7. Chapter VI. Or, On the Origin and Progress of Idolatry — Chapter IV
Chapter VI. Or, On the Origin and Progress of Idolatry — Chapter IV A nother corruption of natural theology — the worship of natural things under the mask of dead men, a pretext for some — whether the exposition of φυσικὴς [natural] theology is μυθική [mythical] and allegorical — a new method of philosophizing — the theology of the Stoics, of Zeno, of Chrysippus, refuted by Philo of Byblos, and by Eusebius — idolatrous confusion — whether the Sun and Apollo are the same — the tradition of Jacob's history in the servitude of Apollo — the follies of the philosophers in excusing the ancient idolaters — a comparison of the ancient idolaters with the more recent — the frauds of the Pharisees, and of the Jesuits, in excusing the sins of men — the art of exorcising demons common to gentiles, Jews, and Papists.
I. We have shown that the sun, and the rest of the host of heaven, were, through the depraved superstition of men, the first to occupy the place and dominion of the Godhead in the world. From this, in process of time, another new and most pernicious superstition sprang up, which they call
φυσικὴ [natural] theology. Its beginnings too we shall relate — but briefly, and as it were ἐν παρόδῳ [in passing].
II. By the precepts of natural theology, the works of nature were appointed to promote the true worship of the Creator of all things. This we established in the first book, in expounding that theology. That religious worship was owed to these very works — this too we showed the first idolaters to have taught. Their worship they called natural theology, because it was the things of nature that were worshipped, whereas true natural theology in fact teaches us to draw lessons from natural things for the promotion of the worship of nature's author. That, in the process of time, another kind of idolatry was introduced, we shall see below. It took its rise from fabulous traditions, and from the impious and imaginary ἀποθέωσις
[deification] of wicked men. But after philosophising began to be practised somewhat more strictly among certain men, and more refined opinions concerning the divine nature had gained ground among many, the wise began to be ashamed of the ignorance and utter darkness of those iron ages which had produced those gods. They contended, accordingly, that everything commonly celebrated by the ancient μυθολόγους [mythologists] concerning the fictitious gods — Jupiter, that is, and the whole sacred apparatus of Hellenism — was but a shadowing-forth of natural things. This theology they call μυθική [mythical], which, they say, was nothing other than an allegorical exposition of τῆς φυσικῆς [natural philosophy].
Diodorus Siculus, book I, and Plutarch, On Isis and Osiris, weave this web; and, in Eusebius's most excellent Treasury, very many others do the same. For them, Jupiter was nothing but the Sun, or the Air; Juno, the Moon, or the Earth; and the rest of the idols of former ages — whose beginnings we shall show hereafter — were either the elements, or the
natural causes of things. This the more recent poets also everywhere suggest. So Juvenal, Satire V, line 78: "When Jupiter roared with the fierce spring hail."
And before him, Virgil, Georgics II, lines 324–327: "In spring the earth swells, and demands the seeds of generation; then the almighty father
Aether descends in fruitful showers into the lap of his joyful spouse, and, mingling his great body with hers, nourishes all her offspring."
And Lucretius the Epicurean, who preceded him, book II, lines 654–658:
"If anyone should decide to call the sea Neptune, and the crops Ceres, and prefer to misuse the name of Bacchus rather than to give to liquid its own proper name, let us allow that he may call the round earth the Mother of the Gods, provided that in reality he does not actually believe it so."
And the more ancient Greeks — Orpheus:
— "Earth, mother of all things, Demeter, giver of wealth."
For Δημήτηρ [Demeter] was Γῆ μήτηρ [Earth the mother], as Diodorus attests. Empedocles too, in verses which Athenagoras cites in his Legation:
Ζεὺς ἀργὴς, Ἥρη τε φερέσβιος, ἠδ' Ἀϊδωνεὺς Νῆστις θ' ἣ δακρύοις τέγγει κρούνισμα βρότειον.
— that is:
"Zeus, shining with fire; Hera, the life-sustaining; and Aïdoneus, lowest of the gods; and Nestis, who moistens with her tears the mortal spring."
And another — Ennius, in Cicero, On the Nature of the Gods, book II, chapter 25: "Behold this shining vault above, whom all men call Jupiter."
