The flaming sword and the rite that leads nowhere
Next Celsus sets out other myths: that some people go back into the forms of the archons, so that some become lions, others bulls, others serpents or eagles or bears or dogs. In the diagram we had we found also what Celsus called “the square figure”, and what those wretched people say is at the gates of paradise. The flaming sword was drawn as the diameter of a fiery circle, as though escorted by the tree of knowledge and the tree of life (Genesis 3:24; Genesis 2:9).
Celsus, then, would not, or could not, set out the speeches that, according to the myths of these impious people, those who pass through each gate will make. But we have done this too, so that we may show Celsus and those who read this work that we know the end of that initiation which initiates into nothing, and know it as alien to the reverence toward God that Christians hold.
Greek
Εἶθ᾿ ἑξῆς ἄλλους μύθους ὁ Κέλσος ἐκτίθεται, ὥς τινων εἰς τὰς ἀρχοντικὰς μορφὰς ἐπανερχομένων, ὥστε τινὰς μὲν γίνεσθαι λέοντας ἄλλους δὲ ταύρους καὶ ἄλλους δράκοντας ἢ ἀετοὺς ἢ ἄρκους ἢ κύνας. εὕρομεν δὲ ἐν ᾧ εἴχομεν διαγράμματι καὶ ὃ ὠνόμασε Κέλσος τετράγωνον σχῆμα καὶ τὸ ἐπὶ τῶν τοῦ παραδείσου πυλῶν λεγόμενον ὑπὸ τῶν ἀθλίων ἐκείνων. ἐζωγραφεῖτο δὲ ὡς διάμετρος κύκλου τινὸς πυροειδοῦς ἡ φλογίνη ῥομφαία ὡς δορυφορουμένη τῷ τε τῆς γνώσεως ξύλῳ καὶ τῆς ζωῆς. ὁ μὲν οὖν Κέλσος οὐκ ἠθέλησε τὰς δημηγορίας ἢ οὐκ ἐδυνήθη ἐκθέσθαι, ἃς καθ᾿ ἑκάστην πύλην κατὰ τοὺς τῶν ἀσεβῶν μύθους ἐροῦσιν οἱ διϊόντες αὐτάς· ἡμεῖς δὲ καὶ τοῦτο πεποιήκαμεν, ἵνα τὸ τῆς ἀτελέστου τελετῆς πέρας δείξωμεν τῷ Κέλσῳ καὶ τοῖς ἐντυγχάνουσι τῇ γραφῇ ἐγνωκέναι ὡς ἀλλότριον τῆς Χριστιανῶν περὶ τὸ θεῖον εὐσεβείας.