working

Celsus proceeds as follows: “With regard to the origin of the world and its destruction, whether it is to be regarded as uncreated and indestructible, or as created indeed, but not destructible, or the reverse, I at present say nothing.” For this reason we too say nothing on these points, as the work in hand does not require it. Nor do we allege that the Spirit of the universal God mingled itself in things here below as in things alien to itself, as might appear from the expression, “The Spirit of God moved upon the water;” nor do we assert that certain wicked devices directed against His Spirit, as if by a different creator from the great God, and which were tolerated by the Supreme Divinity, needed to be completely frustrated. And, accordingly, I have nothing further to say to those who utter such absurdities; nor to Celsus, who does not refute them with ability. For he ought either not to have mentioned such matters at all, or else, in keeping with that character for philanthropy which he assumes, have carefully set them forth, and then endeavoured to rebut these impious assertions. Nor have we ever heard that the great God, after giving his spirit to the creator, demands it back again. Proceeding next foolishly to assail these impious assertions, he asks: “What god gives anything with the intention of demanding it back? For it is the mark of a needy person to demand back [what he has given], whereas God stands in need of nothing.” To this he adds, as if saying something clever against certain parties: “Why, when he lent [his spirit], was he ignorant that he was lending it to an evil being?” He asks, further: “Why does he pass without notice a wicked creator who was counter-working his purposes?”

Again, not understanding the meaning of the words, “And God ended on the sixth day His works which He had made, and ceased on the seventh day from all His works which He had made: and God blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it, because on it He had ceased from all His works which He had begun to make;” and imagining the expression, “He ceased on the seventh day,” to be the same as this, “He rested on the seventh day,” he makes the remark: “After this, indeed, he is weary, like a very bad workman, who stands in need of rest to refresh himself!” For he knows nothing of the day of the Sabbath and rest of God, which follows the completion of the world’s creation, and which lasts during the duration of the world, and in which all those will keep festival with God who have done all their works in their six days, and who, because they have omitted none of their duties, will ascend to the contemplation [of celestial things], and to the assembly of righteous and blessed beings. In the next place, as if either the Scriptures made such a statement, or as if we ourselves so spoke of God as having rested from fatigue, he continues: “It is not in keeping with the fitness of things that the first God should feel fatigue, or work with His hands, or give forth commands.” Celsus says, that “it is not in keeping with the fitness of things that the first God should feel fatigue.” Now we would say that neither does God the Word feel fatigue, nor any of those beings who belong to a better and diviner order of things, because the sensation of fatigue is peculiar to those who are in the body. You can examine whether this is true of those who possess a body of any kind, or of those who have an earthly body, or one a little better than this. But “neither is it consistent with the fitness of things that the first God should work with His own hands.” If you understand the words “work with His own hands” literally, then neither are they applicable to the second God, nor to any other being partaking of divinity. But suppose that they are spoken in an improper and figurative sense, so that we may translate the following expressions, “And the firmament showeth forth His handywork,” and “the heavens are the work of Thy hands,” and any other similar phrases, in a figurative manner, so far as respects the “hands” and “limbs” of Deity, where is the absurdity in the words, “God thus working with His own hands?” And as there is no absurdity in God thus working, so neither is there in His issuing “commands;” so that what is done at His bidding should be beautiful and praiseworthy, because it was God who commanded it to be performed.

Again, not understanding the meaning of the words, “And God ended on the sixth day His works which He had made, and ceased on the seventh day from all His works which He had made: and God blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it, because on it He had ceased from all His works which He had begun to make;” and imagining the expression, “He ceased on the seventh day,” to be the same as this, “He rested on the seventh day,” he makes the remark: “After this, indeed, he is weary, like a very bad workman, who stands in need of rest to refresh himself!” For he knows nothing of the day of the Sabbath and rest of God, which follows the completion of the world’s creation, and which lasts during the duration of the world, and in which all those will keep festival with God who have done all their works in their six days, and who, because they have omitted none of their duties, will ascend to the contemplation [of celestial things], and to the assembly of righteous and blessed beings. In the next place, as if either the Scriptures made such a statement, or as if we ourselves so spoke of God as having rested from fatigue, he continues: “It is not in keeping with the fitness of things that the first God should feel fatigue, or work with His hands, or give forth commands.” Celsus says, that “it is not in keeping with the fitness of things that the first God should feel fatigue.” Now we would say that neither does God the Word feel fatigue, nor any of those beings who belong to a better and diviner order of things, because the sensation of fatigue is peculiar to those who are in the body. You can examine whether this is true of those who possess a body of any kind, or of those who have an earthly body, or one a little better than this. But “neither is it consistent with the fitness of things that the first God should work with His own hands.” If you understand the words “work with His own hands” literally, then neither are they applicable to the second God, nor to any other being partaking of divinity. But suppose that they are spoken in an improper and figurative sense, so that we may translate the following expressions, “And the firmament showeth forth His handywork,” and “the heavens are the work of Thy hands,” and any other similar phrases, in a figurative manner, so far as respects the “hands” and “limbs” of Deity, where is the absurdity in the words, “God thus working with His own hands?” And as there is no absurdity in God thus working, so neither is there in His issuing “commands;” so that what is done at His bidding should be beautiful and praiseworthy, because it was God who commanded it to be performed.

What I have now said, then, is offered not for the purpose of cavilling with any right opinions or sound doctrines held even by Greeks, but with the desire of showing that the same things, and indeed much better and diviner things than these, have been said by those divine men, the prophets of God and the apostles of Jesus. These truths are fully investigated by all who wish to attain a perfect knowledge of Christianity, and who know that “the mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom, and his tongue talketh of judgment; the law of his God is in his heart.” But even in regard to those who, either from deficiency of knowledge or want of inclination, or from not having Jesus to lead them to a rational view of religion, have not gone into these deep questions, we find that they believe in the Most High God, and in His only-begotten Son, the Word and God, and that they often exhibit in their character a high degree of gravity, of purity, and integrity; while those who call themselves wise have despised these virtues, and have wallowed in the filth of sodomy, in lawless lust, “men with men working that which is unseemly.”

But the Greeks will say that these accounts are fabulous, although two whole nations are witnesses to their truth. But why may we not consider the accounts of the Greeks as fabulous rather than those? Perhaps some one, however, wishing not to appear blindly to accept his own statements and reject those of others, would conclude, after a close examination of the matter, that the wonders mentioned by the Greeks were performed by certain demons; those among the Jews by prophets or by angels, or by God through the means of angels, and those recorded by Christians by Jesus Himself, or by His power working in His apostles. Let us, then, compare all these accounts together; let us examine into the aim and purpose of those who performed them; and let us inquire what effect was produced upon the persons on whose account these acts of kindness were performed, whether beneficial or hurtful, or neither the one nor the other. The ancient Jewish people, before they sinned against God, and were for their great wickedness cast off by Him, must evidently have been a people of great wisdom. But Christians, who have in so wonderful a manner formed themselves into a community, appear at first to have been more induced by miracles than by exhortations to forsake the institutions of their fathers, and to adopt others which were quite strange to them. And indeed, if we were to reason from what is probable as to the first formation of the Christian society, we should say that it is incredible that the apostles of Jesus Christ, who were unlettered men of humble life, could have been emboldened to preach Christian truth to men by anything else than the power which was conferred upon them, and the grace which accompanied their words and rendered them effective; and those who heard them would not have renounced the old-established usages of their fathers, and been induced to adopt notions so different from those in which they had been brought up, unless they had been moved by some extraordinary power, and by the force of miraculous events.