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Valentinus (Gnostic)
Valentinus (Greek: Οὐαλεντῖνος; c. 100 – c. 180 CE) was the best known and, for a time, most successful early Christian Gnostic theologian. He founded his school in Rome. According to Tertullian, Valentinus was a candidate for bishop but started his own group when another was chosen.
Valentinus produced a variety of writings, but only fragments survive, largely those quoted in rebuttal arguments in the works of his opponents, not enough to reconstruct his system except in broad outline. His doctrine is known only in the developed and modified form given to it by his disciples, the Valentinians. He taught that there were three kinds of people, the spiritual, psychical, and material; and that only those of a spiritual nature received the gnosis (knowledge) that allowed them to return to the divine Pleroma, while those of a psychic nature (ordinary Christians) would attain a lesser or uncertain form of salvation, and that those of a material nature were doomed to perish.
Valentinus had a large following, the Valentinians. It later divided into an Eastern and a Western, or Italian, branch. The Marcosians belonged to the Western branch.
Epiphanius of Salamis wrote (c. 390) that he learned through word of mouth (although he acknowledged that it was a disputed point) that Valentinus was "born a Phrebonite" in the coastal region of Egypt, and received his Greek education in Alexandria, an important and metropolitan early center of Christianity. The word "Phrebonite" is otherwise unknown, but probably refers to the ancient town of Phragonis, near present-day Tidah. In Alexandria, Valentinus may have heard the Gnostic philosopher Basilides and certainly became conversant with Hellenistic Middle Platonism and the culture of Hellenized Jews like the great Alexandrian Jewish allegorist and philosopher Philo.[citation needed]
Clement of Alexandria records that his followers said that Valentinus was a follower of Theudas, and that Theudas in turn was a follower of Paul the Apostle. Valentinus said that Theudas imparted to him the secret wisdom that Paul had taught privately to his inner circle, which Paul publicly referred to in connection with his visionary encounter with the risen Christ (Romans 16:25; 1 Corinthians 2:7; 2 Corinthians 12:2–4; Acts 9:9–10), when he received the secret teaching from him.[citation needed] Such esoteric teachings were downplayed in Rome after the mid-2nd century.
Valentinus apparently taught first in Alexandria and went to Rome about 136, during the pontificate of Pope Hyginus, and remained until the pontificate of Pope Anicetus, dying probably about 180. Most available details about his life are debated, as many of them are from his adversaries and of dubious reliability.
In Adversus Valentinianos, iv, Tertullian says Valentinus was a candidate for bishop before turning to heresy in a fit of pique, along with Marcion.
Valentinus had expected to become a bishop, because he was an able man both in genius and eloquence. Being indignant, however, that another obtained the dignity by reason of a claim which confessorship had given him, he broke with the church of the true faith. Just like those (restless) spirits which, when roused by ambition, are usually inflamed with the desire of revenge, he applied himself with all his might to exterminate the truth; and finding the clue of a certain old opinion, he marked out a path for himself with the subtlety of a serpent.
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Valentinus (Gnostic)
Valentinus (Greek: Οὐαλεντῖνος; c. 100 – c. 180 CE) was the best known and, for a time, most successful early Christian Gnostic theologian. He founded his school in Rome. According to Tertullian, Valentinus was a candidate for bishop but started his own group when another was chosen.
Valentinus produced a variety of writings, but only fragments survive, largely those quoted in rebuttal arguments in the works of his opponents, not enough to reconstruct his system except in broad outline. His doctrine is known only in the developed and modified form given to it by his disciples, the Valentinians. He taught that there were three kinds of people, the spiritual, psychical, and material; and that only those of a spiritual nature received the gnosis (knowledge) that allowed them to return to the divine Pleroma, while those of a psychic nature (ordinary Christians) would attain a lesser or uncertain form of salvation, and that those of a material nature were doomed to perish.
Valentinus had a large following, the Valentinians. It later divided into an Eastern and a Western, or Italian, branch. The Marcosians belonged to the Western branch.
Epiphanius of Salamis wrote (c. 390) that he learned through word of mouth (although he acknowledged that it was a disputed point) that Valentinus was "born a Phrebonite" in the coastal region of Egypt, and received his Greek education in Alexandria, an important and metropolitan early center of Christianity. The word "Phrebonite" is otherwise unknown, but probably refers to the ancient town of Phragonis, near present-day Tidah. In Alexandria, Valentinus may have heard the Gnostic philosopher Basilides and certainly became conversant with Hellenistic Middle Platonism and the culture of Hellenized Jews like the great Alexandrian Jewish allegorist and philosopher Philo.[citation needed]
Clement of Alexandria records that his followers said that Valentinus was a follower of Theudas, and that Theudas in turn was a follower of Paul the Apostle. Valentinus said that Theudas imparted to him the secret wisdom that Paul had taught privately to his inner circle, which Paul publicly referred to in connection with his visionary encounter with the risen Christ (Romans 16:25; 1 Corinthians 2:7; 2 Corinthians 12:2–4; Acts 9:9–10), when he received the secret teaching from him.[citation needed] Such esoteric teachings were downplayed in Rome after the mid-2nd century.
Valentinus apparently taught first in Alexandria and went to Rome about 136, during the pontificate of Pope Hyginus, and remained until the pontificate of Pope Anicetus, dying probably about 180. Most available details about his life are debated, as many of them are from his adversaries and of dubious reliability.
In Adversus Valentinianos, iv, Tertullian says Valentinus was a candidate for bishop before turning to heresy in a fit of pique, along with Marcion.
Valentinus had expected to become a bishop, because he was an able man both in genius and eloquence. Being indignant, however, that another obtained the dignity by reason of a claim which confessorship had given him, he broke with the church of the true faith. Just like those (restless) spirits which, when roused by ambition, are usually inflamed with the desire of revenge, he applied himself with all his might to exterminate the truth; and finding the clue of a certain old opinion, he marked out a path for himself with the subtlety of a serpent.