BAEBJGLO

BARCABBAS

249

seventh heaven, and proclaimed himself to hethe only God; and when she heard this wordshe lamented. She was always appearing to theArchons in a beautiful form, that by beguilingthem she might gather up her own scatteredpower. Others, Epiphanius further seems to say(78 f.), told a similar tale of Prunicus, sub-stituting Caulacau for Jaidabaoth. In his nextarticle, on the “ Gnostici ” (83 c d), the idea ofthe recovery of the scattered powers of Barbelo,the Mother above,” stolen from her by “ theArchon who made the world, and the other godsand angels aud daemons who were along withhim,” recurs as set forth in an apocryphal Bookof Noria, Noah’s legendary wife. In both placesEpiphanius represents the doctrine as giving riseto abominable immorality. In a third passage(91 f.), enumerating the Archons said to havetheir seat in each heaven, he mentions as theinhabitants of the eighth or highest heaven “herwho is called Barbelo,” and the self-genderedFather and Lord of all things, and the virgin-born ( avTo\6x*vTov ) Christ (evidently as herson, for according to Irenaeus her first progeny,“the Light,” was called Christ); and similarlyhe tells how the ascent of souls through thedifferent heavens terminated in the upper region,“ where Barbero or Barbelo is, the Mother ofthe Living” (Gen. ii. 20). Theodoret {M. F.f. 13) merely paraphrases Irenaeus, with a fewwords from Epiphanius. In the Pistis SophiaBarbelo is named often, but her place is notclearly defined (cf. Kostlin in Baur and Zeller’sJahrbucher for 1854, p. 61). She is one of thegods (p. 359), “ a great power of the InvisibleGod” (373), joined with Him and the three“Thrice-powerful deities” (379), the mother ofPistis Sophia (361) and of other beings (49);from her Jesus received His “ garment of light ”or heavenly body (13, 128; cf. 116, 121); theearth apparently is the “ matter of Barbelo ”(128) or the “ place of Barbelo ” (373). Jeromeseveral times includes Barbelo in lists of por-tentous names current in Spanish heresy, thatis, among Priscillianists; Balsamus and Leusiborabeing three times associated with it {Ep. 75c. 3, p. 453 C. Vail.; c. Vigil, p. 393 A; inEsai. Ixvi, 4 p. 361 c; in Amos iii. 9 p.257 e).

Barbelo doubtless represents one of the variousattempts to imagine a supreme female principle,the single passive antecedent of creation in itsmanifoldness. The only plausible etymology ofthe name that has been proposed is that ofHarvey (on Irenaeus, l. c.), and Lipsius {Gnosti-cismus , p. 115 ; Ophit. Syst. in Hilgenfeld’s Zeit-echrift for 1863, p. 445), Barba-Elo , The Deity-in Four , with reference to the tetrad (sufficientlyill defined in our present text, at least), whichby the report of Irenaeus proceeds from her.Her relation to this tetrad bears however notrue analogy to the Col-Arba of Marcus [Colar-basus]; it forms only the earliest group of herprogeny; and it is mentioned but once. The rootbalbelj much used in the Targums (Buxtorf, Lex.Rabb. 309), in biblical Hebrew balal, signifyingmixture or confusion, suggests a better derivationfor BarbelOy as denoting the chaotic germ ofvarious and discrete existence: the change from? to *1 is common enough, and may be seen inthe alternative form Bap&rjpd. If the Babel ofJustinus (Hipp. Maer. v. 26; x. 15) is identical

with Barbelo, as is at least possible, this deriva-tion becomes still more probable. [H.]

BARCABBAS and BARCOPH. AgrippaCastor, according to Eusebius {II. E. iv. 7. 7),stated that Basilides “ named as prophets tohimself Barcabbas and Barcoph, providing him-self likewise with certain other [? prophets] whohad no existence, and that he bestowed uponthem barbarous appellations to strike amaze-ment into those who have an awe of suchthings.” In Latin transcripts of this passage(Ruf. l.c. ; Hier. deVir. III. 21; cf. Routh, P. S.i. 90) the names appear variously in the MSS.as Barchabas, Barchabbas , Barcabas , and Barchob ,Barcoby B<trchabos, BarchOy Barchon t &c. Eachname virtually recurs elsewhere. Accordingto Epiphanius (i. 83 CD) some of the Ophiticheretics whom he calls “ Gnostici ” appealed to acertain prophet called Barcabbas, and quotedfrom him a “foul narrative ” {Si-fiyno-tv at<r*pd»'),the purport of which may have been immoral,but may also, to judge from his language, havebeen only directed against the doctrine of vir-ginity. Clement of Alexandria quotes bookswritten by Isidore, the son and disciple of Basi-lides {Strom, vi. 767), which were “expositionsof the prophet Parchor.” Lastly, Terebinthusor Buddas, the predecessor of Mani according tothe story, and heir of Scythianus’s books ofmagic, conversed, we are told, in Persia with thepriests of Mithras, and “ disputed about the twoprinciples with a certain Parcus and Labdacus,”who apparently were of their number (Epiph. i.621 A; Acta Arch, et Man. 52 p. 188 Routh),Labdacus being in one account called a son ofMithras {Act. Arch.y. it seems not unlikely herethat in the dative ndpfcep we have a corruptionof II apK<ap or UapKw<p but it is as old as theLatin version of the Acts. There can be noreasonable doubt that the names Barcoph andParchor are identical (Fp), and Parcus , ifgenuine, another inflected form. It is possiblethat Barcabbas is only a duplicate of it with theGreek ending superadded ; but on this supposi-tion A. Castor must have combined two differentreports of the same fact. The alleged prophecies,we see, were evidently current among differentGnostic bodies, and also among Manicheans. Itis remarkable that the use of books of this classby the Gnostics is the most prominent circum-stance dwelt on by Porphyry (F. Plot. 16) inhis account of Plotinus’s controversy with them ;and Amelius and himself, as well as Plotinus,wrote treatises against the claims set up for someof the books, especially a claim to have beenwritten by Zoroaster. Now we learn from thepassage of Clement already cited that Isidoredeclared the theological allegories of Pherecydesto have been taken “ from the prophecy ofHam.” Josephus (c. Ap. i. 3) and other authorsmaintain that Pherecydes derived his materialsfrom the Egyptians or Eastern nations, but theprophecies of Ham appear never to be mentioned,either in this connection or in any other. Therewas however a tradition that Mizraim, thereputed progenitor of the Egyptians, Babylonians,and Persians, was identical with Zoroaster, andthat he was taught magical arts by his fatherHam {Pec. Clem. iv. 27; cf. Mom. Clem. ix. 3 f.);and some even identified Ham himself withZoroaster (Cassian. Coll. viii. 21 [“quantumantiquae traditiones ferunt”], and later writers;