3 εἰ δὲ τὸ "ἐπήρκεσεν" ἐπὸ τῶν μέσων καὶ σωματικῶν λαμβάνει.
Book 11. | ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. 63 frantic woman, as ye state.” And because she is not the only one who is recorded to have seen the Saviour after His resur- rection, but others also are mentioned, this Jew of Celsus calumniates these statements also in adding, * And some one else of those engaged in the same system of deception!”
CHAPTER LX.
In the next place, as if this were possible, viz. that the image of a man who was dead could appear to another as if he were still living, he adopts this opinion as an Epicurean, and says, « 'T'hat some one having so dreamed owing to a peculiar state of mind, or having, under the influence of a perverted imagi- nation, formed such an appearance as he himself desired, re- ported that such had been seen; and this,” he continues, “ has been the case with numberless individuals.” But even if this statement of his seems to have a considerable degree of force, it is nevertheless only fitted to confirm a necessary doctrine, that the soul of the dead exists in a separate state [from the body]; and he who adopts such an opinion does not believe without good reason in the immortality, or at least continued existence, of the soul, as even Plato says in his treatise on the Soul that shadowy phantoms of persons already dead have ap- peared to some around their sepulchres. Now the phantoms which exist about the soul of the dead are produced by some substance, and this substance is in the soul, which exists apart in a body said to be of splendid appearance. But Celsus, un- willing to admit any such view, will have it that some dreamed a waking dream,’ and, under the influence of a perverted ima- gination, formed to themselves such an image as they desired. Now it is not irrational to believe that a dream may take place while one is asleep; but to suppose a waking vision in the case of those who are not altogether out of their senses, and under the influence of delirium or hypochondria, is incredible. And Celsus, seeing this, called the woman “half-mad,”’—a state- ment which is not made by the history recording the fact, but 1 χὰ μὲν οὖν γινόμενα περὶ ψυχῆς τεθνηκότων Φαντάσματα doró τινος ὑπο- κειμένου γίνεται, τοῦ κατὼ τὴν ὑφεστηκυῖαν ἐν τῷ καλουμένῳ αὐγοειδεῖ σώροατι ψυχήν. Cf. note in Benedictine ed.
3 ὑχαρ.
64 ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. [Book 11.
from which he took occasion to charge the occurrences with being untrue.
CHAPTER LXI.
Jesus accordingly, as Celsus imagines, exhibited after His death only the appearance of wounds received on the cross, and was not in reality so wounded as He is described to have been; whereas, according to the teaching of the Gospel—some por- tions of which Celsus arbitrarily accepts, in order to find ground of accusation, and other parts of which he rejects—Jesus called to Him one of His disciples who was sceptical, and who deemed the miracle an impossibility. That individual had, indeed, ex- pressed his belief in the statement of the woman who said that she had seen Him, because he did not think it impossible that the soul of a dead man could be seen; but he did not yet con- sider the report to be true that He had been raised in a body, which was the antitype of the former. And therefore he did not merely say, “Unless I see, I will not believe;" but he added, “Unless I put my hand into the print of the nails, and lay my hands upon His side, I will not believe." These words were spoken by Thomas, who deemed it possible that the body of the soul might be seen by the eye of sense, resembling in all respects its former appearance, ** Both in size, and in beauty of eyes, And in voice;" and frequently, too, * Having, also, such garments around the person? [as when alive]."
Jesus accordingly, having called Thomas, said, * Reach hither thy finger, and behold: my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believun δ CHAPTER LXII.
Now it followed from all the predictions which were uttered regarding Him—amongst which was this prediction of the resurrection—and from all that was done by Him, and from l ἐν σώματι ἐντιτύπῳ ἐγηγέρθαι. 3 ψυχῆς σῶμα. 8 Cf. Homer, Iliad, xxiii. 66, 67. * Cf. John xx. 27.
