9. Chapter VIII. Or, On the Origin and Progress of Idolatry — Chapter VI
Chapter VIII. Or, On the Origin and Progress of Idolatry — Chapter VI T he progress of idolatry — the visible objects of the first superstitious worship — κίονες πυραμοειδεῖς [pyramid-shaped pillars], λίθοι ἀργοί
[rough stones], βαιτύλια [baetyls], ַמֵּצָבה [matstsebah], στήλαι [stelae], ἄγαλμα [image], what these are — the testimony of Clement, of the author of the Phoronis, of Eumelus — the origin of the stelae, from Clement — a truer opinion — the pillar-stone in the field of Colchester — λίθοι ἀργοί — the testimonies of Pausanias, Maximus of Tyre, Suidas — Theusares —
Stonehenge — Elagabalus; the Idaean Mother — the Persians destroy the ἀγάλματα, and mock them — the image of Diana of Ephesus — the idols of the Germans; groves empty of images: oaks — the most ancient temples without images — no ἀγάλματα in antiquity — rough and quadrangular stones — βαιτύλια — sacred stones — the testimony of Sanchuniathon — he feigns that Uranus devised living stones — most of what Eusebius draws from him ridiculous — the ancients feigned stones to be ἔμψυχοι [ensouled]
— βαίτυλος in Hesychius, whence the proverb βαίτυλον ἂν κατατίνοις arose — βαίτυλα in Damascius, in Photius — what θεραπεύω [to serve, to tend]
means — anointed stones, in Clement and Arnobius — whence βαιτύλια are named — Scaliger's conjecture — the erection of the stone at Bethel by Jacob — what ַמֵצָבה signifies — the nature of Jacob's act — and to what end
— why the common translator renders ַמֵּצָבה as "title" — the ἐπιφάνειαι [manifestations] of the gods, in Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Cicero — the Christian festival — the stone of Bethel worshipped among the Phoenicians — the progress of idolatry — statues fashioned to the likeness of the human face dedicated to the sun, and other matters.
I. What we have said concerning the progress of idolatry in the invention of the worship of present objects is confirmed by what remains, from the monuments of history, in memory of the first visible σεβάσματα [objects of worship]. These, in ancient times, were of two kinds: κίονες πυραμοειδεῖς, pillars tapering to a point; and λίθοι ἀργοί, rough and shapeless stones — to which may be added the βαιτύλια. Not until long afterwards, in process of time, were images fashioned to human form — namely, when the worship of the dead had been introduced through Hellenism.
II. The Greeks call sacred pillars στήλαι. So the Septuagint renders ַמֵּצָבה, forbidden Leviticus 26:1, Deuteronomy 16:22. "ַמֵּצָבה," says Kimchi, "is a stone which is set up for worship. From נצב, 'he set up.'" So Apollo
Agyieus was a pyramid, as Hesychius attests — that is, κίων εἰς ὀξὺ λήγων [a pillar tapering to a point]. Of these, Clement of Alexandria says, book I:
Πρὶν γὰρ οὖν ἀκριβωθῆναι τὰς τῶν ἀγαλμάτων σχέσεις, κίονας ἱστάντες οἱ παλαιοὶ ἐσίδοv τούτους ὡς ἀφιδρύματα τοῦ Θεοῦ. That is: "For before the fashioning of statues was perfected, the ancients, setting up pillars, worshipped these as seats of the god." An ἀφίδρυμα [image] of this kind is an image which is, as it were, the seat of a deity. This is what we have said: since ἀγάλματα [images] were not yet accurately fashioned, they set up
pillars, which might receive the power of the absent deities, and thus become, as it were, seats of the gods. But ἄγαλμα is an image artfully made
— Πᾶν ἐφ' ᾧ τις ἀγάλλεται, says Suidas — that is, "anything in which one delights"; that is, whatever so feeds the eyes as to affect the mind with a certain joy.
III. To this belongs what the same Clement relates, from the author of the Phoronis, concerning Callithoe, the first priestess of Juno:
Καλλιθόη κλειδοῦχος Ὀλυμπιάδος βασιλείηςἭρης Ἀργείης, ἣν στέμμασι καὶ θυσάνοισιΠρώτη ἐκόσμησεν περὶ κίονα μακρὸν ἀνάσσης.
