SOURCE: “Structural Similarities and Dissimilarities in the Thought of Clement of Alexandria and the Valentinians,” in The Second Century: A Journal of Early Christian Studies, Vol. 3, No. 4, Winter, 1983, pp. 201-17.

[In the following essay, Davison compares and contrasts the stances of the Valentinians and of Clement in four areas: the doctrine of God; creation and humanity; salvation; and eschatology.]

Even a cursory reading of selections from the work of Clement of Alexandria suggests that there are characteristic motifs at work that set him somewhat apart from the general trend of developing orthodoxy in the late second and early third centuries.¹ These motifs bear resemblances to features that are well known from Gnosticism. When we bear in mind that Clement sometimes quotes Valentinus and the Valentinians approvingly,² we are led to wonder how close Clement's thought in fact is to that of Gnosticism and, more particularly, to that of the Valentinians.

A comparison of the basic structure of Clement's theology to that found in the Valentinians is the more interesting due to the special affinities of Valentinus to Christianity. He and his followers appear to have developed as a “small offshoot from an orthodox main body.”³ Born in Egypt and educated in Alexandria, he made his way to Rome around 140, nearly becoming bishop of the church there.⁴ His teaching was continued—with modifications—by his followers at Alexandria; hence, Clement, living there later in the century, knew the basic Valentinian viewpoints well. This can be seen most readily from his Excerpts from Theodotus.

The present comparison will be restricted to the general structural features of Valentinianism and to the source material found in Clement himself—almost exclusively in the Stromateis and the Excerpts—with occasional references to material in Irenaeus's Against Heresies.⁵ Four headings will be examined: the doctrine of God, creation and man, salvation, and eschatology. In each case the Valentinian view will be outlined; then Clement's position will be set out and, finally, comparisons and contrasts will be made. I will then draw some conclusions regarding the relationship of Clement to Valentinianism in general.

I

THE DOCTRINE OF GOD

The starting point for the Valentinian doctrine of God is the absolute transcendence of the deity. He is the “unknown Father” (Exc. 7,1), the “Depth” that is inexpressible and incomprehensible (Exc. 29). He is so completely other that he can be spoken of only in terms of negation. There seems to have been some divergence among Valentinians regarding the question of whether the Father is to be regarded originally as paired with a syzygy or as existing alone. Valentinus himself and the “Oriental School,” of which Theodotus was a member, appear to have held the former view, while Ptolemaeus and the “Italic School” leaned toward the latter.⁶ In any case, the Father is understood as at some point paired with another Aeon, Sigē, Silence (also called Ennoia)—“the Mother of all who were put forward by Depth” (Exc. 29). The pairing of Aeons is typical of Valentinianism, and it is the reason offered for a distinction between “pleromata” and “images”: “whatever come out of a syzygia are complete in themselves (pleromas) and whatever come out of one are images” (Exc. 32,1; cf. Strom. IV. xiii). It would be a mistake to conceive of those pairs dualistically. Sagnard is probably correct that the female element of the pair is intended to express a quality which is inherent in the male element.⁷

The various paired Aeons of the Pleroma originated as emanations from the Father. They represent in hypostatized form various aspects of his fullness, and they are arranged in a hierarchical order. There is therefore a scale of being from superior to inferior in the Pleroma, and each Aeon-pair has its proper place within it. The basic Valentinian Ogdoad is composed of four syzygies: Father and Silence; Monogenes and Truth; Logos and Life; and Man and Church (Irenaeus, Adv. haer. I.i.1). Valentinian exegesis found support for this differentiation in John 1. The first verse of the Gospel, “In the Archē was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God,” substantiates the first three male elements of the pairs: the Father (God); the Nous (Archē); and the Logos.⁸ It should be noted that, taking this verse with John 1:18 (“The Only-begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father”), the Valentinians stressed that both the Logos and the Monogenes Son are rightfully called “God.”

First on the scale of emanations stands Monogenes, also called Nous and Son. He was first put forth when the Father, totally unknown, wished to be known: through his own thought… the Father caused Monogenes to emanate as a “spirit of Knowledge” arising from Knowledge: “So he too who came forth from Knowledge, that is, from the Father's thought, became Knowledge, that is, the Son” (Exc. 7,1). Notice that the same emphasis on the divinity of Monogenes as seen in the interpretation of John 1 is repeated here. The Son is Knowledge proceeding from Knowledge. Casey comments that this is simply “a complicated way of saying that Monogenes, even when projected, remained consubstantial with the Father.”⁹ Monogenes knows the Father, since he is Knowledge; but he is the only Aeon who can know the Father, and this limitation upon the Aeons sets up the conditions that led to crisis in the Pleroma.