Book 11. ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. 65 all the events which befell Him, that this event should be marvellous above all others. For it had been said beforehand by the prophet in the person of Jesus: * My flesh shall rest in hope, and Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hades, and wilt not suffer Thine Holy One to see corruption.”* And truly, after His resurrection, He existed in a body intermediate, as it were, between the grossness of that which He had before His suffer- ings, and the appearance of a soul uncovered by such a body. And hence it was, that when His disciples were together, and Thomas with them, there “came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then saith He to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger,’? etc. And in the Gospel of Luke also, while Simon and Cleopas were con- versing with each other respecting all that had happened to them, Jesus “drew near, and went with them. And their eyes were holden, that they should not know Him. And He said unto them, What manner of communications are these that ye have one to another, as ye walk?” And when their eyes were opened, and they knew Him, then the Scripture says, in express words, “And He vanished out of their sight.”* And although Celsus may wish to place what is told of Jesus, and of those who saw Him after His resurrection, on the same level with imaginary appearances of a different kind, and those who have invented such, yet to those who institute a candid and intelligent examination, the events will appear only the more miraculous.
CHAPTER LXIII.
After these points, Celsus proceeds to bring against the Gospel narrative a charge which is not to be lightly passed over, saying that “if Jesus desired to show that his power was really divine, he ought to have appeared to those who had ill- treated him, and to him who had condemned hin, and to all men universally.’ For it appears to us also to be true, according to the Gospel account, that He was not seen after His resur- rection in the same manner as He used formerly to show Him- self—publicly, and to all men. But it is recorded in the Acts, that “being seen during forty days,’ He expounded to His ORIG.—VOL. II. n 66 ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. [Boox 1.
disciples “the things pertaining to the kingdom of God."! And in the Gospels’ it is not stated that He was always with them; but that on one occasion He appeared in their midst, after eight days, when the doors were shut, and on another in some similar fashion. And Paul also, in the concluding por- tions of the first Epistle to the Corinthians, in reference to His not having publicly appeared as He did in the period before He suffered, writes as follows: “ For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve: after that He was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto the present time, but some are fallen asleep. After that He was seen of James, then of all the apostles. And last of all He was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.”? I am of opinion now that the statements in this passage con- tain some great and wonderful mysteries, which are beyond the grasp not merely of the great multitude of ordinary be- lievers, but even of those who are far advanced [in Christian knowledge], and that in them the reason would be explained why He did not show Himself, after His resurrection from the dead, in the same manner as before that event. And in a treatise of this nature, composed in answer to a work directed against the Christians and their faith, observe whether we are able to adduce a few rational arguments out of a greater number, and thus make an impression upon the hearers of this apology. CHAPTER LXIV.
Although Jesus was only a single individual, He was never- theless more things than one, according to the different stand- point from which He might be regarded;* nor was He seen in the same way by all who beheld Him. Now, that He was more things than one, according to the varying point of view, is clear from this statement, *I am the way, and the truth, and the life;" and from this, “I am the bread;" and this, “I am the door," and innumerable others. And that when seen He did 1 Acta i. 9. 3 Cf. John xx. 26. $ 1 Cor. xv. 3-8. 4 πλείονα τῇ ἐπινοίᾳ cr.