That is: "Callithoe, key-bearer of the Olympian queen, Argive Hera, who first adorned her, with garlands and tassels, about the long pillar of the queen." The poet calls it "long" (μακράν) because the στήλη [stele/upright stone] was erected lengthwise, unlike the λίθοι ἀργοί [idle stones]. So a κίων [pillar] in Homer is sometimes called μακρός [long], sometimes ὑψηλός [high]. He produces similar things from Eumelus, namely:
That is: "That we might hang up for the god a tithe and the choicest spoils from the sacred doorposts, and from the lofty pillar" — although Eumelus perhaps meant nothing more than that the ἀκροθίνια and spoils were customarily hung from doorposts and pillars, which is very well known.
IV. Clement writes that demons invented these things in imitation of that pillar which went before the Israelites in the wilderness. Others may judge as they will; I have no doubt that, at that very time when the tabernacle was set up, pillars and στήλαι [upright stones] of this kind were already in common use among many nations. Hence, perhaps, arose the Anthelian
Gods, the guardians of doorways — little pillars at the doors of temples and
of other houses. Hesychius: Ἀντήλιοι θεοὶ οἱ πρὸ τῶν θυρῶν ἱδρύμενοι — "Anthelian gods, those set up before doors." Athenaeus, book X: ἐπὶ τῆς αὐλῆς — "in the courtyard"; that is, at the first entrance of the house, in the open air. Men had not yet conceived of ἀγαλματοποιΐα [the craft of making images], or εἰκονοποιΐα [image making], when first they set up pillars and στήλας [upright stones] for the sake of religion. For since they held the heavenly bodies alone to be in the place of deities, there was no reason for them to erect to these images fashioned and fabricated in human form. That, indeed, came to pass as superstition grew stronger — when, that is, the same being was the sun, and, I know not, some Apollo, substituted for him; but since the idolaters had nothing else in mind than to make the absent deities present by some visible sign, they had no need of the representation, in that sign, of any living creature. I recall having seen a pillar of this kind in the field of Colchester, among the Trinobantes, upon which later ages set the image of a cross, and consecrated it anew to the use of a new superstition.
V. Then, besides these tapering pillars, they used, for the same purpose, rough stones. So Pausanias, in the Achaica: Ἑστήκασι δέ … ἐγγύτατα τοῦ ἀγάλματος τετράγωνοι λίθοι τριάκοντα μάλιστα ἀριθμόν· τούτους σέβουσιν οἱ Φαρεῖς ἑκάστου θεοῦ τινος ὄνομα ἐπιλέγοντες· τὰ δὲ ἔτι παλαιότατα καὶ τοῖς πᾶσιν Ἕλλησι τιμὰς θεῶν ἀντὶ ἀγαλμάτων εἶχον ἀργοὶ λίθοι. That is: "Near the image stand about thirty square stones; these the men of Pharae worship, naming each one after some god; and, indeed, in the most ancient times, rough stones held, among all the Greeks, the honours of the gods in place of images." A notable testimony. He mentions stones of this kind also in the Boeotica. This, I say, was the custom of those most ancient
Greeks, of whom we showed, from Plato, that they worshipped the sun, the
moon, and the other stars of heaven, and these alone. And Maximus of Tyre, of the Arabians, Oration 38: Ἀράβιοι μὲν σέβουσι ὅντινα οὐκ οἶδα· τὸ δὲ ἄγαλμα ὃ εἶδον, λίθος ἦν τετράγωνος. That is: "The Arabians worship I know not whom; but the image which I saw was a square stone." The sign of the unknown god was a quadrangular stone. But that god was called θευσάρης — "τοῦτ' ἔστι," says Suidas, "θεὸς Ἄρης" — "that is, the god
Ares" — in which explanation of the name he is without doubt mistaken; he adds, however, whoever that god was: Τὸ ἄγαλμα, λίθος ἐστὶ μέλας τετράγωνος, ἀτύπωτος, ὕψος ποδῶν δ' εὖρος δύο, ἀνάκειται δὲ ἐπὶ βάσεως χρυσηλάτου· τούτῳ θύουσι, καὶ τὸ αἷμα τῶν ἱερείων προχέουσι· καὶ τοῦτό ἐστιν αὐτοῖς ἡ σπονδή. That is: "The image is a black, square stone, without any carved shape — that is, rough — four feet in height, two in breadth, resting upon a base of beaten gold; to this they sacrifice, and pour out the blood of the victims; and this is their libation."
