Address to the Greeks

THE GREEKS CLAIM, WITHOUT REASON, THE INVENTION OF THE ARTS. Greeks, do not be so hostile toward non-Greek peoples or resent their beliefs. Which of your institutions did not come from non-Greek peoples? The most eminent of the Telmessians invented divination through dreams; the Carians, prediction through the stars; the Phrygians and the most ancient Isaurians, divination through the flight of birds; the Cyprians, divination by inspecting sacrificial animals. To the Babylonians you owe astronomy; to the Persians, magic; to the Egyptians, geometry; to the Phoenicians, instruction by alphabetic writing. Stop calling these imitations your own inventions. Orpheus, again, taught you poetry and song; from him you also learned the mystery rites. The Tuscans taught you sculpture; from the Egyptian historical records you learned to write history; you acquired the art of playing the flute from Marsyas and Olympus, both Phrygians; country people developed the harmonious sound of the shepherd's pipe. The Tyrrhenians invented the trumpet; the Cyclopes, metalworking; and a woman who was formerly a queen of the Persians, as Hellanicus tells us, the practice of writing letters. Her name was Atossa. Give up this conceit and stop boasting about your elegant language. You praise yourselves, with your own people supporting you. A sensible person should wait for others to testify, and people should also agree in how they speak their language. Yet you alone do not even speak alike in everyday conversation; for the way of speaking among the Dorians is not the same as that of the inhabitants of Attica, nor do the Aeolians speak like the Ionians. With this disagreement where there should be none, I do not know whom to call a Greek. Strangest of all, you honor expressions that are not native to you and have made your language a mixture by adding foreign words. For this reason we have rejected your wisdom, although I was once highly skilled in it; for, as the comic poet says, these are grapes left after the harvest and idle talk, schools of twittering swallows, corrupters of art. Yet those who eagerly pursue it shout loudly and croak like ravens. You have also developed rhetoric to serve injustice and slander, selling the free power of your speech for hire, and often representing the same thing at one time as right, at another time as not good. The poetic art, again, you employ to describe battles, and the gods' love affairs, and the corruption of the soul. THE VICES AND ERRORS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS. What noble thing have you produced by your pursuit of philosophy? Who of your most eminent men has been free from empty boasting? Diogenes, who flaunted his independence by living in a barrel, developed an intestinal illness after eating a raw octopus and died through his gluttony. Aristippus, walking about in a purple robe, lived extravagantly, in keeping with the views he professed. Plato, a philosopher, was sold by Dionysius for his gluttony. And Aristotle, who absurdly placed a limit to Providence and defined happiness in terms of things that give pleasure, flattered Alexander in complete disregard of his duty as a teacher, forgetting that Alexander was only a youth; and he, showing how well he had learned his teacher's lessons, because his friend would not worship him, shut him up and carried him around like a bear or leopard. He strictly followed his teacher's instructions in displaying manliness and courage by feasting, and running his closest and dearest friend through with a spear, and then, pretending to grieve, weeping and starving himself so that his friends would not hate him. I could laugh at those also who still follow his doctrines, people who say that things below the moon are not under Providence's care; and so, being nearer the earth than the moon, and below its orbit, they themselves look after what is left without care; and as for those who have neither beauty, nor wealth, nor bodily strength, nor high birth, they have no happiness, according to Aristotle. Let such people practice philosophy, as far as I am concerned! RIDICULE OF THE PHILOSOPHERS. I cannot approve of Heraclitus, who, being self-taught and arrogant, said, "I have explored myself." Nor can I praise him for hiding his poem in the temple of Artemis, so that it might later be published as a mystery; and those who take an interest in such things say that Euripides the tragic poet came there and read it, and, gradually learning it by heart, carefully passed Heraclitus' obscure teaching down to later generations. Death, however, demonstrated the stupidity of this man; for, suffering from dropsy, as he had studied the art of medicine as well as philosophy, he plastered himself with cow dung, which, as it hardened, caused his whole body to contract, and he died in convulsions. We cannot accept Zeno, who declares that at the conflagration the same man will rise again to perform the same actions as before; for instance, Anytus and Meletus to accuse, Busiris to murder his guests, and Hercules to repeat his labors; and in this doctrine of the world's destruction by fire, he introduces more wicked people than just ones: one Socrates and a Hercules, and a few more of the same class, but not many, for the bad will be found far more numerous than the good. And according to him the Deity will clearly be the author of evil, dwelling in sewers and worms, and in people who act irreverently. The eruptions of fire in Sicily, moreover, refute Empedocles' empty boasting: although he was no god, he almost passed himself off as one. I laugh, too, at Pherecydes' old wives' tales, and the doctrine inherited from him by Pythagoras, and that of Plato, an imitation of his, though some think otherwise. And who would approve of Crates' doglike marriage rather than reject the wild, inflated speech of people like him and investigate what truly deserves attention? Do not be misled by the grand gatherings of philosophers who are no philosophers. They assert contradictory doctrines, while each voices whatever crude notions occur to him. They also have many disputes among themselves; each one hates the other; they indulge in conflicting opinions, and their arrogance makes them eager for the highest places. They should stop visiting kings uninvited and flattering people in power, and wait for those powerful people to come to them. THE CHRISTIANS WORSHIP GOD ALONE. Why, men of Greece, do you want to bring the civil authorities into conflict with us, as in a boxing match? If I am unwilling to follow some people's customs, why should I be hated as a despicable criminal? Does the ruler order me to pay taxes? I am ready to pay them. Does my master command me to serve as a slave? I acknowledge that slavery. A human being should be honored as a fellow human; God alone should be feared. He is invisible to human eyes and beyond the reach of human art. Only when I am ordered to deny Him will I refuse to obey. I would rather die than prove false and ungrateful. Our God did not begin to be in time: He alone is without beginning, and He Himself is the beginning of all things. God is a Spirit, not pervading matter, but the Maker of material spirits, and of the forms that are in matter; He is invisible and cannot be touched, and He Himself is the Father of both perceptible and invisible things. We know Him through His creation and recognize His invisible power through His works. I refuse to worship the things He made for us. The sun and moon were made for us: how, then, can I worship my own servants? How can I speak of pieces of wood and stone as gods? For the Spirit that pervades matter is inferior to the more divine spirit; and this, even when joined to the soul, should not receive equal honor with the perfect God. We should not even present gifts to God, who is beyond description. He needs nothing, and we should not misrepresent Him as needy. I will explain our views more clearly. THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHRISTIANS AS TO THE CREATION OF THE WORLD. God was in the beginning; but the beginning, we have been taught, is the power of the Logos. For the Lord of the universe, Himself the necessary ground (hypostasis) of all being, was alone when no creature yet existed. Yet since all the power of visible and invisible things was with Him, He Himself gave existence to all that was with Him through Logos-power (dia logikes dynameos). And by His simple will the Logos comes forth; and the Logos, not coming forth without purpose, becomes the firstborn work of the Father. We know Him (the Logos) as the beginning of the world. But He came into being by sharing, not by being cut off; for what is cut off is separated from the original substance, but what is shared, being distributed for its function, does not diminish the one from whom it is taken. For just as from one torch many fires are lighted, but the light of the first torch is not lessened by the kindling of many torches, so the Logos, coming forth from the Logos-power of the Father, has not deprived the One who fathered Him of the Logos-power. I myself, for instance, talk, and you hear; yet sharing speech does not leave me without speech (logos). By speaking aloud, I try to put the disordered matter in your minds in order. And as the Logos, brought forth in the beginning, in turn brought forth our world, having first created for Himself the necessary matter, so also I, in imitation of the Logos, having been born again and having acquired the truth, am trying to put in order the