Against Julian

Saint Cyril of Alexandria · the golden age of the Fathers

Against Julian

Dedication to the Most Pious and Christ-loving Emperor Theodosius The successes of your holy empire are noteworthy, remarkable, and cannot be expressed in words, and the incomparability of your piety, which is like an inheritance come to you from above, you have successfully defended from the arrows of envy, thanks to the skill in all things excellent that you received from your father and also your grandfather, as is obvious in this instance. And I am impelled to apply to your own person the words of our Savior, since he says, “A city set upon a hill cannot be hidden.” For elevated things somehow always have the attribute of being conspicuous. And what could possibly match the height of Your Serenity? Certainly nothing, for the fame of your scepters has advanced to the highest sphere, irradiating the universe with the splendor of lawful order, and causing heaven – that is, the rational powers above in heaven – to rejoice at your clemency and devotion to Christ. For you are admired on both accounts, so much so that, possessing an equal virtue in both domains you have surpassed all manner of acclamation. As a result, the offerings brought by others to you, O Christ-loving Emperor Theodosius, comprise victories, crowns, calls of thanks, and all other means by which people might reasonably honor the mighty deeds of emperors. But as for us whose lot is to offer the divine service, we too were required to bring an offering of our own, in the form of well-composed books in defense of God’s glory.

For establishing that glory has truly always been the focus of your desire and your habits and your many prayers: on the one hand, people who drunkenly rage against it in every possible way are regarded by you as utterly detestable and are designated your worst enemies, while, on the other hand, whoever undertakes to think and to speak in a way that promotes the glory of God you deem worthy of every honor. I would say that this excellence is even saintly and that it is entirely in keeping with the renowned summits that you occupy. For the divine prophet David, singing to Christ, the Savior of all, at one point says, “Did I not hate those who hate you, Lord, and was I not wasting away at your enemies? I hated them with a perfect hatred; they became my enemies.” Now this statement is exceptionally appropriate. For just as someone clearly demonstrates their devotion to you by desiring to oppose those who – I do not know how – have chosen out of sheer stupidity not to love you, so too the authenticity of one’s love for Christ is made manifest by vigorously contending with people who have slan-dered what belongs to him, all but crying out and repeating that statement from the God-breathed scripture, “Being zealous, I was zealous for the Lord.” It is necessary to say what sort of work I am dedicating to you with these words of mine.

Forgive me for undertaking to speak not merely against an emperor, but also on behalf of the glory of Christ, the great Emperor who, with his Father, is joint ruler of the universe, the only one who could properly, and indeed necessarily, say, “Through me emperors rule.” For he too is “the Lord of glory,” both in heaven and upon the earth. Therefore, it necessarily follows that we who take up arms on behalf of the sacred doctrines and who have, of course, been appointed by him to this task, should oppose those intent on injuring his glory by raising up arguments capable of advocating on his behalf, which might also prove beneficial to readers: for those whose hearts are fickle and very easily snatched and carried off to what is inappropriate it will be a most useful protection, but for those who have a firm footing in the faith it will be a sort of staff able to provide the support needed for them to be still more securely established and to keep the tradition of the orthodox faith unshaken. Who then is the one fighting against the glory of Christ? While there have been many who at various times have been dragged down to this level through the devil’s perversity, surpassing them all is Julian, who formerly was renowned in the splendor of imperial office, but was Dedication ignorant of Christ who bestows the empire and the power to rule.

For, before the period of his rule, he was numbered among the believers and was considered worthy even of holy baptism itself and had also been trained in the sacred books. But depraved and superstitious men who became acquainted with him – I do not know how – produced argu-ments in favor of apostasy. Then, taking up arms with Satan for this purpose, they escorted him to the customs of the Greeks and took this man who had been trained in the holy churches and monasteries and turned him into a servant of unclean daemons. For “bad company corrupts good morals,” as the all-wise Paul said. And so I say that those intent on having a secure mindset and guarding the tradition of the orthodox faith like a pearl must not let people intent on practicing superstition sneak into their mind or allow them to speak freely. For it is written, “With the holy you will be holy, with the innocent man you will be innocent, with the chosen one you will be chosen, and with the crooked you will pervert.” Therefore, having a clever tongue, His Excellency Julian sharpened it against Christ, the Savior of us all, and composed three books against the holy gospels and against the pure worship of Christians, with which he is rattling many people and causing no small amount of injury. For fickle and credulous persons are easily falling into his arguments and are becoming fresh prey for the daemons.

And occasionally somehow even those who are firm in the faith are being thrown into confusion. For they suppose that he knew the sacred and divine scriptures since he heaps up numerous testimonies from them for his own arguments, despite the fact that he actually had no idea what he was talking about. have been deceived, by showing that the accuser of Christ, the Savior of us all, has been misled and does not know the divine scriptures. Now I dedicate my words on this subject to your Christ-loving and most holy Highness. May God always protect you in unwavering tranquility, as you overwhelm your enemies and place them all under your feet, and pass on your holy empire to your children’s children, with Christ nodding in assent, through whom and with whom be glory to God the Father with the Holy Spirit unto eternity. Amen. Those wise and sagacious experts in the sacred doctrines marvel at the beauty of the truth and highly regard the ability to understand “a parable and an obscure word, both the sayings of the wise and their obscure utterances.” For by thus focusing their exact and discerning mind on the God-breathed writings, they fill up their souls with the divine light, and by setting their ambition upon achieving an upright and most lawful way of life, they may also become providers to others of the highest assistance.

For it is written, “Son, if you should become wise for yourself, you will be wise also for your neighbor.” But those people who have a perverted heart and a crippled mind, with no share at all in the divine light, rise up against the doctrines of piety and, with exceedingly arrogant tongues, disparage the ineffable glory, and, spewing out insulting words, “they speak injustice up to the height” as sung by David in Psalms. I believe that they acquired this sickness due to the extreme madness and ignorance inherent in them, or rather, to be honest, as a result of a plot of that wicked dragon who is the source of all evil, I mean Satan. And we find additional confirmation of this in the marvelous Paul, who wrote, “Even if our gospel has been concealed, it has been concealed among those who are being destroyed, among whom the god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers to prevent them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.” Indeed, it is not hard to see that the one deemed to be “god of this age” and the plunderer of the glory above has darkened their hearts. For they have undeniably been led astray and they set up over life too many gods to count, both daemons and souls of heroes, as they themselves say and are bent on thinking.

However, the wise shed few tears for those people who choose to keep quiet about things that someone might be ashamed of, and reasonably so. But now this undertaking of theirs is proceeding so far into impiety that they are also seeking to implant into others the sickness of so shameful a superstition. For they are like a group of serpents lying in ambush at an intersection, who cruelly rush upon passers-by, injecting the poison of perdition into people who are easily led astray. And about them it might be said, and appropriately so, “Serpents, brood of vipers, how can you speak good things when you are evil?” And the Lord would not have been far from the truth when he said, “The good person brings forth good things out of the good treasure of his heart, and the evil person brings forth evil things out of the evil treasure of his heart”; and, “from the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” I say this after having read the books of Julian, who brought an intolerable accusation against our pure worship, claiming that we have been deceived and have foolishly departed from the straight and blameless path, and that we are going onto the rocks and render to the God over all a worship that is utterly unwanted by him, since it accords neither with the laws that came through the all-wise Moses, nor with the superstitions of the Greeks – that is, their customs and habits – but instead have invented a kind of intermediate way of life that misses them both.

Now as for my own view, I would say that we have escaped from the Greek stupidity and that a long list of differences separates Christianity from their sophistry. For there is no “fellowship of the light with the darkness,” nor is there any “sharing of the believer with the unbeliever.” And, moreover, when it is the right occasion to exercise our reason on these topics I will try to demonstrate, as far as I can, that in fact we are not at odds with the books of Moses nor do we practice a way of life in opposition to his oracles. But for the moment, I should think we only need say the following. It is true, as the proverb coined by someone goes, that “One is wise from another.” Moreover, it surely should be obvious to everyone that the teaching of the ancients is known by those who came after them, rather than the teaching of those later people being known by their predecessors. Therefore, since the children of the Greeks think highly of their own teachers and suppose they can frighten some people by name-dropping for our benefit the Anaximanders, Empedocleses, Protagorases, and Platos of the world, and adding to this list others who were the inventors of their unholy teachings and were, if I can put it this way, founts of ignorance, come now and let us say that one can see them rising up as though opposing one another with diverse views and bringing forward a defense that is irreconcilable with any aspect of reality.

Then, in addition to this, let us demonstrate that Moses takes the honors for chronological precedence; that he introduced the most unerring and correct view concerning the ineffable and supreme substance; that he has memorialized the best account of the creation of the world; and that he was a remarkable judge who issued laws that lead to piety and justice. Furthermore, let us demonstrate that their so-called “wise men” were born later, being in fact much more recent; that they have stolen what belonged to Moses and woven it together with their own words; and that, even if they haven’t done so altogether soundly, they were thus in the end able to seize upon this respectable view and give the impression of speaking something true. Accordingly, while certain people were born just after Moses, still others flourished later in the days of the holy prophets who came after him. Some of them chose to follow his views and so deserve a better verdict than the rest, despite the fact that they give an explanation of their view of God that is not altogether free from falsehood. Therefore, by scrutinizing the books written accurately by the chroni-clers, we aim to establish clearly that the divinely inspired Moses was older – I mean according to the date of his birth – and that those others came after him, much later in time.

And I should add that prospective readers must not have a dainty appetite when reading the list of names and calculation of dates, but should have an intense thirst for full confidence on each point, which is good and beneficial. 1.G So then, Noah, a man who was especially beloved by God, was in the tenth generation from the first man, that is, Adam. Since there was about to be a flood that would bring utter destruction upon all those who lived upon the earth, the God of the universe commanded this man to construct an ark and to go into it together with his closest relatives and their wives and all kinds of animals, including both those that fly and those that walk upon the ground, and to sail through the flood in this ark. And once it was all over, the entire human race, along with all other living creatures, perished, but he and his household were saved. When the waters had subsided, the ark landed at the mountains of Ararat, that is, in Armenia. And once Noah had again set foot on the ground, he offered sacrifices of thanksgiving. Now, the God-breathed scripture is sufficient for faith, but since some of those superstitious people assert that our books are mere pointless myths that have no persuasive force or truth at all, I will have to mention some of their own historians as well.

I have in mind Alexander Polyhistor and Abydenus. For they too have provided a narrative of these events in their own writings, though it is not entirely free from error and is somewhat strange, inasmuch as they did not have the benefit of the doctrines that lead to piety. Alexander says the following: “When Otiartus died, his son Xisuthrus reigned for eighteen saroi and it was in his reign, they say, that the great flood occurred.” Then he says that Xisuthrus was saved when Cronus told him beforehand what was about to happen and said that it behoved him to build an ark for himself and to sail in it together with birds and beasts and domesticated animals. Furthermore, Abydenus provides a clearer account when he says, After him, others ruled, including Xisuthrus. Cronus told him in advance that there would be a huge amount of rain on the fifteenth of the month of Daisios, and he ordered him to hide at Heliopolis of Sippar any docu-ments in his possession. Once Xisuthrus had fully accomplished this, he set sail to go straight to Armenia and immediately the events foretold by the god overtook him. And on the third day when the rain abated, he released birds as a test to see if they could find any land that had emerged from the water. But with nothing but the wide-open sea waiting for them, the birds did not know where they should land and so returned back to Xisuthrus.

Another release of birds had the same outcome, but when the third attempt was a success – for they returned with their feet covered in mud – the gods removed Xisuthrus from humankind. And the boat stayed in Armenia and supplied the people of that country with wooden amulets possessed of healing properties. Thus these two historians call Noah “Xisuthrus,” possibly because this is how he is known in the language of the Assyrians, but even here they have again fallen short of the truth when they say that “Cronus” delivered this oracle to him instead of saying the God over all did so. This, however, is not surprising given that they had no share in the divine light nor indeed had they beheld the venerable beauty of the truth with the eyes of the mind. So Noah performed sacrifices when he went forth from the ark, and he camped on that spot with his relatives. And there were born to him three sons, and indeed from them came many others and so they became a second beginning of humanity on earth. And at first they lived in close proximity, only in the east, but then they were scattered in all directions when the God over all divided them into a variety of languages. For he had become indignant at their building of a tower. And we will realize no less from their own writings that those persons we just named also have a record of this story.

For this is what Alexander says: Now the Sibyl says that when all humanity spoke the same language, some of them built a tower of enormous size so that they could go up into heaven, but when God blew winds against the tower he overturned it and gave to each person a distinct language. And this is why the city was called Babylon. Here they say those who emerged first, puffed up with conceit by their strength and stature, and, imagining that they were, in fact, far greater than the gods, raised up a gigantic tower in the place where Babylon stands today. And as they were drawing near to heaven, the winds came to the aid of the gods and caused the fabricated structure to collapse around them. The ruins came to be called Babylon. And although up to this point they spoke the same language, they then received from the gods confused speech. Next, once Noah’s descendants had been scattered and time galloped on, Ninus, the son of Arbelus, is said to have been the first notable ruler of the Assyrians. The city of Nineveh is said to be named after him, and its magnificent walls were made by Semiramis who was married to Ninus. Now they say it was when Ninus was administering the kingdom of the Assyrians and Europs the kingdom of the Sicyonians that blessed Abraham is said to have been born.

He was an extremely wise man with wide learning, and was eager to categorize among the most serious of pursuits the duty of knowing the truth and the identity of the Craftsman and Lord of all. For he rejected and pushed far away the views of the Assyrians – I mean those pertaining to the polytheistic error – and was welcomed by God because he supposed that knowing the truth would be enough to bring complete well-being. For he heard, “Go out from your land and from your family and from the house of your father, and go into the land that I will show to you.” As for the manner of life that he and his descendants lived, I will set aside speaking about that for now, since time forces us to turn the discussion to other matters. And skipping the intervening generations, on account of the great number of events and names involved, I will come swiftly to the hierophant Moses himself. For after 425 years had passed since the divine Abraham lived, Moses was born in Egypt while Abraham’s descendants were sojourning there. And when he was still young and had encountered the wisdom of the Egyptians, he came to regard such human concerns as a sort of warm-up exercise for more divine studies. Having traced, then, the time from Abraham to Moses, let us take the latter as a second chronological starting point and count forward from Moses’ birth.

They say that in Moses’ seventh year Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Atlas (Prometheus’ brother) were born, along with the all-seeing Argos. During Moses’ thirty-fifth year, Cecrops, who was nicknamed “two natures,” became the first king in Athens. They say that he was the first person to sacrifice an ox and to name “the highest of the gods” among the Greeks (to use their expression) Zeus. They say that it was in Moses’ sixty-seventh year that Deucalion’s flood occurred in Thessaly, the same time that Phaethon, who the Greeks claim was the son of Helios, was burned up in Ethiopia. In the seventy-fourth year of Moses, Hellen, the so-called son of Deucalion and Pyrrha, gave the Hellenes their name, although they were formerly called “Greeks.” In Moses’ 120th year, Dardanus founded the city called Dardania, while Amyntas reigned over the Assyrians, Sthenelus over the Argives, and Ramses over the Egyptians. And Ramses was also called Aegyptus and was himself the brother of Danaus. In the 160th year after Moses, Cadmus ruled over Thebes, and his daughter was Semele, who gave birth to Dionysus by Zeus, as the Greeks say. Now it was also at that time that the musicians Linus of Thebes and Amphion lived. And at that time Phineas, son of Eleazar, son of Aaron, succeeded to the priesthood among the Hebrews, after Aaron had died of course. They say that the rape of Kore by Hades, king of Molossus, which is sung about among the Greeks, took place in the 195th year after Moses.

Hades is said to have kept an immense dog named Cerberus that he let loose upon Peirithous and Theseus when they came to take away his wife. They say that then, when Peirithous had been destroyed, Heracles, who happened to be present, rescued Theseus, and this is why they tell the myth that he escaped from Hades. In the 290th year, Perseus killed Dionysus, whose tomb they say is in Delphi, next to the golden Apollo. In the 355th year after Moses, Priam ruled after Laomedon. Four hundred and ten years after Moses, Troy was sacked when Heshbon was leading the Hebrews, Agamemnon the Argives, Hophra the Egyptians, and Tautanus the Assyrians. Hence, we can conclude that 410 years passed from the birth of Moses until the fall of Troy. And now consider for me again those people who came next. For I will run through them rapidly, not dwelling on the intervening generations, but rather anchoring our account only to the essential persons. So, in the fifth year after the fall of Troy, Aeneas ruled over the Latins and Demophon, son of Theseus, over the Athenians, while Samson was judge among the Hebrews. Sixty-five years after the fall of Troy, the priest Eli died, as it is written in the first book of the Kings, and foreigners carried away the ark into their own land, at the time when the blessed Samuel, who would eventually anoint Saul as king, was serving as a prophet.

They say that Homer and Hesiod were born 165 years after the fall of Troy, when Labotas was ruling over the Lacedaemonians, Laosthenes over the Assyrians, Alba Silvius over the Latins, and Agelaus over the Corinthians. Two hundred and sixty-eight years after the fall of Troy, Elijah and Elisha were serving as prophets, while Joram administered the kingdom of the Hebrews and Archelaus the kingdom of the Lacedaemonians. Three hundred and sixty-five years after the fall of Troy, Lycurgus was making laws for the Lacedaemonians while Agemon was ruling over the Corinthians and Procas Silvius over the Latins. Three hundred and eighty years after the fall of Troy, Hosea, Amos, Isaiah, and Jonah were serving as prophets. And some say that Hesiod was not a contemporary of Homer but was born at the time that Azariah, who was also called Uzziah, was administering the affairs of the Hebrews, Arbaces those of the Medes, and Procas Silvius those of the Latins. Hence, we can conclude that there were 405 years from the fall of Troy to the first Olympiad, and 815 years from the birth of Moses until the same point, the first Olympiad. In the first Olympiad, the epic poet Arctinus of Miletus is said to have been born, and Romus and Romulus were born when Joatham was ruling over Judea and Pekah over Israel. They say that in the ninth Olympiad the epic poet Eumelus and the Erythraean Sibyl were born.

They say that in the seventeenth Olympiad the Sibyl, whom they also called Herophila, was born. They say that in the twenty-third Olympiad Archilocus was born, while Manasseh was exercising rule over the Jews. They say that in the twenty-ninth Olympiad Hipponax, Simonides, and the musician Aristoxenus were renowned. It is said that in the thirty-fifth Olympiad Thales of Miletus, the son of Examyes and the first natural philosopher, was born, and they say that his life extended until the fifty-eighth Olympiad. In the thirty-sixth Olympiad, the divine Jeremiah was serving as a prophet in Judea, as was also Zephaniah. In the forty-second Olympiad Alcmaeon and Pittacus, who was from Mytilene and was one of the seven sages, were renowned, as too was Stesichorus the poet. And it was at this same time that the blessed Daniel and his companions were born. In the forty-sixth Olympiad Solon issued laws abrogating Draco’s laws except for those concerning homicide. In the forty-ninth Olympiad, while the Jews were in Babylon or in the mountains of the Persians and Medes (for they had become captives), Daniel and Ezekiel were serving as prophets among them. In the fiftieth Olympiad the seven sages and the natural philosopher Anaximander of Miletus were renowned. In the fifty-sixth Olympiad, when Cyrus was exercising rule over the Persians, Haggai and Zechariah were prophesying, while Simonides and Chilon, who belong to the seven sages, were already distinguished.

In the fifty-eighth Olympiad, Theognis became famous as a poet. In the fifty-ninth Olympiad, Ibycus the lyric poet and Pherecydes the historian, along with the tragic poets Phocylides and Xenophanes, were born. In the sixty-second Olympiad, Pythagoras is said to have been born. In the seventieth Olympiad, they say that the natural philosophers Democritus and Anaxagoras were born, together with Heraclitus who was nicknamed “the obscure.” In the seventy-fourth Olympiad Phrynicus and Choerilus and the natural philosophers <around> Diagoras [flourished]. They say that in the eighty-sixth Olympiad Democritus of Abdera was born, along with Empedocles, Hippocrates, Prodicus, Zeno, and Parmenides. They say that in the eighty-eighth Olympiad the comic poets Aristophanes and Eupolis were born, as was also Plato. They say that in the 103rd Olympiad Aristotle, at a very young age, listened to Plato’s lectures. They say that in the 112th Olympiad Alexandria in Egypt was founded in the seventh year of Alexander’s reign. And at that same time the philosophers Anaximenes and Epicurus were born. G They say that in the 124th Olympiad, while Ptolemy Philadelphus was ruling in Egypt, Serapis came to Alexandria from Sinope, and he was the same as Pluto. For this reason, a temple was founded for the statue that the Egyptians, in the local language, call Rhacotis, by which they mean nothing other than Pluto. This is the same reason why they built the shrine near the tombs.

Now the Greeks have a dispute among themselves about the account of Serapis. For some do not think he is Pluto, but rather Osiris, and others say Apis. Hence, since there was much wrangling over this matter – so they say – they erected the statue after settling, as if by unanimous agreement, on the unified expression “Osirapis,” so that both Osiris and Apis could be understood in the same term. And accounts of the death and burial of them both are in circulation. But, over time, the persistent habit of omitting the letters “Osi” caused the image to be named Serapis. Now this Ptolemy, who became one of the most learned people, sent one of his close friends to Judea, carrying a letter to Eleazar who was at that time the priest according to the law. He asked Eleazar to send him all the books of Moses and of the holy prophets, since he was eager to learn from them, and along with them also to send forth persons capable of translating them into the Greek language. And so it was done. In the 194th Olympiad, when Augustus Caesar was ruling over the Romans, our Lord Jesus Christ was begotten according to the flesh. Hence, from the exact record of the times and indeed the genera-tions, how is it not clear to everyone that the divine Moses was older than all the Greek wise men, who instead are youths, almost as if they had only just shown up?

For they were not even born until long after the list of the Olympiads had begun. On this basis, it is, I think, rather easy to see, and would be correct to say, that they did not entirely miss out on Moses’ doctrines nor was it as though they had never heard of the God-given and unadulterated wisdom abiding in him. As a result, from time to time they happen to mutter the truth imperfectly, entwining it with falsehood and mingling the sweetest perfume with filth. For is there any wise teaching worth grasping that isn’t contained in the Mosaic books? And how could anyone not admire his ideas? For those who are well-versed in the finer points of the Greeks’ academic pedantry say that philosophy is divided into contemplative knowledge and practical knowledge, and that, if a person is skilled in both, he goes on to be regarded as someone who successfully practices philosophy. Well then, observe that Moses was just this kind of person. For he theol-ogizes unlike anyone else about the substance above all substances and its incomparable glory and preeminence over all things, and he shows that the one and only God is the Lord and generator of the universe. And if you place a high value on the good and are passionate about the good life, you will see him ordaining exceptional laws that surpass all others and enable people to become especially revered.

But perhaps someone will say, “Alright, so Moses’ books are older even than the Greeks’ wise men. Still, it is not true to say that they can be convicted of stealing or appropriating the wisdom that was in him.” In that case, if our argument seems quite implausible, then let our eager listeners put it to the test. The Greeks’ historians traveled over practically the entire earth in their constant desire to learn something, in order that they might seem learned. For they considered it a crowning feature of their own writing not to pass over in silence any past event. How, then, could people who were so accustomed to seeking out knowledge have neglected the necessary task of investigating such a venerable history and such an exact explanation of the most time-honored doctrines and laws? In fact, Pythagoras of Samos and Thales the Milesian spent no small amount of time in Egypt gathering together Egyptian sources and, it is said, making a collection of their teachings, before bringing these back to their own country. And, indeed, Plato himself, the son of Ariston, also says in the Timaeus that Solon the Athenian went to Egypt and heard one of the false prophets, or rather priests, there saying, “O Solon, Solon, you Greeks are always children, and there is no such thing as a Greek old man; […] you are all youths at heart.

For you have among you not a single ancient view or any teaching that has grown old with time; […] but this has escaped your notice because over the course of many genera-tions people died without being able to express themselves in writing.” Nevertheless, I think the following observation should also enable anyone to realize that Christianity is notable for its antiquity. For there was not yet even knowledge of writing among the Greeks when Moses’ books had already been written, since Cadmus had only just brought over the alphabet to them from the Phoenicians. Nevertheless, Solon, the inventor of the Athenian laws, and indeed also Plato himself, who had both gone to Egypt to give themselves the appearance of knowing more than other people, no doubt also marveled at Moses’ books. And one may see from their actual writings that the Greek historians were extremely well acquainted with Moses. For Polemon, in the first book of his Greek Histories, mentioned him, as does also Ptolemy of Mendes and indeed also Hellanicus, Philochorus, Castor, and others besides these. And Diodorus, having investigated Egyptian matters, claims that he heard information about Moses from the wise men in Egypt and has written word-for-word as follows: For after the establishment of settled life in Egypt in ancient times, which according to the myths occurred in the period of gods and heroes, they say that the first person to persuade the multitudes to use written laws was a man who was great in soul and who was, of those memorialized among the Jews, the most innovative in his way of life, namely Moses, who was called “god.”

For since they observed with wonder that Moses was full of every virtue, they even called him “god,” which, I believe, is a way some of those in Egypt show honor. Or perhaps they had noticed what was said to him by the God over all, “Behold, I have made you a god to Pharaoh.” So then, as for the topic of antiquity, I believe that we have devel-oped a sufficient argument, containing clear and unimpeachable proof, which demonstrates that Moses’ books go back earlier than the wisdom honored among the Greeks and contain the older view. That done, I now think we must examine the view the Hebrews held about God and about the origin, or rather fashioning, of the world, and must then make clear for our readers the views taken up by the wise men of the Greeks. For in those areas in which they are in harmony with the words of the God-breathed scripture, one will see that the Greeks outdo themselves and agree with one another. But in those areas in which each of them gives an explanation of his own inventions, it’s all too easy to show that they disagree with one another and are drunk with strange views. For it would by no means be possible [for them] to perceive matters surpassing our mind and innate rationality, without the God who rules everything infusing [their] mind with light, giving birth to an interior wisdom, extending [their] faculty of speech, and allowing them as far as possible to understand and express some aspect of the ineffable realities about him.

But such a grace would not come upon everyone indiscriminately, but rather only upon those who have transcended the passions of the flesh and are free from earthly impurity, who are mentally sound and experts in the virtuous deeds that lead to piety. The God of the universe incites us to this end when he says through the voice of David, “Be still and know that I am God,” and indeed our Lord Jesus Christ also says, “Blessed are the pure in heart, because they will see God.” Now the nature that is above all would be seen not by the eyes of the body, but by the inner, hidden eyes of the mind, which focuses its subtle and precise curiosity on him and takes in the rays of the vision of God through imagery transcending sense-perception. Hence, the people who were born from Adam until Noah revered one God, he who was by nature and in truth the fashioner of the universe and its Lord. For none of them were accused of inclining towards other gods or ascribing worship to unclean daemons. But after the flood, the building of the tower, and the differentiation of languages, the very view of God held by those scattered throughout all the earth also came to be irreconcilable. For once they had withdrawn the mind from the truth and anchored it on the shores of fleeting and earthly affairs and bodily pleasures, they departed into every kind of the worst absurdities and they parcelled out among themselves, so to speak, the crimes of the polytheistic error.

Thus, while some surmised that the sky is god, others said the same about the sun and moon, in addition to the stars and the elementary principles of the world – fire, water, air, and earth, out of which each particular thing is said to have been constructed. And still others slid even further towards the ultimate stupidity and got lost in such vulgarity of reasoning that they built up temples and sacred precincts, lavishing upon them the costliest materials, and set in them statues and monu-ments to humans, weeping over those who had died and regarding them as gods, even daring to honor them with drink offerings and sacrifices. There are, therefore, a great many people who go through life ascribing to the elementary principles of the world the glory that is due to God alone. But this indictment applies to the Chaldeans more than all the rest: on the one hand they calculate the movement of the stars with the greatest curiosity, and on the other hand they make the flights of birds a pretext for divination. But, as I said already, the divine Abraham did not adhere to their stupid ideas. For he deplored their proclivity for regarding God’s supreme nature, which transcends everything, as one of those visible things that are subject to sense, and he indeed did not fall short of the truth by confining the divine nature to the creaturely realm.

Rather he restored it to its lofty place and placed it above everything called into existence and thus he understandably became something of a marvel. It was for this very reason that he was received by God. For the one whom he was seeking eventually made himself known to him. Therefore, let us see what sort of view our forefather Abraham appears to have held, and then which of those figures who came after him will be able to clarify his characteristic faith and view. Now it seems to me that Moses could fulfil this purpose for us, since he descended from him and thought it fitting to adopt for himself the exact same ideas that he knew Abraham had held, passing these down in writing. Consequently, in composing the book of Genesis, he said that after certain persons had ravaged the forces of Sodom, they then took Lot and several others captive and rejoiced that they had been victorious. But their hope was foiled when Abraham orchestrated a surprise attack and took them by force, and then released all those who had been captured. And when he returned “from the slaughter of the five kings” (for so it is written), Chodollogomor, the king of Sodom begged him, saying, “Give me the men, and take the cavalry for yourself.” Now Abraham refused to make the losses of someone else a recompense for his acts of courage, so he swore an oath not to take the goods, saying, “I will stretch forth my hand to the Most High, who has created the heaven and the earth, if I shall take from all your goods from a small cord to a sandal strap, lest you should say, ‘I have made Abraham rich.’”

And the “king of Salem,” that is Melchizedek, also honored him as the victor. For he blessed him with these words, “Blessed be Abraham by God Most High, who created the heaven and the earth, and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies to you as your subjects.” And when Abraham sent one of his close associates or rather one of his most loyal servants into Mesopotamia and commanded him to bring back a bride for Isaac, he said, “I adjure [you] by the God of heaven and the God of earth.” Therefore, the divine Abraham knew the one and only God, clearly confessed that he exists, and called him “Most High” and the generator of the universe, including things in heaven and things on earth. Now surely the quality of being “high” is not something sensible, nor indeed is it understood as denoting a particular place or anything that one could take in a corporeal sense. Instead, it is understood as indi-cating that he is set over everything, in a manner befitting the deity, and that he has created both those things in the heavens and those things on the earth and even the firmament itself and of course the earth, I mean the very element of earth. And if everything has come to be by him, then he must undoubtedly also be other than everything else, and other according to nature, since he is neither created nor has he come into existence from non-existent things, but is rather uncreated, eternal, older than all time, and the first cause of the universe.

Therefore, as I said a moment ago, the divine Abraham clearly knew that God is one and used to offer to him alone pure and undefiled worship. But when time had sharpened his mind, leading to his advancement in correct understanding, it was then, yes then, that he received more subtle theological instruction. For he learned not only that there is one God, and none other besides him, but was also taught, still in types and practically medi-ated by the senses, that the fullness of the one unmixed nature is understood as denoting the holy and consubstantial Trinity. And why is that? Because to those only recently called “to knowledge of truth,” who don’t possess a mind well acquainted with contemplative knowledge, the “light” of the vision of God seems, and in fact really is, somehow “unapproachable.” For this kind of knowledge requires a mind firmly established, disciplined by training, one that knows how to look with keen sight, and, in addition to all this, has first of all made faith its companion. For it is the bedrock and unshakeable foundation of theology. And the prophet Isaiah confirms this point for us when he says, “If you do not believe, neither shall you understand.” Now how could anyone doubt that instruction through riddles is altogether necessary for people who are first encountering such subtle concepts, concepts that have, as it were, been filed down to an elegant polish (that is, concepts about God), when even the wise men of the Greeks were not ignorant of this requirement?

Porphyry, who has a noble reputation among them for his worldly learning, says in the first book of his Philosophical History something like this about the so-called “wise men,” or better put, those who have a reputation for thinking that they are wise: For, he says, because they [i.e., the Pythagoreans] were not able to express clearly in language the first forms and the first principles due to the difficulty of understanding and explaining them, they had recourse to numbers on account of the clarity of this form of instruction, thereby imitating the geometricians and the teachers of grammar. For when the latter are intending to convey the functions of sounds and the sounds themselves, they use letter forms, asserting in an initial lesson that these letter forms are the sounds. Later, however, they teach that these letter forms are not sounds, but that through them a conception of the true sounds arises. As for the geometricians, because they are not able to set forth incorporeal forms in language, they have recourse to diagrams of shapes and say, “This is a triangle.” However, they do not mean that the triangle is the one that falls before the eyes. Rather, by setting forth a diagram that can be seen, they present the idea of the triangle. So the Pythagoreans did the same with respect to first principles and forms. Because they could not express the incorporeal forms and first principles in language, they had recourse to an explanation relying on numbers.

In this way they spoke of “the one,” referring thereby to the rational principle of unity, to the rational principle of identity and of equality, and to the cause of the common animation and interconnected-ness of the universe and of the preservation of that which is invariably in the same state. G Accordingly, because the distinct and exceptional properties of the deity are “difficult to explain” and hard to expound, since they are not amenable to observation, and because whatever words one might use in talking about it would turn out to be altogether insignificant and would fall short of the divine dignity, we learn about it through more palpable “forms” and types, as “in a mirror and in a riddle.” We maintain that it was in this way that the divine Abraham received instruction. For so it is written about him: “And God appeared to him at the oak of Mamre, while he was sitting at the door of his tent in the middle of the day. And looking up with his eyes he saw, and behold three men stood over him. And when he saw them, he ran forward from his tent door to meet them and prostrated himself on the ground, and said, ‘Lord, if I have found favor before you, do not pass by your servant.’” And a little further on it says, “He said to him, ‘Where is Sarah your wife?’

And he answered and said, ‘Behold in the tent.’ And he said, ‘I will return and come to you at this time next year and Sarah your wife will have a son.’” Notice how with exceptional clarity it says “God appeared to him,” yet there were “three men” that he saw, and, as he was running towards them, the divine Abraham did not say, as though he were speaking to three men, “Lords, if I have found favor before you, do not pass by your servant.” Rather, calling the three men “Lord” in the singular, he thought it right that the three men should be coming down to him as one, since the three of them, being one, were also speaking as though from a single person: “Where is Sarah your wife?” and “I will return and come at this time next year.” Observe, therefore, that there were three persons who appeared to Abraham and each one individually subsisted, yet by the principle of consubstantiality they were gathered together into one and were careful to conduct the dialogue in these terms. Now the images of such matters are to some degree vague and fall far short of the truth, even though they are necessary as a guide, I mean as a guide concerning matters surpassing mind and reason. Nevertheless, the light of the divine vision enters into the purest of minds, and we somehow fly up from sensible things to realities higher than the senses which transcend the power of our innate rationality.

For everyone agrees that there is one divine nature that is “over all and through all and in all,” but that it is expanded conceptually into a holy triad that is sacred and consubstantial – I mean the Father, and of course also the Son and the Holy Spirit. But even if each one of those named also subsists individually, being in truth what it is also said to be, still the principle of consubstantiality gathers them together into an undifferentiated nature. For the Son has been born from the Father and is in him and from him by nature, and the Spirit also proceeds, existing as God the Father’s own Spirit, and likewise the Son’s. For, through the Spirit, God the Father sanctifies that which has been naturally disposed to be sanctified. So, then, our forefather Abraham was not unaware that the Craftsman of the earth and heaven and the universe, whose might holds sway in all domains, is the one worshipped in the holy Trinity. Now those descended from him, I mean Isaac and Jacob, didn’t think any differently, but followed in the footsteps of their father’s virtue and so became emulators of his faith. The blessed Moses, for example, while telling us their story in his book about the creation, says the God of the universe appeared to Jacob, and that he made him feel certain of his good prospects by saying, “I am the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac.”

And Jacob himself also promised, saying, “If the Lord gives me bread to eat and clothes to wear … then the Lord will be God for me.” Now this is enough about them, but I also think I must finally turn the discussion to the divine Moses himself. For he too proclaims one who is truly God by nature and was not unaware of the one through whom all things have been brought into existence – I mean his living and subsistent Word – nor of the life-giving Spirit who is in God and from him, and who is sent through the Son to creation. For he said, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” After making him known with this statement as the generator of the universe, in a rather summary and brief manner, he goes on to elaborate the account and has shown that everything that previously did not exist was brought into existence through the living Word of the God who rules over all and is also given life in the Spirit. For he says, “God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and light came into existence. […] Let there be a firmament in the midst of the water […]’ and thus it came into existence.” And anyone can see that, for every created thing, the Father says, “Let this or that particular thing exist,” and brings into existence through the Word the very thing that he intended, without any delay.

“For the Word of God is living and active,” and if he should give a mere assenting nod, what he has decided exists. Moreover, he said, “The earth was invisible and unformed, and darkness was upon the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the water.” Hence, he quite clearly mentions the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And in other ways too he proclaims the one natural and true divinity in the holy and consubstantial Trinity. For when he released fire upon the Sodomites who had committed intolerable offenses, it says, “The Lord rained down fire and brimstone from the Lord upon Sodom.” But, I should, I think, introduce into the discussion the following point that would be most especially beneficial for readers. About the fashioning of humanity it has been written as follows, “And God said, ‘Let us make humanity according to our image and according to our likeness.” Then a little further on he continues, saying, “And God made humanity; according to the image of God he made it.” For the Son is the “image” of God the Father, after whom we too have been modelled in an intellectual sense, and the nature of humanity has been enriched with this special privilege. For the beauty of the Craftsman flashes like lightning within it. What then would those people say who oppose our arguments and feign piety by confessing that there is only one God, but not that he has begotten the Son from himself?

To whom did God say, “Let us make humanity according to our image and according to our likeness”? Wouldn’t anyone reckon that it is the holy and consubstantial Trinity who speaks to itself about these matters, seeing how the all-wise Moses wanted to show that the formation of humankind didn’t occur without reflection on God’s part, and was practically honored with prior deliberation? For although the uncompounded divine Intellect would not need examination, doubt, and inquiry about anything whatsoever – since as soon as something has been willed, that thing also exists, correctly and free from fault – nevertheless, as I said, the nature of humankind has been honored with a kind of prior deliberation. Now certainly we should not pass over in silence the arguments of the atheists. For in response to this they would probably reply straightaway, “For the Father has not, as you suppose and deem to be the right view, spoken to his own Word and to the Spirit. Rather, he has spoken to the secondary, inferior gods who are with him.” Yet how is it not clear to everyone that even those accustomed to practice Greek philosophy thought it best to confess that there is one God, the Craftsman of the universe who is by nature beyond all things, and that any other “gods” (to use their expression), both intelligible and sensible, were made and brought into existence by him?

Plato, for example, says quite clearly, Therefore, first of all, in my view, we must make a distinction: what is that which always exists and has no becoming, and what is that which becomes and never exists? Now one of these is that which can be apprehended by knowledge and with reason, which always exists in the same state, and again the other is that which one forms an opinion about using the unreasonable senses, which comes into being and passes away, and never exists. Now with the phrase “that which always exists and has no becoming” he names the highest nature that is too great to have been made – I mean the God of the universe who truly exists. For he himself says the following at one point to the hierophant Moses, “I am the one who exists.” As for “that which is becoming and never exists,” by this phrase he means that which has been brought into existence from a state of nonexistence by a certain inexpressible and incomprehensible power of the God who fashions our whole universe. It is, therefore, settled that I have quite clearly demonstrated, not only from our own sacred writings but also using what they themselves have come to think and to say, that everything has been brought into existence by God and that he himself has been allotted a nature that isn’t shared with those things that he made.

For that which has been created is situated lower than the creator and is naturally inferior in every way to him. If this is the account we follow on that topic, what then do those people say who suspect that the God of the universe said to other gods, “Let us make humanity according to our image and according to our likeness”? For if he wanted to mold the rational animal on earth in the image of the creatures, why would he introduce his own person along with them, saying “Let us make” and “according to our image”? But if, on the other hand, he considered it necessary to shape it according to the most divine beauty that is his alone, why then does he allow others to be imitated as well, or take their form into account – or whatever the right expression would be to describe such things? For an identity of nature and of excellence and of dignity would never be ascribed to the Craftsman and the creation, the generated and the ungenerated nature, the incorruptible and what is subject to corruption, assuming we are correct in saying that that which is understood in the category of “becoming” is unavoidably and invariably bound also to be liable to corruption. For the divine Moses, peering into the future by the Holy Spirit’s mystagogical revelations, took account of our circumstances, and how he did so I will now explain.

For since the one, ineffable, and incomprehensible nature of God is understood in the Father and in the Son and in the Holy Spirit, that is, in the consubstantial Trinity, he ensured that no one whose extreme folly had led him to improper notions might say that humankind has been made “according to the image” and “according to the likeness” of God the Father, but not also that of the Son – and of course it was also likely that someone would conjecture and assert the inverse, that humankind was made “according to the likeness” of the Son, but not also that of the Father. To avoid this, Moses, perceiving in advance, as I said, that contrived arguments would at some point arise among certain individuals, said that the holy Trinity said to itself, “Let us make humanity according to our image and according to our likeness,” in order that [humankind] might be understood as modelled according to the entire ineffable nature of the divinity, in an intellectual sense that is. And yet those who fancy themselves exceedingly clever think that these things are idle nonsense leading nowhere and, finding the light of the truth unapproachable due to their sheer stupidity, they doggedly maintain that he perhaps makes this statement to certain illegitimate gods who are falsely so called. Yet would it not be right to suppose that the one who by nature is Craftsman would not have graced the nature of created things with the preeminent honor of his own glory and excellence?

