Preparation for the Gospel

^A "And while you are still speaking," the Scripture says, "I will say: Behold, I am present." Diphilus, the comic poet, again discourses on this very matter of judgment:

Do you imagine, Niceratus, that the dead, Who have spent their every day in every luxury, Could have escaped the divine, as if they were hidden? There is an eye of justice that sees all things. For, because we suppose there to be two paths, One for the just, and another fixed boundary for the wicked, Go, though you may plunder, steal, defraud, and stir up confusion, And even if the earth, they say, covers both in time— Do not be misled; there shall be judgment even in Hades, Which God, the Master of all, will perform, Whose name is fearful, which I would not even speak, He who grants a long life to those who sin. But if any mortal thinks, as he does some new wickedness Day by day, that he has eluded the gods, He thinks evil, and, thinking so, is caught Whenever Justice happens to have leisure. Behold, all you who think there is no God; For He is, He is. But if any man acts wickedly, Being evil by nature, let him count his time a gain. For in time, this man shall later pay the penalty.

The tragedy also harmonizes with these things through these lines:

For there shall be, there shall be that time of the age, When the golden ether shall unleash the treasure ^B Filled with fire; and the fire, having been fueled, Shall burn all things terrestrial and high up, Having become mad.

And after a few lines he adds again:

And when the All fails, The entire abyss of the waves shall be gone, And the earth, bereft of its foundations, and not even any Winged flocks shall sprout, being scorched, And then it shall save all that it had perished before.

We shall find things similar to these also in the Orphic writings, written down in this manner:

For having hidden everything, again into the joyful light, He brought them forth from his sacred heart, performing wondrous deeds.

If we live holily and justly, we shall be blessed indeed here, but after our departure from this life, we shall be far more blessed, our happiness ^C not being limited by any time, but being able to rest in eternity,

Dwelling with the immortal ones, Sharing their table—free from the evils of the Achaean heroes (as the philosophical poetry of Empedocles says). No one shall be so great, according to the Greeks, as to surpass justice, nor so small as to escape notice. And the same Orpheus also says these things:

But looking to the divine Word, attend to him, Directing the intellectual vessel of your heart, and walk well. ^D

^A Walking with consistent step upon an untrodden path, And seeing only the King of the universe, The Immortal.

Furthermore, regarding God, he declares Him invisible, stating that He is known to only one of the Chaldean race, whether he speaks of this Abraham, or of his son, through these verses:

Unless one be offspring born of the Chaldean race from above; for he was skilled in the movement of the stars, And the motion of the sphere around the earth, how it revolves, Rounded in equal measure, and by its own impulse; And he guides the winds, and about the air and around the current.

Then, as if paraphrasing that saying, «Heaven is my throne, and earth the footstool of my feet,» he adds:

^B He himself, again, is firmly set high above the vault of heaven Upon a golden throne; his feet rest upon the earth. He has stretched out his right hand to the ends of Ocean; And the base of the mountains trembles within its heart, Nor can it bear his mighty force; and he is everywhere, Himself heavenly, and he brings all things to completion upon the earth, Possessing at once the beginning, and the middle, and the end. But it is not lawful for you to speak, and I tremble in my limbs In my mind. He rules from the highest place.

And what follows these. For by these things he has clearly indicated all those prophetic words: «If you should open heaven, trembling will seize it; and mountains will melt from your presence, just as wax melts from the face of the fire.» And those things through Isaiah: «Who has measured the heaven with a span, and all the earth with his fist?» Again, when he sings thus:

O Ruler of the ether, and of Hades, of the sea, and of the earth, Who with thunders shake the firm threshold of high Olympus, Whom the demons shudder at, and the company of the gods fears, Whom the Fates obey, though they be unyielding; Imperishable Father of the Mother, by whose spirit all things are shaken, Who moves the winds, and covers all things with clouds, Cleaving the wide ether with lightnings. Yours is the Order among the stars, running in unchanging harmonies; And around your fiery throne stand the industrious Angels, to whom it is a care how all things are accomplished for mortals. By your spring, the fields shine anew with purple blossoms; Your winter rages, driven under cold clouds, And to you is owed the vintage fruit of Bromius.

^D Then he continues, addressing God in explicit terms as the Almighty:

Imperishable, immortal, speakable only to the immortals. Come, greatest of all gods, with mighty necessity, Dread, unconquered, great, imperishable, whom the ether crowns.

For indeed, while he calls Him Father of the Mother, he not only indicated the creation out of nothing, but also provided starting points for those who introduce emanations, perhaps even to conceive of a consort.

^A of God. He also paraphrases those prophetic scriptures, both the one through Hosea: "Behold, I am he who establishes the thunder, and creates spirit, whose hands founded the host of heaven." And the one through Moses: "See, see, that I am, and there is no God other than me. I will kill, and I will make to live; I will strike, and I will heal. And there is no one who shall deliver out of my hands."

