Similar to Simon’s account of the heavens and of his descent through them were the teachings of the Ophites and Sethians who, according to Irenaeus,[1616] held that Christ “descended through the seven heavens, having assumed the likeness of their sons, and gradually emptied them of their power.” These heretics also represented the “heavens, potentates, powers, angels, and creators as sitting in their proper order in heaven, according to their generation, and as invisibly ruling over things celestial and terrestrial.” All ruling spirits were not invisible, however, since the Ophites and Sethians identified with the seven planets their Holy Hebdomad, consisting of Ialdabaoth, Iao, Sabaoth, Adonaus (or, Adonai), Eloeus, Oreus, and Astanphaeus,—names often employed in the Greek magical papyri,[1617] in medieval incantations, and in the Jewish Cabbala. The Ophites and Sethians further asserted that when the serpent was cast down into the lower world by the Father, he begat six sons who, with himself, constitute a group of seven corresponding and in contrast to the Holy Hebdomad which surround the Father. They are the seven mundane demons who are ever hostile to humanity. The Sethians of course took their name from Seth, son of Adam, who in the middle ages was regarded sometimes, like Enoch, as the especial recipient of divine revelation and as the author of sacred books. The historian Josephus states in his _Jewish Antiquities_ that Seth and his descendants discovered the art of astronomy and that one of the two pillars on which they recorded their findings was still extant in his time, the first century.[1618] Under the caption, _Sethian Tablets of Curses_, Wünsch has published some magical imprecations scratched on lead tablets between 390 and 420 A. D. at Rome.[1619] Eight revelations ascribed to Adam and Seth are also extant in Armenian.[1620] [Sidenote: A magical diagram.]