confused matter that is akin to me. For matter is not, like God, without beginning, nor does it have power equal to God as though it had no beginning; it was brought forth, not produced by any other being, but brought into existence by the Maker of all things alone. CHRISTIANS' BELIEF IN THE RESURRECTION. For this reason we believe that there will be a resurrection of bodies after all things reach their end; not, as the Stoics claim, through recurring cycles in which the same things are produced and destroyed for no useful purpose, but a resurrection once for all, when our periods of existence are completed, and through the gathering of human beings alone for judgment. Minos or Rhadamanthus does not pass sentence on us. According to the myths, not a single soul was judged before they died. Instead, the Creator, God Himself, is the judge. And, although you regard us as people who talk nonsense, it does not trouble us, since we have faith in this doctrine. For just as, before I was born, I did not exist or know who I was, and existed only as a possibility (hypostasis) in bodily matter, but being born, after not existing, my birth gave me certainty that I exist; in the same way, having been born, and through death existing no longer, and seen no longer, I shall exist again, just as before I was not, but was afterwards born. Even if fire destroys all traces of my flesh, the world receives the vaporized matter; and although I am scattered through rivers and seas or torn apart by wild beasts, I am kept in the storehouses of a wealthy Lord. And, although the poor and the godless do not know what is stored, yet God the Sovereign, when He pleases, will restore the substance that is visible to Him alone to its original condition. CONCERNING THE FALL OF MAN. For the heavenly Logos, a spirit emanating from the Father and a Logos from the Logos-power, in imitation of the Father who brought Him forth, made humanity an image of immortality, so that, just as God is free from decay, human beings, sharing in a part of God, might also possess the principle of immortality. The Logos, too, before the creation of men, was the Maker of angels. And each of these two orders of creatures was made free to act as it pleased, not having the nature of good, which again is with God alone, but is brought to perfection in men through their freedom of choice, so that a wicked person may be justly punished for becoming corrupt through his own fault, while a just person deserves praise for his virtuous deeds, having freely chosen not to violate God's will. This is how things are ordered for angels and human beings. And the power of the Logos, with its ability to foresee future events as the choices of free agents rather than as fate, foretold future outcomes from time to time; it also forbade wickedness through prohibitions and praised those who remained good. And, when men attached themselves to one who was more subtle than the rest, considering his status as the firstborn, and declared him to be God, though he was resisting the law of God, then the power of the Logos excluded the one who began this folly and his followers from all fellowship with Himself. The one made in God's likeness becomes mortal when the more powerful spirit is separated from him; but that firstborn one through his transgression and ignorance becomes a demon; and those who imitated him and his delusions, have become a host of demons, and through their freedom of choice have been given up to their own delusion. THE DEMONS SIN AMONG MANKIND. Human beings provide the material (hypothesis) for their rebellion. Like dice players, they showed people a chart of the stars' positions and introduced Fate, a blatant injustice. For the judge and the judged are made so by Fate; the murderers and the murdered, the wealthy and the needy, are the offspring of the same Fate; and every birth is treated as theatrical entertainment by those beings about whom Homer says, "Among the gods Uncontrollable laughter arose." But must not those who are spectators of single combats and are supporters of one side or the other, and he who marries, has sex with boys, and commits adultery, who laughs and is angry, who flees and is wounded, be regarded as mortals? For, the actions through which they show people their characters encourage those who hear about them to imitate them. And are not the demons themselves, with Zeus at their head, subjected to Fate, being overpowered by the same passions as men? And, besides, how are those beings to be worshiped when their opinions differ so sharply? For Rhea, whom the inhabitants of the Phrygian mountains call Cybele, instituted castration because she was in love with Attis; but Aphrodite is delighted with marital embraces. Artemis is a poisoner; Apollo heals diseases. And after the Gorgon, Poseidon's beloved, was beheaded and the horse Pegasus and Chrysaor sprang from her, Athena and Asclepius divided between them the drops of blood; and, while he saved men's lives by means of them, she used the same blood to kill and stir up wars. Out of concern for her reputation, it seems to me, the Athenians attributed to the earth the son born of her connection with Hephaestus, so that Athena would not be thought to have lost her chastity to Hephaestus, as Atalanta did to Meleager. This limping manufacturer of buckles and earrings, probably deceived the motherless child and orphan with these girlish ornaments. Poseidon roams the seas; Ares delights in wars; Apollo is a player on the cithara; Dionysus is absolute ruler of the Thebans; Cronus kills a tyrant; Zeus has intercourse with his own daughter, who becomes pregnant by him. I can also mention Eleusis, the mystic Dragon, and Orpheus, who says, "Close the gates against the profane!" Aidoneus carries off Kore, and his deeds have been made into mysteries; Demeter mourns her daughter, and some people are deceived by the Athenians. In the precincts of the temple of the son of Leto is a spot called Omphalos; but Omphalos is the burial-place of Dionysus. Now I praise you, Daphne! By overcoming Apollo's lack of self-control, you disproved his power of prophecy; for, not foreseeing what would occur to you, he derived no advantage from his art. Let the far-shooting god tell me how Zephyrus killed Hyacinthus. Zephyrus conquered him; and in accordance with the saying of the tragic poet, "A breeze is the gods' most honored chariot." Conquered by a slight breeze, Apollo lost his beloved. THEY GIVE RISE TO SUPERSTITIONS. Such are the demons; they are the ones who established the doctrine of Fate. Their basic principle was to place animals in the heavens. For the creeping things on the earth, and those that swim in the waters, and the four-legged animals on the mountains, with which they lived when expelled from heaven: they honored these with a place in the heavens so that people would think the demons themselves still lived there. By placing the constellations there, they made the irrational course of earthly life appear rational. Thus the high-spirited and the person worn down by work, the self-controlled and the uncontrolled, the poor and the wealthy, are what they are simply because of those who control their birth. For the design of the zodiac is the work of gods. And, when the light of one of them predominates, as they express it, it deprives all the others of their honor; and the one now defeated gains dominance at another time. And the seven planets are well pleased with them, as if they were amusing themselves with dice. But we are superior to Fate, and instead of wandering (planeton) demons, we have learned to know one Lord who does not wander; and, as we do not follow the guidance of Fate, we reject its lawgivers. Tell me, I ask you: did Triptolemus sow wheat and prove a benefactor to the Athenians after their sorrow? Why did Demeter not benefit humanity before she lost her daughter? The Dog of Erigone is shown in the heavens, and the Scorpion the helper of Artemis, and Chiron the Centaur, and the divided Argo, and the Bear of Callisto. Yet how were the heavens unadorned before these performed those deeds? And to whom will it not appear ridiculous that the Triangle should be placed among the stars, according to some, because of Sicily, or, as others say, because of the first letter in the name of Zeus (Dios)? For why are not Sardinia and Cyprus honored in heaven? And why have not the letters of the names of the brothers of Zeus, who shared the kingdom with him, been fixed there too? And how is it that Cronus, who was put in chains and ejected from his kingdom, has been appointed a manager of Fate? How can someone who no longer reigns give kingdoms to others? Reject these absurdities, and do not do wrong by hating us unjustly. RIDICULE OF THE HEATHEN DIVINITIES. There are legends of human beings changing shape: among you, the gods change shape too. Rhea becomes a tree; Zeus a dragon, because of Persephone; the sisters of Phaethon are changed into poplars, and Leto into a bird of little value, which gave what is now Delos the name Ortygia. A god, supposedly, becomes a swan, or takes the form of an eagle, and, making Ganymede his cupbearer, takes pride in a vile passion. How can I revere gods who are eager for presents, and angry if they do not receive them? Let them have their Fate! I am unwilling to worship wandering stars. What is that hair of Berenice? Where were her stars before her death? And how was the dead Antinous fixed as a beautiful youth in the moon? Who carried him there? People paid to lie under oath are believed when