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The following is a summary of information taken from the Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume IV, along with commentary. Properly his name is Titus Flavius Clemens (c. 150-215 AD), but he is known in church history by the former designation to distinguish him from Clement of Rome. Date of birth unknown; died about the year 215. St. Clement was an early Greek theologian and head of the catechetical school of Alexandria. Athens is given as the starting-point of his journeyings, and was probably his birthplace. He became a convert to the Faith and travelled from place to place in search of higher instruction, attaching himself successively to different masters: to a Greek of Ionia, to another of Magna Graecia, to a third of Coele-Syria, after all of whom he addressed himself in turn to an Egyptian, an Assyrian, and a converted Palestinian Jew. At last he met Pantaenus in Alexandria, and in his teaching "found rest".
St. Clement of Alexandria was a convert to the Christian faith, through the direction of St. Pantaenus. He became St. Pantaenus's disciple and assistant at the Christian School of Alexandria. This is where Clement would be influenced by the various theologies circling at Alexandria which would lay the groundwork for his later "interpretations" of Jesus. It was at Alexandria that Clement was first introduced to the Essene concept of the "Angel-Messiah" and it would be natural for him to apply such ideas to Jesus; especially in light that many considered him "the" Messiah. Under St. Pantaenus, he helped create the Coptic alphabet and translate Scripture into Coptic. Clement was a highly regarded philosopher, and he became St. Pantaenus's successor to the School of Alexandria (before 190 AD). As a philosopher, and head of the Catechitical School in Alexandria, St. Clement of Alexandria is considered the "father" of Christian philosophy. Following earlier examples, like St. Justin Martyr, St. Clement saw the strength of philosophy, and believed God had inspired the Greeks with philosophy, to become a preparatory tool for Greeks for the Gospel. Through philosophy, he brought many other converts into Christianity, as well as strengthened the faith of those who were already Christians in Alexandria. His theology and philosophy delved into new areas for Christians, and so became the example to his successors of what Christian philosophers should be like, including his famous student, Origen. The philosophers were critics or eclectics, and Plato was the most favored of the old masters. Neo-Platonism, the philosophy of the new pagan renaissance, had a prophet at Alexandria in the person of Ammonius Saccas. Philo, their foremost thinker, became a sort of Jewish Plato.
The place of Alexandria itself was well chosen, not only because of the Essene influence but the great library that was there. It was natural that Christian speculation should have a home at Alexandria. This great city was at the time a centre of culture as well as of trade. Not to be underestimated is Alexandria and the religious center in which it functioned because of its unique location. Being a center for trade in the world at that time it served as a melting pot for all religious ideas; even more so because of the great library there as well as the university and the Essene influence with their university as well. This great university had grown up under the long-continued patronage of the State. The intellectual temper of Alexandria was broad and tolerant, and became a city where so many races and their theologies mingled. Alexandria was also the center for the Essenes and their religious school in Egypt. The influence of the Essenes and their theology (which was a mixture of sun-worship and Judaism) would have a lasting impact upon Clement. The Jews, the Hellenized Jews, along with the Essenes who were there in very large numbers breathed its liberal atmosphere, and had assimilated secular culture along with its liberal religious beliefs of the day. They there formed the most enlightened colony of the Dispersion. Having lost the use of Hebrew, they found it necessary to translate the Scriptures into the more familiar Greek. Not being able to read Hebrew was a detriment of unparalleled portion as it made necessary the use of the Greek translation of the Jewish Scriptures. This Septuagint became the Bible for the Jews in Alexandria as well as the Greek converts to the Christian faith. The Greek-Jewish Essenes who translated the Scriptures into Greek from Hebrew in the second century B.C.E. in Alexandria often inserted their own philosophies into the translation to promote their own particular theologies. Christian Ginsburg details for us on page 32 of his monumental work The Essenes, Their History and Doctrines, that when these Greek-Jews of Alexandria were employed to translate the Prophets and the Psalms into Greek, that they availed themselves of the opportunity to introduce their tenants and rites into their version of the translation. This version is called the Septuagint and is a grossly mistranslated version of the Jewish Scriptures. Millions of Christians are not aware of this and many of the Christian scholars stop short to examine the evidence for themselves; simply they just don't know it happened. Not being able to read Hebrew for themselves, they accept the Greek translation bequeathed to them as if it came for God. Your evaluation of the facts concerning this translation will show you otherwise. C.D.F. Moule, in The Birth Of The New Testament, records for us on page 59 that the Greek translation of the Jewish Scriptures is "a wildly inaccurate translation." Likewise, Lucetta Mowry, in The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Early Church, again tells us on page 11-12: "...the Qumran authors....altered the stories of the Pentateuch by pious and frequently fanciful embellishments. A more serious purpose of alteration was the attempt to use the stories as authoritative expression of the tenants of the Sect....rewriting familiar events of Israel's history and by inserting legendary details to make the Law of Moses correspond with Qumran thought. These documents, together with the commentaries, testify to the Sect's interest in supplementing biblical authority by adapting canonical works to its own purpose. The community desired in particular to prove that its members were the true heirs of Israel's tradition and that the promise of redemption revealed by God to the patriarchs and to Moses now belonged to their brotherhood." This is just the tip of the iceberg and you should understand that men like Clement, who grew up and was schooled in Alexandria, not only heard this Essene theology and their teachings on the Angel-Messiah, but their documents, even the Greek translation of the Jewish Bible had such tenants of the group included within it. This explains the natural tendency for these early Greek Fathers to accept and promote a theology that was in opposition to what the conservative Jews of Palestine believed as preserved in their Jewish Scriptures, which now read quite differently from the Greek translation of the Essenes in Alexandria.
