Tripartite Tractate

First part — concerning the Father. The Unbegotten Source, His Son the Only-Begotten, and the Church of Aeons that came forth from them.

1As for what we may say concerning the things which are exalted — what is fitting is that we begin with the Father, who is the root of the All. From Him we have received grace to speak about Him.

2He existed before any other thing else came into being, save Himself alone. He is the Father, properly so called, of whom we may not speak nor conceive. He is the only One that is from Himself, even before all things.

3He is unbegotten; He is uncreated; He is unborn. There is none that brought Him forth. There is none that is His cause. He is the Father; He is the Self-Existent.

4He is the One above whom there is no other; He is the One within whom there is no measure; He is the One whom no name can name; He is the One whom no thought can frame.

5Yet He is good. He is the source of every good. He is glorious. He is the source of every glory. He is wisdom. He is the source of every wisdom.

6He hath been alone forever — yet not alone. For He hath ever had the Son with Him; the Son was ever in His bosom. And the Son is His Word — even the Word in whom He delighted from before the foundation of all things.

7And the Son is the only-begotten — the firstborn of the Father, the image of the invisible Father, the form of the formless. He is begotten, yet not begotten in the manner of mortals. He is from the Father, even as light is from light.

8From the Father and the Son cometh forth the Holy Spirit, who is the breath of love between them, and who fillethevery aeon, and who anointeth every chosen one.

9And from the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit, came forth the Pleroma — the assembly of the Aeons, even the Church of the firstborn. And the Aeons are not other than the Father; for they came forth from Him, and they abide in Him, and they return unto Him.

10Each Aeon is a thought of the Father; each Aeon is a face of the Father; each Aeon is a member of the Body of the Son. And the Aeons together form one great praise of the Father; their being is their hymn unto Him.

11And the Aeons knew the Father, but they knew Him not perfectly. For He is the Unsearchable. They reached out to know Him; but they grasped only what He gave them to grasp. Yet did they rejoice in what they had received; and they ceased not from their hymns of praise.

12But there was one Aeon that was not satisfied with the portion which it had received. It longed to comprehend the Father utterly. It sought to know that which cannot be known. And out of this longing — out of this excess of desire without knowledge — there came to be a wandering and a turning aside.

13Now the wandering of that Aeon was not evil in its root. Its root was love — the love of the Father. But love without knowledge is a perilous thing; for it draweth the soul into places where it ought not to go.

14And so the Aeon that wandered came to be in a place outside the Pleroma. And there was a deficiency. And the Pleroma was troubled. But the Father, in His mercy, did not abandon the wandering one.

15He sent the Son to seek and to bring back. He sent forth the Logos — the perfect Word — that He might restore the Aeon to the place from which she had departed.

16And the Logos came forth from the Pleroma. He clothed Himself with the suffering of the wandering one. He bore her grief. He took her labour upon Himself. And He led her back unto the Father.

17Now from the suffering and the longing of the wandering Aeon, there came to be the matter of the cosmos. The cosmos is not from the Father directly; rather, it is the shadow of the deficiency, the trace of the longing.

18But because the Logos went down into the cosmos, the cosmos shall be redeemed. The Logos shall not leave any portion of His handiwork in the deficiency. Even the matter shall be transformed; even the shadow shall be brought into the light.

19Therefore the cosmos is not for ever. It is a parenthesis in the eternal life of the Pleroma. It came to be; it shall pass away. And when it hath passed away, the All shall be the All — and the Father shall be all in all.

20These are the things which are exalted. We have spoken concerning the Father, and the Son, and the Spirit, and the Pleroma, and the wandering of the one Aeon, and the going forth of the Logos. Glory be unto Him from whom all things come, and unto whom all things return. Amen.