Demonology is the study of demons or beliefs about demons. They may be human, or nonhuman, separable souls, or discarnate spirits which have never inhabited a body.
The name Abraxas was taken from abra-cadabra. He is presented on amulets with the head of a cock, dragon’s feet and a whip in his hand.
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The seven letters spelling its name may represent each of the seven classic planets. The word may indeed be related to Abracadabra, although other explanations exist.
There are similarities and differences between such figures in reports about Basilides's teaching, ancient Gnostic texts, the larger Greco-Roman magical traditions, and modern magical and esoteric writings. Speculations have proliferated on Abraxas in recent centuries, who has been claimed to be both an Egyptian god and a demon.
According to the Appendix of Tertullian’s De praescriptione haereticorum (On the prescription of heretics), the second-century heretic Basilides claimed that Abraxas is the supreme Deity who created Mind (Greek: Nous), Word, Providence, Virtue and Wisdom.
Out of these, Abraxas is said to have created the Principalities, Powers and Angels, and the 365 heavens. One of these angels, who created this world, became known as the God of the Jews; however, Basilides considers him to be an angel, not a God. It was Abraxas, not this Jewish God, who sent Christ in ghost form, not as a flesh and blood human.
Basilides also claims that it was Simon, not Christ, who was crucified.
Later demonologists described him with the head of a King and serpents for feet.He was seen by the Basilidians (a group of second-century heretics) as the supreme god because the Greek letters that formed his name added up to 365, the number of days in a year.
They placed under him several angels who presided over the 365 heavens, and to whom they attributed 365 virtues, one for each day of the year. They also claimed that Abraxas send Jesus Christ to earth in the form of a benevolent ghost.
Collin de Plancy also described the word “abracadabra” as a Persian and Syrian word of enchantment that could cure fever and other diseases. The word was written in a triangular arrangement and was worn around the neck.
With the availability of primary sources, such as those in the Nag Hammadi library, the identity of Abrasax remains unclear. The Holy Book of the Great Invisible Spirit, for instance, refers to Abrasax as an Aeon dwelling with Sophia and other Aeons of the Pleroma in the light of the luminary Eleleth.
In several texts, the luminary Eleleth is the last of the luminaries (Spiritual Lights) that come forward, and it is the Aeon Sophia, associated with Eleleth, who encounters darkness and becomes involved in the chain of events that leads to the Demiurge's rule of this world, and the salvage effort that ensues.
As such, the role of Aeons of Eleleth, including Abraxas, Sophia, and others, pertains to this outer border of the Pleroma that encounters the ignorance of the world of Lack and interacts to rectify the error of ignorance in the world of materiality.
The Catholic church later deemed Abraxas a pagan god, and ultimately branded him a demon as documented in J. Collin de Plancy's Infernal Dictionary, Abraxas (or Abracax) is labeled the "supreme God" of the Basilidians, whom he describes as "heretics of the second century." He further indicated the Basilidians attributed to Abraxas the rule over "365 skies" and "365 virtues".