At this point we encounter an extremely important feature of the Valentinian doctrine of God. While some forms of Gnosticism locate evil in an external source, Gnosticism in general and Valentinianism in particular placed the origin of evil squarely within the Godhead itself.¹⁰ Error and fallibility are possible within the Pleroma. A fall is most likely to occur at the weakest point, of course, and that is precisely where tragedy occurred. Sophia, the last of the emanations, developed a passion to know the Father (Exc. 30,2). In her wish to “grasp that which is beyond knowledge,” she ended in “ignorance and formlessness” (31,3; cf. Adv. haer. I.ii-iii). The fall is not just a harmless lapse, but a tragedy: it carries with it unavoidable consequences that result in the formation of the material world and the concomitant need for salvation from it.

Clement's doctrine of God, like that of the Valentinians, takes as its point of departure the utter transcendence of God. He is “above all speech, all conception, all thought” (Strom. V.x). Appealing to the same passage as the Gnostics, John 1:18, Clement says that here the apostle identifies invisibility and ineffability with the “bosom of God” (V.xii). “Hence,” he writes elsewhere, “some have called it the Depth, as containing and embosoming all things, inaccessible and boundless.” The reference to “the Depth” appears to indicate the Gnostics; Clement accepts it as a fitting description of the One who ultimately is beyond description.¹¹

Clement, too, affirms strongly a negative theology. It is necessary to abstract from all corporeal properties and afterwards from all incorporeal properties, in order that “we may reach somehow to the conception of the Almighty, knowing not what He is, but what He is not” (V.xi). This does not mean that no terms may be applied to God. Names like “the Depth,” “the One,” “the Good,” “Absolute Being,” “Father,” and “Lord” are all acceptable so long as it is remembered that they are not used “properly” (V.xii). None of them alone can express God, but “all together are indicative of the power of the Omnipotent.”¹²

While Clement employs an emanationist model of the Godhead,¹³ he does not maintain an original syzygy at the foundation of divine reality; nor does he hold that the deity is composed of a series of paired Aeons. Rather, his standpoint is trinitarian. References to the Father, Son, and Spirit are to be found throughout his works, although it seems that Clement is more concerned with the status of the Son than the Spirit.¹⁴ Accordingly, this discussion is limited to his comments regarding the Son.

The Son is the eternal image of the invisible God (Strom. V.vi), and it is through Him that we are to learn the “Remoter Cause,” the Father (VII.i). The Son is the αϱχη (V.vi; VII.i; Exc. 19,1-2); the Word and Wisdom (VII.ii); or the Word, Wisdom, and Power of God (V.i). Clement especially likes to describe the Son not only as God's image, but also as the “face of God.”¹⁵ Notice that, for Clement, the Son is a single hypostasis, embracing in himself a number of titles and functions that the Valentinians dispersed among a variety of Aeons. With regard to the term “Monogenes,” for example, Clement specifically affirms that the Jesus who appeared on earth is “one and the same” as the Onlybegotten.¹⁶ Elsewhere Clement comments that it is one and the same Logos who is the Son, who is the Creator of everything, who spoke through the prophets, and who was manifested in the Savior (Exc. 19,1ff.; cf. 8,1).

Although Clement is opposed to the Valentinian doctrine of God, there is a clear structural similarity between the two concepts of God. Both concepts employ an emanationist model, and in both the emanated beings—however many or few—are all of divine status. In both, the original, ultimate Godhead is unlimited and beyond comprehension. Therefore, he can be known only by the Revealer, his Nous.

The major difference in Clement's conception from that of the Valentinians seems to reside in the fact that he strictly limits the number of aspects of the Father which may be hypostatized. Obviously, the principle for Clement's limitation is the church's tradition (Strom. VII.xvi; cf. xvii). The Valentinians too could speak of Father, Son, and Spirit, but that did not hinder them from identifying a number of other beings in the divine hierarchy as well.

We must note one other difference: while Son and Spirit are subordinate to the Father for Clement, their divine attributes are not thereby lessened. Consequently, there can be no suggestion of failure or weakness in the Godhead. Sin is due either to ignorance or inability and, Clement comments, “both depend on ourselves” (VII.xvi). God is wholly good, and so too is his Son (Paed. I.viii). This contrast finds almost symbolic expression in the fact that the name of the Aeon to whom the Valentinians attribute evil in the Pleroma, Sophia, is attributed emphatically by Clement to the Son: He is not only God's Word, but also his Wisdom!

II

CREATION AND HUMANITY

For the Valentinians, creation is a negative concept: matter has arisen only because of failure in the Pleroma. Sophia's fall resulted in the production of some sort of formless substance that the Christ shaped into Achamoth, or lower Sophia. From the passions of Lower Sophia emerged the four elements and the soul. At length she formed the Demiurge, an inferior, harsh being (Exc. 33,4), who in turn created the world.¹⁷ By his activity the material and psychic substances were fashioned into a world. The pneumatic element, however, was placed in man without his knowledge (Exc. 50,1-53,5).