And by no means do we say that this is because he was envious – why would he be?! – but because the nature of things made could never attain the excellence of the divine honors, nor, it seems to me, could it be enriched, in its essence, with any of those properties that naturally adhere solely and specifically to the ineffable nature. There is another reason why it is absurd to think that the Emperor and Lord of the universe said to other gods, “Let us make humanity according to our image and according to our likeness.” For what could possibly have happened to him to make him take certain beings as coworkers or assistants, as it were, solely for the formation of humankind, while casually improvising all the rest of the creation, I mean angels and dominions, rulers, authorities, intellectual powers, as well as heaven and earth, the sun and moon, stars and light, and, in brief, everything that is in the heavens and on the earth? Would someone say that, as though suffering impotence or not having enough energy for this, he allows helpers to join him? But if some people choose to think in this way, would it not entail an accusation of extreme stupidity against them? For the divine is all-powerful and sufficient in itself for anything whatsoever and nothing is impossible for it. Therefore, leaving behind the nonsense in these ideas, let us proceed to the alternative view, namely the necessary confession that the fullness of the ineffable deity is understood in the holy and consubstantial Trinity.

And we ourselves have been formed according to the true and most exact image of the Father, that is, the Son, and his divine beauty is intimated in our souls through participation in the Holy Spirit. For he too is in us, like the Son himself. For “the Spirit is the truth,” according to scripture. This is how the all-wise Moses has truly initiated us into these mysteries, and the holy prophets who came after him, along with the apostles and evangelists, did not differ from his thinking on these topics. Rather, one and the same mode of theology is evident in them all, and one would find that they are not at odds with one another on any point at all. For with a true inspiration they speak words from one Holy Spirit. And our Lord Jesus Christ himself does not leave us in any doubt about this matter, since he says with utmost clarity, “It is not you who are speaking, but the Spirit of your Father who is speaking in you.” Hence, possessing an authentic view of God which has come down to us from above and from the holy fathers, we take pride in it. And we are not accustomed to forfeit it to those from the blood of Israel, as if it belonged to them instead – far from it! Rather, we count ourselves too among the children of Abraham.

For we ourselves are his sons according to the promise. And Paul also will convince us of this, since he writes, “For not all those who are from Israel are Israel, nor are they Abraham’s children because they are his offspring. […] Rather, the children of the promise are regarded as Abraham’s offspring.” It would not be difficult to add a great many other things to what has been said about both our pure worship and the blameless view we hold concerning the God who rules over all. But since the principle of artful design demands that we assign the various insights to their appropriate time and place, I will pass over those things for now and instead direct my attention to the required discussion of Greek sources, poring over their books and making an exact examination of the view of each of them. Now they say that Orpheus, son of Oeagrus, was the most superstitious person of them all and came before Homer’s poetry, naturally enough since he was also chronologically older, and that he wove songs and hymns for the gods who are falsely so-called, for which he won no ordinary reputation. Then condemning his own doctrines and realizing that he nearly left the highway and had lost the straight path, he converted to what was better and chose the truth over falsehood. He says the following about God: I will speak to those to whom it is lawful.

All you who are profane, shut the doors. Now listen, offspring of the light-bringing Memory, O Musaeus. For I will utter true things. Let not the former impressions in your breast deprive you of cherished life. Look to the divine account and apply yourself to it, guiding aright the intellectual hollow of your heart. Tread well upon the path and look upon the only Master of the universe. […] There is one, self-generated. All things are sprung from him, and he is superior to them. Nor does any mortal being look upon him, though he himself sees everyone. And again, a little further on, [he says], For he is firmly established in the brazen heaven, on a golden throne. With his feet he is planted upon the earth, and, as far as the boundary of Oceanus, his right hand on all sides he has stretched out. For the high mountains tremble along with the rivers and the depths of the hoary blue sea. So then, God, who is through all and over all, he calls “one” and “self-born,” saying that, while he has heaven as a throne, the earth lies under his feet – intending, I think, by this to signify the infinity of his uncompounded nature and the fact that it extends throughout all things and fills all things. And the fact that it grasps the universe is indicated by his hand stretching out to the very boundaries of Oceanus while mountains and sea, and basically the whole cosmos, tremble.

For as the God-breathed scripture says, “All the earth calls upon the truth, and heaven blesses it, and all his works shake and tremble.” So this is what Orpheus has to say about these matters. 1.G But as for Homer, the best of the poets, someone would, I think, say he differed little from those dancers on stage. For, on the one hand, such persons, according to those fond of shows, are accustomed to portray the natures of things by their poses and nods and seem nearly to make the things themselves all but present to those watching. And Homer’s practice, on the other hand, is to make into gods both virtues and vices as well as the parts of the universe and even the very nature of the elements. For example, he says the gods formerly opposed one another at Ilion, and he relates clearly and in detail who faces off against whom: Now indeed opposite Lord Poseidon Phoebus Apollo took his stand, with his winged arrows, Gray-eyed goddess Athena countered warlike [Ares]; The goddess of the golden spindle stood opposite Hera, clattering with her pouring arrows, Artemis, the sister of the far-shooter [Apollo]; Hermes, stout and quick to help, stood opposite Leto; The great river [Xanthus] with its deep eddies countered Hephaestus. Observe how obviously keen he is in this passage to depict the virtues in a sense rising up in opposition to the vices.

For while the Greek poets are accustomed to call Ares foolish, enraged, and even “double-faced,” Athena they call most cunning and wily, and similarly they surmise that Leto is forgetfulness and Hermes memory and reason. He then touches upon natural philosophy, and explains the distinction among the elements when he says, Now indeed opposite Lord Poseidon Phoebus Apollo took his stand, with his winged arrows […] The goddess of the golden spindle stood opposite Hera, clattering […] The great river [Xanthus] with its deep eddies countered Hephaestus. For it seems to me that here he calls the watery substance “Poseidon,” the sun “Apollo,” the air “Hera,” the moon the “goddess of the golden spindle, clattering,” and fire “Hephaestus,” while he regards the “river” as standing in for the cold. Nonetheless, even if Homer displays excessive fondness for myths, still we will not find him completely ignorant of the truth. For at one point he also says, […] Not even if God himself were to promise, Stripping away my old age, to make me a young man in my prime. For he does not anywhere say, “Even if a certain one of the gods should promise me deliverance from old age, and the recovery of youth,” but he has instead confined the matter to the only God over all, attributing to his powers alone the ability to accomplish everything effortlessly, even what is beyond hope and human reason.

He says “not even if God himself were to promise,” and “God himself” wouldn’t signify one of the gods fabricated in myths, but instead he who is the only true God. But, while Homer saw fit to think and to speak in this manner, let us now go on also to those haughty and supercilious persons, who have obtained no lowly reputation among the children of the Greeks for thinking that they are wise. Now Porphyry, who has rained down nasty statements upon us and practically dances in triumph upon the Christians’ worship, says that the so-called “wise men,” who were seven in number, snatched this title for themselves on the following pretext (as he writes in the first book of his Philosophical History): Although there were nine, seven came to be called “wise men” for the following reason. When a fisherman was selling his catch of fish to some young men, it came to pass that a golden tripod was discovered in his net. And when the fisherman said he had sold the fish but not the tripod and the young men attributed the discovery to their good fortune, they chose to leave the decision up to the god. And when the god responded with an oracle telling them to give the tripod to the wise man, the tripod was offered to Thales first, but he handed it off to Bias, saying he was the wise man.

And he sent it to another and that one to another, until, after the tripod had been passed around to seven [of them] and then returned again to the first person, they decided to dedicate it to the god, since he was the wisest of them all. What sort of views these people held we will discuss when the time is right. For Thales the Milesian says that God is an Intellect of the cosmos, while Democritus of Abdera agrees with him in one respect, but adds still something else. For he himself also confidently maintains that God is Intellect, but in a fiery sphere, and that God is the soul of the cosmos. Meanwhile Anaximander takes a completely different path, defining God as the infinite cosmoses, whatever that means.

1. But the person who has the most formidable and marvelous gift for testing ideas – I mean Aristotle the Stagirite, the disciple of Plato – calls God the separable form, and contends that he is mounted upon the sphere of the universe. Yet again those called “Stoics” say that God is a designing fire that makes its way for the purpose of generating the cosmos. The views of these people have been recounted by Plutarch and other elite ranks among the Greeks, along with that man who arrogantly opposes us, Porphyry. Do they not, therefore, disagree with one another? And, as for men drunk with such diverse views, do they not reveal themselves to be those who merely guess at random rather than people who can discern the truth? Yet if they had true and unwavering knowledge, they ought not to have opposed each other’s ideas in any way whatsoever, just as one can, of course, see is the case with respect to us. But I suspect someone will respond to this by saying, “What are you saying, my fine fellow? For are there not many sects also among you yourselves, with certain people splitting themselves off so as to think and speak differently?” Nevertheless, good sir – I would say – those in the beginning who were our first teachers in the holy doctrines all agree with one another, and those in between and those who came last, agree with those who were first.

For it is not the case that Moses thought one thing, while those after him issued teachings that are at odds with his ideas. Rather, as I have said, there is a single account of God espoused by all of them, up to and including the holy apostles and evangelists.

1. For they all confess that there is one God who is “over all and through all and in all,” who has no beginning and is eternal, unbegotten, incorruptible, life and life-giving, maker of heaven and earth and, in short, of all that is in them. But if some of those who came after them did not understand what they had said and utterly missed the truth, then according to the right line of reasoning, the accusation of being mistaken will apply not to the former people, but to these latter ones. Therefore, if the originators of their innate stupidity and instructors of unholy doctrines agree with one another’s views, let them prove it and then I will concede. But if their earliest representatives themselves differ from one another and hold divergent views, how is it not clear to everyone that they deviate from the straight and beaten track and have gotten lost? For if someone should want to learn very well the correct and genuine theology about the God who is beyond all things, whose view should he accept so as not to miss the mark? For Thales and Anaximander and the others we have just mentioned can be caught spouting random nonsense. But Pythagoras and Plato, having spent time in Egypt and encountering many people there, inasmuch as the two of them were the greatest lovers of learning and inquiry, were not unaware of Moses’ virtue.

For the facts about Moses were regarded by the Egyptians with no small degree of wonder. I think it was from there that they gained a thorough understanding of this theology with all due sophistication, and thereby came to hold views about God that are in some sense more reasonable than the others and indeed decided to conduct their thinking accordingly. And we will find also among the Athenians some who have agreed with what they took to be right. I think I must honor with mention and remembrance the Egyptian Hermes, the one they say is actually called “Thrice-Greatest,” since the people at that time honored him <as a god>129 and, according to the opinion of some, compared him to the son who legend has it was born from Zeus and Maia. So, then, this Hermes from Egypt, despite being a priest and always sitting in the temples full of idols, is found to have had the same ideas as Moses – even if not correct and blameless in every way, still at least in part. For he too has derived benefit from Moses. Someone at Athens who composed the fifteen books called Hermaica has also made mention of him in his writings. For he writes the following about him in the first book, and has introduced one of the priests saying, Therefore, so that we may start our discussion over again on equal footing, have you really not heard that our Hermes also divided the entire land of Egypt into lots and portions, measuring out the land by acre, and has cut ditches for irrigation?

And that he established the nomes and has named the regions after them, and that he established contractual obligations? And that he recently produced a catalogue of the stars’ ascendance and cut plants [for medicine], and, that he discovered and transmitted [the art] having to do with numbers, calculations, and geometry, as well as astronomy, astrology, music, and grammar? I will accordingly narrate the views of each of these people, and I will recall others as well who obtained a remarkable name among them for their learning. I should add that those about to read the following need to attend to their writings with the greatest love of learning instead of becoming quickly sated and bored. Pythagoras, for example, says, God is one, and he is not as some suppose, outside the universal order, but is in it, wholly present in the whole sphere, watching over all generations, being a mixture of the entirety of the ages and the administrator of his own powers and works, first principle of all things, giver of light in the sky and father of all, intellect and animation of the universe, the motion of all the spheres. Observe that he clearly says the God of the universe is “one” and “first principle of all things” and one who actualizes “his own powers,” and, moreover, that he is “the giver of light,” “the animation (that is, the life-giving process) of the universe,” and “the motion of all the spheres.”

For nothing is self-moved, but all things have been produced by him and have clearly received from him the movement from nonexistence into existence. Furthermore, Plato somewhere utters the following: It is difficult to discover the father and maker of this universe. To express him to everyone on finding him – impossible. He is quite correct. For, “The glory of the Lord conceals verbal expression,” as it is written, and all talk about him is feeble and falls short of his dignity. For he is beyond every concept, and when it comes to matters pertaining to him we see “through a mirror” and “in a riddle,” as the all-wise Paul says. Moreover, Porphyry says in the fourth book of his Philosophical History that Plato held the view – and, moreover, expressly said about the one God – that no name is suitable for him, nor can human knowledge comprehend him, but rather it predicates of him names that are used of lesser beings, although in an inexact sense: And if one really must be so bold as to say something about him using the words in use among us, then the names “One” and “Good” should especially be applied to him. For the former indicates his simplicity and the self-sufficiency that results from it. For he needs nothing – no parts, no substance, no powers, no activities – but is the cause of all these things.

The name “Good,” on the other hand, shows that everything that is good is from him, while other things – if one must say so – imitate this attribute of his, insofar as they are able, and are preserved through it. Moreover, Hermes the Thrice-Greatest says something like the following: To understand God is difficult, and, even for the one who can understand him, to speak about him is impossible. For it is impossible for the corporeal to signify what is incorporeal; it is not possible for the imperfect to grasp the perfect; and it is difficult for the eternal to associate with the ephemeral. For the one always exists but the other passes away; and the one is true but the other is overshadowed by appearance. Therefore, to the degree that what is weaker differs from the stronger and the lesser from the greater, so also does the mortal differ from the divine and immortal […] Therefore, if there is some incorporeal eye, let it leave the body for the vision of the beautiful and let it fly and be raised aloft seeking to behold, not a shape or a body or forms, but rather that maker of these things, the silence, the calm, the stability, the unchangeable, the Everything and Alone, the One, that which is from itself, that which is in itself, that which is like itself, which is neither similar to anything else nor dissimilar to itself.

And again Hermes says, Therefore, any time you are reflecting on him who is the One and only Good you should say that nothing is impossible for him since he is absolute power. You should not imagine that he is in anything, nor again that he is outside of anything. For being limitless, he is the limit of everything, and, being encompassed by nothing, he encompasses everything. What then is the difference between bodies and the incorporeal, between gener-ated beings and the ungenerated, between beings subject to necessity and one with self-determination? Or the difference between the earthly and the heavenly, between the corruptible and the eternal? Is it not that one possesses self-determination while the other is subject to necessity? […] And that things below, being imperfect, are corruptible? Yet Sophocles too says the following about God, There is one God, in truth, one, who made heaven and the vast earth, the blue swell of the sea and the mighty winds. Many of us mortals, being led astray in our heart, have erected as consolation for our miseries statues of gods made of stone and wood or carved images in gold or ivory, and we suppose that we are being pious by making sacrifices and empty festivals for them. And indeed the most wise Xenophon also says, The one who shakes everything while remaining at rest is perceived as a great and powerful being.

But what sort of form he has is uncertain. Neither does the sun, which appears to shine upon all, seem to permit itself to be seen, but if someone should recklessly gaze upon it, he destroys his sight. Therefore, the fact that there is truly one God according to nature, who transcends all thought and language, who is incomprehensible, formless, the giver of life and the origin of all, who is unbegotten, incorruptible, and the generator of the universe is plainly attested both by the God-breathed scripture and by the statements from their own poets and writers. But that they also knew the Son begotten from him according to nature, who is his creative Word, we shall now demonstrate through their writings, adducing the passages relevant to this topic. Take, for example, what Porphyry says in the fourth book of his Philosophical History, with Plato speaking about the Good as follows: From this one [i.e., the Good], by some process inconceivable to humans there arises the Intellect that subsists entirely in itself, in which really existing things and all their substance reside. It is the primordial beauty and beauty-in-itself, possessing the form of beauty from itself. It processed before time began, dependent upon God as its cause, though being self-begotten, as its own father. For its procession occurred, not because God moved it towards its creation, but because it passed from God through self-generation.

Nor did it pass from a temporal beginning, since time did not yet exist. Not even when time came to be did time apply to it. For Intellect is always atemporal and alone eternal. But just as the first God is one and alone eternal, even though everything has come from him (since he is neither counted among them nor can their status be classified with his existence), so also the Intellect that is alone eternal, subsisting atem-porally, is also itself the time of temporal realities, ever remaining identical to its own eternal reality. 1.G In addition, Orpheus also at one point says the following: I adjure you in the name of Heaven, wise work of the great God, I adjure you by the speech of the father, which he first uttered, When he established the entire world by his own counsel. Now by “speech of the father which he first uttered” he means his only-begotten Word, who always coexists with the Father. For there was no time when God the Father could be understood to exist without his own Word. And in the same passage he also declared that God is the Craftsman of the universe. And the Thrice-Greatest Hermes utters the following about God: For when his word processed, it was entirely perfect, fertile, and acted as the Craftsman in fertile nature; falling upon the fertile water, he made the water pregnant.

Therefore, the pyramid is the foundation of nature and of the intellectual cosmos. For it has the creative word of the master of all placed over it as its ruler, who is, after him, the first power, unbegotten and limitless, who emerged from him, and holds authority and rules over the beings formed through him, and is the firstborn, perfect, and fertile legitimate son of the one who is entirely perfect. Again, when one of the temple-wardens in Egypt asked, “Why then, greatest Agathos Daemon, has the lord of all called him by this name?,” [Hermes] replied, I also said this in the earlier discussion, but you did not understand. The nature of his intellectual word is a generative and creative nature. This is, as it were, his generative power or his nature or habit – call it whatever you want, so long as you understand this alone, that it is perfect in perfection and from its perfection it produces, creates, and endows with life perfect good works. Therefore, since he is of such a nature, he is rightly called by this name. Once more, in the first of the detailed discourses with Tat, Hermes says the following about God: The word of the Craftsman, my child, is eternal, self-moved, without increase or decrease, immutable, incorruptible, alone always like unto itself, equal, uniform, steadfast, well-ordered, existing as one after the God who is known first.

With this last phrase I think he indicates the Father. These comments, then, suffice, I think, for a most complete demonstration of the fact that they too had a notion of the only-begotten Word of God. However, I think I must add to what I have said by also bringing forward their statements about the Holy Spirit. For Porphyry, in explaining the view of Plato, says, Plato said the substance of the divine proceeded as far as three hypostases […], with the highest god being the Good, and after it in second place the Craftsman, and the World Soul as the third; for divinity processed as far as Soul. Behold how clearly in this passage he resolutely maintains that “the substance of the divine proceeded as far as three hypostases.” For the God of the universe is one, but on the other hand our knowledge about him expands, as it were, into the holy and consubstantial Trinity – I mean the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, whom Plato also calls the “World Soul.” And the Spirit gives life, since he proceeds from the living Father through the Son, and “in him we live and move and have our being.” For our Lord Jesus Christ speaks truly when he says, “The Spirit is the one who gives life.” Once more the same Porphyry says about Plato, That is why he [i.e., Plato] speaks in riddles and esoteric language about such matters, saying, “All things are around the king, and all things are for his sake, and he is the cause of all that is beautiful.

And around the second [god] are the second [beings], and around the third [god] are the third [beings].” For his [i.e., Plato’s] meaning is that everything is around the three gods, but in fact first around the emperor of all, second around the god who comes from him, and third around the one from him. He has also manifestly shown that the process of individuation from one another begins from the “king,” and has shown the descent and subordination of those after the first by saying “first,” “second,” and “third,” and that all things are from one and are preserved through it. So then, he has theorized about this issue not in an entirely sound manner, but rather constructs his divisions and hypostases just like those who hold Arius’ views, introducing the hypostases as subordinate to one another and supposing that the holy and consubstantial Trinity exists separately as three gods. Nevertheless, he was not entirely unaware of the truth. And I think that besides speaking and thinking soundly he would have made the complete version of the view of God public to everyone else too, if he had not been afraid of the accusation of Anytus and Meletus and of facing Socrates’ hemlock. Furthermore, Hermes too says in the third of his discourses to Asclepius, For it is not possible to present such mysteries to the uninitiated. Just listen with your intellect.

There existed one unique and intellectual light prior to the intellectual light, and it exists eternally, shining intellect of intellect, and nothing else existed except the oneness of that one. Existing eternally in itself, it eternally contains everything by its own intellect and light and spirit. And further on he says, Outside of this one there is no god, no angel, no daemon, no other substance. For he is lord of all and father and god and source and life and power and light and intellect and spirit, and everything is in him and under him. For, in my view at least, he calls the Son “intellect from intellect” as well as “light from light,” and he also has made mention of the Spirit as “containing everything.” Finally, he says that neither “angel” nor “daemon” nor indeed any other nature or “substance” lies outside of his divine preeminence, or rather authority, but he instead defines all things as under his authority and existing because of it. And again, the same Hermes in the same third discourse to Asclepius says the following when someone asked Agathos Daemon about the divine Spirit: If it was not a part of the providence of the lord of all that I reveal this idea, then you would not be possessed right now with such a desire to look into this question. Now listen to the remainder of the discourse.

All things need this spirit about whom I have often spoken before. For it bears up all things, giving them life according to their worth and nourishing them, and is dependent upon the holy fountain, eternally existing as a helper to spirits and as a source of life for all, while yet being one. Therefore, he knew both that the Spirit exists individually, “giving all things life and nourishing them,” and that he depends upon God the Father as “a holy fountain.” For he goes forth from him by nature and is furnished to the creation through the Son. So then, having busied ourselves with their own books, as much as possible, we have made the view of each of them utterly transparent, so that our future readers might know that, on the one hand, in sticking to their own ideas not a few of the Greek wise men have erred and adopted views contradictory to one another, while, on the other hand, there are some of them who did not fail to benefit from the Mosaic books since their love for learning drove them as far as Egypt. This latter group conducted their thinking in a manner better than the rest, and even came close to the truth, though certainly they did not keep their mind’s eye entirely pure. In fact, I think one would not fall short of a fitting description if one were to call them people who are squinting at the truth.

Accordingly, I think my argument has been enough to show clearly that Christian ideas are older and full of the truth; have been assumed to be right by a select group of elite ranks; and are incomparably better than the claptrap of the Greeks. Book 2 2. Because we considered it not at all unreasonable, or rather thought it useful and essential, to begin with the required account of who was chronologically born before whom and indeed also what sort of theological views each of them held, we have given the most precise explanation possible of these matters [in the previous book]. But perhaps someone might bring the following objection: “Since you have made it your purpose to advocate for the Christians’ doctrines and are eager to oppose Julian’s slanders with a helpful reply, why did you not think to follow this path straightaway, but have instead, as it were, diverted the momentum propelling the discussion directly to the appropriate topics by throwing yourself into genealogies and preparing an investigation of the views of the Hebrews and the Greeks?” Let us now rebut such objections and contend that guiding the discussion in this direction was a good way to start. For [Julian], emulating the Babylonian Rabshakeh, was not afraid to rail violently with an unbridled tongue against God’s glory and, having profanely cried out against our pure worship, he frequently mentions the wise men among the Greeks and crowns their false opinions with every praise, while at the same time he assaults the church’s holy doctrines, despises Moses’ narratives, and, in short, denounces all the saints too.

For this reason, it was very reasonable for us to pile up in advance, as it were, raw material useful for refutations – that is, a clear and utterly compelling proof that the treatise of the most excellent Moses is older than the Greek wise men and, moreover, that anyone should realize the tradition of the Christians’ faith is incomparably superior to the views those people have propounded. Indeed, only in this way was it possible to rid the rest of the treatise of extensive digressions and any impression that I was, from time to time, being extensively distracted from consideration of the arguments at hand. Enough of such matters.

2. Now we must come to that man’s actual book. Setting forth his lines word for word, we shall bring forward our own arguments in the order that is required, since we know that we must oppose his accusations in a noble fashion. And since, as I said, in opening his unrestrained mouth he has greatly defamed Christ, the Savior of us all, and hurls abusive statements at him, I will not mention such things. Instead, very sensibly passing over those parts of his book containing statements that might defile someone simply by encountering them, I will rise up against the essential points, showing that he is at every turn someone devoted to mockery and pointless nonsense, who completely lacks the ability to say anything true. Furthermore, one should note the following. In the first book he proceeds through a great many ideas and does not stop flipping the same points over up and down and going around in circles, and, by inserting also at the middle and the end exactly what he can be found asserting at the start, he reveals that the words of his refutation have been made arguably without any kind of order. For it is entirely unavoidable that those determined to challenge his statements would appear to be constantly talking about the same thing, not once, but many times. Therefore, by dividing his book into an order that is more appropriate and sorting the topics it contains into categories, we will encounter each one, not multiple times, but only once, as far as each requires and with rhetorical skill.

So he begins his discourse against us by saying, It seems to me to be a good idea to set before all humanity the reasons that persuaded me that the Galileans’ intrigue is a human fabrication constructed with maliciousness. Although there is nothing divine about it, by exploiting that childish and senseless part of the soul that has a fondness for myths, it gives its fairy tale the credibility of truth. Now when he says “Galileans,” he means, I think, the holy apostles, and by “fairy tale” he refers to the books of Moses and the predictions and divine proclamations of the holy prophets. And perhaps he did not realize, or rather it was with the help of God, that he has in fact brought an accusation against his own superstition. For there are actually two Galilees: one is in Judea, while the other borders on and is a neighbor to the cities of the Phoenicians. For example, on the one hand, in the gospels it is written concerning Christ, the Savior of us all, that “while walking by the Sea of Galilee” (that is, the lake of Tiberias) he chose his disciples. And, on the other hand, God said at one point through one of the holy prophets, “And what are you to me, Tyre and Sidon and the entire Galilee of the foreigners?” In addition, the divine Isaiah says, “The country of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali […] and the rest of those living by the sea […], Galilee of the nations […], the people sitting in darkness have seen a great light.”

Therefore, the ones living in Judea are surely not the only people who should be regarded as “Galileans,” but all the nations should be as well. For he says, “Galilee of the nations.” So then, it is ambiguous and not yet clear who would more properly and correctly be the target of his statement – whether it is directed against us or against himself together with those who esteem the senseless superstition dear to him, since they too are “Galileans.” Though, in fact, no one would have any doubt that the force of his words would fit the dumbstruck madness of the Greeks. For where else is there so much that is mythical, foolish, and “childish,” so much that is insipid, pointless, and full of every stupid idea, but solely among those who, by devising all sorts of fairy tales, even attempt to “give the credibility of the truth” to a falsehood? And the crudeness among them is even so great that also the select few who usually are the best at practicing their philosophy have denounced in the strongest terms the poets’ madness, which is not inspired but bizarre, and have openly admitted that the appropriate thing to do would be to abandon their school of claptrap. For Plato in fact does not accept the poems of Homer, who portrays gods and goddesses as, on the one hand, condemned for their licentiousness and harmed by acts of human rapacity, and, on the other hand, as weeping and grieving over their dead offspring, saying “Woe is me” like a woman, because they would like to snatch one of them away from death and yet are not able to do so.

Instead, they yield to the Fates and surrender to Destiny, as apparently more formidable even than the one who outranks all the other gods, the one they actually call “Zeus the highest”! Even though I could in fact say still much more on this topic, I will refrain from doing so, lest I seem to be carried away from what is relevant, and will instead come back to the point of the present discussion. That which is “mythical” belongs to the Greeks and they are the ones who eagerly gave “the fairy tale the credibility of truth,” drawing not on simple ideas but instead ideas contrived in an unholy manner with a love for “maliciousness,” and they are the ones who “constructed an abominable fabrication” against the inexpressible glory of the God who rules over all and concocted this “intrigue” as a kind of snare for the souls of simpler folk. For they led people throughout all the earth astray by saying that the heaven and all the other elements are god, and, as the all-wise Paul writes, “Though claiming that they are wise, they became foolish and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for images in the likeness of a corruptible human along with birds and animals and creeping things.” But to ensure that we make room for his ideas as well – not hurling the accusation at others but instead allowing him to make an assault on the holy apostles, or rather the all-wise Moses himself and the holy prophets in one fell swoop – let him come and show clearly what is this “fabrication maliciously constructed,” and what kind of “fairy tale” he takes it to be, and what aspect of the Christians’ worship is “fond of myths and childish.”

Has Moses composed myths for us when he says there is one true God by nature, who is unbegotten, eternal, incorruptible, immeasurable, invisible, immutable, intangible, who is life and life-giving, wisdom, power, generator, King, and Lord of the universe? Has the message of the holy prophets fallen short of the truth, when it ardently followed in the footsteps of the Mosaic doctrines? Will we find the teaching of the holy apostles being any different in character? Certainly not! 2.G If so, then how can he maintain that the Galileans’ books “have nothing divine” in them and say that they are merely pointless myths and a “fairy tale”? Yet, wouldn’t everyone agree that nothing could be better for humans than rightly and accurately discerning the one who truly is by nature the Craftsman and Lord of the universe? And I know that they too [i.e., the Greeks] would say that the most noble and excellent part of philosophy is said to be, and in fact is, the contemplative part, by which matters that relate to God can become comprehensible for those capable of a more intellectual perception, though still with difficulty and only to the degree that is possible for humans. And since he says “he himself has been persuaded,” he ought to explain how this happened or who persuaded him. For he should not boast of being the only person who knows this.

Now, if “he has been persuaded ” all by himself and if, as he at least imagines and says, this is supposed to suffice as the most perfect demonstration of the fact that Christianity is inadequate, I will not even bother saying that it is pure nonsense for him to do so. Nevertheless, let him go ahead and revel in arguments against us all by himself. For we will not submit ourselves to a judge that is so extremely hostile. But if, on the contrary, he thinks the statements made by prosecutors against a given group of people ought to be true rather than false, then he should not say he has “persuaded ” himself all alone but should instead pursue a conviction on the basis of facts. Furthermore, through what he has said we will again recognize that his indictment of mythmaking will justly fall upon himself rather than us, and that his accusation is suspect: Soon I will speak about all their so-called doctrines, but I want to say this first, that if my readers should wish to dispute what I say, they must act as though in a law court and not busy themselves with anything irrelevant to the case nor, as the saying goes, bring countercharges, until they have successfully defended themselves against what I first have said. For it will be better and clearer if, whenever they wish to examine an idea of mine, they present it as a separate lawsuit, and if they bring no countercharges when they are defending themselves against my prosecution.

Tell me now, must the one you are prosecuting be deprived of his tongue? Are you ordering that the defendant be convicted in silence and that he settle for confirming the indictment against himself by mentioning absolutely none of your own views? Yet the fact that you do not want us to say anything about your views is proof that you are afraid and are well aware of the distasteful shamefulness intrinsic to them. If, then, while denouncing the Christians’ worship he refrains from bestowing any praise at all upon the Greeks’ superstition nor crowns it with the highest honors, he ought to demand the same treatment in return. But if, on the contrary, he prides himself in his words against us and ascribes the greater glory to his own poor counsel, comparing and contrasting [our ideas] with those of the Greeks as though they were superior, how then can he expect us to be silent and to make no mention at all of any of their ideas, given that, when we intend to advocate for our own doctrines, this is precisely the issue up for debate? If, then, on the one hand, we had abandoned the needed rebuttal of your arguments [against Christianity] and had shifted our approach to follow a requirement that we mention only the views of the Greeks, I would say that his statement on this point is correct and not beyond the bounds of what is reasonable.

But, on the other hand, when we are defending ourselves and want to reply to each and every one of the argu-ments he has made, how could it still be just for him to censure us for also choosing to advocate for our own side as we devote ourselves to stripping bare the ugliness of the Greek impiety? For just as one can see the appearance of colors more plainly when they are contrasted with one another – for “the light shines in the darkness” – in this same way, I think, the beau-ties that are rooted in the virtues would not otherwise be obvious to the minds of those more ignorant except only through the shamefulness of their opposites. For the absence of beauty in vice is what convinces someone that he ought to award the victorious verdict to the better party. So this is why he is, quite understandably, afraid of what belongs to his own tradition and refuses to allow what he is ashamed of to enter into the debate, but demands silence, even from those who are under examination. And he also brings other kinds of allegations against us, saying the following: It is worth considering for a moment whence and how a conception of God first came to us, then to set side by side what is said about the divine among the Greeks and among the Hebrews, and after this to ask those who are neither Greek nor Jewish but belong to the sect of the Galileans why they chose the tradition of the Hebrews over ours, and, in light of this, why they in fact never adhere to the Hebrews’ tradition but abandoned it and went their own separate way.

Professing not one thing that is noble or worthy of attention, either from the tradition of us Greeks or from the tradition the Hebrews received from Moses, and instead culling from both the features that became affixed like certain defects to <these> nations – on the one hand atheism from the Jewish villainy, and on the other hand a debased and lax manner of life from the apathy and vulgarity among us – this they wanted to be labelled the best form of godliness. The one who imposed “an order upon those reading” the slanders he is going to bring against us, saying “if they should wish to dispute what I say, they must act as though in a law court and not busy themselves with anything irrelevant to the case nor, as the saying goes, bring countercharges,” clearly announces in these words that he will “set side by side what is said about the divine among the Greeks and among the Hebrews.” But what, then, does the comparative method look to as its aim and what goal could he possibly have in comparing the doctrines of the Hebrews, or rather Christians, with those of the Greeks?

2. For you could not possibly say Julian has abandoned denunciation and given up his need to slander, and thus will treat his readers as unerring judges, so as even to wish to learn from them what is better or worse! Perhaps he thinks, and for good reason, that he would only find people who support the view of God that he holds if the doctrines of the Christians are revealed to be corrupt and incur the shameful verdict through comparison with those of the Greeks. This, however, would never happen among those who know both the impotence of falsehood and the power of truth. Nevertheless, observe this: by, as it were, issuing a law requiring us to be silent and to mention nothing from his tradition when we craft argu-ments on behalf of our own worship, he is found to be convicted by his own prohibition. And since he also raises the question of why, having given up the doctrines of the Greeks, we have inclined towards those of the Hebrews, come and let us say the same thing to him in turn, “Having given up the doctrines of the Christians and run away from the truth, why do you love falsehood and mindlessly prefer such an utterly detestable self-made worship – I mean the worship of idolaters – over the exact view about God? Do you really think you have made the right decision rather than actually submitting to the most extremely bad view of all?”

And if he wants to know the truest reason why we have given up the doctrines of the Greeks and hold those of the Hebrews in high regard, we reply with his own words. For he said the following: Greeks, therefore, fabricated unbelievable and fabulous myths about the gods. For they said Cronus devoured his children and then again vomited them back up. And [they also talked about] marriages that are now against the law. For Zeus had sex with his mother, and, having begotten children by her, he married his own daughter, or rather he did not marry his daughter but simply had sex with her and then gave her over to another. Then [there is] the tearing apart of Dionysus and the reattachment of his limbs. These are the kinds of stories they call the “myths” of the Greeks. In these words you have a defense from us that should suffice! Why, then, are you so stirred up and think it is right to prosecute us for kicking away such shameful, unbelievable, and pointless myths of the Greeks and awarding the better verdict to the stories that are true? For the divine Moses and, in addition, the chorus of the holy prophets, along with the apostles and evangelists, glorify the one true God by nature and persuade us to hold the same conviction as well, guiding us away from the myths and every fable and shameful mindset, and also attuning us to an admirable way of life.

And nothing in their writings has been fabricated, nor does anything in them require an implausible explanation of the ideas involved. For, when the time is right, our treatise will clearly demonstrate that our tradition corresponds to the proc-lamations of Moses and the holy prophets, and that the import of the evangelical and apostolic teaching agrees with the notions of those who came before them. Since he obstinately maintains that there is among us “not one thing that is worthy of attention or good” – I do not know what he has in mind – come now and let him prove it. For he should not make a mere unfounded denunciation. How is there “not one thing worthy of attention” among us? Isn’t the account of God and of the world’s creation found among the Christians exact and sharpened? Have we not been abundantly furnished from our sacred writings with irreproachable and blameless knowledge of how one should live? Indeed, is it not clear to everyone that the best philosophical life can be conducted correctly, so it seems to me, in no other way? For philosophy that is contemplative as well as practical would receive praise from everyone and is admired by those who are zealous for the things of the Greeks. Therefore, we have not learned “atheism” from the view of the Hebrews – for he said this too – but, if one wants to tell the truth, we have on the basis of the God-breathed scripture condemned the Greeks for being ignorant.

How would it not be evident to everyone that “atheism” is something present instead among those who do not know the one who alone is truly God by nature? He also says that we have chosen “a debased and lax manner of life from the apathy” that exists among them, calling the Greek practice of indiscriminately eating delicacies and abstaining from nothing that is edible “vulgarity and apathy.” For they reduce the meaning of piety to this above all and suppose that they have gained perfect possession of every virtue if they but abstain from certain edible things. Yet why on earth do they define a pure way of life in these terms? For, on the one hand, everything has come from God and what comes from someone who is good is certainly honorable. And the one who is all-pure and undefiled would not have produced anything that would, in the normal course of things, defile us. For what effect could food even produce in those who partake of it or what sort of defilement could it introduce within them? On the other hand, it seems to me that it is appropriate to prohibit those things that would reasonably defile someone, and the habits of vice would accomplish this very effectively: acts of adultery, fornication, slander, speaking falsely, calumny, avarice and the rest. And, as for those people who are not concerned about any of these things, while they make a pretense of eating only a little and sometimes even exclude some edible things outright, they are afraid of nothing that is immoral.

In addition, they gladden Zeus the Highest by choosing to honor his actions and they pay homage to the sovereignty of the one born on Cyprus. Now there are a great many arguments thrown against us by that man, but he especially brings baseless criticisms of the all-wise Moses and makes a not insignificant accusation against his treatise. For Julian claims that in composing his book about the creation of the world, “Moses said absolutely nothing that is true, but simply heaped up a jumble of antiquated nonsense. As for those topics that one would reasonably regard as most important, he took no account of any of them. And while simply reciting lines of verse 41 randomly, he gave the impression of saying something wise and worth hearing.” Julian has, furthermore, marveled at the views on this topic held by the Greek wise men, and above all he awards the crown to Plato’s view with acclamation and applause. He, moreover, conducts himself with no small amount of pretension, though I will refrain from discussing it again at this point. I will, however, attempt to argue, as far as I am able, that his superciliousness with respect to the Greeks’ ingenuity with words is too hasty. It is necessary, I think, once more to draw upon their own books and set forth the view that each of them thought fit to hold concerning the formation of the world, and then to offer Moses’ creation account as an alternative.

For in this way readers will see both the nonsense of their quibbling as well as the unmixed truth of Moses’ writings. So then, Plutarch, who was no insignificant man among the Greeks, in the second book of his Collection of Physical Doctrines, says the following about the cosmos: Pythagoras first named the container of all things “cosmos” in light of the order within it. Thales and those who followed him say that the cosmos is one. Democritus, Epicurus, and his teacher Metrodorus say that there are infinite cosmoses in an infinite space throughout the entire surrounding area. Empedocles says that the circuit of the sun is the circumference of the cosmos’ boundary. Seleucus says that the cosmos is infinite. Diogenes says that while the All is infinite, the cosmos is limited. The Stoics say the All and the universe are different. For the All includes the infinite void but the universe is the cosmos separate from the void, with the result that the universe and the cosmos are the same thing. Next, concerning the shape of the cosmos he once more says the following: The Stoics say the cosmos is spherical, but others say conical, and others egg-shaped. Epicurus says it is possible that the cosmoses are spherical, but it is also possible that they take on other shapes as well. And again, in setting forth an explanation of the views of the Greek philosophers on the question of whether or not the cosmos is ensouled, he said the following: All the others say the cosmos is ensouled and managed by providence, but Democritus, Epicurus, and those who introduced atoms and the void say it is neither ensouled nor managed by providence, but by an irrational nature.

Aristotle says the universe is neither ensouled throughout nor is it rational or intelligent, nor is it managed by providence. For he says the celestial bodies partake of all these qualities – since they contain ensouled and living spheres – while earthly things partake of none of them but participate in good order accidentally and not by design. So much for these topics. Now since their aim was also to examine closely whether or not the cosmos was ever naturally corruptible, they set forth the following views on this question as well: Pythagoras, <Plato,>49 and the Stoics say the cosmos is generated by God and, as far as its nature is concerned, is corruptible – for it is perceptible by sense because it is also corporeal – but will not be destroyed thanks to the providence and maintenance of God. Epicurus says it is corruptible, because it is generated, like a living creature, like a plant. Xenophanes says the cosmos is ungenerated, eternal and incorruptible. Aristotle says the part of the cosmos that is under the moon is subject to change, the part in which also the things on earth play out. 2.G Listen, O men, and at last understand what a great load of nonsense there is in these comments! For when they rise up against one another’s views and thoughtlessly blurt out this or that idea in complete and utter confusion, in accord with whatever seems right to each of them, should they not be regarded as people who are randomly guessing rather than being experts in the truth?

