112 



CANON J. A. MacCULLOCH; D.D., ON 



of the Cross ; in other words, Christ Himself, Who is called the 

 Tree of Life in the Acts of Matthew.^ Its powers may be com- 

 pared with those of the immortal food of the Zoroastrian heaven, 

 the holy oil of the blessed, as described in the Avesta.f Celsus,. 

 perhaps quite properly, reported these Gnostic views when he 

 said that the Gnostic writings refer to a Tree of Life and a re- 

 surrection of the flesh by means of the Tree, " because I unagine 

 their Teacher was nailed to a Cross," although Origen says that 

 he mistook the symbolical expression : " through the Tree came 

 death and through the Tree comes life, because death was in 

 Adam and life in Christ. "J Celsus was perhaps quoting from 

 some Gnostic document in which Christ was identified with the 

 Tree of the Cross, the Tree of Life. Orthodox writers could 

 indeed use the same ideas, though doubtless in a less realistic 

 manner. Hippolytus, e.g., says that the Tree of Life is Christ, 

 because He has brought forth fruits of knowledge and virtue like 

 a tree, whereof they that eat receive eternal Hfe, and shall enjoy 

 the Tree of Life in Paradise with Adam and all the righteous. § 

 Gnostic and Catholic spoke much the same language, though 

 their purpose was different. 



The symbolic identity of the Tree of Life, the Cross, and Christ, 

 held by the Gnostics, was connected with a legend which was wide- 

 spread in the Middle Ages. Seth planted on Adam's grave a 

 branch of the Tree of Life. A beam of this tree was thrown by 

 Solomon into the Pool of Bethesda, which now had healing 

 powers. At the time of the Passion this beam floated up and 

 from it the Cross was made, the relics of it afterwards per- 

 forming innumerable miracles. This story is given in full detail 

 in the Golden Legend of Jacobus de Voragine, so popular in the 

 Middle Ages. 



VI. 



Out of their extreme veneration for the Cross, the Gnostics 

 shared with the Catholics the custom of using the sign of the 



* A. S. Lewis, Mythological Acts of the Apostles, p. 105. 

 t L. H. Mills, Avesta Eschatology, p. 30. 

 j Origen, Contra Celsum, vi, 34. 



§ Hippolytus, Comm. on Proverbs, in Mai, Bib. nova Patrum, vii, 2, 71. 

 Cf. S. Ignatius, ad Ephes. 17, " For this cause did the Lord suffer the 

 ointment to be poured on His head, that He might breathe the breath of 

 immortality into His Church," 



