The library · Edition and sources
On the Origin of the World
Samuel Zinner, edited by Mark M. Mattison; Other Gospels · Translated text
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Chapter 25
1. Let us return to the archons we discussed previously, so we can offer an explanation of them.
2. When the seven archons had been thrown down from out of their heavens onto the earth, they fashioned for themselves copious demonic angels in order to serve them, and these latter taught humanity several kinds of error, and magic, and potions, and idol worship, and bloodshed, and altars, and temples, and sacrifices, and libations to all the earthly demons, collaborating together with fate, who came into being from the agreement between the gods of injustice and justice, and in this way, when the world had come to be, it went astray, continually confused, because all humans on earth worshiped demons, from the creation to the consummation (of the age), both the angels of righteousness and the humans of unrighteousness.
3. In this way, the world had come to exist in confusion, in ignorance, and in a stupor.
4. All of them had gone astray, until the appearance of the true man.
5. Let this be sufficient as far as the topic is concerned.