the Father, the Son, Christology, & the Church in the Tripartite Tractate

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MrMacSon
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the Father, the Son, Christology, & the Church in the Tripartite Tractate

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the Tripartite Tractate is an untitled treatise of Valentinian theology (I think one Gnostic scholar says Valentinianism is not typically Gnostic (I can't remember who - maybe Elaine Pagels - but if/when I confirm who I will insert details here).
... the treatise...contains elements that point toward an early phase of Valentinian theology, like the theory that the aeons initially existed inside the Father as in a womb— a theory also attested for Valentinus himself (Tertullian Against the Valentinians 4.3) and found in the Gospel of Truth. It is not unlikely that the Tripartite Tractate incorporates materials and ideas from different Valentinian sources, some of which may be significantly older than the treatise itself.

Einar Thomassen (2010) 'The Tripartite Tractate', in The Nag Hammadi Scriptures: The Revised and Updated Translation of Sacred Gnostic Texts Complete in One Volume, Meyer, Marvin W. & Robinson, James M., eds; HarperOne.(Kindle Locations 1486-1490)

Below are excerpts from the chapter by Einar Thomassen in The Nag Hammadi Scriptures ..., 2010. The text in white boxes are excerpts from the the Tripartite Tractate itself.

In one section, Einar first framed things by how they are not representative of other Valentinian theology and then said what the Tripartite Tractate says, but I have reversed the order to state what Einar says about the Tripartite Tractate first, then put the other commentary in smaller sized text in square brackets [...] next.
THE TRIPARTITE TRACTATE

NHC I,5

Introduced and Translated by Einar Thomassen

The first and longest part deals with the Father, the Son, and the emanation of the Pleroma, or Fullness, the fall of the youngest aeon, and the creation of the cosmos. The second, quite short part narrates the creation of the first human and his transgression and expulsion from paradise. The last part describes the many confused opinions among people about the nature of the cosmos, the advent of the Savior, the establishment of the church, and the fates of the various categories of humans.

The importance of this tractate is above all that it contains a version of the Valentinian system that is distinctly Valentinian at the same time that it differs on many points from the well-known systems reported by the church fathers. For this reason, it helps us understand better what are the constant and indispensable features of the Valentinian systems and what are individual and local variations.

... its aeons are numberless and nameless [the system of Tripartite Tractate does not have a Pleroma of thirty aeons and does not list the names of the aeons] ...

... the Tripartite Tractate describes the emanation process in embryological terms as a gradual formation of the Pleroma within the Father that ends in the birth of the aeons as autonomous beings [Instead of presenting the Pleroma as being unfolded by means of arithmetical and geometrical derivations].

Further, there [is] only one Sophia [not two Sophias, as in the systems reported by Irenaeus and Hippolytus]

In fact, the fallen aeon is not called Sophia at all, but simply a logos, or word (logos being used as a generic name for the aeons). ... in the Tripartite Tractate the Savior is himself incarnated in a human body, suffers, dies, and is redeemed [there is no “psychical Christ”— the figure that the Savior [might] puts on when he descends into the world and who suffers and is crucified while the Savior himself remains passionless] ...

In its Christology and soteriology, the Tripartite Tractate in fact agrees with the Eastern Valentinian Theodotus, who says that the Savior himself was in need of redemption after having descended into the world of matter (Excerpts from Theodotus 22.7; cf. Tripartite Tractate 124, 32– 125, 4). The idea that the Savior participated fully in the human condition in order for humans to share in his spiritual being (cf. Tripartite Tractate 115, 3– 11) is a distinctive Eastern Valentinian doctrinal feature. The Tripartite Tractate therefore seems to be the only preserved example of a complete Eastern Valentinian systematic treatise.

The outline of the treatise follows a pattern familiar from the heresiological presentations of the Valentinian system and whose main features can be found in certain other Gnostic treatises as well, such as the Secret Book of John.

