The Secret Book of John (hereafter SBJohn) has been called “the Gnostic Bible.”Footnote ¹ It is arguably the most classic of the “Classic Gnostic” texts. Yet what if we do not approach it solely as a “gnostic” document, but as a Christian one – or as a gnostic Christian one? After all, SBJohn, in its present form(s), is ostensibly Christian. It represents a dialogue between Jesus and John, son of Zebedee, who is possibly the beloved disciple. It speaks of the Father, the origin of Christ, a theory of the Trinity, the creation of humanity based on Genesis, and final salvation made possible by Christ’s new revelation. These are classic Christian topics of discourse, and Christian discourse was a type of discourse using and transforming Jewish texts and traditions.Footnote ²

SBJohn is not a stable or a single text. It survives in four copies and in three recensions. Three of the four copies are from the Nag Hammadi Codices, and one is in the fifth-century Berlin Codex (Papyrus Berolinensis 8502,2). Every copy is written in Coptic, but each is presumably a translation from a Greek text. The longer recensions – which usually receive the lion’s share of attention – appear as the first text in Nag Hammadi Codices II and IV (hereafter “SBJohn II” and “SBJohn IV”). There are two recensions of the shorter version, one in the Berlin Codex (hereafter BG), and the other in the first-place position of Nag Hammadi Codex III. Due to its relative neglect in scholarship, the present volume will focus on the Codex III version of SBJohn, hereafter “SBJohn III.”

The shorter version of SBJohn is probably earlier than the longer one, since the longer shows editing consistent with the addition of a final section (the Providence monologue) and smooths over various inconsistencies and rough patches in the shorter version(s).Footnote ³ It also adds a longer introduction and conclusion (see Chapter 7).

There is a reasonable – though debated – argument that the Nag Hammadi versions came to be housed in a monastery library (or libraries) in Upper Egypt.Footnote ⁴ Still, SBJohn could have originated from the pen of an alternative Christian writer or writers living in an urban environment. During the whole time of its early existence, the only known readers and preservers of SBJohn were Christians, whether they lived along the Nile’s stream or along the Rhône in southern France.

Outline and Characters

The myth of SBJohn is perennial in its power to bewilder and to entice. It begins with John son of Zebedee’s encounter with a Pharisee in the temple. When John turns to a deserted place, his metaphysical questions are answered by a triform Jesus bursting with light (the transfiguration “take two”). Jesus begins with the Father discourse, then turns to the emanation of the Barbelon, her four attendants, the emanation of the Selfborn God, the Selfborn’s four attendants, their rule over four realms, and the denizens of these realms. Next comes the launch of Wisdom’s adventure, her failed imitation of the Father, the birth of Yaldabaoth, Yaldabaoth’s (angelic) creations, and Wisdom’s repentance. The plan to redeem Wisdom’s light power follows, starting with the creation of Adam, his reception of the light power, the inhabitation of luminous wisdom, the truth about “paradise,” the creation of the earthly woman, and the production of Cain and Abel. A dialogue intervenes on the topic of how souls are saved and lost, followed by the origin story of fate and the counterfeit spirit (a retelling of the Great Flood narrative), and Jesus’ curt conclusion before reascending.

The myth has more characters than a Russian novel – and some of the characters have long names and multiple designations. The figures of John and Jesus are familiar enough to readers of the gospels. A Pharisee is not surprising to find either – though his name – Arimanias – is unusual for a Jew (1.1). Then we arrive at the Father, also known as the One, and the Invisible Spirit (4.2). From him emerges Barbelon – as Barbelo is named in Codex III – who is called the primal Human (5.4–9). From her comes a tetrad of eternal beings, or “eternities” (aka “aeons”): Primal Knowledge, Incorruptibility, Eternal Life, and Thought. Barbelon’s most exalted Son is the Selfborn (aka “Autogenes”), who is Christ (7.6–8). Christ has four archangelic attendants called “Lights” or “Luminaries,” namely Armozel, Oroiael, Daveithe, and Eleleth (8.4–12). Each one of these Lights has model occupants: Adamas, Seth, Seth’s Seed, and those who repent (9.1–10). The Lights are also supreme over twelve eternities, though only the last, Wisdom, is a major character (10.1–9).

