Note 653 — Chapter X · THE SYSTEM OF THE PISTIS SOPHIA AND ITS RELATED TEXTS[459]
Reading edition
This word constantly occurs in the Magic Papyri, generally with another word prefixed, as σεσενγεν βαρφαραγγης (Papyrus Mimaut, l. 12, Wessely’s Griechische Zauberpapyri, p. 116), which C. W. King (Gnostics and their Remains, 2nd ed. p. 289) would translate “they who stand before the mount of Paradise” or in other words the Angels of the Presence. Amélineau (Notices, etc. p. 144, n. 2) will have Barpharanges to be “a hybrid word, part Chaldean and part Greek” meaning “Son of the Abyss”—which is as unlikely as the other interpretation.