The main divisions are:
  1. First principles: the Father, the Son, and the Church of aeons (51, 1– 59, 38)
  2. The projection of the aeons (60, 1– 75, 17)
  3. The passion of the youngest aeon and the origin of the material powers (75, 17– 80, 11)
  4. The conversion of the aeon-logos and the origin of the psychical powers (80, 11– 85, 15)
  5. The mission of the Savior and the origin of the spiritual kind (85, 11– 95, 16)
  6. The creation of the cosmos and the region of the Middle (95, 17– 104, 3)
  7. The creation of humanity and the expulsion from paradise (104, 4– 108, 12)
  8. The errors of humankind and the prophecies (108, 13– 113, 5)
  9. The advent and work of the Savior (113, 5– 118, 14)
  10. The destiny of the three kinds of humans (118, 14– 138, 27)

In several respects, the system of the Tripartite Tractate is simpler than the parallel accounts in the church fathers. Instead of the complex hierarchies of aeons, as found in Irenaeus and Hippolytus, the transcendent world is described here as the relationships among three factors: the Father, the Son, and the Church.

The Son is eternally generated by the Father as his self-reflective and self-admiring Thought, and the Church is the multiplicity of divine qualities that inhere in this self-reflective activity, “in the same way as kisses, when two people abundantly embrace one another in a good and insatiable thought— it is a single embrace but consists of many kisses” (58, 22– 29).

It is clear that the multitudinous aeons generated in this way are aspects or attributes of the Father himself. However, they also evolve into a congregation of autonomous beings through a process that brings them forth from the Thought, like children from a womb. The successive phases of this divine gestation are the theme of Tripartite Tractate 60, 1– 75, 17.

Einar Thomassen (2010) 'The Tripartite Tractate', in The Nag Hammadi Scriptures: The Revised and Updated Translation of Sacred Gnostic Texts Complete in One Volume, Meyer, Marvin W. & Robinson, James M, eds.. HarperOne. (Kindle Locations 1401-1440).

The Generation of the Son -

For it is truly his ineffable self that he engenders. It is self-generation, where he conceives of himself and knows himself as he is. He brings forth something worthy of the admiration, glory, praise, and honor that belong to himself, through his boundless greatness, his inscrutable wisdom, his immeasurable power, and his sweetness that is beyond tasting. It is he himself whom he puts forth in this manner of generation, and who receives glory and praise, admiration and love, and it is also he who gives himself glory, admiration, praise, and love ...

This is how he exists eternally within himself. As we have explained, by knowing himself in himself the Father bore him without generation, so that he exists by the Father having him as a thought— that is, his thought about himself, his sensation [57] of himself and… of his eternal being. This is what in truth is meant by “Silence”— or “Wisdom,” 5 or “Grace,” as the latter is also rightly called.

Einar Thomassen (2010) 'The Tripartite Tractate', in The Nag Hammadi Scriptures: The Revised and Updated Translation of Sacred Gnostic Texts ... (Kindle Locations 1544-1553). HarperOne.

“Church” is not a common name for the Pleroma in the extant (Western) versions of the Valentinian system, but the idea it expresses is certainly presupposed there as well. In the Tripartite Tractate the term serves to highlight the correspondence between the Pleroma as a congregation of aeons and the “Church in the flesh” (125, 4– 5). The earthly church is an image of the Pleroma, and this relationship is an essential element in the system as a whole. The origin of the earthly church goes back to before the creation of the world. It is narrated as an episode in the story of the fallen aeon, a story that tells how everything in the lower world came into being.

The fallen aeon— called the Logos, or Word, in the Tripartite Tractate— first experienced a passion, which came alive as a multitude of rebellious powers, the powers of materiality. The Logos’s second emotion was repentance and prayer for help; this gave rise to a superior set of powers having a psychical nature. In response to the prayer for help, the aeons then collectively produced and sent out the Son-Savior, who manifested the totality of the Pleroma to the Logos.

