Clement of Alexandria · a new plain-English translation from the original language
For knowledge is, so to speak, a certain perfecting of man as man, brought to completion through the science of divine things in respect of manner of life and reasoning, harmonious and in agreement both with itself and with the divine word. For through this faith is perfected, since it is only in this way that the believer becomes perfect. Faith, then, is a certain good disposed within, confessing that God exists without seeking further, and glorifying him as existing. Hence one must, being led up from this faith and increased in it by the grace of God, receive concerning him the knowledge that is possible. And we say that knowledge differs from the wisdom that comes about through teaching. For wherever there is knowledge, there wisdom is also found in every case; but wherever there is wisdom, it is not in every case knowledge. For it is only in the sphere of the uttered word that the name of wisdom is imagined to apply. Yet not to doubt concerning God, but to believe, is the foundation of knowledge, and Christ is both — the foundation and the structure raised upon it, since through him come the starting point and the twin outer limits. Now those two limits are not themselves taught: on one side stands faith, on the other stands love — but knowledge, passed on by tradition in keeping with the grace of God to those who make themselves worthy of the teaching, is committed as a sort of trust, out of which the worth of love shines forth, brightness kindling brightness. For thus it has been said: "to him who has, still more will be given" — so faith yields knowledge, knowledge yields love, and love yields the inheritance.
This comes to pass whenever one hangs upon the Lord through faith, through knowledge, and through love, and ascends together with him to where the God and guardian of our faith and love is. Hence at the end knowledge is handed down to those fit and approved for this, because it requires greater preparation and prior training, both for hearing what is spoken, and for the ordering of one's life, and for having advanced by increased effort beyond the righteousness that is according to the law. This leads on to the endless and perfect end, teaching beforehand the dwelling that will be ours with the gods according to God, once we have been released from all chastisement and punishment, which we undergo for our sins as a saving discipline. After this ransoming, the prize and the honors are rendered to those who have been made perfect, who have ceased from purification and have ceased also from every other service, even if it be holy and among the holy; then, having become pure in heart, restoration to eternal contemplation awaits them next in nearness to the Lord. And they have been called gods, enthroned together with the other gods who are ranked first under the Savior. Swift, then, toward purification is knowledge, and fit for the welcome change toward the better.
Hence it also easily removes the soul into what is akin to it, the divine and holy, and by a certain light of its own leads the man across through the mystical stages of advancement, until it restores him to the topmost place of rest, having taught the one pure in heart to look upon God directly, in an encounter of knowing and grasping. For it is somewhere here that the perfecting of the gnostic soul takes place, having passed beyond all purification and service, coming to be with the Lord, where it is directly subordinated to him. Faith, then, is, so to speak, a summary knowledge of urgent things, while knowledge is a strong and firm demonstration of the things received through faith, built up by the Lord's teaching upon faith into unshakeable stability, and conveying it to a comprehension attained with science. And it seems to me that the first saving turn is the passage from the nations into faith, as was noted earlier, while the second is the passage from faith into knowledge; and this, coming to its end in love, thereupon presents the one who knows as friend to friend with the one known. And perhaps such a one already has, from this point on in advance, the being "equal to angels." At any rate, after the last preeminence in the flesh, ever changing according to what is fitting toward the better, he hastens toward the paternal court, toward the truly dominical abode, through the holy seven-fold path, destined to be, so to speak, a light standing and abiding eternally, altogether and in every way unchangeable.
The first mode of the Lord's activity is a sample of the recompense we have spoken of according to piety toward God. Though there are many testimonies, let me offer just one in brief, put this way by the prophet David: "Who will climb up onto the Lord's mountain? Who will take his place in that holy site? Someone clean of hand and clear of heart, who has not lifted up his life toward emptiness, nor given a false oath against his neighbor: such a man will carry off a blessing sent by the Lord and mercy given by God his deliverer. Such is the line of those who search him out, who look for the presence of Jacob's God." Briefly, I think, the prophet has pointed to the gnostic here; and in the process, it would seem, David has revealed to us that the Savior is God, naming him the "presence" "of Jacob's God," the bearer of good news who taught what concerns the Father. That is why the apostle likewise named the Son "the stamp of the Father's glory," the one who both taught and marked out the truth about God, namely that "God and Father are one," he alone almighty, "whom none has recognized but the Son, and whoever the Son chooses to show him." And that God is a single one is signaled through this phrase, "those who look for the presence of Jacob's God," the very ones our Savior and God marks out as belonging to the "one" who is "good," as Father and as God. And this line of people looking for him is "the chosen race," the race set apart for the pursuit of knowledge.
For this reason the apostle also says: "What good am I to you, if my words to you carry no revelation, no knowledge, no prophecy, and no teaching?" And yet certain things are also done rightly by those who are not gnostics, but not according to reason — for example, in the case of courage. For some, being naturally high-spirited, and then having nourished this without reason, rush impetuously into many things without reasoning, and do things similar to what the courageous do, so that at times they achieve the same results, such as enduring tortures with ease; but they do so neither from the same cause as the gnostic, nor with the same purpose set before them, nor even "if they hand over their body to be burned"; "since love is absent from them," as the apostle puts it, the love that is born out of knowledge. Every action, then, that is done through knowledge is well-doing, but that which is done through ignorance is ill-doing, even if it maintains its steadfastness. Since he does not act with courage out of reasoning, nor does he direct his action toward anything useful among the things that turn toward virtue and away from virtue. And the same account holds also for the other virtues, so that it applies proportionately also to piety toward God. Not only, then, is the gnostic such as this in regard to holiness for us, but the professions concerning the rest of his conduct also follow the pattern of scientific piety toward God. For it lies before us now to describe the life of the gnostic, not to set forth the contemplation of doctrines, which we shall expound later at the fitting time, while preserving at the same time the sequence of our discourse.
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