For some say the cosmos is one while others say it is many. Some say it is generated while there are others who are entirely opposed to them and hold different opinions, saying it is incorruptible and ungenerated. Furthermore, some say it is managed by God’s providence, while others in turn say it is managed without providence, and assign the orderly motion of the elements to chance and accidental events. And some say it is ensouled while others say it is neither ensouled nor intellectual. All in all, anyone can see that their account about each topic staggers about here and there like someone who has had too much to drink. And since Julian has singled Plato out from the others and dwells above all on his views, I would concede that both Plato and Pythagoras to a degree manage to form their views about God and the cosmos in a more reasonable fashion. But they had gathered instruction, or rather knowledge, about this due to spending time with the Egyptians, who held the all-wise Moses in high regard and honored the marvelous quality of his doctrines. Nevertheless, they say that Plato himself held views that were self-contradictory and that Aristotle, who attended his school, chose not to follow his ideas, but took a stand against him and advanced views opposed to Plato’s. For Porphyry says Plato expressed a view about heaven and said that its corporeal form was composed out of the four elements, which the soul has united with one another in harmony.

“It was for this reason,” he says, “that it remains at present, since it <is>55 a mixed entity, and is named by the addition [of an upsilon].”

2. He etymologizes its name, I think, and says it is called “heaven” inasmuch as it is something visible, in order that a concept of heaven might be formed on the basis of the fact that it is seen. These views, however, did not seem right to Aristotle. Why? He says the heaven is not constructed nor does it consist of the four elements, but he conceives of a certain fifth body that does not participate in the four elements and is entirely without any share in them. In addition, Plato says the cosmos is ensouled and an intelligent living creature, and he also puts providence in charge of it and defines it as generated and corruptible at least insofar as it depends on its own nature. His pupil, however, once again thought differently. For [he says] the universe is neither ensouled throughout its entirety nor intelligent nor administered by providence, and does not even grant that it is generated, instead [saying] that it is incorruptible and ungenerated. Once again, the clever and renowned Plato declares that there are three first principles of the All: God, matter, and form. God he says is the maker, matter is the substrate, and form is the pattern for each of those things that come into being. Aristotle, however, once again rises up against him and does not agree with him at all. For he does not deign to think or say that form is a first principle, but says there are two first prin-ciples, God and matter.

Once more Plato, after saying that there are three first principles of the universe (God, matter, and form), actually adds a fourth one as well, which he calls the “universal soul.” In addition to this, though he says matter is ungenerated, he also claims it is generated. Next, having granted that form, whatever it is, subsists on its own, he then contradicts his own inventions. For he said that it exists in the thoughts of God and does not have its own existence or ability to become a substance. To whom, then, should those searching for the truth give their assent that they might rush down the blameless and most unerring path? Which of the aforementioned persons should we say was innocent of false speech? To whom would it be right to award the verdict of not having been mistaken in any respect? Or rather how could people who have missed the truth by so much that they oppose not only one another but even their very own views be fit for the task of persuading any others? But the all-wise Julian praises and stands in awe of these views. He mocks Moses’ books and, turning everything upside down, dares to compare them to the words of Plato, saying, At this point allow us, if you will, to bring up Plato’s statement for the sake of comparison. Observe, then, what he says about the Craftsman and what words he attributes to him in his cosmogony, in order that we may set alongside one another Plato’s cosmogony and Moses’.

For in this way it will become apparent who is the better and who is more worthy of God, Plato who “served idols” 64 or the one about whom the scripture says God spoke to him “mouth to mouth.” 65 “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was invisible and unformed, and darkness was over the abyss. And the Spirit of God was moving over the water. And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and light came into existence. And God saw that the light was good. And God made a separation between the light and the dark, and God called the light ‘day,’ and the dark he called ‘night.’ And evening came and morning came – day one. And God said, ‘Let there be a firmament in the midst of the water […].’ […] And God called the firmament ‘heaven’ […]. And God said, ‘Let the water below the heaven be gathered into one gathering, and let the dry land appear.’ And thus it came into existence […]. And God said, ‘Let the earth sprout forth grass for fodder […] and a fruit-bearing tree […].’ […] And God said, ‘Let there be luminaries in the firmament of the heaven, in order that they might serve as light upon the earth […].’ […] And God placed them in the firmament of the heaven in order to rule the day and the night.’

66 In this passage he says neither that the abyss was created by God, nor the darkness nor the water. Yet, given that he said the light came to exist when God commanded, surely he should also have said the same thing about the night and the abyss and the water. But he said nothing at all about them that implies they have come into being, even though he frequently made mention of them. In addition, he mentioned neither the origin or creation of angels, nor in what manner they were brought forth, but only the dwellings round about the heaven and the earth, with the result that God, according to Moses, is the maker of not a single incorporeal thing but is the one who sets in order the material substrate. For the sentence “And the earth was invisible and unformed” can only mean that he regards the watery substance as matter and introduces God as the one who sets it in order. Now as for Moses, if one chose to speak in acclamation of him, it would be possible to go on at great length. For he heard God clearly saying, “I know you among all people and you have found favor before me.” As an exceptionally clear proof of the manifold virtue abiding within him, consider his ability to perform miracles in Egypt. For he submitted himself to the God of the universe and was an assistant to him as he made his creation rise up in rebellion against the Egyptians’ mad ideas.

But as for what sort of person Plato was, even if there was no one who could speak to this question, his departure from Athens to go to Sicily would say it loud and clear. For they say that Dionysius, unsatisfied with the flattery he received from Plato, sold him, inflicting upon him a penalty best suited to a slave, as if he were, perhaps, in no sense a free man. Nevertheless, let the discussion about this topic be set aside for now so that we can return once more to the matter at hand. For we see that the divine Moses has neither composed random words nor was he motivated to write by mere ambition but rather because he had in mind something essential for the edification of one’s life. For he certainly did not intend to give a subtle discourse on physics or to say something about the so-called “first principles” or about the elements derived from them – for these topics are, in my opinion, overly technical and cannot be grasped by the reasoning capacity some people possess. His purpose instead was to focus the minds of his contempor-aries upon the doctrines of the truth. For they had been led astray and were caught worshipping whatever pleased each of them, and, due to their extreme ignorance, they were unaware of the one true God by nature and “worshipped the creation.”

So some entitled the heaven “God,” others the sun’s circuit, while there are yet others who were eager to assign the glory of the most supreme nature to the moon, the stars, the earth, the plants, and to the nature of water and to birds and irrational animals. Since human affairs had reached such a state and since such a terrible disease had overrun everyone on earth, Moses came to their rescue and was revealed as an instructor who introduced the noblest of lessons to everyone: on the one hand, he explicitly cried out that the Craftsman of the universe is one by nature, and, on the other hand, he distinguished him from everything else that was brought into being and existence entirely through him. Hence, with an acute sense of what was most needed, Moses very wisely did not pause to engage in excessively subtle disputation and so moved on to an account of more essential matters.

2. For why would it have been necessary for him to say what sort of nature the waters have or how it came to be in the first place, or why would it have been necessary for him to probe the abyss or the nature of heaven or to busy himself with the mode of the angels’ existence? For I imagine there is agreement on the fact that everyone would find these topics difficult to explain. But even if it might have in fact been possible for him to articulate such matters clearly, with God granting him wisdom, who would have listened to him or been able to understand such subtle ideas, or rather ideas that even surpass human intelligence? And yet we will discover that those who lived at the time when the book of the all-wise Moses was composed had fallen even further behind the very ignorance of the Greeks. For they can be apprehended as having stumbled into the pit of the most extreme kind of stupidity of all due to precisely those factors that should have enabled the clear discernment of the glory of God. For as the God-breathed scripture says, those who lived in ancient times doubtless had to reflect upon the Craftsman and designer of the universe on the basis of the beauty of created things. Nevertheless they were departing into such an ill-advised course of action that even those very things that would reasonably have brought them to a knowledge of the truth instead became the very means by which they were caught suffering an addiction to falsehood.

The all-wise Paul would also be a faithful witness of this fact, since he has written as follows: “For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divinity, are clearly visible, apprehended in the things that have been made, with the result that they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give him thanks but became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened.” Now this passage would be a fitting description of those people who have invented that false worship that belongs to the herd and the rabble and is entirely irrational, the sort of people who were, as I said, the intended audience of the all-wise Moses’ book. But if we busy ourselves with the view of those who came after them, we will easily see that they can be caught in flagrante infected with a madness that has reached its fullest extent. For Plutarch, that exceptionally subtle man, spoke about this at one point in the first book of his Collection of Physical Doctrines: But they received a conception of God from this. For the sun, moon, and the rest of the stars, after being carried along under the earth, always rise with the same colors, equal to their sizes and in the same positions. And once more in the same book, he said, They define their conception of God in the following way: an intelligent and fiery spirit, without any form, that changes into whatever it wishes and assimilates itself to all things.

And they first received a conception of this being from the beauty of what is visible, applying the idea that nothing beautiful could come into existence randomly or by chance, but [only] with the aid of some artistry that crafts it. I will add to these things what was at one point written by Hermes Thrice-Greatest in his work To His Own Mind (for so the book is named): Then do you say, “God is invisible”? Hold your tongue! Who is more visible than him? This is the reason he made everything, in order that through everything one might see him. This is God’s goodness and this his virtue, that he be made manifest through everything. And we will observe that even Julian himself who denounces our pure worship agrees with these comments. For he maintains emphatically that to know God is a matter that cannot be taught, that it is something humans learn for themselves. For he speaks as follows: Let our first proof of the fact that [the idea of God]82 is not taught but naturally belongs to human beings be the common desire for the divine that all people have, both publicly and privately, at the level of individuals as well as entire nations. For without being taught, everyone believes in something that is divine. Yet beyond this, it is not easy for everyone <to have> precise <knowledge>, nor is it possible for those who do know to communicate it to everyone.

And after other things he once more says, In addition to this common conception that all people have there is also another. For all of us humans are naturally so attached to heaven and the gods apparent in it that even if someone did imagine another God besides those ones, he without exception assigned heaven to him as a dwelling place, not separating him from the earth, but, so to speak, seating him as the emperor of the universe in that most honorable place of all, and imagining that from that place he gazes upon what goes on here below. Observe, then, that there were some who did not tolerate the thickheaded, fraudulent, and, if I may say so, vulgar error and abandoned the view of the common herd; they were thus not entirely devoid of the true conception of God but deduced that the transcendent magnitude of his innate power must be so great that it subjected even such a vast and marvelous creation to orderly laws. The others, however, about whom this passage speaks, did not even know God through the created things. For they instead became so stupefied and so far removed from a properly human way of thinking, that they not only chose to worship the heaven and earth and moon and the other stars, but also placed in sacred precincts seated statues of diverse forms and engraved upon them not only human forms but also those of irrational animals and birds and reptiles, and these they addressed as gods and saviors.

How then could someone not admire the Mosaic art of saying nothing technical or deep and nothing that was difficult for people at that time to receive, but instead telling them what was needed to empower them to transition to a correct state and able to steer them to a blameless view, I mean a view of God as the ruler over all things? Now someone would quite reasonably commend the teachers of schoolchildren who accommodate themselves to the intellectual ability of their students and little by little lead them by the hand so that they gain the ability to know some aspect of ineffable realities, offering at the beginning nothing that requires a great deal of training or a steep uphill climb. Should we then not regard the most sacred Moses as worthy of all praise when he did the same? But if it seems to you that Moses said nothing about the topics that are essential, would you like us to touch upon those lessons dearest to you? Let us busy ourselves, as far as possible, with the precise details of Hesiod’s Theogony.

2. For he pretends to speak with God’s voice, and, giving himself the appearance of one inspired by the Muses, as though that were something great and desirable, he says, Tell me how, at the beginning, gods and earth came to be And rivers and the boundless sea seething with swell, Shining stars and far-reaching Heaven above. Next, after saying that Chaos and Night came to be, though without specifying how this happened, he says, Earth first brought forth, equal to herself, Starry Heaven to cover her all around, and, after declaring that Heaven is Earth’s child, [he says] she also bore seas, and “laying with Heaven [she bore] Coeus and Oceanus and Hyperion and Iapetus and Theia and Rhea and Themis and Mnemosyne,” and, in addition to these, Phoebe, whom he names “golden-crowned,” and, of course, also “lovely Tethys.” Moreover, he says Cronus was born as “the youngest” of them all. He then adds a sort of mishmash of pointless and incoherent stories. Perhaps, however, Julian will call Hesiod’s fabrication of these myths poetic license. For it may be that he blushes at Hesiod’s stories. If so, then why is he accusing the hierophant Moses, who has composed such a clear and completely inerrant book containing true stories? For he said God made both the heaven and the earth, both sun and moon, stars and light, birds and swimming things and species of irrational animals, as well as beautiful plants, edible fruits, and the herbs of the fields.

2.G And observe how with these words Moses, with great wisdom, shears off the error that had fallen upon the ancients. For do they not name the heaven “Zeus,” the earth Demeter,” the sun “Apollo,” the moon “the noisy goddess with the golden arrows,” that is Artemis, and the wet substance “Poseidon”? In summary, they bestowed on each of those things made by God whatever name seemed best and worshipped them as gods. Furthermore, allow us, if you please, to show clearly that the divine Moses’ account of the cosmogony is clear and easily understood, having nothing technical, and was even made with great accuracy. For he says, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” So he rules out entirely the view that matter is without a beginning and coeternal with God and, as some say, ungenerated; or the view that what at one time did not exist is concurrent and cosubsistent with the one who always exists; or that what has only just been brought into existence in time is cosubsistent with the one who is eternal; or that what has been put into motion is cosubsistent with the one who is invariably in the same state; or that what is subject to corruption is cosubsistent with the one who is incorruptible. Rather, he circumscribes the creation by time and by a first principle that calls it into existence, as though brought by the will of God from nonbeing into being exactly what it is.

And surely he does not say that, with matter existing in advance as a substrate waiting to be discovered, God was simply a designer who set it in order, endowing that which was formless with form in a way only he can understand, and that all he did was to apply to it different qualities as well as magnitudes and masses. No, what he said was that by a certain ineffable and indescribable power he brought that which previously neither existed nor had any being at all to the initial moment of its existence. As for the manner by which he creates, it cannot be compre-hended by our intellect, and is even, in my view, beyond all telling. For how could someone explain matters that surpass the intellect? The creative inventions of the substance above all substances and the path towards anything whatsoever that needs doing will, I think, surpass our capacities to the same degree that we are also inferior to it with respect to nature. Hence, when Moses says, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,” you should realize that he narrates the generation of the entire creation in summary fashion as though he were gathering everything together into a few words. He then skillfully proceeds to the needed description of how they were ordered and how each of those things created was exceedingly well allotted to be exactly what it is.

Furthermore, he says that it was by his all-powerful Word that he has crafted all things. For the Craftsman of the universe, his Word, is God and from God according to nature. For Moses states, “God said, ‘Let a firmament come into existence,’” and observe, please, that the firmament, which he also calls “heaven,” was immediately established by the power of the Word. God said, “let the dry ground appear,” and the water ran together “into one gathering.” In addition, God also said, “Let the sun come into existence,” and it did so, along with the moon and stars and light and animals, those living on land and in water and also the birds. Moreover, Moses taught that even the very nature of the elements would not have had the ability to escape from corruption on its own or from itself but instead requires the hand of the one who sustains it in its appropriate state, as one can see when he says, “The Spirit of God was moving over the water.” For the Spirit of God gives life to everything and is itself also life by nature, coming as it does from the life of the Father. Everything stands in need of it and would not otherwise experience the stability of continuing to be that which it is. Observe, therefore, that it was by the Word, as I said, that the firmament was established and that the dry land emerged as the waters were gathered together into one place.

Observe the land sprouting forth both grasses and trees with their generative principles so that through them such ephemeral realities might persist and be preserved, stealing the power of eternal existence. Consider the “luminaries in the firmament” being brought into existence by God not for any other purpose than solely that they would “give light” to those “on the earth,” and demarcate the “seasons and days and years.” Moreover, Moses says the land too was commanded to put forth the nature of irrational animals, as the Craftsman distributes a form for each of them, along with its size and the exact purpose for which it would be brought into existence. Furthermore, once everything else in the world had finally been created and not a single one of those things needed by humans was lacking, then and only then did the Craftsman reflect upon the manner in which humans also should exist. For the generation of humanity did not in fact occur extemporaneously as happened with the other creatures. But since the supreme nature is thought to be, and in fact is, grand and remarkable, or rather beyond all thought and speech and marvel, it decided to make an animal similar to itself, insofar as was possible. This is why, to avoid giving the impression that the animal about to exist as its image and likeness (the human that is) is something unimportant and despised or even that it differs little from the other animals, it quite reasonably regarded the generation of humanity as something that should not be undertaken without prior reflection.

2. Yet someone might say – and they would be not far from the truth – that nothing could escape the notice of the divine intellect. He knows, indeed he knows, “all things before their generation.” What, then, was he reflecting upon, when he already was aware of human nature in advance? It is, as I said, by way of accommodation that the most excellent Moses says humanity has somehow, so to speak, been honored with prior deliberation, not intro-ducing what one might call a simple generation, varying in no way from the others, but rather with God, so to speak, rolling the matter over in his mind. It is a hyperbolic account, but one that, in my view, seems to be well made, if we agree that humanity is the best of the animals on earth and has even been made according to the image of the Creator. That the entire creation has been brought into existence by God’s supremely powerful beckoning is easily learned also – at least in my view – from what the teachers of Julian’s superstition have written. For it seemed right to all of them to think and to say that everything without distinction has been crafted by him, realities both intelligible and sensible, invisible and visible. For they have agreed that “all things are around the king” and lord “of all.” And in fact Plato even goes so far as to say “Gods of gods!

Those works of which I am the Craftsman and Father.” Now we have already introduced the quotations of the Greeks – I mean those that related to this topic – and I will refrain from repeating myself but will make mention of the discourses of Hermes the Thrice-Greatest.

2. For he said the following in his discourse to Asclepius: Osiris, he says, spoke: “Then, O greatest Agathos Daemon, how did the whole earth appear?” And the great Agathos Daemon said, “It was in an orderly fashion by a process of drying up, as I said. When the abundant waters were ordered by the Lord to withdraw into themselves, the whole earth appeared, muddy and trembling. Finally, when the sun flared up and started continuously heating and drying it, the earth surrounded by water began to solidify amidst the waters.” In addition, somewhere else he says, The Craftsman and Lord of all spoke, “Let the earth exist and the firmament appear,” and immediately earth came into being as the beginning of his creation. So much for the earth. About the sun Hermes once more says the following: And Osiris said, “O Thrice-Greatest Agathos Daemon, where did this great sun come from?” And the great Agathos Daemon said, “Osiris, do you want us to declare the sun’s birth and the source of its appearance? It appeared by the providence of the master of all. The sun’s origin is from the master of all and came to be by his holy and creative Word.” Similarly, in the first of his detailed discourses with Tat, Hermes says, The Lord of all immediately spoke by his own holy, intelligible, and creative Word, “Let the sun exist,” and, as soon as he said it, nature by its own spirit drew to itself the fire with an ascending nature – I mean that fire that is unmixed and brightest, being more active and fecund – and it raised [the fire] on high, away from the water.

Therefore, for a human it would be fitting to think and true to say that all things have been made by God’s command through his creative Word, but as for how or in what way he did so, this is something he and only he would know. And the fact that, according to his prerogative, he grants to each of those things that come into existence a particular mode of being and that he is the one who determines the manner of the existence of all things would also be clear through what Moses said: “‘Let the firmament exist,’ … and thus it came into existence,” and “‘Let the water be gathered into a single gathering,’ and the dry ground appeared.” For these statements actually define the nature of each of those things brought into existence. Hermes, who is Thrice-Greatest among the Greeks, once again makes mention of this point too. For he has intro-duced God as saying to the creatures, “I will bestow upon you, my subjects, this necessary commandment given to you through my Word. For this you have as a law.” For, as I just said, the Craftsman defined a natural law for each of those things that came into existence, and it is clear that by his beckoning [each] one happens to be – or not be – allotted a particular mode of being. Now this is what a straightforward account free from any underhanded tricks would sound like.

Julian, however, has an inordinate admiration for Plato’s view and says, Now as for Plato, hear what he says about the cosmos: “The whole heaven or cosmos – or if there is some other name that would be most acceptable, let us call it that – […] has it always existed, having no start to its existence, or has it come into being, beginning at some initial moment? It has come into existence. For it is visible and tangible and has a body, and all such things are susceptible to the senses, capable of being comprehended by conjecture with the aid of sensation.” 118 And further on he says, “If 119 [one is] in fact [following] the most probable account, then one must say this cosmos has truly come into existence as a living creature, endowed with soul and intellect, thanks to God’s providence.” 120 Observe how clearly even Plato, who Julian thinks is divine and all-wise, has affirmed that the entire cosmos – or whatever one wants to call it – was generated and began at some initial moment; is tangible, visible, and embodied; is subject to the judgment of the senses; and was made in accordance with the providence of the Craftsman. But Julian, since he was completely hung up on Plato’s ingenious argumentation and crowned it with the utmost praise, shared in his errors and did not think in a blameless manner, but was, as it were, “carried about by every wind.”

We will make this clear without any delay by once more setting forth Julian’s own words. For he said the following: Let us simply place one alongside the other and compare them: what is the creative act performed by the God in Moses’ account and what kind is it, and what kind is undertaken by the God in Plato’s account? “And God said, ‘Let us make humanity according to our image and according to our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the sky and the cattle and all the earth and all the creeping things that creep upon the earth.’ And God made humanity; according to the image of God he made them; male and female he made them. And God blessed them, saying, ‘Increase and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and all the cattle and all the earth.’” 122 Listen also, then, to Plato’s speech that he attributes to the Craftsman of the universe: “Gods of gods! Those works of which I am the Craftsman and Father […] shall be indissoluble as long as I will it. Everything that is bound is soluble, but only an evil being would decide to dissolve that which is joined together well and in a good state.

Therefore, inasmuch as you have come to exist, you are not immortal nor altogether indissoluble. Yet in fact you will not be dissolved nor meet the fate of death, having found in my will a bond still greater and more sovereign than those by which you were bound when you came into existence. Now then learn what I say to you by way of explanation. Three races of mortal beings still remain uncreated, and so long as they have not come into existence heaven will be incomplete. For it will not have all the kinds of living creatures in it […]. But if I were the one who brought them into existence and gave them a share in life, they would be equal to gods. Therefore, in order that they may be mortal and that this All may really be all, apply yourselves, according to your nature, to the creation of living creatures, imitating the power I showed when generating you. And insofar as it is proper for them to have the same name as the immortals – that part that is called ‘divine’ and rules in those who always intend to follow after justice and after you – that part I myself will hand over to you, once I have sown it and granted it existence. The rest of the task is yours: by weaving together the mortal with the immortal, produce living creatures and beget them, and by giving them food cause them to grow and when they perish receive them back again.”

123 So then, this noble man, so audacious in his arguments against us, mocks the origin of humanity – I mean the one that was narrated through the most excellent Moses – and thinks it a trifle that God bestowed on human nature a creation according to his own image and likeness. Yet would not all sensible people agree that his doing so effects one of the most beautiful adornments someone could receive? For what, pray tell, is better than to say that the divine likeness is stamped upon us? Do we not affirm that the divine substance is that which is supreme and higher than everything else, radiant with inexpressible glory and consti-tuting absolutely every form of virtue and its beauty? If so, then how could what I have said not be clear to everyone? Why, then, does he mock such exceptional realities? And why does he also jeer at the fact that of all the living creatures on earth, the most godlike one endowed with intellect and reason – I mean humanity – should have been honored with an authority over all else? Surely the very nature of the facts themselves agree with the words that came through Moses. Nevertheless, Julian completely disregards what is reasonable and instead inclines with no restraint towards the requirement that one should cling solely to Plato’s words. In fact, without giving it due consideration, he has marveled at the “speech” fabricated by Plato – I know not how – which he says the God “of the universe” has actually delivered to certain generated and falsely named “gods.”

It is, I think, incumbent upon us to respond to him on this point as well. For if, on the one hand, in this passage Plato is inventing a character and employing poetic license to attribute to the character of “God” words that he thought were appropriate for him, he has missed his target by no small amount, and someone could criticize him for not knowing how to portray God as a character in the manner required. But if, on the other hand, he is pretending to record God’s actual voice, away with his nonsense! For it is in fact not right to say that the God who has authority over the universe allows those who are not truly gods to share in the honor that is distinctly appropriate for him and him alone. For he said, “My glory I will not give to another nor my excellences to carved images.” Come now, without going on at length, let us set the truth in opposition to Plato’s words and say the following. Let us concede, if he wants, that the intelligent powers above which were brought into existence by God have been honored with the title “god.” For we admit that there are certain beings in heaven who have been called both “gods” and “lords.” But also we ourselves have been crowned with such a title, since God says to us, “I said, ‘You are gods and are all sons of the Most High.’”

In these instances, however, there is a certain most essential reason for him to do so and this magnanimous statement made by God to us would in fact be exceedingly correct: since “the Craftsman of the universe” had fashioned the intelligent and rational creation according to his own image and likeness, seeing as he is good as well, he also honored it with the title “god.” And there is nothing unreasonable about this, since we ourselves also are accustomed to name the image of a human, so to speak, by the same name “human.” 2.G Therefore, the intelligent and rational creation, inasmuch as God holds it in higher regard than the nonrational and nonintelligent creation, has manifestly been granted the better glory, having been gilded with the title “god.” In contrast, not a single one of the other creatures has been called “god.” For if one wanted a proof that the heaven or simply the cosmos is neither a living creature nor indeed at all endowed with soul, even if there were no one on our side who chose to point this out and even if you set aside the others who are said to be wise, Aristotle, Plato’s very own disciple, would suffice. For he said, as we already emphasized previously, that the whole cosmos is neither ensouled throughout nor is it rational or intelligent. Therefore, because the force of the truth prevents [Aristotle] from saying that the whole cosmos – or whatever [Plato] means by “the All,” since that is what he called it – is either ensouled or intelligent throughout, [Plato] has, even in his own camp, as I said, the most formidable resistance from those who are dearest to him above all.

Furthermore, the nature of the matter itself, if we subject it to an appropriate examination, should prove to us that God would not have told those ensouled and intelligent gods, who in fact are not gods at all, that they must create. For why would “the Craftsman of the universe,” after having reflected on the matter entirely on his own, have entrusted to the other gods the toil required to create the “three races”? Maybe they would say that he did so because he hesitated or because he thought our affairs were not worth taking into account. But such ideas would be entirely alien to the substance transcending all substances, at least in my view. For if the Craftsman is good, how could any hesitation have come upon him about anything whatsoever? For Plato himself at one point says the following: “He was good, and no envy about anything comes upon someone who is good.” Yet to say that God disowns something as unworthy of him would be nothing other than to assign vanity to him and to bring against him the indictment of being contemptuous. And why would he choose to rule over those beings when he disdained the task of creating them? Or how could he delight in our worship, if already at the outset he thought the task of creating us was altogether worthless? Now it would be exceedingly easy for me to bring forward a great many true testimonies from the God-breathed scripture showing that he does want us to honor him, demands that we be docile, and determines that human nature must become like himself through every virtue.

Since, however, Julian places his trust instead in his own authors, I will point out that Porphyry has written as follows in the second book of his On Abstinence from Ensouled Things: Let us, too, then sacrifice but let us sacrifice as is proper […]136 to the God who is over all, as a certain wise man said, neither burning nor dedi-cating anything belonging to the senses. For there is nothing material that is not immediately unclean to the immaterial. Therefore, not even a word spoken with the voice is appropriate to him, nor is the inner word when it has been defiled by the soul’s passion. But we shall worship him with a pure silence and with pure thoughts about him. It is, then, necessary for us to be united to him and made like him and then to offer our own manner of life to God as a sacred sacrifice, the very same thing that is both our hymn and our salvation. Therefore, this sacrifice is performed in the soul’s passionless state and in the vision of God. God, therefore, does wish to be honored by us and for us to represent him intellectually through our pure way of life, as we inscribe his beauty within our souls. If so, then tell me how can he demand this from us, if he has all but cast us aside to other craftsmen and, if I may say so, withheld from us the personal attention he bestowed on all the other creatures?

And why does he bother at all to exercise providence over those on earth, when, as Plato supposes, they have been given to the other gods as a plaything? For the one who knows God as his own Father will himself teach us that he exercises providence over us and that his care and kindness extend even to the most insignificant matters, since he says, “Are not two sparrows sold for an assarion? And not one of them will fall to the earth apart from our Father who is in heaven.” Nevertheless, Julian will probably cross out this saying on the grounds that it is not true – for he bizarrely fights against God – and will accept instead those who were his close associates, in the sense, that is, of sharing his delusion. Well then, Alexander, the disciple of Aristotle, writes as follows in his book On Providence: To say that God does not want to exercise providence over those here below is entirely alien to God. For it is characteristic of an envious and altogether monstrous nature to fail to do what is better when one has the ability to do so. Since both of these are alien to God, neither both of them nor just one of them is true of him. Therefore, it remains that the divine is both able and willing to exercise providence over those here below, and if he is both willing and able, it is clear that he does in fact exercise providence.

It is, then, irrational to suppose that anything, even the most trifling occurrences, happens in the absence of the divine decision and will. Some people say that Plato also holds this view, and obviously Zeno of Citium and the followers of the Stoa represent this doctrine. Therefore, even they too have testified that the supreme God of the universe, who is the only God by nature, exercises providence over our affairs as well. Someone might then say, “So what?” Well, it would have been out of character for one who had deigned to exercise providence to deprive the human race of what was best of all, namely to be made by him instead of being relegated to certain generated craftsmen who merely have the title “god” superficially and not based on inherent prop-erties; not to mention that to suppose others also have the ability to create and to call into existence what previously did not exist will especially bring one into open conflict with the divine glory itself. For it is in fact not right to say that the distinctive characteristics and excellencies of the divine and ineffable nature can inhere naturally in any of those beings created by it. Rather, the task is suitable for the divine nature and it alone, and is consistent with its supreme glory. For as I just said, the properties that uniquely belong to the only substance that is above all substances are inaccessible to the creature and we maintain that one such property is the ability to work like a Craftsman and to bring into existence what previously did not exist.

If so, then how could the generated nature, which has been made and which is invariably and unavoidably characterized by inevitable corruption – insofar, that is, as the principles inherent to its nature are concerned – how could it accomplish those deeds that belong to God? Now if the act of creating is understood as a kind of knowledge in God, one would concede that it is not unreasonable to suppose that the knowledge of how to create can be given by him to the creature, since we ourselves also create from time to time, taking some material substrate and applying to it a technical skill appropriate to it. If, however, the act of creating in a divine manner is, as I said, an activity and ability belonging to a magnificent nature, one that exceeds the limi-tations of the creature, why do they debase the dignity of the supreme nature and, as seems right to them, bestow this honor upon beings subject to generation and decay? So they believe they are grasping some crucial point but instead are actually defaming the divine statements, since they say that the one who is ungenerated entrusted to generated beings the ability to carry out deeds that were his alone. “Yes,” they say, “for if God were to create something, of course it was also unavoidable that it would be altogether superior to the processes of death and corruption.”

Then, my dear friends, it must be that the Craftsman begrudged certain other beings and did not permit them to partake of what is most excellent, but plunged them into a worse situation by refusing to create them. Did he fear the necessity that prevented him from being able to create mortal beings, or was he perhaps somehow even completely unaware of how to do so? Now, if they claim he was ignorant, then his creation knows something more than him. For, as the Greeks themselves say, [the created gods] were the ones who created everything subject to corruption. But if, on the contrary, they do not take that position and insist that he did know [how to create mortal beings], how could it be characteristic of a good being to fail to do what he knew was good? Surely immortality is better than mortality! Additionally, it would not, in my view, indicate ignorance but rather wisdom for me to say the following. The gods to whom they say the Emperor and Lord of the universe entrusted the act of creating, they also say are not immortal but are bound together and soluble and remain outside the process of corruption so long as God wills for them to exist in these conditions. Since, therefore, nothing is incorruptible or immortal or indissoluble according to its own nature, how could it not be a sign of ignorance for them to say that the God of the universe refused to create the three mortal races, and instead handed over this task to others that they should do it?

But since we have set aside the nonsense of the Greeks, we say that the Craftsman, using an authority that is most fitting to his divinity, has made the diversity and variety evident in creation and is responsible for the fact that each thing is different in various ways and not the same in genus and species. For, as I said, nothing is immortal or indissoluble, but God’s will for each thing he has made constitutes its nature, and, without any hesitation, reaches down even as far as our affairs. For he is one and unique, and does not learn this from someone else, since it is not a matter of a form of knowledge but of a divine privilege of his nature, attached to it and it alone, just like the rest of the honors that are scarcely attainable by generated beings and have been naturally assigned, as I said, to this nature and to it alone. Moreover, one could observe from Julian’s own teachers as well that it is utterly bizarre for us to assign the activity of creating to other gods, divorcing it from the one who is truly God by nature.

2. For Hermes who is called Thrice-Greatest writes as follows about the nature of the All: If, then, it has been agreed that two entities exist, that which comes to be and that which makes, they are one by unification – the antecedent and the consequent. The antecedent is the God who makes, and that which comes to be is the consequent, whatever it may be. And there is no need for the varied quality of what has come to be to put you on your guard and make you fear that you are attributing lowliness and disgrace to God. For his single glory is to make all things, and this making is like the body of God. And nothing bad or shameful is believed to attach to the maker himself. For these are the by-products of the process of generation, like corrosion on bronze and dirt on the body. But neither did the bronzeworker make the corrosion nor the parents make the dirt. Further on, Hermes speaks in more vivid terms by giving a clear example and says, Given that one and the same painter is allowed to make the heaven, the earth, the sea, gods, humans, all things irrational and without a soul, is it not possible for God to make all things? O how great are people’s stupidity and ignorance about God! For such people suffer the most terrible thing of all.

While claiming that they are honoring God and singing his praises by not attributing the making of all things to him, they in fact do not even know him. In addition to not knowing him, they commit the greatest sacrilege against him by attributing to him the condition of contempt or of impotence. For if he did not make all things, either he did not make them because he despised the task or because he was unable to do so, which are sacrilegious ideas. For God has only one condition, which is goodness, and the one who is good is neither contemptuous nor impotent. This is what God is: the good, the entire power to make all things. That which is generated comes to be by the one who is good and who is able to make all things. But if you want to learn how he makes, how what has come to be came to be, it is possible for you to do so. Observe a most beautiful image that corresponds most closely to him: a farmer, casting seeds upon the earth, here wheat, there barley, and there some other kind of seed. Observe him planting a vine and an apple tree and the other kinds of trees. In the same manner, God also sows immortality in heaven, and on earth change, and in everything life and movement. Thus, the ancient Greek wise men who were by no means insignificant held these views and indeed also thought others should choose to hold them too.

However, the fair-minded Julian, who despises the herd, has said farewell to the views of others and yields to Plato’s words alone. In fact, he tries to clarify the speech that Plato, wisely in his view, has the character of God make. For he writes: But surely this is not a dream, is it? Reflect upon it and learn. Plato gives the name “gods” to those that are visible – the sun and moon, along with the stars and the heaven – but these are images of invisible gods. The sun that is visible to our eyes is an image of the intelligible and invisible sun, and again the moon visible to our eyes and each of the stars are images of the intelligible ones. Plato was, then, aware of these <intelligible and>156 invisible gods that subsist in and coexist [with the Craftsman], and have been begotten by the Craftsman himself and have proceeded from him. It is reasonable, therefore, that the Craftsman in Plato’s account says “gods,” speaking to the invisible ones, and “of gods,” meaning the visible ones. And the common Craftsman of them both is the one who devised the heaven, the earth, the sea, and the stars, begetting archetypes of these things in the intelligible realms. Observe, then, that what is said subsequently is also well put. For he says, “there remain three mortal races,” 159 that is, the race of humans, of animals, and of plants.

For each of these has been defined by its own principles. “If then,” he says, “each of these should also come to exist by me, it would be absolutely unavoidable that they would become immortal.” For there is no other cause for the immortality of the gods and the visible cosmos than the fact that they came to exist by the Craftsman. What does he then say? “Whatever in them is immortal must have been given by the Craftsman” – and this is the rational soul. “Therefore, when I have sown the forms of these and caused them to subsist, with your consent, I will hand them on to you. Finally, you weave the mortal with the immortal.” It is, then, clear that the creative gods, after receiving from their own father the creative power, begot the mortal animals on earth. For if heaven was going to be no different from humanity and, by Zeus, no different from the animals and finally the creeping things themselves and the little fish swimming in the sea, it would have required that there be one and the same Craftsman for everything. But if there is a great gap between immortals and mortals – the immortal part, in comparison with the mortal things subject to decay, not becoming greater by any addition nor less by subtraction – it follows that some beings were the cause of mortals and others were the cause of immortals.

Now it is exceedingly easy, for anyone who wishes to do so, to perceive that in this passage Julian confuses everything and jumbles together the natures of things. For he first says that the more visible gods are images of the more invisible gods, those that Plato thought right to call “intelligible” and “knowable,” while he called visible things “that which is subject to judgment using the senses.” With these words, our most excellent Julian seems to be intending to clarify the “ideas,” which Plato at one point maintains subsist in themselves as substances, while elsewhere he defines them as being the thoughts of God.

2. But, whatever the case may be, those skilled in these topics say that Plato’s argument on this point was found to be unacceptable even by his own disciples. For Aristotle says “Good riddance to the forms. For they are mere prattle and, even if they do exist, are irrelevant.” Why then does Julian think it a good idea to endorse and try to introduce as an unobjectionable view a supposition that even his own teachers thought was incorrect? Next, in addition to this we will also find another statement of his that is sick with a serious case of ignorance. For he says, “Plato was aware of the intelligible and more invisible of the gods that subsist in and coexist [with the Craftsman], and have been begotten by the Craftsman himself and have proceeded from him.” And he adds that the God of the universe, who devised the earth and the heaven and begot the stars, is the Craftsman of both the visible and the intelligible [gods]. Hence, given that, as he himself has clearly conceded, the ungenerated God is the generator of both the former and the latter, how can he say both that these gods were generated by him and that they coexist with him and subsist in him? How, tell me, can the generated coexist with the ungenerated God? And in what way can it subsist in him?

As for us, we maintain that the Word of God, which is ungenerated, necessarily coexists with the one who engendered him and that, while he subsists in him, he has also proceeded from him in the sense of begetting. But, in contrast, that defender of Plato’s ingenious language, being so precise, says on the one hand that the supreme God is ungenerated, but on the other hand that those things made by him subsist in him and were begotten and proceeded from him, in this way mixing everything up and throwing it into confusion, and disregarding entirely the purity required for the vision of God. 2.G One could say to Julian that proverb on the lips of many: “Far apart are the lands of the Mysians and the Phrygians.” Abandon such insipid, pointless myths, O man! The topic of your discourse is the God who is beyond all things, but you have been caught possessing an altogether paltry view of his glory. Next, after presenting him as the generator of the universe and the only one who could have produced such brilliant and marvelous things in creation, Julian says other gods helped with the lower parts of the universe and cooperated with him in the act of creating. These gods might perhaps even say to the God over all, “Collect a contribution from us and then introduce the three mortal races that are missing from the universe.

For when you provide a soul, we ourselves will add the body, weaving the mortal with the immortal.” Nevertheless, Julian will probably respond and fight for his own doctrines by reinforcing his ranks with the argument that the nature of earthly bodies is produced by the congre-gating of the elements. Now in this respect as well he is following his own instructors. For they say that Empedocles son of Meton in fact held this view too and indeed also chose to think in this manner. For he says that the principles of those things that exist are fire, air, water, and earth, and he adds to them love and strife. And Plotinus also mentioned these things in his treatise On the Three Primary Hypostases, saying the following: “And, for Empedocles, strife divides, but love is the One – he also makes it incorporeal – and the elements are posited as matter.” Consequently, even if the congregating of the elements should contribute some advantage deriving from themselves to earthly bodies, we shall not accept the point without an investigation. For it is incumbent upon us to examine the question of who it is that directs them to come together and gathers together into a unity the elements that are naturally opposed and, as it were, tames them, with the result that the force of each of them does not remain unmixed with the others, but with all of them, as it were, converging with one another into the subsistence and existence of one particular thing.

Is not God the one who does this, the artisan most skilled in every domain, who wisely devises this process for earthly bodies, in order that they might participate in all of the elements and so derive benefit from them? For love means that things are related to one another. Therefore, the craftsmen of the three races cannot be some other [gods]; rather, the one who is supreme and unique and who is the first principle of all things is reasonably understood to be the generator of all. After him, there is absolutely nothing beyond, but rather everything is by him and through him and under his feet, as his creation. Moreover, the writings of the Greeks even maintain that God rejoices over his works, which we too say, since the God-breathed scripture itself agrees with this. For indeed Wisdom says, “I was the one in whom he rejoiced. And day by day I was glad in his presence at every moment, when he was glad at the completion of the world and was glad among the sons of humanity.” If so, then how is it not better that he should exult in his own creatures rather than in the creatures of others? Plato, however, says the Craftsman was arguably overcome by hesitation or, as I said, out of envy he did not want those on earth to possess what was better.

