Hippolytus, Refutation of All Heresies 21

This is what they say, along with similar claims in countless writings. They persuade their disciples to investigate the theory of mixture and separation—a theory studied by many, including Andronicus the Peripatetic. The Sethians maintain that this theory works as follows: a bright ray is mixed in from above, while the tiniest spark is subtly blended and joined with the dark waters below, forming a single mixture. They compare it to a single fragrance rising from many incense ingredients—styrax, myrrh, frankincense, or whatever else—blended together on the fire. They insist that an expert, possessing a keen sense of smell, can distinguish each individual ingredient from that one combined scent. They offer other illustrations as well: gold mixed with bronze, yet a technique exists to separate the bronze from the gold. Likewise, if tin or bronze or any similar metal is found alloyed with silver, a superior refining method can distinguish them. Even water mixed with wine can be separated, they say. So, they claim, every mixed substance can be resolved into its components.

And, he says, learn from living creatures: when an animal dies, each part separates out, and when the body dissolves, the creature ceases to be. This, he says, is the meaning of the saying: "I did not come to bring peace on earth, but a sword" (Matthew 10:34)—that is, to divide and separate what has been mixed together. For each of the mixed elements is divided and distinguished, finding its own proper region. Just as there is a single region of mixture for all living things, so there is also a single region of separation, which no one knows, he says, except us—the spiritually reborn, not fleshly—whose citizenship is in the heavens above. By slipping in this way, they corrupt their listeners, sometimes using set speeches to twist well-spoken truths toward their own evil ends, and they conceal their own injustice behind parables of their own choosing.

All things, then, as has been said, possess their own proper region and rush toward it—like iron to the Heraclean lodestone, chaff to amber, and gold to the center of the sea-hawk. In the same way, the ray of light mixed with water, having received its proper region through instruction and learning, hastens to the Word that came from above in a servant's form, and becomes Word with the Word there, where the Word is—more strongly than iron draws to the Heraclean stone. And that matters stand thus, he says, and that all mixed things are separated each to its own place—learn this. There is a well in Persia, in the city of Ambe beside the Tigris River. Above it a cistern has been built with three outlets. When someone draws water from the well with a bucket and pours whatever comes up into the adjacent cistern, the liquid reaches the outlets, is collected in a single vessel, and separates. At the first outlet salt appears, at the second asphalt, at the third oil. The oil is black, as Herodotus also records, and gives off a heavy scent; the Persians call it rhadinake. The Sethians say that the likeness of this well alone proves their point more convincingly than all the previous examples.