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      THIS BOOK IS MADE POSSIBLE BY A COLLABORATIVE GRANT FROM THE ANDREW W. MELLON FOUNDATION.

      © 2014 University of Pennsylvania Press

      All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations used for purposes of review or scholarly citation, none of this book may be reproduced in any form by any means without written permission from the publisher.

      Published by

      University of Pennsylvania Press

      Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-4112

       www.upenn.edu/pennpress

      Printed in the United States of America

      on acid-free paper

      10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Burns, Dylan M.

      Apocalypse of the alien god : Platonism and the exile of Sethian gnosticism / Dylan M. Burns. — 1st ed.

      p. cm. — (Divinations : rereading late ancient religion)

      Includes bibliographical references and index.

      ISBN 978-0-8122-4579-0 (hardcover : alk. paper)

      1. Apocalyptic literature—History and criticism. 2. Gnostic literature—History and criticism. 3. Gnosticism. 4. Neoplatonism. I. Title.

      BL501.B87 2014

      299’.932—dc23

      2013032143

      Im Abstande erst erzeugt sich ja mein Leben.

      —Gerschom Scholem, Tägebücher 2:245

      CONTENTS

       Abbreviations

       Introduction

       1. Culture Wars

       2. Plotinus Against His Gnostic Friends

       3. Other Ways of Writing

       4. The Descent

       5. The Ascent

       6. The Crown

       7. Between Judaism, Christianity, and Neoplatonism

       Appendix: Reading Porphyry on the Gnostic Heretics and Their Apocalypses

       Notes

       Bibliography

       Index

       Acknowledgments