DeConick A.D

158
JOHN AND THE DARK COSMOS
creator of it.” Jesus, the Son, sits at the right hand of the Father in the
heavens and, as the Father’s Word, he created not only the heavens but
also the earth and humankind (Letter of the Apostles 1, 3).
This Son did not become flesh through the descent of the Spirit at
Jesus’ baptism but was physically conceived by the Holy Spirit in the
womb of the Virgin Mary, and then was birthed as a child. With reference
to John 1:14, the author claims to have seen all of this (Letter of the
Apostles 3). Several chapters in the letter are devoted to explaining how
a great angelic power became flesh by descending through the celestial
spheres and ending up in the womb of Mary (13–14, 17).
The author assures us that, at the Judgment, Jesus will redeem all those
who are baptized and who have kept the Father’s commandments, along
with Jesus’ own new commandment to love others. The author of the
letter is convinced that Jesus will save the Children of Light from the
evil rulers who have bound the soul and spirit with fetters in their jail of
wickedness and evil deeds (28).
This fight to rescue the fourth Gospel from Cerinthus and Gnostic
sentiment is reflected also in a humorous second-century tale that Bishop
Polycarp liked to tell about the day that Jesus’ disciple John went to soak
in the warm waters of the local bathhouse in Ephesus. But he never got
to bathe. Instead, he rushed out of the doors and into the street, yelling,
“Take off! The bathhouse might collapse! Cerinthus, the enemy of truth,
is inside!” (Irenaeus, Against the Heresies 3.3.4).
Although this is a funny, fictitious tale, in it we are again faced with
Cerinthus and his connection to the fourth Gospel. In this case, he is
set against the disciple John. By this time, the Apostolic Catholics had
successfully begun claiming that John wrote the fourth Gospel, so the
humor works because both men were connected with this Gospel. John
flees because he, as the real author of the fourth Gospel, has identified
Cerinthus’s interpretation of the Gospel as so evil that it will bring God’s
judgment down upon all those who associate with him. The roof of the
bathhouse will fall in upon them.
The other information we have about Cerinthus comes from a Roman
named Gaius and his followers, who lived in the late second century. Gaius
considered himself an Apostolic Catholic. He was very concerned about
the fourth Gospel and the book of Revelation because they were being