Wisdom independently gives birth to the creator called Yaldabaoth, also called Saklas. Yaldabaoth makes numbered sets of authorities and powers, totaling 360. Seven of these powers make Adam’s soul and body – although all 360 fit the joints together. Yaldabaoth himself makes the earthly woman, Eve. From Eve and Yaldabaoth come Cain and Abel, whose true names are Yahweh and Elohim. Then Adam fathers Seth, and Seth has a posterity which includes Noah and his family. This “immovable family” (aka the “unshakable generation”) is helped by a manifestation of Wisdom called “Luminous Insight” (16.1–9). They are, in turn, hindered by a “counterfeit spirit” made by the lower rulers.

Provenance

1. (1) Date. Sometime in the 180s ce, Irenaeus reported the contents of a treatise with strong resemblance to SBJohn’s Father discourse and the story of Wisdom. Scholars have sometimes inferred that he possessed the entire text of SBJohn while omitting its narrative frame, its story of salvation, and its conclusion. It is more likely that Irenaeus had a section of a text that was revised and later incorporated into SBJohn (see Chapter 6).

   As a result, Irenaeus is not the decisive anchor determining when SBJohn arose. The best one can say is that SBJohn (here referring to the shorter version in Greek represented by SBJohn III) was not known to Irenaeus. He either had not discovered it or it had not yet been compiled in its present form. Its compilation probably occurred before the mid third century ce, when texts like Zostrianos were read in Plotinus’ seminar at Rome. Zostrianos exhibits awareness of the master story in SBJohn. A longer version of SBJohn was composed somewhat later, probably in the mid to late third century.

2. (2) Place of Origin. SBJohn’s place of origin can only be judged from the text itself. SBJohn’s mention of 360 angels (14.25) seems to assume a 360-day calendar year. The 360-day year was not universal in the Mediterranean during the Roman period. It reflects a distinctly Egyptian calendar.Footnote ⁵

   SBJohn refers to lower rulers with animal faces (12.25–31). Here the author(s) would seem to be parodying native Egyptian depictions of animal-headed deities. SBJohn also presents a doctrine of transmigration (departed souls deposited in other bodies). Not many Christians asserted transmigration in the second and early third centuries ce. In fact, the only known Christians who clearly taught transmigration during this time were Alexandrians – namely Basilides, Carpocrates, and the Naassenes.Footnote ⁶

   SBJohn speculates on the God “Human,” in the figures of Barbelon and Adamas. Viewing God as the ultimate Human is significant, since Alexandria is the only place to which we can pinpoint speculation about a divine Human existing before flesh-and-blood humanity. Philo of Alexandria speculated about an androgynous type or form of Human who was the true image of God and different from the earthly Adam who received God’s breath.Footnote ⁷ The Hermetic tractate Poimandres also presents a pre-existent androgynous Human, the image of God, who became entangled in matter and now lives as the inner essence of humans on earth.Footnote ⁸ Both Philonic and Hermetic texts originated in Egypt.

   There are other exegetical traditions that distinctively appear in both SBJohn and Philo: Wisdom as God’s wife and daughter,Footnote ⁹ a double creation of Adam,Footnote ¹⁰ the divine image as noetic (not fleshly),Footnote ¹¹ the higher mind as “a divine fragment,”Footnote ¹² and the allegory of Eve as a means of knowledge.Footnote ¹³

   In describing the Flood, SBJohn treats the traditions of 1 Enoch as if they were on par with those of Genesis. One must inquire, then, where other Christians valued 1 Enoch as a quasi-scriptural authority in the second and third centuries ce. The epistle of Barnabas cites 1 Enoch as scripture (4.3).Footnote ¹⁴ Scholars debate whether it alludes to the books of Enoch in two other places (16.5, 6), though most believe it does.Footnote ¹⁵ Due to “Barnabas’s” citation formulas for 1 Enoch (“it has been written,” 4.3; “for scripture says,” 16.5), one can conclude that the author understood 1 Enoch as at least quasi-scriptural. The majority of scholars consider Barnabas a product of Alexandria.Footnote ¹⁶