III. Of this same sort, too, were the doctrines of the Stoics. So, of Zeno, Velleius the Epicurean says, in Cicero, On the Nature of the Gods, book I, chapter 14: "When he interprets the Theogony of Hesiod, he does away entirely with the customary and accepted notions of the gods; for he counts neither Jupiter, nor Juno, nor Vesta, nor anyone so called, among the number of the gods; but teaches that these names have been assigned, by a kind of signification, to things inanimate and mute." And presently, of Chrysippus: "The same man argues that the Aether is he whom men call
Jupiter; and that the air, flowing through the seas, is Neptune; and that the earth is what is called Ceres." Hence, Seneca observes, Natural Questions, book IV, chapters 6 and 7, that sacrifices were offered to the clouds, that they might not send hail and storms.
IV. The more recent Platonists and Pythagoreans followed the same path — Plotinus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Amelius, Eumenius, and others. Let the fable of Porphyry serve as an example: his interpretation of Saturn's castration of his father Coelus, applied to the causes of the heavenly bodies.
Ὁ Κρόνος … δεθεὶς ἐκτέμνεται, ὡς ὁ Οὐρανός· τοῦ θεολόγου (hoc est Musæo) δι' ἡδονῆς δεσμεῖσθαι καὶ κατάγεσθαι τὰ θεῖα εἰς γένεσιν αἰνισσομένου, ἀποσπερματίζειν τε δυνάμεις εἰς ἡδονὴν ἐκλυθέντα· ὅθεν ἐπιθυμίᾳ μὲν συνουσίας τὸν Οὐρανὸν κατίοντα εἰς Γῆν ἐκτέμνει Κρόνος· πρῶτος τῶν ἀντιφερομένων τῷ Οὐρανῷ ὁ Κρόνος ἐστὶ, καὶ ἡ τούτου σφαῖρα· κατίασι δὲ δυνάμεις ἐξ Οὐρανοῦ καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν πλανωμένων· ἀλλὰ τὰς μὲν ἐξ Οὐρανοῦ δέχεται Κρόνος, τὰς δὲ ἀπὸ τοῦ Κρόνου Ζεύς. — that is: "Saturn, bound, is castrated, as Coelus was: by which the theologian
(that is, Musaeus) hints darkly that the divine essences, enticed by sweetness, are bound and drawn down into generation, and, dissolved by pleasure, sow abroad certain powers: whence, as Coelus descends toward
Earth in desire of union, Saturn castrates him. For Saturn, and his sphere, is the first of those that moves in a direction contrary to Coelus; and certain powers descend both from Coelus and from the wandering stars. But Saturn receives the powers of Coelus; and Jupiter, in turn, receives those of Saturn."
So he, in his book On the Cave of the Nymphs, in Homer. That is: he contends that the fable signifies that Saturn — who, in the reverse order of his motion, stands nearest to Coelus — so receives the prolific power of Coelus that it cannot descend immediately to the earth; and that Jupiter's power, in turn, intercepts the influence of Saturn. By this device, I say, they laboured to gloss over the stupidity of the first idolaters, and the madness of Hellenism.
V. Philo of Byblos, in Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel, book I, chapter 9, shows at length, and most aptly, that the philosophers most foolishly invented these things, when the matter was plainly otherwise:
Ἀλλὰ … οἱ μὲν νεώτατοι τῶν ἱερολόγων, τὰ μὲν γεγονότα πράγματα ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἀπεπέμψαντο, ἀλληγορίας καὶ μύθους ἐπινοήσαντες καὶ τοῖς κοσμικοῖς παθήμασι συγγένειαν πλασάμενοι μυστήρια κατέστησαν — that is: "But the more recent theologians, having rejected the things that actually happened from the beginning, and having devised allegories and invented fables, and contrived some kinship with the phenomena of the universe, established mysteries."
