nt given by the Fathers of the Church is
also in the highest degree untrustworthy. The principal and most
characteristic points are not noticed by them. If we assume, as we must
needs do, that the opinions which Basilides promulgates as the teaching of
the "barbari" (_Acta Archelai_ c. 55) were in fact his own, the fragments
prove him to have been a decided dualist, and his teaching an interesting
further development of oriental (Iranian) dualism. Entirely consistent with
this is the information given by the _Acta Archelai_ that Basilides, before
he came to Alexandria, had appeared publicly among the Persians (_fuit
praedicator apud Persas_); and the allusion to his having appealed to
prophets with oriental names, Barkabbas and Barkoph (Agrippa in Eusebius
_Hist. Eccl._ iv. 7 s. 7). So too his son Isidorus explained the prophecies
of a certain Parchor ( = Barkoph) and appealed to the prophecies of Cham[1]
(Clemens Alexandrinus, _Stromat._ vi. 6 s. 53). Thus Basilides assumed the
existence of two principles, not derivable from each other: Light and
Darkness. These had existed for a long time side by side, without knowing
anything of each other, but when they perceived each other, the Light had
only looked and then turned away; but the Darkness, seized with desire for
the Light, had made itself master, not indeed of the Light itself, but only
of its reflection (_species_, _color_). Thus they had been in a position to
form this world: _unde nec perfectum bonum est in hoc mundo, et quod est,
valde est exiguum_. This speculation is clearly a development of that which
the Iranian cosmology has to tell about the battles between Ahura-Mazda and
Angro-Mainyu (Ormuzd and Ahriman). The Iranian optimism has been replaced
here by a strong pessimism. This material world is no longer, as in
Zoroastrianism, essentially a creation of the good God, but the powers of
evil have created it with the aid of some stolen portions of light. This is
practically the transference of Iranian dualism to the more Greek
antithesis of soul and body, spirit and matter (cf. Irenaeus i. 24 s. 5:
_animae autem eorum solam esse salutem, corpus enim natura corruptibile
existit_). The fundamental dualism of Basilides is confirmed also by one or
two other passages. In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, Basilides
saw the proof of _naturam sine radice et sine loco rebus supervenientem_
(_Acta Archelai_). According to Clemens, _Strom._ iv. 12 s. 83, &c.,
Basili