   Origen had no problem citing “the book of Enoch” among other “sacred scriptures” – at least when he was writing On First Principles.Footnote ¹⁷ He wrote this work when he was in Alexandria (about 225 ce). When he moved to Palestine, however, Origen acknowledged that 1 Enoch was not accepted as scripture by all Christians.Footnote ¹⁸

   Accordingly, we have two early Christian authors who, while they were in Egypt (and Alexandria specifically), referred to 1 Enoch as scripture during the second and early third centuries ce. In other areas (for instance Rome, Asia Minor, and Gaul), early Christians showed (sometimes extensive) knowledge of Enochic traditions, but they did not cite 1 Enoch as scripture.Footnote ¹⁹ One can infer that the acceptance of 1 Enoch by early Christians as a quasi-scriptural authority was distinctively Egyptian. (In fact, the only church to preserve 1 Enoch as scripture was the Ethiopic church to Egypt’s south.Footnote ²⁰) Accordingly, a text that also treated 1 Enoch as quasi-scriptural authority (namely, SBJohn) is likely to have arisen in Egypt.

   The tradition that cosmic or planetary rulers have charge of human body parts appears in SBJohn 14.13–19. The idea is attested in Egypt; it appears in Ptolemy’s Tetrabiblos (3.12) which was available by about the mid second century. Celsus, the first great critic of Christianity, also mentions it in the 160s or 170s ce. Celsus probably dwelled in Egypt or at least sojourned there for a considerable period of time.Footnote ²¹ Celsus also related the distinctly Egyptian tradition of what he called thirty-six daimones (namely, the decans), each in charge of a different body part.Footnote ²²

   Taken singly, none of these arguments is decisive, but together they make a fair case for SBJohn’s Egyptian provenance. The exact social formation behind SBJohn remains a mystery. Karen King speaks of an urban school setting in Alexandria.Footnote ²³ One could also imagine a single individual writer (plus individual editors) or an ecclesial setting featuring religious fellowship and a liturgy.Footnote ²⁴ The boundaries between “school” and “church” were fluid.

3. (3) Codex III. Nag Hammadi Codex III manifests a distinctive handwriting, style, and vocabulary that is closer to standard Sahidic Coptic than is the case with other Nag Hammadi Codices.Footnote ²⁵ In the Codex, SBJohn stands in the first position, followed by the Holy Book of the Great Invisible Spirit, then Eugnostus, the Wisdom of Jesus Christ, and the Dialogue of the Savior. Each of these texts could be categorized as gospel or gospel-like literature. In their current forms, SBJohn, the Wisdom of Jesus Christ, and the Dialogue of the Savior are manifestly Christian works featuring Jesus and his apostles. They sandwich the Holy Book and Eugnostus, which were evidently useful or interesting to Christian readers in some way. Even if one maintains the theory that the Holy Book and Eugnostus were originally non-Christian, every text in Codex III was most likely copied out by Christians for Christian use sometime in the late fourth or early fifth century ce.

   The scribe of Codex III names himself “Gongessos” (a form of Concessus). He may or may not be identical with Eugnostus, the “well-knower” who is both “blessed” and “beloved” (NHC III,3 69.10). René Falkenberg proposes the theory that this “well-knower” would have been identified with the beloved disciple who, in early church tradition, is typically understood as John son of Zebedee.Footnote ²⁶ Since this son of Zebedee is the implied author of SBJohn, he could be the implied author of other texts in Codex III as well.Footnote ²⁷

   SBJohn III has some readings that appear in no other version of SBJohn. For instance, although it blames Wisdom for wanting to manifest her likeness without her partner’s consent, it uniquely records that Wisdom “was complete due to the guardian within her” (10.7). No other version of SBJohn refers to Wisdom as “complete” in her very act of self-will. And no other version refers to her inner “guardian” (a reading that is often corrected).Footnote ²⁸ In fact, we are later told that Wisdom became deficient, and the whole point of salvation is to fill up her lack (13.20–22). Evidently, the author(s) of SBJohn III wanted to shield Wisdom from too much blame.

   Another unique reading regards Adam’s sexuality. SBJohn III says that, after woman was created, Adam “knew his own lawlessness” (ἀνομία, 19.18). This is a rewriting of Genesis 4.25, where Adam “knew his wife, Eve.” The rewriting does not explicitly deny that Adam had sex with his wife. But his sexual performance is not coded as good.