VI. Eusebius attacks this vanity at greater length, Preparation for the Gospel, book III, chapter 1 — for this was, at that time, a matter of concern to the Christians. For after the light of the gospel had struck the world with its rays to such a degree that the shameful madness of the old superstition had come, even among the common people, into contempt, the sharper
sophists — as I have said — clung most stubbornly to this fiction, which all the credit of history contradicts, in order to make that folly appear lovely, dyed in a new colour. Indeed, to mention this in passing, in the earliest times of the church the whole method of philosophising was renewed even among the gentiles themselves. For after Ammonius of Alexandria, the coryphaeus of the philosophers of his age — whose hearers were Origen,
Herennius, and Plotinus (the latter the teacher of Porphyry, as Porphyry was of Iamblichus) — had sown certain seeds of heavenly wisdom in the minds of his hearers through his philosophical discourses, those who, on account of inveterate prejudices and the hatred of the world, refused to embrace the Christian religion, nevertheless did not cease to cultivate those seeds to the best of their ability, drawing rivulets of truth into the cisterns of Plato. Add that others, from reading our own books, had drawn a great deal from the most hidden mysteries of the gospel. Among these were Numenius,
Amelius, Plotinus, Herennius, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Proclus, Hierocles, Marinus, Damascius, and others, who, though they abandoned neither the curious speculations of the Platonists nor the magical incantations of the Pythagoreans, nevertheless mingled with them many little sparks of heavenly truth.
VII. Among the ancients, however, everything on this subject was confused and uncertain. Plutarch discusses at length whether Apollo was distinct from the sun, in his book Why the Pythia No Longer Prophesies in Verse. But the most ancient of the poets teach, in their very hymns, that he was the sun, and set forth where he was born and of what parents — so that the Arcadians could claim to be older not only than the Moon but even than the Sun. They add, too, fables patched together from ancient traditions.
Such is what they write of Apollo's pastoral exile — which Callimachus
celebrates in such a manner that I could almost believe that fable to represent the manner of life of Jacob, spent among the flocks of Laban the Syrian. He teaches that the cause of his journey and of the task he undertook was love: Ἡλίου δ᾽ ἔρωτι κεκαυμένος Ἀδμήτου — "Burning with love for the youth Admetus" — just as, for Jacob, love was the cause of his pastoral servitude. And in assigning the cause of Apollo's servitude, since
Callimachus departs here from the rest of the poets, there is no doubt that the report of some obscure tradition gave him occasion for doing so. Then he depicts, most excellently, the increase of the young flocks under his care:
Ῥεῖα κε βουβόσιον τελέθει πλέον, οὐδέ κεν αἶγες Δεύοιντο βρεφέων ἐπιμηλάδες, ᾗσιν Ἀπόλλων
Βοσκομένῃς ὀφθαλμὸν ἐπήγαγεν, οὐδ' ἀγάλακτοι Οἴες, οὐδ' ἄκυθοι, πᾶσαι δέ κεν εἶεν ὕπαρνοι,
— that is:
"Easily, indeed, would the herd of cattle grow yet more numerous, nor would the she-goats, mingled among the ewes, lack for young, upon which Apollo, as they grazed, cast his eye; nor would the sheep be without milk, nor barren, but all would have lambs beneath them, and she that bore but one would at once bear twins."
If it were fitting to examine the poet's words one by one, very many things would be found that wonderfully agree with the history of Jacob; but since an attentive reader will perceive this at first glance, and since we are engaged in other matters, it does not please us to dwell upon them here.