And this is not at all surprising, given that Plato places the Good even above the very god who creates and says that the Good is immovable, unshakeable, stable, and far removed from the obligation and the intention of producing any of those beings brought into existence, and that, as if recoiling from them, it entrusted the task of creating to the second god who is from him and with him. Nevertheless, observe how, even alongside the second god, Plato appoints still other gods who know how to perform the same operation, so that there might be nothing about the second god that appears to be too exalted. Now since Julian thinks it is a wise and exact argument to say that, if the Craftsman of the universe is understood to be one and unique, heaven would differ in no way from humanity or the wild beasts or those animals that naturally swim in the sea and indeed also the creeping things – and thus one must even introduce a Craftsman that is proportional to the measure of each thing made – come let us respond to him on this point also. How would it be at odds with correct notions, or in opposition to them, to choose to say that everything is due to one Craftsman? For would the power that sufficed [to create] such transcendent entities not suffice for things that are in fact inferior?

Or, if it did lie within his power to do so, then does the transcendence and excellence of those beings who are especially superior to the rest consist solely in the fact that they have been granted personal creation by God himself?

2. If so, then would this not be an arbitrary allotment peculiar to them, as if God had disdained the rest of the creatures and all but bid a long farewell to earthly beings? As we have said already, these arguments are nonsense and full of the most extreme stupidity. Nevertheless, let Julian explain this for us. He says the begotten gods produced the three remaining races. But do we not clearly see among these three races – even setting aside human affairs – such a massive difference in terms of genera and species and sizes of bodies? For the generation of the three races would extend from the highest beings down to the most insignificant of all, and someone would not be incorrect if they included even the very plants in this claim. Shall we then allocate for each of the created things its own craftsman proportional to it, lest a god’s transcendent majesty be insulted if he should be labelled the creator of very lowly entities as well? Humanity would therefore quite reasonably have one craftsman, and there would be as many other craftsmen as there are things that have been made, descending all the way to the most extremely insignificant things. Tell me, then, is this not risible claptrap, which ultimately carries one away from what is reasonable and the notions that lead to the truth? How could this not be clear to everyone?

But, of course, it should be obvious that together with his instructors he delights in views that are insalubrious and eccentric. For he actually maintains that the heaven is God and once more says the following: What need is there for me to call the Greeks and the Hebrews as witnesses to this? There is no one who, when praying, does not stretch his hands to heaven; no one who when swearing by one God or several – and so forming a general concept of the divine – is not transported to that heavenly realm. And this experience of theirs is not unreasonable. For since they saw that none of those things that move about the heaven are diminished or increase, nor do they change or suffer any irregular influence, but its movement is harmonious and its order is elegant, with the laws governing the moon being fixed, and the rising and setting of the sun being fixed, always occurring at fixed times – seeing all this, it was reasonable for them to suppose it is a god and the throne of a god. For, such a being, inasmuch as it is neither increased by any addition nor diminished by any subtraction and stands beyond all change due to alteration and variation, is pure of all corruption and generation. Being by nature immortal and indestructible, it is pure from every kind of defilement.

Being eternal and ever-moving, as we can see, it is either carried in a circle around the great Craftsman due to a greater and more divine soul indwelling it or, having received its motion from God himself (in the same way, I think, our bodies have from the soul in us), it wheels about its endless circuit with an unceasing and eternal impulse. Now it is transparent that these are the words of someone who is delirious and completely devoid of true ideas. But, since he has gotten the notion – how I do not know – that he will have sufficient proof that heaven is God from the fact that people intending to pray raise their hands and eyes up high, come let us respond to him on this point. Tell me, then, if someone had the idea of observing clouds and if he directed the eye of his body upwards towards them, would this fact suffice to convince him that he must also confess them to be goddesses? If not, then how would a person whisked away into error by such insipid ideas not be an appropriate object of laughter? But since, he says, heaven has reasonably been regarded as a marvel and assumed by many to be both “God ” and “God’s throne” on the grounds of its natural features, let Julian come forward and teach us whether he thinks these two claims are identical and whether he regards them as belonging to the same category.

But I doubt he would ever reach such a degree of madness as to think that “to be God ” and “to be God’s throne” differ in no way at all. For hardly anyone would doubt that matters related to God are, quite reasonably, not understood with our senses nor indeed in terms of bodies, even if they should perhaps be spoken of in a manner that falls short of what is required. Therefore, if one were to speak of “God’s throne,” it would indicate the kingdom under his rule, just as, for example, also on our level it is true to say that the throne of some person is radiant and preeminent, meaning his rule and his kingdom. If so, then how could that which is under authority be on level footing with that which exercises authority, that which governs be equal to the lowly estate of its subjects, that which is exalted be on the same plane as those that are in submission to it, that which falls short be equivalent to that which excels? How, then, or in what way can he say that heaven is either “God ” or “God’s throne”? “Nevertheless,” Julian says, “the movement of the heaven is orderly, harmonious, and elegant; and the sun and moon naturally provide illumi-nations that are fixed; and the risings and settings of the stars, their revolu-tions and courses and movements throughout space, are invariably the same at every moment.”

If so, then was not the divine Paul exceedingly wise, since he uses such observations to identify the ruler and governor of creation’s good order, who, in keeping with his divinity, ordains how each of those things created by him should exist and shows that such a manifold and immeasurable creative act is not without oversight, by which heaven is maintained in good order and made something marvelous? For he says, “For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divinity, are clearly visible, apprehended in the things that have been made.” It seemed good also to those who were Julian’s instructors to adhere to these ideas in their thinking and discourse. Hence, as we already said earlier, Plutarch said about them: “But they received a conception of God from this. For the sun, moon, and the rest of the stars, after being carried along under the earth, always rise with the same colors, equal to their sizes and in the same positions.”

2. Therefore, those long ago who were the inventors of Julian’s doctrines did not arrive at a conception of heaven when marveling at the course of the sun and after having observed that likewise every other created thing is orderly and harmonious and is allotted a not inelegant movement; rather they deduced the power of the one ruling over it and discerned his glorious and exalted sovereignty. Julian, however, changes their view on this very point as well into its complete opposite when he says, “Heaven endures nothing irregular and maintains an elegant order.” If so, then who has appointed its order and elegant movement? Who has assigned to the moon the appropriate time for each of its illuminations? Who has set the limits of the sun’s course? Is it not the one commander of all things, as I said? Why, then, do you distract those who marvel at these things from more truthful conceptions, bidding them not to pursue the vision of the divine but merely knowledge of heaven – that it is God, standing outside of alteration and mutability and all change, and is not defiled by corruption and generation, being by nature immortal and indestructible? How, tell me, can you say that the generated heaven is exempt from variation, alteration, and change? For if it has come to be at all, then it also has been moved, and this means variation and a change in condition, since the fact that it formerly did not exist has already been ascribed to it as a kind of privation.

For if what has come to be arises from a state of nonexistence, its being called into existence would be understood as alteration and variation. And since it is agreed that it has come to be, how could that which came to be exist beyond corruption? Furthermore, how can that which is tyrannized by generation and corruption possibly be immortal by nature? And how can that which has been introduced at a moment in time possibly be eternal? Indeed, Plato clearly says, “Time came to be with heaven, in order that, having been begotten together, they might also be dissolved together, if perhaps their dissolution should ever come to pass.” How then can that which is dissolved be immortal by nature? And how can that which owes its preservation from corruption solely to the Craftsman’s will possibly be indestructible? For in such beings it is in fact not their nature that possesses an unshakeable permanence, nor is the firm grounding each one has in its natural state a quality of the nature itself; rather, they are assisted in this matter by acts of will from the one who maintains them. He next says, “it is either carried in a circle around the great Craftsman due to a greater and more divine soul indwelling it or, having received its motion from God himself (in the same way, I think, our bodies have).”

“But, good sir,” I would respond, “that being who, according to you, is ungenerated, incorruptible, and indestructible, the immutable and unchangeable heaven which is pure of all defilement, which you actually say is even eternal – what kind of greater and more divine soul manages it? If there is some aspect of that soul that is superior to heaven, and if there is something greater and more excellent than the God who made it, I cannot imagine what it would be. As for my own view, I think that God’s ineffable nature is full of the supreme glory. If we should indeed say that God is incorruptible, indestructible, beyond variation and alteration, ungenerated, eternal, free of every defilement, possessing pure perfection and standing in need of nothing whatsoever, then what have you reserved for that soul when you glorify the nature of things made with such brilliant and preeminent honors?” Nevertheless, “the Hebrews,” Julian says, “when thinking about matters pertaining to heaven, say it is God’s throne and the earth is his footstool.” Correct, my good fellow! For I will mention that God himself said through one of the holy prophets, “The heaven is my throne, and the earth is the footstool for my feet. What sort of house will you build for me, says the Lord, or what will be my place of rest?” Although he does not say that the heaven is God, he does compare it to God’s throne and indeed also the earth to his footstool.

And if someone wanted to learn the reason for this description, it would not be difficult for us to respond with a truthful answer. For the most wise Solomon built in Jerusalem that renowned temple, but the communities of the Jews took great delight in it and thought the God of the universe dwelt in it as though he were contained within it. For they were nearly always slow to understand and without any expertise in theology. Thinking that Jerusalem was even God’s city, they used to maintain earnestly that he dwelt there and there alone, due to what had been said by the voice of David, “Glorious things were spoken about you, O city of God.” It is for this reason that God reproves those people who were entertaining such petty ideas and says, “What sort of house will you build for me when I have the heaven as my throne and the earth as my footstool?” For it was necessary, yes necessary indeed, that those who assumed his nature was confined and circumscribed by place should be clearly shown that he is everywhere and that, while nothing contains him, he is instead present throughout all space and that, while the heaven is full of him, the earth is filled by him as well. 2.G Moreover, the fact that the heaven has been generated could easily be shown with many more testimonies from the God-breathed scripture.

For God in one place said, “With my hand I made the heaven firm, and I commanded all the stars.” In addition, the blessed David says, “By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established and by the Spirit of his Mouth all their power exists.” And he knew that the heavens also “declare the glory of God.” How or in what way do they do this? In light of the fact that they exist and have been generated, they are a wonderful source of amazement, and well-nigh employ a voice that expresses itself like this. For the best and most excellent things that have been skillfully devised, although they do not have a voice, nevertheless loudly proclaim the knowledge of the one who fashioned them by revealing it in themselves. Book 3 3. Julian has, therefore, slandered all the habits, customs, and mysteries of Christians, and there is not one thing done well or even said correctly in the God-breathed scripture that he does not unabashedly surround with accusations for the purpose of debasing it. He exults only in those things that would naturally cause no small amount of distress to the truly intelligent and lead them to turn to a better course. And, just as unreservedly, he is in awe of Plato’s speech, which he has appropriated for himself in order to defame the divine and supernatural glory.

As though he were “adding sin upon sin,” Julian again makes an attack against the writing of Moses and sharpens his tongue against it; or rather, he “lifts his horn aloft and speaks injustice against God” and arms himself against the doctrines of truth, when he speaks as follows: Compare to these [namely, the teachings of Plato] the Jewish teaching: the “paradise planted” by “God,” Adam “formed” by him, and then the “woman” who was made for him. For God said: “It is not good that the man be alone; let us make for him an assistant like him” 4 – though she was of assistance to him in nothing at all but deceived him and became for both him and herself jointly responsible for their fall from “the delight of paradise.” This is entirely mythical. For how is it reasonable that God was unaware that the one created by him to be an “assistant” would be to the detriment rather than the advantage of him who received her? He disbelieves, therefore, that “a paradise was planted by God,” or perhaps he unthinkingly condemns the ineffable power as being unable to do this. And he makes the molding of Adam and the woman from him an opportunity for laughter and says that the God who knows not how to err in anything failed in his purpose and plan. “She did not,” he says, “contribute to Adam’s advantage,” but rather to his “deception” and the loss of both “paradise” and “delight.”

Do you then want us, dear sir, to abandon these things that you consider stale and follow the words of your teachers? Would you like us to investigate what you along with your fathers have found marvelous by “comparing” the cosmogony of Hesiod to that of Moses? After invoking the Muses and asking from them “sweet song” (to use his own words), he collected for us narratives of noisome nonsense. For he says that “Coeus and Hyperion” were born from Earth and Heaven, and besides them Iapetus, and from him came a certain Prometheus. If he had not “stolen” fire “from Zeus,” woman would not have come into being at all, she whom “the cripple” – that is Hephaestus – made, and whom they say the “daughter of a mighty father” – I mean Athena – beautified with varied “adornment” and gave to men as a “fair evil.” If so, then, since woman didn’t yet exist, whom we [men] received because of the wrath of Zeus, as they themselves say, how could the human race have been established? Or how could the “gods of gods” otherwise have become craftsmen, “weaving together the mortal with the immortal” as Plato supposes? They have not felt any sense of dread at trotting out these stories against the writings of the all-wise Moses; and yet shouldn’t one instead burst into praise from a sound mind?

But perhaps they might say that the law of poetic expertise allows the poets to construct myths without being blamed for them. Well then, if they produced nothing essential for us, all of their poetry should be disbelieved and called myths, nonsense, and the mutterings of old women; even if there is some discourse about the gods in it, this, too, should be left behind and designated poetic witticism. But they would not agree to take it in this way – indeed far from it. For they have a different attitude, claiming that the poets’ descriptions of the gods are not mere artful speech and myth. Instead, they accept their words as trustworthy and true, and even the most intelligent do so. For instance, Herodotus, who composed a renowned history, said at one point the following: “I think Hesiod and Homer lived 400 years before me and no more. They were the ones who composed an account of the origins of the gods for the Greeks; they assigned names to the gods, distributed honors and areas of specialty to them, and indicated their appearance. The poets said to be earlier were, it seems to me, actually later than these men.” So then, if those poets who named the gods, gave them honors and names, and established their appearance have composed myths for them and nothing else, then they should reasonably be ridiculed and their nonsense and inanities should merit no consideration.

But if, on the contrary, [the poets] are honored among them – and if indeed even up to the present day they say that those named [by the poets] are gods – why in vain do they indict them for speaking foolish nonsense when [the poets] of course say something discordant with their views? If they consider the poets trustworthy when they are writing about the gods, why do they insult them by disbelieving the rest of their words? One could show through his own words – and this quite easily – that their revered Plato did not think Hesiod’s Theogony objectionable. For he spoke thus: “But it is impossible to escape the notice of the gods or to use force against them.” Well then, if they do not exist or are unconcerned about human affairs, we for our part must nonetheless practice escaping their notice. But, if they do exist and are concerned for us, we know and have heard that they are like this from no other source than the poets’ stories and genealogies. These same poets say that the gods can be persuaded to be present at “sacrifices and gentle prayers” and votive offerings. See then how Plato has clearly conceded that if the gods exist at all one must gain knowledge and learn from what others have written about them. It would certainly be clear that he has honored Hesiod’s tale about the gods when he furthermore writes the following: Oceanus and Tethys were born as children of Earth and Heaven, and from them came Phorkys, Cronus and Rhea […] Zeus, Hera and all the others whom we know are said to be their brothers.

Is it not clear to everyone that precisely in those passages where their argument is too weak to advocate for the obscenity of their teach-ings, there they straightaway ascribe to the poets’ artful speech the need to fashion myths and they mischievously accept only the tales about their gods? Why then, Your Excellency, shall we give up the woman fashioned by God and the story about her as though it were inelegant and accept instead Hesiod’s Pandora? Does doing this seem best to you? But Julian is perhaps saying that God’s actions regarding her were a mistake: “She was made as an assistant and to be for some benefit to the man, but she did none of these things. On the contrary, she is seen to contribute a not insignificant loss ‘both for herself and for him.’ For both of them fell away ‘from the delight of paradise’ and have gone very far from any superiority over death and corruption.” Someone could respond to such claims by precisely applying their mind to the oracles of the God-breathed scripture. It is true that the woman was made for the purpose of assistance. But, it is necessary and quite reasonable, I think, to investigate the type of assistance for which she was created. For in this way we shall release the Craftsman from Julian’s indictment. The woman was in fact not taken as a partner in his purpose or plan; and she was allotted passage into existence by a verdict of God who knows all, [but] not in order that she might by nature have immutability and an ingrained inability ever to diverge from the Lord’s will.

For the rational creature is governed by voluntary choices, darting towards the good and its opposite with voluntary inclinations. Instead, she was taken for the purpose of assistance so as to aid in the bearing of children; for it was said to both of them, “Increase and multiply and fill the earth.” 3.G For the other animals had already been brought into existence, I mean land animals, birds, and water animals; and indeed, the race [of animals] had hopes of being able to become a countless multitude, for there were both male and female among them. But the man lacked something “like him,” that is, something similar to him in nature, through which the bearing of his children would necessarily become abundant in equal measure to the other animals. Look here for me at the female brought into existence wisely and expertly according to what God deemed fitting. For although he was able to start afresh also in her case and to take “the dust from the ground” and fashion her in the same manner as Adam himself was created, he did not do so; rather, wanting to implant in the man an inclination for her, God took a small part of the man, and having interwoven the rest he brought forth a woman well-suited to the principles of the man’s nature. The man accepted her gladly and, aroused to love by natural stirrings and all but embracing her, says “This is now bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh; she will be called woman because she was taken from her man.”

Therefore, God implanted in the nature of males a natural connection – I mean for the female – since human affairs would be arranged best if those joined in lawful harmony were disposed towards their wives in the same way as Adam. Accordingly, the meaning of the “assistance” brought to Adam by his wife should reasonably be understood in terms of the manner of reproduction. If it was possible for reproduction to be accomplished in a different way, let Julian tell us what it was and prove it, and I will be silent. But if human reproduction could not happen unless the matter involved both, I mean both father and mother, why does he jump on us for no good reason and, being addicted to slander, dare to disparage things done rightly in this manner, which proceed, so to speak, along a straight path? Let him, therefore, release the Craftsman from the indictment; for he has not at all shown that he erred in his plans in the case of the female. “This is true,” he says, “but nevertheless she did not give good counsel when she seduced Adam to consider as worthless the command given [about the forbidden fruit].” Yes, admittedly she became a poor counselor – I will hardly deny the truth. But, if he has some complaint against the laws of nature or censures God’s actions as not done well, let Julian show us the charges for which someone might indict God for straying from his purpose.

If, on the other hand, this is in fact madness and a clear proof of the utmost insanity, why does Julian say that God was mistaken? And why would he make this accusation if, furthermore, the female was brought by the whisperings of another [i.e., the snake] to choose to do what was wrong, although human reason has received the power over what should and shouldn’t be done and, as I said, has been allowed to pursue any course of action whatsoever by its voluntary incli-nations, since God who is the best artisan of all thought that this too was right? For it was necessary that the rational creation be honored with the capacity for voluntary action and that its readiness in good works be revealed as the fruit of free choice. These things seemed to be worthy of all praise even to Julian’s teachers. Porphyry, for example, in his book To Nemertius speaks thus: Now God wanted humans also to be partakers of the truth about reality; for this reason, he also made them rational since reason would be capable of tracking down the truth. And he also has given freedom and free will to each person, so that the beauty adorned with praise because of its voluntary nature might be up to them. But many people, turning aside towards irrationality and a lack of reasoning arising from their laziness, have fallen into a beastly manner of life and have been mistaken with respect to reality; since even a sober-minded person, by the virtue of hard work, can scarcely maintain the truth about these things.

And indeed, elsewhere he also writes: Free will belongs to the soul which has received the possession of freedom for the purpose of [exhibiting] virtue or the voluntary choice of vice, in order that praiseworthiness and blameworthiness might be assessed in the case of each individual soul, and that there might be room among humans for approbation, praise and due rewards – as well as censure, dishonor and punishment for those who chose to perform deeds of injustice. Wise men say that souls choose the life that each wants, having the ability to do so from [God’s] providence. Does our account seem to you to fall short of the truth? Or will you agree with your own teachers and yourself admit that this is how things are? If Julian thinks that he needs still more testimonies on this subject, I shall present him with the words of Alexander, a man who was one of the most subtle and precise among them. For in his book On Providence he said, Someone might see the goodwill of the divine nature towards us also in the following. Since it was impossible for the virtues to be in us by nature, the divine nature, by granting us the power over which it is the master, made the acquisition of the virtues up to us and no one else, in order that what we could not have from it we might be able to get by ourselves as though from it.

If then we were able to possess virtues by our nature there would be no room left for vice. But since this is impossible – since our nature only goes so far as our being able to receive the virtues – everything that is receptive of something to which there is an opposite, is necessarily also receptive of its opposite. Again, Alexander said in his On Fate, We don’t see everyone or even the majority of people possessing the virtues – which is an indication of what is natural – but must content ourselves with perhaps just one such person who exhibits through training and teaching the natural superiority of humans in comparison with the other animals, having supplemented on his own what is necessarily lacking in our nature. For this reason, the acquisition of the virtues is up to us, and it is neither useless nor pointless to give praise or blame, or encourage one towards what is better, or to guide one through better habits that are in accord with the laws. Therefore, someone who has chosen to think rightly will not at all doubt that the God of the universe must be entirely free of the charge of not planning well in the fashioning of humanity, even if some may have become disobedient, since, as I said, the inclination and permission to choose anything whatsoever has been allotted to them as a rudder and they have willingly tended towards what is outside the law and discordant with it.

For continual happiness would no doubt have been theirs in every way if they had observed the law that had been given. But since they were carried off towards apostasy, their hopes were immediately disappointed and they were brought down to a more shameful condition and, even more, to everything that would naturally cause grief. “But why did God even legislate anything at all,” he says, “and scare them away from something they could eat? For he commanded ‘to eat from every tree’ excluding only the one ‘in the middle of paradise.’ But no offense would have occurred if no law or commandment had been passed. If he is good why did he punish them?” 56 Since, therefore, the God who is beyond all “is good,” tell me, would it be appropriate for us to disregard what comes from him, and shall we despise it with impunity? Indeed, such an attitude and way of thinking didn’t even seem right to the wise men of the Greeks. For Plato once more said at one point: “According to an ancient account, God holds the beginning, end, and middle of all that exists, and completes in a straight course his circuit in conformity with nature; and Justice ever attends him as a punisher of those who abandon the divine law.” Thus, since “Justice attends” him “as a punisher,” punishing with complete justice those who have chosen to despise the divine law, no one should think that because God “is good ” it is necessary and proper for us to pursue with impunity everything that seems best to us.

We should instead recognize that we are to fear his greatness, keeping in mind his preeminence over all things, and to submit to his ordinances, making the neck of our reasoning tractable and easily guided by his reins. Would one not grant that it is especially proper for someone who is good not to acquiesce to vices? So how is it not true to say that the goad of the laws is sharpened not against the virtuous but rather against those who have no desire to do good works and who reject the duty of living as a free person? So then, people who have attached the mooring-lines of their reasoning to the virtues are in fact able to rely on the laws; if, that is, it is not to be doubted that [the laws] restrain that which is stubborn and by the threat of punishment hold in check that which inclines to apostasy, turning people towards the good and compelling those who have chosen to have no part in proper reasoning to leave behind what is rather shameful. No thoughtful person would blame the laws themselves or those who have formulated them. For the laws are not responsible for the fact that those who are convicted of crimes necessarily suffer – since, although they could have chosen right thinking, they went off after what pleased them. Instead, they are caught in the act of destroying themselves.

If, therefore, Julian were to say that the God of the universe should not have laid down a law for the first humans in the beginning, he will hear in answer from us – and this quite reasonably: “Tell me, then, should humanity have been left unsupervised, completely free to roam unbridled, not knowing anything superior or even who the ruler is at all? And yet, complacency is nearly always accompanied by a state of instability and complete laxity, with a formidable tendency to cause confusion and to send a person veering off into wasting their energies; that which is under the yoke and control of the one assigned to rule, on the other hand, shows more moderation. In the same way that bridles are not useless for horses to know how to run well, which is a mark of honor for them, nor likewise are rudders useless for ships – for by them they stay true to course – so also law is not useless for humanity.” If Julian censures what I have said, then he admits it is pointless to issue laws, although he himself was a legislator. It would then be necessary, Your Excellency, for us even to remove judges from public life, as well as the very fear that is most beneficial to habitual wrong-doers, I mean the fear of an inevitable punishment; or perhaps there would be nothing strange about removing children from the instruction of their parents!

However, a horse would never run well without a bridle and rider, nor indeed would ships run straight on course if the one who knew how to steer them was removed, nor will a city earn the reputation for being administered in the best way without judges presiding over it, nor indeed is the instruction of parents useless for those who are still children. The presiding law is, therefore, in every way beneficial. Let us, if it seems good to you, examine the other parts of creation, to see if they are not yoked to the Craftsman’s laws. The great and brilliant sun completes its proper course with due order, and indeed the moon also and the other stars; the hours come forth in orderly manner as day and night. From them, those who are willing can see that the creation proclaims its Orderer through its excellent order, and through its fine disposition all but shouts aloud that it yields to laws and is administered by the ineffable decisions of God, the best artisan of all things. Accordingly, the prophet David says in a psalm: “You made the moon for marking times, the sun knew its setting.” The God-breathed scripture is full of such testimonies. However, confirmation from those who hold the same opinions as Julian will perhaps persuade him or rather put him on the right path, even if he is unwilling.

So then, Alexander, an illustrious man, speaks as follows in his book On Providence: Nothing in the universe happens without providence. For all things are full of the divine and it pervades all of reality. For this reason, too, all that comes to be happens according to God’s will […]. This is confirmed also by what is seen. For the order of that which comes to be by nature, ever remaining in a similar condition, is a great proof of the fact that these things do not happen by chance. Moreover, in another passage: Aristotle says that the preservation and birth of things here, and the eternal continuation of their species do not occur without divine providence. For the power from the sun and from the other stars that are the sun’s companions, according to him, possesses the cause of the birth and preservation of things established by nature. Therefore, from the good order in the visible phenomena and their harmonious movement it should be apparent that they are yoked to the laws of their Ruler. For, it says, “The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament announces the work of his hands.” If someone with the innermost eyes of their mind should leap up above the nature of perceptible things, and if they are carried beyond everything visible and investigate the intelligible and knowable creation, he shall find that it, too, is administered by appropriate laws, and is obedient, compliant, and entirely dedicated to the God over all.

For angels and archangels serve and honor him with unending praises, possessing a genuine sense of devotion to the power of his glory. Accordingly, the divine prophet Isaiah says that he “saw the Lord Sabaoth sitting upon a lofty and exalted throne, and the Seraphim stood about him in a circle,” and they were singing hymns antiphonally in response to each other. And David likewise sings a psalm and says: “Bless the Lord all his angels, you who are powerful in might, doing his word in order to listen to the sound of his words; bless the Lord all his powers, his servants doing his will.” Accordingly, it is undeniable that the giving of the law to the first humans by God hardly proved to be detrimental to them – far from it! – but rather turned out to convey the utmost benefit and provided them with exceptional goods. And if it seems to anyone that I am not putting the truth first here, let him look at the matter from the facts themselves: for there were a great number of trees in Paradise and he commanded that all of them should be used for food but only the one “in the middle” should be avoided. “And yet,” someone might say, “it was perhaps more beneficial to have put the tree that they were prohibited from eating at the edges of Paradise, perhaps even in places they did not know, so that it would not constantly be seen and thus whet the viewers’ appetites towards desiring it.”

What shall we say to this? The plan to ensure that the tree would not escape their notice was put forward with the greatest foresight and skill, since God was the tree’s maker. For it was necessary, yes it was necessary that those who looked upon the tree should constantly be called to remembrance of the law by the tree itself and recognize the preeminence of their Ruler and not be ignorant that he was a lawgiver and Lord. And, from another perspective, the requirement that they, for a time, practice docility in such small matters and intensely exercise self-control would not have failed to contribute something beneficial to them. 3.G In addition to this, it will be necessary, I think, to say the following. For it was also highly likely that, because they always saw the tree and were not able to ignore the law about it, they were always called to remembrance of the God who gave the command and thus leapt up to contemplate him. By raising their thought above earthly affairs, they wisely considered who had given the command and how great he was. Nothing could have been more precious than the true contemplation of God, if indeed such activity implants within us participation in complete blessedness. Accordingly, our Lord Jesus Christ, when he was discoursing with God, the heavenly Father, said, “This is eternal life: that they might know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you sent.”

And indeed, the all-wise Moses also begged God when he was longing to obtain such knowledge, saying: “If I have found favor with you, show yourself to me; may I see you intelligibly.” For Israel, and Moses along with them, had seen God, but it was more with their bodily perception and not yet “intelligibly,” since God “descended” in the form “of fire on Mt. Sinai.” Christ has confirmed that the divine and ineffable nature is not actually known as fire nor would it ever be subject at all to vision, when he spoke to the Jews about God the Father: “You have neither heard his voice nor seen his form.” For only by way of God’s accommodation was the divinity given shape in fire. Moreover, the fact that the precise vision of God would provide to those who are worthy to seize it the happiness that surpasses all other forms of happiness is something that can be shown also from the books written by those who think differently from ourselves. For Alexander, whom we just mentioned, again said, It is not right to pass over the following thing either, which has itself also been given by divine providence to humanity, and which we mentioned briefly in what was already said before. And it is this: that the pinnacle of our happiness lies in piety towards the divine, such that we do not expect any external rewards for this reason from it, but that we obtain the supreme good in service to it.

Therefore, it is agreed that happiness for humans chiefly rests in contemplation. For this activity belongs to the most honorable of the soul’s faculties, namely the intellectual faculty. For the true knowledge of the most excellent things in existence is contemplation. And the most excellent things of all that exist are divine. Our happiness is thus in the knowledge of divine things. So then, given that “happiness” lies “in the contemplation” “of divine things,” something that even those who share Julian’s opinions and superstition themselves say, how can anyone not greatly admire the God of the universe who gave to the first humans the law about the tree as a springboard for focusing on the divine? The tree had also been planted “in the middle of Paradise” because it was necessary that those seeing it be called very frequently to the remembrance of the law and that through the law they should in a way always imagine the preeminence and the exceptional beauty of the one who had implemented it. Accordingly, insofar as the Craftsman’s goal was concerned, one can see that the female did not become a source for any loss or harm to her husband; and indeed, we hold that the pure Intellect that surpasses all things was not unaware of what would happen. On the contrary, he knows “all things before their generation,” but permits human affairs to go with the flow, so to speak, precisely because it is apparent that the decision of whether or not to do any given thing hangs upon each person’s choice.

Now, given that God is good and his invariable inclination is to hate everything that participates in inappropriate conduct and is remiss in its duties, someone might for this reason determine that it would have been better if he had not permitted certain people to come into existence from the outset. But if we followed this line of reasoning, then it seems to me we would have to blame him not only for the first humans, but also for a great many other people, or rather for all those who were born after them and who, right up to our own day, are lax and sinful and who habitually disregard the divine laws. Nevertheless, the wise thing to do, in my view, would be to ascribe to him and him alone the knowledge of all things and the administration of our affairs in whatever way he chooses, and to be fully convinced that everything is correct and blameless. To censure him about anything at all brings with it an indictment for the most serious impiety. For as the prophet Isaiah says: “Who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” And the prophet David, too, is most correct to cry aloud and say to him: “Your path is in the sea, and your ways are in many waters, your steps shall not be known.” For it is difficult for humans to see, or rather it would be entirely beyond the reach of our sight to behold the plan and will of the sovereign God with respect to each one of our affairs and also the very path he takes to carry them out.

I shall add to what I have said the agreement of Julian’s own teachers in this matter. For once more, Porphyry said the following: for, since that which presides over the universe is a divine Intellect ordering and administering everything with the surpassing greatness of its wisdom and with the incomparable distinctiveness of its power, the human intellect, being small, fails to notice many causes even if it should seem to be wise and a discoverer of truth. But the pious thing is for us to abandon difficult investigation into impassable problems and not only to keep from daring to blaspheme but also to think and say that things are good as they are and that it is because they are good that they have come to be in the manner that they have. For why would an Intellect of such greatness and character act contrary to its own law? But one must regard it as impermissible for our understanding to scrutinize what is good and for our lack of understanding to scrutinize what is bad. Accordingly, the requirement that one think and say that everything coming from God is done correctly would hardly be inconsistent with prudent considerations, but it is entirely unholy and abhorrent to want to meddle in things we cannot capture or, rather, outrun our finitude and intellect. But the all-wise Julian adds still other notions to what he has already said and continues without interruption the thread of his argument: What sort of language shall we say the snake used when it conversed with Eve?

Was it a human language? How are such stories any different from the myths invented by the Greeks? 93 See how he again censures the true accounts and claims they resemble “Greek myths.” So then, he clearly knows that those stories he deems worth pondering and regards as having religious power are myths and old wives’ prattling, nothing more. But actually, dear sir, we do not say this about the holy and God-breathed scripture. For there is no mythical element in it at all; rather, everything is filled with truth. I am amazed that, although he is quite subtle and not inexperienced in teachings that he at least thinks and says are esoteric, and although he sometimes even pushes his mind beyond the sensible realm, he fails to understand that the speech occurred by the activity of that wicked daemon who is the origin of evil, who was using the snake as a cloak for his own innate perversity. For, although at that time there was no other animal that could speak, the female, due to her excessive simplicity, perhaps supposed that the capacity to use human speech had also been granted to other animals. Now Moses’ account alone is more than sufficient for the required demonstration that it is not difficult for impure spirits to conduct these sorts of enterprises on occasion. Since, however, it is likely that those who have chosen to hold the same mindset as that slanderer of Christianity will be averse to concurring with our accounts, come let us prove the matter, insofar as possible, by busying ourselves with their own histories.

So then, Homer, when he composed an account of the deeds of the Greeks at Troy, maintains that one of Achilles’ horses (namely, Xanthus) prophesied his death and that the hero responded: “Xanthus, why do you prophesy my death?” And Homer was hardly unconcerned with not giving the appearance of lying, since he said, “The white-armed goddess Hera made the horse speak with a human voice.” Perhaps Julian will again make his usual objections and say that this is a case of poetic mythology. But if this claim seems right to him, then he should accordingly denounce the deception of Homer’s poems and he should bring an accusation against his own teachers. Nevertheless, we should busy ourselves also with others who have composed similar accounts. Now, Porphyry, his partner and the father of his verbal onslaught against us, at one point said the following while relating the life of Pythagoras: Because they are so popular, we shall omit the stories recorded about the dedication to Argive Hera at Mycenae of the shield of Euphorbus the Phrygian along with the spoils of Troy. But they say that the Caucasus River addressed him once when he was crossing it with many of his companions. With a sort of shrill and resounding cry the river called out, “Greetings, Pythagoras,” while everyone listened on. But some people might, I suppose, respond that Porphyry said the river itself addressed him, not that it was a daemon that spoke.

Fair enough. Then perhaps the water was capable of speech! But we, I think, would say this explanation comes from a deranged mind and is simply inconceivable. So then, it was a daemon who spoke and the fact that the river seemed to address him is proof of Pythagoras’ sorcery. “But this is untrue and instead exhibits an addiction to slander,” [someone might say]. If, then, Pythagoras was not completely full of what the Greeks call ineffable wisdom, or rather magical skill, let him be released from blame and we ourselves will be the ones speaking nonsense! But if he should be revealed to be a sorcerer, an enchanter, and a person skilled in such matters, isn’t it true to say that the river’s greeting to him was performed by the activity of one of the daemons connected to it? Once more, Porphyry writes about him as follows: Pythagoras did not take his walks with many people in a manner that would cause jealousy, but on the contrary, he would walk with one or two others, in the holy sites and sacred groves, choosing the most tranquil and beautiful places. He dearly loved his friends, being first to declare that “friends hold their possessions in common” and “a friend is another self.” He would spend time with those who were healthy; he would take care of those whose bodies were ill and also comfort those whose souls were sick, some with incanta-tions and magical arts and others with music, just as we said.

And I suppose that saying the snake previously could not use a human voice is equivalent to saying the same about the Caucasus River, which found its voice thanks to the magician. And Clement who was most wise has mentioned Pythagoras in his Stromateis, saying: “Pythagoras was a devotee of Zoroaster the Persian, and those who belong to the school of Prodicus boast in the fact that they acquired that man’s secret books.” Now invariably they will say that the Magi are a Persian race. Moreover, no argument will release Zoroaster from the charge of being entangled in magical arts, and this is actually the person whose most excellent disciple they say was Pythagoras, so that some even boasted about the secret books he had composed. So much for the reports of Porphyry and Clement. Now Philostratus, when he was attempting to venerate the life of Apollonius with discriminating eloquence and was raising him to the pinnacle of all admiration, has him go to the very furthest edges of the land of Thebes. He said Apollonius made it to the very cataracts of the Nile River and spent time with the Gymnosophists there, who are themselves the very ones who know best how to practice sorcery. Then he says that the leader of them all – that is, Thespesion – spoke to Apollonius with the following exact words: “Since we are not incapable of being wise, he said, ‘You tree there’ – it was an elm tree, the third from the one under which they were talking – ‘speak to the wise Apollonius.’

And the tree spoke to him as it was commanded; its voice was articulate and female.” We shall also mention the oak of Dodona, which they say likewise has a human voice. And indeed, Isigonus of Citium also says that the bull of Zeus on the island of Rhodes is not unable to engage in speech like us. Observe, therefore, how the trifles of those who practiced sorcery show quite well that the ability on occasion to produce voices is inherent to the nature of daemons and not only, in fact, voices from animals with perception, but even from things without sound and perception, namely water and trees. It is accordingly clear to everyone that the snake could not have conversed with the woman if it was alone and acting by itself, since it possesses a nature incapable of speech and thought; rather, it was Satan, the origin of evil, who adopted the snake’s persona, intending to rob humanity of the immortality granted it. Would it not be entirely reasonable then for someone to find fault with Julian for failing to understand these things despite the fact that they nearly cry out with a loud voice against the wicked and unholy dragon? And I would add that, even if he himself refuses to believe, this by no means implies that the truth is unattainable; and he would rightly be ridiculed for not admitting the truth.

Having finished his argument on this topic as it pleased him, Julian again attacks the sacred scriptures like a hot-headed youth and says, Is it not excessively strange that God prohibits the humans he fashioned from discerning good and evil? What would be more foolish than a being unable to discern good and evil? For it is clear that he would not flee from the one – I mean evil things – nor would he pursue the other – I mean good things. In sum, God prohibited them from tasting prudence, although nothing could be more honorable for a human than this. For it is probably clear even to the unintelligent that the discernment of what is good and what is bad is the proper task of prudence. Now, an investigation would prove that Julian is ignorant of the force of what was written. But in order to clarify the nature of the whole matter, I suppose it is necessary for me to say a few things to him in response. It is true that complete ignorance of what the good is and also what its opposite is would be appropriate for a beast and more natural to a rock or tree, and is, I think, entirely alien to a rational soul. But the meaning of the phrase “to know good and bad,” in the God-breathed scriptures at least, wouldn’t in any way indicate that one has received an understanding of things in the form of bare and solitary knowledge, but in the form of capacity and experience, as will be shown clearly and plainly as my discourse advances.

Furthermore, I think it useful to say that God created humanity “for good works,” as it is written, lacking no good thing and being complete at least with respect to the principles implanted by nature, I mean those in both soul and body. For his mind had been created in such a way that it could behold God and the things of God, at least, that is, up to the limit assigned to his nature – “For we see in a mirror and in a riddle,” as it is written. It was filled with a desire for each and every marvelous thing, and was allotted a knowledge of everything good, though one that was still, so to speak, simple and singular, and it gazed upon it without distraction as though looking at it alone, focused on it with all the inclinations of its will, and readily going towards it as a willing agent. But as for his body, while it has been made from earth, it was nevertheless superior to death and corruption (even if some unbelievers should laugh when they hear me say this), since this is in fact what God willed and the nature of things follows his decrees and whatever seems good to him he renders entirely and wholly achievable thanks to certain ineffable operations; for the nature of each created thing is exactly what he had in mind.

For we could, of course, just use the words Plato has God say to those beings he had created, or rather the heaven and sun and stars which he also calls visible gods:133 “Therefore, inasmuch as you have come to exist, you are not immortal nor altogether indissoluble. Yet in fact you will not be dissolved nor meet the fate of death, having found in my will a bond still greater and more sovereign than those by which you were bound when you came into existence.” But, if we permit Plato to say this, then we cannot refuse to believe Moses’ writings if he should say that what was prone to corruption has, by God’s will, been placed beyond corruption. So then, his body was superior to death, since the Craftsman of all implanted life in it. And since it was beyond corruption, it was on the one hand allotted innate desires, I mean those desires for food and reproduction; but on the other, his mind was amazingly not tyrannized by inclinations for these things. For he used to do what he pleased with freedom since his flesh was not subjugated to the passions arising from corruption. But when he offended God who had framed him, disregarding the command he had given, and when the eating of what was forbidden became the beginning of his loss of self-control, from that point onwards he has been conquered by fault-inducing pleasures; the “law of sin” entered the body’s nature; the passions arising from improper desires sprang up from corruption as from an unholy root; and the love of pleasure has been running wild in us like an untameable beast ever since, rising up in opposition to our impulses for each and every excellent thing.

