Against Celsus, Book VI · §4 · Origen of Alexandria

Philosophers who saw God and worshipped idols

Yet those who wrote such things about the first good go down “to the Piraeus” to pray to Artemis as a goddess and to watch the festival held by the common people (Plato, Republic 1.327a). After philosophizing so loftily about the soul and describing the life of the soul that has lived well, they abandon the greatness of what “God showed them” (Romans 1:19) and think mean and petty thoughts, paying “a cock to Asclepius” (Plato, Phaedo 118a). And though they pictured to themselves “the invisible things” of God and the ideas “from the creation of the world” and from the things of sense, from which they ascend to the things known by the mind, and though they saw, not ignobly, his eternal power and divinity, they nonetheless “became futile in their reasonings” (Romans 1:20–21), and their “senseless heart” (Romans 1:21), as it were, wallows in darkness and ignorance about the worship of the divine.

And one can see men who pride themselves on their wisdom and their theology bowing down to “the likeness of an image of corruptible man” (Romans 1:23), in honour, so it is said, of that being, and sometimes even going down with the Egyptians to birds or four-footed beasts or creeping things. And even if some seem to have risen above these things, they will still be found to have “exchanged the truth of God for a lie” and to be worshipping and serving “the creature rather than the Creator” (Romans 1:25).

Therefore, since the wise and learned among the Greeks go astray in their deeds concerning the divine, “God chose” “the foolish things of the world” “to put the wise to shame”, “and the base things” “and the weak things” “and the things despised”, and “the things that are not, to bring to nothing the things that are” (1 Corinthians 1:27–28); and truly, so that “no flesh may boast before God” (1 Corinthians 1:29).

But our own wise men, Moses, the most ancient of all, and the prophets after him, were the first to know that the first good can “by no means” be “spoken”. They did write, since God shows himself to those who are worthy and fit, that God “appeared”, for example, to Abraham or to Isaac or to Jacob (Genesis 12:7; Genesis 26:24; Genesis 35:9; Exodus 6:3). But who it was that appeared, and of what kind, and in what manner, and to which part of us, they have left to be examined by those able to make themselves like the men to whom God appeared; for he was seen not by their bodily eyes but by their pure heart. For, according to our Jesus, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).

