22. Irenaeus writes that when the Marcosians "lead them [i.e. their catechumen] to water, and while they baptize them they repeat the following words: Into the name of the unknown father of the universe, into truth, the mother of all things, into the one that descended, into Jesus." [εἰς τὸν κατελθόντα εἰς τὸν ᾽Ιησοῦν] [Eusebius/Book IV/Chapter 11;AH. i. 21. 3]These are the words cited by Eusebius out of the copy of Irenaeus' work that HE HAD IN HIS AGE. Almost every scholar who has ever studied Against the Heresies has recognized that our surviving text is corrupt. Eusebius baptismal hymn makes it clear that the initiates of Mark were baptized INTO THE ANGEL JESUS; our surviving texts make it seem as if Jesus was a 'real person.' This was not the original understanding. Like the Marcionites the Marcosians believed that Jesus was an angelic power who baptized his disciples 'into himself.'
Clement of Alexandria similarly declares "receive, then, the water of the Word; wash, ye polluted ones; purify yourselves from custom, by sprinkling yourselves with the drops of truth." [Exhortation 10]
"These are our invulnerable weapons: armed with these, let us face the evil one; "the fiery darts of the evil one" let us quench with the sword-points dipped in water, that, have been baptized by the Word, returning grateful thanks for the benefits we have received, and honouring God through the Divine Word." [ibid 11]
"But most of all is it necessary to wash the soul in the cleansing Word." [Instructor III:9]
"But the providence of God as revealed by the Lord does not order now, as it did in ancient times, that after sexual intercourse a man should wash. For there is no need for the Lord to make believers do this after intercourse since by one Baptism he has washed them clean for every such occasion, as also he has comprehended in one Baptism the many washings of Moses." [Stromata III.82]
"So the high priest, putting off his consecrated robe (the universe, and the creation in the universe, were consecrated by Him assenting that, what was made, was good), washes himself, and puts on the other tunic -- a holy-of holies one, so to speak -- which is to accompany him into the adytum; exhibiting, as seems to me, the Levite and Gnostic, as the chief of other priests (those bathed in water, and clothed in faith alone, and expecting their own individual abode), himself distinguishing the objects of the intellect from the things of sense, rising above other priests, hasting to the entrance to the world of ideas, to wash himself from the things here below, not in water, as formerly one was cleansed on being enrolled in the tribe of Levi. But purified already by the gnostic Word in his whole heart, and thoroughly regulated, and having improved that mode of life received from the priest to the highest pitch, being quite sanctified both in word and life, and having put on the bright array of glory, and received the ineffable inheritance of that spiritual and perfect man, "which eye hath not seen and ear hath not heard, and it hath not entered into the heart of man;" and having become son and friend, he is now replenished with insatiable contemplation face to face. For there is nothing like hearing the Word Himself, who by means of the Scripture inspires fuller intelligence. For so it is said, "And he shall put off the linen robe, which he had put on when he entered into the holy place; and shall lay it aside there, and wash his body in water in the holy place, and put on his robe." But in one way, as I think, the Lord puts off and puts on by descending into the region of sense; and in another, he who through Him has believed puts off and puts on, as the apostle intimated, the consecrated stole. Thence, after the image of the Lord. the worthiest were chosen from the sacred tribes to be high priests, and those elected to the kingly office and to prophecy were anointed." [Stromata V.6]
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