16

I hoped it to be, teeming with mantic art, Aeschylus reviles Apollo as a false prophet, he who sang the hymn, he who was present at the feast, he who said these things, he it is who killed my son. But perhaps these things are a poetic fiction, but there is a certain physical and such an account of them: "shining Zeus," as Empedocles says, "and life-bringing Hera, and Aidoneus, and Nestis, who with her tears wets the mortal spring." If, then, Zeus is fire, Hera the earth, and the air Aidoneus, and the water Nestis, and these are elements, fire, water, air, none of them is a god, neither Zeus, nor Hera, nor Aidoneus; for from the matter distinguished by God is their composition and generation, fire and water and earth and the gentle height of air, and Love among them. Since these things, which without Love cannot remain, being confounded by Strife, how then could anyone say these are gods? According to Empedocles, Love is the ruling principle, the compounds are the ruled, and the ruling principle is dominant; so that if we posit one and the <αὐτὴν> same power for both the ruled and the ruler, we shall unawares make matter, which is corruptible and fluid and changeable, of equal honor with the unbegotten and eternal and ever-consistent God. According to the Stoics, Zeus is the seething substance, Hera is the air, and if the name were joined to itself and pronounced together, Poseidon is drink. But others allegorize differently: for some say that Zeus is the twofold, male-female air, others that he is the season turning time to a good temperature, for which reason he alone escaped Kronos. But against those of the Stoa one may say: if you believe in one highest god, unbegotten and eternal, and compounds into which is the change of matter, and you say that the spirit of God, having passed through matter according to its alterations, receives different names, the forms of matter will become the body of God, and when the elements are destroyed in the conflagration, the names must be destroyed along with the forms, with only the spirit of God remaining. Of which bodies, therefore, the alteration according to matter is corruptible, who would believe these to be gods? And to those who say that Kronos is time, and Rhea is earth, the one conceiving from Kronos and bringing forth, whence also she is considered the mother of all, and the other begetting and consuming, and that the castration of the necessary parts is the intercourse of the male with the female, cutting and casting seed into a womb and begetting a man having in himself desire, which is Aphrodite, and that the madness of Kronos is the turn of season destroying the animate and inanimate, and the chains and Tartarus are time being turned by seasons and