"To mortals he plants evil from good things, And grievous war." According to Orpheus. Something similar says the Parian Archilochus: "O Zeus, thine is the rule of heaven, and thou, Sendest works upon men, both grievous and lawless." Again, let the Thracian Orpheus sing to us: "His right hand he hath stretched forth about the ends of the Ocean On all sides, and his holy foot hath stepped upon the earth." These things were manifestly taken from those scriptures: "The Lord will save the cities that are inhabited, and will take possession of the whole world with his hand like a nest." And, "The Lord who made the earth in his strength," as Jeremiah says, "and set up the world in his wisdom." Further to these, Phocylides, calling angels by the name of demons, distinguishes some of them as good and others as evil, as we also have accepted that some are rebels: "But the race of demons has not one power over men, For to some is the right to avert a coming plague." Rightly, therefore, the comic poet Philemon cuts away idolatry through these words: "There is no god called Fortune among us, There is not; but whatever happens to each man By chance, they call Fortune." And the tragic poet Sophocles says: "Not even to the gods do all things yield, Apart from Zeus; for he holds the end and the beginning." And Orpheus: "One power, one divinity has come to be, the great Heaven, And in it all things have been wrought, in which all these things ^B are contained, Fire, and water, and earth." And what follows these. The lyric poet Pindar, as if possessed by a Bacchic frenzy, speaks clearly: "What is God? Everything." And again: "God who creates all things for mortals." But when he says: "What wisdom, man, do you expect to gain from man Beyond what is small? To search out the counsels of the gods is difficult for mortal nature, For it is born of a mortal mother." From there he drew the sentiment: "Who has known the mind of the Lord?"

^A And Hesiod too, through whom he writes, agrees with what has been stated before: "No prophet is there among earth-born men, Who might know the mind of Zeus, the aegis-bearer." Rightly, then, Solon the Athenian, in his *Elegies*, having himself followed Hesiod, writes: "The mind of the immortals is entirely hidden from men." Again, regarding Moses’ prophecy that, because of the neglect of God's commandment, the woman would bring forth children in great pain, a certain poet of no mean standing writes: "... nor by day shall they cease from toil and woe, nor by night shall they be relieved; for the gods will send them heavy cares."

^B Furthermore, Homer, when he says, "And the Father balanced the golden scales," points to the justice of God. And Menander the comic poet, declaring God to be good, speaks thus: "To every man a guardian spirit stands near, From the moment he is born, a guide of his life, A good one; for one ought not to think a spirit evil That harms a good life." Then he adds: "That God is entirely good"—meaning either that God is entirely good, or, which is closer to the truth, that God is good in all things. Then too, Aeschylus the tragedian, in declaring to us the power of God, does not hesitate to call Him "the Highest" in these verses: "Separate the Deity from mortals, and do not think That He is of like nature, fleshly. You do not know Him. At times He shines forth as fire, Untouchable in His onset; at times as water, and at times as darkness; And He becomes like wild beasts, Like wind, and cloud, and lightning, thunder, and rain. The sea serves Him, and the rocks, And every spring, and the gatherings of water. The mountains tremble, and the earth, and the vast Abyss of the sea, and the height of the cliffs, when ^C The great, piercing eye of the Lord looks down; For the glory of the highest God is supreme." Does it not seem to you that this paraphrases the words, "The earth trembles before the face of the Lord"? In addition to these, Apollo, most gifted in divination, bearing witness to the glory of God, is compelled to speak concerning Athena, at the time when the Medes were invading Greece, how she was begging and supplicating Zeus on behalf of Attica. The oracle is as follows: "Pallas cannot appease the Olympian, Though she beseeches Him with many words and cunning craft; She will cast many temples of the immortals into consuming fire, Which now, perhaps, stand dripping with sweat, Trembling with terror." For all things are possible, and the glory of God is supreme.

And what follows. ^A Thearidas, moreover, writes in his work *On Nature* in this manner: “The beginning of the universe, the beginning indeed truly real, is one.” For that is from eternity one and alone.

“There is no other besides the great king,” says Orpheus. Whom Diphilus the comic poet followed, saying he is the most general father of all,

..... him with pious mind forever worship, From whose sole hand so many good things spring.

Jure ergo Plato justly accustoms the most excellent natures to attain that kind of discipline which we said before to be the greatest, that is, to the perception of the knowledge of the Good, and to arrive by ascending to that ^B ascent. And this, as it seems, would not be the turning of a shell, but the turning of the soul from a kind of nocturnal day to the true return to that which is, which indeed we shall call true philosophy. And he judges those who have partaken of this to be of the golden race, saying, “You are all brothers indeed.” But those who are of that golden race are most accurate, and in every way naturally and untaught, they apprehend of the Father and Maker of all things everything from everybody; the inanimate things ^C sympathizing, but of animals, of those endowed with life, some are already immortal, and others labor from day to day. And of mortals, some are in fear, even while they are still carried in the womb by their mother; others are already masters of themselves, guided by their own reason. And of men, all are Greeks and barbarians. But no race anywhere of those who till the soil, nor of the nomads, nor even of those who live in a state, can live without being previously possessed by faith in the one who is superior. Wherefore every nation, whether it touches the eastern ^D or western shores, or the northern, and all those toward the south, has one and the same anticipation concerning him who established this rule, if indeed the most universal of his benefits have also equally spread to all. But the philosophers among the Greeks, who are much more inquisitive, having set out from the philosophy of the barbarians, gave the prerogative to the invisible, and only, and most powerful, and most skillful, and the cause of other most beautiful things, not knowing the consequences of these things unless they had been instructed by us, nor even him in what way

nature itself prescribes we should come to know God; but only, as we have often said, they circumscribe him by a certain circumlocution. Thus far Clemens.

