§10Sed quidam exitum Sophiae et restitutionem aliter somniauerunt: post inritos conatus et spei deiectionem deformatam eam. pallore, credo, et macie et incuria.
But some have dreamed of Sophia's end and restoration otherwise: that after her fruitless endeavors and the casting down of her hope, she was deformed—by paleness, I suppose, and leanness, and neglect.
proprie utique patrem non minus denegatum dolebat quam amissum.
At all events, she grieved for the father being denied no less than as if he were lost.
dehinc in illo maerore ex semetipsa sola, nulla opera coniugii, concipit et procreat feminam.
Then, in that grief, from herself alone, with no cooperation of marriage, she conceives and procreates a female.
miraris hoc? et gallina sortita est de suo parere; sed et uultures feminas tantum aiunt et tamen sine masculo matres.
Do you wonder at this? Even the hen has been allotted to bring forth of her own; and indeed they say that vultures are only females and yet become mothers without a male.
et *** metuere postremo, ne finis quoque insisteret; haerere de ratione casus, curare de occultatione.
And indeed, they feared at last lest an end also should press upon them; they hesitated about the reason of the occurrence, and cared for its concealment.
remedia nusquam.
Remedies were nowhere.
ubi enim iam tragoediae atque comoediae, a quibus forma mutuaretur exponendi quod citra pudorem erat natum? dum in malis res est, suspicit, conuertit ad patrem.
For where were now the tragedies and comedies from which might be borrowed the form of exposing what had been born without shame? While the matter is in distress, she looks up and turns to the father.
sed incassum enisa, ut uires deserebant, in preces succidit. tota etiam propinquitas pro ea supplicat, uel maxime Nus.
But having striven in vain, as her strength was failing, she sank down into prayers. All her kindred also supplication makes for her, and especially Nus.
quidni? causa mali tanti! nullus tamen Sophiae exitus uacuit.
Why not? He was the cause of so great an evil! Yet, no end of Sophia was without effect.
omnes aerumnae eius operantur in materiae originem, siquidem ex illa tunc conflictatione [peruenit] ignorantia pauore maerore substantiae fiunt.
All her distresses work toward the origin of matter, since from that conflict at that time, ignorance, fear, and grief become substances.
ibi demum pater, motus aliquando, quem supra diximus Horon per Monogenem Nun in haec promit in imagine sua, feminam marem, quia et de patris sexu ita uariant.
There at last the father, being moved at length, sends forth into these things, through the Only-begotten Nus, him whom we have called Horos above, in his own image, female-male, because they also vary thus concerning the father's sex.
adiciunt autem Horon etiam Metagogea (circumductorem) uocari et Horotheten.
And they add that Horos is also called Metagogeus (the leader-around) and Horothetes.
huius praedicant opera et repressam ab inlicitis et purgatam a malis et deinceps confirmatam Sophiam et coniugio restitutam; et ipsam quidem in Pleromatis censu remansisse, enthymesin uero eius et illam adpendicem passionem ab Horo relegatam et crucifixam et extra eum factam.
By his works, they preach, Sophia was both restrained from unlawful things, and purged of evils, and subsequently confirmed, and restored to her marriage; and that she herself indeed remained in the census of the Pleroma, but her thought (enthymesis) and that attendant passion were banished by Horos, and crucified, and cast out of it.
malum, quod aiunt, foras! spiritalem tamen substantiam illam, ut naturalem quendam impetum Aeonis, sed informem et inspeciatam, quatenus nihil adprehendisset, ideoque fructum infirmum et feminam pronuntiatam.
"Evil, out of doors!" as they say. Yet, that spiritual substance, as a certain natural impulse of the Aeon, but shapeless and without appearance, inasmuch as it had apprehended nothing, and therefore was pronounced an infirm fruit and a female.
§11Igitur post Enthymesin extorrem et matrem eius Sophiam coniugi reducem iterum ille Monogenes, ille Nus, otiosus plane de patris cura atque prospectu solidandis rebus et Pleromati muniendo iamque figendo, ne qua eiusmodi rursus concussio incurreret, nouam excludit copulationem: Christum et Spiritum Sanctum, turpissimam putem duorum masculorum.
Therefore, after the banished Enthymesis and her mother Sophia restored to her husband, once again that Only-begotten, that Nus, being completely at leisure from the care and contemplation of the father, in order to solidify things and fortify the Pleroma, and now fix it, lest any such concussion should run into it again, hatches a new coupling: Christ and the Holy Spirit, the most shameful pair, I should think, of two males.
aut femina erit Spiritus Sanctus, et uulneratur a femina masculus? munus enim his datur unum: procurare concinnationem Aeonum, et ab eius officii societate duae scholae protinus, duae cathedrae, inauguratio quaedam diuidendae doctrinae Valentini.
Or will the Holy Spirit be a female, and is the male wounded by the female? For one task is given to them: to procure the harmony of the Aeons, and from the partnership of this office, straightway two schools, two chairs, a certain inauguration of dividing the doctrine of Valentinus.
Christi erat inducere Aeonas naturam coniugiorum — uides quam rem plane — et innati coniectationem et idoneos efficere (re)generandi in se agnitionem patris, quod capere eum non sit neque comprehendere, non uisu denique, non auditu compotiri eius, nisi per Monogenem.
It belonged to Christ to introduce to the Aeons the nature of marriages—you see what kind of thing clearly—and the conjecture of the Unbegotten, and to make them fit for (re)generating in themselves the knowledge of the father, because it was not possible to grasp or comprehend him, and finally, not by sight, nor by hearing, to obtain possession of him, except through the Only-begotten.
et tamen tolerabo, quod ita discunt patrem nosse, t ne nos et illud.
And yet I will tolerate that they learn to know the father in this way, lest we also [suffer] that.
magis denotabo doctrinae peruersitatem, quod docebantur incomprehensibile quidem patris causam esse perpetuitatis ipsorum, comprehensibile uero eius generationis illorum et formationis esse rationem.
Rather, I will point out the perversity of the doctrine, because they were taught that the incomprehensible indeed of the father is the cause of their perpetuity, but his comprehensible is the reason of their generation and formation.
hac enim dispositione illud, opinor, insinuatur, expedire deum non adprehendi, siquidem inadprehensibile eius perpetuitatis est causa, adprehensibile autem non perpetuitatis, sed natiuitatis et formationis, egentium perpetuitatis.
For by this disposition, I think, it is insinuated that it is expedient for God not to be apprehended, since his incomprehensibility is the cause of perpetuity, whereas the comprehensible is not of perpetuity, but of birth and formation, which stand in need of perpetuity.
filium autem constituunt adprehensibile patris; quomodo tamen adprehendatur, tum prolatus Christus edocuit.
And they constitute the Son as the comprehensible of the father; but how he may be apprehended, Christ, then brought forth, taught.
Spiritus uero Sancti prouincia, ut de doctrinae studio omnes peraequati gratiarum actionem prosequi nossent et ueram inducerentur quietem.
But the province of the Holy Spirit was that, all being made equal in the study of doctrine, they should know how to offer thanksgiving, and should be introduced into true rest.