Читать книгу A Source Book for Ancient Church History - Joseph Cullen Ayer - Страница 99

Asceticism is a wide-spread phenomenon in nearly all religions. It is to be found in apostolic Christianity. In the early Church it was regarded as a matter in the option of the Christian who was aiming at the religious life [see above, § 16]. The characteristic of the Encratites was their insistence upon asceticism as essential to Christian living. They were therefore associated, and with abundant historical justification, with Gnosticism.

Additional source material: Clement of Alexandria, Strom., III, passim; Eusebius, Hist. Ec., IV, 29, cf. the many references in the notes to McGiffert's edition, PNF.