16

ἤλπιζον εἶναι, μαντικῇ βρύον τέχνῃ, ὡς ψευδόμαντιν κακίζει τὸν Ἀπόλλω ὁ Aἰσχύλος, ὁ δ' αὐτὸς ὑμνῶν, αὐτὸς ἐν θοίνῃ παρών, αὐτὸς τάδ' εἰπών, αὐτός ἐστιν ὁ κτανών τὸν παῖδα τὸν ἐμόν. Ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν ἴσως πλάνη ποιητική, φυσικὸς δέ τις ἐπ' αὐτοῖς καὶ τοιοῦτος λόγος· "Ζεὺς ἀργής", ὥς φησιν Ἐμπεδοκλῆς, "Ἥρη τε φερέσβιος ἠδ' Ἀϊδωνεύς Νῆστίς θ', ἣ δακρύοις τέγγει κρούνωμα βρότειον". εἰ τοίνυν Ζεὺς μὲν τὸ πῦρ, Ἥρα δὲ ἡ γῆ καὶ ὁ ἀὴρ Ἀϊδωνεὺς καὶ τὸ ὕδωρ Νῆστις, στοιχεῖα δὲ ταῦτα, τὸ πῦρ, τὸ ὕδωρ, ὁ ἀήρ, οὐδεὶς αὐτῶν θεός, οὔτε Ζεύς, οὔτε Ἥρα, οὔτε Ἀϊδωνεύς· ἀπὸ γὰρ τῆς ὕλης διακριθείσης ὑπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ ἡ τούτων σύστασίς τε καὶ γένεσις, πῦρ καὶ ὕδωρ καὶ γαῖα καὶ ἠέρος ἤπιον ὕψος, καὶ φιλίη μετὰ τοῖσιν. ἃ χωρὶς τῆς φιλίας οὐ δύναται μένειν ὑπὸ τοῦ νείκους συγχεόμενα, πῶς ἂν οὖν εἴποι τις ταῦτα εἶναι θεούς; ἀρχικὸν ἡ φιλία κατὰ τὸν Ἐμπεδοκλέα, ἀρχόμενα τὰ συγκρίματα, τὸ δὲ ἀρχικὸν κύριον· ὥστε, ἐὰν μίαν καὶ τὴν <αὐτὴν> τοῦ τε ἀρχομένου καὶ τοῦ ἄρχοντος δύναμιν θῶμεν, λήσομεν ἑαυτοὺς ἰσότιμον τὴν ὕλην τὴν φθαρτὴν καὶ ῥευστὴν καὶ μεταβλητὴν τῷ ἀγενήτῳ καὶ ἀϊδίῳ καὶ διὰ παντὸς συμφώνῳ ποιοῦντες θεῷ. Ζεὺς ἡ ζέουσα οὐσία κατὰ τοὺς Στωϊκούς, Ἥρα ὁ ἀήρ, καὶ τοῦ ὀνόματος εἰ αὐτὸ αὑτῷ ἐπισυνάπτοιτο συνεκφωνουμένου, Ποσειδῶν ἡ πόσις. ἄλλοι δὲ ἄλλως φυσιολογοῦσιν· οἱ μὲν γὰρ ἀέρα διφυῆ ἀρσενόθηλυν τὸν ∆ία λέγουσιν, οἱ δὲ καιρὸν εἰς εὐκρασίαν τρέποντα τὸν χρόνον, διὸ καὶ μόνος Κρόνον διέφυγεν. ἀλλ' ἐπὶ μὲν τῶν ἀπὸ τῆς Στοᾶς ἔστιν εἰπεῖν· εἰ ἕνα τὸν ἀνωτάτω θεὸν ἀγένητόν τε καὶ ἀΐδιον νομίζετε, συγκρίματα δὲ εἰς ἃ ἡ τῆς ὕλης ἀλλαγή, καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα τοῦ θεοῦ διὰ τῆς ὕλης κεχωρηκὸς κατὰ τὰς παραλλάξεις αὐτῆς ἄλλο καὶ ἄλλο ὄνομα μεταλαγχάνειν φατέ, σῶμα μὲν τὰ εἴδη τῆς ὕλης τοῦ θεοῦ γενήσεται, φθειρομένων δὲ τῶν στοιχείων κατὰ τὴν ἐκπύρωσιν ἀνάγκη συμφθαρῆναι ὁμοῦ τοῖς εἴδεσι τὰ ὀνόματα, μόνου μένοντος τοῦ πνεύματος τοῦ θεοῦ. ὧν οὖν σωμάτων φθαρτὴ ἡ κατὰ τὴν ὕλην παραλλαγή, τίς ἂν ταῦτα πιστεύσαι θεούς; πρὸς δὲ τοὺς λέγοντας τὸν μὲν Κρόνον χρόνον, τὴν δὲ Ῥέαν γῆν, τὴν μὲν συλ λαμβάνουσαν ἐκ τοῦ Κρόνου καὶ ἀποτίκτουσαν, ἔνθεν καὶ μήτηρ πάντων νομίζεται, τὸν δὲ γεννῶντα καὶ καταναλίσκοντα, καὶ εἶναι τὴν μὲν τομὴν τῶν ἀναγκαίων ὁμιλίαν τοῦ ἄρρενος πρὸς τὸ θῆλυ, τέμνουσαν καὶ καταβάλλουσαν σπέρμα εἰς μήτραν καὶ γεννῶσαν ἄνθρωπον ἐν ἑαυτῷ τὴν ἐπιθυμίαν, ὅ ἐστιν Ἀφροδίτη, ἔχοντα, τὴν δὲ μανίαν τοῦ Κρόνου τροπὴν καιροῦ φθείρουσαν ἔμψυχα καὶ ἄψυχα, τὰ δὲ δεσμὰ καὶ τὸν Τάρταρον χρόνον ὑπὸ καιρῶν τρεπόμενον καὶ