Book 11] ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. 67 not appear in like fashion to all thosé who saw Him, but according to their several ability to receive Him, will be clear to those who notice why, at the time when He was about to be transfigured on the high mountain, He did not admit all His apostles [to this sight], but only Peter, and James, and John, because they alone were capable of beholding His glory on that occasion, and of observing the glorified appearance of Moses and Elijah, and of listening to their conversation, and to .the voice from the heavenly cloud. I am of opinion, too, that before He ascended the mountain where His disciples came to Him alone, and where He taught them the beatitudes, when He was somewhere in the lower part of the mountain, and when, as it became late, He healed those who were brought to Him, freeing them from all sickness and disease, He did not appear the same person to the sick, and to those who needed His healing aid, as to those who were able by reason of their strength to go up the mountain along with Him. Nay, even when He interpreted privately to His own disciples the parables which were delivered to the multitudes without, from whom the explanation was withheld, as they who heard them explained were endowed with higher organs of hearing than they who heard them without explanation, so was it altogether the same with the eyes of their soul, and, I think, also with those of their body.’ And the following statement shows that He had not always the same appearance, viz. that Judas, when about to betray Him, said to the multitudes who were setting out with him, as not being acquainted with Him, **W homsoever I shall kiss, the same is he.”? And I think that the Saviour Himself indicates the same thing by the words: * I was daily with you, teaching in the temple, and ye laid no hold on me.”* Entertaining, then, such exalted views regarding Jesus, not only with respect to the Deity within, and which was hidden from the view of the multitude, but with respect to the transfiguration of His body, which took place when and to whom He would, we say, that before Jesus had “ put off the governments and powers,” * and 1 οὕτω xal ταῖς ὄψεσι πάντως μὲν τῆ; ψυχῆς, ἐγὼ δ᾽ ἡγοῦμαι, ὅτε καὶ τοῦ σώματος.
3 Matt. xxvi. 48. δ Matt. xxvi. 55.
4 ró» μὴ ἀπκικδυσάμενον, etc, Cf. Alford, in loco (Col. ii. 15).
68 ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. [Boos 11.
while as yet He was not dead unto sin, all men were capable of seeing Him; but that, when He had “ put off the govern- ments and powers,” and had no longer anything which was capable of being seen by the multitude, all who had formerly seen Him were not now able to behold Him. And therefore, sparing them, He did not show Himself to all after His resur- rection from the dead.
CHAPTER LXV.
And why do I say “to all?” For even with His own apostles and disciples He was not perpetually present, nor did He constantly show Himself to them, because they were not able without intermission? to receive His divinity. For His deity was more resplendent after He had finished the economy? [of salvation]: and this Peter, surnamed Cephas, the first-fruits as it were of the apostles, was enabled to behold, and along with him the twelve (Matthias having been substituted in room of Judas); and after them He appeared to the five hundred brethren at once, and then to James, and subsequently to all the others besides the twelve apostles, perhaps to the seventy also, and lastly to Paul, as to one born out of due time, and who knew well how to say, “ Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given;” and probably the expression “least of all” has the same meaning with “one born out of due time." For as no one could reasonably blame Jesus for not having admitted all His apostles to the high mountain, but: only the three already mentioned, on the occasion of His trans- figuration, when He was about to manifest the splendour which appeared in His garments, and the glory of Moses and Elias talking with Him, so none could reasonably object to the state- ments of the apostles, who introduce the appearance of Jesus after His resurrection as having been made not to all, but to those only whom He knew to have received eyes capable of seeing llis resurrection. I think, moreover, that the following statement regarding Him has an apologetic value? in reference to our subject, viz.: “ For to this end Christ died, and rose again, that He might be Lord both of the dead and living."
l διηνεκῶς. 2 τὴν οἰκονομίαν τελέσαντος.
8 χρήσιμον ὃ οἶμαι πρὸς ἀπολογίαν τῶν προχειμένων. 4 Cf. Rom. xiv. 9.
Book m.] ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. 69 For observe, it is conveyed in these words, that Jesus died that He might be Lord of the dead; and that He rose again to be Lord not only of the dead, but also of the living. And the apostle understands, undoubtedly, by the dead over whom Christ is to be Lord, those who are so called in the first Epistle to the Corinthians, * For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible;”* and by the living, those who are to be changed, and who are different from the dead who are to be raised. And respecting the living the words are these, “ And we shall be changed;” an expression which follows immediately after the statement, ** The dead shall be raised first."? Moreover, in the first Epistle to the Thessa- lonians, describing the same change in different words, he says that they who sleep are not the same as those who are alive; his language being, *I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them who are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died, and rose again, even so them also that sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them that are asleep."? The explanation which appeared to us to be appropriate to this passage, we gave in the exegetical remarks which we have made on the first Epistle to the Thessalonians.
CHAPTEB LXVI.
CHAPTEB LXVI.