Greek

Ἀλλ᾿ οἱ τοιαῦτα περὶ τοῦ πρώτου ἀγαθοῦ γράψαντες καταβαίνουσιν „εἰς Πειραιέα,“ προσευξόμενοι ὡς θεῷ τῇ Ἀρτέμιδι καὶ ὀψόμενοι τὴν ὑπὸ ἰδιωτῶν ἐπιτελουμένην πανήγυριν· καὶ τηλικαῦτά γε φιλοσοφήσαντες περὶ τῆς ψυχῆς καὶ τὴν διαγωγὴν τῆς καλῶς βεβιωκυΐας διεξελθόντες, καταλιπόντες τὸ μέγεθος ὧν „αὐτοῖς“ „ὁ θεὸς“ „ἐφανέρωσεν“ εὐτελῆ φρονοῦσι καὶ μικρὰ, „ἀλεκτρυόνα“ „τῷ Ἀσκληπιῷ“ ἀποδιδόντες· καὶ „τὰ“ „ἀόρατα“ τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ τὰς ἰδέας φαντασθέντες „ἀπὸ τῆς κτίσεως τοῦ κόσμου“ καὶ τῶν αἰσθητῶν, ἀφ᾿ ὧν ἀναβαίνουσιν ἐπὶ τὰ νοούμενα, τήν τε ἀΐδιον αὐτοῦ δύναμιν καὶ θειότητα οὐκ ἀγεννῶς ἰδόντες οὐδὲν ἧττον „ἐματαιώθησαν ἐν τοῖς διαλογισμοῖς αὐτῶν,“ καὶ ὡς „ἀσύνετος αὐτῶν (ἡ) καρδία“ ἐν σκότῳ καὶ ἀγνοίᾳ καλινδεῖται τῇ περὶ τοῦ θεραπεύειν τὸ θεῖον. καὶ ἔστιν ἰδεῖν τοὺς ἐπὶ σοφίᾳ μέγα φρονοῦντας καὶ θεολογίᾳ „ὁμοιώματι εἰκόνος φθαρτοῦ ἀνθρώπου“ προσκυνοῦντας, εἰς τιμήν φησιν ἐκείνου, ἔσθ᾿ ὅτε δὲ καὶ καταβαίνοντας μετ᾿ Αἰγυπτίων ἐπὶ τὰ πετεινὰ ἢ τετράποδα ἢ ἑρπετά. ἵνα δὲ καὶ δοκῶσί τινες ταῦτα ὑπεραναβεβηκέναι, ἀλλ᾿ εὑρεθήσονται ἀλλάξαντες „τὴν ἀλήθειαν τοῦ θεοῦ ἐν τῷ ψεύδει“ καὶ σέβοντες καὶ λατρεύοντες „τῇ κτίσει παρὰ τὸν κτίσαντα.“ διόπερ τῶν ἐν Ἕλλησι σοφῶν καὶ πολυμαθῶν τοῖς ἔργοις περὶ τὸ θεῖον πλανωμένων „ἐξελέξατο ὁ θεὸς“ „τὰ μωρὰ τοῦ κόσμου,“ „ἵνα καταισχύνῃ τοὺς σοφοὺς,“ „καὶ τὰ ἀγενῆ“ „καὶ τὰ ἀσθενῆ“ „καὶ τὰ ἐξουθενημένα“ καὶ „τὰ μὴ ὄντα, ἵνα τὰ ὄντα καταργήσῃ“· καὶ ἀληθῶς, ἵνα „μὴ καυχήσηται πᾶσα σὰρξ ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ.“ πρῶτον δὲ ἡμῶν σοφοὶ, Μωϋσῆς ὁ ἀρχαιότατος καὶ οἱ ἑξῆς αὐτῷ προφῆται, „οὐδαμῶς“ „ῥητὸν“ ἐπιστάμενοι τὸ πρῶτον ἀγαθὸν ἔγραψαν μὲν, ὡς θεοῦ (ἑαυτὸν) ἐμφανίζοντος τοῖς ἀξίοις καὶ ἐπιτηδείοις, ὅτι „ὤφθη“ ὁ θεὸς (φέρ᾿ εἰπεῖν) τῷ Ἀβραὰμ ἢ τῷ Ἰσαὰκ ἢ τῷ Ἰακώβ. τίς δὲ ὢν ὤφθη καὶ ποταπὸς καὶ τίνα τρόπον καὶ τίνι τῶν ἐν ἡμῖν, καταλελοίπασιν ἐξετάζειν τοῖς δυναμένοις ἑαυτοὺς ἐμπαρέχειν παραπλησίους ἐκείνοις, οἷς ὤφθη ὁ θεός· ὀφθεὶς αὐτῶν οὐ τοῖς τοῦ σώματος ὀφθαλμοῖς ἀλλὰ τῇ καθαρᾷ καρδίᾳ. καὶ γὰρ κατὰ τὸν Ἰησοῦν ἡμῶν „μακάριοι οἱ καθαροὶ τῇ καρδίᾳ, ὅτι αὐτοὶ τὸν θεὸν ὄψονται.“

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About this text

Celsus claims that the best Christian teachings were taken from Plato and said better by the Greeks, and he charges Christians with the diagram of an obscure sect and with a crude reading of Genesis. Origen answers that the plain speech of Scripture serves everyone, that the prophets spoke before Plato, and that the God of the Christians is spirit, not body, and is made known through His Word.

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 an independent review. No earlier English translation was consulted.

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Translated from Koetschau GCS 2 – 3 (1899) — Greek (Greek · Book VI, chapters 1 – 81)

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