In accordance with the three basic substances, the Valentinians distinguished three kinds of people—material (hylic), animal (psychic), and spiritual (pneumatic). The differences among them are absolute. There is no hope for members of the first class; they are purely material and are destined by nature for utter destruction at the end (81,1). Between the other two classes, the all-important difference is that some were implanted imperceptibly with spiritual seed by Sophia (53,2) or, alternatively, by the Logos (2,1). These are the pneumatics; they are the best of mankind (21,1), for they contain an element of the Pleroma within themselves and are thus destined, ineluctably, to return to the Pleroma at the end.

According to the Valentinians the pneumatics possess salvation by nature (56,3). The psychics, in contrast, possess free will and face an uncertain destiny. Salvation, albeit on a lower plane, is possible for them, but only if they live moral, continent lives (Adv. haer. I.vi.4). The Valentinians designated the psychics as the “called” and identified them with the “orthodox” in the Church, while they saw themselves as the “elect.”¹⁸

While the human situation in the world is one of darkness and death (Exc. 22,2; 80,1), human beings are not really responsible for their tragic state. The fall must be characterized as tragedy and fate, not as guilt. That the elect should be saved from this state, therefore, is due not so much to God's goodness as to a kind of moral necessity: it is incumbent upon the Pleroma to rectify its failure.

For Clement, on the other hand, the creation is not negative, but positive. He argues that the docetic rejection of human birth as unholy is a “blasphemy against the will of God and the mystery of creation” (Strom. III.xvii). Creation must be good, for the Creator is God himself (II.viii). Clement rejects any attempt, either Gnostic or Marcionite, to attribute the creation to a Demiurge distinct from the Good God himself (V.i). Wishing to avoid any suggestion of docetism, he rebukes Valentinus for claiming that Christ's body was not really material, but psychic (III.xvii).

Clement, too, makes a triple division among men: Gnostics, believers, and the hard of heart (VII.ii). While this distinction is significant, it is not based on the inherent nature of man. According to Clement, “Salvation is from a change due to obedience, but not from nature” (II.xx). All men, since they possess mind, also possess free will. Thus, “we are born to obey the commandments, if we choose to be willing to be saved” (VII.iii).

Man's present situation in the world, Clement says, is in darkness, delusion (Protr. 1), bondage, ignorance (10), and error (9). Attracted by pleasure, the first man disobeyed God and became “fettered to sins” (11). Thus humans are responsible for the situation in which they live, and God's redemption is an act of pure kindness and love. Jonas suggests that for the Valentinians the world actually exists for the sake of salvation, so that the real object of salvation is the godhead itself.¹⁹ This is not true of Clement.

III

SALVATION

As has often been remarked, soteriology is the basic interest of all Gnostic theology. Since the overriding problem for human beings is ignorance—ignorance of their origin and destiny—it is essential that the Pleroma impart knowledge to people. At baptism complete gnosis is made available.

But it is not only the washing that is liberating, but the knowledge of who we were, and what we have become, where we were or where we were placed, whither we hasten, from what we are redeemed, what birth is and what rebirth. (Exc. 78,1f.)

Sagnard remarks that this knowledge is in fact the raison d' être for Valentinianism.²⁰ With knowledge in his possession, a person is freed from fate (78,1) and enters into salvation.

While knowledge had been imparted gradually throughout history, the process culminated with the human Jesus. At his own baptism the powers of the Pleroma descended upon him, accompanying him throughout his earthly ministry and departing only at his passion. After his resurrection he remains at the right hand of the Demiurge until the end.²¹ The way to salvation has been made available fully in Jesus Christ; hence, he is given the name Savior. Obviously, this term is virtually equivalent to “revealer.”

The knowledge thus revealed has an esoteric character. The Valentinians saw such knowledge as containing great “mysteries” (Adv. haer. I.i.3) understandable only by those who are spiritual, that is, the Gnostics themselves. These mysteries run much deeper than the common, public teachings of the mass of Christian believers; in fact, they encompass “the perfect knowledge of God” (I.vi.1; cf. III.ii.2). Ptolemaeus argues that this secret tradition is just as firm as is the tradition claimed by orthodoxy, for it has been passed down orally by succession from the apostles.²²

How should the enlightened pneumatic live in the world? Two opposing lifestyles could be based on Gnostic principles: libertinism or asceticism.²³ Clearly, Valentinus cannot be classed as a libertine. Clement quotes him as arguing that only through the Son “can the heart become pure, by the expulsion of every evil spirit from the heart.” After commenting on the unclean spirits that cause the heart to perform lustful deeds, Valentinus remarks that “when the only good Father visits it, it is sanctified, and gleams with light” (Strom. II.xx). Of the positive comments that Clement makes about Valentinus and the Valentinians, all have to do with ethics.²⁴ For instance, Clement quotes Valentinus's view that Jesus was continent with regard to food and drink to illustrate the fact that continence must be applied more broadly than to sexuality alone (Strom. III.vii).

