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Authentic Logos

Authoritative Teaching

About this book

The Logos as Medicine

Chapter 2

Her bridegroom secretly brought it, putting it to her mouth, causing her to eat it like food. He put it on her eyes like a medicine, causing her to see with her mind, and to comprehend her kin, and to learn about her root,⁠ so that she could hold fast to the branch from which she originally had come, so that she could receive what belongs to her, and to renounce matter [...].

Texts in conversation

Compare Authentic Logos 2:2 and Exegesis on the Soul 4:19

Nag Hammadi

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Summary

Authentic Logos, a Nag Hammadi text, describes a bridegroom helping the soul recognize where she came from. Exegesis on the Soul, also from Nag Hammadi, connects marriage with the soul’s return to her original state.

Passages

Authentic Logos 2:2

Nag Hammadi · Authoritative Teaching
Her bridegroom secretly brought it, putting it to her mouth, causing her to eat it like food. He put it on her eyes like a medicine, causing her to see with her mind, and to comprehend her kin, and to learn about her root, so that she could hold fast to the branch from which she originally had come, so that she could receive what belongs to her, and to renounce matter [...].
150–300 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Authentic Logos

Exegesis on the Soul 4:19

Nag Hammadi
In this way, after the soul [had beautified] herself once more in her splendor, [she desired] to adore her beloved, and [he, too], loved her. And when she united with him, she obtained from him the seed of the life-giving spirit. By it she bears upright children and raises them, because this is the great, perfect miracle of birth. And so this marriage is completed by the will of the Father. It is appropriate that the soul regenerates herself and again becomes what she earlier was. The soul then moves by her own will, and from the Father she obtains the divine nature for her renewal, to restore her to the place where she was at first: This is the resurrection from the dead.
200–230 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Exegesis on the Soul

References

“... It has points of similarity with Hippolytus‘ discussion of the Naasene gnostics (Elenchos V, 6–7), with what may be a pre-Valentinian form of the Sophia myth (Jonas 1958) found in The Apocryphon of John (NHC II,1 and elsewhere), and with other Nag Hammadi codices, such as Authentic Teaching (NHC VI,3: the spiritual soul, thrown into a body, becomes involved in this life, forgets her origins, then turns against this world, and at her marriage receives from the bridegroom the word which provides her with the true and saving knowledge of her origins) and The Gospel of Philip (NHC II,3: connects salvation and the bridal chamber). ...”
David Noel (ed.) Freedman, The Anchor Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 2:689.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Authentic Logos 2:2 and Exegesis on the Soul 4:19

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