Part 3 (1/2)

The Valentinians are known to have divided their members into three cla.s.ses--the Pneumatics, the Psychics, and the Hylics (i.e.

materialists); the Basilideans are also said to have possessed secret doctrines known to hardly one in a thousand of the sect. From all this M. Matter concludes that:

1. The Gnostics professed to hold by means of tradition a secret doctrine superior to that contained in the public writings of the apostles.

2. That they did not communicate this doctrine to everyone....

3. That they communicated it by means of emblems and symbols, as the Diagram of the Ophites proves.

4. That in these communications they imitated the rites and trials of the mysteries of Eleusis.[122]

This claim to the possession of a secret oral tradition, whether known under the name of ???s?? or of Cabala, confirms the conception of the Gnostics as Cabalists and shows how far they had departed from Christian teaching. For if only in this idea of ”one doctrine for the ignorant and another for the initiated,” the Gnostics had restored the very system which Christianity had come to destroy.[123]

Manicheism

Whilst we have seen the Gnostic sects working for more or less subversive purposes under the guise of esoteric doctrines, we find in the Manicheans of Persia, who followed a century later, a sect embodying the same tendencies and approaching still nearer to secret society organization.

Cubricus or Corbicius, the founder of Manicheism, was born in Babylonia about the year A.D. 216. Whilst still a child he is said to have been bought as a slave by a rich widow of Ctesiphon, who liberated him and on her death left him great wealth. According to another story--for the whole history of Manes rests on legends--he inherited from a rich old woman the books of a Saracen named Scythia.n.u.s on the wisdom of the Egyptians. Combining the doctrines these books contained with ideas borrowed from Zoroastrianism, Gnosticism, and Christianity, and also with certain additions of his own, he elaborated a philosophic system which he proceeded to teach. Cubricus then changed his name to Mani or Manes and proclaimed himself the Paraclete promised by Jesus Christ. His followers were divided into two cla.s.ses--the outer circle of hearers or combatants, and the inner circle of teachers or ascetics described as the Elect. As evidence of their resemblance with Freemasons, it has been said that the Manicheans made use of secret signs, grips, and pa.s.swords, that owing to the circ.u.mstances of their master's adoption they called Manes ”the son of the widow” and themselves ”the children of the widow,”

but this is not clearly proved. One of their customs is, however, interesting in this connexion. According to legend, Manes undertook to cure the son of the King of Persia who had fallen ill, but the prince died, whereupon Manes was flayed alive by order of the king and his corpse hanged up at the city gate. Every year after this, on Good Friday, the Manicheans carried out a mourning ceremony known as the Bema around the catafalque of Manes, whose real sufferings they were wont to contrast with the unreal sufferings of Christ.

The fundamental doctrine of Manicheism is Dualism--that is to say, the existence of two opposing principles in the world, light and darkness, good and evil--founded, however, not on the Christian conception of this idea, but on the Zoroastrian conception of Ormuzd and Ahriman, and so perverted and mingled with Cabalistic superst.i.tions that it met with as vehement denunciation by Persian priests as by Christian Fathers. Thus, according to the doctrine of Manes, all matter is absolute evil, the principle of evil is eternal, humanity itself is of Satanic origin, and the first human beings, Adam and Eve, are represented as the offspring of devils.[124] Much the same idea may be found in the Jewish Cabala, where it is said that Adam, after other abominable practices, cohabited with female devils whilst Eve consoled herself with male devils, so that whole races of demons were born into the world. Eve is also accused of cohabiting with the Serpent.[125] In the Yalkut s.h.i.+moni it is also related that during the 130 years that Adam lived apart from Eve, ”he begat a generation of devils, spirits, and hobgoblins.”[126] Manichean demonology thus paved the way for the placation of the powers of darkness practised by the Euchites at the end of the fourth century and later by the Paulicians, the Bogomils, and the Luciferians.

So it is in Gnosticism and Manicheism that we find evidence of the first attempts to pervert Christianity. The very fact that all such have been condemned by the Church as ”heresies” has tended to enlist sympathy in their favour, yet even Eliphas Levi recognizes that here the action of the Church was right, for the ”monstrous gnosis of Manes” was a desecration not only of Christian doctrines but of pre-Christian sacred traditions.

2

THE REVOLT AGAINST ISLAM[127]

We have followed the efforts of subversive sects. .h.i.therto directed against Christianity and orthodox Judaism; we shall now see this attempt, reduced by gradual stages to a working system of extraordinary efficiency, organized for the purpose of undermining all moral and religious beliefs in the minds of Moslems. In the middle of the seventh century an immense schism was created in Islam by the rival advocates of successors to the Prophet, the orthodox Islamites known by the name of Sunnis adhering to the elected Khalifas Abu Bakr, Omar, and Othman, whilst the party of revolt, known as the s.h.i.+ahs, claimed the Khalifate for the descendants of Mohammed through Ali, son of Abu-Talib and husband of Fatima, the Prophet's daughter. This division ended in open warfare; Ali was finally a.s.sa.s.sinated, his elder son Hason was poisoned in Medina, his younger son Husain fell at the battle of Kerbela fighting against the supporters of Othman. The deaths of Hasan and Husain are still mourned yearly by the s.h.i.+ahs at the Moharram.

The Ismailis

The s.h.i.+ahs themselves split again over the question of Ali's successors into four factions, the fourth of which divided again into two further sects. Both of these retained their allegiance to the descendants of Ali as far as Jafar-as-Sadik, but whilst one party, known as the Imamias or Isna-Asharias (i.e. the Twelvers), supported the succession through his younger son Musa to the twelfth Iman Mohammed, son of Askeri, the Ismailis (or Seveners) adhered to Ismail, the elder son of Jafar-as-Sadik.

[Ill.u.s.tration:

Choice of SUNNIS Abu Bakr (1st Khalifa) 632 Omar 634 Othman 644 Ali

Choice of s.h.i.+AHS

Abd-ul-Muttalib Abdullah MOHAMMED A.D. 570-632 Fatima married Ali Abu Talib ALI (4th Sunni and 1st s.h.i.+ah Khalifa murdered in Kufa) (2) Hasan poisoned A.D. 680 (3) Husain killed at battle of Kerbela A.D. 680 (4) Ali II (5) Mohammed (6) Jafar-as-Sadik Choice of ISMAILIS (7) Ismail Mohammed disappeared circ. 770 Choice of IMAMIAS or ISNA-ASHARIAS (7) Abu'I Hasan Musa (8) Ali III (9) Abu Jafar Mohammed (10) Ali (11) Abu Mohammed al Askari (12) Mohammed al Mahdi