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| Chapter VI
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Chapter VI.
He next proceeds to make the following statement
about the Jews:—“The first point relating to the Jews which
is fitted to excite wonder, is that they should worship the heaven and
the angels who dwell therein, and yet pass by and neglect its most
venerable and powerful parts, as the sun, the moon, and the other
heavenly bodies, both fixed stars and planets, as if it were possible
that ‘the whole’ could be God, and yet its parts not
divine; or (as if it were reasonable) to treat with the greatest
respect those who are said to appear to such as are in darkness
somewhere, blinded by some crooked sorcery, or dreaming dreams through
the influence of shadowy spectres,4086
| 4086 ἢ τοὺς μὲν ἐν
σκότῳ που ἐκ
γοητείας οὐκ
ὀρθῆς
τυφλώττουσιν,
ἢ δι᾽
ἀμυδρῶν
φασμάτων
ὀνειρώττουσιν
ἐγχρίμπτειν
λεγομένους,
εὖ μάλα
θρησκεύειν. | while those
who prophesy so clearly and strikingly to all men, by means of whom
rain, and heat, and clouds, and thunder (to which they offer worship),
and lightnings, and fruits, and all kinds of productiveness, are
brought about,—by means of whom God is revealed to
them,—the most prominent heralds among those beings that are
above,—those that are truly heavenly angels,—are to be
regarded as of no account!” In making these statements,
Celsus appears to have fallen into confusion, and to have penned them
from false ideas of things which he did not understand; for it is
patent to all who investigate the practices of the Jews, and compare
them with those of the Christians, that the Jews who follow the law,
which, speaking in the person of God, says, “Thou shalt have no
other gods before Me: thou shalt not make unto thee an image, nor
a likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth
beneath, or that is in the waters under the earth; thou shalt not bow
down to them, nor serve them,”4087
worship
nothing else than the Supreme God, who made the heavens, and all things
besides. Now it is evident that those who live according to the
law, and worship the Maker of heaven, will not worship the
heaven at the same time with God. Moreover, no one who obeys the
law of Moses will bow down to the angels who are in heaven; and, in
like manner, as they do not bow down to sun, moon, and stars, the host
of heaven, they refrain from doing obeisance to heaven and its angels,
obeying the law which declares: “Lest thou lift up thine
eyes to heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the
stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldst be driven to worship them,
and serve them, which the Lord thy God hath
divided unto all nations.”4088
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