Against Heresies: Book II

IF: once again, they claim that the twelve apostles were only a symbol of the group of twelve Æons that Anthropos, together with Ecclesia, created, then let them provide ten more apostles as a symbol of those remaining ten Æons, who, they say, were created by Logos and Zoe. It is illogical to think that the junior Æons, who are considered inferior for that reason, were represented by the Savior through the selection of apostles, while their seniors, and therefore their superiors, were not represented; since if the Savior chose the apostles with the intent of showing the Æons in the Pleroma through them, He could have also chosen another ten apostles, and another eight before these, to represent the original and primary Ogdoad.

He could not demonstrate any symbol of the second Duo Decad, since the apostles' number already served as a symbol. For after the twelve apostles, our Lord sent seventy others ahead of Him.

But seventy cannot possibly be a symbol of an Ogdoad, a Decad, or a Triacontad. So why are the inferior Æons, as I mentioned, represented by the apostles, but the superior Æons, from whom the former derive their existence, not prefigured at all? If the twelve apostles were chosen to indicate the number of the twelve Æons, then the seventy should have also been chosen as a type of seventy Æons; and in that case, they must assert that the Æons are not thirty but eighty-two in number.

For He who chose the apostles to be a type of those Æons in the Pleroma would not have made them types of only some and not others; instead, through the apostles, He would have attempted to preserve an image and exhibit a type of all the Æons in the Pleroma.

2.

FURTHERMORE: we must not remain silent about Paul, but question them about the type of Æon that apostle has been portrayed as, unless perhaps they claim he represents the Savior composed of all of them, who came into being from the combined gifts of the whole, and whom they call All Things, as having been formed from them all. Concerning this being, the poet Hesiod has expressed himself strikingly, calling him Pandora—meaning "The gift of all"—because the best gift that everyone possessed was centered in him.

When describing these gifts, the following account is given: Hermes (as he is called in Greek) "implanted words of fraud and deceit in their minds, and thievish habits," to lead foolish people astray so they would believe their lies. For their Mother, Leto, secretly incited them (which is also why she is called Leto, according to the Greek meaning, because she secretly incited men), without the Demiurge's knowledge, to spread deep and unspeakable mysteries to eager listeners. Not only did their Mother ensure that this mystery was revealed by Hesiod, but she also skillfully did so through the lyric poet Pindar.

In his description to the Demiurge of the case of Pelops, whose flesh was cut into pieces by the Father and then gathered, reassembled, and united by all the gods, she indicated Pandora and these men with consciences seared by her, asserting, as they believe, the same things, proving them to be of the same family and spirit as the others.