For example, the inspired Paul, all but groaning over the weaknesses of his nature, says: “For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am fleshly, since I have been sold [as a slave] under sin. For I do not understand what I do.” And again: “For I know that the good does not dwell in me, that is, in my flesh. For the intention of doing good is present within me, but not the doing of it. For I do not do the good that I want, but I do that evil which I do not want. But if I do that which I do not want, it is no longer I who am doing it, but the sin dwelling in me.” For if someone were to choose to examine carefully the innate movement of the flesh, I mean that movement which goes after the most improper of passions, [he would see that] “the good does not dwell in us”; for that movement forces the human mind towards the inevitability of aban-doning deliberation and choosing to do what is not right and it dares to subject the free person to a yoke of slavery like captives of war. The all-wise Paul also reveals that the revolt it presents is unbearable when he says: “For I delight in the law of God according to my inner person, but I see […] another law at war against the law of my mind, taking me captive to the law of sin that exists in my members.”

3.G Who, then, led human nature to this point of infirmity joined with misery? It was clearly the utterly evil dragon, who beguiled the woman’s as yet simple and innocent reasoning and brought an accusation against the ineffable glory. For, although Eve said that the God of the universe had prohibited them from taking food for themselves from the tree “in the middle of the Paradise of delight” and had even threat-ened death if they ignored his law, the snake tricked her, saying: “You shall not die with death: for God knew that on the day on which you ate of it […] you would be like gods so as to know the knowledge of good and evil.” Observe, therefore, how he became the inventor of destructive teach-ings. For the snake said that the God of the universe did not tell them the truth, but instead had lied and out of envy had prohibited them from eating, since he knew full well that when they had eaten it they would be gods. Hence, he slandered the supreme and ineffable nature itself and implanted in the first humans’ souls the destructive teaching of polytheism; and it is for this reason that he was quite reasonably named the “devil.” So, as I said, corruption leapt into human nature through the transgression and the ever-twisting passions arising from it entered as well – this, I suppose, was the “knowledge of good and evil,” not in the sense that our forefather Adam or those born in the beginning received into their mind just a simple knowledge of evil, as one might say, but in the sense that they came to possess knowledge of evil through their very own actions and experience.

For instance, it has been written, “Adam knew Eve his wife.” Someone would certainly not say that the knowledge in this case indicates a simple kind of knowledge or one that consists of mere awareness; rather the sacred scripture called the act of their coming together “knowledge.” Hence, it is the habit of the God-breathed scripture to use the word “knowledge” on occasion to indicate awareness regarding any moral action whatsoever that arises from experience itself. The only-begotten Word of God, at any rate, when he was transforming human nature back into what it was in the beginning, nullified “the sin in the flesh” by becoming human; and, moreover, having transferred us, as I said, into “newness of life,” he commands that the ancient dignity of our nature be restored and persuades us to return with nobility once more to that admirable beauty. He said, for instance: “It was told to the ancients, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ but I say to you ‘You shall not lust.’” Admittedly, this goal is difficult to attain and hard to grasp, at least in my view, and perhaps it is beyond our nature. But the inspired Paul does not allow us to think like this, since he has written: “For what was impossible for the law, in that it was weakened through the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and, on behalf of sin, he condemned the sin in the flesh in order that the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”

When the only-begotten, therefore, became human for our sake, “the law of sin” “in the flesh” was nullified and human affairs were, so to speak, reversed, undergoing a return to our original state: in other words, we prevail over death, corruption, fleshly pleasure, and the other desires which, allied with corruption, were ravaging our feeble and helpless intellect. Now then, I suppose this was a necessary discussion, but, since our argument has arguably fallen into a digression on such matters, it must return to the course it had in the beginning. The first humans did not live in ignorance of good and evil in Paradise. For as they were rational, they were allotted the knowledge befitting humans, since the Craftsman rendered their knowledge perfectly suited to their every need and to what was natural for them in terms of their substance. And by keeping their thought untyrannized by the pleasures of the flesh and improper desires, they were persevering in a holy and thrice-blessed life. But when, as I said, corruption rushed in upon them and when the pleas-ures that drag one down into bad behavior had been roused in their flesh, they did not experience the simple awareness of evil but now infirmity gained a foothold through experience itself. And if someone should choose to make an investigation into intellectual substances that transcend body and perception, he would be compelled to say that the knowledge of good and likewise its opposite certainly exists in them; but surely not the kind of knowledge involving the passions that arises from being entangled, as it were, in an actual experience, as we readily say occurred in the case of us humans.

For among the holy angels, some, still “preserving their authority,” enjoy a life that is renowned, thrice-blessed, and held in complete awe, keeping their own intellect turned towards the good and looking towards it, and they reject as impure what is not in this condition; for they are not ignorant of evil, but they know it in an untyrannized and free manner. But there are other angels, “who left their own dwelling” and dismissed what is better, and, by choosing instead more shameful actions, although they had knowledge of evil even before their misstep, they came to know it more distinctly through the actual experience of it. But if it seems good to you, come, let us confirm our intellect more firmly in the truth, the truth, that is, about the theories currently at hand, and let us raise our discourse as far as the realm of things that surpass all intellect. Shall we grant that the divine and hypercosmic nature, which is so venerable and all-holy, does not have knowledge of good and evil? How then does he provide legislation and, on the one hand, prohibit things that are more shameful and reveal the different types of sins, while, on the other, prompting people towards what is better and clarifying the means by which one can live in a noble manner and acquire a truly select glory for doing so?

Therefore, the divine and ineffable nature is good and singularly beneficent, or rather it is quite simply the Good itself. But it is not ignorant of what is evil, though it knows it in a nonexperiential way. In fact it is because we have experienced such knowledge that we have fallen into evil in all its forms. Now that we have compiled for ourselves ideas relevant to these topics in the preceding section, let us see what comes next. The philosopher Julian brings his own arguments to a sort of climax by saying the following: Julian … with the result that the snake was instead a benefactor for the human race and certainly not its destroyer. And this is not all, for Julian also adds again to what he said: On top of this, God is said to be jealous. For when he saw humanity sharing in prudence he “cast them out of Paradise” to prevent them from tasting, God says, “from the tree of life,” stating explicitly: “Behold, Adam has become like one of us so as to know good and evil, and now perhaps he will stretch out his hand and take from the tree of life and eat and will live forever. And the Lord God sent them out from the Paradise of delight.” 164 Therefore, each of the things said – unless it is a myth containing a secret theory, which is what I have believed – these words are full of a great deal of blasphemy against God.

For being unaware that the one created to be an “assistant” would be the cause of the transgression, prohibiting the knowledge “of good and evil,” which it seems alone sustains human life, and to top it off being struck with jealousy at the idea that humanity might partake of life and thus go from being mortal to being immortal – all of this is characteristic of someone who is consumed by envy and jealousy. What I’ve said above is sufficient as a proof of the stupidity inherent in his words. But it would do no harm – on the contrary, it would be beneficial for readers – if I choose to say a few more things at this point on the same issue. For in fact, it was not because humanity “had come to share in prudence” that the God of the universe drove them out of Paradise – for they were rational and had been created so at the beginning. Nor on the contrary was it an act of “jealousy and envy,” as Julian has dared to say, to prohibit “them from eating of the tree of life,” lest “they live forever.” Rather, the character of God’s foresight in this very matter should actually be admired, at least by those who are of sound mind. For they had once and for all neglected the divine laws, they had been conquered by the pleasures of the stomach, and finally they had been brought down to such a degree of misery that they were even sick with “the law of sin” in the very nature of their body and thus were about to sink into each and every form of reproachable conduct; so it was necessary to prevent them from being preserved in this world as an undying evil and from leading a long life incurring the hatred of the all-holy God in the same manner as unclean spirits.

Surely someone would say that it would be better for those who have erred from what is good not to appear entirely and constantly wicked but to cease, as it were, and reach the limit of their evil, heaping up for themselves a hope of at least some mercy through the imposition of death as a form of punishment. Hence, in order that humanity might not have a long life on this earth after having taken hold of the knowledge of evil that comes through experience and incurs God’s hatred, their life was, with the utmost skill, curtailed by the death of the flesh, since God knew the appropriate moment for showing clemency and loving-kindness to them. And this is what the inspired Paul teaches, having written that the mystery of Christ was “foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was revealed at the last” moments of the age, when it was necessary that there be a correction of what had happened to human nature. Therefore, these are in fact hardly mythologies or fictional accounts of pointless nonsense, but rather wise and essential discourses that in no way have erred from the truth. For I suppose even the very experience of things would suffice as proof of the truth that the Craftsman of the universe was executing a supremely well-ordered plan when he subjected human nature to death after seeing it tyran-nized by sin, namely in those first humans at the time of Adam.

Nevertheless, Porphyry, a partner in his way of thinking, also provides additional confirmation. For he said the following in the first book To Nemertius: God, knowing what is going to happen, frequently acts in advance to remove people from this life, some due to their youthful piety and others due to the future damage they will cause to those closest to them, while still others he pities and removes in advance to avoid irreparable misfortunes. And indeed, he elsewhere also said the following: Chrysippus, the follower of Socrates, did not think it right to say “Who knows [why]?” in response to things that happen but rather, “This was absolutely for the best.” For unless it is possible to sketch out an administration better than the divine one, we must surely suppose that what happens is better the way it is. For is it not true in your own experience [Nemertius] that, when you received from the emperor down here the task of exercising providence over a certain portion of the human empire and obeyed the laws for the benefit of the political order, it was impossible for you to maintain a lawful political order in any other way than to exile some of your subjects, confiscate the property of others, and even condemn still others to death; and is it not the case that you did not preserve the life of all its citizens since doing so wasn’t in the interests of everyone?

So then, when it comes to one who administers so great a world as this, are we really not going to let him administer his own realm in the manner he deemed right for the universe, without being called to account by us, even when he proceeds by means of deaths and changes [of fortune] and by the indefiniteness of one’s lifespan? So indeed, [Julian] accused even his own teachers, who by no means indict the ineffable plans of the God who rules over the universe for being out of order, but instead avoid prying into them and honor them with the verdict of being entirely right. For they have assigned to the highest knowledge the task of steering the rudder of human affairs in accordance with its own understanding of what is right and skillful and in whatever way seems preferable to it and it alone. For the one who is the source, giver, and governor “of understanding and wisdom” for everyone else could in no way miss what is best and blameless in either speech or action. God, therefore, was not envious nor was he overcome by pangs of jealousy like us, but was instead carefully crafting what happened. For Moses has shown that the first human was carried away by the dragon’s tricks into a futile hope, supposing he could perhaps even be a god by eating of the tree, since he has introduced the God of the universe as saying: “Behold, Adam has become like one of us.”

For in fact it is not the case that he was a god on account of his transgression, but he was caught having fallen into the most extreme misery. Furthermore, the fullness of the holy Trinity would become clear to us also through these verses; for it was not to one of the holy angels that the one beyond all creation said, “Behold Adam has become like one of us”; rather, the one ineffable nature beyond all things, which is in the holy and consubstantial Trinity, addressed these words to itself. But Julian once again redirects the method of his “intrigue” against us to yet further topics and attempts to compare his own entirely wretched doctrines to those of the Christians, saying the following: With respect to what both [the Jews] correctly believe about God and our fathers have handed down to us from the beginning, our account is as follows:186 the Craftsman proximate to this world 187 – for Moses mentioned nothing at all about beings higher than this; at least, he ventured nothing about the nature of the angels, except he said often and in many passages that they minister 188 to God. But he nowhere specifies whether they are generated or ungenerated; whether they are generated by one god and have been assigned to minister to another or they do so in some other way. Thus Moses provides a narrative about heaven and earth and the things in it, and how they were ordered.

He says that God commanded some things “to come into being” 190 – like day, light, and firmament – but he “created” other things 191 – like heaven, earth, sun, and moon – while yet other things, which already existed but were still hidden, he “separated” 192 – like water and dry land, I guess. In addition, he dared not speak about the generation or making of the Spirit, but only, “And the Spirit of God was moving over the water.” But he fails to make clear whether it was ungenerated or generated. Now it is not difficult to see that he uses inventive speech in a disordered manner, and, abandoning the path that was most appropriate to his argument, he has fallen into intervening nonsense. Nevertheless, let us address him on these matters, too. The inspired Moses clearly declared to us that the one highest God who is beyond all is the Craftsman of the universe, but it was through his Son in the Holy Spirit; for thus the ineffable nature is indeed “proximate” to his creatures, understood in the manner of an extrinsic relation. Why, therefore, does Julian come up with such incredibly stupid lies and say that nothing at all is said about what he calls the “highest God”? For what is beyond the one who is beyond all things? What sort of origin can be conceived for the origin of the universe?

For his father and teacher, Plato, “specified ” that the “Craftsman” who is the source of all is one – and also says he is “proximate to the world ” – but that another god, or rather, the form of the Good, subsists prior to this one; and he also has a notion of a third cause, which is lesser than the first two in rank and in nature, and indeed he also calls it the soul of all beings. But as for us, when it comes to the vision of God, we have been enriched with a wiser and more precise account and have been taught to worship the one true nature of divinity in the holy Trinity, which is beyond every generated thing, attending as we do upon the words of those who speak about God. We hold, therefore, that God the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit, is the Craftsman of the universe, whose intelligible and hypercosmic beauty one could, in my view, trace out – at least insofar as possible – on the basis of the fact that the things generated were well made. And indeed it is readily conspicuous that it was brought into existence with an order that is fitting: “For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divinity, are clearly visible,” it says, “apprehended in the things that have been made.”

Moreover, we claim that the account of Plato himself also agrees with this statement; for he said one will need to ascend from the beauty of perceptible things to the intelligible beauty of God, and one must contemplate his excellence on the basis of “the [beauty] contained in the laws and common practices.” Now, although we also praise the path of contemplating God in this way – for the creation loudly proclaims its Craftsman – it is not only on the basis of what we have just mentioned that we marvel at the Father; rather, it is on the basis of the exact image of him, namely the Son, that we are even more astonished; for in his own nature he inscribes his begetter for us in an intelligible fashion. Furthermore, someone could learn from Plato’s own words that, although he established the first God, as he says at one point, in stillness and immobility, he himself recognized in a different sense that he moves in a creative way through the second [God] as it pleases him in turn. For he said, These are the lives, not only of the first God, but also of the second. And it is clear that, while the first God will stand firm, the second on the contrary is moving; therefore, while the first concerns the intelligibles, the second concerns the intelligibles and perceptibles.

Do not again be amazed that I said this; for you will hear something much more amazing. For, instead of the movement present to the second God, I claim that the stability present to the first is a kindred movement, from which the ordering of the world, its eternal permanence, and its preservation are poured forth to the universe. Since, therefore, the “stability” of his “first” God might be understood quite rightly as “kindred” to the “movement present to the second God” – for in this way he co-establishes generated things and he allots order and permanence to each – our accuser has recited a futile declamation against the history of Moses, saying that he revealed “nothing” at all about the first and highest God, although he has clearly written that all things were brought into being and subsistence from the Father through the Son in the Spirit. 3.G But, Julian claims, he is found to have written “nothing about the nature of angels.” This was because he had to avoid saying what cannot be understood. For if it is true that, “We discover the things at hand with force,” as it has been written, and if the inquiry into things that are perceptible and subject to opinion is something our minds can lay hold of only with great difficulty, how could one speak of matters transcending perception and possessing a glory residing far beyond human language?

For how could anyone doubt that they are generated when Moses names them ministers and says they are yoked to someone else’s will as though by necessity? For everything that is under a yoke is a slave; and whatever might be said to minister is not entirely free by nature. And the inspired David also at one point sings: “He makes spirits his angels and fiery flames his ministers.” Since a similar topic occurs in Julian’s accusations against Moses – for he claims Moses said nothing about the divine Spirit, whether it is generated or ungenerated, but only that “the Spirit of God was moving over the water” – he should listen to our response: “Yet shouldn’t one examine the meaning of these words in a more thoughtful and careful manner than he has done? For if Moses gave the Spirit an altogether divine name, how could it be understood as generated, or how could that which is created naturally belong to the one who is uncreated? Therefore, by merely saying that it is the ‘Spirit of God’ he has testified that it is also ungenerated. For that which comes from God according to nature could not be of a nature different from his own or foreign to him in terms of substance, at least if we are sticking to an account that is reasonable and in keeping with the appropriate theories.”

In addition to this, Julian accuses the supremely excellent Moses for introducing to us the God of the universe as at one time bringing into existence some beings by a word, while at another time having also “created” [others]. In response to this, we claim that his account was formed in an excellent and very sensible manner on every point. For it was necessary, yes necessary indeed, to declare not only that God was the generator of the universe, but also to add the most advantageous point that he accomplishes whatever he wants by a word and a nod. For while the ability to create something is also in us, nevertheless it does not happen in an identical manner – far from it! – but rather by labor and by working with our hands we give form to matter and therefore become inventors of arts and are called craftsmen. The activities of God, therefore, will transcend ours by incomparable differences; for he brings what once did not exist into existence, but nevertheless is seen to be carrying out such deeds by the mere act of willing, as his Word fastens together whatever he decides. But perhaps Julian understands none of this: as though he had no shame and had given free rein to his insults against God, he always contrives something else still more impious than his previous remarks and attempts to prove that “the one proclaimed in the writings of Moses” must be described as and must in fact be “a certain one” of the many beings who are thought to be gods “in part,” so much so that he even “was allotted as his portion” some “smallest” piece of land under the sun – I mean, Judea – and yoked to himself only the single race of Israel and is perhaps barely able to “exercise providence over” his subjects and then only with difficulty.

Then, throwing together certain strange and puerile concepts, he imagines that he has provided a sufficient proof for his argument. I am going to set forth each of his nonsensical assertions “part by part,” omitting the majority and gathering together briefly those passages that relate to the same way of thinking. Accordingly, he said, Since, therefore, Moses has surely not discussed everything about the Craftsman proximate to this world, let us compare with each other the views of the Hebrews and our fathers on these same topics. Moses says the proximate Craftsman of this world “chose” the nation of Hebrews and is devoted 223 to it alone and cares for it, and Moses assigns to him the administration of this nation alone. But as for the other nations, Moses makes no mention whatsoever of how or by which gods they are administered – unless one were to concede the following words, that he “assigned” the “sun and the moon” to them. But more on that a little later. For now, I shall show that Moses himself, the prophets after him, and Jesus the Nazarene say that he was the God of Israel alone and of Judea and that these people were “elect”; 226 as does also that man who surpasses all the magicians and deceivers that have ever existed anywhere on earth, Paul. Listen to their very words and first to those of Moses: “Tell Pharaoh, ‘[…] Israel is my firstborn son.’

And I have said, ‘Let my people go that they might worship me; but you were unwilling to let him go.’” And a little later: “They said to him, ‘The God of the Hebrews has summoned us; we shall go, therefore, on a three-day journey into the wilderness, to sacrifice to the Lord our God […].’” And again after a few things he similarly says: “The Lord the God of the Hebrews has sent me to you saying, ‘Let my people go in order that they might worship me in the desert.’” 230 To these he strings together still other quotations compiled from the sacred scriptures, attempting to confirm that he has been named God of Israel alone and that the race descended from Abraham has been allotted to him as his particular inheritance. Then he brings his own arguments to a climax, asserting that, as for the God of the Hebrews, it is important that we think of him, not as the generator of the whole world nor as the ruler of the universe, but, as I said, as diminished and thought to have limited authority amidst the welter of other gods. This, then, is the aim of Julian’s innate perversity. Now for our part we shall also make counterarguments on each point, pitting the truth against his cunning devices, such that those who admire his claims might know that he has quoted the words of the God-breathed scripture in a crude way to give the appearance of being some wise man well-studied in the doctrines of the Christians.

But we shall see from the facts themselves that he understands nothing at all, but is selfabsorbed, arrogant, and tells unbridled lies. He has cheated the God of the universe, by maintaining first – I know not how – that he entirely neglected the other nations, and secondly that he cut off for himself Judea alone and foisted the yoke of his kingdom upon only those descended from Israel. On this basis, in my view, someone could quite easily delineate the frailty of Julian’s innate way of thinking; for he is entirely ignorant of the fact that the highest nature has the entire creation under its feet and exercises providence over the universe. To begin with, we claim that knowledge of the divine has been implanted into human nature, and that the Craftsman has instilled within it an innate awareness of all that is beneficial and necessary for salvation. And because humanity had been allotted such a constitution and proceeded directly to the truth on the basis of the world’s generation, orderliness, beauty, and continuation in this state, they naturally saw how great is the “wisdom and power” beyond every mind, which belongs to the one who framed it and brought it into existence. And what’s more, the most excellent Moses has taught well on this subject, rekindling the law inherent in nature. For he has compiled for us discourses about God and he says that he is generator of all the world without anything at all being excluded.

For he says, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,” in my view, indicating in brief and summary fashion also all the things contained within them both. And again: “This is the book of the generation of heaven and earth […] on the day that God made the heaven and the earth, […] and all the grass of the field.” So then, if Julian is going to use the words of Moses to fight against us, he ought to believe Moses. So how could he who constructed this universe by a nod and brought it into existence by a word, possessing a power that is so supernatural and incomprehensible to every mind, he who made “a human upon the earth,” how could he have consented to ruling over just a handful of people despite the fact that he has a claim to stretching across the universe and not being thought of amidst the welter of other gods, with a circumscribed realm of authority? Come, then, let us investigate the reasons why God might have decided to do otherwise, or rather let Julian himself come and teach us. Was he weak and unable to exercise providence over the universe? If so, how then does he appear to be capable of its making and generation? For it would be quite unpersuasive and insolent, in my view, to say that, while he possessed a competence and power sufficient for the task of creating, he was nevertheless still unable to rule over it as well.

And yet, isn’t it easy to see that he exercises his rule in a properly divine manner? For, indeed, just as much as it was in the beginning, so even to this day the creation shows an inclination towards movement and there is nothing that has thrown it into complete confusion and disorder. For the sun moves in an orderly fashion and follows its orbit from the East to the West; similarly, the moon rules the night, and likewise the brilliant chorus of stars is governed by laws. Thus, there arises the sequence of seasons one after the other, the revolutions of night and day marked off by proportional intervals, the growth of fruit, the falling of ripe ones, the births of land animals, birds, and fish; and I will add to these also the affairs of us humans ourselves. The one, therefore, who has placed upon his creatures the ineluctable yoke of his own will, seems to me to rule the universe with supreme strength and has neither cast it aside to others nor established the falsely named gods, who are in fact impure daemons, as harsh masters over his own creatures. The most wise Moses has, therefore, introduced God for us as generator of the universe. Observe, please observe, whether the facts themselves don’t agree with his words. For he claimed that the “beginning of the day” is under the command of the sun, and in the same way that the moon has been established “as the authority of the night” and is in truth “for times” and “signs,” and that the chorus of stars is for “giving light” to those “on the earth.”

But the one who has written these things does not intend to impose upon people the obligation of ascribing reverence instead to other gods nor indeed to created things, but he has ordained that they devote themselves solely to the Craftsman of the universe. For he says: “And you shall not, looking to the sky and beholding the sun, moon and stars and all the order of the sky, be driven into error and worship those things […], which the Lord your God assigned to all the nations that are under the sky.” In light of this, how can he say that the God of the universe disre-garded the remaining multitude of nations, but ruled only those from Israel and assigned his special providence to them? And yet, the author of our sacred books claims that the benefits of his craftsmanship have been allotted “to all the nations that are under the sky.” So in fact Julian ought not belittle so great a good, which is worthy of acceptance, by saying “unless one were to concede the following words, that he assigned the sun and the moon to them.” For the one we ourselves worship, whom those descended from Israel also accepted on the basis of Moses’ writings, is in fact the God of the universe and is revealed to have allotted an ample amount of attention to people everywhere on earth, and this without any interruption; we will now demonstrate this point on the basis of the God-breathed scripture itself.

Taking the reins of our discourse and guiding it back to the beginning, so to speak, we shall proceed to the first human himself, namely Adam. Well then, he “was formed” by God and from him the entire race sprang forth, I mean the human race. For this very reason, the human on earth, or quite simply the whole race, is understood as belonging to the God who is over all; for the Lord of the root would naturally possess those shoots that come from the root as his own too. Two young men were born from the first man: Cain and Abel. These were the first to have sacrificed, the one rightly, the other not so. For what reason? While he praised right-minded and “just” Abel, the other one’s sacrifice he did not accept, and quite rightly so. For it was entirely necessary that their descendants learn from those who were the first to show reverence and piety towards God the proper and blameless way to bring to God the honors that were fitting and owed to him. And this act which ensured that those who had chosen to gain distinction could live a magnificent life would, in my view at least, be indicative of someone who was exercising providence and showing concern. For I, at least, hold that piety towards God is something important and truly worth acquiring.

And in fact, after this pair of brothers, other practitioners of justice were born who are admired for their virtue and whose swift pursuit of each and every good thing has won them the best verdict of all. One of these I hold was the thrice-blessed Enoch, about whom the sacred scripture says, “he was not found”; for “God transferred him.” Thus, he transferred Enoch, since everything that is exceptional, admirable, and resplendent with virtuous achievements is dear to God and proper to him. But when the entire earth “corrupted […] its path,” as it has been written, and when the heart of “humanity” had veered away “towards wickedness from their youth,” God let loose a flood upon those throughout all the earth, as though he were recovering an overgrown and barren garden and safeguarding a noble tree in it, namely the most excellent Noah, in order that starting from him the human race might be transformed, as it were, into a new beginning and thus be once more preserved upon the earth. But how will Julian respond to this, that man who never in any way relents in his delight at slandering us and who is so clever in his use of words and deception? For if in fact the God of the Hebrews was restricted to Judea alone and possesses a circumscribed dominion, how, tell me, did he let loose “the floodwaters of the sky” upon the inhabit-ants of the earth and condemn everyone with a single punishment by again engulfing the whole earth entirely with water?

If he wasn’t ruling all, as Julian claims, why have the other gods been silent? For it was indeed incumbent upon them to defend their respective worshippers and for each one to contend nobly for his own kingdom; but they unfathomably either abandoned their respective worshippers or were lax in their duty of watching over the realm assigned to them. Therefore, aren’t these ideas immediately shown to be ridiculous nonsense fit for old women? What’s more, isn’t it a clear proof that “the one proclaimed” to the world “by Moses” must not be called a “partial” god or thought of as one of the falsely named gods? For Moses declared him to be the maker of the world and the Lord of the universe, but says the race of Abraham was chosen by God and taken like a sort of firstfruits of the other nations, since God guides all peoples to knowledge of the divine by means of those he initially invited who are like a root. But this noble man, omitting the first part of Moses’ writings, actually attempts to limit God’s kingdom based on the mere fact that he “chose” Israel. Yet someone could say to him on this point: “Your Excellency, the one who ensnared Abraham in later times and honored his race by an unrivalled verdict, declaring it to be his particular allotment since the other nations had not yet been called, it was this very one and no other who ‘made firm the sky’ and ‘founded the earth upon its stability,’ as it has been written, and who, to sum up, produced ‘the entire creation,’ ‘the visible and invisible.’”

Now if Julian is stuck in the swamps of unbelief and considers the all-wise Moses’ discourse about God to be unacceptable, this does no harm at all to the power of the truth. For, as the all-wise Paul writes: “Their unbelief will not abolish God’s faithfulness.” But since he dares to subject the kingdom of the only true God to boundaries and limits, adducing quotations of the saints and presenting the words of even the all-wise Moses, in which God is seen to call Israel his particular “allotment,” come and let us oppose him with other statements of the saints, which reveal him to be the God of the universe. Accordingly, the blessed prophet Isaiah said: “Thus says the Lord who made the sky, this is the God who displayed the earth and made it, he himself set its boundaries; he did not make it to be empty, but to be inhabited; I am he, and there is none besides me.” And indeed elsewhere also: “I am your God who made firm the sky and created the earth, whose hands created all the host of heaven, and I did not show you these things so that you would follow after them.” And at one point he has also addressed Cyrus who took the kingdom of the Babylonians by storm: “I called you by my name, and will receive you; but you did not know me.

Since I am the Lord God and there is no god besides me and you did not know me, in order that those from the rising of the [sun] and those from its setting might know that there is none besides me; I am the Lord God and there is no other; I am the one who furnished light and made darkness.” Now, in my view at least, these quotations should suffice on their own. But if Julian thinks he has need of still others, I shall bring forth the following as well: for again it has been written, “Lift up your eyes to the sky and behold: who has displayed all these things? The one who brings forth his world by number will call them all by name from his great glory and in his powerful strength.” “I, God, am first and for the things that are coming, I am. Nations saw and the ends of the earth were afraid.” In light of this who could dare to say with impunity that God cut off for himself some small and restricted realm despite the fact that he brought into existence the entire creation and is the generator and Lord of the universe? And in fact, if one chose to recall the plagues inflicted upon Egypt as well, he would no doubt marvel at his omnipotence and the boundless superiority that abides in him; for the whole of creation, yielding as it were to the will of its ruler, was arming itself against those who had offended God.

Furthermore, given that Israel has been named God’s “firstborn,” what prevented such a learned man from being able to understand that no one, I think, would be considered a firstborn if there were no others before whom he will of course receive priority? Therefore, if Israel is God’s firstborn, he no doubt has other brothers too under God as Father. For even if some come later than Israel who was the first to be called, nevertheless they are not excluded from being counted among the children of God, insofar as he is understood to be the Father of all, by virtue of the fact that he himself likewise provided to all of them the cause of their existence, or rather he himself is the beginning and origin of all things. For the fact that all those on earth must be catalogued among the children of God as being collectively his creations is something that we shall recognize on the basis of the following considerations as well. The leader of the synagogue of the Jews – Caiaphas was his name – said that Christ’s birth in their midst would benefit the people of Israel. The evangelist adds the following words by way of explanation: “He did not say this on his own, but, since he was high priest that year, he prophesied that Christ would die for the nation, and not only for the nation but in order also to bring together as one the children of God who were scattered abroad.”

For the whole race on earth has been divided into two nations: the Jews and, of course, the nations. Therefore, Christ was going to endure the death of his flesh not only for the people of Israel but in order to bring together as one also the other children of God who had been scattered into polytheistic error by the devil’s perversity; he did so, that is, in order that, by having brought them together to a single and unerring knowledge of God, “he might create one new human out of the two people, thus making peace,” according the scriptures, “and might reconcile them both in one body […] to the Father.” 3.G But that man who insatiably revels in nonsensical statements against God goes on to say the following: Not only Moses and Jesus, but even Paul has clearly said that from the beginning God was concerned for the Jews alone and that they became his special allotment. And yet, one should be astonished at this claim in Paul’s case; for he changes his teachings about God to conform to the circumstances, just as the octopus changes its colors to match the rocks, at one time contending that the Jews alone are God’s inheritance, but, then again, when he is trying to persuade the Greeks to side with him, he says: “Isn’t he the God of the nations too, not just of the Jews?

Yes, he is also the God of the nations.” 271 It is, therefore, right to ask Paul: If he was not only the God of the Jews but of the nations too, why would he send to the Jews the prophetic spirit in abundance along with Moses, the anointing, the prophets, the law, the miracles, and the incredible myths – for you hear them crying out, “A human ate the bread of angels” 272 – and finally he also sent Jesus to them, but for us there was no prophet, no anointing, no teacher or no herald to announce that his love for humanity would, although late, one day come to us as well; rather, for tens of thousands of years – or if you like, for thousands of years – he over-looked those who, as you say, were “serving idols” in such great ignorance, those from the rising sun to its setting and from the northern regions to the south, except for a small race that settled in a single part of Palestine not even two thousand years ago? For if he is the God of all of us and likewise the single Craftsman of all, why did he overlook us? And after other things, he says, Are we still to pay attention to you because you or someone from your stock formed an image of the God of the universe, though going no further than a bare notion of him?

Aren’t all these partial [conceptions of divinity]: “a jealous God” – for why is he jealous? – and a God “who punishes the children for the sins of the fathers?” 276 Of course it is true that, as Julian says, God was concerned with those from the blood of Israel – isn’t this clear to everyone? For it was necessary, yes necessary, that, by being yoked to the divine law and returning from the error of polytheism, they should not be deprived of God’s care, and should be taught instead the reasonable means by which one could successfully return to a better condition and gradually progress towards the capability of learning the mystery of Christ. But when he says Paul was a “sorcerer” and that he attained the pinnacle of all evil, he is denouncing his own fathers and does not exonerate them from this charge, though I’ll not bother discussing this since everyone knows it is true. But since he claimed that Paul changes his mystical teachings “to conform to the circumstances” because he stated – and quite rightly, I might add – “Or isn’t he the God of the nations, not just of the Jews? Yes, he is the God of the nations too, if, that is, God is one,” I would be delighted to ask him on what basis he could find fault with such words as though they were not well said.

For the God of the universe will not be deprived of the honors naturally befitting him just because some people have shaken off his yoke and ignored the transcendence of his inherent glory. For if some people despise the common laws that have been established, does this mean that we should also remove from their office those who have the glorious task of legislating, whoever they may be? Or, if someone under the authority of the emperors decided to go beyond what is reasonable, does this mean that the one who sits upon the imperial throne, crowned quite rightly with the highest honors, should slip off that throne? Or if perhaps some of those among us should not know the blaze of the sun’s brightness because their eyes have dimmed, would anyone say that, because of them, the element [of fire] does not emit light, or will he rather pity them because of their handicap? If, therefore, he had decided to act reasonably, why does Julian dare to call so venerable and admirable a man a sorcerer and a hypocrite when [Paul] fought with great wisdom against Jewish hot-air and the ignorance of certain individuals? For, since out of their excessively great stupidity certain people, holding the same ideas as the one who wrote against us, supposed that the God of the universe rules only over the land of the Jews, for this very reason the mystagogue [Paul] quite wisely nips this idea in the bud and, equipping himself with the weapons of truth, attacks those thinking these things, and states: “Or isn’t he the God of the nations, not just of the Jews?

Yes, he is the God of the nations too, if, that is, God is one.” For if there is one God over all and if there is no other besides him, he must be the master of all, since he is also the Craftsman of all. For Paul has confirmed that he is “God of the nations too” through the innate laws that the Craftsman etched “on the hearts” of all: “For when the nations,” he claims, “which do not have the law, do the requirements of the law by nature, they are a law for themselves, despite not having the law; they exhibit the work of the law written on their hearts.” But if in fact he were God and Craftsman just of the Jews and not also of the nations, how could those who do not have the law be a law for themselves, coming to this as they do by innate instructions? For, [their] nature is enriched in a self-taught manner with the awareness of every good thing, having obtained this, too, by the decrees of their maker. So then, in fact, he of course deems not only those from the blood of Israel to be worthy of his providence, but, as I said, also those throughout all the earth. For there is one master of the universe. Since Julian attempts to show in a most unsophisticated and irrational manner that he is God and master only of Abraham’s offspring, based on the fact that the nations obtained none of those things that the former were deemed to deserve – for if, he says, God actually did take account of the nations, he naturally ought also to have sent them a prophetic spirit, to commission prophets as mystagogues, and to make the sacred laws, I mean those through the all-wise Moses, shine forth before the other nations, and divine signs likewise should have been displayed to them – we respond as follows, restraining his tongue’s intemperance: “Your Excellency, it should, in my view, be both clear and acknowledged that it is especially perilous and absurd to fight against the verdicts of God.”

Moreover, someone will opportunely recall the words of Isaiah and will surely say: “Who measured the water with his hand and the sky with the span of his fingers and all the earth by the handful? Who weighed the mountains with a scale and the valleys with a balance? Who knew the mind of the Lord or who became his counselor?” For the divine is all-sufficient and stands in need of absolutely nothing; but rather it instills both “wisdom and understanding” in those worthy of grasping them. Next, in addition to this, is it not right to take the following into consideration? When it comes to those who customarily train young horses and are skilled in this area, if there is some large number of horses that have been brought to them for this purpose, do they bring them under the yoke altogether in a herd or one by one individually? I suppose it is of course obvious to everyone that they instill in them the habit of running well not as a herd but rather one by one. If indeed the horses that came last were to go on to find fault with the fact that they are not the first to learn because others have entered training before them, despite the fact that the one claiming to teach them is not unaware of the time appropriate for each horse, who would [not]288 acquit the trainer of this indictment – or rather, not an indictment, but a stale accusation and slander?

For the teacher was not in any way lax, but the nature of the matter, in fact, made it necessary that the first horses be the first to be subjected to his expertise. If, therefore, the horse-tamer showed no concern for those horses that came after the first ones, then it would be just to find fault with him, for he was entirely careless. But if, on the contrary, he has kept for the appropriate time the entry of each horse and [given] what was necessary to those called in first, he ought to be released from indictment. Unmooring ourselves from so paltry an image and sailing on to greater and much more excellent matters, come, indeed come, let us investigate the ineffable plan of the all-wise God. For Israel, which was the first to be called in, was granted the means by which it would have been reasonable for them, once they were freed from their ancient sickness, to ensconce themselves in better things and be illuminated by divine fear, and to appear enviable and admirable because they were filled with the virtuousness of the law. The remaining multitude of nations was also deemed worthy of care and providence at the fitting moment. For they were called after the others and have their special allotment and they stand in a better position than those who came first. For, while the former were “under law” and punishment, the latter are “under grace” and forgiveness.

And while the former had a servant as a mediator, the latter had as their mediator the very one who is the Son by nature. And while among the former there was a “spirit of slavery,” among us there is a spirit who frees us and makes us sons, namely the Holy Spirit; for through him “we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’” Now if he asks why Israel has entered before all the other nations, there is no one, I think, who would not respond with irritation and say: “Dear sir, forget these things and, if having a reputation for wisdom is something you think deserves careful attention and thought, then ‘know thyself.’” For the pure Intellect knows, indeed it knows the fitting moment for each occurrence. Shall we then, on the one hand, leave it to the expertise of doctors to determine the best method and to choose the appropriate time for assisting the sick and applying to them a beneficial treatment, while, on the other hand, censuring the entirely excellent and supreme Intellect and recklessly saying that this or that occurrence was done poorly by it? Yet, is it not better to suppose that, when it comes to being wise, the degree to which we say we fall behind and are inferior to him is as great as the gulf and barrier between us, at least according to the rational principles inherent in our natures?

So when it comes to the mediation of the all-wise Moses, that is all we have to say. But as for the fact that God the Savior of the universe has shown care for the nations and not just Israel alone, this is something we will now easily demonstrate. For one can clearly see him assigning to the nations a providence that was older than the calling of those led by Moses out of Egypt “into the land of promise.” For in fact those who have subtly and meticulously numbered the times from the beginning of the age and plowed through so many detailed accounts reckon the number of just about 2, years from Adam to Noah, who was tenth from Adam. But in the sacred scriptures, at least, we shall find no one at all born in that period of time who was guilty of the charge of polytheistic error. For although they were blamed for other deeds and there were good reasons for them to be destroyed in the impending flood – since it says, “All flesh corrupted its path” – nevertheless, we won’t find anyone at all faulted for idolatry. After the flood, the human race expanded from the three sons of Noah into an innumerable multitude as though from a new beginning. And after 942 years passed and those from the blood of Noah were scattered in every direction and resided in the regions towards the East and the South, and after they had already gathered together in cities, the first man to rule the land of Assyria was the pretentious and supercilious Arbelus, who is also said to have been the first among humans to receive the title of “god” from his subjects.

The Assyrians and their neighboring nations, at least, have continued to sacrifice and worship him. Next, Ninus was son of Arbelus; and the son of Ninus was Ninuas, after whom Nineveh is named, which Semiramis his wife is said to have fortified with invincible walls. The inspired Abraham, then, was born when Ninus was ruling the land of the Assyrians. Now he detested the undertaking of the Assyrians and was downcast because God’s glory was being wronged. Accordingly, Abraham was snatched from the midst of those who were deceived and was called to the light of true knowledge of God. How then could Julian, who is clever in arguments, be ignorant that God cared about the salvation of the nations? For behold, yes behold, Abraham was born as a “root” of those educated in piety by the law and prophets; and we hold that he was called out of polytheistic error into a precise knowledge of the one who is truly God. We claim, therefore, that the almighty God’s care and indeed providence for the nations is manifestly older than even the calling out of Egypt of the children of Israel, such that consequently “the acceptance” of the Hebrews by God was also a calling of the nations, which was accomplished in Abraham as a sort of “firstfruits” of the race; for God snatched him as if from a wild tree, so to speak, and made him an authentic worshipper.

