Carpocrates was an early Gnostic from sometime in the second century A.D. who was mentioned by Clement of Alexandria in the "Mar Saba letter" discovered in 1958 by ancient historian Morton Smith. In the letter Clement mentions and quotes from a previously unsuspected Secret Gospel of Mark, which Carpocrates had wheedled an opportunity to copy at Alexandria. A corrupted copy was circulating among Carpocrates' followers ("Carpocratians"). Carpocrates was the father of Epiphanes who wrote On Righteousness, a famous Gnostic scripture.

The most vivid account of Carpocrates and his followers comes from Irenaeus (died 202 A.D.) Against Heresies [1] (http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/bible/carpocra.stm), where they were said to believe in transmigration of the soul. In order to leave this world, one's imprisoned eternal soul must pass through every possible condition of earthly life, or it cannot free itself from the material powers (what other Gnostics call Archons, the Demiurge etc.).

The followers of Carpocrates believed that you could experience "everything" in one life time . Because of this belief, Irenaeus says, they practice all things condemned by the Mosaic law, on the assumption that in order for the spirit to achieve gnosis, the soul (psyche) had to live through "all" aspects of earthly life, and thus all kinds of vile and horrible things.

Epiphanius of Salamis writes that

"Carpocratians, derived from a native of Asia, Carpocrates, who taught his followers to perform every obscenity and every sinful act. And unless one proceeds through all of them, he said, and fulfils the will of all demons and angels, he cannot mount to the highest heaven or get by the principalities and authorities."

Carpocratians are claimed be an early sect of Christianity that has been corrupted by magic and sexual obscenity. Claims like these heresiological and horrible accounts were also ascribed to the Christians by outsiders. The Carpocratians also claimed to possess the only existing portrait of Jesus, a painting they claimed had been made by Pilate during his lifetime. They also had portraits of Plato, Pythagoras, Aristotle and other hellenistic philosophers.

External link

• Irenaeus, Against Heresies (http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/bible/carpocra.stm) Book i.xxv

See also

• Gnosticism
• Borborites
• Cainites