Now, indeed, since we have shown that the reasoning of Platonic philosophy in many things agrees with the writings of the Hebrews (for which reason we truly praise the man, both for his sharpness in discerning the truth and for his liberal and noble fairness in other matters), we must at last come to those things in which we cannot similarly approve of him, and [show why] we hold the philosophy of his doctrine to be superior to that which is commonly called "barbarian."

CHAPTER XIV

The oracles of the Hebrews, which contain certain divine predictions and responses, and which show a power truly more divine than human—and therefore claim God himself as their author—since they have their own indications, confirmed by the prediction of future events and by the very outcome of things corresponding to the prophecies, are rightly said to be far removed from every false notion. For, indeed, ^B "The divine words are pure, and silver tried in the fire, proven in the earth, purified seven times" are so called. But those of Plato are not of this kind, nor are those of any other of the number of wise men among men, who, with the eyes of mortal understanding and with certain vain and futile conjectures, sleeping as it were, and not as those who keep watch, while they form the nature of things in their mind, ^C have mixed much of the alloy of falsehood with the truth of nature, so that you cannot find a single head of doctrine among them pure and immune from all error.

And that you may not go further, if you will relax a little of this private and domestic affection and look upon the light itself through the power of reason, you will yourself truly recognize that that even admirable philosopher, who alone of all the Greeks touched the threshold and vestibule of truth, ^D defiled the name of the gods with decaying and perishing matter, and with images fashioned into human form by the hands of base workmen; and after that sublime height of magnificence, by which he stretched himself to know the Father and Creator of this whole universe, he [descended] from somewhere above, from the super-celestial vaults, into the lowest abyss of God-hated idolatry to be accepted and learned by the common people.

[alt-version omitted]

^A Thus indeed, seeing that he was not ashamed to write that Socrates, in order to fulfill a vow to the goddess and to be present at that barbarian festival which was then being celebrated for the first time by the citizens, had descended into the Piraeus—nor did he blush to admit that he had ordered a cock to be sacrificed to Asclepius, or to call that daemon sitting at Delphi a god, as if he were a certain national interpreter for the Greeks—he may justifiably be charged with the guilt of that superstitious error which misled the unintelligent multitude.

Now, call to mind, I pray you, a little of what was said a moment ago, and observe what sort of things this "all-wise" man, after his discourse on the incorporeal and indestructible Ideas, and after his mention of the First God and the second principle, and after the spiritual and immortal essences, has seen fit to legislate regarding this common, popular belief, which was even ratified by his own laws: ^B "As for the other daemons, to explain or to know their generation is a task beyond our power. Therefore, in this matter, we must place our faith in those who have spoken before us, who were, as they claim, the descendants of gods, and who surely must have had clear knowledge of their own ancestors. It is impossible, then, to disbelieve the children of gods, even though they speak without probable or necessary demonstrations; but since they profess to report what concerns their own kin, we must follow the law and believe them. Thus, then, let the generation of these gods according to them be held and stated by us: Of Earth and Sky were born Oceanus and Tethys; from them came Phorcys, Saturn, and Ops, and all who follow them; and from Saturn and Ops were born Jupiter, Juno, and all those whom we know as their brethren, as well as the other descendants of these."

For this reason, then, we must abandon this philosopher, for he acts not as a philosopher should, nor does he even agree with himself, since he adopts the mythical genealogies of the poets. For hear how he himself speaks in the *Republic*: ^C "'In the greater myths, I said, we shall easily see the lesser ones also. For it is necessary that there be one single form and power common to both the greater and the lesser. Do you not think so?' 'Indeed,' he said, 'but I do not understand which you call the greater.' 'Those,' I said, 'which Hesiod and Homer, and the other poets, have told us. For these, I suppose, have composed and still compose false myths for men, such as those we set forth a little while ago.' And again, it was his own discourse through which he said: 'We shall then erase, I said, beginning from this verse, all such things: ^D *I would rather be a serf in the land of some other*.'

And what follows; through which he adds: 'Again, we shall request of Homer and the other poets not to represent Achilles as the son of a goddess, *Now on his side, and now lying supine*.'"

' ^A And the things that follow these. To which he adds: "Or of Jupiter, and the bond of Mars and Venus by Vulcan, and other such things."