He said some such thing, at any rate, through one of the holy prophets: “I found Israel like a grape-cluster in the desert and like an early and auspicious fruit in a fig tree I saw their fathers.” For while a cluster of grapes in the desert is something difficult to find and hard to procure, once it has been found, it would, I believe, be thrice-desired and worth snatching by all who behold it; and also, when it comes to figs, the sweetest ones are those that ripen first before the others – or rather “early” – and are already at that time more suitable for eating than the others. “It was in this way that I beheld Israel,” he says, “and in this way that I found their fathers”; for those throughout all the land of the Assyrians were idolaters and superstitious. But, as I said previously, the inspired Abraham was being snatched “like a grape-cluster in the desert” and like “an early and auspicious fruit in a fig tree.” Indeed, he rightly likens Abraham to those figs that come in early; for among ripe fruit, that which is early is given this name on the grounds that there is also other fruit that will come after it. Therefore, since other nations too would shortly follow in his steps and inasmuch as they were on the cusp of becoming ripe, the faithful Abraham was “early,” a “firstfruits” of the calling of the nations.

Who, then, was it who brought him to this point? Clearly it was Christ. For “the Word was God” and was coeternal with the Father, even if he has become like us at the end of the age. Why, then, does Julian bring an accusation, saying that the Father didn’t send him as Savior and redeemer to the nations but instead bestowed favor upon Israel’s descendants? In that case he ought to listen to the holy prophets who spoke with a loud voice on this topic, in order that he might clearly learn that Christ was in fact the hope for the nations. Accordingly, the all-wise Isaiah declared about him: “And there will be […], on that day there will be one Lord and his name will be one, encompassing the whole earth.” And [Christ] himself says at one point in one of the prophets: “‘Be glad and rejoice, daughter of Zion, since behold I myself am coming and I shall dwell in your midst,’ says the Lord. And many nations will find refuge in the Lord on that day and will be a people for him and they will dwell in your midst. And know this, that the sovereign Lord has sent me to you.” And again: “Since the sovereign Lord says this: ‘Once more I will shake the sky and the land, the sea and the dry ground; and I will shake all the nations together, and the chosen of all the nations will come, and I will fill this house with glory,’ says the sovereign Lord.”

Now it would not be difficult to pile up still other passages on top of those we have cited; but when the actual events that have transpired suffice as an incontestable confirmation of our argument – for the multitude of nations has been called and sanctified by Christ, resplendent in its faith in him – there is probably now no reason to consider substantiating these things by still more biblical verses. Furthermore, if the sacred scripture happens to say that God is “jealous” and indeed that he also “repays the sins of the fathers upon the children up to the third and fourth generation to those who hate him,” no one ought to be scandalized by this. For in fact the divine and ineffable nature is not like us but is so sublime and moves so high above us in an intelligible sense that even the principles that distinguish it from us are incomparable. For the dispositions related to each event are understood in our case as involving the passions, since our nature is sick with impotence and an extreme propensity to discord. But when it comes to the God over all, while such states are indicated with human language and words, they nevertheless are not understood in this manner – why? – because the divine is passionless. And he is said to be “jealous” because he wants to ensure that no one who has once recognized his glory should be shaken by inclinations towards what is baser.

For it is wrong, or rather it is entirely unholy, to trivialize the service of God and to ascribe reverence to profane and unclean daemons. Therefore, if he is said to be “jealous” he would be acting in these cases in the manner we have just described, given that he is good by nature and “wants all people to be saved and come to a knowledge of truth.” It is characteristic of the one who is truly good to care whether there is anyone anywhere who, having slipped from the truth and pushing the divine light out of their mind, might foolishly slip into choosing to adopt inferior thoughts and to fill their own mind with darkness and folly. For those who remain firmly committed to their duty of appearing single-minded and wise will certainly receive rewards from God, but those who incline towards what is not permitted will receive retribution, punishment, and the resulting harm. Thus, he “is jealous,” if we must also speak in human terms, in the sense that it pains him to see some of those who have become his subjects miserably ruined. Those who have once been accepted must surely learn this lesson too, in order that they might know that their indifference does not go unpunished. For wouldn’t it be fitting for good fathers also to have this sort of mindset about their legitimate sons?

Then how can this be disputed? “He repays the sins of the fathers upon the children, up to the third and fourth generation,” not without further qualification, for the essential phrase “to those who hate him” has been added. For this reason indeed someone could, in my view, even stand in great amazement at the incomparable clemency of the master of all. For if, in fact, any humans should become indifferent and sin-loving, thereby also provoking the legislator’s hatred of evil against their very own selves, God, showing tolerance to the first generation and not letting loose right on the spot the punishment for their sins, grants this kindness also to the second generation; and sometimes his tolerance proceeds even “to the third […] generation.” But as for those descendants of the third generation, if they should still choose not to be outdone by their ancestors’ errors but should perhaps become worse and crueler than them, looking towards indifference with even less restraint and inhibition, at that time, yes at that time, he quite reasonably punishes them but only rarely and with hesitation. For he is by nature good and is the principle and origin of all clemency. And we are also reminded of this point by the statement of Ezekiel who also taught this very thing and did so with great clarity. For he declared: “The soul which sins is the one that will die; and the son will not inherit the wrong of his father nor will the father inherit the wrong of his son […] Each person will die in his sin that he committed.”

This is the holy verdict of the God who judges justly, and he does not make war against his own laws. We must, therefore, understand in a pious manner the statement that “he repays the sins of the fathers upon the children, up to the third and fourth generation to those who hate him” – this means he will do so only if neither the first, nor indeed the second, nor the third, nor even the subsequent generations do not cease from their accursed and sin-loving mindset. For they would be the ones who are also “hating God” because they dare to oppose his divine ordinances; and a just punishment would understandably come upon those who have been condemned for such deeds. Book 4 4. Julian has, therefore, denounced God’s glory and cried out most disgracefully against the doctrines of Moses, as though it was otherwise impossible for him to secure a winning verdict for the Greeks’ supersti-tions unless he vilified the teachings of Christians – a tactic in keeping with his deceptions and love of slander. And yet, surely it would have been necessary and better, at least in my view, if he supported their opin-ions with the facts themselves – assuming there is something true in them – and didn’t deck them out in the inventive bombast of certain persons, just like those women, for example, who are courtesans and suppose they can dispel the shame of their activity with seductive chitchat and superficial make-up.

But, with regard to Julian and each and every person who wants to think like him, we, too, should say in the Savior’s words: “Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks in keeping with his own nature, since he is a liar, just like his father as well, and he does not stand in the truth.” Therefore, it is difficult, or rather impossible, for the truth to spring forth from Greek mouths and a mind full of the devil’s activity. Furthermore, this noble man is self-absorbed and acts with bold presumption towards his own ancestors. For, indeed, he does not accept the words of the poets, calling them “myth-makers”; and he boasts and is pretentious, anchoring himself in the words of Plato alone, although he was born later than the others and he faced noble opposition from his contemporaries; for one of them was his very own student Aristotle, who was supercilious and exceedingly arrogant, and possessed the greatest cleverness in doctrinal and rational precision, and others after him have won no small amount of glory for carrying forward his way of thinking. I shall omit saying here how and in what way the opinions of them both are irreconcilable with each other, since the argument that we already made on this topic is sufficient. I now proceed to another topic. As I said, Julian follows Plato’s views but also, I think, adds his own, too, when he declares that “the proximate Craftsman of the world ” (to use his own words) is the master of the universe, and, although he subordinates everything to his rule, in another respect he in turn removes him from ruling over us and is not embarrassed to allot his kingdom to countless other gods besides him.

For he writes once more as follows: But, observe again our views in comparison to those ones. For our [writers] claim that while the Craftsman is the common father 12 and emperor of all, he has allotted the rest to ethnarchs ruling over the nations and city-guarding gods, each of whom governs his own allotment in a way corresponding to himself. For, since, on the one hand, in the Father everything is perfect and “everything is one,” 15 but on the other hand, among the particular gods a different power predominates in each, therefore Ares governs the warlike nations, Athena the nations that are warlike as well as prudent, and Hermes those that are more intelligent than daring; and likewise the nations governed by them correspond to the individual substance 16 of their respective gods. If, therefore, experience does not testify to these words of ours, let our doctrines be a fabrication and a poorly timed rhetorical ploy and let your doctrines be praised. But if the complete opposite is the case, and experience has forever been testifying to what we are saying while nothing at all seems to conform with your words, then why do you maintain such a love of controversy? For tell me, what is the cause of the Celts and Germans being bold, the Greeks and Romans being generally civic-minded and humane while at the same time being both steadfast and warlike, the Egyptians being quite intelligent and skillful, the Syrians being unwarlike and prone to luxury, yet intelligent and rash, adaptable and quick to learn?

For if one were to determine that there is no cause of this difference among the nations, but instead say that they have even turned out the way they have spontaneously, how can he suppose that the world is still administered by providence? But if one does posit that there are causes for these differences, then, in the name of the Craftsman himself, he ought to speak up and teach me [what they are]! 19 This is the right moment for us again to state what was said by the voice of Ezekiel the prophet: “Alas for those who prophesy from their heart and see nothing at all.” For “who has known the mind of the Lord,” as it has been written, “or who has been his counselor?” For that noble man is lying and, all but declaring that he has intimate knowledge of the divine ideas, he claims that the nations have been allotted to certain “ethnarchs” and “city-guarding” daemons, or as he says “gods.” Well then, for us who wish to learn, Julian ought to explain whether God was yielding the exercise of providence to others because in certain instances he proved to be incapable of ruling over them and had insufficient power to do so or because he was entirely capable of it and possessed the power to rule without even having to exert any effort. If, then, he claims the Craftsman of the world was too weak and indicts him for renouncing his rule, he lays a sentence of impotence upon the substance that surpasses all things.

But if, on the contrary, Julian knows that the Craftsman has the power to rule but then claims that he has chosen not to do so, he ought to teach us the reason he did so. For if he says the herds of nations have been allotted to “city-guarding gods,” since they know how to educate the nations better than the Craftsman, then the instructor of such utterly disgraceful doctrines must ultimately concede, even if he is unwilling to do so, that the “proximate Craftsman of the world,” despite being the Creator of all, had made, I know not how, certain [gods] who are superior and exceedingly more skilled than himself. But if, on the contrary, they were worse [at educating the nations] and did not do so in accordance with God’s own nature and knowledge, it would not be characteristic of a good Creator to prevent his creatures from sharing in what is better. “But,” Julian says, “he did not deem it right to do this.” And yet how does this assertion not make God guilty of contempt? Why did he even wish at the outset to create these beings when he disdains their education and considers the duty of ruling over them to be something trivial and to fall beneath the honor befitting him? I, on the contrary, maintain that the ardent desire to be conformed to the all-holy God “insofar as possible,” through whatever illustrious brave deeds and pious virtue someone might be capable of valiantly undertaking, is both something greatly to be sought and truly worth desiring.

Accordingly, [it must be that] he entrusted the guidance of the nations to other “gods,” even though he loves virtue. Did he, then, do so in order that they might teach this thing [namely, likeness to God and virtue], or rather, as he himself says, so that they might, in whatever way it pleased them, convince the nations to conform in their thinking and acting to whatever each of those assigned [to rule] over them might choose, and even more so that they might compel those yoked under them to follow their rulers’ judgments? If, then, he claims that the nations have been given to them in order that [their subjects] might be guided also towards what pleases God, then doesn’t this imply that all peoples on the earth should be seen as “cultivated,” good, experts in all virtue, and dependent upon one and the same judgment? For the will of God is surely not a variable thing nor indeed divided into one thing and another, but rather it is uniform with respect to the good and whatever is admirable. But, if this is not the case, and he contends that the nations were given to the “city-guarding gods” in order that, as he says, “each governs his own allotment in a way corresponding to himself,” come then, yes come indeed, and let us see if Julian is not audaciously denouncing God’s providence by thinking and saying such things.

For while “the Celts and,” in addition, “the Germans are bold ” and bloodthirsty, “the Greeks and Romans are generally civic-minded and humane […], and the Syrians are prone to luxury.” I myself would add those nations dwelling towards the East too: for while the Scythians are both savage and murderous, they say that the Chaldeans practice incest with their mothers and are mad for their sisters and do the most shameful things of all, while no one punishes them and, in fact, their laws even encourage them to do these things. And, to add something further from the Mosaic writings: the inhabitants of Sodom, because they were violently titillated by the good looks of males and wildly pursued pleasures contrary to nature, they utterly perished in fire as loathsome and profane. Furthermore, the Romans rightly condemn such shameful deeds and are practitioners of justice, lovers of knowledge, enemies of unholiness, and the fiercest adversaries to everything inappropriate. If, therefore, each of the “city-guarding gods,” in whatever way pleases them, implants such an idea and mindset in those who happen to be yoked to them – for instance, implanting in the Persians and Medes the mindset they possess, in the Germans and Celts their savagery and harshness, while in the Scythians their unavoidable thirst for blood and savage delight in murders, and in the Romans their unavoidable tendency towards honoring exceptional deeds – someone might say, “What is this, noble sir, and besides, what kind of ‘providence’ would produce this result?

How could we still be just in indicting the nations, even if one were to see them caught in the most extreme vices? Or how could one rightly praise those who are practitioners of the best habits, if neither they nor indeed others were permitted to do voluntarily what pleased them, but in fact they were practicing vice and virtue as a result of being tightly bound by necessity to the dispositions and laws of the ‘city-guarding gods’?” For those who choose to do good of their own volition quite reasonably receive appropriate praise, while those who are lovers of unholiness and have come to this point in their thinking by free inclina-tions must be corrected and called to account by the laws. If, therefore, as I said, those nations under discussion have developed either a good or a bad character without having any say in whether their thinking and actions conformed to what was better or more shameful, we will have to retract our praises of those who are good and our denunciations of those who are not good for not being so. The admonishment of children by their fathers would likely now be a pointless and entirely useless endeavor; again, guidance of the young by those who know how to introduce the finest subjects would probably be superfluous and empty recitation. In addition, we shall destroy even the laws themselves, which have been the arbiters of what should or should not be done.

For, unless each person has a say in pursuing whichever way of life he should decide to take, instead of being led by the decisions of others and being tied to this course with a chain that is difficult – nay, rather, entirely impossible – to escape, then, as I said, one must eradicate laws and everything else that is beneficial. 4.G I would be most delighted to ask our opponent the following question. There are a great many herds of nations that are beyond number throughout all the earth that lies under the sun: some are beastly in character, train themselves in savagery, and consider the life full of every reproachable activity to be glorious; others maintain a way of life that is full of everything good and make much of living in the most excellent and noble way possible. Nevertheless, the all-wise Julian insists that all are allotted to “city-guarding” and presiding “gods” and daemons, and indeed also angels and a particular class of souls. Well, then, does he praise the ways of the Greeks and delight in the laws of Romans, or will he decree that the customs and character of the former nations are the most beautiful of all? Will he marvel at the barbarians’ boldness and harshness or will he do what is just and admit that those who have inclined towards civility are in a superior condition to the others?

But, I suppose indeed that he censures the character of the former nations and, in contrast, admires the character of the latter ones. Then how could it be the case that “the Craftsman of all ” and “father” gave to some nations overseers that were “wild,” uncivilized, and did not know how to carry them towards anything praiseworthy, but gave to other nations civilized and sensible overseers? In that case, won’t someone, albeit unwillingly, be declaring and crying out, on the basis of the facts themselves, that the Intellect beyond all has failed to formulate a good plan? For anyone who wants to do so can see that the barbarian race is easily provoked towards unbridled impulses, and they are so eager for bloodshed that they consider nothing to be better. Indeed, therefore, governing all these [nations] in a manner that seems best to him is that “one born to be an evil,” Ares, “the rager,” that “bloodthirsty” “blight to mortals” – for thus has he been named by those poets who know him. Then how could God, the lover of virtue, have left so many herds of nations under the “one born to be an evil” and the “blight to mortals”? For if his goal was to adorn human nature with all virtue, why was he not giving these nations to noble tutors, so to speak, who were capable of teaching these things?

But, if, on the contrary, he takes no account of our affairs but simply casts them aside to instructors in evil, and instead places them under gods, daemons, and angels who are skilled at compelling them towards everything inappropriate, why does he indict them as lawbreakers and why is he inclined to censure them for not living rightly? For, I suppose, if someone were to ponder these ideas he might say: “To which teachers do sensible fathers bring their own children? Is it not to the best and most serious? To which slaves do we usually entrust the guidance of other slaves? Is it not to noble and doubtless also reasonable ones who reliably guide others towards what pleases their masters? And, tell me, to which helmsmen is it appropriate to entrust the guidance of a trading ship? Is it not to the most skilled and to those who know quite well how to navigate wisely at sea? To which farmers should the care of the garden belong: to those who are careless and have utterly no idea how to do that which is most beneficial and advantageous, or to those skilled in this area? Shall we then consider God’s conduct to be inferior to ours and shall we place his actions beneath those of humans?” Is this not, then, madness and aren’t these ideas full of insanity? [The Craftsman] would clearly be caught benefiting human affairs in no way by these actions, but would instead be adding to their harm, and not permitting them at all to attain the virtuous life, if it is the case that each of those gods or daemons established [over the nations] forces them unwillingly to follow his will.

For [Julian] says, “Ares governs the warlike nations, Athena the nations that are warlike as well as prudent, Hermes those who are more intelligent than daring, and likewise the nations governed by them correspond to the individual substance of their respective gods.” But, dear sir, in that case for those who were going to fare well, as God wanted them to, it would have been better that they not follow the nature and mindset of those “who govern” them but rather that they submit to the Craftsman of the universe. And I shall tell you how this is so, for Julian himself said: “For, since, on the one hand, in the Father everything is perfect and ‘everything is one,’ but on the other hand, among the particular gods a different power predominates in each, therefore Ares governs the warlike nations, Athena and Hermes the others.” Therefore, given that “in the Father everything is perfect and one” while “among the particular gods” there is only ever knowledge of a single given thing, then wouldn’t it be better and more profitable for the nations to conduct their affairs under God and be taught by him alone, in whom all good things exist perfectly, or would it instead be better that they be under others who are not entirely good and are suitable for one thing alone, naturally just like those who pursue the arts of manual labor, I mean someone like a blacksmith or a potter?

And yet this would show that they are not even gods. For, indeed, the one who is by nature the true God is understood to be something all-powerful and perfect in itself, self-sufficient for any and every particular task, the fountain and origin of every good. So how could that which does not exist in such a state but bears only a single invention of its weak mind, and even then only with difficulty – how could something like this be thought of as God? Furthermore, anyone who wants to can recognize, even on the basis of human affairs, the ugliness of the view held by the Greeks. For those who sit conspicuously upon the thrones of the earthly empire and have received power over all things appoint as protectors for the country districts and crown with the insignia of office whichever of their subjects they know to be wise and expert in the finest matters. And those who are deemed worthy of such splendid rewards govern their jurisdiction by directing it not in accord with their own laws but those of the inspired men; they doubtless pass on the praises they receive from everyone to their highest superiors and assign what is owed to the emperor’s prerogative – tribute, taxes, levies. They erect images of the emperors in private and in public, thereby ever making their subjects remember their sovereign’s preeminence, no doubt just by the mere sight of them.

Come, therefore, let us see if those “city-guarding gods” and daemons, as well as angels, having received their rule from God as Julian claims, have preserved for him the honors he is owed – the worship, the reverence, the presentation of gifts, the glory – instead of placing them upon their own heads. And yet, is it not clear that this is exactly what they have done? For they entirely carried the inhabitants of the earth away from any knowledge whatsoever of the one who is by nature the true Craftsman and master of the universe; moreover, they snatched for themselves the honors given by all – the sacrifices, feasts, hymns, and thankofferings – and they have persuaded the inhabitants of the earth to be dedicated to their service alone. And what even are the statues placed in the sacred precincts, one might ask, if they are not multiform and diverse images, presenting a profane insult against the glory of God? For the arti-sans of these things attempt to drag down the formless nature under the guise and form of not only human bodies but also those of irrational animals, fish, and birds. Now, if the “city-guarding gods” and daemons were doing these things with the assent of the Father of all, it ought, of course, to be clear that he considers our knowing him to be worthless and that he disowns our worship.

And if this is the case, how could we think of ourselves as pious when we worship him and serve him through the life he approves? And indeed, why do we treat contemplating him as the most important thing of all and why do we say that those who see him, even if but “in a mirror and a riddle,” are blessed? But if, on the contrary, it was in violation of God’s will that the inhabitants of the earth wandered in error, and if it was the [daemons] who dragged them to this condition against their will, then what sort of argument could release [the daemons] from the charge of tyranny against God? Or how many tears would need to be shed for those who have fallen into this state? For at one time, they were counted among the holy angels and had been reckoned with the choirs of the spirits above, living the truly blessed and undefiled life. But, as the sacred text says, “they have not preserved their own authority,” and, all but bidding farewell to being with God, they slipped into what is more shameful and, aban-doning the station assigned to them and thrusting aside their duty of submitting to God, those wretches were excluded from the throng of the saints as stubborn and haughty. They divvied up the inhabitants of the earth among themselves and they herded them away from everything virtuous and kept from them all knowledge, at least with respect to the identity of the one who is by nature the true God of the universe, the Lord to whom power over all things is essentially anchored.

They have persuaded them to “worship the creation rather than” him and, contriving for each of the nations a form of reverence that seemed good to them in their simple and unreflective state, they caused [them] to establish [it] in shrines and to construct altars and honor them with liba-tions and sacrifices. Since it was likely that the inhabitants of the earth would be guided by innate impulses towards their duty of knowing the truth and beholding, with the subtle eye of the mind, the identity of the God and Father of the universe and thus would depart from the perversity of the [daemons’] rule, and would unlearn what is worse and choose instead what is beneficial, for this very reason, the daemons became for them guides and teachers in everything wicked and they have not ceased dragging them down to each and every thing that is hateful to God. For it seemed to them to be a good idea to kindle enmity so that those on the earth would remain disconnected from God, with sin ever impeding them. But when the Lord and Craftsman of the universe, the Word of God, saw humanity driven away from all good behavior and falling in droves into abysses under the earth – for “Hades widened its soul and opened its mouth without ceasing,” as it has been written – and when he “appeared to us,” we were rescued from their greed.

And, indeed, those holy and rational powers, who had received their origin from him and subordinated their thought to his rule in a completely blameless way, habitually serving their master’s will and in their own case preserving their obedience entirely above reproach, these ones [the Word] urged to join in the fight on behalf of the oppressed, not because he suffered from any impotence when it came to the task of saving them – for how could he and what would be the source of such impotence? Rather, he is like an emperor permitting native-born guardsmen to resist barbarian attacks and to scare off from his subjects their greedy advances. For, an “angel of the Lord,” it says, “will encamp in a circle around those who fear him and will rescue them.” And through the voice of the saints it has been said to every holy person who has chosen to do good, “He will command his angels about you to protect you in all your ways.” And indeed, the all-wise Paul says about them, “Aren’t they all ministering spirits sent to serve on behalf of those who will inherit salvation?” And the Savior and Lord of the universe himself says at one point: “You shall see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.” These [angels] remove the sinful beasts from us, dragging away from their savagery those captured by them, and they teach us how to make the path leading to each and every praiseworthy thing easy and accessible.

These [angels], along with us, glorify the God over all, for it has been written: “Bless the Lord all his angels […]; bless the Lord all his powers, his servants doing his will.” These are the ones who teach us to bring the honors, the worship, not to themselves, but instead only to the God who is over all. Furthermore, what I have said receives confirmation from the sacred writ-ings. For an angel of the Lord once appeared to Gideon and said to him, “The Lord will be with you, and you will strike Midian as though it were only one man.” And Gideon said to him: “If I found compassion in your eyes and if you will do for me today everything we have been discussing, do not depart from here until I come to you, and I will bring out a sacrifice and will place it before you.” And he said: “I am [here], I shall sit down until you return.” And Gideon went inside and prepared the kid of a goat and an ephah of wheat flour and unleavened bread, and he set the meat in a basket, and he put broth in the pot, and he brought these things to him under the terebinth tree. And [Gideon] approached. And the angel of the Lord said to him: “Take the meat and the unleavened bread and set it on that rock, and pour out the containers of broth.”

And he did so. In addition, God also spoke one time to Manoah through an angel and usefully mentioned something that was about to happen; and again, it has been written as follows in the book of Judges: “And Manoah said to the angel of the Lord: ‘Let us detain you here, and we shall prepare the kid of a goat before you.’ And the angel of the Lord said to Manoah: ‘If you detain me, I will not eat from your loaves; and if you prepare a whole burnt offering, you will offer it up to the Lord.’ […] And Manoah took the kid of the goat and the sacrifice,” it says, “and offered them up to the Lord on the rock; and the angel set apart the doing of it.” You see how they do nothing at all to hinder those who are determined to be pious from honoring the master of the universe with what was in their hand, but instead they teach that it would be appropriate for them to ascribe honors not to those under yokes [of ministry] and ranked among the servants but rather to the Lord. For the phrase, “Set it under the shelter of that rock,” I think, means nothing other than clearly saying, “Offer it to Christ.” For, “the rock was Christ,” as the all-wise Paul says. In addition, [the angel of the Lord] says, “If you prepare” a “kid,” you prepare it “for the Lord.”

And although he received [only] this instruction, it was once more upon the rock that he offered the sacrifice, since he knew that Christ was called a “rock” on account of the steadfastness with which the divine nature is attached to those honors appropriate to it. If, therefore, God truly subordinated the nations to “city-guarding gods,” why was it not to him that they commanded the nations to bring offerings instead [of to themselves]? But, as it is, having entirely led us astray from service under him and instead having prevented us from knowing him at all, they have ascribed to themselves the acts of worship, the prayers of all, the confessions, the praises, the gifts. Moreover, they have persuaded [the nations] to descend to such a point of vulgarity and unholy audacity as even to choose to carry out blood sacrifices for them, a practice that would especially prove that the daemons are hardly good but instead corrupt, and entirely removed from all good behavior.

4. Porphyry, for example, writes as follows about them in the second book of On Abstinence from Ensouled Things: And yet, even the whole of sorcery is accomplished by the opposite [beings]. For people who <enact> evils through deeds of sorcery especially honor their presider, too, along with them. <For> the daemons are <full> of every illusion and are capable of deception through the working of marvels; it is with their help that people possessed of an evil daemon prepare spells and love charms. For all lack of restraint and hope of wealth and glory come through them, and especially deception. In fact, they are at home with falsehood, since they want to be gods and their presiding power wants to appear as <the supreme> God; these are the ones who rejoice “in both libation and savory aroma,” the very same things that fatten their bodily and pneumatic part. For this part lives by vapors and smoke arising in a variety of ways and from a variety of sources, and they are empowered by the savory aromas coming from blood and flesh. For this reason, a man of understanding and prudence will avoid performing such sacrifices, by which he will attract such beings to himself; and he will be eager to purify his soul in every possible way. For they do not attack a pure soul because of its unlikeness to them.

Elsewhere, Porphyry also pretends to want to cross-examine one of the false prophets, or rather priests, from Egypt about the causes [of daemonic behavior] and to resolve to learn the cruelty of the daemons’ moral perversity, speaking as follows: “How can theosophists present them as subject to passions and enjoying obscene speech and other such vices?” And he explains the distinctiveness of the evil inherent in them by saying, They posit that there is a subordinate race external [to the soul], which is of a deceptive nature, taking all forms and shifting in character, feigning to be gods, daemons, and souls of the dead; and everything that seems to be good or bad is brought about through them. Since, [as the theosophists posit,] this race quite simply cannot contribute to those things that are essentially good, which are in the soul, nor can they know these things, they instead devote themselves to evil and mock and often obstruct those who are training in virtue; they are full of hot air and enjoy sacrificial smoke and flattery. Surely, Julian ought, therefore, to be able to see clearly that Porphyry, who was his like-minded co-superstitionist, revealed the true views about daemons. For he claims that they “devote themselves to evil,” they resist those wanting to achieve virtue, “and they enjoy sacrificial smoke” and take great delight in blood sacrifices. Furthermore, we shall find that Homer’s gods, too, desired so disgraceful an honor, if, that is, this type of thing should even be thought of as something honorable at all.

For Zeus says, Never was my altar lacking an equal feast of libation and savory aroma; for we have obtained this reward. And the Argives also used to sacrifice: Solid black bulls to the dark-haired shaker of the Earth. It is perhaps tedious to go through all the details, since no one is unaware that all their gods, or rather loathsome and unclean daemons, delight in “libations and savory aromas”; for the inspired David would not lie when he says, “All the gods of the nations are daemons.” “Yes,” Julian says, “but nonetheless if you censure the sacrifices of the Greeks and hold that the practice is worthy of much blame you will, it would seem, entirely have to indict Moses’ law too. For he has ordained that they slaughter sheep and use the same methods when bringing offerings to God.” Come, then, speaking with as much subtlety as possible, let us investigate what method was used in the instruction provided by the law and what God was aiming at when he permitted the ancients to practice blood sacrifice. 4.G Well then, it was a sort of accommodation, not the institution of a necessary practice. For, on the one hand, someone who loves blood sacrifices would not only gladly welcome those who wanted to perform these sacrifices and offer them but would also honor the act with an unqualified approbation and in fact incite them to do this without ceasing; and even more he would demand it as something necessary, with all people owing him this honor and anyone slipping into laxity in such matters being punished for their reluctance.

But, conversely, someone who was demonstrating that the practice was neither necessary for their edification nor, indeed, even what he wanted, would avoid letting those who worship in this way go without rebuke, but rather would even censure them and at the necessary time prevent them from bringing offerings and in a sense toiling in vain, and would set them on a better course when they thought they could become renowned based upon something entirely useless. For “why,” he says, “do you bring me frankincense from Saba and cinnamon from a distant land? Your whole burnt offerings are not acceptable, and your sacrifices do not delight me.” And again on this matter: “For who sought these things from your hands? You shall not continue trampling upon my court. If you should bring fine wheat flour, it would be futile. Incense is abhorrent to me.” He said also through another prophet: “Gather your whole burnt offer-ings along with your sacrifices and eat meat; because I did not speak to your fathers about whole burnt offerings and sacrifices on the day that I brought them up from the land of Egypt.” For God was not in need of blood, nor, indeed, was he seeking gross and material worship; rather, he seeks a subtle and intellectual worship – namely worship “in spirit” accomplished by means of every virtue, which is the good and inviolable way of life made conspicuous by the honorable distinctions that come from good behavior.

And, in addition, he seeks the pure contemplation of him, the intelligible fragrance of doctrines with an edge honed to a straight and true point, and the trustworthy and irreproachable knowledge of that which is really good. But since it was practically impossible for Israel, who had only just recently been drawn away from their slavery to shameful and unholy customs in Egypt and the indecency of the people there, and whose mind was still practically impotent and feeble, and did not yet know how to walk with youthful vigor – I mean with respect to the ability to pursue the path of the exceptional life, which lay so high above them, and to reach the furthest achievements (I mean, spiritual achievements) – God established the Mosaic law for them like a caregiver for a child, and ordained that they leave behind the polytheistic error, but he meanwhile allowed them to follow their former custom and honor him with what was at hand, presenting to him thank offerings and sacrifices that were ordained in a wise and skillful manner, so that they might reveal the truth beforehand as though through types and shadows. For the law possesses the “form of truth” and the mystery of Christ is sketched through it. Moreover, the first steps in a field of knowledge in a sense always fall short of the complete comprehension of the subject; instead they bring one up gradually to a state of perfection, by establishing and supple-menting [one’s learning] little by little, and carrying the movement of our thinking upwards to a more solid state by advances towards what is better, as though by a flight of stairs.

And so it is in this case too: since, as I said, Christ the Savior of us all shone upon us at the necessary time, that which was in types has been abolished and the impotence of the shadow, consisting as it did “in letters,” has been brought to an end. For he himself is the same one who was sketched in that [outline] for those people long ago. Therefore, he stopped the blood sacrifices that had been conceded to the ancients as exercises to accommodate them and had fulfilled the role of early childhood education. For Christ said: “God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.” Furthermore, [God] will make clear that, even from the outset, the force of the worship according to the law was not, in his view, free from blame and accusation when he says through the all-wise Moses himself, who was the mediator of the law, But if the Lord God shall destroy the nations into which you shall go in that place to inherit their land, and if you inherit them and dwell in their land, take heed for yourself lest you seek to follow them. After their destruction from before you, do not seek out their gods saying, “In the manner that the nations do these things for their gods, I too shall do the same.”

You shall not do these things in this way for the Lord your God; for the abominations, which the Lord hated, these they did for their gods, in that they even burned their sons and their daughters in fire for their gods. He thus forbids blood sacrifices, since those who did not know him have done these things for their gods. What’s more, he adds an accusation of a thing which is truly heinous and unholy and violates the very laws of nature, namely the slaughter of their sons and daughters for these gods. O the great inhumanity of the “city-guarding gods”! O their dreadful cruelty and beastly thinking! For, when it comes to humans, they often set themselves in opposition to those who have grieved them and attack their enemies with wrath of equal measure, but whenever harm is about to come to children, they restrain their anger and pity each other’s offspring. But, in contrast, those gods who, as Julian says, administer human affairs “in a way corresponding” to themselves and according to the nature and mindset each one has, turn into child-killers those people who wronged them in no way at all but on the contrary even sought to honor them; they delight in the blood of humans; and when they see their own worshipper killed on unholy altars they consider it a delicacy. Now, someone will perhaps say we have spoken nonsense and laid a groundless indictment against them, since in fact this never happened.

Let us see, then, basing ourselves on the Greek historians, whether or not it is true that the altars and sanctuaries of their gods used to be stained with the blood and gore of humans. For, Aristomenes the Messenian used to offer 300 corpses at the same time as thanks to the Zeus named after Mount Ithome, and in addition to these he even included the king of the Lacedaemonians – Theopompus, that is. “The highest” and most excellent “of the gods” is for this reason admirable! For in all likelihood he used to smile upon men perishing in a horrible way, when he saw his own “altar” filled with “an equal feast.” In fact, it was their custom to revel in the misfortunes of humanity. Moreover, the Scythians around the Tauric Chersonese, who slaughtered guests they had captured for their Artemis, used to attach their heads to the gates of the temple, bringing the slaughter of a man as a fair catch for the goddess and a gift of hospitality well-pleasing to her, so that she might be revealed as harsher even than the sea and the very waves, snatching away those seeking refuge and, for those who came to anchor at that land, making their hope of being saved an occasion for their death. Furthermore, Dorotheus the historian, in the fourth book of his History of Italy, claims that Erechtheus in Athens cruelly slaughtered his own daughter for the daemons under the earth.

Monimus, too, records in his collection of marvelous tales that some people in Pellene of Thrace were sacrificed to Peleus and Chiron. And indeed also they claim that the Lesbians drenched the altar of Dionysus with the blood of men. Moreover, when the Greek superstition was still at its peak, gladiatorial contests used to be performed at special times among the Romans, and hidden underground was a certain [statue of ] Cronus, with its gaping mouth facing upwards through perforated stones in order that he might be defiled by the gore of the one who had fallen. Porphyry, too, again writes in the second book of On Abstinence from Ensouled Things as follows: History, at any rate, has passed down the record not only of those people mentioned by Theophrastus but also of a great many others who likewise sacrificed humans long ago […]. And [to show] that we say this not simplistically but because history is full of them, it will be sufficient also to present the following. For on Rhodes, too, a human being used to be sacrificed to Cronus on the sixth day at the beginning of the month Metageitnion […]. And in what is now Salamis but was before called Koronis, a human used to be sacrificed in the month of Aphrodisios, as the Cypriots call it, to Agraulos the daughter of Cecrops and the nymph Agraulis.

And the custom persisted until the time of Diomedes; then it was changed so that it was to Diomedes that the man was sacrificed. Both the temple of Athena and that of Agraulos and Diomedes lie under a single precinct. And the one being slaughtered would run around the altar three times, led by the ephebes; then the priest would strike him with a lance in the throat, and thus they would make a whole burnt offering of him upon a pyre that had been set ablaze. And after other things [Porphyry writes]: Both on Chios and on Tenedos, they used to sacrifice a human to Dionysus by tearing him apart, as Euelpis the Carystian says. Next, Apollodorus says that the Lacedaemonians, too, used to sacrifice a human to Ares. The Phoenicians, when they were in great misfortunes, either from war, pestilence, or drought, used to sacrifice one of their dearest to Cronus by the casting of a vote. And after other things [Porphyry writes]: Istros, in his Compendium of Cretan Sacrifices, says that the Curetes long ago used to sacrifice children to Cronus. The altars of their gods, therefore, used to be stained by the blood of wretched humans. But perhaps one of those who cares about the customs of the Greeks might say: “Yes, men have, at times, been slaugh-tered, but those who were accustomed to do this weren’t offering them to gods, but rather to wicked daemons who are to be averted.”

Where, then, shall we put Cronus and Zeus, Ares and the haughty “arrow-pouring” sister of Apollo, and the son of Semele, the thunderstruck Dionysus, who are still even now being worshipped or even perhaps are preeminent among the gods, to whom also the elite ranks of the Greeks say that blood sacrifices have been brought? They should, therefore, either admit that they are unholy and wicked daemons who are to be averted, or they will have to insist that they are gods and so join us in indicting them for having altogether reached the pinnacle of cruelty and for not letting the daemons outdo them in their disgusting behavior, or rather for having already been proven by the present facts themselves to be none other than hateful daemons who are to be averted. Furthermore, they ought to answer this question: What was the goal of those who sacrifice? Was it to prevent something terrible from happening to them that they became murderers? Yet we all naturally regard this sort of thing to be abominable, profane, and worthy of the most extreme guilt. And if someone should become the unholy murderer even of his own children, how is it not the case that his fortunes are rushing onward to the heights of wretchedness and to the deepest depths of misery? For what suffering could be worse than for someone to have their child utterly perish and fall miserably by the hand of their own father?

That wild Scythian woman, namely the daughter of Aietes, who was a twittering witch, loved her man at first. But when the charms of her licentiousness unexpectedly failed, she became a child-killer and a myth for human life and a subject of tragic theatre. Such fortunes are what the polluted and profane daemons, those masterminds behind everything wicked, graciously give to their respective worshippers. These are the ones who, according to them, have presided over human affairs, along with gods and angels, by the permission of God the Craftsman of the universe. “If, as you yourselves maintain, it was not to gods but instead to wicked daemons needing to be averted that the ancients used to bring blood sacrifices, consisting not only of humans but also of irrational animals, for whom then,” I would ask, “did you build temples throughout every land and city and for whom did you set up altars therein?” Yet how could it not be clear to everyone that even up to our own times they used to sacrifice in every temple, and there was no one among them – small, great, uneducated, wise, those holding the highest office, those in a lowlier position with nothing noteworthy about them – no one who did not practice such shameful and bloodthirsty sacrifices always and in every way? Hence, it is the wicked daemons that they have served; if, however, the daemons had to be averted, as they themselves say, shouldn’t they have attempted to accomplish this by desiring to attach themselves to the Father and Craftsman of the universe?

This could be done – and it would be quite correct to do so – if one were to give consideration to wanting to live rightly and irreproachably and to seeking to become like the all-holy God through a yearning and eagerness for each and every good thing. For it is in this way that we shall be superior to their perversity and impregnable to their assaults. And scripture is full of witnesses to this: for it has been written that, an “angel of the Lord will encamp in a circle around those who fear him and will rescue them.” But I shall also present the statements of the Greeks themselves. Now, we already mentioned Porphyry, who has written the following: “For this reason, a man of understanding and prudence will avoid performing such sacrifices, by which he will attract such beings to himself; and he will be eager to purify his soul in every possible way. For they do not attack a pure soul because of its unlikeness to them.” And Hermes, who according to them is Thrice-Greatest, also used to regard the matter in the same light. In his To Asclepius, he likewise writes as follows about the unholy daemons, whom we must guard against and from whom we should flee with all haste: Piety is the only protection and it is a necessary one; for neither an evil daemon nor Fate can ever overpower or control the pious, holy, and reverent person.

For God rescues such a person, who is really pious, from every evil. Why, therefore, have they disregarded what everyone agrees is entirely praiseworthy and inclined to what is worse, saying that it was necessary for them to offer sacrifices to loathsome daemons who are to be averted? But since, as I said, it was to Cronus and Zeus, to Dionysus and Athena, and indeed also to Ares and the others that they used to bring such sacrifices, it is clear that they themselves, and no one but them, would be the wicked and corrupt daemons who are to be averted and who have stolen the name of divinity. But Julian, bringing yet another objection, adds to his attempts to think incorrectly and says, For when it comes to laws, it is clear that the nature of a given people established them to correspond to itself – civic and humane ones corresponding to those in whom a humane disposition had been cultivated the most, but wild and inhumane ones corresponding to those whose underlying and inherent character had the opposite nature. For legislators added little through their guidance to their natures and propensities. “The Scythians,” therefore, did not accept Anacharsis “in his Bacchic revels.” And among the western nations, you would have a hard time finding more than a very few people who had an aptitude for philosophy, or geometry, or other such pursuits, despite the fact that the Roman Empire has now ruled for such a long time; there are, it is true, some exceptionally gifted ones who take advantage merely of dialectic and rhetoric, but they take part in no other field of learning.

