Chapter LIII.

Having said so much on this subject, let us proceed to another statement of Celsus:  “Since men are born united to a body, whether to suit the order of the universe, or that they may in that way suffer the punishment of sin; or because the soul is oppressed by certain passions until it is purged from these at the appointed period of time,—for, according to Empedocles, all mankind must be banished from the abodes of the blessed for 30,000 periods of time,—we must therefore believe that they are entrusted to certain beings as keepers of this prison-house.”  You will observe that Celsus, in these remarks, speaks of such weighty matters in the language of doubtful human conjecture.  He adds also various opinions as to the origin of man, and shows considerable reluctance to set down any of these opinions as false.  When he had once come to the conclusion neither indiscriminately to accept nor recklessly to reject the opinions held by the ancients, would it not have been in accordance with that same rule of judging, if, when he found himself not disposed to believe the doctrines taught by the Jewish prophets and by Jesus, at any rate to have held them as matters open to inquiry?  And should he not have considered whether it is very probable that a people who faithfully served the Most High God, and who ofttimes encountered numberless dangers, and even death, rather than sacrifice the honour of God, and what they believed to be the revelations of His will, should have been wholly overlooked by God?  Should it not rather be thought probable that people who despised the efforts of human art to represent the Divine Being, but strove rather to rise in thought to the knowledge of the Most High, should have been favoured with some revelation from Himself?  Besides, he ought to have considered that the common Father and Creator of all, who sees and hears all things, and who duly esteems the intention of every man who seeks Him and desires to serve Him, will grant unto these also some of the benefits of His rule, and will give them an enlargement of that knowledge of Himself which He has once bestowed upon them.  If this had been remembered by Celsus and the others who hate Moses and the Jewish prophets, and Jesus, and His faithful disciples, who endured so much for the sake of His word, they would not thus have reviled Moses, and the prophets, and Jesus, and His apostles; and they would not have singled out for their contempt the Jews beyond all the nations of the earth, and said they were worse even than the Egyptians,—a people who, either from superstition or some other form of delusion, went as far as they could in degrading the Divine Being to the level of brute beasts.  And we invite inquiry, not as though we wished to lead any to doubt regarding the truths of Christianity, but in order to show that it would be better for those who in every way revile the doctrines of Christianity, at any rate to suspend their judgment, and not so rashly to state about Jesus and His apostles such things as they do not know, and as they cannot prove, either by what the Stoics call “apprehensive perception,”1867    καταληπτικὴ φαντασία. or by any other methods used by different sects of philosophers as criteria of truth.

