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Concept
Basilides
Summary
Basilides (Greek: Βασιλείδης) was an early Christian Gnostic religious teacher in Alexandria, Egypt who taught from 117 to 138 AD, and claimed to have inherited his teachings from the apostle Saint Matthias. He was a pupil of either the Simonian teacher Menander, or a supposed disciple of Peter named Glaucias. The Acts of the Disputation with Manes state that for a time he taught among the Persians. According to Agapius of Hierapolis he appeared in the 15th year of Trajan reign (113 AD). He is believed to have written over two dozen books of commentary on the Christian Gospel (now all lost) entitled Exegetica, making him one of the earliest Gospel commentators.
The followers of Basilides, the Basilideans, formed a movement that persisted for at least two centuries after him – Epiphanius of Salamis, at the end of the 4th century, recognized a persistent Basilidian presence over the Nile Delta in Egypt. It is probable, however, that the school melded into the mainstream of Gnosticism by the latter half of the 2nd century.
Basilidians
The diverse and sometimes contradictory descriptions of Basilides' system by primary sources pose challenges. St. Irenæus portrayed Basilides as a dualist and emanationist in his Adversus Haereses, while Hippolytus painted him in his Philosophumena as a pantheistic evolutionist.
From Irenaeus' perspective, Basilides proposed a hierarchy of emanations from an Unborn Father (Abraxas), resulting in multiple heavenly realms and angelic powers, with the Jewish God identified as one of these angels. He introduced Christ as a savior from the angelic rule, implying a replacement of Christ with Simon of Cyrene during the crucifixion.
Epiphanius and Pseudo-Tertullian contribute to this portrayal by associating Basilides with the mystical name Abraxas and contempt for material reality. They indicate that Basilides considered suffering and martyrdom as meaningless and attached to the physical world.
Official source
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