an extraordi- nary lifetime of scholarship. John’s work has been of enormous importance not only for each of us—the editors—and the many other colleagues, stu- dents, and friends who have contributed essays, but also for the study of late antique religions in general. Beginning with his doctoral work in the late 1960s, John was among the first generation of Coptologists to study the Nag Hammadi codices as a member of the team directed by James M. Robin- son at the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity at Claremont, and he has since been responsible for groundbreaking critical editions and trans- lations of Coptic texts as well as countless articles, books, and commen- taries on this material. John has developed a comprehensive theory of the history of Sethian Gnosticism—on the basis of Hans-Martin Schenke’s sem- inal work in the 1970s and 1980s1—showing that Sethian thought was not a monolithic entity, but consisted of heterogeneous materials that commin- gled over the course of a long and dynamic history. John also identified what he termed “Platonizing Sethianism,” that is, a philosophically-inspired sub- current of the Sethian movement represented in the closely-related tractates Zostrianos, Allogenes, Marsanes, and the Three Steles of Seth. Furthermore, John collaborated substantially with the BibliothèquecoptedeNagHammadi at Université Laval (Québec), on whose editorial board he also serves. He has organized several pioneering colloquia—notably the Society of Bibli- cal Literature seminars “Gnosticism and Later Platonism” (1993–1998) and “Rethinking Plato’s Parmenides” (2002–2007)—that served to gather a thriv- ing international community of scholars and establish and disseminate con- crete advances in the field. And last but not least, with his characteristic wisdom, erudition, and generosity, he has mentored undergraduates at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, supervised several generations of doctoral students throughout the world (some of whom have contributed to the present volume), and inspired a wide range of scholars working on Gnos- ticism and Platonism. 1 Schenke 1974; 1981; 1987. xii preface Perhaps the most important aspect of John’s work has been its eminent position at the forefront of an ongoing paradigm shift, so to speak, in the study of Gnosticism and Platonism. As recently as thirty-five years ago— before the full effect of the Nag Hammadi corpus’ publication had been felt—it was still possible for A.H. Armstrong to assert that the influence of Greek philosophy upon Gnosticism was “not genuine, but
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