Although Valentinus cannot be classed as a libertine, the term “ascetic” would hardly fit either. Clement also remarks that, since the Valentinians hold that the union of man and woman “is derived from the divine emanation in heaven above,” they approve of marriage (III.i) and speak of sexual intercourse as a “spiritual union” (III.iv).

No less than the Valentinians, Clement's major concern is soteriology. Human beings are in an unhappy situation and need redemption. Due to Adam's fall into disobedience, humans are captive to ignorance and error. Hence, gnosis is needed, and gnosis is what, ultimately, Jesus Christ has come to bring. Jesus' role as Savior, therefore, as with the Gnostics, especially involves revelation. While the Valentinians could speak at the most of a readying of pneumatic seed for the coming of the Savior,²⁵ Clement holds to continuous, significant revelation to all human beings throughout the course of history. The basis of this view is his overarching concept of the Son as Logos (cf. Exc. 19,1ff.). The Logos, who became incarnate in Christ, had already been active among both Jews and Gentiles.… Clement maintains that the revelations of the Old Testament prophets as well as the truths of Gentile philosophy and poetry derive from the Logos. Hence, while he argues at times that the truths of philosophy were stolen from Moses and the prophets, his more characteristic view is that the Greeks, too, have been inspired by God.²⁶

The full revelation has come, nevertheless, in Jesus Christ. He is frequently called the “Teacher” (as in Strom. V.i; VII.ii). The second work in Clement's trilogy, the Paedagogus, derives its title from the office of the Logos as Tutor (Paed. I.i). In Jesus Christ God himself is made known (Paed. I.vii). By this revelation, human beings discover how they can be deified: “The Word of God became man, that thou mayest learn from man how man may become God” (Protrep. 1).

Like the Valentinians, Clement holds to the existence of a secret tradition within the church. As with the general tradition proclaimed to the mass of believers, this tradition derives from the apostles (Strom. VI. viii), but it is taught only to those who are worthy (I.xii), that is, to those who are “capable of receiving and being molded” by such secret teachings (I.i). Clement likes to call such teachings “mysteries.”²⁷

The contrast between a simple teaching offered to the multitudes and a secret teaching reserved for initiates corresponds to Clement's major distinction between faith and knowledge. This distinction is so great that he can describe the movement from faith to knowledge in the same terms as the conversion from nonbelief to belief: “And, in my view, the first saving change is that from heathenism to faith … and the second, that from faith to knowledge” (Strom. VII.x). However, Clement stresses that, in spite of the great difference, there is continuity between the two states. Belief, he writes,

is the foundation of knowledge. But Christ is both the foundation and the superstructure, by whom are both the beginning and the ends. And the extreme points, the beginning and the end—I mean faith and love—are not taught. But knowledge, conveyed by tradition according to the grace of God as a deposit, is entrusted to those who show themselves worthy of it;…For it is said, “to him that hath shall be given”: to faith, knowledge; and to knowledge, love; and to love, the inheritance.²⁸

Notice that Clement does not distinguish faith and knowledge absolutely. There is no substantial dichotomy among human beings; and, although knowledge is a higher stage than faith, it is not separate from faith (V.i). In the Valentinian view, pneumatics and psychics are forever distinguished; for Clement, the Gnostic is something the believer can—and should—become.

Further, Clement considers knowledge and love almost interchangeable here. Camelot points out that Clement offers two ways to attain perfection, or to become a true Gnostic. The one is moral; the other, intellectual. The one is concerned with virtue and love; the other, with an intellectual ascent.²⁹ However, as the above quotation indicates, the two ways are not mutually exclusive. Gnosis is not purely intellectual; love is perfected by knowledge and knowledge is perfected by love.³⁰

Concretely, Clement's ethical thinking incorporates the Stoic virtue of impassibility, or passionlessness. As God, who is purely noncorporeal, is “impassible, free of anger, destitute of desire” (IV.xxiii), man too must strive to attain the same condition (VII.iii).… According to Clement Jesus ate food only to avoid giving any grounds for a docetic interpretation of his nature (VI.ix). In fact, his body did not need food at all, since it was maintained by a “holy energy.” Clement asserts that “He was entirely impassible; inaccessible to any movement of feeling—either pleasure or pain.” This explains the fact that Clement quotes Valentinus approvingly to the effect that Jesus

ate and drank in a manner peculiar to himself, and the food did not pass out of his body. Such was the power of his continence that food was not corrupted within him; for he himself was not subject to the process of corruption. (III.vii)

Valentinus and Clement are not making precisely the same point, for Valentinus intends his comment in the sense that Christ's body was psychical; that is, it was not corporeal at all (III.xvii). Clement, in contrast, means to affirm the real, physical character of the Lord's body. Still, at best we can say that Clement just barely avoids docetism himself. While Christ's body was real, all bodily needs are eliminated and his human soul loses all significance.³¹

Unlike Jesus, Clement's Gnostic can never live in this world without passion as regards his physical existence. Bodily necessities continue to affect him. However, he can attempt to imitate the Savior as regards passions of the soul, and Clement is convinced that the apostles, after Christ's resurrection, were indeed successful at living in such a state… (VI.ix).