And be not surprised if all the multitudes who have be- lieved on Jesus do not behold His resurrection, when Paul, writing to the Corinthians, can say to them, as being incapable of receiving greater matters, “For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified; ” * which is the same as saying, *Iitherto ye were not able, neither yet now are ye able, for ye are still carnal."5 The Scripture, therefore, doing everything by appointment of God, has recorded of Jesus, that before His sufferings He appeared to all indifferently, but not always; while after His sufferings He no longer appeared to all in the same way, but with a certain 70 ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. [Boor π.
discrimination which measured out to each his due. And as it is related that * God appeared to Abraham,” or to one of the saints, and this “ appearance” was not a thing of constant occur- rence, but took place at intervals, and not to all, so understand that the Son of God appeared in the one case on the same prin- ciple that God appeared to the latter."
CHAPTER LXVII.
To the best of our ability, therefore, as in a treatise of this nature, we have answered the objection, that “if Jesus had really wished to manifest his divine power, he ought to have shown himself to those who ill-treated him, and to the judge who condemned him, and to all without reservation.” There was, however, no obligation on Him to appear either to the judge who condemned Him, or to those who ill-treated Him. For Jesus spared both the one and the other, that they might not be smitten with blindness, as the men of Sodom were when they conspired against the beauty of the angels entertained by Lot. And here is the account of the matter: “But the men put forth their hand, and pulled Lot into the house to them, and shut to the door. And they smote the men who were at the door of the house with blindness, both small and great; so that they wearied themselves to find the door.”? Jesus, ac- cordingly, wished to show that His power was divine to each one who was capable of seeing it, and according to the measure of His capability. And I do not suppose that He guarded against being seen on any other ground than from a regard to the fitness of those who were incapable of seeing Him. And it is in vain for Celsus to add, “ For he had no longer occasion to fear any man after his death, being, as you say, a God; nor was he sent into the world at all for the purpose of being hid.” Yet He was sent into the world not only to become known, but also to be hid. For all that He was, was not known even to those to whom He was known, but a certain part of Him remained concealed even from them;. and to some He was not known at all. And He opened the gates of light to those who 1 οὕτω μοι νόει καὶ τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ ὦφθαι τῇ παραπλησίᾳ εἰς τὸ περὶ ἐκείνων, εἰς τὸ ὦφθαι αὐτοῖς τὸν Θεόν, κρίσει.
Boox π.] ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. 71 were the sons of darkness and of night, and had devoted them- selves to becoming the sons of light and of the day. For our Saviour Lord, like a good physician, came rather to us who were full of sins, than to those who were righteous.
CHAPTER LXVIII.
CHAPTER LXVIII.
But let us observe how this Jew of Celsus asserts that, “ if this at least would have helped to manifest his divinity, he ought accordingly to have at once disappeared from the cross." Now this seems to me to be like the argument of those who oppose the doctrine of providence, and who arrange things differently from what they are, and allege that the world would be better if it were as they arrange it. Now, in those instances in which their arrangement is a possible one, they are proved to make the world, so far as depends upon them, worse by their arrangement than it actually is; while in those cases in which they do not portray things worse than they really are, they are shown to desire impossibilities; so that in either case they are deserving of ridicule. And here, accordingly, that there was no impossibility in His coming, as a being of diviner nature, in order to disappear when He chose, is clear from the very nature of the case; and is certain, moreover, from what is recorded of Him, in the judgment of those who do not adopt certain portions merely of the narrative that they may have ground for accusing Christianity, and who consider other por- tions to be fiction. For it is related in St. Luke's Gospel, that Jesus after His resurrection took bread, and blessed it, and breaking it, distributed it to Simon and Cleopas; and when they had received the bread, “their eyes were opened, and they knew Him, and He vanished out of their sight."!
CHAPTER LXIX.