VI. Of this kind, perhaps, were the stones which are here in England, in the field of Salisbury — huge and rough boulders, λίθοι ἀργοί, as Pausanias speaks. Jones, a most skilled architect, proves, in a particular treatise, that these were sacred. That the ancient Britons worshipped the Moon under the name of Andraste, Dio Cassius attests, History, book LXII. To the Sun and the Moon, stones of this kind were erected.
VII. That the worshippers of the heavenly bodies erected these stones and pillars, in order to have at hand the power and ἐνέργεια of the deities they worshipped, for protection and blessing, we have shown before. This, they believed, could be brought about by the descent of the Ethereal Spirit. At length the stones themselves were called gods, or divine. Lampridius, in the Life of Heliogabalus: "He wished to carry off, from its own shrine, the image of Diana of Laodicea — the 'stones which are called divine' — from
its inner sanctuary, where Orestes had placed it." The historian means nothing other than such λίθοι ἀργούς as were consecrated to the sun and moon, which, in process of time, came to be reckoned by the name of gods.
Hence the custom of swearing "by Jupiter the Stone." And of the idol Elagabalus, from whom that monster of a man, the pseudo-Antoninus, borrowed his name, Herodian says: Λίθος τίς ἐστι μέγιστος, κάτωθεν περιφερής, λήγων εἰς ὀξύτητα. That is: "It is a very great stone, round below, tapering to a point." Also, ֶעְגֵלי ַבַעל [Egle Ba'al] is "the round lord," by which name they denoted the sun itself — unless the sun should rather be called, in Syriac, אלה נבל, that is, "the God of the Gabalites," a name taken from the place of worship, as "Baal Peor." The Idaean Mother, which, with such great religious observance, was brought from Pessinus to Rome, and set up by the whole city in the Temple of Victory, was a stone of this kind, as Livy attests, book XXIX, chapter 11.
VIII. In early times, then, among many nations, ἀγάλματα had no use, and were unknown — held, indeed, by some, in abhorrence. Herodotus, in his Clio, of the Persians: Ἀγάλματα μὲν καὶ νηοὺς καὶ βωμοὺς οὐκ ἐν νόμῳ ποιευμένους ἱδρύεσθαι, ἀλλὰ καὶ τοῖσι ποιεῦσι μωρίην ἐπιφέρουσι· ὡς μὲν ἐμοὶ δοκέειν, ὅτι οὐκ ἀνθρωποφυέας ἐνόμισαν τοὺς θεοὺς, κατάπερ οἱ
Ἕλληνες, εἶναι — chapter 131. That is: "It is not their custom to set up images, or temples, or altars; rather, they charge those who do so with folly
— because, as it seems to me, they do not believe the gods to be of human form, as the Greeks do." A notable testimony. We have shown above that the Persians pursued the sun and moon with religious worship. Clinging to that superstition received from the first idolaters, they never admitted the deities which Hellenism introduced, and for that reason had no ἀγάλματα at all. Hence those who wrote the history of the Magi, in Diogenes Laertius's
proem, relate that Xerxes, on his expedition into Europe, ἀγάλματα εἰκότως καθαίρειν — "removed images, according to the ordinance of his discipline." Nay, they not only removed such images, but mocked them pleasantly. For when Cambyses had entered the temple of Vulcan at Memphis, πολλὰ τῷ ἀγάλματι κατεγέλασεν, Herodotus, book III — "he greeted the image with much laughter"; and in the shrine of the Cabiri, τὰ ἀγάλματα ἐνέπρησε, πολλὰ κατασκώψας — "he burnt the images, jesting much over them." He burnt them, according to the custom of his country, because they were images of men; he laughed, because they were ridiculously fashioned. For this cause he gave to the flames all the temples of Asia, according to Solinus — save that of Diana of Ephesus alone, whose image was a sharpened trunk of elm, or of beech. So Callimachus teaches us, Hymn to Artemis:
Σοὶ καὶ ἀμαζόνιδες πολέμου ἐπιθυμήτειραι Ἔν κοτε παραλίῃ Ἐφέσου βρέτας ἱδρύσαντο,Φηγῷ ὑπὸ πρέμνῳ.