In harmony with the Valentinians, then, Clement conceives of salvation as consisting especially in the gaining of knowledge that drives away ignorance and allows humans to achieve union with God. For both, the role of the Savior, Jesus Christ, is essentially that of providing the revelation of the knowledge necessary for this redemption. Both also affirm strongly a secret tradition available only to a select group of initiates. A strong distinction is made by both the Valentinians and Clement between this small circle of the truly spiritual and the rest of those who belong to the church. The ideal mode of life of this higher class seems to be essentially the same in both schemes—witness the docetic view, to some degree at least, of the Savior's nature.

Nevertheless, there are important differences between the conceptions of Clement and the Valentinians. The distinction in levels within the church, while significant for Clement, is conceived not as an unbridgeable gap between different natures, but as a difference of lower and higher stages that he hopes is temporary. The goal of all, not just some, is union with God. There is also a significant difference between the two conceptions regarding the relation of ethics to the gnosis which is revealed by the Savior. For the Valentinians, the moral life in this world does not appear to be a central theme.³² For Clement, in contrast, ethics is a primary concern: love is an essential element in the constitution of the true Gnostic; thus, love and knowledge belong together.

IV

ESCHATOLOGY

For the Valentinians, at the end Jesus will assemble the elect seed and enter into the Pleroma with Sophia. This indicates a substantial union of the elect with the Godhead; they return from whence they came, so that the Pleroma is finally reunited and brought to repose. The Valentinians can speak of resurrection in this context, but it is obviously not to be understood as in any sense physical; matter is destined only for utter destruction.

The Demiurge and the psychics advance to the position Sophia has held; they enter only the intermediate Ogdoad, the place of Repose near—but outside—the Pleroma (Exc. 63). The substantial dichotomy within humanity—between pneumatics and psychics—is thus continued into eternity. Material souls, which constitute a third class within mankind, are of course destroyed in the fire. When all of this has occurred, the whole process of salvation will be complete. But the restoration will not in fact return everything precisely to its former condition. Originally, all that existed was the Pleroma in a state of pure Repose.

Now, not only is there the Pleroma, but there is also a nondivine, perfected “creation” as well. The good psychic elements, an inevitable product of Sophia's fall, cannot enter into the full Repose of the Pleroma, but neither would it be just, apparently, to annihilate them completely, since they have lived morally. Hence, a heaven is created for them to make their existence as blessed as possible.

For Clement, the consummation means the completion of the advancement³³ that has already begun on earth in the life of the Gnostic. The soul ascends through the seven heavens until it reaches a state of perfect contemplation. There, together with the seven archangels, the elect will behold the face of God, that is, the Son (Exc. 11,1; 15,2; 23,4-5). Clement conceives of this ascent as a gradual one, so that a purgation by fire is necessary in the afterlife (Strom. VII.vi). The fire will purify believers and cause most nonbelievers to repent, so that only those who are incurable due to their perseverance in rejection will themselves be rejected.³⁴

The perfected Gnostic will be deified (Protr. 9; 11). This does not mean that humans will become divine; they continue to remain creatures, but now they have become as much like God as possible.³⁵ The soul has become pure, and it is “now no longer distinguished by… the body, being bound to it like an oyster to its shell” (Strom. V.xiv).

Both the Valentinians and Clement thus maintain a distinction within humanity extending into the eschaton, although the conceptions of the distinction vary. Clement allows for a much larger group to participate in salvation, and he holds that the differences between humans are due to their actions, not to their natures. Both the Valentinians and Clement, further, articulate the eschatological existence as an ascent into the divine realm, with the material reality of this world being annihilated. But the Valentinians picture the eschaton as an escape from a bad existence, while Clement sees it rather in terms of passing from one stage—which, in itself and by nature, is not bad—to a better one. In addition, Clement continues to affirm a distinction in natures between the Creator and his creatures, instead of a reunion of the divine nature with itself. The ascending soul is deified, that is, it becomes as much like God as possible, but it remains a creature.³⁶

V

SUMMARY

As we have seen, there are impressive parallels between Clement's viewpoint and that of the Valentinians. The most significant similarities may be summarized in the following points:

(1) The Emanationist View of the Godhead. In both schemes God the Father is understood first and foremost as an unlimited, incomprehensible being, beyond all conception. The Godhead is pictured in terms of an emanationist model. Later emanations, while fully divine, are more limited and consequently in some sense subordinate. The primary emanation is the Nous, and only he can comprehend the Father. At the same time, because of his diminished transcendence, he can reveal the otherwise unknowable Father.