If these things have been said in this manner, what then does he mean by his subsequent language, which labels the poets as sons of gods, and asserts that it is impossible not to believe them, although he has long since ^B testified without any necessary or probable demonstration that these myths about the gods were fabricated by them? And what is that unreasoning faith, which he wishes to be guarded and fortified even by the fear of the laws? And how are Heaven and Earth first among the gods, and then their offspring, Ocean and Tethys, and Saturn, and Rhea, and Zeus, and after all these, Juno, and all the sons and brothers and grandsons of theirs who are fabulously recounted by Homer and Hesiod, since he himself pulls these very inventions up by the roots by saying: "Which, I said, is the first and most reprehensible of all things, especially when a person does not lie correctly." What is that, moreover? "When a person represents the nature of gods and heroes badly in discourse, just as a painter would do if he were to paint a tablet that was in no way similar to the thing he had undertaken to express with his brush." And likewise: "First, I say, the greatest lie, and the one concerning the most important matters, which Hesiod related—namely, what was done by Heaven, and what in turn Saturn retaliated upon him—he fabricated quite wrongly." And what follows. How then, pray, can the same poets whom he here calls vain and mendacious be held to be (as he claims) the grandsons of the gods? With justice, certainly, and deservedly is he to be abandoned by us, who was soothing the Athenian populace after the manner of actors through fear of death; ^C on the other hand, Moses is to be observed, and the oracles of the Hebrews are to be embraced, which excel in piety that is entirely sincere, and at once true and devoid of any error. Behold now this other matter.

CHAPTER XV.

That Plato did not in all respects rightly conduct the discourse concerning spiritual natures, but the Hebrews.

The Hebrews teach that the intermediate nature, consisting of those who partake of reason, has had a beginning of its coming-to-be, and is not unbegotten. Distributing these by account into various orders of spiritual substances, they name them spirits, virtues, ministers of God, angels, and archangels. ^D From the number of these, who fell by their own fault, they derive the race of demons and every sort of activity that is hostile and injurious to men. Wherefore they do not allow even these to be held in the place of gods, who do not have the good and the noble, which is inseparable from their nature, not merely from themselves, but do not even have their very being from themselves, but from the cause of all things.

^A Plato, however, although he agrees with the Hebrews that there are certain rational, incorporeal, and spiritual natures, yet he fails in consistency; first, by asserting them to be unbegotten, as he does of every soul; and next by saying they were formed from an emanation of the first cause—for he is unwilling to grant that they came into existence from nothing. Hence, he posits a race of many gods, regarding them in his logic as certain emanations or processions of the first and second cause; and he considers them to be good in nature, and in no way capable of falling away from their own proper virtue, for which reason he deems them gods. He thinks that the tribe of demons is different from these, being one of wickedness and malice, and susceptible to turning for the worse; ^B some of whom are called good, and others evil. But since he proposes this view in a way contrary to the Hebrews, he does not provide an account of how it is likely that demons came into being. For no man of sense would say they arose from the matter of incorporeal [c] things, since that is irrational; yet demons are rational, and one would never be born from the irrational. But if these are from the emanation of the superior beings, how are they not also gods, equal in status to those who begat them? And if the source is good, how are its products not similar? Or whence did the sprout of evil grow in the second order, while the root from above proceeded from good things? How could the bitter be produced from the sweet? And if the race of wicked demons is heavier than all darkness and all bitterness, how could it be said to have flowed from the emanation of the nature of the superior beings? If it did flow from thence, it would never have swerved from its own proper state. If it is changed, its nature would not have been impassible from the beginning. ^C And if it was not such a lot that it possessed—but if they were neither from the emanation of the superior beings, nor yet from the matter of bodies—it is time either to call them unbegotten, and to draw up, alongside the unbegotten matter of bodies, a third rank of unbegotten rational beings against God, and no longer acknowledge God to be the maker and creator of all things; or else, by acknowledging this, to confess along with the teachings of the Hebrews that He makes things which do not exist. What, then, do they teach regarding these? They say that the intermediate race of rational natures came into being, not from the matter of bodies, nor from an emanation of that nature which is unbegotten and always exists in the same way and condition; but that when they were not existence before, they came into being by the productive power of the Cause of all things. For this reason they are not gods, nor are they worthy of this title in the strict sense, because their nature is not equal to that which made them, ^D nor is it as inseparable from God as it should be; it is drawn towards the good, but it is also capable of turning to that which is contrary to the noble, through a neglect of the attention it ought to pay to the superior—over which each person is rightfully master, being endowed with his own impulse and judgment. These things we have said regarding these matters. Let us now move on to other things.

CHAPTER XVI.

Plato, having followed the Hebrews in positing that the soul is immortal and like to God, subsequently departs from them; for he sometimes wishes its substance to be composite, as though it possessed one part derived from the indivisible and ever-identical nature, and another part taken from the divisible nature of bodies. Indeed, he expresses this in the very words of the *Timaeus*: "He," he says, "constructed the soul, both in origin and in virtue prior to the body, as a master to rule over a subject, out of these elements and in this manner: since there are two natures—one indivisible, which is always the same, and the other divisible, which has its place in bodies—he blended a third type of substance, of an intermediate nature, from both; ^B and he joined the nature of the Same and the nature of the Other, and established it in the middle of their indivisible nature and of that which is divisible according to bodies. And having taken these three, he blended them into one form, forcing the nature of the Other, which is hard to mix, into the same." From this, it is with reason that the passionate part is joined to the rational part of the soul in his doctrine.