Seeing him, the Logos experienced a third emotion: joy. Expressing this emotion by jubilant thanksgiving, the Logos gave birth to the third kind of beings, the spiritual seed. These beings form the spiritual church, which is established as a special region below the Pleroma. This church was an image of the Pleroma because it originated from the Logos’s vision of the Son and Savior.

... The cosmogonic myth explains how the cosmos was made from the substances of matter and soul; the anthropogony narrates how the material and psychical powers each contributed to the composition of the first human. In addition to body and soul, however, the first human received an input of spiritual seed from the region of the Logos and the spiritual church, a region now situated in the middle between the cosmos and the Pleroma. In consequence, some humans carry the spiritual seed from above inside them, but it is hidden in body and soul and not fully conscious of itself. At best, it inspired prophecies about a Savior and revealer coming in the future.

At a certain moment in time the Savior appeared on earth, assuming a human body and soul. Coming down, however, he also brought with him, as his spiritual body, the church of the spiritual seed from the intermediary region of the Logos. This idea of a preexistent church and body of the Savior, which was incarnated together with him, is an important and very characteristic Valentinian notion.

The descended church participates in the Savior’s work to redeem the spiritual seed hidden in humans; in addition, however, it needs instruction and redemption itself, since it still remains for it to be reunited with the Pleroma, its model. In this way, the cosmos serves as a training ground and an arena of redemption for the spiritual seed. To fulfill this purpose the church exists in the world, teaching, performing baptism, and doing similar sorts of things. Eventually the whole spiritual seed will have passed through the cosmos on its journey back to the Pleroma. The existence of the cosmos is thus a necessary element in the Father’s plan of salvation— the oikonomia— and has been willed by him from the beginning.

Einar Thomassen (2010) 'The Tripartite Tractate', in The Nag Hammadi Scriptures: The Revised and Updated Translation of Sacred Gnostic Texts Complete in One Volume (Kindle Locations 1441-1467). HarperOne.

The Preexistent Church (57, 23– 59, 38) -

He revealed his inscrutable power, and he mixed it with the plentiful abundance of his generosity. For not only the Son but also the Church exists from the beginning1.

If somebody now thinks that this statement is contradicted by the fact that the Son is an only son, that is not so, because of the mystery of the matter. For just as the Father is singular, and was shown to be his own father, so also the Son may be found to be his own brother, without generation and without beginning ...

... They have issued from him, the Son and the Father, in the same way as kisses, when two people abundantly embrace one another in a good and insatiable thought— it is a single embrace but consists of many kisses. This is the Church that consists of many people and exists before the aeons and is justly called “the aeons of the aeons.”

… the Church exists in the properties and qualities in which the Father and the Son exist and which I have described earlier. Thus it consists of innumerable births of aeons, and these in turn give birth in infinite number through the qualities and properties in which they [exist]. These [are a] community [formed] with one another and [with the ones] who have gone forth from [them and] with the Son, because of whom they exist as glory.

Einar Thomassen (2010) 'The Tripartite Tractate', in The Nag Hammadi Scriptures ... HarperOne. (Kindle Locations 1558-1571).

What strikes me from the description about and text from the Tripartite Tractate is that much of can be seen as 'proto'-Christian theology.

1 That stikes me as being Eusebian ie. the sort of thing Eusebius would like and emulate.
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Re: the Father, the Son, Christology, & the Church in the Tripartite Tractate

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MrMacSon wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 3:03 am the Tripartite Tractate is an untitled treatise of Valentinian theology (I think one Gnostic scholar says Valentinianism is not typically Gnostic ...
...
What strikes me from the description about and text from the Tripartite Tractate is that much of can be seen as 'proto'-Christian theology.

