Marcellina (Gnostic)

As a Carpocratian, Marcellina taught the doctrine of antinomianism, or libertinism,[5][6] which holds that only faith and love are necessary to attain salvation and that all other perceived requirements, especially obedience to laws and regulations, are unnecessary.[5][6] She, like other Carpocratians, believed that the soul must follow the path to redemption, possibly going through many incarnations.[5][6] The goal of the believer is the escape from the cycle of reincarnation by ascending through several stages of deification.[6] The Carpocratians believed that Jesus was only human, not divine,[6] and saw him as an exemplary model to be followed, but an example which a particularly devout believer was capable of surpassing.[5] Jesus's prime virtue was that he could perfectly remember the Divine from his pre-existence.[6] They also venerated Greek philosophers as models to be emulated as well.[6][7] The Marcellians' syncretic cult of images was a natural consequence of this teaching.[5][6] One of the foundational teachings of the Carpocratians was the idea of social egalitarianism, which advocated equality for all people.[8][6] Marcellina's position as the leader of the Carpocratian community in Rome indicates that, for her community at least, this was an idea which was meant to be literally implemented.[8] Some Carpocratians, possibly including Marcellina, held all property in common and shared sexual partners.[6] They also celebrated a form of agape feast.[6]

Irenaeus records that the Marcellians venerated images of Greek philosophers, including Pythagoras, Plato, and Aristotle.[6][9][10] Busts of philosophers, such as this one of Pythagoras, were common objects of adoration in second-century Roman society.[10]

The Church Father Irenaeus (c. 130 – c. 202) records in his apologetic treatise Adversus Haereses:

Others of them [i.e., the Carpocratians] employ outward marks, branding their disciples inside the lobe of the right ear. From among these also arose Marcellina, who came to Rome under [the episcopate of] Anicetus, and, holding these doctrines, she led multitudes astray. They style themselves Gnostics. They also possess images, some of them painted, and others formed from different kinds of material; while they maintain that a likeness of Christ was made by Pilate at that time when Jesus lived among them. They crown these images, and set them up along with the images of the philosophers of the world that is to say, with the images of Pythagoras, and Plato, and Aristotle, and the rest. They have also other modes of honouring these images, after the same manner of the Gentiles.[11]

Marcellina is the only woman associated with early Gnostic Christianity who is recorded to have been an active religious leader in her own right.[12] Other women such as Helena (allegedly a former Tyrian prostitute turned muse of Simon Magus), Philumena (a prophetess associated with Apelles), and Flora (a student of Ptolemy) are known to have been active as prophetesses, teachers, and disciples involved in sects led by men,[13] but none of them are known to have been leaders themselves.[12] Nonetheless, Marcellina still appears in relation to Carpocrates, a male teacher, who appears to have been more actively involved than her in leading followers, writing treatises, and teaching students.[12] Anne McGuire states that it is unclear whether this description of Marcellina in relation to Carpocrates is a result of Irenaeus's own patriarchal worldview, the actual relationship between her and him, or both.[12]

Marcellina's use of images of Jesus and Greek philosophers would not have been unusual in Roman society at the time, because busts and images of philosophers were common objects of adoration in second-century Roman society.[10][7] While Irenaeus interprets this as a sign of Marcellina's heterodox teaching,[14] to any non-Christian Roman, it would have actually made her seem far less aberrant than "orthodox" Christians.[14] By venerating busts of philosophers and including Jesus among them as the greatest, Marcellina's followers were honoring him in the same way that other philosophers were typically honored throughout the Greco-Roman world.[15] The Carpocratians may have had a more intellectual outlook than other sects,[15] since, according to Clement of Alexandria, Carpocrates's son Epiphanes had been trained in Platonic philosophy.[16][15][17] Nonetheless, Michael Allen Williams states that the veneration of images seems highly unexpected for a supposedly Gnostic sect,[18] since Gnostics are thought to have held the physical body in contempt.[18] He suggests that Marcellina and her followers, like their pagan contemporaries, may have viewed representations of philosophers' physical likenesses as "windows to the soul" and a means of reflecting on the person's teachings.[18] Peter Lampe interprets Marcillina's use of images of famous philosophers as an indication of religious syncretism.[17]

Joan E. Taylor notes that Irenaeus does not state that the Marcellians' portrait of Jesus was inaccurate or that portraits of Jesus were inherently immoral.[15] She also argues that the Marcellians' busts of Jesus and other philosophers may have survived long after their sect declined,[15] observing that, nearly a century later, the Roman emperor Alexander Severus (reigned 222 – 235) is said to have possessed a collection of portrait busts of various philosophers, religious figures, and historical figures including Jesus, Orpheus, Apollonius of Tyana, Alexander the Great, and Abraham.[15] She remarks, "For all we know, one of the many unidentified philosopher busts that exist in today's collections might have been thought of as Jesus in the second–third centuries."[15]

According to David Brakke, the reason why Marcellina and the members of her school identified themselves as "Gnostics" was not as a sectarian identification with the branch of early Christianity known as "Gnosticism",[19] but rather as an epithet for "the ideal or true Christian, the one whose acquaintance with God has been perfected".[20] He notes that Irenaeus himself identifies Marcellina and her sect with the Carpocratians, not with the "Gnostic school of thought".[20] Also, Hippolytus of Rome, who relied on Irenaeus as a source, references that another sect known as the Naassenes "call themselves 'gnostics' in their own way, as if they alone have drunk from the amazing acquaintance of the Perfect and Good."[19] In the late fourth century, the ascetic monk Evagrius Ponticus described the most advanced stage of Christian asceticism as "the Gnostic",[20] indicating that, despite the association of the word "Gnostic" with Gnosticism, it still retained its original positive meaning in the sense with which Marcellina and her disciples identified.[20] Bentley Layton does not classify Marcellina and her followers as members of the Gnostic sect either.[21]

Origen (c. 184 – c. 253) also briefly mentions Marcellina in his Contra Celsum, stating that "Celsus knows also of Marcellians who follow Marcellina, and Harpocratians who follow Salome, and others who follow Mariamme, and others who follow Martha."[9] Anne McGuire states that, because all the other figures listed by Origen in this passage are figures who appear in the canonical gospels, it is possible that the Marcellians may have regarded Marcellina, not only as a teacher and religious leader, but as "an authoritative source of apostolic tradition".[9] Williams notes that Origen seems to have been aware that the Marcellians called themselves Gnostics,[22] since, elsewhere in Contra Celsum, he notes that one of Celsus's arguments against Christianity was the existence of different sects, including ones "who call themselves gnostics".[22] This would presumably include Marcellina and her followers,[22] but Origen refrains from calling them by this term.[22]