(2) Salvation as Knowledge. For both Clement and the Valentinians, human beings are bound in darkness and ignorance and are in need of salvation. Salvation, conceived of essentially as knowledge, is the central concern of both systems. Consequently, the Savior-figure is understood particularly as a Revealer. Further, this revealed knowledge is seen as the prerogative of a select few: it is withheld from the majority in the church, but is available to initiates by secret, oral tradition.

(3) The Dichotomy within the Church. Both schemes thus view salvation as involving two levels within the Church—those with and those without knowledge. There is thus a broader class which has a lesser salvation as well as a smaller, “elite” group that participates in full salvation. The latter group enjoys a relationship to God which is not shared by the larger group of common believers.

(4) The Ideal for Life in the World. Life in this world means a mode of existence that is provisional at best; hence both Clement and the Valentinians view the ideal life-style in terms of what we may characterize as a moderate asceticism. Both advocate a limited, cautious use of the material realities of the world.³⁷

(5) Eschatological Ascent. Ultimate salvation for both signifies a transcendence of the empirical realm. Matter will be destroyed, and the saved will ascend to the realm of the divine.

From these parallels it is clear that there are some very basic structural similarities between the thought of Clement and that of the Valentinians. Thus Clement's comparatively positive reaction to Valentinus, which might seem unexpected at first glance, is not surprising. The affinities between Clement and Valentinus are due to their common roots in the philosophical currents of the time, especially in Philo, Middle Platonism, and Numenius.

Nevertheless, along with these similarities, there are also some basic points where Clement diverges from the conceptions of the Valentinians. These can be summarized as follows:

(1) The Infallible Godhead. For the Valentinians, weakness and liability to error are conceivable qualities of the Godhead. The myths of the emanations of the Aeons and the fall of Sophia recount the divine prehistory and explain how the present deplorable situation came into being. Curiously, starting from the utter illimitability and total otherness of God, the Valentinian system ends with a fallible Godhead.³⁸ Clement, in contrast, denies any possibility of divine limitation and error. Thus, the responsibility for evil must be set squarely within the created realm.

(2) A Universal Inclusive Outlook. In the Valentinian conception, the world is a cosmic mistake which stands in opposition to God. As God has limited his relationship to this unwilled universe to the placing of pneumatic seed within it, his activity within the world is also confined within a very narrow range. Divine activity is exhausted in redeeming the “elect.” For Clement, however, the world is good; it is the product of the divine will. Clement's outlook on the world is correspondingly broader. Three instances will clarify this. First, the Logos is active in all of human history, inspiring not only the prophets of Israel, but active in the poetry and philosophy of the Greeks as well.³⁹ Second, God is concerned with all human beings, not just with an exclusive class. Since all humans have the same nature, all can be saved. The guilt is purely one's own if anyone does not come to be among the “elect.” Third and finally, all the elements of creation—even matter—must be judged positively. While matter is certainly an inferior reality, it has its proper place in serving God's ultimate intentions for the perfection of human beings.

(3) The Expectation of a Perfected Creation. When the eschaton arrives, according to the Valentinians, the elect seed will be taken up into the Pleroma from which it came. All reality will return to its original, placid state, and—with one exception—created reality will be destroyed. The exception is that a place of repose will be left for the Demiurge and the psychics. However, this appears to be a concession to the “orthodox” rather than a consistent part of Valentinian theory.⁴⁰ At best, it is an afterthought on the part of the Father, not an aspect of the pretemporal, divine plan for creation. Clement views the matter very differently. For him, a perfected creation in which humans progress from a lower to a higher existence was God's original intention. Yet the ascent to God does not entail a radical break with the past: there is continuity throughout. Consequently, not only does the person perfectly united to God remain substantially human, but he also remains substantially one with the person who has not (yet) ascended so far. For Clement, then, creation was originally intended for—and is destined ultimately to receive—completion, not annihilation.

There is no question that the concerns of Clement and Valentinus are the same and that the doctrines of God and salvation betray obvious similarities. However, the dissimilarities appear to be the more decisive. Jonas claims that there are elements of rebellion, protest, and extremism at the heart of Gnostic thought, and that its characteristic mood is very pessimistic.⁴¹ Interestingly, Harnack isolated optimism as a characteristic feature of Clement's thought and, thus, as one of the elements that distinguish him from Gnosticism.⁴² In terms of this psychological feature, Clement and the Valentinians would appear to be worlds apart.