That is: "For thee too the Amazons, eager for war, once set up an image on the shore of Ephesus, beneath the trunk of an oak." For the rest, the father of history does not say that the Persians had no statues at all. They had no ἀγάλματα [images], because they did not believe the gods to be ἀνθρωποφυεῖς [of human origin]. But that they repudiated all pillars and stelae, he does not say, nor is it true. Tacitus relates the same of the Germans, On the Customs of the Germans, chapter 9: "For the rest, they think it improper, judging by the greatness of heavenly beings, to enclose the gods within walls, or to liken them to any form of the human face: they consecrate groves and forests, and call by the names of the gods that hidden presence which they behold only with reverence." But a little before, he had said: "They believe a god to be present with them in battle, and carry into
the fight certain images and standards, taken from their groves," chapter 7.
Not every effigy or standard, then, but only those fashioned in any likeness of the human face, were absent from the groves.
IX. Perhaps, too, in place of the stones and pillars which the peoples of the East erected, living oaks, or the ancient trunks of oaks, were in use among the Germans. For we have shown, from Maimonides, that the heavenly bodies were worshipped in trees as well. Hence Claudian, In Praise of Stilicho: "That it might be permitted to hunt in safety, far off, through the vast silences of the Hercynian forest, and the groves grim with ancient religion, and the oaks that stand as images of barbarian divinity."
Also, "oaks held by the Greeks for oracles" — Virgil, Georgics, II, line 16.
And the Gauls, in Lucan, book III, line 412: "And the mournful images of the gods lack all art, and stand shapeless on hewn trunks. Their very rudeness, and the squalor of the already rotting wood, strike men with awe."
Maximus of Tyre also teaches that the Celts — that is, the Gauls — worshipped Jupiter, whose sign was the tallest oak. Procopius of Caesarea, too, in his History of the Gothic War, book IV, affirms that the people of the Abasgi, dwelling from the Pontic Sea to the roots of the Caucasus, "even to his own time" — that is, the time of the Emperor Justinian — "venerated groves and forests with superstition, and believed trees to be gods, with barbarous simplicity." Similarly, too, the Huns — the first who drove the Goths from their ancient Scythian dwellings — whom Jordanes, On the Origin and Deeds of the Getae, chapter 24, carried away by a wondrous credulity, relates to have been born of unclean spirits, begotten upon certain sorceress-women whom they called Aliorumnae; and historians relate that the remnants of these people, in Lithuania, worshipped trees down to a late age, until King Jagiełło cut them down with his own hand. Philostratus
relates that at Cadiz there was a most ancient temple dedicated to Hercules, in which he says there were no ἀγάλματα, but only unmarked altars; he shows, however, that the inhabitants of that place had στήλαι inscribed with unknown letters, which were four-sided, like anvils — see his Apollonius, book V, chapter 1. Of the same temple, Silius Italicus says: "But there is no known effigy or image of the gods." Curtius, book IV, chapter 1, relates that in this Hercules the Tyrians — from whom the people of Cadiz derived — worshipped Apollo, or the sun. So true is what Themistius says, Oration 15:
Καὶ πρὸ μὲν Δαιδάλου τετράγωνος ἦν, οὐ μόνον ἡ τῶν Ἑρμῶν ἐργασία, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἡ τῶν λοιπῶν ἀνδριάντων· Δαίδαλος δέ, ἐπειδὴ πρῶτος διήγαγε τὼ πόδε τῶν ἀγαλμάτων, ἔμπνοα δημιουργεῖν ἐνομίσθη. That is: "Before Daedalus, not only the workmanship of the Herms, but that of the rest of the statues too, was square; but Daedalus, since he was the first to separate the two feet of the images, was reputed to fashion them living and breathing."
Of which more hereafter.