they say, in mockery of the gods, that kings have ascended into heaven. Perhaps someone likewise placed this man among the gods and received honor and payment for it. Why have you robbed God? Why do you dishonor His creation? You sacrifice a sheep, and you worship the same animal. The Bull is in the heavens, and you slaughter its image. The Kneeler crushes a harmful animal; and the eagle that devours the man-maker Prometheus is honored. The swan is supposedly noble because it committed adultery; and the Dioscuri, living on alternate days, the abductors of the daughters of Leucippus, are also noble! Better still is Helen, who abandoned blond Menelaus, and followed the turbaned and gold-adorned Paris. The man who carried this adulteress to the Elysian Fields is just and self-controlled too! But even the daughter of Tyndarus is not endowed with immortality, and Euripides has wisely depicted this woman being put to death by Orestes. THE SIN OF MEN DUE NOT TO FATE, BUT TO FREE WILL. How, then, can I accept that birth is governed by Fate when I see such managers of Fate? I do not wish to be a king; I am not eager to be rich; I decline military command; I detest sexual immorality; an insatiable desire for profit does not drive me to sea; I do not compete for victory wreaths; I am free from a mad thirst for fame; I despise death; I am superior to every kind of disease; grief does not consume my soul. If I am a slave, I endure slavery. If I am free, I do not boast about my birth. I see that the same sun is for all, and one death for all, whether they live in pleasure or destitution. The rich man sows, and the poor man shares in the same crop. The wealthiest die, and beggars have the same limits to their life. The rich lack many things, and enjoy glory only through the esteem others give them; but the poor man and the person with very moderate desires, seeking only what suits his circumstances, more easily achieves his aim. How is it that you are fated to be sleepless through greed? Why are you fated to grasp at things often, and often to die? Die to the world, rejecting its madness. Live to God, and by understanding Him put aside your old nature. We were not created to die, but we die by our own fault. Our free-will has destroyed us; we who were free have become slaves; we have been sold through sin. Nothing evil has been created by God; we ourselves have brought wickedness to light; but we who brought it to light can also reject it. THE TWO KINDS OF SPIRITS. We recognize two kinds of spirit, one of which is called the soul (psyche), but the other is greater than the soul, an image and likeness of God: both existed in the first men, so that in one sense they might be material (hylikoi), and in another superior to matter. The situation is this: we can see that the whole structure of the world, and the whole creation, has been produced from matter, and the matter itself brought into existence by God; so that on the one hand it may be regarded as raw and unformed before it was separated into parts, and on the other as arranged in beauty and order after the separation was made. Therefore in that separation the heavens were made of matter, and the stars that are in them; and the earth and everything on it is formed in a similar way: so that there is a common origin of all things. Yet there are differences among the things made of matter, so that one is more beautiful, and another is beautiful but surpassed by something better. The body is governed as a single whole and performs the function for which it was made. Yet its parts differ in importance: and the eye is one thing, and another the ear, and another the arrangement of the hair and the distribution of the intestines, and the joining of marrow, bones, and tendons; and though one part differs from another, their arrangement has the full harmony of a musical concert. In the same way, the world, which through its Maker's power includes some things of greater splendor and others unlike them, received a material spirit by the Creator's will. Each of these things can be understood by anyone who does not arrogantly reject those supremely divine explanations that have been written down over time and make those who study them deeply loved by God. Therefore the demons, as you call them, having received their structure from matter and obtained the spirit inherent in it, became uncontrolled and greedy; some few, indeed, turning to what was purer, but others choosing what was inferior in matter, and adapting their way of life to it. These beings, produced from matter, but very remote from right conduct, you Greeks worship. For, turning to empty self-glorification through their own folly, and shaking off the reins [of authority], they have eagerly stolen the place of God; and the Lord of all has allowed them to amuse themselves until the world reaches its end and dissolves, and the Judge appears, and all those men who, while attacked by demons, strive after the knowledge of the perfect God receive through their struggles a more complete testimony in the day of judgment. There is, then, a spirit in the stars, a spirit in angels, a spirit in plants and the waters, a spirit in men, a spirit in animals; but, though one and the same, it has differences in itself. And while we say these things not from mere hearsay, nor from probable conjectures and sophistical reasoning, but using words of a certain diviner speech, those of you who are willing should hurry to learn. And you who do not reject with contempt the Scythian Anacharsis, do not scorn being taught by those who follow a non-Greek code of laws. Give at least as favorable a reception to our doctrines as you would to the predictions of the Babylonians. Listen to us when we speak, if only as you would to an oracular oak. And yet the things just referred to are the tricks of frenzied demons, while the doctrines we teach are far beyond the world's understanding. THEORY OF THE SOUL'S IMMORTALITY. Greeks, the soul is not immortal in itself, but mortal. Yet it is possible for it not to die. If, indeed, it does not know the truth, it dies, and is dissolved with the body, but rises again at last at the end of the world with the body, receiving death through punishment that lasts forever. But, again, if it acquires the knowledge of God, it does not die, although it is dissolved for a time. In itself it is darkness, and there is no light in it. And this is the meaning of the saying, "The darkness does not comprehend the light." For the soul does not preserve the spirit, but is preserved by it, and the light comprehends the darkness. The Logos, in truth, is the light of God, but the ignorant soul is darkness. For this reason, if it remains alone, it moves downward toward matter, and dies with the flesh; but, if it unites with the Divine Spirit, it is no longer helpless, but ascends to the regions where the Spirit guides it: for the dwelling place of the spirit is above, but the origin of the soul is from beneath. Now, in the beginning the spirit was a constant companion of the soul, but the spirit abandoned it because it was not willing to follow. Yet, retaining what was like a spark of its power, but unable to discern what is perfect because of the separation, the soul wandered in search of God and made many gods for itself, following the demons' deceptive arguments. But the Spirit of God is not with all, but, living with those who live justly, and closely joining with the soul, by prophecies it announced hidden things to other souls. And the souls that are obedient to wisdom have attracted to themselves the spirit akin to them; but the disobedient, rejecting the minister of the suffering God, have shown themselves to be fighters against God, rather than His worshipers. THE DEMONS SHALL BE PUNISHED MORE SEVERELY THAN MEN. You Greeks are like this too: fluent in speech, but with strangely distorted minds; and you acknowledge the dominion of many rather than the rule of one, accustoming yourselves to follow demons as if they were mighty. For, as a brutal robber overpowers others like himself through daring; so the demons, going to extremes of wickedness, have utterly deceived the souls among you which are left to themselves by ignorance and false appearances. These beings do not die easily, since they have no share in flesh; but while alive they practice the ways of death, and die themselves as often as they teach their followers to sin. Therefore, what now chiefly distinguishes them, that they do not die like men, they will retain when about to suffer punishment: they will not share in everlasting life or receive it instead of death in a blessed immortality. And just as we, who now easily die, later receive either immortality with joy or suffering with immortality, so the demons, who misuse the present life for wrongdoing, dying continually even while they live, will later have the same immortality, like that which they had during the time they lived, but in its nature like that of men, who willingly did what the demons commanded them during their lifetime. And do not fewer kinds of sin break out among men because their lives are short, while these demons commit more wrongdoing because their existence has no limit? NECESSITY OF A UNION WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT. We must now seek what we once had but lost, unite the soul with the Holy Spirit, and seek union with God. The human soul consists of many parts, and is not simple; it is composite, so that it can appear through the body; for it could never appear by itself