[OOC] The Ophites and the Ophidians: Inspiration Behind the Snake Cult

[WarderDragon]

I thought this would be an interesting tidbit for those interested in the inspiration behind Ultima and the Ophidians. You can read the entire article here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophites

The Ophites were a Christian Gnostic Sect of the Ancient Levant also known as the Serpentinians. The Ophidians in Ultima were a group of humans who worshipped a Trinity of Three Serpents; Chaos, Order, and Balance.

The Ophites (also called Ophians or Serpentinians) (from Greek ὄφιανοι > ὄφις = snake) were members of numerous Gnostic sects in Syria and Egypt about 100 AD. The Ophite sects revered the serpent of Genesis as a symbol of gnosis, which the tyrant Yaldabaoth tried to hide from Adam and Eve. As John 3:14 tells that "as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up," the Ophites felt perfectly justified in their position, and Christian heresiologists took particular offense at turning their view of the serpent on its head.

Irenaeus wrote a history of heresy toward the end of the second century from which our principal mythos is derived; Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, vii. 17, § 108) mentions beside the "Cainists" the "Ophians" (Οφιανοί), saying that their name is derived from the object of their worship. Philaster, an author of the fourth century, places the Ophites, the Cainites, and the Sethians at the head of all heresies (ch. 1-3), because he holds that they owed their origin to the serpent (the Devil).