That stikes me as being Eusebian ie. the sort of thing Eusebius would like and emulate.
Not sure what part of it you mean by 'proto-Christian'? The Father, Son and Church elements? Eusebius? The Gnostics really were not very abundant in his time, unless you include Marcionites. I cannot believe that he would have wrapped up all these ideas and made up sources like Papias and Hegesippus to express them, which then somehow influenced revisions of Irenaeus' Against Heresies, if that is what you are suggesting.

The scenario described by Einar Thomassen would make an excellent plot for a big budget Science Fiction movie! It is like something L. Ron Hubbard would come up with if he was on Meth-amphetamines. The instability in the existing order and its unwelcome consequents, and the heroic "suicide" rescue mission made by a projected aeon to make it all right again, brilliant! It is not a uniquely "Christian" story, though. Notions of that kind of cosmic drama I can believe pre-existed the mid 1st century CE.

So, you start with gentile converts to Judaism who followed the teachings of Jesus of Galilee about the coming Messianic Kingdom. The failed attempt by Judeans and Galileans and Idumeans to establish a revived "Judean" kingdom without Roman consent probably caused them to be disillusioned to the point of re-defining themselves. Were they "Judeans" or were they "righteous gentiles"? Divine Savior ideas such as outlined above were adapted to the former messianic ideas, to produce the classic "Christ" theology in the letters of Paul.

I also think it likely that some devotee of an early Cosmic Redeemer myth adapted the classic Christ theology from the Christian NT to produce the Aeon Redeemer theology of the Tripartite Tractate, which was later developed by Valentinus and his followers.

DCH
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Re: the Father, the Son, Christology, & the Church in the Tripartite Tractate

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DCHindley wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 7:50 am
MrMacSon wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 3:03 am the Tripartite Tractate is an untitled treatise of Valentinian theology (I think one Gnostic scholar says Valentinianism is not typically Gnostic ...
...
What strikes me from the description about and text from the Tripartite Tractate is that much of can be seen as 'proto'-Christian theology.

That stikes me as being Eusebian ie. the sort of thing Eusebius would like and emulate.
Not sure what part of it you mean by 'proto-Christian'? The Father, Son and Church elements?
Essentially. Narratives about "the advent of the Savior, the establishment of the church, and the fates of the various categories of humans."

"The idea that the Savior participated fully in the human condition in order for humans to share in his spiritual being" and "that the Savior himself was in need of redemption after having descended into the world of matter".

DCHindley wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 7:50 am Eusebius? The Gnostics really were not very abundant in his time, unless you include Marcionites. I cannot believe that he would have wrapped up all these ideas and made up sources like Papias and Hegesippus to express them, which then somehow influenced revisions of Irenaeus' Against Heresies, if that is what you are suggesting.
Just the statement that "the Church exists from the beginning." It brought up the issue of the bishops lists, which, although finalised by Eusebius, are said to have originated in the times of Hegesippus, etc.

DCHindley wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 7:50 am The failed attempt by Judeans, and Galileans and Idumeans, to establish a revived "Judean" kingdom without Roman consent probably caused them to be disillusioned to the point of re-defining themselves. Were they "Judeans" or were they "righteous gentiles"? Divine Savior ideas such as outlined above were adapted to the former messianic ideas, to produce the classic "Christ" theology in the letters of Paul.

I also think it likely that some devotee of an early Cosmic Redeemer myth adapted the classic Christ theology from the Christian NT to produce the Aeon Redeemer theology of the Tripartite Tractate, which was later developed by Valentinus and his followers.
I think disillusionment is likely to have been matched by members of the Jewish diaspora meeting and living among members of non-Jewish cults.
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Re: the Father, the Son, Christology, & the Church in the Tripartite Tractate

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MrMacSon wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 12:54 pm I think disillusionment is likely to have been matched by members of the Jewish diaspora meeting and living among members of non-Jewish cults.
Quite. That is where Birger Pearson finds the origins of the "Sethian" Gnostics. These totally rejected their national God as a petty, jealous, ignorant pretender and thus unworthy of worship. They just wanted out of this world. It HAD to be a tragic mistake, but one that could not be fixed.