But we wish to show that His instantaneous bodily disappear- ance from the cross was not better fitted to serve the purposes of the whole economy of salvation [than His remaining upon it was]. For the mere letter and narrative of the events which happened to Jesus do not present the whole view of the truth. For each one of them can be shown, to those who have an in- 1 Cf. Luke xxiv. 80, 31.
72 ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. [Book 11.
telligent apprehension of Scripture, to be a symbol of something else. Accordingly, as His crucifixion contains a truth, repre- sented in the words, “I am crucified with Christ,” and inti- mated also in these, “ God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is cru- cified to me, and I unto the world;"! and as His death was necessary, because of the statement, “ For in that He died, He died unto sin once,"? and this, * Being made conformable to His death,”? and this, *For if we be dead with Him, we shall also live with Him:"* so also His burial has an application to those who have been made conformable to His death, who have been both crucified with Him, and have died with Him; as is declared by Paul, * For we were buried with Him by bap- tism, and have also risen with Him."? These matters, how- ever, which relate to His burial, and his sepulchre, and him who buried Him, we shall expound at greater length on a móre suitable occasion, when it will be our professed purpose to treat of such things. But, for the present, it is sufficient to notice the clean linen in which the pure body of Jesus was to be enwrapped, and the new tomb which Joseph had hewn out of the rock, where *no one was yet lying,” ἡ or, as John ex- presses it, * wherein was never man yet laid."" And observe whether the harmony of the three evangelists here is not fitted to make an impression: for they have thought it right to describe the tomb as one that was “quarried or hewn out of the rock;” so that he who examines the words of the narrative may see something worthy of consideration, both in them and in the newness of the tomb,—a point mentioned by Matthew and John,°—and in the statement of Luke and John,’ that no one had ever been interred therein before. For it became Him, who was unlike other dead men (but who even in death mani- fested signs of life in the water and the blood), and who was, so to speak, a new dead man, to be laid in a new and clean Cf. Gal. vi. 14. 3 Rom. vi. 10. 3 Phil. iii. 10.
5 Luke xxiii. 58, οὐκ ἦν οὕπω οὐδεὶς κείμενος.
7 John xix. 41, ἐν o οὐδέπω οὐδεὶς ἐτέθη.
8 Cf. Matt. xxvii. 60 with John xix. 41.
9 Cf. Luke xxiii. 53 with John xix. 41.
Book 1.7 ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. 73 tomb, in order that, as His birth was purer than any other (in consequence of His being born, not in the way of ordinary generation, but of a virgin), His burial also might have the purity symbolically indicated in His body being deposited in a sepulchre which was new, not built of stones gathered from various quarters, and having no natural unity, but quarried and hewed out of one rock, united together in all its parts. Regarding the explanation, however, of these points, and the method of ascending from the narratives themselves to the things which they symbolized, one might treat more profoundly, and in a manner more adapted to their divine character, on a more suitable occasion, in a work expressly devoted to such subjects. The literal narrative, however, one might thus ex- plain, viz. that it was appropriate for Him who had resolved to endure suspension upon the cross, tb maintain all the accom- paniments of the character He had assumed, in order that He who as a man had been put to death, and who as a man had died, might also as a man be buried. But even if it had been related in the Gospels, according to the view of Celsus, that Jesus had immediately disappeared from the cross, he and other unbelievers would have found fault with the narrative, and would have brought against it some such objection as this: * Why, pray, did he disappear after he had been put upon the cross, and not disappear before he suffered?" If, then, after learning from the Gospels that He did not at once dis- appear from the cross, they imagine that they can find fault with the narrative, because it did not invent, as they consider it ought to have done, any such instantaneous disappearance, but gave a true account of the matter, is it not reasonable that they should accord their faith also to His resurrection, and should believe that He, according to His pleasure, on one occa- . Sion, when the doors were shut, stood in the midst of His dis- ciples, and on another, after distributing bread to two of His acquaintances, immediately disappeared from view, after He had spoken to them certain words?
CHAPTER LXX.
But how is it that this Jew of Celsus could say that Jesus concealed Himself? For his words regarding Him are these: 74 ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. [Boor rr.