Τοσαῦτα δὲ καὶ εἰς τοῦτον εἰπόντες τὸν τόπον ἴδωμεν τοῦ Κέλσου καὶ ἄλλην λέξιν, οὕτως ἔχουσαν· Ἐπειδὴ δὲ σώματι συνδεθέντες ἄνθρωποι γεγόνασιν, εἴτ' οἰκονομίας τῶν ὅλων ἕνεκεν εἴτε ποινὰς ἁμαρτίας ἀποτίνοντες, εἴθ' ὑπὸ παθημάτων τινῶν τῆς ψυχῆς βαρυνθείσης, μέχρι ἂν [ἐν] ταῖς τεταγμέναις περιόδοις ἐκκαθαρθῇ· δεῖ γὰρ κατὰ τὸν Ἐμπεδοκλέα τρίς μιν μυρίας ὥρας ἀπὸ μακάρων ἀλάλησθαι, γινομένην παντοίαν διὰ χρόνου ἰδέαν θνητῶν· πειστέον οὖν ὅτι παραδέδονταί τισιν ἐπιμεληταῖς τοῦδε τοῦ δεσμωτηρίου. Ὅρα δὴ καὶ ἐν τούτοις περὶ πόσων ἀνθρωπίνως ἀμφι βάλλων καὶ παραθέμενος πλειόνων δόγματα περὶ τῆς αἰτίας τῆς γενέσεως ἡμῶν ἐμφαίνει τινὰ εὐλάβειαν, μὴ τολμῶν ἀποφήνασθαί τι τούτων ψεῦδος εἶναι. Ἆρ' οὖν οὐκ ἦν κατὰ τὸν τοιοῦτον, καὶ ἅπαξ κρίναντα μήτε ὡς ἔτυχε συγκατα θέσθαι μήτε τολμηρῶς ἀθετῆσαι τὰ δόξαντα τοῖς ἀρχαίοις, καὶ περὶ τοῦ Ἰουδαίων λόγου δηλουμένου παρὰ τοῖς ἐκείνων προφήταις καὶ περὶ τοῦ Ἰησοῦ, εἰ μὴ ἐβούλετο πιστεῦσαι, κἂν ἀμφιβάλλειν καὶ σκοπῆσαι ὅτι εἰκὸς ἦν καὶ τοὺς θερα πεύσαντας τὸν τῶν ὅλων θεὸν καὶ ἕνεκεν τῆς εἰς τοῦτον τιμῆς καὶ εἰς τὰ πεπιστευμένα ὑπ' αὐτοῦ νενομοθετῆσθαι πολλάκις μυρίους κινδύνους καὶ θανάτους ἀναδεξαμένους μὴ ὑπερεωρᾶσθαι ὑπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ, ἀλλὰ καὶ αὐτοῖς τινα ἐπιφάνειαν γεγονέναι, τὰ μὲν τῆς ἀνθρωπίνης περὶ τὰ ἀγάλματα τέχνης ὑπερηφανήσασιν ἀναβαίνειν δὲ πειραθεῖσι τῷ λογισμῷ ἐπ' αὐτὸν τὸν ἐπὶ πᾶσι θεόν; Ἐχρῆν δ' αὐτὸν σκοπῆσαι ὅτι πάντ' ἐφορῶν καὶ πάντ' ἐπακούων ὁ κοινὸς πάντων πατὴρ καὶ δημιουργὸς τὴν ἑκάστου προαίρεσιν, ζητοῦσαν αὐτὸν καὶ εὐσεβεῖν βουλομένην, κατ' ἀξίαν κρίνων καὶ τούτοις τινὰ ἀπονέμει καρπὸν τῆς προστασίας αὐτοῦ, ἵνα μᾶλλον αὔξωσιν ἣν ἅπαξ παρειλήφασι περὶ αὐτοῦ ἔννοιαν. Ταῦτα γὰρ εἰ ἐλογίσατο Κέλσος καὶ οἱ μισοῦντες Μωϋσέα καὶ τοὺς ἐν Ἰουδαίοις προφήτας καὶ Ἰησοῦν καὶ τοὺς καμόντας διὰ τὸν λόγον αὐτοῦ γνησίους μαθητὰς αὐτοῦ, οὐκ ἂν οὕτως διελοι δορήσαντο Μωϋσεῖ καὶ τοῖς προφήταις καὶ Ἰησοῦ καὶ τοῖς ἀποστόλοις αὐτοῦ· οὐδὲ μόνους παρὰ πάντα τὰ ἐπὶ γῆς ἔθνη Ἰουδαίους ἀπεδοκίμαζον, λέγοντες αὐτοὺς εἶναι καὶ Αἰγυπτίων χείρονας, τῶν μέχρι ἀλόγων ζῴων εἴτε κατὰ δεισιδαιμονίαν εἴτε κατὰ οἱανδήποτ' αἰτίαν ἢ πλάνην καταγαγόντων τὸ ὅσον ἐπ' αὐτοῖς τὴν πρὸς τὸ θεῖον τιμήν. Ταῦτα δ' εἰρήκαμεν οὐκ ἐπὶ τὸ ἀμφιβάλλειν προτρεπόμενοί τινας περὶ τοῦ κατὰ χριστιανισμὸν λόγου ἀλλὰ παριστάντες ὅτι τοῖς πάντῃ διαλοιδορουμένοις τῷ Χριστιανῶν λόγῳ αἱρετώτερόν ἐστι κἂν ἀμφιβάλλειν περὶ αὐτῶν καὶ μὴ οὕτω θρασέως λέγειν περὶ τοῦ Ἰησοῦ ἢ τῶν μαθητῶν αὐτοῦ, ἃ μὴ ἐπίστανται καὶ ἀποφαίνονται οὐ μετὰ τῆς καλουμένης παρὰ τοῖς ἀπὸ τῆς Στοᾶς "καταληπτικῆς φαντασίας" οὐδ' ἀπ' ἄλλου τινὸς κριτηρίου, περὶ οὗ ἑκάστη τῶν φιλοσόφων αἵρεσις τὸ φαινόμενον, ὡς ἔδοξε, κατεσκεύασεν.