without the body, nor does the flesh rise again without the soul. Man is not, as the croaking philosophers say, merely a rational animal, capable of understanding and knowledge; for, according to them, even irrational creatures appear to possess understanding and knowledge. But man alone is the image and likeness of God; and I mean by man, not one who performs actions similar to those of animals, but one who has advanced far beyond mere humanity toward God Himself. We have discussed this question in greater detail in the treatise on animals. The main point to discuss now is what the image and likeness of God means. What cannot be compared is abstract being itself; what can be compared is what resembles something else. The perfect God is without flesh; but man is flesh. The bond of the flesh is the soul; that which encloses the soul is the flesh. This is how a human being is formed. If this structure is like a temple, God is pleased to live in it through the spirit, His representative. If it is not such a dwelling, a human being surpasses wild animals only in articulate speech; in other respects his way of life is like theirs, since he is not a likeness of God. But none of the demons possess flesh; their structure is spiritual, like that of fire or air. Only those in whom the Spirit of God lives and whom He strengthens can easily see the demons' bodies. Others, by which I mean those who possess only a soul, cannot see them at all; what is inferior cannot perceive what is superior. For this reason the nature of the demons has no place for repentance; for they are the reflection of matter and of wickedness. But matter wanted to rule the soul; and according to their free-will these beings gave human beings laws of death; but men, after the loss of immortality, have conquered death by submitting to death in faith; and by repentance a call has been given to them, according to the word which says, "Since they were made a little lower than the angels." And, anyone who has been defeated can conquer again by rejecting the condition that brings death. People who long for immortality can easily see what that condition is. VAIN DISPLAY OF POWER BY THE DEMONS. But the demons who rule over men are not the souls of men; How could human souls act after death, unless we believed that a human being who lacked understanding and power while alive gained greater ability to act when dead? This cannot be the case, as we have shown elsewhere. And it is difficult to conceive that the immortal soul, which is hindered by the body's limbs, should become more intelligent when it has left the body. For the demons, raging against humanity because of their own wickedness, mislead people's already downward-inclined minds with various deceptive spectacles, preventing them from rising to the path that leads to heaven. The things in the world are not hidden from us, and we can easily understand the divine if the power that makes souls immortal visits us. The demons are seen also by people who possess only a soul when the demons sometimes show themselves to them. They do this to seem important, to harm people as enemies while posing as friends, or to give those who resemble them reasons to honor them. For, if it were possible, they would without doubt pull down heaven itself with the rest of creation. But now they cannot possibly do this, for they have not the power; but they make war by means of the lower matter against the matter that is like themselves. Anyone who wants to conquer them should reject matter. Being armed with the breastplate of the heavenly Spirit, he will be able to preserve everything it covers. There are, indeed, diseases and disturbances of the matter that is in us; but, when such things happen, the demons attribute their causes to themselves, and approach a man whenever disease seizes him. Sometimes they themselves disrupt the body's condition with a storm of madness; but, struck by the word of God, they depart in terror, and the sick man is healed. THEY FALSELY PROMISE HEALTH TO THEIR FOLLOWERS. What can we say about Democritus' sympathies and antipathies except that, as the common saying goes, the man from Abdera talks like a fool from Abdera? But, as the man who gave the city its name, a friend of Hercules as it is said, was devoured by the horses of Diomedes, so the man who boasted of Ostanes the Magus will be delivered up on the day of completion as fuel for the eternal fire. And you, if you do not cease from your laughter, will gain the same punishment as the tricksters. So listen to me, Greeks, as I address you as though from high ground. Do not mock the herald of truth by attributing your own lack of reason to him. An illness (pathos) is not destroyed by a counteracting influence (antipatheia), nor is an insane person cured by hanging little leather amulets on him. Demons visit people, and those who are sick, claim to be in love, hate others, or want revenge accept them as helpers. And this is the method of their operation: just as the forms of alphabetic letters and the lines formed from them cannot convey meaning by themselves, but people have invented signs for their thoughts, understanding from their particular combination what the arrangement of letters was intended to express; in the same way, the various kinds of roots and the mutual relation of the sinews and bones can do nothing by themselves, but are the basic matter through which the demons act wickedly, having decided the purpose for which each can be used. And, when they see people agreeing to receive help through such things, they take them and make them their slaves. But how can it be honorable to assist adultery? How can it be noble to encourage people to hate one another? Or how is it fitting to credit matter with relieving insanity, and not to God? For by their art they turn people away from reverently acknowledging God, leading them to place confidence in herbs and roots. But God, if He had prepared these things to achieve exactly what people want, would be a Producer of evil things; whereas He Himself produced everything which has good qualities, but the demons have recklessly used nature's products for evil purposes, and the evil appearance these things have comes from the demons, and not from the perfect God. How is it that I was in no way evil while alive, but now that I am dead and can do nothing, my remains, which cannot move or even perceive, should produce some perceptible effect? How can someone who died a most miserable death help avenge anyone? If this were possible, he could all the more defend himself against his own enemy; if he could help others, he could all the more avenge himself. THEY DECEIVE, INSTEAD OF HEALING. But medicine and everything included in it is an invention of the same kind. If anyone is healed through trusting matter, how much more will he be healed by turning to God's power. Harmful preparations are material compounds, and remedies are of the same nature. Yet even if we reject inferior matter, some people often try to heal by combining one of these bad things with another, using the bad to achieve the good. But, just as someone who dines with a robber, though not a robber himself, shares the punishment because of his close association with him, in the same way, someone who is not bad but associates with the bad, having dealings with them for some supposed good, will be punished by God the Judge for sharing in the same undertaking. Why is someone who trusts in the system of matter unwilling to trust in God? Why do you not approach the more powerful Lord, but rather seek to cure yourself, like the dog with grass, or the stag with a viper, or the hog with river crabs, or the lion with apes? Why do you deify the objects of nature? And why, when you cure your neighbor, are you called a benefactor? Yield to the power of the Logos! The demons do not cure, but by their art make men their captives. And the most admirable Justin has rightly condemned them as robbers. For, just as some people capture others and then return them to their friends for a ransom, so those regarded as gods invade people's bodies, make their presence felt through dreams, and command them to appear in public. Then, in everyone's sight, after taking their fill of worldly things, they leave the sick, remove the disease they themselves caused, and restore people to their former condition. DEPRAVITY LIES AT THE BOTTOM OF DEMON-WORSHIP. Those of you who do not understand these things should learn from us who know them, although you profess to despise death and to be self-sufficient in everything. But your philosophers are so deficient in this discipline, that some of them receive from the king of the Romans 600 aurei yearly, without performing any useful service, so that they do not even wear a long beard without being paid for it! Crescens, who made his nest in the great city, surpassed everyone in sexual desire for boys (paiderastia) and was deeply addicted to money. Yet this man, who professed to despise death, was so afraid of death, that he tried to have Justin, and indeed me, sentenced to death, treating it as an evil, because by proclaiming the truth he exposed the philosophers as gluttons and cheats. Which philosophers did he usually attack, except you alone? If you say, in agreement with our doctrines, that death should not be feared, do not court death from an insane love of fame among men, like Anaxarchus, but become despisers of death through knowing God. The construction of the world is excellent, but the life men live in it is bad; and we