So strong does nature seem to be. So then, what variation is there among the customs and laws of the nations? 138 Are you then going to argue that human nature is somehow not the same and that we should not predicate a single definition of substance for all humans? For, as you seem to think, we have not been made in the same way but instead differ essentially in our respective tendencies, such that, while one person happens to have been allotted a gifted and virtue-loving nature, another person instead is allotted a rather shameful and quite loathsome nature. Where in this, then, would one discern the freedom of each person’s mind? For it would no longer be up to us to do either good or bad, but we will be forced to go, involuntarily and without reflection, wherever the law of our natural propensity might carry us. And fighting against nature will be a challenge – or rather, it will even prove impossible. Even if, therefore, someone happens to be cruel and harsh, he has been forced to this condition by natural laws: the Scythian ought to be released from blame on this score and let everyone else, too, whose mind has inclined to what is harsh and bitter be released from blame. And if those who are wise in these matters establish laws in keeping with “the propensities of their natures,” none of the Greeks and Romans should act like a barbarian, I mean in terms of their character and undertakings, and, conversely, among the barbarians there should be a severe shortage of people who are gentle and wise, or even practitioners of justice.

For it is impossible for nature to be forced into not being whatever it happens to be. Furthermore, if some people, as Julian thus thinks, suffer from a natural defect, this state of affairs would, I suppose, be a clear indictment of the one who has brought them into existence. For [in this case] he has created wicked things, despite the fact that he is good by nature. How, then, can we maintain that he who knows how to determine what is just has taken our affairs into account and that he has exercised providence for his own creations? How is it not the case that he instead clearly committed an injustice if, in short, in some people’s nature he implanted error, savagery, ignorance, and a lack of wisdom? 4.G Nevertheless, the Aristotelian Alexander in the book On Providence says about God, Reason grasps that [the divine] continually and without interruption performs excellent and blessed activities, to which its very existence corre-sponds, and that providence over things here is exercised by it inasmuch as it is good and is a doer of good. For benefiting others is a property of every good being. How, therefore, did the one who does good deeds benefit those who obtained from him by nature what does not even please him? For surely it is characteristic of a good being to will good things. But perhaps Julian will say that defectiveness does not inhere in their nature as if necessity required it, but that laws have come to be that are instead similar to the nature of their customs.

What, then, would this contribute towards his aim of proving that the nations were allotted to “certain city-guarding and ethnarch gods” or daemons and angels? For he nevertheless says, I think, that the inclination of their thinking coheres with the habits and character of those allotted to rule over them; for, he says, the nations governed by them correspond to the individual substance of their gods.” Therefore, since the Scythians and certain others are cruel, haughty, and beastly in character, while there are other examples of shameful and ridiculous conduct honored by many of the nations, one has absolutely no way of avoiding the implication that those beings set over them, who “govern” them, are also like this. Is it then to these beings that God, the lover of virtue, would have yoked humanity whom he created for virtue? Nevertheless, he says, “the Scythians did not accept Anacharsis in his Bacchic revels.” And what was the reason, Your Excellency, that they did not accept him? Was it because they belonged to a nature that had received inhumanity as its portion? Then how was a Scythian engaged in Bacchic revels? For Anacharsis himself was also a Scythian by race; and [yet] he is so admired among the Greeks for his wisdom that some even think that he, too, ought to be numbered among the Seven Sages. Moreover, since, as a supporting argument for his incorrect thinking on this matter, Julian condemns the lack of learning among “the western nations” and claims that no expert in the liberal arts exists among them except for just a few, come, let us say to him on this point: “How is it that even these few have a desire to learn at all when they have not been allotted this in their essence?

For if the things contrary to one’s nature are inevitably unattainable and cannot be apprehended, how have these people entered into such domains?” Hence, for our part, we will hardly accuse the Craftsman of the universe of implanting into some people a natural defect – for it says, “God saw everything that he made, and behold everything was very good”; on the contrary, we shall instead assign the “difference” in the habits “of the nations” to their customs, upbringings, and the founders of the races, who have arguably made the laws of each resemble their own ways of thinking. For example, it is effortless for those who want to do so to observe among both the Greeks and the Romans some people who are bad and have the worst sort of character, despite the fact that their laws conduct them towards each and every admirable thing, while in contrast the barbarians are not all simply wild but on occasion some of them have attained such a degree of uprightness and virtue that they too have obtained a reputation worthy of emulation. For instance, Alexander, who is called Polyhistor, records in his On Pythagorean Symbols that Pythagoras studied under Zoroaster, an Assyrian by race. The so-called prophets among the Egyptians also practiced philosophy, and, indeed, likewise the Chaldeans among the Assyrians, the Druids among the Galatians, the Samanaeans from Persian Bactria, quite a few of the Celts, the Magi among the Persians, the Gymnosophists among the Indians, Anacharsis himself among the Scythians, and Zamolxis in Thrace.

And they say some even from the Hyperborean nations who dwell beyond the Ripaean Mountains are stewards of justice and avoid dainty food and they do not keep a Sybaritic lifestyle, but prefer to eat only fruits. Aristobulus the Peripatetic at one point says the following: “Indeed, all the things about nature said among the ancients are also said by those who philosophize outside of Greece, some by the Brahmins among the Indians and others by those in Syria called Jews.” This, too, is recorded:161 they say that Hippa, who was the daughter of Chiron the centaur and was married to Aeolus, taught her husband natural philosophy, having received this knowledge as a kind of inheritance from her father. And Euripides says about her, She first prophesied divine matters In oracles based upon the clear risings of the stars. But enough of this, lest our audience find my account tiresome by the addition of still more material. It should, nevertheless, certainly be clear that the inventions of Julian’s mind are overflowing with ignorance. For in fact, we have not been bound to being good or defective by the laws of nature as if we were forced by necessity, but rather we naturally go “hither or thither” with unrestrained free thoughts. Now our clever opponent who loves faultfinding and mockery, tossing and turning in every direction and constantly changing his argument from one thing to another at random, sarcastically attacks the God-breathed scripture and, not understanding anything at all in it, again adds: For indeed, Moses has given quite a mythical cause for the fact that languages are not alike.

For he said “the sons of men,” having come together, wished to build “a city” and a great “tower” in it, and God declared that it was necessary to go down and “confuse their” languages. And lest anyone think that I am falsely accusing him of these things, we shall read what comes next in the books of Moses: “And they said, ‘Come let us build for ourselves a city and a tower, the top of which will go up to heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name before being scattered over the face of all the earth.’ And the Lord came down to see the city and tower, which the sons of men built. And the Lord said, ‘Behold, they are all one race and have one tongue, and they began to do this thing and now nothing that they might set themselves to do will fail. Come, let us go down there and confuse their language, in order that each of them might not understand the voice of his neighbor.’ And the Lord God scattered them over the face of all the earth, and they ceased from building the city and tower.” 167 Do you then think it is right that we believe this story but you disbelieve what Homer says about the Aloadae, how they plotted to set three mountains upon each other, “in order that heaven might be scaled”?

For my part, I claim that this story is just as mythical as that one. But when it comes to you, if you accept the former, why, in the name of the gods, do you reject Homer’s myth? For I suppose I should be silent in the presence of unlearned men about the fact that, even if all the humans throughout all the inhabited earth were to use a single language and tongue, they would not be able to build a city reaching to heaven, even if they were to make all the earth into bricks – for those who would have strength sufficient to reach as far as the orbit of the moon would require an endless supply of bricks of the same size as the entire earth. Let us assume for the sake of argument that all humans had come together, using a single tongue and language, and quarried the earth and made it into bricks: when would they ever reach up to heaven, even if it were stretched thinner than a thread as they unwound it like a ball of yarn? Do you, then, still dare to boast in your knowledge of God when you believe to be true what is so clearly a myth and when your view of God is that he confused their languages because he was afraid of humans with murderous intent? What could be more vulgar than these sorts of ideas?

For he supposed that the God beyond all was afraid of the attack of humans, and furthermore that he has gone down to confuse their tongues lest, after miraculously erecting a heaven-sized tower, they perhaps even depose him from his imperial throne. How then could God, who had reached the degree of cowardice suggested by that man who is so clever in his words, have descended to confuse their tongues and to watch the city and tower being set up? Or perhaps it’s only to be expected that, so long as he remained on high and cherished his own throne, he would sustain injury from those with evil intent, but, if it was upon earth that he should wage war against them, he would easily suppress their uprising? Yet, someone gripped by fear, instead of willingly confronting those determined to fight against him, would typically have withdrawn and put as much distance as possible between himself and them. And I am not unaware that I am being foolish by plunging myself into arguments about these matters; for the divine is omnipotent and nothing is impossible for him should he merely nod his head. But it was, nevertheless, necessary for me to show that, owing to his extreme lack of aptitude for learning, our opponent habitually delights in slander and is spewing forth his arguments from a disabled intellect and a mind that has lost its grip on what is reasonable.

But he somehow pretends to give the requisite impression of plausibility by saying that those on earth, even if “they were to make the whole of it into bricks,” would not be capable of “reaching as far as the orbit of the moon.” Now we, too, hold that the attempt was futile for those at that time. But we must state the reason they did so. For in fact we maintain that it was not, as Julian thinks, because the God of the universe “was afraid” that he divided into a diversity of languages those “building the city” or setting up “the tower” in it, but instead because he was benefiting them and curtailing their futile labors. For since the humans who had lived just before them were all utterly destroyed because of the great impiety ingrained within them when God let loose upon them the flood, for this reason they were afraid that, should they one day experience this again, they would undergo the same destruction as the previous generation and they began setting their hands to shameful and useless pursuits. For, practically raising up their own mind in revolt against the divine purpose, the poor wretches were foolishly eager to erect a tower for themselves higher than the clouds; for they probably supposed that, by going up aloft, they would be impervious to suffering a flood, if in fact, as I said, one should perhaps come upon them again.

You can see the error of those who lived at that time, their ineffectual plans, their pointless undertaking, their disregard for the doctrine concerning God. For first of all, it was impossible for him who had promised not to let loose a flood against those on the earth a second time ever to lie. For he spoke in this way to the inspired Noah: “I will not continue to curse the earth because of the actions of humans, because the thinking of humanity inclines intently towards wickedness from their youth.” But secondly, it was impossible for people to avoid God’s omnipotent hand, if he should choose to punish the guilty. Therefore, to keep them from neglecting those pursuits that were essential for their benefit and from choosing to devote the sweat of their brow to futile endeavors, God scattered them and implanted within them a clamorous noise, contriving the remedy of foreign languages instead of retribution and punishment. Now, when indeed the sacred text says that those who lived at that time intended to raise the tower as high as heaven, we hold that they certainly were not seriously planning to raise the edifice to heaven itself – for that is impossible. Rather, it is the custom of the God-breathed scripture to use the word “heaven” for “high up,” in accordance with the common way of speaking among humans. The inspired David, for example, sings a psalm and uses a hyperbolic expression for those sailing in the sea: “Those who go down into the sea on boats, plying their trade on many waters, they know the Lord’s works and his marvels in the deep […]; they go up to the heavens, and they go down to the abysses.”

Since Julian has mentioned the Aloadae and calls that man a mythmaker whom he admires so much and who has passed on to him the origin even of the very gods whom he serves, come and let us respond briefly to this point as well. Why is it amazing, dear sir, if there were some youths at the time outstanding in bodily strength, hot-blooded, haughty, full of disdain, who raised their eyebrow to heaven? Wanting to indicate the sort of character they had as a kind of lesson, at least as I understand it, Homer hyperbolically ascribes something great and preposterous to them, saying that it was doubtless their aim to make even heaven somehow “accessible” to themselves, if, that is, they should prove able to put the highest of the mountains on top of one another. But, the question of whether Homer lied about this story and tossed it in as something “mythical” or if it has another explanation is no concern of ours. But since Julian claims that “you still dare to boast in your knowledge of God ” by applying your mind to Moses’ narratives, how, tell me, did [Moses] say something impossible took place? Let it be agreed that those who, due to their extreme folly, had planned to raise up the tower beyond the clouds, lost their sense of what is reasonable, and found their way into condemned modes of thinking, surely just like the two sons of Aloeus did – what is that to God?

If, therefore, Moses has written that God was afraid of this attempt of theirs, let Julian prove it and I will say nothing more. But if, on the contrary, God stopped some ignorant people from their futile endeavors, why does Julian unjustifiably rant and babble immoderately by adding the following? But I return once more to discuss that episode. Now it is true that on the question of how God confused their languages, Moses said the cause for this was that he was afraid lest they do something against him by finding a way to scale heaven since they had a common language and mindset with each other; and, on the question of how God accomplished this, [Moses said] he came down from heaven, since he was unable to do it from above, so it seems, without coming down to earth. But when it comes to the fact that there are differences in terms of customs and legal institutions, neither Moses nor anyone else gave a clear account of this. Yet, the difference in legal and civic institutions among the nations of humanity is in every respect greater than the difference in languages. For who among the Greeks holds that one ought to have intercourse with his sister, or who with his daughter, or who with his mother? But this is judged to be a good thing among the Persians.

Why must I go through one by one the Germans’ love of liberty and refusal of submission, or go through in detail the submissiveness and docility of the Syrians, Persians, Parthians, and quite simply all those barbarians who dwell towards the east and the south, and all the nations that are perfectly happy to possess more despotic kingdoms? If, therefore, these greater and more significant differences came to pass in the absence of a greater and more divine providence, why do we uselessly waste our effort and serve one who does not exercise providence? For does he who showed no concern for ways of life, habits, character, good laws, or political constitution still have a decent claim to our respect? Not at all! Look at what an absurd conclusion your doctrine comes to. For of all the goods found in human life, those of the soul lead the way, and those of the body follow. If, therefore, [God] so completely neglected goods related to our soul, neither showing providence for our physical make-up nor sending teachers or legislators to us as he did to the Hebrews under Moses and the prophets after him, what valid reason would we have to give thanks to him? 192 Well then, we already stated above that Julian lies, swaggers about, and has filled his mind with nothing true about God. For, indeed, he supposes that the inviolate Intellect sometimes succumbs to fear and is incapable of dividing those on earth into a diversity of languages unless he came down to it, perhaps by abandoning the realms above and leaping off his transcendent throne.

But I suppose someone might say in response: “You are speaking, dear sir, about God, who constructed this universe by certain indescribable operations and is beyond every intellect.” The inspired David also sang to him: “Where shall I go from your Spirit, and where shall I flee from your presence? If I go up into heaven, you are there; if I descend into Hades, you are present.” For everything is full of him. And the Savior himself informs us of this point when he says: “‘Don’t I fill heaven and earth?’ says the Lord.” How, then, can Julian say without embarrassment that, “unless he came down to earth,” God would not have been able to divide those who lived at that time into a diversity of languages? Or, perhaps, does he think that God really did descend bodily? Does he subject the incorporeal nature to corporeal laws? And does he believe that a being who is without quantity or size and who is entirely exempt from any necessary limitation made use of movements from one place to another? But if Julian is actually sarcastically mocking the statement of Moses who wrote that the God of the universe came down to earth from above, he is unaware that Moses has used human words in full awareness of the due limit placed upon speech by human nature; for there are no words that can rival God’s glory.

Now since he busies himself with the question of why one sees differences among the nations in terms of their habits and laws and where these differences came from and <insists> that Moses and the prophets who were born after him spoke nothing at all about these things, and since he then measures out the character traits that make up this difference, [insisting] that marrying one’s mother and being keen to bed one’s sister were greatly despised by the Greeks and Romans and yet this very behavior has been honored by others, and since, what’s more, he accepts the Germans’ unbridled disposition and of course the docility of others, and then indicts the God of the universe for indifference when it comes to our affairs if he himself was not the one who stipulated and legislated such shameful and rightly hated conduct – in light of all this, come, let us say to him: “You are wrong, man. For at that time, the state of monolingualism was contributing to the destruction of those who had quite irrationally built for themselves the heaven-sized tower; therefore, the Craftsman of mind and word confused their tongues. Furthermore, how could the difference between the nations, with their lack of agreement in customs and character, be in harmony with God who loves what is good? For this latter state of affairs had its cause and birth, so to speak, in the fact that not everyone chose to honor the good and blameless life.”

For we hold that human nature comes from the Craftsman of all, lacking no good thing and allotted the possession of a self-taught knowledge of what is beneficial. Moreover, the God-breathed scripture supports our argument. Nevertheless, a great many pleasures and the onslaughts of manifold passions corrupt the heart and carry away each person’s intellect from the reasonable way of thinking, and it was absolutely unavoidable that a person also be subject to whichever of the vices might have taken him captive. For the mind of every person is autonomous and free to do what it likes. As a result, even if some people have been trained by defective laws to have an incorrect disposition, they can easily and voluntarily change course to what is better and beneficial, since they are not hemmed in to what is more shameful by laws of nature, nor indeed compelled to what is contrary to their will by some sort of necessary attraction; rather, it is possible, as I said, for them freely to move to a better anchorage.

4. G Why, therefore, does Julian say that we must suppose that God was involved in the dividing of the nations into different customs and laws? Yet, wouldn’t everyone have to agree that, if the aim and intention of everyone on earth was to devote themselves to going through life in accordance with what pleased God, then all people, inclining unreservedly towards good deeds, would have one character, constitution, and law? But, since, as I said, we disregarded the life appropriate for humans and threw aside the better and most lawful constitution dear to God, and, like beasts, exchanged it for one that was more shameful and bodily – like “gold for bronze” according to Homer’s myth – and since we are overcome by manifold pleasures and fail to approach what is supremely beneficial, putting momentary gratification in front of what is edifying, it is for this reason that we differ in terms of our “customs” and “character,” with some maintaining customs that are not entirely condemnable, while others maintain those that have obtained a worse verdict. And so Julian should not for this reason indict God for allegedly “neglecting providence” in our affairs and being unconcerned with “our physical make-up.” For if he had in mind that certain members of the human race have been allotted a different natural origin and are not of a nature like ours, it seems to me his argument would no longer be about humans.

For, if they are excluded from the definition and account of what it means to be human, they would no longer be like us – how could they be? – but would be some kind of animal with a different nature and in no way like humans. But let him come forward and show us someone fitting this description, lest we should seem to be making a baseless criticism of him for saying the Craftsman was careless towards “our physical make-up.” But he cannot – how could he? – he is instead mistaken, as I said, and arguably puts natures also in the same [category] as customs and laws. Furthermore, it was sufficiently clear from our argument in the previous discussion that God has given Moses, the law, and indeed also the prophets to the herds of nations. For it was shown that not only Abraham’s children but, in fact, also the inspired Abraham himself, although he was a foreigner from the land of the Chaldeans, has been called by God to a “knowledge of truth.” And indeed, God, through the mediation of Moses, saved those who in Egypt were subject to the worship of idols and guided them by the law to a correct and irreproachable disposition. As a result, according to the precise interpretation of the matter, it would be reasonable to consider Abraham and his descendants after him as having been a “firstfruits” of the calling of the nations.

The prophet Jonah was also sent to give proclamation to those in Nineveh, and it was not of his own accord, but he was dispatched after God ordered his departure. For he has power over the universe since he is also the generator and Lord of all. But Julian supposes that God’s authority is restricted and is scarcely able to extend as far as the borders of the land of the Judeans; that he received the charge of ruling over only those who were descended from Israel, arguably like some kind of allotment; and indeed that he also differed little from the other ethnarchs, as he, at every turn, keeps calling gods and daemons. For again he said, But see if God didn’t ever give us [teachers and lawgivers] 205 too, whom you know nothing about, along with gods as good protectors who are not inferior to the one honored since the beginning by the Hebrews in Judea, the only land over which he was assigned to exercise providence, as was said by Moses and those after him up to our own time. Now if the one honored by the Hebrews was the proximate Craftsman of the world, we ourselves have a superior conception of him, he gave us greater goods than them – both psychological and external goods about which I will say more a little later 208 – and he also sent to us legislators who were in no way inferior to Moses, if not many that were in fact far greater than him.

Since, therefore, he has attempted to use the writings of Moses and those holy prophets who came after him to prove that God used to rule Judea alone, come now, yes come, and let us rein in our argument in a necessary and most useful manner and show that he is lying. For Moses did in fact proclaim one true God by nature, who is supreme, transcending all beings and surpassing every created thing; and he claims that he constructed this universe through the Son in the Spirit, as we have already made clear with a lengthy discussion. But the one who is supreme, transcending all beings and surpassing every created thing, who holds the glory of lordship over all things as an essential attribute, this one our noble man places among the number of the daemons when he claims, “see if God didn’t ever give us [teachers and lawgivers] too, whom you know nothing about, along with gods as good protectors who are not inferior to the one honored by the Hebrews in Judea.” Tell me, are you saying gods and “good protectors” have been given both to you and to those who think like you? What kind of gods or protectors preside over some of the nations, such as those dwelling in the Tauric Chersonese, and then the Scythians, and the most inhuman of barbarians among whom nothing cultivated and gentle counts for anything, but who highly esteem a hot temper, have no self-control when it comes to unholy behavior, and even glorify murder?

And what sort of gods or protectors “govern” the Persians, among whom incest is held in high regard and eagerly pursued? “Yes,” he says, “but the Greeks and Romans are nevertheless administered by good laws that are appropriate for humans and have the best gods and daemons presiding over them.” If this is the case, Your Excellency, how then is it not better and doubtless also wise to establish for all people good guides who are noble, gentle, and beneficent? For God’s good name is at stake! And if he is indeed good, how can you not say that he must appear as the distributor of every good thing for those who live under his rule? “Nevertheless,” Julian says, “if, on the one hand, the one honored by the Hebrews is like one of the others, with a delimited realm of authority, we ourselves have been allotted the better [gods]; but if, on the contrary, he is the proximate Craftsman of the world, we ourselves have a superior conception of him.” He therefore demotes “the proximate Craftsman of the world” as though to a secondary rank and nature in comparison to the first. For having set the Good above the Craftsman, they say that it is unwavering and, ensuring that it has no concern at all over our affairs, they conceive of a second God whom they also call “proximate” to creation.

Yet, he says, “if he is [the proximate Craftsman], we ourselves have a superior conception of him”! I shall, for the time being, forego arguing with him over the finer points. But Julian should at least explain how their conceptions are superior when they have allotted rule over the nations to innumerable other gods. And yet, how is it not better for him to rule over all and be honored with acclamations from all? And how can he welcome the idea that the nations were taught by others – and not even in accordance with what pleases him, if, that is, he is good – and that they go through life in such a way that – again, if he holds the good in high regard – he would be provoked to anger, since no one has given any attention to what his will is? Now as for the legislators, sages, and teachers among the Greeks, at the right time we will show that those among us are incomparably better. Persisting with his own inventions and hiring himself out, so to speak, as an advocate for falsehood, he again said, So then, to get back to what we were saying: if it is not the case that for each nation some god, governing as an ethnarch – and under him an angel, a daemon, and a separate race of souls, ministering to and assisting the higher ones – established this differentiation in laws and customs, then let it be shown how this came about from someone else.

For it is insufficient to say “God said … and it came into existence.” For the natures of created things ought to correspond to God’s commands. Let me put what I mean more clearly. God ordered fire to ascend, let’s say, and earth to sink down: in order for the command of God to come to pass, was it not necessary that the one be light and the other be heavy? And the same reasoning would apply in other areas also. And after other things: The same is true also in the case of divine things. The cause of this is that the human race is perishable and corruptible. It is, therefore, reasonable that its works are also corruptible, changeable, and undergo all sorts of transformation. But, in contrast, because God is eternal, it is fitting that his ordinances also be such. And since they are such, they either are the natures of things that exist or correspond to the nature of things that exist. For how could nature fight against God’s ordinance? And how could it fall out of correspondence [to it]? Therefore, it was not at random that God commanded that, just as the languages of the nations should be confused and disagree with one another, so too should their political constitutions. It was not by a mere command that he did these things; rather he also established that we should have natures that produce these differences.

For it was necessary that first there should be different natures underlying those traits among the nations that were going to be different. At any rate, this is also seen in bodies, if one were to observe how much Germans and Scythians differ from Libyans and Ethiopians. Is this too, then, just a mere command? And do the climate and the region, by virtue of being in a certain position relative to the heavenly bodies, contribute nothing to this? 223 Cyril 4.. Now I think I have said quite enough about the cause “of the difference of customs and laws,” which separate the nations from one another such that there is variation; for we have attributed the fact that some are accustomed to live in this way and others in that way to the inclinations of their free choices and the guidance of their forefathers. Yet that man who is renowned on the stage and has written tragedies on the sufferings of many – I mean Sophocles – will assist us on this point; for he has written in the following manner: Every city belongs to those who lead, And every army; but those of mortals who are disordered Become evil because of the words of their teachers. Do you hear that disorder is self-chosen and comes from teachers, and it does not happen to anyone because of a natural necessity?

But if in fact, as he says, the nations’ allotment to ethnarch gods and governing daemons caused the differences in their laws and customs, let him explain again – for I shall ask him – whether the “city-guarding” daemons assented unwillingly to the customs and laws of humans, while having themselves a different frame of mind, or if those under their rule, since they were overcome by their superiors and forced to submit to them, were misled to go through life in accordance with what pleased them, instead of proceeding to do what each of them thinks is honorable according to the inclinations of their own wills. If, then, the gods adapted themselves to the customs and laws of humans and this situation was contrary to their will, then they are the ones who have been taught instead of doing the advising themselves, and so are proven by the actual facts to have yoked their neck to their subor-dinates. If this is the case, why was God making the nations subject to those who were ignorant or incapable of conveying them to a way of life in keeping with their judgment? Julian ought to teach us what benefit this would bring. But if, on the contrary, the subordinate portion follows the laws “of the ethnarchs,” it would be reasonable for us to assign to the latter “the causes” of such a great and dissimilar “difference” in the quality of the character “and laws” of “the nations.”

Among the “city-guarding or ethnarch gods” and daemons there would, therefore, be some who are harsh, cruel, quick-tempered, and murderous, and who have chosen to love the worst of all the vices. For we would have to view the presiders over the nations as having the same characteristics that are apparent in the nations subordinated to them. In that case, isn’t it clearly blaspheming God to say that he surrendered everyone on earth to beings who are so utterly loathsome and know only how to convey them to each and every inappropriate thing? And there is something even more unbearable than this: Julian says it was necessary that “there should be different natures underlying those traits that were going to be dissimilar” in order that matters might correspond to God’s decrees. So then, is it the case that, just as it was necessary for fire “to be light” by nature in order that it might obtain the ability “to ascend” but necessary for earth to be heavy in order that it might possess the property of lying “down” and staying there always, in the same way some members of the human race also had to possess an evil nature and be made in this condition by the Craftsman, due to the requirement that they be carried along by the wishes of their ethn-archs? What sort of defense will be sufficient to come to his aid when he is called to account by someone with common sense?

How will he release the Craftsman of the universe from inevitable and entirely understandable mockery if he is in fact the creator of defective natures? For, if Julian claims it was against his own will that he was brought to do this, he is arguably inferior to some other being set over him who surpasses him and can compel him to do something, in which case there is something greater than him. If, on the contrary, Julian contends that it was hardly against his own will that this happened, but that it was as a free agent that he came to do this, how then can he be good and from the Good? For it is in such terms as this that Plotinus speaks about him, not presenting it as his own opinion but rather as an interpretation of Plato’s view: [Plato] says the Good, beyond intellect and beyond substance, is father of the cause that is Intellect. And he often calls being and Intellect the “idea”; consequently, Plato knew that the Intellect is from the Good and Soul is from the Intellect. And he bears witness that these words are not new or recent, but were spoken long ago, although not explicitly, while our present words have brought out their full meaning. If, then, [Julian] says the Good is father to the Craftsman and the latter has created natures that are not good, the blame rises up to the Good itself, thanks, that is, to the mediation of the Craftsman who is “proximate to the world ”; for they think it a good idea to speak in these terms.

Furthermore, I am amazed that he takes the colors of bodies as proof that one must assume there are different natures underlying the nations. But, if he imagines that in making this claim he is thinking or saying something true, he fails to notice that he is in error; for surely he would be forced to conclude that all who are of the same color would, it seems, think in the same way as each other and agree in their thoughts! And if there should be someone with white skin who also happens to be good, then apparently among those without white skin there would be no one good. But if, on the contrary, there should in fact be someone black or with a dark complexion who is good, then similarly among those with white bodies there would be no one good. Aren’t these ideas immediately laughable? Hasn’t he spoken pointless nonsense and doesn’t he vomit forth words filled with the greatest vulgarity? How could anyone argue otherwise? But Julian brazenly insults the doctrines of piety and slanders the priestly Moses, and, supposing that Moses held the same ideas as himself, he has fallen into error, and is lying and misrepresenting the truth. For he spoke again as follows: Julian [It is clear] 232 that Moses also knowingly used to conceal this sort of thing; nor has he attributed the confusion of languages to God alone.

For he says that he did not come down alone, nor that just one being descended with him, but that many did so. And he does not say who these ones were; but it is clear that he assumed that those descending with him were like him. If, therefore, the Lord doesn’t come down alone to confuse the languages but those with him also come down, it is clear that, with respect to the confusion of customs too, not only the Lord, but also those who with him were confusing the languages, would reasonably be assumed to be the cause for this discord. He has therefore clearly admitted that Moses did not choose to go so far as saying that certain beings came down together with God at the confusion of languages, but that he only said this: “Come, let us go down and confuse their tongues.” So how does Julian himself divine the meaning as he pleases and claim that those who came down were gods “like” the one who is God by nature, with a glory equal to him? Yet, the inspired Moses, quite clearly and not once but often, condemned those falsely named gods and said that you must worship one God only. For he says, “You shall worship the Lord your God and shall serve him alone.” And again: “The one who sacrifices to other gods aside from the Lord alone shall be utterly destroyed.”

And he said also in the person of God: “There shall be no other gods for you but me.” How then could Moses “know” that other gods “descended” and cooperated with the one and only true God by nature? He will, nevertheless, next respond by asking, “How could Moses say ‘Come’ and ‘Let us go down’ [in the plural] if he were referring to one subject?” Moses was not unaware that God is one or that one nature of divinity is worshipped in a holy and consubstantial Trinity, I mean in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. For even if each of those named is believed to be precisely what it is by virtue of being distinct persons and hypostases – for the Father is a father, the Son is a son, the Spirit is a spirit – nevertheless, the identity of their substance brings them together into a unity. Furthermore, our argument has shown already that even his own teachers, who are so admired by him for obtaining a reputation of supposed wisdom, also expanded the inviolate divine nature “as far as three hypostases.” But there is no harm in recalling it briefly. Plato, for example, says the highest God is the Good, while the Intellect shone forth from him and is the “proximate Craftsman of the world ” since the First remains immoveable, and he introduces Soul in third place, by which he claims all things are moved and ensouled.

That is what Plato says. As for ourselves, however, when we compose an account about the highest divinity that is sound and has been honed to a true point, we say that the Son has been begotten from God the Father, being in every respect invariably equal to him in nature, and that the Holy Spirit too proceeded, in whom he gives all things life. The life-giving Holy Spirit, therefore, proceeds ineffably, as I said, from the Father, while being conferred upon the creation through the Son. Moses, therefore, knew the one venerable nature of divinity that is in the holy Trinity. For this very reason, he sometimes uses the singular and at other times also the plural, such as “Let us make humanity according to our image and according to our likeness.” For God was not actually making certain other beings his helpers in order to create humanity; instead, the phrases “Let us make” and “according to our image” were an indication of the holy and consubstantial Trinity. Accordingly, the present passage, “Come, let us go down and confuse their tongues,” does not indicate that other gods were taken as his assistants – for how or in what way could he do this since they do not exist at all? Rather, it hints at the venerable, great, and remarkable mystery of the holy Trinity. Moreover, this too is something worthy of amazement: although Julian is wise, at least according to his own perspective and his smug self-understanding, he is not ashamed to ascribe to the virtue-loving God the perversion of human customs and to say that he, along with the others, is an accessory to such shameful and unholy deeds.

In fact, the confusion of tongues contains a perfectly reasonable explanation of the cause of this occurrence. For the Craftsman of the universe was wanting to hinder those at that time who were pointlessly toiling away at the tower’s construction; and indeed, he also succeeded in hindering them by dividing them into a diversity of languages. Nevertheless, this act did not harm those who experienced it to the point of going from good to bad and passing from excellent customs to more shameful ones. In fact, in every person there exists the potential to attain a good reputation and to go through life in a magnificent manner, even if he should speak a different language that does not sound like the language of the Greeks. Moreover, how could the perversion of customs not prove detrimental to those on earth if the customs of barbarians are loathsome, namely their cruelty and unrestrained wrath, their inability to control their desires, their tolerance of murder, and all of their other customs that our laws censure? How, then, could it be the case that God, who is such a lover of good, brought about the perversion of what was upright? 4.G Summing up his whole argument, he again says the following: Well then, why have I given such a detailed account of these topics when my intention was <not> to speak at length? This is why: if the God proclaimed by Moses is the proximate Craftsman of the world, better views about him can be found among us who take him to be the common master of all, while taking the others as ethnarchs who happen to be under him like viceroys of a king, with each one variously directing its own department; and we do not position him as a particular god rivalling the gods positioned under him.

But if, on the contrary, Moses honored a particular god and attributed to him a universal rule, then it would be better for them to be persuaded by us and recognize the God of the universe, while also not ignoring [the particular Jewish god], than to honor the one who has been allotted control of the tiniest portion in place of the Craftsman of all things. Now it is true that the one who has been proclaimed by the all-wise Moses is “the Craftsman of all things” and he is the master of the universe both visible and invisible, and there is nothing that exists which does not submit its neck to his rule. Nevertheless, Julian once more divvies up his kingdom to apostate and unclean daemons and yet says that his conception of him is superior to ours! What’s more, coming up with ingenious explanations, he adds that if the one worshipped by us is a “particular” god, it would be better “not to ignore” the one universal God. But, in fact, we do not ignore the one God who is over all beings, as we have shown in a lengthy argument. So those who share Julian’s error should listen also to our response: “‘Listen, you who are deaf, and look up to see, you who are blind’; abandon such disgusting and ridiculous worship. Get rid of the ‘particular,’ falsely named gods, who are not in fact gods at all, and with us worship the one true God by nature.”

Moreover, those who want to do so can easily understand from the God-breathed scripture that Julian is lying when he says the God of the universe divvied up his own kingdom to certain other gods and “vice-roys” and “ethnarchs.” For I will now attempt to show that this state of affairs was contrary to his will. So then, Israel once made a calf in the desert, disregarding their own salvation. God was angered at this and said to the hierophant Moses: “Go, rise up from here, you and your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt to the land that I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying: ‘I shall give it to your seed. And I shall send along my angel before your face […]; I shall not go up with you because you are a stiff-necked people […].’ And the people,” it says, “upon hearing this dreadful statement mourned in clothes of mourning […]. And Moses said to him: ‘Unless you yourself go along, do not lead me up from here; how else will it truly be known that I have found favor with you, both I and your people, unless you go along with us? […].’ And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Even this request of yours, which you have spoken, I will do.’” Observe, then, surely observe that Israel conducted themselves under God’s guidance and enjoyed this condition as a fruit of the greatest prosperity, but when they had committed no small offense by inclining towards apostasy, they took on the condition of being under an angel’s guidance as a form of punishment.

And I might point out that it was also a holy angel that God was promising would preside over them; still it was incomparably better to be under the Lord of the universe himself instead of being yoked to certain other beings besides him – a fate, indeed, that Israel avoided because the all-wise Moses entreated God on their behalf. But if, in fact, Israel’s being under an angel was something essential and beneficial, Moses would not have begged God to prevent it, nor would the God of the universe himself have assented to him if Moses was begging to prevent something good. And when he desisted from his anger, saying that he would in his own person be present with Israel despite the fact that they had sinned, it should certainly be clear that it was not something contrary to God’s will or undignified for him to rule those on the earth, not through some mediator but closely and in a hands-on way, so to speak. And, it should likewise be clear that it was not without detriment for humans to be placed under the rule of other beings, whether “ethnarchs” or angels, even if some of them should be good, holy, and subordinate to the God over all beings. I should, moreover, add something else that will not fail to contribute to my readers’ benefit. For it is true that wicked apostate daemons divided up those on earth among themselves, but the only-begotten Word of God, the Father’s omnipotent right hand, the hand that rules over all, became human to release the captives from the daemons’ greed and bring them to God the Father.

This will be confirmed by that priest of Christ’s mysteries, the all-wise Paul, who writes: “For just as all die in Adam, so also in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his proper order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ, then comes the end when he will hand over the kingdom to God the Father, once he has abolished all rule and all authority and power.” You hear that, when all “authority and power” have been abolished and the devil’s greed is entirely destroyed, the Son “hands over the kingdom to God the Father,” as if he had taken away from a tyrant what he had plundered and were bringing it to the one who begot him. For it is not the case that he hands over the kingdom to the Father by removing himself from ruling over it; rather, he hands it over because it is now free, as I said, since the enemies have been scared off and no one else is left to rule over those on earth except him and him alone through the Son with the Holy Spirit. How, then, could it not be the case that the subjection of those on earth to certain “ethnarchs” or “city-guarding gods” was something contrary to the will of him who has in fact even become human like us and “endured the cross, despising its shame,” in order to expel the mass of unholy daemons from their tyranny over us?

Book 5 5. The blessed David reveals that the inability to control one’s tongue is the most shameful of diseases. For example, he even used to offer prayers about it, saying: “Place a guard on my mouth, O Lord, and a gate of constraint about my lips. Do not turn my heart away to words of wickedness.” In fact, I would say that it is priceless to make the wise choice of keeping one’s mind focused upon the thoughts that are appropriate for truly sensible people and, indeed, to use irreproachable speech in this endeavor. For it has been written that, “If a person does not stumble in his speech, he is a perfect man, capable of reining in the rest of his body too.” On the other hand, how could anyone not find fault, and quite understandably so, with someone using a carefree and relaxed tongue that has free rein to proceed to each and every reprehensible thing? And someone will, I suppose, say that those caught in such fearful illnesses have exceeded the bounds of every vice. Come, therefore, let us show that one such person is Julian, the lover of slander and accusation, who readily gallops down every path of abuse against us and who has drilled himself in disparaging speech like no other critic of the Christians’ worship who came before him. For, in addition to what he has dared to speak thus far, he also vilifies the law that came through the all-wise Moses and has made such an outcry against the sacred utterances that, if someone could be indicted for ignorance, it would be just to call him to account on precisely these grounds.

He writes as follows: Moses’ law is marvelous, namely that Decalogue, “You shall not steal. You shall not murder. You shall not bear false witness […].” Let us write each of the commandments using the exact words, which he claims were written by God himself: “I am the Lord your God who led you up from the land of Egypt […].” Second after this:5 “You shall have no other gods but me. You shall not make for yourself an idol […],” and he adds the reason for this: “For I am the Lord your God, a jealous God repaying the sins of the fathers upon the children up to the third […] generation […].” “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain […]. Remember the day of the Sabbath […]. […] Honor your father and mother […]. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not murder. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness […]. You shall not desire your neighbor’s things.” 7 By the gods, what sort of nation is there that, aside from “You shall not worship other gods” 8 and “Remember the day of the Sabbath,” does not think it obligatory to keep the other commandments, so as also to lay down punishments for those who transgress them, sometimes harsher, sometimes similar to the punishments legislated by Moses, and sometimes even more humane than his?

9 He seems to me to have forgotten the objection he has often made, in which he strived to show that some nations are steered by good and most civilized laws, while others have an allotment that is more savage, such that they are carried by unchecked impulses towards each and every vice. For he said that each of the “ethnarchs” or “city-guarding” daemons administers the realm allotted to them as they see fit and, for those under them, they issue laws that are in keeping with their own judgment. How, then, can he here speak of every nation or say there are no people who want to disregard the duty of living in a correct and lawful manner? I am, therefore, unable to explain what convinced him to consider so venerable and admirable a law as worthy of the worst possible slanders, since the law is manifestly concerned about two things that are more important than anything else and, after putting them before the other divine decrees, it uses them to set the tune for the other ones also, which enable one to attain the most excellent life of all, and quite rightly so. For I hold that the greatest of all the divine decrees is piety towards God, and that it is brought to completion through our desire to be attached to him and our rejection of the habits that go along with apostasy, and by our refusal to assign to anyone else the honors properly due to him and him alone.

For “I am the Lord your God,” it says, and, “You shall have no other gods but me.” Given, then, that even in our own affairs falsehood is detestable to all decent people, while going straight towards the truth has nearly always been cherished, wouldn’t it be worthwhile to choose to recognize the one who truly exists, with a knowledge that is precise and finely calibrated to the truth, and not go off in another direction after what is inappropriate, attaching worship to certain falsely named beings who are not gods? Hence, after first showing that there is one true God by nature, Moses has ordered that they be people who show respect towards parents, offering rewards worth attaining to those wishing to win renown in this regard. For he says, “Honor your father and your mother, in order that it might go well with you and you might be long-lived in the land.” Then, after this, he prohibits every form of badness and abolishes unholy behavior. For he says, “You shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not commit adultery,” and so on. How, then, could anyone not admire the extremely wise Moses and consider the law established through him to be worthy of all amazement, unless it should be the case that those who have chosen to think like the Greeks have completely disregarded the duty of living a brilliant and holy life?