VIII. This new mystical natural theology, however, was a most putrid fiction of men blinded by ignorance and malice. The greater part of mortals
worshipped the sun, the moon, and the rest of the heavenly bodies with divine honours long before the fables of Hellenism had their rise or occasion. Greece was, as it were, the birthplace of the ἀνθρωποφυέων
[man-born; of human origin] gods, and the workshop of idols. But that the Greeks themselves, in ancient times, worshipped no other gods than the sun, the moon, and the stars, we have shown above, from Plato. But it pleased these new masters to undertake the defence of the ignorance and darkness of former ages — being themselves no wiser than those of whom they were most ashamed. Not otherwise, even today, do the Jewish rabbis twist all the monstrosities of the Talmud into I know not what allegories; it is a wonder the Jesuits have not done the same in reading their own writings. They would perhaps have acted more prudently and more modestly had they, imitating the philosophers and the rabbis, devised ingenious lies by which to win credit for those writings, rather than doing what they have in fact done — after leading so many years, and so many thousands of men in every nation, through the byways of the most hideous errors, utterly and openly rejecting them. But this, you will say, is an injury
— nay, a violence — to wish to compare and liken the most holy fathers of the Society of Jesus with the philosophers and the rabbis? Come, then, let us examine, by one example (or perhaps another), but one of the greatest weight, whether they follow in their footsteps or not. No one can inflict a more atrocious injury upon the immortal souls of mortals, upon human society, and upon the obedience owed to the Supreme Being, than he who so labours to palliate and excuse the crimes of sinners that men take from it fresh courage to commit them further, and more freely. What the masked hierophants among the gentiles did to this end, the divine philosopher relates at length in the second book of the Republic:
Ἀγύρται … δὲ καὶ μάντεις ἐπὶ πλουσίων θύρας ἰόντες, πείθουσιν ὡς ἔστι παρὰ σφίσι δύναμις ἐκ Θεῶν ποριζομένη, θυσίαις τε καὶ ἐπῳδαῖς, εἴ τέ τι ἀδίκημά του γέγονεν αὐτοῦ, ἢ προγόνων, ἀκεῖσθαι μεθ' ἡδονῶν τε καὶ ἑορτῶν, ἐάν τέ τιν' ἐχθρὸν πημῆναι ἐθέλῃ, μετὰ σμικρῶν δαπανῶν ὁμοίως δίκαιον ἀδίκῳ βλάψειν, ἐπαγωγαῖς τισὶ καὶ καταδέσμοις τοὺς
Θεούς, ὡς φασι, πείθοντές σφισιν ὑπηρετεῖν· τούτοις δὲ πᾶσι τοῖς λόγοις μάρτυρας ποιητὰς ἐπάγονται, οἱ μὲν κακίας πέρι εὐπετείας διδόντες, —
Ὡς τὴν μὲν κακότητα καὶ ἰλαδὸν ἔστιν ἑλέσθαιῬηϊδίως· λείη μὲν ὁδός, μάλα δ' ἐγγύθι ναίει·Τῆς δ' ἀρετῆς ἱδρῶτα θεοὶ προπάροιθεν ἔθηκαν· καί τινα ὁδὸν μακράν τε καὶ ἀνάντη· οἱ δὲ τῆς τῶν θεῶν ὑπ' ἀνθρώπων παραγωγῆς τὸν Ὅμηρον μαρτύρονται, ὅτι καὶ ἐκεῖνος εἶπε,
Στρεπτοὶ δέ τι καὶ θεοὶ αὐτοί·Καὶ τοὺς μὲν θυσίαισι καὶ εὐχωλαῖς ἀγαναῖσινΛοιβῇ τε κνίσῃ τε παρατρωπῶσ' ἄνθρωποιΛισσόμενοι, ὅτι κέν τις ὑπερβήῃ καὶ ἁμάρτῃ· Βίβλων δὲ ὅμαδον παρέχονται Μουσαίου καὶ Ὀρφέως, Σελήνης τε καὶ
Μουσῶν ἐγγόνων, ὥς φασι, καθ' ἃς θυηπολοῦσι, πείθοντες οὐ μόνον ἰδιώτας ἀλλὰ καὶ πόλεις, ὡς ἄρα λύσεις τε καὶ καθαρμοὶ ἀδικημάτων διὰ θυσιῶν καὶ παιδιᾶς ἡδονῶν εἰσὶ μὲν ἔτι ζῶσιν, εἰσὶ δὲ καὶ τελευτήσασιν· ἃς δὴ τελετὰς καλοῦσιν, αἳ τῶν ἐκεῖ κακῶν ἀπολύουσιν ἡμᾶς· μὴ θύσαντας δὲ δεινὰ περιμένει· — "Begging priests and diviners go to the doors of the rich, and persuade them that they possess a power, procured from the gods by sacrifices and incantations, to heal, with pleasures and festivities, any wrong done either by the man himself or by his ancestors; and if he wishes to injure some enemy, at small expense he will be able to harm alike the just and the unjust man, by binding the gods, as they say, with certain spells and enchantments to serve them. For all these claims
they bring forward the poets as witnesses — some, concerning the ease of vice:
'Wickedness, in droves, one may easily choose; smooth is the road, and it lies very near; but before virtue the gods have set toil' — and a road both long and steep.
