teacher of
the truth, but the manifestation of the truth), more plainly than where
he was regarded as the subject of Old Testament revelation. The
pre-existent Christ has significance in some Gnostic schools, but always
a comparatively subordinate one. The isolating of the person of Christ,
and quite as much the explaining away of his humanity, is manifestly out
of harmony with the earliest tradition. But, on the other hand, it must
not be denied that the Gnostics recognised redemption in the historical
Christ: Christ personally procured it (see under 6. h.).]

[Footnote 348: In this thesis, which may be directly corroborated by the
most important Gnostic teachers, Gnosticism shews that it desires _in
thesi_ (in a way similar to Philo) to continue on the soil of
Christianity as a positive religion. Conscious of being bound to
tradition, it first definitely raised the question, what is
Christianity? and criticised and sifted the sources for an answer to the
question. The rejection of the Old Testament led it to that question and
to this sifting. It may be maintained with the greatest probability,
that the idea of a canonical collection of Christian writings first
emerged among the Gnostics (see also Marcion). They really needed such a
collection, while all those who recognised the Old Testament as a
document of revelation, and gave it a Christian interpretation, did not
at first need a new document, but simply joined on the new to the old,
the Gospel to the Old Testament. From the numerous fragments of Gnostic
commentaries on New Testament writings which have been preserved, we see
that these writings there enjoyed canonical authority, while at the same
period, we hear nothing of such authority, nor of commentaries in the
main body of Christendom (see Heinrici, "Die Valentinianische Gnosis", u.
d. h. Schrift, 1871). Undoubtedly, sacred writings were selected
according to the principle of apostolic origin. This is proved by the
inclusion of the Pauline Epistles in the collections of books. There is
evidence of such having been made by the Naassenes, Peratae,
Valentinians, Marcion, Tatian, and the Gnostic Justin. The collection of
the Valentinians, and the Canon of Tatian must have really coincided
with the main parts of the later Ecclesiastical Canon. The later
Valentinians accommodated themselves to this Canon, that is, recognised
the books that had been added (Tertull. de praescr. 38). The question as
to who first conce