CARPOCRATIAN

follower of Carpocrates, a 2nd-century Christian Gnostic, i.e., a religious dualist who believed that matter was evil and the spirit good and that salvation was gained through esoteric knowledge, or gnosis. The sect flourished in Alexandria. Carpocratians revered Jesus not as a redeemer but as an ordinary man whose uniqueness flowed from the fact that his soul had not forgotten that its origin and true home was within the sphere of the unknown perfect God. In other words, Jesus was to them a fellow Gnostic and as such a model for imitation. Carpocratians completely rejected the created world by identifying themselves with spiritual reality. They claimed to communicate with demonic spirits and presented this as proof of their power over, and superiority to, the material world. The subversion of Jewish biblical law was considered a serious responsibility because they claimed it came from evil angels who created the world. The Carpocratians have been called libertine Gnostics because they contended that the attainment of transcendent freedom depended on having every possible experience, sinful or otherwise. Such an array of experiences normally required more than one lifetime, so the Carpocratians espoused the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, perhaps inspired by Indian or Pythagorean beliefs. Apparently the Carpocratians had a more fully developed cult than other Gnostic groups, for they made brightly coloured icons with images of Plato, Pythagoras, Aristotle, Jesus, and others. Indeed, they were the first sect known to have used pictures of Christ. They also practiced magic for such purposes as the making of love potions.