Underlying the divergences between Clement and Valentinus is Clement's affirmation of the Judeo-Christian tradition that God is one, good, and Creator of heaven and earth. The Valentinians rejected the God of Genesis, demoting him to the status of a Demiurge; they reversed Jewish belief about this God as the One, true, and good God; and they denied the concomitant Old Testament assertions of the goodness of creation and the responsibility of mankind for sin in the world. In addition, they did not hold to any difference in essence between God and those whom he redeems. Now these are all characteristic assertions not only of Jewish belief but also of the “orthodox” regula fidei as well, and Clement adheres to these beliefs.

Thus, for all of his speculative, ascetic leanings, Clement's loyalty to basic tenets of Jewish tradition and of developing orthodoxy in the church places him in fundamental opposition to Valentinianism. Clement's relatively favorable reaction to Valentinus is due partly to Valentinus's own inclination to a “moderate” Gnosticism, partly to Clement's own stance markedly to the left in the orthodox spectrum, and—not the least important point—partly to one of Clement's own characteristic traits, an unusual openness to the ideas and thoughts of others.⁴³

Notes

1. In general, quotations from Clement will follow the translation in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. II, ed. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson (Grand Rapids, 1971²). It should be noted that there is a significant number of inaccuracies in the English translation. Stromateis III, which is presented in Latin in the ANF, will be quoted from John Oulton and Henry Chadwick, Alexandrian Christianity, Library of Christian Classics, Vol. III (Philadelphia, 1954). Quotations from the Excerpta ex Theodoto will follow the translation of Robert Pierce Casey, The Excerpta ex Theodoto of Clement of Alexandria, Studies and Documents, Vol. I (London, 1934).

2. Cf. Strom. III.i.iv,vii; VI.vi.

3. James F. McCue, “Orthodoxy and Heresy: Walter Bauer and the Valentinians,” Vig. Chr. 33 (1979) 130.

4. Tertullian, Adv. Valent. 4.

5. Elaine Pagels, “Conflicting Versions of Valentinian Eschatology: Irenaeus and the Excerpta ex Theodoto,” HTR 67 (1974) 35-53, questions the accuracy of Irenaeus's picture of the Valentinians, but her argument is unconvincing. Cf. James F. McCue, “Conflicting Versions of Valentinianism? Irenaeus and the EXCERPTA EX THEODOTO,” in Bentley Layton, ed., The Rediscovery of Gnosticism, I: The School of Valentinus (Leiden, 1979) 404-416.

6. Gilles Quispel, “The Original Doctrine of Valentinus,” in Gnostic Studies, Vol. I (Leiden, 1974) 28.

7. F. Sagnard, ed., Clément d'Alexandrie: Extraits de Théodote (Paris, 1948) 21-22.

8. Exc. 6,1-4; Iren., Adv. haer. I.viii.5. This identification of Monogenes with Archē is made also by Clement (as in Strom. VI.vii), as it is by numerous other early Christian writers. Cf. refs. in Sagnard, Clément d'Alexandrie, 65.

9. Casey, Excerpta, p. 102.

10. Hans Jonas, “Delimitation of the Gnostic Phenomenon,” in U. Bianchi, ed., Le Origini dello Gnosticismo (Leiden, 1967) 96.

11. G. W.H. Lampe, ed., A Patristic Greek Lexicon (Oxford, 1961) 306, does not list any places where the term is applied to God by the Greek Fathers. Unfortunately, however, the present reference is not listed either.

12. See A. H. Armstrong's comments on this negative theology in “The Self-Definition of Christianity in Relation to Later Platonism,” in E. P. Sanders, ed., Jewish and Christian Self-Definition, I: The Shaping of Christianity in the Second and Third Centuries (Philadelphia, 1980) 92-97. See also S. R. C. Lilla, Clement of Alexandria: A Study in Christian Platonism and Gnosticism (Oxford, 1971) 217-226.

13. It is generally agreed that Clement's concept originates most directly from Philo's concept of the Logos as emanating from God. For details of Clement's doctrine of the Logos and its connections not only with Philo but also with Platonic currents of thought, see Lilla, ibid., 199-212.

14. This, of course, is not particularly different from other Christian writings of the era. See Origen, de Princ. I. Pref.: “it is not yet clearly known whether he (the Spirit) is to be thought of as begotten or unbegotten, or as being himself also a Son of God or not.”

15. Cf., for example, VII.x. Clement emphasizes this idea in the Excerpta, pointing out that God is unknown except as he is visible in the Son (cf. 10,5-12,1; 23,5).

16. Exc. 7,3c. Casey attributes this to the Valentinians. But see Exc. 4,2, where the same thought is present: the Light that is manifest on earth is the same Light that is on High.

