On the Origin of the World · 2 of 28

The Emanation of Sophia and the Hosts

1. After the natural form of the deathless entities had finished evolving out of infinity, at that time a likeness, who is called Sophia, emanated from Pistis.

2. She exerted her will and became a created entity like the primordial light, and straightaway her will displayed itself in the likeness of heaven, possessing an incomprehensible size which was between the deathless entities and those entities that came to be after they had, resembling [...].

3. She acted like a veil that separated humanity from the entities above.

4. Now, the aeon of Truth possesses no external shadow, because the infinite light dwells inside it everywhere.

5. However, its exterior is a shadow called by the name “Darkness,” from which appeared a host which ruled above the darkness, and the hosts that came to be after them called the shadow “Infinite Chaos,” from which every type of divinity sprung upwards [...] together with the entire place, with the additional result that shadow is subsequent to the first created entity.

6. It appeared ‹inside› the Abyss, originating from the previously mentioned Pistis.

7. The shadow next realized that something more powerful than it existed, and grew envious, and when it had grown pregnant by its own will, it straightaway gave birth to jealousy.

8. From that day, the law of jealousy prevailing among all the aeons and their worlds has been evident.

9. Now, regarding that jealousy, it was discovered to be an abortion lacking all spirit inside it.

10. It came to be as a shadow inside an immense aqueous substance.

11. The bile that had come to be from the shadow was next thrust into a section of Chaos.

12. From that day, an aqueous substance has been evident, and that which sank down inside of it gushed away while it was visible inside Chaos.

13. Like the case of a woman who gives birth to a child, when all her accumulated matter gushes out, even so, matter came to be from out of a shadow, and was propelled away from it, and it did not exit from Chaos.