The Gnostic Creation Story in the Tripartite Tractate
Some Remarks on the Tripartite Tractate
The Tripartite Tractate is one text from the Nag Hammadi Scriptures as a different form of the Gnostic Creation myth which alters the myth ascribing the fall to a masculine Aeon the Logos
In the beginning there was only the self-existent and transcendent Deity who is called the Eternal Spirit which has male and female attributes dwelling in silence and repose. The Deity is both corporeal and non-corporeal at the same time
From the transcendent Deity there was emanated a male principle called Mind and a female principle called Thought. In these principles emanated others, in male and female pairs to the total of thirty knows as Aeons who collectively constitute the fullness or the divine realm which others would call the spirit world which is beyond the physical heavens it is also called the 3rd Heaven.
Of all the Aeons only the first pair Mind and thought knew and comprehended the greatness of the self-existent Uncreated Eternal Spirit and could behold him but the last and youngest Aeon Logos or (Reason).
The intent, then, of this one who is the Logos, was good. When he had come forth, he gave glory to the Father, even if it led to something beyond possibility, since he had wanted to bring forth one who is perfect, from an agreement in which he had not been, and without having the command. and without the knowledge or consent of his female counterpart Sophia (wisdom) he projected from his own being a flawed emanation.
Thus the Logos motivated by abundant love and seeking only to give glory to the self-existent Uncreated Eternal Spirit creates other beings which are the seven archangels their leader is Michael who is the Demiurge the creator of the material cosmos or the physical heavens
But when the logos perceives that these are inferior to the emanations of the self-existent Uncreated Eternal Spirit indeed mere shadows and phantoms of them, lacking reason and light, dwelling in ignorance, bringing forth more and more defective creatures little weakling, hindered by the illnesses by which he too was hindered
From the transcendent Deity there was emanated a male principle called Mind and a female principle called Thought. In these principles emanated others, in male and female pairs to the total of thirty knows as Aeons who collectively constitute the fullness or the divine realm which others would call the spirit world which is beyond the physical heavens it is also called the 3rd Heaven.
Of all the Aeons only the first pair Mind and thought knew and comprehended the greatness of the self-existent Uncreated Eternal Spirit and could behold him but the last and youngest Aeon Logos or (Reason).
The intent, then, of this one who is the Logos, was good. When he had come forth, he gave glory to the Father, even if it led to something beyond possibility, since he had wanted to bring forth one who is perfect, from an agreement in which he had not been, and without having the command. and without the knowledge or consent of his female counterpart Sophia (wisdom) he projected from his own being a flawed emanation.
Thus the Logos motivated by abundant love and seeking only to give glory to the self-existent Uncreated Eternal Spirit creates other beings which are the seven archangels their leader is Michael who is the Demiurge the creator of the material cosmos or the physical heavens
But when the logos perceives that these are inferior to the emanations of the self-existent Uncreated Eternal Spirit indeed mere shadows and phantoms of them, lacking reason and light, dwelling in ignorance, bringing forth more and more defective creatures little weakling, hindered by the illnesses by which he too was hindered
This logos is the cause of the creation of the world and the lower beings including mankind but the logos is not the agent of creation the Demiurge is the agent of creation being used by the logos as a hand
This defective Logos is interceded for by his counterpart the Divine Logos or First Thought the Son in the Pleroma
Heracleon interpreted this in the same way he identifies the logos not with the agent of creation but with the casue making the creator lower than the logos
Fragment 1, on John 1:3 (In John 1:3, “All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made.”) The sentence: "All things were made through him" means the world and what is in it. It excludes what is better than the world. The Aeon (i.e. the Fullness), and the things in it, were not made by the Word; they came into existence before the Word. . . “Without him, nothing was made” of what is in the world and the creation. . . "All things were made through Him," means that it was the Word who caused the Craftsman (Demiurge) to make the world, that is it was not the Word “from whom” or “by whom,” but the one “through whom (all things were made).”. . . It was not the Word who made all things, as if he were energized by another, for "through whom" means that another made them and the Word provided the energy.
The archon is the agent of creation being used by the logos as a hand