   SBJohn in BG is more positive here, stating that “Adam knew his essence (ousia) which was like him.” And the Codex II version has Adam recognizing “the likeness of his own foreknowledge” (II 24, 16–18). These versions might suggest that intercourse – or some sort of spiritualized sex with the true Eve – was good for Adam. But such a reading is harder to cull from SBJohn III. SBJohn III also says that it is the wicked creator who sowed in Adam a lust for reproducing (19.15–16).

4. (4) Authorship. In a previous generation, some scholars claimed that “the core material” of SBJohn “has no Christian elements in it at all.”Footnote ²⁹ The frame story, in this view, “Christianizes” the core by presenting SBJohn as a revelation of the risen Christ. Within the frame, Christ speaks the entire content of SBJohn, including the commentary on Genesis, as part of a dialogue with John.

   The idea that SBJohn was “Christianized” relies in part on the theory that the text summarized by Irenaeus in AH 1.29 was the initial version of SBJohn and that this version lacked the frame narrative and the dialogue between Christ and John.Footnote ³⁰ One must observe, however, that the text summarized by Irenaeus already manifests Christian features (the appearance of Christ as the divine child in heaven, for instance), and that Irenaeus understood it as a text written by people claiming a Christian identity (if the text were not perceived as Christian, he would not have attacked it as Christian heresy).

   Nevertheless, if Irenaeus did not have the whole of SBJohn, but rather a section later woven into it, then one cannot say that SBJohn was Christianized – since SBJohn did not yet exist. When SBJohn emerged (after Irenaeus wrote), it was from its origin constructed as a Christian text. Even if one observes that SBJohn became increasingly Christian over time – evident when one compares the shorter and longer versions – there was likely never a time when SBJohn was not Christian on some level.

   Who originally wrote SBJohn? Jewish elements in SBJohn, such as Hebrew and Aramaic names and familiarity with interpretations that show up in rabbinic literature (for instance, Eve raped by the devil), might suggest a gnostic author who emerged from a “fringe group of hellenized Judaism.”Footnote ³¹

   An important question here is whether any group of Jews – no matter how Hellenistic, and how “fringe” – would turn against their own deity and depict him as a lion-serpent monster. There were certainly social crises for Jews in the early second century ce. Yet there is no surviving evidence that any such crisis led any Jews to turn on their own god.Footnote ³² The only documentable figures who supported “negative demiurgy” were Christians.Footnote ³³ They included (presumably Gentile) theologians like Basilides and Marcion. Other Christians like Valentinus and his heirs took up what might be called “neutral demiurgy” – the view that the creator was not evil, but righteous and subordinate to the true God. (To suppose that the vilification of the creator is inherently unchristian is to accept a view of Christianity controlled by Irenaeus and his heirs.Footnote ³⁴)

   Arguably, both neutral and negative demiurgy are based on Gentile Christian assumptions. One of these assumptions is that the supposedly eternal Law of Moses is not or is no longer valid. If the Law of the Jewish Lord is not valid – or valid only for a certain time and ethnic group – then the Jewish Lord manifests his local and limited nature. The covenant of this local lord is not permanent, but transient and mediated by lower (angelic) beings (Gal 3.19). To those who never grew up worshipping the Jewish deity, Yahweh’s claims to universality and singularity (e.g., “I, I am He, and there is no God besides me” [Deut 32.39]) sound less like blessing and more like bluster.

   To be sure, Philo attests that some Jews were “extreme allegorizers,” who read Torah symbolically and rejected its practical implementation. At the same time, these allegorizers never attacked the laws of Moses or repudiated the stories in Genesis. Some interpreters, Philo says, scorned the stories of Genesis as myths, but they never attacked the creator revealed in Hebrew scripture.Footnote ³⁵ Both kinds of interpreters were thus distinct from the attackers of Yaldabaoth in SBJohn. Such an attack presupposes that the Mosaic Law is already invalid, and that its implementation (practicing circumcision, for instance) is not only unnecessary, but also spiritually harmful.