But while he holds this view concerning the substance of the soul at one time, at another time he attaches to it something worse and more absurd, claiming that that divine and heavenly nature—which passes beyond the heavenly vaults through the greatness of its virtue, being itself immaterial and rational, like to God, and eminent above the world—descends from those highest regions into donkeys, wolves, ants, and bees; and he contends in his discourse that we should believe this without any demonstration. For in the dialogue *On the Soul* he has this: "And they wander," he says, "until, ^C by the desire for the body-like nature which follows along, they are again bound back into a body. They are consigned, as is natural, to such customs as they happened to have practiced in their life." — "What kind of customs do you mean, Socrates?" — "Such as those who have practiced gluttony, and violence, and drunkenness, and have not taken care, into the ^D [kinds of animals]..."

[alt-version omitted]

^A that are likely to be; or do you not think so?" — "Certainly, what you say is likely." — "And those who have preferred injustice, and tyrannical power, and rapine, into the kinds of wolves, and hawks, and kites; or to what else could we say that such people would go?" — "Assuredly," said Cebes, "into such things." — "And therefore," he said, "it is evident that the others also, whichever way each goes, will go according to the resemblances of their own practice." — "Evidently so," he said; "for how could it be otherwise?" — "And are not the most fortunate among these," he said, "and those who go to the best place, those who have practiced that social and civic virtue, which they call temperance and justice, which have been formed by habit and practice without philosophy and [intellectual] mind?" — "In what way, then, are these the most fortunate?" — "Because it is likely that these will arrive again at such a civic and gentle ^B kind, perhaps of bees, or wasps, or ants, or also back into the human race itself."

And in the *Phaedrus* also, listen to what sort of things he relates: "For no soul arrives at the same place ^C from which it came for ten thousand years; for it does not grow wings before that much time, except for the soul of one who has practiced philosophy without deceit, or who has loved boys along with philosophy. These, in the third millennium cycle, if they choose this life three times in succession, being winged in this way, depart in the three-thousandth year. But the others, when they finish their first life, they obtain judgment. Being judged, some go into the prisons under the earth and pay the penalty; others, being lightened by Justice, arrive at some place in heaven, and spend their time in a manner worthy of the life they lived in the form of a human. At the thousandth year, both groups arrive at the casting of lots and the choosing of the second life, and each chooses whatever it wishes. And there a human soul arrives at the life of a beast, and from a beast, which was once a human, back into a human." And these things are in the *Phaedrus*.

But in the *Republic*, listen to him writing the following: "For to see," he said, "the soul that was once Orpheus choosing a swan's life, out of hatred for the female sex, due to his death at their hands, not wishing to be born by being conceived in a woman. And to see the soul of Thamyris choosing a nightingale; and to see a swan changing into the choice of a human life, and other musical animals likewise, as is likely. And the soul that attained [the lot] to choose, chose the life of a lion; and it was the soul of Ajax, son of Telamon, shrinking from becoming a human, remembering the judgment of the armor. And after this, the soul of Agamemnon, also hostile to the human race because of his sufferings, exchanged it for the life of an eagle. And in the midst, the soul of Atalanta attained the lot, and beholding the great honors of an athlete, she could not pass them by, but took them. And after this one, to see the soul of Epeus, son of Panopeus, passing into the nature of a craftsman woman." ^D

^B Far off in the last place, he saw the soul of the buffoon Thersites, putting on the form of an ape. And by chance, the soul of Ulysses, which had fallen to the last place of all, was to choose. Remembering its former labors, and having been cured of ambition, it wandered for a long time, seeking the life of an ordinary and private man, and with difficulty found one lying somewhere, neglected by the others, and upon seeing it, said that it would have done the same even if it had come first, and chose it gladly. And likewise from other beasts into men, and among one another; changing the unjust into wild beasts, and the just into tame ones, and mixing all manners of unions. ^C Such are the things Plato said regarding the soul, and it is evident that he is Egyptianizing in this doctrine. For this is not a Hebrew teaching, and it is not even consistent with the truth. But this is not the time to refute it, since he himself did not even attempt to support the problem with proofs. Yet one might reasonably point out how it is not consistent for the same man to say that, immediately upon death, the souls of the impious departing from here give accounts in Hades for what they have done, and are punished there forever; and then, on the other hand, to say that they themselves choose their lives here according to their own judgment. For he asserts that they clothe themselves in a body out of a desire for the corporeal; and those who have been nurtured in insolence and gluttony become asses, and take on the bodies of other beasts, choosing these things according to their own judgment and not by way of a judge’s punishment; and the unjust and rapacious become wolves and kites, coming to this of their own will. Then, that the soul of Orpheus desired to be a swan; that of Thamyris, a nightingale; and that Thersites chose the life of an ape. Where then would the judgment following the departure from here be, which he describes in the *On the Soul*, saying: ^D "As soon as the dead arrive at the place to which their daemon conveys each one, those who appear to have lived middling lives, having gone to the Acheron, and having boarded the vehicles which exist for them, they arrive in them at the lake, and there they dwell, and being purified, and giving satisfaction for their injustices, they are released, if anyone has done any injustice, and for their good deeds they receive honors according to the merit of each; but those who appear to have behaved incurably on account of the magnitude of their sins, or who have committed many great acts of temple-robbery, or many unjust and unlawful murders, or other such things—the appropriate fate casts them into Tartarus, from whence they never emerge." And so he speaks about the impious in this way; but regarding the pious, listen to what he says: "Those of these same ones who have been sufficiently purified by philosophy live for all time after this without bodies at all, and they arrive at dwellings even more beautiful than these, which it is neither easy to describe, nor is there sufficient time in the present." And in the *Gorgias* observe what he says: "He who has lived his life justly and piously, when he dies, departs to the islands of the blessed, to live in all happiness, free from evils; but he who has lived unjustly and impiously, into the prison of account and justice—that is, which they call Tartarus—is sent. Those who have committed the ultimate crimes, and on account of their ^A

