Chapter XXV.—An Extravagant Way of Accounting for the Communication of the Spiritual Nature to Man. It Was Furtively Managed by Achamoth, Through the Unconscious Agency of Her Son.

In Achamoth, moreover, there was inherent a certain property of a spiritual germ, of her mother Sophia’s substance; and Achamoth herself had carefully severed off (the same quality), and implanted it in her son the Demiurge, although he was actually unconscious of it. It is for you to imagine236    Accipe. the industry of this clandestine arrangement.  For to this end had she deposited and concealed (this germ), that, whenever the Demiurge came to impart life to Adam by his inbreathing, he might at the same time draw off from the vital principle237    Anima derivaret. the spiritual seed, and, as by a pipe, inject it into the clayey nature; in order that, being then fecundated in the material body as in a womb, and having fully grown there, it might be found fit for one day receiving the perfect Word.238    Sermoni perfecto. When, therefore, the Demiurge commits to Adam the transmission of his own vital principle,239    Traducem animæ suæ. the spiritual man lay hid, although inserted by his breath, and at the same time introduced into the body, because the Demiurge knew no more about his mother’s seed than about herself. To this seed they give the name of Ecclesia (the Church), the mirror of the church above, and the perfection240    Censum. of man; tracing this perfection from Achamoth, just as they do the animal nature from the Demiurge, the clayey material of the body (they derive) from the primordial substance,241    Or, the substance of ᾽Αρχή. the flesh from Matter. So that you have a new Geryon here, only a fourfold (rather than a threefold) monster.

CAPUT XXV.

0578B Inerat autem in Achamoth ex substantia Sophiae matris, peculium quoddam seminis spiritalis: sicut et ipsa Achamoth in filio demiurgo sequestraverat, ne hoc quidem gnaro. Accipe industriam clandestinae providentiae hujus. Ad hoc enim et deposuerat et occultaverat, ut cum demiurgus animam mox de suo adflatu in Adam communicaret, pariter et semen illud spiritale quasi per canalem derivaretur in choicum: atque ita foeturatum in corpore materiali, velut in utero, et adultum illic, idoneum inveniretur suscipiendo quandoque Sermoni perfecto. Ita que cum demiurgus traducem animae suae committit in Adam, latuit homo spiritalis flatu insertus, et pariter corpori inductus, quia non magis 0579A semen noverat matris demiurgus, quam ipsam. Hoc semen Ecclesiam dicunt, Ecclesiae supernae speculum , et hominis censum: proinde eum ab Achamoth deputantes, quemadmodum animalem a demiurgo: choicum, substantia αῤχῆς: carnem, materia . Habes novum, id est quadruplum Geryonem .