   In the late second and early third centuries ce, the only persons propounding these ideas were Christians. One of these Christian interpreters – probably Alexandrian – had earlier claimed that an “evil angel” wheedled the Jews into practicing literal circumcision (Barnabas 9.4).Footnote ³⁶ The distance between an evil angel and an evil creator might seem large. But the idea that the creator god of the Jews was evil had already been canvassed by Egyptian writers who wrote counternarratives against the Hebrew myth of the Exodus.Footnote ³⁷ Gentile Christians in Egypt had only to conclude that the God of the Old Testament – who forbade the fruit of knowledge, regretted the making of humanity, and wiped them out with a flood – was not the God preached by Jesus. Second-century Christian debates about what could and could not be appropriated from Hebrew scriptures is the natural arena in which a Gnostic critical attitude to the Hebrew god could develop.Footnote ³⁸ Gnostics were Christians who could not tolerate the violence of the Hebrew god or see him as the Father of Jesus Christ.

   Although in the first and early second centuries ce “Jewish” and “Christian” were still fluid signifiers, by about 200 ce most Christians of Gentile extraction had distinguished themselves from Jewish practices and institutions. The process was accelerated in Alexandria. A massive pogrom in this city during the Diaspora revolt (115–117 ce) meant that the previously large Alexandrian Jewish population lost much of its cultural capital, and Gentile Christians were free (and, indeed, motivated) to carve out their own distinctive identities.Footnote ³⁹

   At the same time, these Christians did not suddenly forget that their cult and their Messiah emerged from a Jewish matrix. They still used Jewish scriptures, traditions, interpretive methods, and, in many cases, Judaic names and phrases to advance their identities. Whoever wrote SBJohn was deeply familiar with Jewish exegetical traditions, Hebrew and Aramaic names for angels and the Jewish deity, not to mention a range of texts from Jewish scripture. Such knowledge could equally suggest a Jewish or a Christian identity, or both.

   The fact that SBJohn primarily rewrites the first chapters of Genesis does not mean that the text was – or was at one time – Jewish. In antiquity, Genesis was a lightning rod attracting both Jews and the followers of Jesus. Jesus devotees read Jewish literature like 4 Ezra and 2 Baruch, and they even composed new fictions in which ancient Jewish figures speak (for instance, the Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs). They used the classic translation of Jewish scriptures (the Septuagint) – a translation which Jews increasingly abandoned to the Christians.Footnote ⁴⁰ There seems to be little doubt that the author of SBJohn used the Septuagint to selectively attack Genesis.Footnote ⁴¹ SBJohn is, therefore, most probably to be read as a Christian book, a manifestation of one of many Christian anti-Jewish texts which was – ironically – based on Jewish traditions.Footnote ⁴²

5. (5) Genre. One might conceive of an “original” SBJohn “shorn of its secondary framework and interpolations” as rewritten scripture.Footnote ⁴³ But the category of “rewritten scripture/Bible” has been criticized as diffuse and unknown in antiquity – not to mention the fact that shearing away the Christian elements of SBJohn is both risky and artificial.

   SBJohn manifests a plethora of genres including “romance,” “treatise,” “cosmogony,” “true history,” and “Wisdom monologue.”Footnote ⁴⁴ Overall, however, “revelation dialogue” seems a fair description of the final product. A revelation dialogue can be thought of as a Christian adaptation of a philosophical dialogue. In the mid second century, the Platonist Albinus distinguished “instructional” and “investigative” dialogues. The instructional type is appropriate for teaching, practice, and the demonstration of truth; investigative dialogues, in turn, train the reader to argue and refute what is false.Footnote ⁴⁵ There is a bit of both in SBJohn, but it is primarily instructional, and the instruction chiefly occurs by revealing truths as opposed to making logical arguments.

   As a Christian product, SBJohn can also be named a dialogue gospel. Gospel literature, broadly defined, is any type of literature involving the saving acts or message of Jesus.Footnote ⁴⁶ Thus the Gospel of Thomas is a gospel, although it has no continuous narrative, and the Holy Book is a gospel, though it is primarily an ecstatic liturgy. In dialogue gospels, Jesus is typically the main speaker, and he speaks with a range of disciples who ask brief and programmatic questions. As a dialogue gospel, SBJohn fits in nicely with the Wisdom of Jesus Christ and the Dialogue of the Savior, two of its companion texts in Nag Hammadi Codex III.