can see people who do not know God greeted with applause as though at a grand gathering. For what is divination? and why are you deceived by it? It serves your worldly desires. You want to make war, and you take Apollo as an adviser in slaughter. You want to abduct a young woman, and you select a divinity to be your accomplice. You are ill by your own fault; and, as Agamemnon wished for ten advisers, so you wish to have gods with you. Some woman by drinking water gets into a frenzy, and loses her senses by the fumes of frankincense, and you say that she has the gift of prophecy. Apollo was a predictor and a teacher of diviners: in the matter of Daphne he deceived himself. An oak supposedly delivers oracles, and birds announce omens! And so you are inferior to animals and plants! It would surely be fine for you to become a divining rod or take on a bird's wings! The one who makes you love money also predicts that you will become rich; the one who stirs up rebellions and wars also predicts victory in war. If you are superior to the passions, you will despise all worldly things. Do not hate us who have reached this state; reject the demons and follow the one God. "All things were made by Him, and without Him not one thing was made." If there is poison in natural productions, this has come about through our sinfulness. I am able to show the perfect truth of these things; just listen, and anyone who believes will understand. THANKS ARE EVER DUE TO GOD. Even if drugs heal you (I grant you that point as a courtesy), you should still credit God with the cure. For the world still draws us down, and through weakness I lean toward matter. For the wings of the soul were the perfect spirit, but, having cast this off through sin, it flutters like a nestling and falls to the ground. Having left its heavenly companionship, it longs for fellowship with inferior things. The demons were driven out to another dwelling; the first created human beings were expelled from their place: the former were cast down from heaven;⁠a the latter were driven from earth, yet not out of this earth, but from a more excellent order of things than exists here now. Now, longing for that original state, we should put aside everything that hinders us. Human being, the heavens are not infinite, but finite and bounded; and beyond them are the superior worlds which have no changing seasons to cause various diseases. Instead, they enjoy a perfectly pleasant climate, perpetual day, and light inaccessible to people below. Those who have written detailed descriptions of the earth have described its various regions as far as human beings could; but, unable to speak about what lies beyond because they could not observe it personally, they have assigned as the cause the existence of tides; and that one sea is filled with weed, and another with mud; and that some places are burned by heat and others cold and frozen. We, however, have learned things which were unknown to us, through the teaching of the prophets, who, fully convinced that the soul will receive the heavenly spirit as a covering for its mortality, foretold things unknown to other minds. But anyone who is naked can obtain this clothing and return to the soul's original kinship. COMPARING CHRISTIAN AND GREEK TEACHINGS ABOUT GOD. We are not acting foolishly, Greeks, or telling idle tales, when we announce that God was born in the form of a man. I call on you who criticize us to compare your myths with our accounts. Athena, as they say, took the form of Deiphobus for Hector's sake, and long-haired Phoebus tended the slow-footed oxen for Admetus, and Zeus' wife came to Semele as an old woman. But, while you take such things seriously, how can you ridicule us? Your Asclepius died, and the man who violated fifty virgins in one night at Thespiae lost his life by giving himself to a consuming fire. Prometheus, fastened to Caucasus, suffered punishment for his good deeds to men. According to you, Zeus is envious, and hides the dream from men, wishing their destruction. Look at your own traditions and grant us your approval, even if only because we deal in legends like yours. We, however, do not deal in folly, but your legends are only idle tales. If you speak of the origin of the gods, you also declare them to be mortal. Why is Hera never pregnant now? Has she grown old? or is there no one to give you information? Believe me, Greeks, and do not turn your myths and gods into allegory. If you attempt to do this, you overturn your own understanding of the divine nature; for, if your demons are as they are said to be, their characters are worthless; or, if regarded as symbols of the powers of nature, they are not what they are called. But I cannot be persuaded to worship the natural elements, nor can I try to persuade my neighbor. And Metrodorus of Lampsacus, in his treatise about Homer, has argued very foolishly, turning everything into allegory. For he says that neither Hera, nor Athena, nor Zeus are what the people who dedicate sacred enclosures and groves to them suppose, but parts of nature and certain arrangements of the elements. Hector also, and Achilles, and Agamemnon, and all the Greeks in general, and the non-Greeks with Helen and Paris, being of the same nature, you will of course say are introduced merely to make the poem work, none of these figures having actually existed. But we have presented these things only for the sake of argument; we cannot even compare our understanding of God with beings wallowing in matter and mud. RIDICULE OF GREEK FESTIVALS. What kind of teachings do you offer? Who must not treat with contempt your grand festivals, which dishonor people by celebrating wicked demons? I have often watched a man affect extreme delicacy and all kinds of feminine behavior. I have been astonished, and that astonishment has turned to contempt at how he is one thing inside but outwardly pretends to be something else; sometimes darting his eyes about; sometimes throwing his hands back and forth, and raving through a clay mask; sometimes impersonating Aphrodite, sometimes Apollo; a solitary accuser of all the gods, an epitome of superstition, an abuser of heroic deeds, an actor of murders, a chronicler of adultery, a storehouse of madness, a teacher of cynaedi, male prostitutes, an instigator of death sentences; yet such a man is praised by all. I have rejected his falsehoods, his irreverence, his practices, and the man himself altogether. But you are led captive by such men, while you insult those who do not join your pursuits. I do not want to stand open-mouthed before a group of singers or share the feelings of a man who winks and gestures unnaturally. What wonderful or extraordinary thing is performed among you? They speak obscenities in affected voices, and go through indecent movements; your daughters and sons watch them giving lessons in adultery on the stage. What supposedly admirable lecture rooms you have, where every vile act committed at night is announced aloud and those listening are entertained with disgraceful speeches! Admirable too are your lying poets, whose fictions lure those listening away from the truth! BOXERS AND GLADIATORS. I have seen men weighed down by bodily exercise, and carrying around the burden of their flesh, before whom rewards and victory wreaths are set, while the judges cheer them on, not to deeds of virtue, but to rivalry in violence and discord; and the one who strikes best is crowned. These are the lesser evils; as for the greater, who would not shrink from telling them? Some, giving themselves over to idleness for the sake of reckless living, sell themselves to be killed; and the poor man sells himself, while the rich man buys men to do the killing. And for these the witnesses take their seats, and the boxers meet in single combat, for no reason whatever, and no one enters the arena to help. Do displays like these bring you credit? Your leading man gathers a legion of bloodstained murderers and undertakes to support them; he sends these thugs out, and you assemble at the spectacle to be judges, partly of the judge's wickedness, and partly of that of the men who engage in the combat. And anyone who misses the murderous display is upset because he was not fated to witness wicked, irreverent, and abominable deeds. You slaughter animals to eat their flesh, and you purchase men to supply a cannibal banquet for the soul, nourishing it by the most impious bloodshedding. The robber commits murder to steal, but the rich man purchases gladiators so that they will be killed. OF THE OTHER PUBLIC AMUSEMENTS. What advantage should I gain from the man Euripides brings onto the stage in a frenzy to act out Alcmaeon's murder of his mother; who does not even retain his natural behavior, but with his mouth wide open goes about sword in hand, and, screaming aloud, is burned to death, dressed in a robe unfit for a man? Away, too, with the mythical tales of Hegesias, and Menander, a poet of the same kind! And why should I admire the flute player of myth? Why should I concern myself with the Theban Antigenides, like Aristoxenus? We leave you to these worthless things; and you should either believe your own doctrines, or, like us, give up yours. BOASTINGS AND QUARRELS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS. What great and wonderful things have your philosophers accomplished? They leave uncovered one of their shoulders; they let their hair grow long; they cultivate their beards; their nails are like the claws of wild beasts. Though they say that they need nothing, yet, like