The Gospel of Basilides is a "lost" text from the New Testament apocrypha by Basilides, mentioned by Origen, Jerome, Ambrose, Philip of Side, and the Venerable Bede. It was composed in Egypt around 120 to 140 AD. In all likelihood, this gospel was compiled of canonical gospels, the text being shortened and altered to suit Basilides's Gnostic tenets, a diatessaron. or harmony, on Gnostic (Docetic) lines.
One of the features of the Gospel of Basilides is it objected to the reality of the passion i.e. the suffering of Jesus Christ leading up to and including the crucifixion. His works were rejected by later Christians as heretical and the text is classed as gnostic for it opposes the death of Jesus on the cross and his divinity as accorded by mainstream Christianity. To Basilides, Christ seemed to men to be a man and to have performed miracles. It was not however, Christ, who suffered on the cross but Simon of Cyrene who was constrained to carry the cross and was mistakenly crucified instead of Christ. Simon having received Jesus's form, Jesus returned Simon's and thus stood by whilst Simon was crucified and Jesus returned to God his father (Irenaeus, Adv. Char., 1, xxiv). According to some apocrypha it was Judas who was thus substituted, not Simon the Cyrenean. This is known as the semblance theory in theological circles.
It has similarities to the Islamic belief of Jesus being raised to heaven alive and not himself being crucified as stated in the Qur'an:
And because of their saying: We slew the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, Allah's messenger - they slew him not nor crucified him, but it appeared so unto them; and lo! those who disagree concerning it are in doubt thereof; they have no knowledge thereof save pursuit of a conjecture; they slew him not for certain. Qur'an (Sura 4 Verse 157) from Translation of Pickthal.
Hippolytus describes another Gnostic sect, who took the semblance theory, although it was not the pronounced feature in their system, by the name of Docetae, a sect dating back to Apostolic times. The name is derived from dokesis, "appearance" or "semblance" though for what reason is not apparent. Their views were in close affinity to those of the Valentians.
As for normal Christian view according to all three Synoptic Gospels the man compelled by the Romans to carry the cross of Jesus, as Jesus was taken to his crucifixion, was Simon. Only the Gospel of John does not mention Simon, saying only that Jesus carried the cross himself, or carried his own cross.
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