into... the place which they call Tartarus. ^A But those who have committed the most extreme injustices, and because of such injustices have become incurable, of these the examples are made. And these themselves are no longer helped, inasmuch as they are incurable; but others are helped, those who see them, because of their greatest sins, suffering most painful and fearful punishments for all time, truly as examples suspended there in the prison of Hades, spectacles and warnings for the unjust who are always arriving. How could these things be made to agree with those arguments regarding the exchange of bodies, which they claim the soul chooses when it departs? For how could the same soul undergo punishment, and prisons, and such retribution for all time after its death from here, and yet again, as if set at liberty and free from bonds, choose whatever lives it may wish? And if it is to choose again according to pleasure, then where is the prison of retribution and justice? Countless other things could be taken up from the argument at leisure, for which it is not the time to lengthen the discussion. And the first slip of Plato’s opinion concerning these matters has thus been displayed; but the other part of the refutation of the dogma, by which he determined that one part of the soul is divine and rational, while another part of it is irrational and subject to passion, has been condemned by his own acquaintances, as one may learn from the following arguments.

CHAPTER XVII

Regarding the soul, according to Plato, which he says was composed by God from an impassible and a passible substance, as a mixture of colors from white and black, we have this to say: That there is a necessity, as a separation of them occurs in time, for it to be destroyed, just as the composition of the intermediate color, toward the proper natures of each...

their own nature, gradually dissolved back into their own proper kinds, must needs pass away. And if this is once proven, we shall certainly posit that the soul is subject to death and not immortal. For if it be admitted as confessed that in this nature of things there is absolutely nothing which lacks an opposite, and that all things which are contained within the compass of the world have been adorned by the hand of God from opposing and warring natures, He having infused into them mutual friendship and communion—as, for instance, dry to moist, and hot to cold, heavy to light, white to black, sweet to bitter, ^C hard to soft, and to all such things yet another communion of all things, and that of a substance immune to passion with one that is subject to passion—and if those things which have been blended and mixed together admit by their nature a separation from one another in time, and if the soul is assumed to have been generated from both an impassible and a passible substance; then it is necessary, just as with the intermediate color, that it too should in time, by nature, be destroyed, as the opposites in its constitution hasten back to their own nature. For do we not see that what is by nature heavy, even if it be carried upwards by us or by some natural lightness added to it from without, is nevertheless snatched downwards by the force and weight of its own nature? Similarly, does not what is by nature light, although it be carried downwards by some similar ^D force impelling it from without, yet struggle upwards by its own powers? For it is impossible that things which have come together from two opposites into one something should always remain in the same state, unless some third thing from the nature of existing beings is always present within them. But the soul is certainly not a third thing, composed of two opposing and warring natures, but rather one simple thing, and by its own nature free from all necessity of suffering and from bodily mass; for which reason Plato and the followers of Plato have determined that it is immortal. But since the common voice of all is that man consists of soul and body, and the commotions which arise in us without bodily commerce, whether we will it or not, are all assigned to the soul, most men, inferring from this that its substance is subject to passion, contend that it is mortal and corporeal, and not devoid of a body. Plato, however, was compelled to attach this other part, which is passible of itself, to that part of it which by its own nature would exclude all necessity of suffering. And that this is not otherwise in the reasoning of both, both of Plato and of the others, we shall endeavor to show by our discourse, by setting forth the faculties that are operative within us, so as to bring them to light. ⟩ Thus far the words of Severus the Platonist. Now let us see what Plato thought regarding the heaven and the beginning of the lights within it.

CHAPTER XVIII.

