Cainites | EPFL Graph Search

Are you an EPFL student looking for a semester project?

Work with us on data science and visualisation projects, and deploy your project as an app on top of GraphSearch.

The Cainites or Cainians (Καϊνοί, Kainoi, and Καϊανοί, Kaianoi) were a Gnostic and antinomian sect known to venerate Cain as the first victim of the Demiurge, the deity of the Old Testament, who was identified by many groups of Gnostics as evil. The sect was relatively small. They were mentioned by Tertullian and Irenaeus as existing in the eastern Roman Empire during the 2nd century. One of their purported religious texts was the Gospel of Judas. The oldest source is to be found in Irenaeus, Against Heresies. i. 31. Ireneaus states that the Cainites regarded Cain as derived from the highest God, not the Creator God worshipped by Jews and other Christians. According to Irenaeus, they claimed fellowship with Esau, Korah, the men of Sodom, and all such people, and regarded themselves as persecuted by the Creator. But they escaped injury from him, because they were protected by the goddess Sophia. Epiphanius of Salamis (Haer. 38), who appears to have some source of information independent of Irenaeus, gives a much longer account. He describes Abel as being derived from the weaker principle. Like other Gnostics, the Cainites distinguished between the Creator and the Supreme God. They identified the Creator with the God of the Jews, viewing him and those he favored with hostility and believing that the purpose of redemption was the dissolution of his work. They claimed kinship with those to whom he showed antagonism in the Old Testament but believed he was the weaker power and could do them no permanent harm, since they enjoyed the protection of Sophia. They may have shared with other heretical Christians a belief in the division of humanity into two classes: the spiritual and the material. Material people belonged to the realm of the Creator and derived their being from him but were doomed to destruction. Spiritual people were imprisoned in bodies of flesh but derived their essential being from the highest Power. They were opposed by the Creator and his minions but were destined to triumph over them as Cain did over Abel.

About this result

This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.

Related concepts (8)

Cainites

Sethianism

The Sethians were one of the main currents of Gnosticism during the 2nd and 3rd century CE, along with Valentinianism and Basilideanism. According to John D. Turner, it originated in the 2nd century CE as a fusion of two distinct Hellenistic Judaic philosophies and was influenced by Christianity and Middle Platonism. However, the exact origin of Sethianism is not properly understood. The Sethians (Latin Sethoitae) are first mentioned, alongside the Ophites, in the 2nd century, by Irenaeus (who was antagonistic towards gnosticism) and in Pseudo-Tertullian (Ch.

Sophia (Gnosticism)

Sophia (Σοφíα "Wisdom", ⲧⲥⲟⲫⲓⲁ "the Sophia") is a major theme, along with Knowledge (γνῶσις gnosis, Coptic ), among many of the early Christian knowledge-theologies grouped by the heresiologist Irenaeus as (γνωστικοί), "knowing" or "men that claimed to have deeper wisdom". Gnosticism is a 17th-century term expanding the definition of Irenaeus' groups to include other syncretic and mystery religions. In Gnosticism, Sophia is a feminine figure, analogous to the human soul but also simultaneously one of the feminine aspects of God.