Proteus, they need a leatherworker for their bag, a weaver for their cloak, and a woodcutter for their staff, and the rich, and a cook also for their gluttony. You who compete with a dog do not know God and have turned to imitating an irrational animal. You cry out in public assuming authority and taking it on yourself to exact revenge; and if you receive nothing, you turn to insults, and philosophy becomes your art of making money. You follow the doctrines of Plato, and a disciple of Epicurus speaks up against you. Again, you wish to be a disciple of Aristotle, and a follower of Democritus abuses you. Pythagoras says that he was Euphorbus, and he is the heir of the doctrine of Pherecydes; but Aristotle challenges the immortality of the soul. You who receive from your predecessors doctrines which clash with one another, you who are out of harmony fight against those in harmony. One of you asserts that God is body, but I assert that He is without body; that the world is indestructible, but I say that it is to be destroyed; that the world will be destroyed by fire repeatedly, but I say that this will happen once for all; that Minos and Rhadamanthus are judges, but I say that God Himself is Judge; that the soul alone is endowed with immortality, but I say that the flesh also is endowed with it. What harm do we do you, Greeks? Why do you hate those who follow the word of God, as though they were the vilest people? It is not we who eat human flesh --they among you who assert such a thing have been bribed to give false testimony; it is among you that Pelops is made a supper for the gods, although beloved by Poseidon, and Cronus devours his children, and Zeus swallows Metis. RIDICULE OF THE STUDIES OF THE GREEKS. Stop showing off sayings taken from others and adorning yourselves like a jackdaw in borrowed feathers. If each state were to take away its contribution to your speech, your fallacies would lose their power. While inquiring what God is, you are ignorant of what is in yourselves; and, while staring open-mouthed at the sky, you stumble into pitfalls. The reading of your books is like walking through a labyrinth, and their readers resemble the cask of the Danaids. Why do you divide time, saying that one part is past, and another present, and another future? For how can the future be passing when the present exists? As those who are sailing imagine in their ignorance, as the ship moves along, that the hills are in motion, so you do not know that it is you who are passing along, but that time (ho aion) remains present as long as the Creator wills it to exist. Why am I called to account for uttering my opinions, and why are you so eager to suppress them all? Were you not born in the same way as us, and placed under the same government of the world? Why claim that you alone possess wisdom, when you have no different sun or rising stars, no more distinguished origin, and no better death than other people? The grammarians have been the beginning of this idle talk; and you who divide wisdom into portions are cut off from the wisdom that is according to truth, and assign the names of the different parts to particular men; and you do not know God, but destroy one another in fierce disputes. For this reason you are all worthless. You claim the sole right to debate, yet speak like a blind man talking to a deaf man. Why do you handle the builder's tools without knowing how to build? Why do you occupy yourselves with words while avoiding action, inflated by praise but crushed by misfortune? Your behavior contradicts reason: you appear pompous in public, but hide your teaching in corners. Finding you to be such men as these, we have abandoned you, and no longer concern ourselves with your doctrines, but follow the word of God. Why, human being, do you set the letters of the alphabet at war with one another? Why do you, as in a boxing match, make their sounds clash with your affected Attic speech when you should speak more naturally? For if you adopt the Attic dialect though not an Athenian, why do you not speak like the Dorians? How is it that one appears to you more rugged, the other more pleasant for conversation? THE CHRISTIANS ARE HATED UNJUSTLY. And if you adhere to their teaching, why do you fight against me for choosing the doctrines I approve? Is it not unreasonable that, while the robber is not to be punished for the name he bears, but only when the truth about him has been clearly established, yet we are subjected to abuse on the basis of a judgment reached without investigation? Diagoras was an atheist, yet you honor him although he openly revealed the Athenian mysteries; yet you who read his Phrygian discourses hate us. You possess the commentaries of Leo, and are displeased with our refutations of them; and having in your hands Apion's opinions about the Egyptian gods, you denounce us as most impious. The tomb of Olympian Zeus is shown among you, though someone says that the Cretans are liars. Your assembly of many gods is nothing. Even if Epicurus, who despises them, carries the mysteries' torch, I do not honor the rulers more than God. I do not hide my view of the universe. Why do you advise me to be false to my principles? Why do you who say that you despise death urge us to use deception to escape it? I have not the heart of a deer; but your enthusiasm for debate resembles Thersites' endless chatter. How can I believe one who tells me that the sun is a red-hot mass and the moon an earth? Such assertions are mere arguments about words, not a clear explanation of the truth. How can it be otherwise than foolish to believe the books of Herodorus relating to the history of Hercules, which tell of an upper earth from which the lion came down that was killed by Hercules? And what use are Attic style, philosophers' chains of arguments, and plausible logical deductions, the measurements of the earth, the positions of the stars, and the course of the sun? Being occupied with such inquiries is what someone does when he imposes opinions on himself as though they were laws. CONDEMNATION OF THE GREEK LEGISLATION. For this reason I also reject your legislation: there should be one common system of government for everyone; but now there are as many different codes as there are states, so that things held disgraceful in some are honorable in others. The Greeks consider sex with one's mother unlawful, but this practice is considered highly fitting by the Persian Magi; sex between men and boys is condemned by non-Greek peoples, but by the Romans, who try to collect herds of boys like grazing horses, it is honored with certain privileges. ACCOUNT OF TATIAN'S CONVERSION. After seeing these things, being initiated into the mysteries, and examining everywhere the religious rites performed by effeminate men and men who take the passive sexual role, and having found among the Romans their Latiarian Jupiter delighting in human gore and the blood of slaughtered people, and Artemis not far from the great city approving similar acts, and one demon here and another there urging people to commit evil, I withdrew by myself and sought a way to discover the truth. And, while I was giving the matter my closest attention, I happened to encounter certain non-Greek writings, too old to be compared with the opinions of the Greeks, and too divine to be compared with their errors; and I came to trust these writings because of their unpretentious language, the writers' lack of affectation, their clear account of the creation of everything, their foreknowledge of future events, the excellence of their instructions, and their declaration that one Being governs the universe. And, my soul taught by God, I discern that the former writings lead to condemnation, but that these put an end to the slavery that is in the world, and rescue us from a multitude of rulers and ten thousand tyrants, while they give us, not something we had never received, but what we had received and then lost through error. HOW HE RESOLVED TO RESIST THE DEVIL. Therefore, being initiated and instructed in these things, I wish to put away my former errors as the follies of childhood. For we know that the nature of wickedness is like that of the smallest seeds; since it has grown strong from a small beginning, but will again be destroyed if we obey the words of God and do not scatter ourselves. For He has become master of all we have by means of a certain "hidden treasure," which covers us with dust as we dig for it, but which we secure as our lasting possession. Anyone who receives the whole of this treasure has obtained command of the most precious wealth. Let these things be said to our friends. But to you Greeks what can I say, except to request you not to insult those better than yourselves or use the fact that they are called non-Greeks as a reason to mock them? For, if you are willing, you will be able to find out why people cannot understand one another's languages; for to those who wish to examine our principles I will give a simple and detailed account of them. THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CHRISTIANS MORE ANCIENT THAN THAT OF THE GREEKS. It now seems appropriate to demonstrate that our philosophy is older than the systems of the Greeks. Moses and Homer will be our reference points, each of them being of great antiquity; the one being the oldest of poets and historians, and the other the founder of all non-Greek wisdom. Let us compare them; and we shall find that our doctrines are older, not only than those of the Greeks, but than the invention