Clement of Alexandria

• He traveled extensively to seek instructions from the most famous Christian teachers.
• Attracted by the lectures of Pantaenus, he settled in Alexandria and was ordained a priest, then a dean of the school.
• He had to leave Egypt in 202 due to the persecution by Septimius Severus, and died in 215 (probably in Palestine or Syria)
• Christianity offers the perfect Gnosis and truth in Christ.
• He was the first Christian writer to confront the ideas of his time with Christian doctrine.
• He believed that there was no enmity between Christianity and philosophy.
• The ancient philosophy, in his view, was unable to achieve more than glimpses of the truth, while Christianity offers the perfect knowledge and truth in Christ.
• Throughout the first two centuries, a heresy appeared under the title “Gnostics” in various forms. The word “gnosis” in Greek means “knowledge”. A fundamental Gnostic claim was that the soul can reach the Supreme God through knowledge rather than faith.
• St. Clement showed the supremacy of Christian gnosis: contemplation; carrying out the commandments; instructions by righteous men.

1. His main work was the Trilogy: a. Protrepticus or The Exhortation to the Heathens (attack on paganism and invitation to salvation). b. Paedagogus or Instructor (The Tutor or Instructor): Practical instructions for the Christian conduct. In it, he wrote: “It is then, as appears, the greatest of all lessons to know one’s self. For if one knows himself, he will know God.” c. The Miscellanies or Stromata (Miscellaneous Studies): Christian faith vs. Greek philosophy

• This Trilogy outlines his theological system that the Word of God, the Logos, invites mankind to abandon paganism through faith, then He reforms their lives by the commandments, and finally, He elevates them to the perfect knowledge of divine things. In short, the Logos converts, disciplines, and instructs.
• This concept of the Divine plan for our salvation influenced the program in the School of Alexandria. It focused first on conversion to Christianity, then on practicing of the commandments, and finally on instructing Christians to attain perfect knowledge of doctrine. 2. A treatise on The Salvation of the Rich Person. 3. Commentaries on passages of the Old and New Testaments. 4. Numerous lost works, 5. Treatises which Clement refers to as written, or about to be written,byhim but of which there is no trace.