In agreement with the Hebrews, Plato gives an account regarding heaven and the things that appear within it, ^B by which he acknowledges that they are generated, brought into being by the Cause of all things, and consist of a corporeal and perishable substance. Yet he does not go on to legislate, as the Hebrews do, that we should worship them and consider them gods; rather, he asserts in the *Epinomis*: "Whom, then, am I commending to you as God, Megillus and Clinias? Heaven, I should say, which we all should worship and pray to especially, as he is most righteous, just as we would all agree that he is for us the cause of all other goods." Next, in the same passage, he adds these things: ^B "But the visible gods, the greatest and most honorable, and those who see everything most sharply—the first [gods], the nature of the stars, and whatever came into existence along with them—must be proclaimed. And after these, and next in order beneath them, the daemons; the airy race, holding the third and middle seat, the cause of interpretation, whom it is very necessary to honor with prayers for the sake of a favorable outcome." By these words, having stated that those mentioned are gods, he goes on to explain, in the *Timaeus*, the nature of their first formation: ^C "That fire is to air, as air is to water; and that as air is to water, water is to earth; [God] bound together and constructed a heaven visible and tangible. And for this reason, from these elements, such as they are, and being four in number, the body of the world was brought into existence through an agreement of proportion. It possessed a friendship arising from these, so that when it had been gathered into unity with itself, it became indissoluble by any other, save by Him who bound it together." He then adds: "And placing the Soul in its midst, he extended it through the whole, and ^D further wrapped the body around it on the outside, and..."

[As for the Latin text provided:]

CHAPTER XVIII.

Concerning heaven, and the stars shining within it, Plato philosophizes in accordance with the mind of the Hebrews, in that he teaches that they had some beginning, were perfected by the Creator of all things, and consist of a corporeal nature subject to destruction. Yet, having abandoned that line of reasoning, he later prescribes and sanctions by his own laws their worship and divinity, while he speaks in this manner in the *Epinomis*: "Whom, indeed, I ask, do I commend to you, Megillus, and to you, Clinias, so greatly as God? Heaven, I think, which truly deserves to be worshipped along with the other daemons, and to be implored with highest prayers. For we may rightly acknowledge that he himself also became for us the cause of all other good things." Then, having interposed several points, he adds this in the same place: "But we ought to hold those gods who fall under our sight—the greatest and those worthy of the greatest veneration, and who most sharply perceive all things everywhere—to be the leaders of all the gods, I mean those stars, and all things that we recognize as having come into existence along with them. Then, after them, and under them, we must worship the daemons. But that airy race, which holds the third and middle seat, and which acts as an interpreter between those on high and men, is especially necessary to appease with prayers, that they may wish this task of theirs to be happy for us." These are his words, whereby he clearly attributes divinity to them. But he philosophizes regarding their first formation in the *Timaeus* thus: "By elements fitted and connected among themselves in such a way that by the proportion with which fire is to air, the same air is to water, and in turn as air is to water, so likewise water might correspond to earth; he bound and strengthened this world in such a way that it could be simultaneously seen and touched. And therefore, since it is from those [elements] and such by its nature," he argues that that soul is not only diffused through all parts of the world, but is also wrapped around and diffused over its whole body. This may be inferred from what follows. For after he tempered this soul at his own will, he then discusses its position and arrangement in the universe thus: "Hitherto the Virgilian lines: *Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus / Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet.* What then? Hear: *Quam postremam periodum Tullius ita vertit, Sic animus a medio profectus (quasi traductus, atque transmissus) extremitatem cœli a suprema regione, rotundo ambitu circumjecit, seseque ipse versans, divinæ, sempiternæ sapientisque vitæ induxit exordium.* Therefore that *κύκλῳ* [he] restores [as] *rotundo ambitu circumjecit*. If the authority of Cicero is removed, to wish..."

to form even one alone ^B, the heaven, as if it were desolate, he has constituted. And again, lowering his tone, he adds, saying: «From this reason (56) and thought of God, concerning the generation of time, so that time might be generated, the sun, and the moon, and five other stars, having the name of planets, came into being for the definition and keeping of the numbers of time; and God, having made the bodies of each of them, placed them in the orbits which the revolution of the other was traversing.» And he adds: «And the bodies having been bound with ensouled bonds, they became living beings, and learned what had been ordained.» And in the tenth book of the *Laws*, he speaks generally about all soul, saying thus: «Everything that is endowed with soul changes (57), possessing in itself the cause of change. And having changed, it is carried ^C according to the order and law of fate; those which have changed in lesser ways in their habits move in lesser ways along the plane of the region; but those which have sinned in more and graver ways are swallowed into the deep gulf.» If, therefore, everything that is endowed with soul changes (59), possessing in itself the cause of change, and the heaven and the sun and the moon are endowed with soul, according to Plato himself, then these also would change, possessing in themselves the cause of change, according to his own argument. How then does he again say that they are eternal, and for this reason gods, although they exist in a corruptible body, and are capable of being dissolved? For he says again in the *Timaeus*: «Since, therefore, all those who visibly revolve in heaven and those who are seen, as far as they wish to be gods, had a generation, the one who generated ^D this whole says to them: Gods of gods, of whom I am the creator and father of works, that which is bound by me is indissoluble if I do not wish it. That which has been well adjusted and is well, to wish to dissolve it is the part of an evil one. Wherefore, since you have been generated, you are not indeed immortal, nor entirely indissoluble, but you shall not be dissolved, nor shall you attain the lot of death, having obtained my will as a bond even greater and more sovereign than those by which you were bound when you were generated.» These things [speaks] Plato. With good reason indeed Moses, and the oracles of the Hebrews, forbid the worship of these, and the considering of them as gods, but leading [the mind] up to the King God on high, [they command] to consider as God alone, and to worship him alone, the maker of the sun, and of the moon, and of the stars, and of the whole heaven and world, who bound and adjusted all things by his divine word.

