Against Celsus, Book IV · §16 · Origen of Alexandria

The Word shows different forms to different hearers

For there are, as it were, different forms of the Word, as the Word appears to each of those who are being led into knowledge, in proportion to the state of each: the one who is just beginning, or who has made a little progress or more, or is already drawing near to virtue, or has even come to live in virtue.

Hence, not in the way Celsus and those like him would have it, our God “was transfigured” and, going up “onto the high mountain” (Matthew 17:1-2; Mark 9:2), showed another form of himself, far better than the one seen by those who stayed below and could not follow him to the height. For those below did not have eyes able to see the transfiguration of the Word into what is glorious and more divine. They could barely receive him as he was, so that those who could not see his better form might say of him: “We saw him, and he had no form or beauty; but his form was without honour, falling short of the sons of men” (Isaiah 53:2-3).

Let this be said in answer to the supposition of Celsus, who did not understand the changes or transformations of Jesus that are told in the manner of historical narrative, nor what is mortal or immortal in him.

Greek

Εἰσὶ γὰρ διάφοροι οἱονεὶ τοῦ λόγου μορφαὶ, καθὼς ἑκάστῳ τῶν εἰς ἐπιστήμην ἀγομένων φαίνεται ὁ λόγος, ἀνάλογον τῇ ἕξει τοῦ εἰσαγομένου ἢ ἐπ᾿ ὀλίγον προκόπτοντος ἢ ἐπὶ πλεῖον ἢ καὶ ἐγγὺς ἤδη γινομένου τῆς ἀρετῆς ἢ καὶ ἐν ἀρετῇ γεγενημένου, ὅθεν οὐχ, ὡς ὁ Κέλσος καὶ οἱ παραπλήσιοι αὐτῷ βούλονται, „μετεμορφώθη“ ὁ θεὸς ἡμῶν καὶ „εἰς τὸ ὑψηλὸν ὄρος“ ἀναβὰς ἄλλην ἔδειξε τὴν ἑαυτοῦ μορφὴν καὶ πολλῷ κρείττονα ἧς οἱ κάτω μένοντες καὶ μὴ δυνάμενοι αὐτῷ εἰς ὕψος ἀκολουθεῖν ἐθεώρουν, οὐ γὰρ εἶχον οἱ κάτω ὀφθαλμοὺς δυναμένους βλέπειν τὴν τοῦ λόγου ἐπὶ τὸ ἔνδοξον καὶ θειότερον μεταμόρφωσιν· ἀλλὰ μόγις αὐτὸν ἐδύναντο χωρῆσαι τοιοῦτον, ὥστε λέγεσθαι ἂν περὶ αὐτοῦ ὑπὸ τῶν μὴ δυναμένων τὸ κρεῖττον αὐτοῦ βλέπειν τό· „εἴδομεν αὐτὸν, καὶ οὐκ εἶχεν εἶδος οὐδὲ κάλλος, ἀλλὰ τὸ εἶδος αὐτοῦ ἄτιμον, ἐκλεῖπον παρὰ τοὺς υἱοὺς τῶν ἀνθρώπων,“ καὶ ταῦτα δὲ πρὸς τὴν Κέλσου ὑπόληψιν, μὴ νοήσαντος τὰς ὡς ἐν ἱστορίαις λεγομένας μεταβολὰς ἢ μεταμορφώσεις τοῦ Ἰησοῦ καὶ τὸ θνητὸν ἢ ἀθάνατον αὐτοῦ, λελέχθω.

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About this text

Origen answers Celsus’s scorn for the belief that God or his Son comes down to the world, showing that the Word comes down without change and that God’s threats and punishments are a cure, not a fit of temper. He then defends the stories of Genesis and the patriarchs, read in their deeper sense, against the charge that they are silly tales, and rejects Celsus’s claim that the world was made no more for man than for the animals, which Celsus thought nearer to God than men.

Translated from the Greek of Koetschau, GCS 2–3 (1899), via the Perseus digital text, which serves as the base text. Each chapter was translated from the Greek and then checked clause by clause against it in a separate review. No earlier English translation was consulted.

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Translated from Koetschau GCS 2 – 3 (1899) — Greek (Greek · Book IV, chapters 1 – 99)

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