X. To these λίθους ἀεργούς [idle stones] belong the βαιτύλια [sacred stones]. The first to mention them, in Eusebius, is Sanchuniathon, in his
Theology of the Phoenicians: Ἔτι δέ … Θεὸς Οὐρανὸς βαιτύλια, λίθους ἐμψύχους μηχανησάμενος. That is: "Moreover, the god Uranus devised baetyls, living stones, by his craft." A most learned man supposes that Sanchuniathon did not write אבנים נפשים, "living stones," but אבנים נשפים
(with the פ and ש transposed) — that is, as he says, "anointed stones." For it is ridiculous, he says, to imagine that Uranus made "animated stones." And it is indeed ridiculous; yet it does not therefore follow that Sanchuniathon did not so write it, since, out of a horrible confusion, partly, and partly out of a mixture of the most monstrous trifles, everything which Eusebius draws from Sanchuniathon in that passage is altogether absurd and
ridiculous — nor is it recorded by him for any other purpose than to show how absurd these things are, and how repugnant to all theology, indeed to reason itself. Moreover, Uranus devised these stones that they might be at hand, to aid him in the war which he was waging against Saturn to recover his kingdom — for which he had need of living stones, rather than anointed ones. It is, moreover, very well known that the ancients no less feigned stones of this kind to be ἔμψυχοι [ensouled] than they feigned the statues of Daedalus to be αὐτοκίνητα [self-moving]. Hesychius derives the word from another source: Βαίτυλος· οὕτως ἐκαλεῖτο ὁ δοθεὶς λίθος τῷ Κρόνῳ ἀντὶ
Διός — that is, "Baetylus: so was called the stone which was given to Saturn in place of Jupiter." A most familiar fable. Whence the proverb, Καὶ βαίτυλον ἂν καταπίνοις — "You would even swallow a baetyl" — which Erasmus, in his Adages, explains from this passage of Hesychius: "Baetylus is the name given to that stone, wrapped in swaddling-bands, which Saturn swallowed in place of Jupiter."
XI. It is certain, however, that there were other stones, destined for sacred uses, called βαιτύλια, besides that one which was given to Saturn in place of Jupiter. The author of the Life of Isidore the Philosopher, in Photius — whom Suidas writes to have been Damascius — mentions them,
Bibliotheca, codex 242. He says that he himself saw: Τὸν βαίτυλον διὰ τοῦ ἀέρος κινούμενον, ποτὲ δ' ἐν τοῖς ἱματίοις κρυπτόμενον, ἤδη δὲ ποτὲ καὶ ἐν χερσὶ βασταζόμενον τοῦ θεραπεύοντος· ὄνομα δ' ἦν τῷ θεραπεύοντι τὸν βαίτυλον Εὐσέβιος. That is: "The baetyl, moved through the air, at one time hidden within garments, and at another time even carried in the hands of him who tended it; and the name of him who tended the baetyl was
Eusebius." Thus does Andreas Schott — otherwise a learned man — interpret those words most absurdly. For what has a physician to do with a
baetyl? Children know what θεραπεύειν τοὺς θεοὺς [to tend the gods] and ἡ περὶ τοὺς θεοὺς θεραπεία [the service paid to the gods] mean. This Eusebius was an impostor, who served the baetyl in its rites — whom he sometimes carried in his hands, and sometimes pretended had moved itself through the air. Ὄνομα δ' ἦν τῷ θεραπεύοντι τὸν βαίτυλον Εὐσέβιος — "the name of him who tended the baetyl was Eusebius." Julius Pollux, Onomasticon, book I, On Occupations: Ὀνόματα τῶν θεοὺς θεραπευόντων, τῶν θεῶν θεραπευταί, ἱερεῖς, νεωκόροι — "Names for those who tend the gods: attendants of the gods, priests, temple-wardens." Damascius further teaches how this Eusebius religiously worshipped the baetyl, and drew oracles from it. And this was one of those ἔμψυχοι [ensouled] stones, which Isidore asserted was moved and, as it were, animated by a demon not of the worst kind: Εἶναι γάρ τινα δαίμονα, τὸν κινοῦντα αὑτόν, οὔτε τῶν βλαβερῶν, οὔτε τῶν ἄγαν προσύλων — "for there was, he said, a certain demon that moved it, neither one of the harmful kind, nor one excessively bound to matter." For, in the process of time, wherever such an idol was set up, demons at once took possession of it, as we shall show hereafter.
Damascius mentions, a little after, other stones dedicated to the Sun, which he calls συνοδιάται [travelling companions].
XII. It must be confessed, moreover, that the ancient idolaters were accustomed to anoint these stones, so that they might no less be called
"anointed" than "living." Clement, Stromata VII: Πάντα λίθον, τὸν δὲ λεγόμενον λιπαρὸν προσκυνοῦντες — "worshipping every stone, especially the one called 'oily' [i.e., anointed]." And Arnobius, speaking of himself, when he was still a gentile: "If ever I had seen a stone made slippery and anointed with oil-ointment, I would flatter it, as though some present power dwelt within it."
XIII. The first, so far as I know, to conjecture — most acutely — that these stones came to be called βαιτύλια from the stone which Jacob set up at Bethel, or from Bethel itself (the name by which the place where he set it up was called from that time on), was that admirable man Joseph Scaliger.
