narrowest section of the Jewish Christians, even as a most declared enemy of St. Paul, travelling like a commissioned agent in the interests of the Judaizers (K. G. i. p. 84; so also Schwegler, Nachap. Zeit, i. p. 342, etc.). This view is founded mainly upon an extract from his works, preserved in Photius (see in Routh, R. S. i. p. 219), where Hegesippus comments on the words, "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for the just," "Such words are spoken in vain, and those who use them lie against the Holy Scriptures and the Lord Who says, 'Blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear.'" It is argued that Hegesippus is here directly attacking St. Paul's words in I. Cor. ii. 9; and the inference is that Hegesippus was keenly Judaic. We know that the Gnostics were in the habit of so using the words in question, and that they described by means of them the very essence of that spiritual insight which the neophyte who had just sworn the oath of allegiance to them received, "And when he [i.e. he who is about to be initiated] has sworn this oath, he goes on to the Good One, and beholds 'whatever things eye hath not seen, and ear hath not heard, and which have not entered into the heart of man'" (Hippolytus, Ref. of all Heresies, i. p. 193, T. &T. Clark). It is much the more probable inference, therefore, that Hegesippus refers to this Gnostic misinterpretation of the words and not to St. Paul (cf. Routh, R. S. i. p. 281; Ritschl, Die Entstehung der Altk. Kirche, p. 267; Hilgenfeld, Die Apost. Väter, p. 102). Further, Hegesippus must have known that Clement, whose epistle he approved, quotes in c. xxxiv., for a purpose precisely similar to that of the apostle, the very passage in question, though with a slight variation in the words. How, then, can he have held the contrary opinion as to the use made of it by St. Paul? It is obviously a particular application of the passage, different from that of the apostle, that he has in view.
In the light of these considerations, Hegesippus appears to have been not a Judaizing but a Catholic Christian; and, if so, he becomes a witness not only for the catholicity in the main of the Christian church of the 2nd cent., but for the extent to which Catholic truth prevailed in it, for his evidence, whatever its purport, has reference to the condition of the church upon a large scale. Either, therefore, over this wide extent the church was as a whole marked by a narrow Judaic spirit, or over the same wide extent it was catholic in spirit, with heretical sects struggling to corrupt its faith. If our verdict be in favour of the latter view, it becomes impossible to look at Hegesippus in the light in which he has been presented by the Tübingen school. We must regard him as a Catholic, not as a Judaizing Christian, and his statements as to the condition of the church in his day become a powerful argument against, rather than in favour of, the conclusions of that school. Cf. Zahn, Forschungen, 1900, vi. 228–273.
[W.M.]
Hegesippus (2) (Egesippus), the alleged author of a work of which a translation from Greek into Latin, or what purported to be such, appeared c. 400, and is commonly referred to as de Bello Judaico or as de Excidio Urbis Hierosolymitanae. It is mainly taken from the Wars of Josephus. The translator freely adds to his author, sometimes from the later books of the Antiquities of Josephus, sometimes from Roman historians and other sources, and also freely composes speeches for the actors.
The work is that of an earnest defender of the Christian faith. An approximation to his date is supplied by several passages; as when he speaks of Constantinople having long become the second city of the Roman empire (iii. 5, p. 179), and of Antioch, once the metropolis of the Persians, being in his time the defence of the Byzantines against that people. He also speaks of the triumphs of the Romans in "Scotia" and in "Saxonia," using language strikingly similar to that of Claudian (c. 398) (v. 18, p. 299; Claud. de iv. Cons. Honor. 31–34). The work early acquired a considerable reputation. Some have ascribed the translation to Ambrose. The Benedictines, however, strongly reject the Ambrosian authorship, asserting that it contains nothing whatever in Ambrose's style; while Galland earnestly contends for it, and reprints an elaborate dissertation of Mazochius which he regards as conclusive (Galland. Biblioth. Patr. vii. prolegom. p. xxix.). The editors of the Patrologia incline to reject the Ambrosias authorship, though they print it among his writings (xv. 1962). The most correct edition (Marburg, 1858, 1864, 4to) was commenced by Prof. C. F. Weber of Marburg, and completed after his death by Prof. Julius Caesar, who elaborately discussed the authorship and date (pp. 389–399). Cf. G. Landgraf, "Die Hegesippus Frage" in Archiv. f. Latin Lexicogr. (1902), xii. 465·472, who decides in favour of the Ambrosian authorship.
[T.W.D.]
Helena (1), said to have been the companion of SIMON Magus. According to Justin Martyr (Apol. i. 26) and Irenaeus (i. 23, p. 99), who possibly makes use of a lost work of Justin's, she was a prostitute whom Simon had purchased from a brothel at Tyre and led about, holding her up to the veneration of his disciples. Giving himself out to be the Supreme Power and the Father above all, he taught, says Irenaeus, that "she was the first conception of his mind, the mother of all things, by whom in the beginning he conceived the thought of making the angels and archangels; for that this Conception proceeded forth from him and, knowing her father's wishes, descended to the lower world, and produced the angels and powers, by whom also he said that this world was made. But after she had produced them, she was detained by them through envy . . . and . . . confined in a human body, and for ages passed into other female bodies, as if from one vessel into another. He said, also, that she was that Helen on account of whom the Trojan war was fought; . . . that after passing from one body to another, and constantly meeting with insult, at last she became a public prostitute, and that she was 'the lost sheep.' On this account he had come that he might first of all reclaim her and free her from her chains, and then give salvation to men through the know-
