Note 301 — BOOK V THE OPHITE HERESIES (continued 2)

Of these twelve names, Babel is written in bar Khôni as Babylon and said to be masculo-feminine, Achamoth is the Hebrew חכמת, Chochmah, Sophia, or Wisdom whom most Gnostics called the Mother of Life, Naas is the Serpent as is explained in the chapter on the Naassenes, Bel, Baal or the Chaldæan Bel, for Belias we should probably read Beliar, the devil of works like the Ascensio Isaiae, Kavithan should probably be Leviathan, Adonaios is the Hebrew Adonai, or the Lord, while Sael, Karkamenos and Lathen cannot be identified. Pharaoh and “Samiel,” a homonym of Satan, appear in bar Khôni’s list of angels who rule one or other of the ten heavens, and Adonaios and Leviathan in the Ophite Diagram described by Celsus. Cf. Forerunners, II, pp. 70 ff.