17. For a systematic account of the details of these events, see Hans Jonas, The Gnostic Religion (Boston, 1958) 182-190.

18. Cf. Clement's somewhat resentful comment in Strom. IV. xiii: “Let not the above-mentioned people [Valentinus and Basilides], then, call us, by way of reproach, ‘natural men.’”

19. Jonas, Gnostic Religion, 196.

20. Sagnard, Clément d' Alexandrie, 203. Sagnard has a useful appendix on baptism on pp. 229-239.

21. Exc. 62,1. This accords with the relatively positive view of the Demiurge offered by Ptolemaeus; see Letter to Flora. Exc. 38,1-3 suggests a more antagonistic relationship between Jesus and the Demiurge.

22. Letter to Flora, in Epiphanius, Panarion haeresium 33,7.

23. See the summary in Jonas, Gnostic Religion, 266-278.

24. The passages that are in some sense positive are: II.xx; III.i; III.iv; III.vii; VI.vi.

25. Jonas, Gnostic Religion, 195; see Elaine Pagels, “The Valentinian Claim to Esoteric Exegesis of Romans as Basis for Anthropological Theory,” Vig. Chr. 26 (1972) 241-258.

26. Adolf von Harnack, History of Dogma, Vol. II (New York, 1958) 326. Cf. for example, Protr. 6, where both conceptions appear side by side.

27. Lilla, Clement of Alexandria, pp. 146-148. For Clement's conception of secret tradition in general, see pp. 144-158. See also P. Th. Camelot, Foi et gnose: Introduction à l'étude de la connaissance mystique chez Clément d'Alexandrie (Paris, 1945) 90-95.

28. Strom. VII.x. For a detailed discussion of faith and gnosis, see Lilla, op.cit., 118-189.

29. Camelot, Foi et gnose, 50ff.

30. Ibid., 123-128.

31. Cf. Aloys Grillmeier, Christ in Christian Tradition (Atlanta, 1975) 136-138. In Strom. VI.ix, Clement says that while Jesus partook of food in order to avoid the danger of docetism, food and drink were not really necessary for him: his body was maintained by “holy energy.”

32. As illustration, note the lack of any ethical questions among those that Valentinian gnosis is intended to answer in the quotation at the beginning of this section. Plotinus sees this as a major objection against the Gnostics (Ennead II.9.15).

33. Pϱοχπη is the technical term for this process. Cf. Exc. 4,1;10,4;11,1;12,2;15,1;17,3;19,3.

34. Charles Bigg, The Christian Platonists of Alexandria (Oxford, 1886) 111ff.

35. Recall that according to the Excerpta the elect reach the same plane as the seven Archangels, the highest creations (10,1ff.). George M. Schurr, “On the Logic of Ante-Nicene Affirmations of the ‘Deification’ of the Christian,” ATR 51 (1969) 99, points out that Clement rejects pagan religion for its claims regarding the “deification” of humans, while at the same time employing the term to describe the ultimate status of Christians.

36. That the ascending soul is not consubstantial with the object of vision is similar to Jewish apocalyptic rather than Greek and Gnostic views of ascent. See John D. Turner, “The Gnostic Threefold Path to Enlightenment: The Ascent of Mind and Descent of Wisdom,” NovT 22 (1980) 324-351, especially 341ff.

37. See Chadwick's discussion of Clement's and the Valentinians' view of marriage (Alexandrian Christianity, pp. 30-39).

38. Jacques E. Ménard, in his article, “Normative Self-Definition in Gnosticism” (in Sanders, Jewish and Christian Self-Definition, pp. 134-150), sees the myth of the fall as essential to all Gnostic systems (pp. 140-41).

39. Raoul Mortley, “The Past in Clement of Alexandria: A Study of an Attempt to Define Christianity in Socio-Cultural Terms,” in Sanders, ibid., pp. 186-200, thinks that interest in the past is an orthodox, as opposed to a Gnostic, concern (p. 190).

40. Given the strongly negative concept of created reality and the fact that the real concern of Gnostic mythology is to describe the return of the pneumatic seed to a restored Pleroma, there is no logical place for the admission that one of the elements of the created reality continues to exist through all eternity.

41. Jonas, “Delimitation of the Gnostic Phenomenon,” p. 100.

42. Harnack, p. 327. It is noteworthy that Paul Henry (“The Place of Plotinus in the History of Thought,” in Plotinus, The Enneads, trans. Stephen MacKenna [London, 1956] xxxv-lxx) characterizes Plotinus's view as a “fundamental optimism” too (p. lvii).

43. See Lilla's comprehensive inquiry into the sources of Clement's thought and his conclusion that Clement's system combines three distinct streams of thought: Jewish-Alexandrine philosophy, the broad Platonic tradition, and Gnosticism (Clement of Alexandria, 227ff.).