Chapter LVIII.
There is next to be answered the following query: "And how is it that he repents when men become ungrateful and wicked; and finds fault with his own handwork, and hates, and threatens, and destroys his own offspring?" Now Celsus here calumniates and falsities what is written in the book of Genesis to the following effect: "And the Lord God, seeing that the wickedness of men upon the earth was increasing, and that every one in his heart carefully meditated to do evil continually, was grieved [4575] He had made man upon the earth. And God meditated in His heart, and said, I will destroy man, whom I have made, from the face of the earth, both man and beast, and creeping thing, and fowl of the air, because I am grieved [4576] that I made them;" [4577] quoting words which are not written in Scripture, as if they conveyed the meaning of what was actually written. For there is no mention in these words of the repentance of God, nor of His blaming and hating His own handwork. And if there is the appearance of God threatening the catastrophe of the deluge, and thus destroying His own children in it, we have to answer that, as the soul of man is immortal, the supposed threatening has for its object the conversion of the hearers, while the destruction of men by the flood is a purification of the earth, as certain among the Greek philosophers of no mean repute have indicated by the expression: "When the gods purify the earth." [4578] And with respect to the transference to God of those anthropopathic phrases, some remarks have been already made by us in the preceding pages.
[4575] enethumethe, in all probability a corruption for ethumothe, which Hoeschel places in the text, and Spencer in the margin of his ed.: Heb. schnyv.
[4576] enethumethen. Cf. remark in note 2.
[4577] Cf. Gen. vi. 5-7.
[4578] Cf. Plato in Timæo.
Chapter LIX.
Celsus, in the next place, suspecting, or perhaps seeing clearly enough, the answer which might be returned by those who defend the destruction of men by the deluge, continues: "But if he does not destroy his own offspring, whither does he convey them out of this world [4579] which he himself created?" To this we reply, that God by no means removes out of the whole world, consisting of heaven and earth, those who suffered death by the deluge, but removes them from a life in the flesh, and, having set them free from their bodies, liberates them at the same time from an existence upon earth, which in many parts of Scripture it is usual to call the "world." In the Gospel according to John especially, we may frequently find the regions of earth [4580] termed "world," as in the passage, "He was the true Light, which lighteneth every man that cometh into the world;'" [4581] as also in this, "In the world ye shall have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world." [4582] If, then, we understand by "removing out of the world" a transference from "regions on earth," there is nothing absurd in the expression. If, on the contrary, the system of things which consists of heaven and earth be termed "world," then those who perished in the deluge are by no means removed out of the so-called "world." And yet, indeed, if we have regard to the words, "Looking not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen;" [4583] and also to these, "For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made," [4584] --we might say that he who dwells amid the "invisible" things, and what are called generally "things not seen," is gone out of the world, the Word having removed him hence, and transported him to the heavenly regions, in order to behold all beautiful things.
[4579] kosmos.
[4580] ton perigeion topon.
[4581] Cf. John i. 9.
[4582] Cf. John xvi. 33.
[4583] Cf. 2 Cor. iv. 18.
[4584] Cf. Rom. i. 20.
Chapter LX.
But after this investigation of his assertions, as if his object were to swell his book by many words, he repeats, in different language, the same charges which we have examined a little ago, saying: "By far the most silly thing is the distribution of the creation of the world over certain days, before days existed: for, as the heaven was not yet created, nor the foundation of the earth yet laid, [4585] nor the sun yet revolving, [4586] how could there be days?" Now, what difference is there between these words and the following: "Moreover, taking and looking at these things from the beginning, would it not be absurd in the first and greatest God to issue the command, Let this (first thing) come into existence, and this second thing, and this (third); and after accomplishing so much on the first day, to do so much more again on the second, and third, and fourth, and fifth, and sixth?" We answered to the best of our ability this objection to God's "commanding this first, second, and third thing to be created," when we quoted the words, "He said, and it was done; He commanded, and all things stood fast;" [4587] remarking that the immediate [4588] Creator, and, as it were, very Maker [4589] of the world was the Word, the Son of God; while the Father of the Word, by commanding His own Son--the Word--to create the world, is primarily Creator. And with regard to the creation of the light upon the first day, and of the firmament upon the second, and of the gathering together of the waters that are under the heaven into their several reservoirs [4590] on the third (the earth thus causing to sprout forth those (fruits) which are under the control of nature alone [4591] ), and of the (great) lights and stars upon the fourth, and of aquatic [4592] animals upon the fifth, and of land animals and man upon the sixth, we have treated to the best of our ability in our notes upon Genesis, as well as in the foregoing pages, when we found fault with those who, taking the words in their apparent signification, said that the time of six days was occupied in the creation of the world, and quoted the words: "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens." [4593]
[4585] erereismenes.
[4586] tede pheromenou.
[4587] Cf. Ps. xxxiii. 9.
[4588] ton prosechos demiourgon.
[4589] autourgon.
[4590] sunagogas.
[4591] ta hupo mones phuseos dioikoumena.
[4592] ta nekta.
[4593] Cf. Gen. ii. 4.