6. (6) Sethian? As a “classic gnostic” text, SBJohn has also been called “Sethian” and “arguably the earliest complete version of the ‘Sethian myth.’”Footnote ⁴⁷ The modern scholarly use of “Sethian” is based on a typology of themes and literary figures which a set of (mostly Nag Hammadi) texts share.Footnote ⁴⁸ Nevertheless SBJohn features more than mere Sethian traditions, but also mixes in “Barbeloite” and “Ophite” lore. Adam’s son Seth and his seed certainly appear in SBJohn, but they do not seem particularly prominent. Seth is not highlighted as a redeemer. His blinkered appearance among the four Lights does not suggest a solid integration.Footnote ⁴⁹

   Even if one attempts to preserve “Sethian” (or “Gnostic” or “Classic Gnostic”) as a category for understanding SBJohn, one should remember that “Sethian” and “Gnostic” identities overlapped with Christian ones. Unfortunately, the modern construction of “Sethianism” or “Sethian Gnosticism” has led some interpreters to conclude that there was an independent Gnostic myth and/or movement – often said to have emerged from Judaism – that was originally unchristian but subsequently – and selectively – Christianized. Such a theory is not supported by the data in SBJohn.

   Due to the problematic and overdetermined category of “Sethianism,” the approach of this book is not to categorize SBJohn as a “Sethian” text pure and simple, but as a Christian one, in accordance with the manifestly Christian features of its final form. At the same time, one could label it a “Sethian Christian” text, written by a Christian or set of Christians identifying themselves as the “immovable family” and the “seed of Seth.”

Individual or Community?

It is debated whether SBJohn was written by independent (even isolated) authors or whether these authors belonged to a concrete Christian group. One way to test the theory of group identity is to identify distinctive ethical and liturgical practices in the text that reflect a communal ethos.

1. (1) Celibacy. It is fair to say that SBJohn is an ascetic text. At the same time, there is a dispute as to whether it actually prohibits sex.Footnote ⁵⁰ According to one theory, SBJohn implies that its ideal readers, “like Adam, by rejecting carnal marriage and procreation, receive restoration to that primordial spiritual marriage in union with the divine spirit.”Footnote ⁵¹ “Carnal marriage” stands “in radical antithesis to spiritual union. Sexual intercourse and procreation are the demonic imitation of spiritual increase and they remain anathema to those regenerated by the spirit.”Footnote ⁵²

   This view has ample support in SBJohn III. First, there is the remark that the snake symbolizes the “sowing of lust, the defilement of destruction” (17.17). In short, the phallic snake is allegorized as sexual lust. Even clearer is the remark, “Till this day, sex was instituted and perpetuated by the first ruler. He sowed in Adam the lust for reproducing so that from this nature, the rulers sowed their likeness” (19.15–16). If the creator (Yaldabaoth), is evil, then sex and sexual desire (the lust for reproducing material bodies) would seem to be part of his diabolical plan. Sex was part of Yaldabaoth’s malign strategy to distract human beings from understanding their true nature. Yaldabaoth invented sex and was the first to perform it – he mated with Ignorance (11.11; or, in other versions, Madness). He paired his lower powers with female partners; he created Eve, raped her, and launched his angels to have sex with other women as well (21.16–17). On the face of it, then, SBJohn III presents a myth hostile toward sexual activity. Read in terms of social practice, SBJohn seems to laud an ideal community free from both sex and sexual desire.

   As counterevidence, one could cite Adam’s quotation of Genesis 2.23–24 after Eve is created: “‘Now you are bone from my bone and flesh from my flesh’ … For this reason the human will leave his father and mother and stick to his wife so that the two become one flesh” (18.12–13). Among most Jewish and Christian interpreters, this verse was an obvious validation of sexuality within marriage.Footnote ⁵³ The passage in SBJohn goes on to say that the Mother’s partner was sent to make right her deficiencies. If the Mother on high is “married” and made right by marriage, then marriage on earth should be approved as well.