of letters. And I will not call witnesses from among ourselves, but will turn to Greeks. The first approach would be foolish, since you would not accept it. The second will surprise you when I fight you with your own weapons and present arguments you did not anticipate. Now the poetry of Homer, his parentage, and the time in which he flourished have been investigated by the most ancient writers: by Theagenes of Rhegium, who lived in the time of Cambyses, Stesimbrotus of Thasos and Antimachus of Colophon, Herodotus of Halicarnassus, and Dionysius the Olynthian; after them, by Ephorus of Cumae, and Philochorus the Athenian, Megaclides and Chamaeleon the Peripatetics; afterwards by the grammarians, Zenodotus, Aristophanes, Callimachus, Crates, Eratosthenes, Aristarchus, and Apollodorus. Of these, Crates says that he lived before the return of the Heraclidae, and within 80 years after the Trojan war; Eratosthenes says that it was after the 100th year from the capture of Ilium; Aristarchus, that it was about the time of the Ionian migration, which was 140 years after that event; but, according to Philochorus, after the Ionian migration, in the archonship of Archippus at Athens, 180 years after the Trojan war; Apollodorus says it was 100 years after the Ionian migration, which would be 240 years after the Trojan war. Some say that he lived 90 years before the Olympiads, which would be 317 years after the capture of Troy. Others place it later, and say that Homer was a contemporary of Archilochus; but Archilochus lived around the twenty-third Olympiad, in the time of Gyges the Lydian, 500 years after Troy. We have now said enough in summary about the date of that poet, Homer, and the disagreements among those who discuss him, for anyone able to investigate accurately. For it is possible to show that the opinions held about the facts themselves also are false. For, when the proposed dates do not agree, it is impossible that the history should be true. For what causes error in writing except describing things that are untrue? CHRISTIAN TEACHING REJECTS DIVISION AND IS SUITED TO EVERYONE. But with us there is no desire for empty glory, nor do we embrace conflicting opinions. For having rejected what is popular and earthly, and obeying the commands of God, and following the law of the Father of immortality, we reject everything which rests upon human opinion. Not only do the rich among us pursue our philosophy, but the poor receive instruction free of charge; for the things which come from God are worth more than payment in worldly gifts. Thus we admit all who desire to hear, even old women and young people; and, in short, people of every age are treated by us with respect, but every kind of sexual immorality is kept away. And in speaking we do not utter falsehood. It would be excellent if you stopped persisting in unbelief; whatever happens, let our cause stand confirmed by God's judgment. Laugh if you like, but you will have to weep later. Is it not absurd that Nestor, who was slow at cutting his horses' reins because age had made him weak and slow, is, according to you, to be admired for attempting to rival the young men in fighting, while you ridicule those among us who struggle against old age and occupy themselves with matters concerning God? Who would not laugh when you tell us that the Amazons, and Semiramis, and certain other warlike women existed, while you insult our young women? Achilles was a youth, yet is believed to have been very great-hearted; and Neoptolemus was younger, but strong; Philoctetes was weak, but the divinity had need of him against Troy. What sort of man was Thersites? yet he held a command in the army, and, if he had not spoken so foolishly and without restraint, he would not have been mocked for being pointy-headed and bald. As for those who wish to learn our philosophy, we do not test them by their looks, nor do we judge those who come to us by their outward appearance; for we argue that there may be strength of mind in all, though they may be weak in body. But your behavior are full of envy and abundant stupidity. DEFENSE OF CHRISTIAN WOMEN. Therefore I have wanted to show from the things you consider honorable that our practices display sound judgment, while yours closely resemble madness. You who say that we talk nonsense among women and boys, among young women and old women, and scoff at us for not being with you, listen to the foolishness that prevails among the Greeks. For their works of art are devoted to worthless objects, while you value them more highly than even your gods; and you behave improperly in matters involving women. For Lysippus cast a statue of Praxilla, whose poems contain nothing useful, and Menestratus one of Learchis, and Silanion one of Sappho the courtesan, and Naucydes one of Erinna the Lesbian, and Boiscus one of Myrtis, and Cephisodotus one of Myro of Byzantium, and Gomphus one of Praxagoris, and Amphistratus one of Clito. And what shall I say about Anyte, Telesilla, and Mystis? Of the first Euthycrates and Cephisodotus made a statue, and of the second Niceratus, and of the third Aristodotus; Euthycrates made one of Mnesiarchis the Ephesian, Silanion one of Corinna, and Euthycrates one of Thaliarchis the Argive. I mention these women so that you will not regard what you find among us as strange. Compare the statues in front of you, and do not scorn the women among us who pursue philosophy. This Sappho is a lustful, lovesick woman who sings of her own sexual indulgence; but all our women are chaste, and the young women spinning thread sing of divine things more nobly than that young woman of yours. Be ashamed, you who profess to be women's disciples yet mock the women who follow our teaching and the religious gatherings they attend. What a noble infant did Glaucippe present to you, who gave birth to a marvel, as is shown by her statue cast by Niceratus, the son of Euctemon the Athenian! But, if Glaucippe gave birth to an elephant, was that a reason why she should enjoy public honors? Praxiteles and Herodotus made for you Phryne the courtesan, and Euthycrates cast a bronze statue of Panteuchis, who was pregnant by a man who frequented prostitutes; and Dinomenes, because Besantis queen of the Paeonians gave birth to a black infant, took pains to preserve her memory by his art. I condemn Pythagoras too, who made a figure of Europa on the bull; and you also, who honor Zeus' accuser because of his artistic skill. And I ridicule the skill of Micon, who made a heifer and upon it a Victory because by carrying off the daughter of Agenor it had carried off the prize for adultery and lewdness. The Olynthian Herodotus made statues of Glycera the courtesan and Argeia the harpist. Bryaxis made a statue of Pasiphae; and, by preserving a memorial of her lust, you almost seem to have wanted the women of your own time to resemble her. A certain Melanippe was a wise woman, and for that reason Lysistratus made her statue. Yet supposedly you cannot believe that among us there are wise women! RIDICULE OF THE STATUES ERECTED BY THE GREEKS. The tyrant Phalaris, who devoured nursing infants, was certainly worthy of great honor! Even today, Polystratus of Ambracia's art presents him as a remarkable man! The Agrigentines dreaded to look at his face, because of his cannibalism; but people of culture now boast about seeing his statue! Is it not shameful that the murder of a brother is honored by you who look on the statues of Polynices and Eteocles, and that you have not rather buried them with their maker Pythagoras? Destroy these memorials of wickedness! Why should I admire the figure of the woman who bore thirty children, merely because of the artist Periclymenus? One should turn away in disgust from a woman who carried off the fruits of extreme sexual indulgence. The Romans compared her to a sow, which they say was likewise considered worthy of mystical worship for a similar reason. Ares committed adultery with Aphrodite, and Andron made an image of their offspring Harmonia. Sophron, who wrote down trivialities and absurdities, became better known through a bronze sculpture by [the sculptor's name is missing], which still exists. And not only have his tales kept Aesop the fable writer in lasting memory, but Aristodemus' sculpture has also increased his fame. How is it then that you, who have so many women poets whose writings are mere trash, and countless courtesans, and worthless men, are not ashamed to slander the reputation of our women? Why should I care to know that Euanthe gave birth to an infant in the Peripatus, or to stare in wonder at the art of Callistratus, or to fix my gaze on the Neaera of Calliades? For she was a courtesan. Lais was a prostitute, and Turnus made her a monument of prostitution. Why are you not ashamed of Hephaestion's sexual immorality, even though Philo has represented him very artistically? And why do you honor the hermaphrodite Ganymede by Leochares, as if you possessed something admirable? Praxiteles even made a statue of a woman wearing a bracelet. You should have rejected all such things and sought what truly deserves attention, rather than turning in disgust from our way of life while approving the shameful writings of Philaenis and Elephantis. TATIAN SPEAKS AS AN EYE-WITNESS. I have not learned these things I have presented to you secondhand. I have visited many lands; I have followed rhetoric, like yourselves; I have encountered many arts and inventions; and finally, while staying in the city of the Romans, I inspected the many statues you