Note 262 — Chapter VIII · POST-CHRISTIAN GNOSTICS: THE OPHITES

In the Bruce Papyrus mentioned in Chapter X, there is much said about a god called Sitheus, so that it is by no means certain that the Seth after whom they were named was the patriarch of Genesis. He might be the Egyptian Set, whose name is transliterated in the Magic Papyri as Σηϊθ. His appearance in Egypt first as the brother and then as the enemy of Osiris has never been fully accounted for. See “The Legend of Osiris,” P.S.B.A. for 1911, pp. 145 sqq. Epiphanius’ attempt in the Panarion (Haer. XXXIX. c. 3, p. 524, Oehler) to connect the genealogy of Jesus with the Seth of Genesis is not even said to depend on the doctrines of the sect, and the whole chapter reads like an interpolation. Cf. Friedländer, Vorchristliche jüdische Gnosticismus, Göttingen, 1898, p. 25.