   Yet one must examine the context in SBJohn III. Before Adam quotes this passage, he recognizes his “joint essence” – a “joint essence” that is never explicitly identified with Eve. In fact, Eve is never named in SBJohn III. Adam’s “joint essence” seems to refer to Luminous Insight, who – having long abided in Adam – had just lifted the veil from Adam’s mind (18.10). Accordingly, Adam’s citation of Genesis 2.23–24 does not initiate his involvement with carnal sex, “but rather his restoration to primordial union with” his true partner and helper, Luminous Insight.Footnote ⁵⁴ This is spiritual sex, not carnal. Adam’s true wife is Insight, not Eve.

   According to SBJohn II, Luminous Insight enters the newly created Eve (19.8).Footnote ⁵⁵ But this point is never admitted in SBJohn III. In this version, Yaldabaoth makes a “secondary formation in the shape of a woman” (18.6), but he himself is unable to grasp Luminous Insight. Thus he could not transfer Insight from Adam to Eve. The reader might infer that Luminous Insight independently leapt into Eve, but that itself is an interpretive leap. The next time Insight appears in the narrative, she is not in Eve, but in an eagle on the tree of knowledge (18.16). On the basis of SBJohn III, then, it is imprecise to say that Eve herself illuminated Adam.Footnote ⁵⁶

   One could still argue, however, that the creator’s invention of sex was “another unsuccessful ploy of the lower rulers to dominate humanity.”Footnote ⁵⁷ According to this theory, the rulers meant sex for evil (to copy themselves), but the first couple used it for good (to sexually produce Seth without sexual desire). “Rather than act from polluting desire, Adam begot Seth when he recognized his spiritual essence in Eve, so that Seth was born through intercourse but according to the pattern of divine reproduction.”Footnote ⁵⁸

   Although SBJohn III does not say that Adam recognized his spiritual essence in (the material) Eve, Adam does father “Seth according to (the model of) the higher family among the eternities” (19.19). One must, however, specify which act of Adam follows the model of the higher family. It could be Adam’s act of reproduction (the fact that he can reproduce himself acting as a father), or his act of sex, or both.

   In the context of SBJohn III, it is not likely that Adam’s sexual act accords with a heavenly model, for two reasons. First – and unlike the report of Irenaeus (AH 1.29) – the author(s) of SBJohn do not accept the idea that the eternities formed pairs to reproduce. There is a heavenly Adamas and a heavenly Seth, but the heavenly Adamas does not unite with a heavenly Eve, and Seth does not have heavenly wives to produce his heavenly seed. The only higher beings that have sex are the wicked “powers and authorities” yoked by Yaldabaoth (12.39).

   Second, in SBJohn 19.18 it is said that Adam “knew his own lawlessness.” Sex meant that Adam realized his lawless sexual impulse – a negatively colored impulse implanted by Yaldabaoth (19.16).Footnote ⁵⁹ In effect, Yaldabaoth first implanted (negative) sexual desire in Adam, and Adam then used it to produce Seth.

   At the same time, the idea that Seth is born “according to (the model of) the higher family” (19.19) might suggest that Seth was born asexually, as births occur in the divine realm.Footnote ⁶⁰ In Genesis 4.25, of course, it is clear that Eve conceives and bears Seth. But in SBJohn III, Adam knows his likeness and he alone fathers Seth (19.19).Footnote ⁶¹ Most readers still infer that Eve must have produced Seth.Footnote ⁶² But if Adam mated with Insight (his true essence), then she is Seth’s real mother. (It is not the case that Insight is always identified or associated with the earthly woman, Eve.Footnote ⁶³)

   Admittedly, the versions of SBJohn seem to disagree, but in SBJohn III, at least, carnal sex is probably not validated, even if it produces Seth, ancestor of the redeemed. In theory, there might be sex without sexual desire, but this position is not clearly advocated in SBJohn III. Accordingly, sexual reproduction is probably not part of the divine plan which contributes to salvation.Footnote ⁶⁴ One can grant that the reproduction of Seth’s seed contributes to salvation, but sex with Eve – the woman of flesh and blood – is not thereby validated. After all, Seth’s seed is not – or not primarily – biological. People recognize Seth as their ancestor by accepting the truth of Sethian lore, not because their Sethian parents had sex.