Alexandria was, in addition, one of the chief seats of that peculiar mixed pagan and Christian speculation known as Gnosticism. Basilides and Valentinus taught there. It is no matter of surprise, therefore, to find some of the Christians affected in turn by the scientific spirit. At an uncertain date, in the latter half of the second century, "a school of oral instruction" was founded. Lectures were given to which pagan hearers were admitted, and advanced teaching to Christians separately. It was an official institution of the Church.
Pantaenus is the earliest teacher whose name has been preserved. As stated earlier, Clement first assisted and then succeeded Pantaenus in the direction of the school, about A.D. 190. He was already known as a Christian writer before the days of Pope Victor (188-199). These facts are very important as they explain how "pagan ideas" and parts of various "pagan religious belief systems" would be mixed into the overall scheme of Clement's theology. These ideas are read today in his writings as if they are God sent. Of most importance is the influence of Alexandria, and its university which served as a cauldron for the tolerant acquisition of various theologies. You need to be aware that this fact is of major importance in his ideas concerning the Angel-Messiah and his legacy of writings left to us where Jesus is read as if a god. It was at Alexandria where this concept of the Angel-Messiah thrived. Coupled with that fact that many scholars regard Clement as the founder of the Alexandrian school of theology, which emphasized the divine nature of Christ, one quickly can see how the "human Messiah" of Judaism is fused with the "cosmic divine godman from Essene solar myths" which were held strongly by the Phytagorean-Buddhist Greek Jews of Alexandria. Needles to say Clement, being a pagan before his conversion, was already familiar with such concepts and it is one short step to connecting such ideas with a "crucified Rabbi named Yeshua." It was Alexandrian theologians such as Saint Cyril and Saint Athanasius who took the lead in opposing Adoptionism and Nestorianism. Understand that Adoptionism was the earliest belief concerning Jesus as held by the Jews who knew him and followed him. This "truth," as earlier held by the Ebionites for that matter, would later be lost under the influence of the preaching of such men like St. Clement, St. Cyril, and St. Athanasius. Today Gentile Christianity is steeped in idolatry because of it.
St. Clement's understanding of Scripture was that it was filled with many layers of knowledge, and saw the need for an allegorical or spiritual level of understanding, above and beyond its literal level. This is just the opposite of how the Rabbis taught Scripture was to be interpreted! Clement is recorded in his writings his belief that the Holy Spirit, in directing the creation of Scripture, inspired the deeper meanings, to further inspire Christians to continue to search and learn from its many depths. He believed Scripture was also written in this manner, so as to confound those who would otherwise try to abuse it, because it would therefore require the unity of the faith to protect and guard true understanding of Scripture. "Wherefore the holy mysteries of the prophecies are veiled in the parables-- preserved for chosen men, selected to knowledge in consequence of their faith..." (St. Clement of Alexandria, Stromata 6:15).
Thus you can understand why scholars have found it no easy task to sum up the chief points of Clement's teaching. His writings lack technical precision and make no pretense to orderly exposition. As if his allegorical method of interpretation over the literal was not enough, he admitted the authority of the Church's tradition. He would be, first of all, a Christian, accepting "the ecclesiastical rule", but he would also strive to remain a philosopher, and bring his reason to bear in matters of religion. "Few are they", he said, "who have taken the spoils of the Egyptians, and made of them the furniture of the Tabernacle." You should ask yourself if such a methodology was wise! This quote alone betrays the Egyptian-Christian synthesis of ideas to be found in his interpretation of the Christian faith. He set himself, therefore, with philosophy as an instrument, to transform faith into science, and revelation into theology. In closing, he misused the text by his faulty exegesis. Unfortunately, he interpreted the Scripture after the manner of Philo. He was ready to find allegory everywhere. The facts of the Old Testament became mere symbols to him. Such hermeneutics and method of interpretation did great damage to the "truth" let alone the proper interpretation of the Scriptural texts. This does not even take into account the "fraudulent Greek text" which was in used in Alexandria in the days of Clement.
The bottom line is that the Alexandrian influence upon Clement, coupled with a "wildly inaccurate Greek translation of the Jewish Scriptures, moved the blossoming Christian Church further away from the truths of the earliest followers of Jesus.
