Exorcism was one of the practices through which early Christians publicly distinguished their religious claims from surrounding ritual cultures. This article surveys Christian exorcistic discourse before Constantine, concentrating on Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Origen. It argues that exorcism functioned simultaneously as pastoral…
This article re-examines Abrasax (later commonly Abraxas) by separating four historical layers frequently collapsed in modern accounts: Basilidean traditions reported by early Christian heresiologists; late antique magical gems and amulets; appearances of Abrasax in Nag Hammadi literature; and Carl Gustav Jung's twentieth-century reappropriation…
The Ars Almadel occupies an unusual position within the textual world later gathered under the title Lemegeton or Lesser Key of Solomon. Unlike the more notorious Goetia, the Almadel tradition is oriented principally toward angelic contact through a portable ritual altar, sacred names,…
The Holy Book of the Great Invisible Spirit, sometimes called the Gospel of the Egyptians, is one of the most complex surviving texts associated with ancient Gnostic tradition. Preserved in two Coptic witnesses in Nag Hammadi Codices III and IV, the work combines…
This article examines the Carpocratians and the followers of Prodicus as heterodox micro-movements within second-century Christianity. Because neither community left a surviving body of literature in its own voice, their teachings must be reconstructed primarily from the hostile accounts of Irenaeus, Clement of…