Others cite Homer as a witness that the gods may be led astray by men, since he too said:
'The gods themselves may be turned aside; men turn them, with sacrifices and gentle vows, with libation and burnt offering, entreating them, when one has transgressed and sinned.'
They stir up, moreover, a great mass of books from Musaeus and Orpheus, who are sprung, as they say, from the Moon and the Muses; by whose precepts they perform their rites; and they persuade not only private individuals but even whole cities that expiations and liberations from crimes are effected, through sacrifices and the festive delights of games, for the benefit of both the living and the dead; which purgations of the departed they call τελεταί [initiations], which, indeed, free men from the punishment of their evil deeds after death; while for those who have not sacrificed, grave penalties await." This superstition, then, as one which brings about the confusion of all duties, and indeed the plague and ruin of the whole of life, the philosopher censures at great length.
IX. Let the reader learn from this that there is scarcely anything new in the contrivances of those who, putting on the mask of religion, either serve the various ἐπιθυμίας [lusts] of the flesh, or gape after wealth, or after dominion over the consciences of blinded men. That the Pharisees among
the Jews — most like these charlatans in wickedness, boldness, and superstition — devised lies twin to theirs, from which to extract an excuse for sin, our most holy Saviour, who is the Way, the Life, and the Truth, has shown, Matthew 5–7. But that the same avarice, the same dishonesty, the same shamelessness, the same twin boldness, are found among the Jesuits, in extenuating, excusing, and expiating the sins and crimes of the most wicked scoundrels, in sharpening and inflaming the minds of men toward vice, and in blunting every prick of conscience, has not long ago been made openly known by one who, in a particular book, has laid bare their mysteries. 2 Let the reader compare what we have adduced from Plato with what that learned man has excerpted from the books of the Jesuits: he will scarcely find one egg more like another than the doctrines of these to the maxims of those charlatans.
X. I shall add yet another instance, which likewise concerns gain and κενοδοξία [vainglory]. Let us take it from the exorcism of demons.
Philostratus, in his Life of Apollonius, book IV, chapter 6, relating a demon cast out of a young man by Apollonius, having set forth the fury and licentiousness of the possessed man, adds: Καὶ οἱ μὲν πολλοὶ τὴν νεότητα σκιρτῶσαν ᾤοντο ἐκφέρειν αὐτὸ ἐς ταῦτα· ὅδ' ὑπεκρίνετο ἄρα τῷ δαίμονι καὶ ἐδόκει παροινεῖν ἃ ἐπαρώνει, τό τε ὁρῶντός τε ἐς αὐτὸν
Ἀπολλωνίου, δεδοικότος τε καὶ ὀργίλου φωνὰς ἠφίει τὸ εἴδωλον ὁπόσαι κλαιομένων τε καὶ στρεβλουμένων εἰσὶν ἀφέξεσθαί τε τοῦ μειρακίου ὤμνυτο, καὶ μηδενὶ ἀνθρώπῳ ἐμπεσεῖσθαι· τοῦ δὲ οἷον δεσπότου πρὸς ἀνδράποδον ποικίλον πανοῦργόν τε καὶ ἀναιδὲς καὶ τὰ τοιαῦτα σὺν ὀργῇ λέγοντος, καὶ κελεύοντος αὐτῷ σὺν τεκμηρίῳ ἀπαλλάττεσθαι· τὸν δεῖνα ἔφη καταβαλὼν ἀνδριάντα, δείξας τινὰ τῶν περὶ τὴν βασίλειον στοὰν πρὸς ᾗ ταῦτα ἐπράττετο· ἐπεὶ δὲ ὁ ἀνδριὰς ἐπεκινήθη πρῶτον, εἶτα ἔπεσε· —
that is: "And most supposed that the luxurious and effeminate character of his youth was the cause of all this. But the young man, under the demon's impulse, was gesticulating, and seemed then to rave, whenever Apollonius fixed his raging gaze upon him. For now uttering the cries of one afraid, now of one enraged, the phantom, with such sounds as those who weep and are tormented make, swore that it would release the young man and enter into no other; but Apollonius used toward it such words as masters use toward slaves, calling it shifty, wicked, and shameless, and commanded it, threateningly and angrily, to depart the young man, giving some sign of its going — namely, to overturn a certain statue, indicating one of those set up in the royal portico, near which these things were being done. When these words were spoken, that statue, at first swaying a little, then fell." Whether these things really happened so, I do not know. Eusebius, against Hierocles, has often caught Philostratus lying flat on his back. But I know that things twin to these are daily done, or feigned, among the fathers of the Society. It is a wonder, too, how greatly they agree with him. You would think you were hearing Menghi, or Thyraeus, or Sprenger speak. But just as this