brought there: for I do not attempt, as is the custom with many, to strengthen my own views by the opinions of others, but I wish to give you a clear account of what I myself have seen and felt. So, bidding farewell to the arrogance of Romans and the idle talk of Athenians, and all their ill-connected opinions, I embraced our non-Greek philosophy. I began to show how this was more ancient than your institutions, but left my task unfinished, in order to discuss a matter that needed more immediate attention; but now it is time to try to discuss its doctrines. Do not take offense at our teaching or prepare an elaborate reply filled with nonsense and obscenity, saying, "Tatian, aspiring to be above the Greeks, above the countless philosophical investigators, has taken a new path and embraced non-Greek doctrines." What is objectionable about a man reasoning with clearly ignorant people who share his own nature? Or how can it be irrational, according to your own sophist, to grow old always learning something? TESTIMONY OF THE CHALDEANS TO THE ANTIQUITY OF MOSES. Let us suppose Homer lived no later than the Trojan War; let it be granted that he was contemporary with it, or even that he was in the army of Agamemnon, and, if anyone wishes, that he lived before the invention of letters. The Moses mentioned earlier will be shown to have been many years older than the capture of Troy, and far more ancient than the building of Troy, or than Tros and Dardanus. To demonstrate this I will call as witnesses the Chaldeans, the Phoenicians, and the Egyptians. And what more need I say? Anyone who aims to persuade those listening should describe events very concisely. Berosus, a Babylonian, a priest of their god Belus, born in the time of Alexander, composed for Antiochus, the third after him, the history of the Chaldeans in three books; and, narrating the acts of the kings, he mentions one of them, Nebuchadnezzar by name, who made war against the Phoenicians and the Jewish people, events which we know were announced by our prophets, and which happened much later than the age of Moses, seventy years before the Persian empire. But Berosus is a very trustworthy man, and of this Juba is a witness, who, writing about the Assyrians, says that he learned the history from Berosus: there are two books of his about the Assyrians. TESTIMONY OF THE PHOENICIANS. After the Chaldeans, the testimony of the Phoenicians is as follows. There were among them three men, Theodotus, Hypsicrates, and Mochus; Laetus translated their books into Greek, and also composed with exactness the lives of the philosophers. Now, in those writers' histories it is shown that the abduction of Europa happened under one of the kings, and they describe Menelaus' arrival in Phoenicia and matters relating to Hiram, who gave his daughter in marriage to Solomon, king of the Jewish people, and supplied wood from all kinds of trees for the building of the temple. Menander of Pergamus composed a history about the same things. Hiram lived around the time of the Trojan War, while Solomon, Hiram's contemporary, lived much later than Moses. THE EGYPTIANS PLACE MOSES IN THE REIGN OF INACHUS. There are also accurate Egyptian chronicles. Ptolemy, not the king, but a priest of Mendes, is the recorder of their affairs. This writer, narrating the acts of the kings, says that the departure of the Jewish people from Egypt to the places where they went occurred in the time of King Ahmose, under the leadership of Moses. He says: "Ahmose lived in the time of king Inachus." After him, Apion the grammarian, a man most highly esteemed, in the fourth book of his Aegyptiaca (there are five books of his), besides many other things, says that Ahmose destroyed Avaris in the time of the Argive Inachus, as Ptolemy of Mendes wrote in his historical records. But the time from Inachus to the taking of Troy occupies twenty generations. The steps of the demonstration are as follows: LIST OF ARGIVE KINGS. The kings of the Argives were these: Inachus, Phoroneus, Apis, Argeius, Criasis, Phorbas, Triopas, Crotopas, Sthenelaus, Danaus, Lynceus, Abas, Proetus, Acrisius, Perseus, Sthenelaus, Eurystheus, Atreus, Thyestes, and Agamemnon, in whose eighteenth year as king Troy was captured. And every intelligent person will note carefully that, according to Greek tradition, the Greeks had no written history; for Cadmus, who taught them letters, came into Boeotia many generations later. But after Inachus, under Phoroneus, their savage, nomadic life was brought under control with difficulty, and they entered a new way of life. So if Moses is shown to be contemporary with Inachus, he is four hundred years older than the Trojan War. But this is demonstrated from the succession of the Attic, [and of the Macedonian, the Ptolemaic, and the Antiochian] kings. Hence, if the most celebrated deeds among the Greeks were recorded and made known after Inachus, this clearly must have happened after Moses. In the time of Phoroneus, who was after Inachus, Ogygus is mentioned among the Athenians, in whose time the first flood occurred; and in the time of Phorbas was Actaeus, from whom Attica was called Actaea; and in the time of Triopas were Prometheus, and Epimetheus, and Atlas, and Cecrops of double nature, and Io; in the time of Crotopas was the burning of Phaethon and the flood of Deucalion; in the time of Sthenelus was the reign of Amphictyon and the coming of Danaus into Peloponnesus, and the founding of Dardania by Dardanus, and Europa's removal from Phoenicia to Crete; in the time of Lynceus was the abduction of Kore, and the founding of the temple in Eleusis, and Triptolemus' farming, and the coming of Cadmus to Thebes, and the reign of Minos; in the time of Proetus was the war of Eumolpus against the Athenians; in the time of Acrisius was Pelops' arrival from Phrygia, and the coming of Ion to Athens, and the second Cecrops, and the deeds of Perseus and Dionysus, and Musaeus, the disciple of Orpheus; and in the reign of Agamemnon Troy was taken. MOSES MORE ANCIENT AND CREDIBLE THAN THE HEATHEN HEROES. Therefore, from what has been said it is clear that Moses was older than the ancient heroes, cities, and demons. And we should believe him, who lived earlier than they did, than the Greeks, who, without being aware of it, drew his doctrines from a fountain. For many of the sophists among them, driven by curiosity, tried to corrupt whatever they learned from Moses, and from those who have practiced philosophy like him, first so that they might seem to have something of their own, and second so that they could hide what they did not understand behind a rhetorical device and misrepresent the truth as a fable. But what the learned among the Greeks have said about our system of government and the history of our laws, and how many and what kind of men have written of these things, will be shown in the treatise against those who have discussed divine things. The most important task is to establish as accurately as possible that Moses is not only older than Homer, but than all the writers that were before him: older than Linus, Philammon, Thamyris, Amphion, Musaeus, Orpheus, Demodocus, Phemius, Sibylla, Epimenides of Crete, who came to Sparta, Aristeas of Proconnesus, who wrote the Arimaspia, Asbolus the Centaur, Bacis, Drymon, Euclus the Cyprian, Horus the Samian, and Pronapides the Athenian. Now, Linus was the teacher of Hercules, but Hercules preceded the Trojan war by one generation; and this is clear from his son Tlepolemus, who served in the army against Troy. And Orpheus lived at the same time as Hercules; moreover, it is said that all the works attributed to him were composed by Onomacritus the Athenian, who lived during the reign of the Pisistratids, around Olympiad 50. Musaeus was a disciple of Orpheus. Amphion, since he preceded the siege of Troy by two generations, makes it unnecessary to collect further details about him for those who want information. Demodocus and Phemius lived at the very time of the Trojan war; for the one resided with the suitors, and the other with the Phaeacians. Thamyris and Philammon were not much earlier than these. We have written fully about their different achievements in each field, their dates, and the records about them, with complete accuracy, I believe. To complete what is still missing, I will explain the dates of the men considered wise. Minos, who has been thought to excel in every kind of wisdom, and sharpness of mind, and skill in legislation, lived in the time of Lynceus, who reigned after Danaus in the eleventh generation after Inachus. Lycurgus, who was born long after the taking of Troy, gave laws to the Spartans one hundred years before the Olympiads began. Draco is found to have lived about the thirty-ninth Olympiad, Solon about the forty-sixth, and Pythagoras about the sixty-second. We have shown that the Olympiads began 407 years after the taking of Troy. Having demonstrated these facts, we will briefly discuss the dates of the seven wise men. The oldest of these, Thales, lived around Olympiad 50; and I have already spoken briefly of those who came after him. CONCLUDING STATEMENT ABOUT THE AUTHOR. Greeks, I, Tatian, a disciple of non-Greek philosophy, have written these things for you. I was born in the land of the Assyrians, I was first taught your doctrines and later those I now undertake to proclaim. From now on, knowing who God is and what His work is, I present myself to you ready to be examined about my doctrines, while firmly maintaining the way of life that accords with God.