These disaffected Judean sages who went "Sethian" did not develop as strong an attachment to divine redeemer theology as did disappointed gentile converts to Judaism.

Disaffected Gentile converts on the other hand converted their messianic figure Jesus the anointed leader to usher in the new age into the divine redeemer of pagan gnostic myths, dba "Jesus Christ."

DCH
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Re: the Father, the Son, Christology, & the Church in the Tripartite Tractate

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DCHindley wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 1:23 pm
MrMacSon wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 12:54 pm I think disillusionment is likely to have been matched by members of the Jewish diaspora meeting and living among members of non-Jewish cults.
Quite. That is where Birger Pearson finds the origins of the "Sethian" Gnostics. These totally rejected their national God as a petty, jealous, ignorant pretender and thus unworthy of worship. They just wanted out of this world. It HAD to be a tragic mistake, but one that could not be fixed.

These disaffected Judean sages who went "Sethian" did not develop as strong an attachment to divine redeemer theology as did disappointed gentile converts to Judaism.
Some of the 'converts' to Judaism through the 1st century had been forced, too ie. many had been slaves. The introduction of the fiscus Iudaicus/ Judaicus by Vespasian caused hassles for them, and the softening of it by Nerva caused further problems for Judaism as it provided an out for freed slaves and other converts.
DCHindley wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 1:23 pm Disaffected Gentile converts on the other hand converted their messianic figure Jesus the anointed leader to usher in the new age into the divine redeemer of pagan gnostic myths, dba "Jesus Christ."
Yep, there would have been various intertwining of theologies (and philosophies such as Platonism and Stoicism) over a period of a few generations.
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Re: the Father, the Son, Christology, & the Church in the Tripartite Tractate

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MrMacSon wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 1:52 pm
DCHindley wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 1:23 pm
MrMacSon wrote: Sat Oct 13, 2018 12:54 pm I think disillusionment is likely to have been matched by members of the Jewish diaspora meeting and living among members of non-Jewish cults.
Quite. That is where Birger Pearson finds the origins of the "Sethian" Gnostics. These totally rejected their national God as a petty, jealous, ignorant pretender and thus unworthy of worship. They just wanted out of this world. It HAD to be a tragic mistake, but one that could not be fixed.

These disaffected Judean sages who went "Sethian" did not develop as strong an attachment to divine redeemer theology as did disappointed gentile converts to Judaism.
Some of the 'converts' to Judaism through the 1st century had been forced, too ie. many had been slaves.
I think you are gonna find that statement hard to defend. Roman law forbade mutilation of slaves, and I cannot think of a single case where I read of a gentile slave being "forced" to convert to Judaism as a slave. Now Judeans, especially well connected ones, did own gentile slaves. Eventually freeing most of these, setting them up with a legacy and at least some form of Roman citizenship (there were two grades - full and limited), was considered good practice.

Their conversion was not required, although they were still tied to their former masters as clients to a patron, and might still even live in their domiciles. Agrippa I (before the "I") called on a couple of his freedmen who had a better grasp on their finances than Agrippa did, for their help in securing loans so he could make it to Rome and beg Tiberius for help. But I don't think that any of them are suggested to have been Judeans themselves, whether by ethnicity or conversion.

It is said that Judeans did not make a slave out of a fellow Judean. You may have heard that some Judeans may have bought existing Judean slaves (of gentile masters), who they might free to make them freedmen clients with the purchaser becoming the freedman's patron. This would be also co0nsidered a good thing, if only to expand one's web of connections. I understand that this sometimes happened, but I cannot cite any sources off the top of my head.

But we do find inscriptions from the 3-4th centuries CE where freed slaves expressed their intention to do so, but I take this as a token of respect for their master's faith, that they gladly assume the same covenant that their (former) master observed.

DCH :?
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