Others suppose that the whole practice of erecting rough stones for superstitious uses proceeded, ἐκ κακοζηλίας [from a wicked imitation] devised by Satan, from this very act. Jacob's deed is recorded in Genesis
28:18, 19. He took the stone which he had put for his pillow, and set it up ַמֵּצָבה, "in titulum," so the Vulgate translator; στήλην, the Greeks. From נצב,
"he set up," comes ַמֵּצָבה, "a statue," as we said above — the same word used in the prohibition of idolatry, Leviticus 26:1; Deuteronomy 7:5, 12:3.
He found a rough stone, by chance, in the field; and, having set it up in this fashion, he anointed it with oil, and, first among mortals, solemnly vowed to God a vow conceived in definite words. Among other things, he promises that this stone shall be to him, thereafter, the house of God, Genesis 28:22
— that is, that he would there solemnly perform the worship of God, once he should have at hand something to offer to God, of all which he was then in want. Afterwards, admonished by God, he fulfilled his vow, chapter 35:6,
XIV. But whether Jacob did rightly or otherwise in erecting this pillar, the commentators inquire. Abulensis gives two answers. First, that this was lawful before the giving of the Law, though afterwards forbidden. Second, that Jacob erected this monument in memory of the event, not that he might worship it. In his opinion, very many others acquiesce. It was, without doubt, lawful for pious men, before the Law was given, to erect altars in any place, and to offer sacrifices upon them. But that Jacob erected this stone in memory of the angelic vision granted to him there, and did not
employ it in religious worship, is clear from the fact that, long afterwards, admonished by God concerning his vow, he built an altar in that very place, chapter 35:7. The Latin translator renders ַמֵּצָבה as "titulum" ["a title" or "inscription"], from the customary practice of inscribing titles upon such sacred stones, indicating to which god they were dedicated. So Damascius:
Καὶ γράμματα ἀνέδειξεν ἡμῖν τῷ λίθῳ γεγραμμένα χρώματι τῷ καλουμένῳ τιγγαβαρίνῳ κατακεχρωμένα — that is, "He also showed us letters written upon the stone, coloured with the pigment called cinnabar."
XV. From this act of Jacob's — likewise commemorating a vision of the true God — there arose afterwards the superstitious custom of erecting pillars, in memory of feigned ἐπιφάνειαι [manifestations] of the gods. Very many writers mention these ἐπιφανίων of the gods. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, book II, chapter 68: Πάνυ δ' ἄξιον καὶ τὴν ἐπιφάνειαν ἱστορῆσαι τῆς θεᾶς, ἣν ἐπεδείξατο ταῖς ἀδίκως ἐγκληθείσαις παρθένοις.
That is: "It is well worth relating the manifestation of the goddess, which she showed to the maidens unjustly accused." To which he adds a ἐλέγχειν
[refutation] of the Epicureans: Ὅσοι μὲν οὖν τὰς ἀθέους ἀσκοῦσι φιλοσοφίας, εἰ δὴ καὶ φιλοσοφίας αὐτὰς δεῖ καλεῖν, ἀπάσας διασύροντες τὰς ἐπιφανείας τῶν θεῶν. That is: "As many as practise those atheistic philosophies — if indeed they ought to be called philosophies at all — ridiculing all the manifestations of the gods" — mocking the presences of the gods, as Cicero explains that word. Athenaeus too, book XII, from Carystius of Pergamon, relates that Demetrius of Phalerum observed, with religious worship, τὴν ἐπιφάνειαν [the manifestation] of his brother
Himeraeus, who had been slain by Antipater, which raised great envy against him among the Athenians. For after he had feigned, it seems, that his dead brother had appeared to him, he paid him religious worship, and
thus introduced a ξένος δαίμων [foreign deity], which was forbidden at Athens, Acts 17:18. Concerning these epiphanies, Cicero, in the second book On the Nature of the Gods, chapter 2: "And so, both among our own people and among others, the worship of the gods, and the sanctity of religious observances, grows daily greater and better. And this happens not by chance, nor without cause, but because the gods often declare their presence." And let us know from what workshop that festival among the Christians proceeded, which they call Epiphany — concerning which a certain priest doubted whether it was masculine or feminine, and fearlessly declared it to be a great saint.
