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| Chapter XXI. Doctrines of the Christians and Greeks Respecting God Compared.
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We do not act as fools, O Greeks, nor utter idle tales,
when we announce that God was born in the form of a man. I call on you
who reproach us to compare your mythical accounts with our narrations.
Athené, as they say, took the form of Deïphobus for the sake
of Hector,483
and the unshorn Phoœbus for the sake of
Admetus fed the trailing-footed oxen, and the spouse us came as an old
woman to Semele. But, while you treat seriously such things, how can
you deride us? Your Asclepios died, and he who ravished fifty virgins
in one night at Thespiæ lost his life by delivering himself to the
devouring flame. Prometheus, fastened to Caucasus, suffered punishment
for his good deeds to men. According to you, Zeus is envious, and
hides the dream484
from men, wishing their destruction. Wherefore,
looking at your own memorials, vouchsafe us your approval, though it
were only as dealing in legends similar to your own. 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. For what reason
is Hera now never pregnant? Has she grown old? or is there no one to give
you information? Believe me now, O Greeks, and do not resolve your myths
and gods into allegory. If you attempt to do this, the divine nature as
held by you is overthrown by your own selves; for, if the demons with
you are such as they are said to be, they are worthless as to character;
or, if regarded as symbols of the powers of nature, they are not what
they are called. But I cannot be persuaded to pay religious homage to
the natural elements, nor can I undertake to persuade my neighbour. And
Metrodorus of Lampsacus, in his treatise concerning Homer, has argued
very foolishly, turning everything into allegory. For he says that
neither Hera, nor Athené, nor Zeus are what those persons suppose
who consecrate to them sacred enclosures and groves, but parts of nature
and certain arrangements of the elements. Hector also, and Achilles,
and Agamemnon, and all the Greeks in general, and the Barbarians with
Helen and Paris, being of the same nature, you will of course say are
introduced merely for the sake of the machinery485
| 485 [Χάριν
οἰκονμίας. Compare
divers uses of this word in Kaye’s Justin, p.
174.] | of the poem, not one of these personages having really
existed. But these things we have put forth only for argument’s
sake; for it is not allowable even to compare our notion of God with
those who are wallowing in matter and mud.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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