^A For by me they were made, they cannot be dissolved against my will: but it is by no means good to wish to dissolve that which is bound by reason. But since you have been born, you are not indeed immortal and indissoluble: yet you will by no means be dissolved, nor will any fates of death destroy you. For my counsel is a greater bond for your perpetuity than those by which you were bound when you were being created.” So far he. With good reason, therefore, does Moses and the oracles of the Hebrews forbid us to attribute worship and divinity to them: and on the contrary, they command us to lift our minds upward to the very God, the manager of all things, I say, the maker of the sun, and of the moon, and of the remaining stars, and indeed of the whole heaven and world, and that we should hold him alone as God, and follow him with that august worship. For thus indeed Moses commands: “Lest, seeing the sun, and the moon, and all the stars, and all the adornment of heaven, you beled astray by error and adore them.”^B

Philo, most learned in Hebraic matters, explaining this interdiction of his more fully, speaks in this manner: “There are those who have supposed the sun and moon and other stars to be all-powerful gods of themselves, and to them they have attributed the causes of all things that come to pass. But to Moses, the world has appeared to be both created and the greatest city, having rulers and subjects; rulers, namely, all those in heaven, such as the wandering and fixed stars; but subjects, the natures after the moon, in the air and upon the earth. But he did not hold the aforementioned rulers to be autonomous, but rather the lieutenants of the one Father of all; imitating whose supervision, they govern by regulating each of the things that have come to pass in accordance with justice and law. But those who do not see the charioteer sitting upon the creatures that are harnessed, have attributed the causes of the things happening in the world to them as though they were the active agents. The most holy lawgiver changes this ignorance into knowledge, saying thus: ‘Lest, seeing the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and all the adornment of heaven, you be led astray by error and adore them.’ ^C He very pointedly and well called the reception of the aforementioned as gods a straying. For those who saw the annual seasons constituted by the approaches and retreats of the sun, in which the generations of living creatures, and plants, and fruits are brought to perfection at determined periods of time; and the moon as the servant and successor of the sun, which has taken upon itself the care and protection by night of those things over which the sun has charge during the day, and who saw the other stars acting and working myriad things for the persistence of the whole according to the sympathy towards earthly things—these were led into a boundless error, supposing these alone to be gods. But if they had exerted themselves to walk along the unerring path, they would have straightway known that just as sense-perception has become a sub-servant of Intellect, in the same way all the perceptible things have been established as servants of the intelligible.” And he adds, saying: ^D “So that, having passed beyond in our reason all visible substance, let us go up to the honor of the unseen, and invisible, and only intelligible [God], who is not only the God of intelligible and perceptible things, but also the creator of all. But if anyone should assign the worship of the eternal and the creator to another who is more recent and created, let him be recorded as deranged, and guilty of the greatest impiety.” These are the teachings of the Hebrew piety, which are in truth pure and divine, before the puffed-up philosophy.

For what need is there for me to speak at length, and to bring to light the other things of Plato, when from these things that are present, it is possible for one to conjecture even those things currently passed over by me in silence? Yet I have not been induced to say these things for the sake of slander, ^A since I truly admire the man. Nay, more than all other Greeks, I consider him a friend, and I honor those things which to me are friendly and akin, even if he has not thought in all things exactly as I do; but when compared with Moses and the prophets among the Hebrews, I show the deficiency of his thought. Although it was in my power, having prepared myself to find fault, to accuse him of a myriad of things, such as the solemn and wise things set down by him in the *Republic* concerning women, or such as the things spoken with solemnity in the *Phaedrus* about lawless love. But you, if you desire to hear these things also, read them, having taken these very words of his. ^A Why must I lengthen this, when we have already honored him? The one who legislates these things did not even remember the words of the wife of Candaules; for she, when her husband ordered her to show her body naked, said most prudently that, in putting off her tunic, a woman also puts off her shame. Yet the philosopher strips the brides of their shame, and teaches shamelessness. The authors of this most foul institution, as of many others, were the Lacedaemonians; as can be seen in Thucydides, book I, and Plutarch in his *Lycurgus* and *Apophthegmata*. He seeks in vain for some appearance and coloring for this disgrace.

CHAPTER XIX.

“Perhaps,” I said, “many of the things being said here, because we now hold another custom, may seem ridiculous if they are carried out as we ordain.” “Indeed,” he said. “But what, pray,” said I, “do you see as the most ridiculous of them?” “Obviously this: that we would want women to exercise naked in the wrestling schools with men, not only the young, but even the older ones as well, just as we see old men in the gymnasia, even though they are wrinkled and unpleasant to look upon, yet studying to engage in this exercise.” Then with more things inserted, he adds this: “The man, he says, who laughs at women naked and engaging in this exercise for the sake of what is honorable, as if he were catching at laughter, reaps the fruit of wisdom from the ridiculous, and does not even know, as it seems, at what he is laughing.” He says in the seventh book of the *Laws* that it will be necessary for the...