   To be sure, Sethian Christians supported spiritual union with Luminous Insight. In terms of social practice, however, they preferred and promoted celibacy, at least for the “full” members of the Sethian Christian group. This is a distinctive ethical position, opposed to the distinct view (represented by Clement of Alexandria), that sex within marriage was acceptable for Christians – if it is performed without lust and limited to reproduction.Footnote ⁶⁵

   Celibate Sethian Christians would not have accepted the label “deviant.” After all, they were not entirely unique in promoting celibacy. They would have joined the ranks of other Christian thinkers and groups such as Julius Cassianus, the author of the Testimony of Truth, and Marcionite Christians – who, by the late second century, had made it to Alexandria.Footnote ⁶⁶ Celibacy, of course, became “orthodox” in the monastic tradition, and remains the case today.

2. (2) Ritual. If the author(s) of SBJohn promoted a distinctive ethic of celibacy, did they also mark their identities by ritual innovation? In several Christian groups, the rituals performed on earth were projected onto the heavenly world. The same seems to be implied in Sethian Christian society. For example, the Father is bathed in a primordial “light water” (5.3), which might indicate the original waters of baptism. If so, this primal baptism led to the production of Thought, which might reflect the enlightenment received in earthly baptism. Clement called baptism “enlightenment” because it conveyed saving knowledge.Footnote ⁶⁷

   There is also the primal anointing of Christ (7.6). This heavenly act might hint at some corresponding rite of anointing on earth. Anointing with “unspeakable ointment” was a Naassene ritual.Footnote ⁶⁸ One might speculate that Sethian Christians, for whom Christ became perfect by anointing, also anointed themselves in a rite to complete their baptism.

   The longer version of SBJohn mentions the Five Seals (II 31,24; IV 49,4). This rite – whether it was a rite of baptism, anointing, or both – appears as a distinctive act of a particular group. Debate continues about its actual process. Perhaps the Five Seals was a rite of anointing (with oil or ointment) following baptism in living water.Footnote ⁶⁹ If eyes, ears, mouth, nose, and skin were anointed, then each of these five senses received a seal. Alternatively, it was the baptism itself that involved a fivefold immersion or lustration in water.Footnote ⁷⁰ Sethian Christians renounced worldly life, and as they were dunked or sprinkled, spiritual powers were invoked. After anointing, they were clothed and enthroned to signify a new status.Footnote ⁷¹

   The heavenly rites of thanksgiving and glorification in SBJohn might also hint at a liturgy practiced on earth. Barbelon gives glory to the Invisible Spirit for her attendants (6.4). These attendants in turn give glory to the Invisible Spirit and to Barbelon (7.17). Christ and his attendants perform a similar courtly ritual of glorification when they come into existence (7.9–17). Adamas proclaims the longest doxology: “I give glory and I bless the invisible Spirit! Because of you all things exist within you. I bless you and the Selfborn, and the eternal one, the Trinity – Father, Mother, Child – the perfect Power!” (9.5–6).

   This elevated language could be taken to reflect a distinctive ritual culture. Whether by accident or by intention, Sethian Christians believed that the structures of earth represented those in heaven. One can hypothesize that they would have imitated ritual and liturgical structures that they thought happened in heaven. From our perspective, these Christians projected elements of their own ritual life onto the heavenly plane. From their perspective, however, heaven was the real world and human liturgies were the paltry imitations.

   All this evidence, admittedly inferential, indicates that SBJohn represents a distinctive ethical and ritual life. Probably, then, the literature reflects a living community of Sethian Christians in early third-century Egypt. The very fact that a new and expanded version of SBJohn emerged in the course of the third century indicates that this text – considered to be a sacred revelation from Christ to his most beloved apostle – required updating for a living community.

Conclusion

To sum up, SBJohn is a distinctly Christian text. This is not to deny that it is also a “classic gnostic” text – yet one must not overload these terms. SBJohn is “gnostic” to the extent that it was meant for true “knowers” in a Christian community. It is “classic” to the extent that it became the paradigm text for this community and was (relative to other texts of Nag Hammadi) broadly known and circulated in antiquity. SBJohn presents the major themes of a “gnostic religion.” But that religion, as it turns out, was yet another form of Christianity – a form unfamiliar and even shocking to us, perhaps, but no less valid than any other.