Apollonius was, above other mortals, so sharp-sighted that he could discern a demon in a drunken youth, when everyone else could see nothing in him but what was to be ascribed to licentiousness and impudence, so it very often happens that the fathers of the Society discern unclean spirits in men
— especially in young men and young women — in whom the rest of mortals, blinder, indeed, than moles, can discern absolutely nothing, except what they judge to be attributable, in some cases to the ravings of the mad, and in others to the tricks of the deceitful. Then, the phantom of Philostratus raged no more at the presence and gaze of the magician Apollonius than is customary for the demons of the Jesuits to rage at the presence, gaze, or
touch of a popish priest. This is taught us, among others, by Edmund the sacrificing priest himself, in his miraculous history of things done in England, about the year 1585 and after: "Scarcely," he says, "had he begun the exorcisms, and laid his hands upon the head, when he" (the Jesuit's young man) "at once began to rage, to be thrown into the air, to struggle with hands and feet, to beat off the priest's hand, to fill everything with cries, oaths, and blasphemous curses" — so that this young man of Philostratus's was plainly no match for him. And in the matter of the reproaches to be hurled at the demon, it will appear quite plainly, if compared to our own men here, that Apollonius was a mere infant.
He called that spirit ποικίλον, πανοῦργον, et ἀναιδή [shifty, cunning, and shameless]. But if one should consult Menghi, Fustis Daemonum, Exorcism
IV, he will easily perceive how paltry these terms are, in comparison with those which he teaches the fathers to use in exorcisms: "Hear," says the priest, "insensate, false, reprobate, master of demons, most wretched creature, tempter of men, deceiver of the wicked angels, deluder of souls, leader of heretics, father of lies, foolish, bestial, witless, drunken one, infernal brigand, most iniquitous serpent, most rapacious wolf, lean, starving, most filthy swine, mangy beast, most savage beast, cruel beast, bloody beast, beast most bestial of all beasts, Acherontine spirit, fuliginous spirit, tartarean spirit." Away with the trifles of Apollonius! Let the demon himself learn to rail from this. It must indeed be an untamed and most stubborn spirit, that is not terrified by such reproaches as these. Without doubt Saint Michael himself did not dare to use such a κρίσει βλασφημίας
[judgement of blasphemy] of this kind, Jude 9. These new masters also imitate the overturning of a statue at the demon's departure — but here they fall shamefully short of Apollonius. For they very rarely proceed further
than the extinguishing of a candle, or the breaking of a window. To overthrow statues is not for every priest. But this art of exorcising demons the Jews received from the Gentiles; and the Papists, from both. Ἤδη μέν τοι οἱ ἐξ ὑμῶν ἐξορκισταὶ τῇ τέχνῃ ὥσπερ καὶ τὰ ἔθνη χρώμενοι ἐξορκίζουσι, καὶ θυμιάμασι, καὶ καταδέσμοις χρῶνται [Already, indeed, your exorcists, using the art just as the gentiles do, exorcise, and employ incense and bindings] — Justin Martyr, in the Dialogue with Trypho:
"Exorcistæ certe vestri jam arte quadam veluti gentes in adjurationibus utuntur, et thymiamata et vincula adhibent" [Your exorcists, indeed, now use a certain art, just as the gentiles do, in their adjurations, and employ incense and bindings].
XI. But we must return to the road from this digression. Through a long succession of years the worship of heaven and of the sun flourished, before it had yet occurred to men to raise up their own kind to the throne of God; nor did it pass unpunished, even among the Greeks themselves, that anyone should blaspheme the Sun as merely πυρὸς ἄθροισμα μέγα [a great mass of fire].
1. The Greek is highly corrupted in the source, making it very hard to decipher.
2. The Provincial Letters, by B. Pascal, 1658, etc.