e Marcosians). [Greek: sunagoge, sustema,
diatribe, hai athropinai suneluseis], factiuncula, congregatio,
conciliabulum, conventiculum. The mystery-organisation most clearly
appears in the Naassenes of Hippolytus, the Marcosians of Irenaeus, and
the Elkasites of Hippolytus, as well as in the Coptic-Gnostic documents
that have been preserved. (See Koffmane, above work, pp. 6-22).]

[Footnote 326: The particulars here belong to church history. Overbeck
("Ueber die Anfaenge der patristischen Litteratur" in d. hist. Ztschr. N.
F. Bd. XII. p. 417 ff.) has the merit of being the first to point out
the importance, for the history of the Church, of the forms of
literature as they were gradually received in Christendom. Scientific,
theological literature has undoubtedly its origin in Gnosticism. The Old
Testament was here, for the first time, systematically and also in part,
historically criticised; a selection was here made from the primitive
Christian literature; scientific commentaries were here written on the
sacred books (Basilides and especially the Valentinians, see Heracleon's
comm. on the Gospel of John [in Origen]); the Pauline Epistles were also
technically expounded; tracts were here composed on dogmatico-philosophic
problems (for example, [Greek: peri dikaiosunes--peri prosphuous
psuches--ethika--peri enkrateias he peri eunouchias]), and systematic
doctrinal systems already constructed (as the Basilidean and
Valentinian); the original form of the Gospel was here first transmuted
into the Greek form of sacred novel and biography (see, above all, the
Gospel of Thomas, which was used by the Marcosians and Naassenes, and
which contained miraculous stories from the childhood of Jesus); here,
finally, psalms, odes and hymns were first composed (see the Acts of
Lucius, the psalms of Valentinus, the psalms of Alexander the disciple
of Valentinus, the poems of Bardesanes). Irenaeus, Tertullian and
Hippolytus have indeed noted, that the scientific method of
interpretation followed by the Gnostics, was the same as that of the
philosophers (e.g., of Philo). Valentinus, as is recognised even by the
Church Fathers, stands out prominent for his mental vigour and religious
imagination, Heracleon for his exegetic theological ability, Ptolemy for
his ingenious criticism of the Old Testament and his keen perception of
the stages of religious development (see his Epistle to Flora in
Epiphanius, haer. 33. c. 7). As a specimen of the lang