Apelles (Gnostic)

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Apelles (Greek: Aπελλής) was a second-century Gnostic Christian thinker. He started out his ministry as a disciple of Marcion of Sinope, probably in Rome. But at some point, Apelles either left, or was expelled from, the Marcionite church.

Tertullian writes that this was because he had become intimate with a woman named Philumena who claimed to be possessed by an angel, who gave her 'revelations' which Apelles read out in public.^[1] Marcion preached that Christians should be celibate and should not marry,^[2] so Apelles' relationship with Philumena was unacceptable to the Marcionite church. Apelles then went to Alexandria, where he developed his own distinctive doctrine, a modified form of Marcionism.