XVI. The Jews affirm that this Bethel-stone was afterwards worshipped by the Phoenicians; and it is exceedingly probable that these rough stones, which they set up to their gods, were called Βαιτύλια from Bethel.
XVII. In this manner, then, the worship of the sun grew: to simple adoration were added pillars and Baetylic stones, to which were joined, first, anointing, then the offering of fruits and flowers, and, finally, sacrifices of animals.
XVIII. It came to pass, indeed, in process of time, that the sun himself came to be worshipped in statues fashioned to the likeness of the human face. Of this kind was the Colossus of Rhodes, seventy cubits in height.
Macrobius, too, relates that the Egyptians and Assyrians were accustomed to carry in procession an image of the sun holding a thunderbolt and ears of corn in the left hand, and raising the right, with a whip, after the manner of a charioteer, Saturnalia, book I, chapter 23. And Pliny, book XXXIV, chapter 7: "Zenodorus," he says, "made a Colossus, intended as an image of the emperor Nero, a hundred and ten feet in height; which, the crimes of that prince having been condemned, was dedicated to the worship of the
sun." This was done by Vespasian, as Suetonius attests, Vespasian, chapter 18: "He rewarded the restorer of the Colossus with a notable largess, and a great fee." The head of the restored statue, having seven rays, was set in Nero's place; this was afterwards removed by Commodus, who set his own head upon it, as Herodian attests, chapter 48: Τοῦ μεγίστου ἀγάλματος κολοσσιαίου ὅπερ σέβουσι Ῥωμαῖοι, εἰκόνα φέρον Ἡλίου, τὴν κεφαλὴν ἀποτεμὼν, ἱδρύσατο ἑαυτοῦ. That is: "Having cut off the head of that greatest colossal image, which the Romans worship, bearing the likeness of the Sun, he set up his own in its place." Scaliger supplies the defective passage with καὶ τὴν ἑαυτοῦ ἀντιτιθείς ["and setting up his own instead"].
This, indeed, was not done until after dead men had been admitted into the number of the gods, and some Apollo or other had been substituted for the sun.
XIX. As, therefore, Jeroboam set up the golden calves, lest the people, left without any visible sign of the divine presence, should return to the true worship of God at Jerusalem — not without the greatest damage, perhaps, and ruin, to his own kingdom — so Satan, taking thought for his own kingdom, which he had obtained in the world by so many various arts and manifold deceit — lest the idolaters, set in dangers and anxious for help, hearkening to the very voice of nature crying out to the Lord of nature, should begin ζητεῖν τὸν Κύριον, εἰ ἄρα γε ψηλαφήσειαν αὐτὸν καὶ εὕροιεν, καίτοιγε οὐ μακρὰν ἀπὸ ἑνὸς ἑκάστου ἡμῶν ὑπάρχοντα, 1 as the apostle speaks — that is, "to seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us" — and so withdraw themselves from his dominion, superadded, upon that former error, this new one, by which, raised up into a false hope, they might not be able to be removed from their wicked prejudice.
XX. Clement of Alexandria, in his Exhortation to the Greeks, sets forth this progress of superstition most excellently: "The Scythians, in ancient times, worshipped a scimitar; the Arabians, a stone; the Persians, a river; and, among other peoples, those who were yet more ancient set up marked pieces of wood, and placed pillars made of stones, which were also called ξόανα, because they were scraped and polished out of the material. In Icarus, certainly, the image of Diana was unworked wood; and that of Cithaeronian Juno, at Thespiae, a hewn trunk; and that of Samian Juno (as Aethlius says) was, at first, a plank, but afterwards, when Procles was
Archon, was fashioned into the form of a statue. But after statues began to be formed, they were called βρέτη, from βροτός, because they resembled men. And at Rome, in ancient times, Varro the writer says, the statue of Mars was a spear, since craftsmen had not yet arrived at this handsome, but wicked, art. But after the art flourished, error increased. It is therefore now clear that they made, out of stones and wood, images resembling men." So he; and thereafter he recounts, in order, who were the first, in various places, to fashion such images.
XXI. And this was the first success and εὐτυχία [good fortune] of Satan's war against the human race, deprived of divine revelations, and left to itself.
This was the wholesale origin of the defection from the foundation of natural theology. Here the prince of darkness laid the foundations of that dominion, which he has exercised, far and wide, over the greater part of mankind, through an innumerable succession of years.
1. Claude corrected a mistake in the Greek transcription on Acts 17:27.