Yet Julian claims that all the nations knew and “kept” these obser-vances – was it because they learned them from another, with someone before the all-wise Moses also legislating such things for them? On the contrary, you would not be able to mention any legislator who was older than Moses. Or was it because the nations possess a knowledge of what is beneficial implanted in their nature by the Craftsman and have obtained the capacity to distinguish what is worse from what is better? Let’s assume it is so. If this is the case, then the best teachings would be those that also agree with the law of nature itself. But he claims that human nature lacks the ability to acquire on its own the knowledge of what is beneficial. If so, then those scattered throughout all the earth would have needed correct instruction. So then, Moses’ law would understandably be worthy of admiration. For, it instills in those who are ignorant the knowledge of how to perform actions that remove them from punishment and make them worthy of rewards. Furthermore, let Julian answer this question for me: does he consider worthy of praise those who want to live rightly and who have chosen to keep such commandments – “You shall not murder; you shall not commit adultery; you shall not desire your neighbor’s things; you shall not bear false witness […]; you shall not commit perjury”; and the rest – or does he consider even these people to be fair game for inevitable ridicule?

Now if it is the case that he praises such people, how is it not foolish of him to make such an extremely rash denunciation of such admirable commandments? For they are keeping those things that they too recognize one should admire. But if, on the contrary, he does not approve of such people at all, and instead prosecutes them, then without doubt he would clearly be the only one who deems it right to admire what is prohibited also by the laws of the Greeks and who chooses to honor whatever is condemned by the verdict of all. For Solon and Lycurgus are said to have drafted the best laws for the Greeks. And not only is Moses older than them both but they were not even born until much later in time. Tell me, then, since the commandment given through Moses clearly declares that one ought neither to engage in murder nor indeed to lust after someone else’s marriage bed, and he condemns stealing, perjury, and the act of bearing false witness, and defines punishments for those who sin, didn’t these things seem correct to Julian’s own legislators, or couldn’t you discover them making their way with equivalent words? If, therefore, Moses has written laws that are out of tune with Solon and Lycurgus, Julian ought to come forward and teach us that this is so; for, it is sufficient for us that those whom he holds in admiration are condemned by his own verdicts.

But, if, on the contrary, their laws sometimes concur with those of Moses and are held in very high esteem when they agree with the laws of the Hebrews, how does Julian not perceive that he is denouncing his own ancestors along with ours? Nevertheless, because Moses’ commandments are well-known and observed by people all around the world and because there is no one who finds them unsatisfactory, for this very reason Julian says they must be maligned! Yet shouldn’t the fact that they have received the honorable verdicts of everyone instead be a reason for them to be suitably admired? Or again, let him teach us which deeds are rightly to be praised instead of these: those deeds that are agreeable to everyone and for which anyone would cast their vote as exceedingly well done and correct; or those that are agreeable to but a few or even no one at all? But, of course, it would be those deeds that are agreeable to everyone, it seems to me. And this is the situation we have when it comes to the divine decrees given through Moses. How, then, have these observations, which should naturally bring one to marvel at these decrees, instead led him, like an imbecile, to subject them to the most extreme slander? Now if, because it was Moses who first declared these things and, furthermore, because they are agreeable to everyone, Julian deems it right to divorce them from the praise that is their due, I would point out that someone who has chosen to think like him would reasonably have to include in his condemnation many other people as well who have obtained a not ignoble reputation.

There were certain people who were the first to discover the arts and sciences pertaining to all the areas of this life of ours: some invented weaving and some bronze-working; others invented shoemaking and furthermore medicine; and a great many other necessary and beneficial things were invented as well by many people. So then if these skills are pleasing to all and have been pursued out of necessity, prevailing even up to the present day, shall we [for this reason] deprive their inventors of receiving their due admiration? But doing so would, of course, be unjust. For the fact that the inventions arising from their innate skill are honored by everyone instead produces an even more robust praise for them. 5.G But this faithless and brash man not only denounces the divine decrees, but also adds something else and says, Julian […]28 but the commandment, “You shall not worship other gods,” 29 which he says while also slandering God, since he says God is “jealous,” 30 and again in another passage: “Our God is a consuming fire.” 31 Is it, then, the case that you think a jealous and envious person deserves blame, but you deify this quality if God is said to be struck with jealousy? Yet how is it reasonable to speak such a blatant lie against God? For if he is struck with jealousy then it is against his will that all the gods are worshipped and that all the other nations worship their gods.

Then why didn’t he prevent it, since he is so jealous and does not want the other gods to be worshipped but himself alone? Was he unable or was he from the beginning unwilling to stop the other gods from also being worshipped? But of course, the first possibility, to say that he actually was unable, is impious, while the second is in accord with our practices. Get rid of this nonsense and don’t draw such a terrible blasphemy down upon your own selves. So, then, he pretends to be pious towards God in order to make his attack on the God-breathed scripture seem plausible; for he says that calling God “jealous” is utterly disgraceful, quite simpleminded, and not undeserving of punishment. In that case he should listen to our response: the divine is untouched by every passion, eternally anchored in its own goods, and possesses an unshakeable permanence in that state in which it exists. Nevertheless, when interpreting the dispositions exhibited in each of its actions, the people who speak about the divine make use of human words drawn from our experience, since otherwise they would not be able to say anything. So, it is true that jealousy and anger, as well as all the [passions] that incur equal criticism, make an impassioned assault against people’s minds, since our nature was afflicted with impotence and a natural propensity for wrongdoing could overpower each person’s soul without, as it were, even lifting a finger.

Yet if these things are said of God as well, then, yes at that time indeed, we, for our part, quite sensibly understand them in a way appropriate to and befitting of the ineffable nature and, by keeping that nature untouched by our weaknesses, we shall in no way commit an impiety. Hence, when God is called “jealous,” you need to consider the fact that the proclivity of his subjects for going after what is rather shameful is something most abhorrent to him. For, in my view, we must have a steadfast disposition and maintain an immoveable permanence in our sincere devotion to God, since the tendency to be agitated and to plunge oneself into unlawful deeds would not be characteristic of good men, but instead presents an intolerable insult against God’s glory. For someone could say to them, “Why in fact have you dishonored the one God who exists by nature and inclined towards the others,” I mean those gods who are falsely named and, in fact, are no gods at all? God says through one of the holy prophets something like this to the descend-ants of Israel: “What error did your fathers find in me, that they turned far away from me and went after empty things and became empty themselves?” For I suppose the person running with free rein away from the one who is God by nature must first air the complaints he has with service under him so that he might have an excuse for his apostasy; but as for the person who is unable to make any accusation against God, yet still chooses to do this anyway and becomes an ardent admirer of such utterly detestable beings, how is it not just that he be punished?

For by experiencing punishment, he will either improve himself or become a source of benefit to others, since they will avoid being captured in the same faults if the punishment is something they detest. Being good, therefore, the Craftsman of the universe couldn’t simply permit people to wander away from him, but instead had to curb by means of fear the laxity and carelessness that lead to apostasy. It was for this reason that God was called both “jealous” and “a consuming fire” in the words of Moses. For we will readily see that dashing away from God is dangerous for those who experience it, and what’s more even contributes to our destruction, if we consider the matter in the following way. For nothing, in my view, can match the sure knowledge of God and the subtle and sharpened contemplation [of him] – no abundance of wealth, no worldly brilliance, no swelling pride of offices, no appearance of “the wisdom” that is “earthly, carnal, and belongs to daemons.” God, at any rate, said at one point through the voice of Jeremiah: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, and let not the powerful man boast in his power, and let not the wealthy man boast in his wealth, but let the one who boasts boast in this, in understanding and knowing that I am the Lord.” And at one point the Savior himself also said to God the Father in heaven: “And this is eternal life: that they might know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you sent.”

Accordingly, knowledge of God would be the most excellent of boasts. The elite ranks of the Greeks also agree that this is correct. Alexander, that ardent admirer of Aristotle, says, for example, in his book On Providence of Particulars, Perhaps one ought to say the truth: it is through piety itself towards the divine that the greatest and most perfect good comes, as invariably does the life that is blessed. And, it has been proven that this resides in contemplation; and contemplation resides in knowledge of the most excellent things; and the most excellent things are admitted by everyone to be those that are divine. Since these things are so, blessedness for us would reside in knowledge of divine things. Accordingly, as I just said, nothing could be more precious to ardent admirers of the true wisdom than the doctrines about God. But what carries a person away from this goal is devoting oneself to falsely named gods and being ignorant of what it is that truly exists, and so being bereft of the pure and true view about God. In that case would it not contribute to the advantage of the inhabitants of the earth to know that this state of affairs grieves God, “who wants all people to be saved and come to a knowledge of truth?” Just as we say that disabled eyesight is extremely difficult and hard for anyone to bear, and that having healthy eyes is thrice-desired and much prayed for, so being unable to see God’s qualities and being deprived of the intelligible light that illumines “the eye of the heart” would understandably be something horrifying that we should avoid at all costs, while the vision of God would be an object worth obtaining and one that would be effective for our salvation, the root and source of all that is good for us.

Why, tell me, wouldn’t someone grant that it is better by far to choose to live lawfully under God than to conduct one’s life unlawfully apart from God? Indeed, how is it not clear to everyone which option is better? Therefore, given that people who live apart from God by choosing to worship beings who are not gods are inevitably bereft of a yoke, laws, and a holy way of life, wouldn’t someone praise God the Savior of the universe for keeping the inhabitants of the earth away from the cause of this condition? But perhaps he has offended Julian when he subjects the unbridled person to punishments and constructs a sort of barrier to keep such pitiful people away from what would destroy them by telling them that he is jealous. On his view, we would then be entirely within our rights to prosecute those seated upon the thrones of the earthly empire if they should happen to be upset at seeing some of their personal bodyguards abandoning their allegiance towards them and choosing instead the side of the barbarians! And of course, even if one of the generals under them should see any of the enlisted soldiers not only casting down their shield, but also completely neglecting the duty of hard work, he should be completely unperturbed by this! And even if some of the livestock in the field should be carried off from the herd and become prey for the most savage of wolves, the shepherd should be nonchalant!

And the farmer too should feel the same way as his garden withers away! And fathers as well should nonchalantly lie back as their dearest children slip into riotous behavior! And the master also should be unperturbed when he sees his most loyal servants neglecting allegiance to him and choosing to plot with his bitterest enemies! Yet I imagine that someone would say these ideas are clear and compelling evidence of a total lack of seriousness. In that case, how could God have no concern for his subjects who had slipped into distress? For it was necessary, yes necessary indeed, that he redirect them into the straight path by using terrifying warnings like a sort of bridle. The divine David also said this sort of thing to him: “May you constrain with a muzzle and a bridle the jaws of those who fail to draw near to you.” Furthermore, Julian owes me an explanation for the following question which I would love to ask him: does he admit that those whom he supposes and claims to be gods find fault with certain people and even are irritated with them if, by coming to their senses and jettisoning their willingness to submit to such beings, they should undergo a transformation to a better condition and submit themselves to the true God, prefer-ring instead the worship of Christians? Or does he hold they are not troubled by this?

Now if such behavior is of no great concern to them, why then does he bring a groundless rebuke against those who have chosen to transfer their allegiance from the Greek error to the truth? Why doesn’t he instead share the attitude of his gods? For if they are right to refuse to feel aggrieved by this, then it is he himself who has adopted the more shameful attitude or perhaps he rebukes his own gods for neglecting what is proper. But if, on the contrary, Julian has adopted the correct attitude in feeling upset and aggrieved, is it not fair to say that he has received the winning verdict and appears somehow to be superior even to the wisest gods? But, of course, this behavior does grieve them. And so, in that case too, it should be understood as a matter of jealousy. And if so, is it then not completely stupid of him to cry out against Moses’ writings by saying God should not be upset if some who have conducted their affairs under God’s guidance should be flippant and easily swayed and, rejecting the life-giving knowledge about him, should fall into the pit of destruction? “Nevertheless,” says Julian, “why didn’t God prevent them [from worshipping other gods], when it was in his power to do so?” “But Your Excellency,” I would say, “isn’t he keeping them away from vice by threatening wrath, suspending punishment over their heads, saying he is a ‘fire,’ and curtailing laxity by using fear?”

“Nevertheless,” says Julian, “it would have been better for him to do so by compelling and forcing them.” In that case, how is the activity of the human mind free and permitted to act according to its own judgment? “Virtue is” something “without any master” as the elite ranks of the Greeks themselves say, in order that due praise may reasonably come to those who are good and due punishment to those who are not, since the fact that it is possible to be distinguished in good deeds means those who fall into more shameful behavior are punished as free agents. In addition, Julian also states, For if [God] does not want anyone to be worshipped, why do you worship this bastard son of his whom he never recognized or regarded as his own? This, too, I will in fact demonstrate without any difficulty. But you, however, for a reason I cannot understand, foist upon him a counterfeit son. Now then it is true that the God of the universe rejects the obligation of “worshipping other gods,” since he is by nature the only true Craftsman and Lord of the universe, and what is appropriate to the divine being is appropriate for him alone. But I have no idea what Julian means in calling the Son a “bastard,” and he is instead warring against God and letting loose this outrageous and impudent discourse against such highly exalted mysteries.

And he claims he can easily prove this assertion, since lying comes as easy to him as riding a horse on the open plain. In fact, we place under the all-holy God neither a “bastard” nor a “counterfeit” son but instead confess that his own proper Word, who is God, naturally proceeded from him; this we will easily prove when it is the right time to engage in verbal sparring on this point. Always taking up his shield to defend Plato’s words and putting his recitations ahead of the sacred writings, Julian again indicts us, asking why we, after taking our leave from Greek eloquence, have sided with the words of truth and recognized the one who is truly God by nature, despite the fact that Moses, he says, “hymns” God’s qualities less than he ought, since he calls God “jealous” and quick-tempered, although he is most gentle and absolutely good. But enough about these topics, since we have spoken about them at length and, I think, frequently. Nevertheless, since he loves slander and is brazen in his speech, come, come indeed, let us observe what other ideas besides these he contrives when he makes war against the worship of the Christians. For he says in addition, Nowhere does God appear to be violent, or irritated, or provoked to anger, nor does he swear oaths, nor go one way and then the other in quick succession, as Moses says he was in the case of Phineas.

If any of you have read Numbers, you know what I am talking about. For after [Phineas], he says, took with his own hand “the man who was initiated into the mysteries of Beelphegor” along with the “woman” who had persuaded him, and “killed” them, having struck the women, he says, “in the womb” 60 with a shameful and most painful wound, God is made to say: “Phineas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, stopped my anger against the sons of Israel when I was jealous with jealousy among them and I did not utterly destroy the sons of Israel with my jealousy.” What could be more trivial than the reason for which God is falsely represented as provoked to anger by the author of this tale? If there were ten or fifteen, or let’s say even one hundred – for surely they will not say there were a thousand, but let us grant that there were even this many who dared to transgress one of the laws ordained by God – what could be more unreasonable than the idea that six hundred thousand people had to be destroyed because of one thousand? It seems better on all counts, at least to me, to preserve one bad man together with a thousand of the best men than to destroy a thousand together with the one. Next, Julian weaves this together with an extended discussion, claiming that the Maker of heaven and earth should not experience such cruel feelings of anger that he even intended, on many occasions, to consume the entire race of the Jews.

For, if, he says, the anger of even one hero and of an insignificant daemon is difficult to endure for entire coun-tries and cities, who could have withstood so great a God who became enraged at daemons, angels, or even humans? 65 So then, Julian supposes, as I said, that the supreme and inviolate nature differs little from the realm of our experience and that the temper-aments he happens to have in the case of specific matters – let us too use words more appropriate to humans, if he wants – are of the same sort as might occur also in our very own experience and are no different. And he likewise supposes that, because “anger” has admittedly been ascribed to God, there is a fire burning in God’s heart along with a bitter and uncontrollable agitation, and, if he should be called “jealous,” Julian will probably not hesitate to say that he suffers the same emotions as humans and is melting from the fire of envy. But, I suppose, this way of thinking would belong to a deranged and insane mind, entirely ignorant of the properties that belong to the divine nature. For just as we claim it stands above the universe and is situated over it, not because it is exalted in a spatial sense but because of the preeminence of this nature and its incomparable difference, so also in the exact same way, I think, it leaps beyond the realm of our experience and is understood to be beyond every passion.

And it weighs human actions, assigning various rewards of a most exalted kind to those who submit a neck responsive to its yoke, while on those whose hearts are stubborn and obdurate imposing punishments that are less than they deserve. For indeed we hold that bad and good people must not appear to have equal honor; but neither should an excessive tolerance widen the path towards apostasy for those who choose it, since they would then proceed unpunished to whatever they want; they would be carried off into illicit behavior, practically leaping away from him; and they would in all likelihood be dragged down to what is worse by bidding farewell even to those things upon which they would have been better off lingering. For how can the Craftsman of all be entirely good if he doesn’t show providence over his own creation and make those dominated by respect for the good to be still stronger thanks to his assistance, while making those who irreverently disregard the sacred oracles more prudent and reining them in with terrifying warnings, even adding the beating that is their due as the best means of aiding them? “For the one whom the Lord loves he disci-plines,” it says, “and he whips every son whom he accepts.” Hence, whenever he pronounces punishment on certain people for their drunken ravings, it is then that he is said by us to have gotten “angry,” despite the fact that he does not endure the experience of the passion of anger; and if it should happen that he does not want any of his associates to be drawn off somewhere from kinship with him through their choosing to worship those who are not gods, it is then that we say he is “jealous,” using a word drawn from our experience to indicate the matter at hand and having no other way of speaking about the power of his innate tender affection.

For it is not the case that he exults in those who are being destroyed but instead wants his subjects, and even more all those on the earth, to distinguish themselves by their virtuous achievements. Furthermore, if God is also said to “swear oaths” to certain people, Julian ought to lay the blame upon those who are faithless for the fact that there is even a need for an oath. And when he does swear, he does so by his own glory, since he says, “I will lift up my hand unto heaven and I will swear by my right hand.” And again: “I have sworn by myself, says the Lord.” For it was not possible to swear by anyone else as though they surpassed, excelled, or exceeded his own glory. In fact, when confirming some of the saints in their faith that the promises made to them would ultimately come to fulfillment, he would sometimes bind his word to them with an oath, since his goal was to erect for his worship-pers an unshakeable faith using every possible method. 5.G Furthermore, since Julian deems it worthy of utmost criticism that the God of the universe would sometimes change from anger to gentleness, come, let us respond to him on this point too by saying, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil.” For, he is foolishly vilifying what in fact it would certainly have been better, and indeed wise, to consider worthy of the highest esteem.

For the God of the universe is slow to anger, or rather, he is slow to pronounce the punish-ments appropriate for sinners, but is easily moved to let go of his anger and is eager to show mercy to those who are trapped in their sins. For example, Israel made a calf in the desert and, forgetting the divine sign in Egypt, they were wanting to offer veneration to a calf. And God was quite reasonably indignant at this and said to Moses the hierophant: “Go, quickly descend from here; for your people whom you led out of the land of Egypt have broken the law; they quickly went aside from the path, which I commanded them; they made for themselves a calf and have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it, saying: ‘These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.’ And now, permit me and I shall crush them, since I have been provoked by my anger at them, and I shall make you into a great nation.” But when the all-wise Moses earnestly begged him to be gracious to the sinners, he said, “The Lord was merciful and preserved his people.” Indeed, one may on occasion observe certain earthly kings incited to absolute rage at those who out of foolishness have offended them, acceding to the entreaties of no one, whether to those who occupy the highest seats, or to those leading armies, or to any others decked out with the highest dignities.

But God, who is so great and beyond all, accepts the prayers of one just man. Perhaps our opponent will say: “Did he then change his mind? Did he realize what was best only after the fact? And does he have second thoughts? Yet surely someone who knows the future, and specifically that he will eventually cease being angry, should have avoided coming to this point from the outset.” It is easy to see that, in choosing to hold such ideas he seems, at least to me, to have forgotten even his own forefathers. For he has perhaps forgotten Homer who said the following about his own gods: […] and even the gods themselves are changeable. But, thanks to his exceedingly great stupidity, Julian has indicted God for actions that ought to have been admired instead, as would be clear without any difficulty at all, if one wanted to learn the plan behind them. For it was surely necessary, yes necessary indeed, to show that those who have committed unholy deeds are liable to punishment, and it is for this reason that God is said to have been “angry.” But, in addition to this, it was also necessary that those of us who came after Moses should learn the preeminence of God’s innate tranquility and how much influence virtue has with him and the power of the prayers of the saints.

Or doesn’t this fact fill life with good hope? For, if he accepts the prayer of one just man even when, on occasion, a great multitude has been condemned for such terrible sins, shouldn’t everyone take heart even if, entangled in human weakness, they crash into the sacred laws and see judgment hanging over their heads? For, the prayer of one just man is sufficient as an aid to those who choose to repent. Now since Julian takes Phineas’ being jealous as a pretext for libel against God, come, yes come, and let us give a cursory overview of the story and also recall the very words of the sacred text so as to prove that yet again he is speaking futile nonsense on this point too. It is written as follows in Numbers (this is a Mosaic book): “And Israel lodged in Satim; and the people became profane so as to practice sexual immorality with the daughters of Moab. And they invited them to the sacrifices of their idols, and the people ate their sacrifices, and they bowed down to their idols. And Israel was initiated into the mysteries of Beelphegor; and the Lord was provoked to anger at Israel.” Is it then the case that their error was an insignificant one, something not sufficiently serious to be able to upset the virtue-loving nature and incite it to indignation?

What miracles could have surpassed those the omnipotent God performed when he raised creation itself in revolt, so to speak, against the Egyptians’ madness, in order that he might free Israel from unbearable slavery? For even heaven was emitting hail; the earth, as it was written, was sending forth frogs; the water was changing “into blood”; when “soot of a furnace” was dispersed throughout the air, “boils” were breaking out on the bodies “of the people.” Then Israel completely lost its senses and was captured by the beauty of wicked women so as to pursue these pleasures without restraint. And indeed, their mind even advanced to such a point of stupidity that they chose to worship the wooden statue honored among them, with an unholy disregard for any and all reverence towards the one true God by nature. Thus, since it followed that the evil had to be restrained in some way and not allowed to spread through the entire race by starting from just a few people and in no time overtaking the rest of them as well, some of the apostates fell at the hands of the faithful, in order that the path towards shameful conduct might usefully be made rough instead of smooth thanks to the fear of suffering. It was right at that time and only then that Phineas too, since a man was pushing the limits of impudence and falling into the embraces of a foreign woman – and this openly!

– “took a barbed lance” and made short work of them both; for he pierced the penetrated along with the penetrator. Look for me here at the compassionate God who often seizes upon even a harsh act as an opportunity for clemency: for he says “Phineas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, stopped my anger against the sons of Israel when I was jealous with jealousy among them and I did not utterly destroy the sons of Israel with my jealousy. So I said: ‘Behold, I am giving to him […] and to his offspring after him an eternal covenant of priesthood, because he was jealous for his God and provided atonement for the sons of Israel.’” For since, he says, [Phineas] was moved by his love for God, practically taking upon himself “my jealousy,” and thus let loose his hand against those who had committed unholy deeds, [God] ceased from his wrath; and then [God] even deemed him to be worthy of rewards, for, it says, “he provided atonement for the sons of Israel.” But he who understands nothing that is excellent or good claims that “the reason” was “trivial” which caused God to desist from the obligatory incitement to anger towards those who had sinned in this way. And yet, how could it not be the case that Julian, out of his extreme ignorance, has allowed himself to be carried away by base and fraudulent ideas when he attempts to vilify that which doubtless he ought instead to deem worthy of all admiration?

For when God saw Phineas, practically having put on the breastplate of a pious and faithful jealousy and marshalling his wrath against those who dishonor divine worship, he was delighted at him and pardoned everyone else of the offenses for which they understandably would have suffered the most severe punishment. For while the divine and supreme nature always abhors someone with a sinful and teetering heart and an effeminate mind prone to waywardness and apostasy from the good, it delights in those who are steadfast, who habitually walk in the straight path, and who avoid falling on one side or the other, those who, with a well-grounded intellect, have a firm grip on their pious devotion to him. Because of even one such person, God often lavishes his mercy upon an innumerable multitude, and on occasion even upon those who had been harshly condemned. For example, when all Jerusalem was once gripped by no ordinary faults and had incited the virtue-loving Intellect against herself on account of her inclination to wallow in each and every thing condemned by the law, and this quite eagerly, the just Judge again wanted to let loose punishments upon them. But when the prophet Jeremiah offered prayers for her, he immediately heard God saying: “Go about in the streets of Jerusalem […] and look in her public squares, and if you should find a man, if he is someone who practices justice and loves faithfulness, I will be gracious to Jerusalem, says the Lord.”

Observe, therefore, how God considers one person to be “equal in value to many people” and “saves” a populous city “together with one” just and good man, rather than destroy one just man together with many impious. Hence, when some people at that time had thoroughly deviated into unbridled behavior and were utterly ruined, wasn’t it necessary that God should express an appropriate concern for those who had not yet suffered this fate, that the impulses of the others should be curbed by the punishment applied to a few, and that by terrifying warnings they should be directed towards their responsibility to stick firmly to what is best? Is it then the case that God, who is all justice, was unjust? Or did he have an unreasonable aim in view when he did these things? Indeed, isn’t it impious to rebuke his judgments in such a foolhardy manner? Julian’s own Porphyry, for example, says in the treatise To Nemertius: “As a result, his [Nemertius’?] book, which dares to give God a lesson in justice, is discovered to be full of the greatest injustice when one unrolls [and reads] it.” Accordingly, the verdict of God in every instance would be reasonably understood to be – and in truth is – holy and entirely blameless, and to think otherwise would be a disease of a crazed mind and an indictable offense. But since Julian hates arguments from us, let him listen again to Porphyry, who writes as follows: Not only for the benefit of the whole and <for>97 the continuation of [the whole’s] harmony does [God] adapt one thing to another, a span of time belonging to each part individually, but he is already the protector, savior, and doctor of all.

Didn’t he set the pattern, on the one hand, for human doctors who use their God-given skill to foresee what will happen to the whole [body] and either cut some of the parts, or cauterize others, or mortify others, or amputate others for the sake of saving the whole? Even if, despite knowing that the doctor does this for the sake of saving the whole, mothers and nurses who are present still often sob and weep mournfully, nevertheless the sensible father, when he is present, both urges on the doctor and takes away food from the weeping [child] for their benefit. If God has set this pattern for human doctors, then would he, in his protection of the whole, have neglected the part that needs to die and depart from the others, like [the removal of ] a single toe from the whole foot for the benefit of the entire body? For surely, if we were able to track down the divine reasoning, we would doubtless realize that for the [greater] good he prevents the birth of some at the outset, while for others he gives prior indication that they will be harmful, and upon still others he has bestowed death as the reward for piety. Despite the fact that, prior to Julian, Porphyry is seen to have waged war against God’s glory in a great many books, I nonetheless think the foregoing is sufficient as confirmation of the sorts of things he thought and wrote.

And yet, I will add still one further snippet from him, which goes something like this: Chrysippus, the follower of Socrates, did not think it right to say “Who knows [why]?” in response to things that happen, but rather “This was absolutely for the best.” For unless it is possible to sketch out an administration better than the divine one, we must surely suppose that what happens is better the way it is. For is it not true in your own experience [Nemertius] that, when you received from the emperor down here the task of exercising providence over a certain portion of the human empire and obeyed the laws for the benefit of the political order, it was impossible for you to maintain a lawful political order in any other way than to exile some of your subjects, confiscate the property of others, and even condemn still others to death; and is it not the case that you did not preserve the life of all its citizens, since doing so was not in the interests of everyone? So then, when it comes to one who administers so great a world as this, are we really not going to let him administer his own realm in the manner he deemed right for the whole, without being called to account by us, even when he proceeds by means of deaths and changes [of fortune] and by the indefiniteness of one’s lifetime?

Why, therefore, does Julian not do what is holy? Why does he shamelessly attack the divine judgments and condemn on a charge of inequity the substance that weighs all things in a holy manner? And why does he cry out against that anger which refashions into a better state people who disregard what is best and moves those who are vacillators towards prefer-ring more solid ground? As the father of your false worship recommends, let us “leave it” [to God], as though he were a physician, to amputate some small part for “the preservation” of “the whole body.” Permit him like a judge to use legal regulations to rein in his subjects by the removal of bad people. For, indeed, as I said already, it is not the case that good people were destroyed along with the wicked, but rather a wicked and numberless crowd “were saved together with one good man,” I mean Phineas, of course; and he has been honored [by God], not because the woman was pierced through with a savage blow, but rather because he prudently filled his heart with zeal for God and quite fervently took up arms against the apostates. But perhaps Julian does not like the sound of apostates having to undergo punishment. For he knows, yes he knows indeed, that he himself is numbered among such people and there is no way he could avoid the most severe punishment for having cast down his shield, with the facts themselves proving that he is a coward who cares nothing at all for virtue and who, by the smooth path of deception, has rolled into the pit of impiety.

But perhaps he imagines that he could rival God as a legislator and can redirect the meaning of the divine decrees to whatever seems right to him. For he always speaks lies about the God-breathed scripture, at one point claiming that the hierophant “Moses was acting as a demagogue rather than speaking the truth when he composed his statements about God, statements that are neither correct nor indeed appropriate for the divine”; while at another point he maintains that “Ezra” added some things from his own ideas [to the writings of Moses]. This attack of his is also extremely vindictive: he pretends to be fair towards God in order that he might give the impression that he has good reasons for saying that [Moses’] statements about God are poorly composed and even to pour disgrace all over the sacred writings. But “a treacherous man will not catch his prey,” as it has been written. “For we,” who have the mind of Christ, “are not ignorant of his schemes,” as the all-wise Paul said. Moreover, the fact that Julian has attained the highest pinnacle of impiety should once more be clear from the following; for he said, It is indeed appropriate to compare him to the mildness of Lycurgus and the tolerance of Solon, or the equity and kindness of the Romans towards malefactors. How can this insolent man be unafraid when he compares the God over all to humans, and even more when he says that the maker of heaven and earth is no better than humans, maintaining that the “Wisdom that is the artisan of all things” is inferior to the equity of humans and that he who authoritatively apportions to existing things the properties that determine what they are is all but cast aside, far behind those who are good in the human realm?

For all understanding and every form of virtue is from the Craftsman of all, and indeed likewise an appetite for good things has been implanted in nature by him. It is, therefore, abundantly clear that it is the wicked and God-hating spirit that has spoken through Julian, and perhaps it would not be out of place if one chose to liken him even to the dragon who is the source of evil, or rather to the snake in Paradise, which was a mediator of the devil’s words even though it was in appearance alone – for the words were not from it but rather from the one who was speaking through it. But while that [snake] tricked only one woman, this man, who is the most skilled imitator of the devil’s perversity, is attempting to “corrupt the whole world,” “lifting his horn aloft and speaking injustice against God,” as it has been written. But since he claims that both Solon and indeed also Lycurgus were the mildest of men, and has even testified to their tolerance, we now must also say the following. Now, Solon was a legislator for the Athenians, Lycurgus for the Lacedaemonians. Therefore, when they were providing a beneficial service to cities or country districts and were laying down the laws for each, did they omit to mention that those found guilty of shameful crimes must pay penalties, and did they intend for the choice of an unholy and unlawful life to go unpunished?

Or did they perhaps stipulate penalties that were proportional to each misdeed and thereby persuade small and great to be prudent and render them practitioners of orderly and good behavior? If, then, they did not view such conduct as being very important, let Julian concede the point and I will rest my case; for what kind of virtue does a legislator have who has disregarded the most profitable things of all? But if, on the contrary, preventing wicked conduct and rebuking bad morals was for them a serious matter of the utmost consequence – for there was no other way to vanquish the laxity of those who do not value the best way of life – should one for this reason no longer think of them as mild and tolerant? Although they voided the laws of Draco, they decreed that his laws pertaining to murderers ought to remain in force, praising them, I would imagine, and in no way being displeased with them, since, although they could have repealed them, they ordered that they be preserved and remain in effect. But, in case it is necessary for me to speak in defense of legislators, besides being mild and tolerant, one would, I believe, say they should also possess a characteristic hatred of evil. Thus, even if they occasionally determined harsh punishments for wicked sinners who chose a lifestyle beyond the laws, one could say they arrived at this judgment not as people tyrannized by anger, but instead as defenders of justice who condemn shameful people out of a strong hatred of wickedness and guide them towards a better state, by, on the one hand, distinguishing what is naturally unjust from what is usually beneficial, while, on the other hand, using fear as a most useful aid against those who prefer laxity and threatening them with punishment like a sort of goad.

5.G And, I suppose, if one were to take into account the disposition and intent of lawgivers in each of the laws they have made, whenever one sees them measuring out brilliant rewards for good deeds and bringing forward praises appropriate to each, it would not be misleading to say that they took the utmost delight in these people and placed the highest value upon the duty of going through life in an irreproachable manner; but whenever one sees them censuring evil deeds, it would not be inappropriate to say that they were full of anger. For in the kinds of laws they issue it is not difficult to see the dispositions within the souls of the legislators all but sketched out. Accordingly, even though the very act of threatening punishments for shameful and improper conduct would understandably make one suspect it is motivated by wrath, nevertheless the legislators have not experienced the emotion of wrath. Something like this is also how you should understand what is going on in the case of God, or rather, something far beyond this, since his ways belong to a realm far removed from our experience and transcend every creature. Well, then, Your Excellency, when it comes to the laws of Solon and Lycurgus – and, I might add, Draco’s too – if someone decides to insult them, putting his foot in the mud as the saying goes, and is invariably and without exception subjected to the punishment meted out to transgressors, is it then unjust that someone who is lax towards the divine commandment and liable to pay the penalty suffers punishment?

Accordingly, given that God says, “You shall worship the Lord your God and shall serve him alone,” and likewise, “You shall have no other gods but me,” wasn’t it necessary that the punishment of death should be given to “those who were initiated into the mysteries of Beelphegor” and had all but sold themselves into apostasy for such loathsome pleas-ures with shameful women? Furthermore, I think it necessary for me to say the following as well: did Solon and Lycurgus, whom he likewise claims to have surely been the most eminent of legislators, take care to issue laws for the Greeks requiring them to pay heed to the gods honored among them by making sacrifices and serving them? Of course I think this is the case and not otherwise. For the matter is so serious to them that the worst punish-ments were decreed for those who were apprehended and indicted for laxity. What need is there to mention the laws that treated temple-robbers as violators of the gods? So then, since they viewed as especially important the duty of guarding against any form of offending the gods – or rather impure daemons – isn’t Julian clearly in the wrong for claiming that punishment was unjustly inflicted upon those who had insulted God’s worship in a brazen and unholy manner? And indeed, they say that the oracular daemon at Pytho, namely Apollo, spoke from his tripods and declared that Socrates was the wisest of all men.

And while there was much admiration for the man among the Greeks, he was imprisoned and ended his human life with hemlock. Now the accusation brought against him by his accusers was that he added “new daemons” to the gods that exist among the Greeks. If this is the case, then was it not necessary that those who dishonored the God of the universe, who instead of service under him chose dutiful submission to Beelphegor, and who worshipped others besides God, should undergo the punishment of Socrates – if not with hemlock, then by a different means – a punishment that was not discordant, I think, with the very laws of the Greeks, or rather those who laid them down, namely Solon, Lycurgus, and, before them, Draco? Accordingly, even if certain people whose duty it is to issue laws should be mild and tolerant people, they would not cease being good and mild when they punish the wicked. Now since he claims the Romans are benevolent and forgiving towards certain “malefactors,” how can he ignore the fact that offenses against humans are much less serious than those against God? For, erring against the nature that is beyond all is not equivalent to offending someone on earth, since, as much as his ways surpass our ways, to the same degree, I think, will the significance of crimes [against God] surpass the rest; and the particularities of the punishment itself will also follow in a manner that is equitable and proportionate to each offense.

As though clearly and unambiguously declaring that the nature which is impervious to passions like ours – in fact, to everything that naturally causes distress – and which surpasses every intellect, is tyran-nized by wrath and is provoked by impulses towards anger, Julian again spews forth some words better suited to old women, which stink of extreme stupidity, and states, On the basis of the following, observe also the degree to which our ways are better than their ways. The philosophers command us to imitate the gods as much as is possible and [they say] that such imitation consists in contemplation of what exists. And it is probably clear and does not even need to be said that this takes place without passion and depends on an absence of passion. Consequently, we assimilate ourselves to God to the degree that we enter a state free from passion when intent on contemplation of what exists. But what sort of imitation of God is hymned among the Hebrews? – Anger, rage, and wild jealousy. For it says, “Phineas […] stopped my anger against the sons of Israel when I was jealous with jealousy among them.” God, in fact, having found someone who was equally indignant and aggrieved, is seen to put aside his own indignation. Often in the scripture Moses has been made to say this and things like this about God.

If then, Your Excellency, submitting to wicked daemons, or rather apostate angels, is obviously better than conducting one’s affairs under God and being ruled by him alone, then your side should gain the victory. But if, on the contrary, doing so is abominable to those who have a beautiful and strong mind and who “love the sight” of true piety and if, conversely, it is productive of every happiness and is truly thrice-desired to gain unerring knowledge of the one that truly exists and rules the universe, from which every form of virtue shines forth and comes to us and from which gush up, as if from a fountain, good things and the distribution of heavenly gifts – if all this is true, how could the ways of the Greeks still be preeminent? Rather, won’t the ways of Christians, sweetly smelling of the myrrh of undefiled service, supersede their claptrap by an incomparable array of differences? Yet, since the mind of the Greeks has sunk in the quagmire of deception and has a “lie” as its “hope,” as the prophet says, it is worthwhile to peer also into the depth of this thinking, which he supposes has been worked out with such great wisdom to suit his purpose. For “the wise have ordered us,” he says, to “imitate the gods insofar as it is achievable.” And the only way this may be accomplished is solely through the “contemplation of what exists” and, of course, through an “absence of passion” – by “absence of passion” meaning, I suppose, the absence of anger in addition to possessing the other virtues: one must first welcome them in and keep them in one’s breast, and so, in this manner, imprint oneself with the imitation of God insofar as is possible and carefully practice the habits of the entirely beautiful and skilled artistry that leads to this goal.

Now then, the claim that a mind that is still and unconcerned with worldly affairs is required for those intent on approaching the true vision of God is one I myself would make as well as everyone habituated to thinking in a correct manner. For the Craftsman and Lord of the universe carries us away to such a state with the words, “Be still and know that I am God.” The state of being beyond rage and “free from the passion” of the waves of anger, insofar as this is attainable, is surely a singular good worth acquiring and one of those that habitually conform us to God. Since this is agreed upon by all and is in fact true, it immediately appears necessary that we must think of the divine not as quick-tempered and harsh, but rather as entirely free from rage and anger. Tell me, then, given that the all-wise Moses says the Craftsman and artisan of all things is not one of those falsely named gods who are unknown and partial, but instead is the God who truly exists and possesses the glory of lordship over all things as a property of his essence, how can this man say without any fear that the imitation of God among the Hebrews consists of “anger, rage, and wild jealousy”? Does he not realize that he is arguably making the divine susceptible to human passion and making the one through whom and in whom all things were brought into existence one of our number?

In fact, the divine scripture, in composing discourses about [the divine], does not speak about it in words appropriate to it, as it is by nature, but in a way that we ourselves might be able to understand and to speak. For, by thus employing terms drawn from our experience and expressions designating concrete particulars, it focuses our attention upon subtle images and draws us up to conceptions that transcend what is spoken. For this reason also, it often attributes parts of the human body to [the divine], using language that is, in a sense, strictly inappropriate, and elegantly draws us up to subtle contemplation from exam-ples, as it were, in our own experiences. Just as, then, it sometimes treats the incorporeal – despite its being simple and incomposite, without magnitude and quantity – as composed of limbs, with each part, as it were, hinting obliquely at one of the divine nature’s inherent properties – the eye hinting at its being all-seeing, the ears at its being all-hearing, the hand doubtless at its creative activity, and of course the feet at the smooth and, so to speak, easily traversed path it takes towards each of its deeds – so too, if perchance “anger” is mentioned in the case of God, it would, on the basis of our experience, induce us to understand that, if he had in fact been able to experience passion, he would have undergone it, brought to this point by the quality of people’s actions.

For the absence of passion is a natural property of the divine. Nevertheless, that which is under his hand and yoke should not for this reason be without blame when it disregards what is proper nor should those who lie under his scepter be allowed to leap into apostasy with impunity, but I maintain that they must be severely tormented and that doing so would be exceedingly just, since being unsupervised is detrimental to the wicked, just as the absence of punishment is detrimental to those children who habitually misbehave. Therefore, whenever the quality and impact of actions committed by any person at all require a show of anger from God, if this should eventually appear to have been inflicted upon them, it is then that he is also said “to have gotten angry,” with the saints having used the language of our experience so we might understand that, if it had been possible to articulate clearly God’s properties in words transcending humanity, the word “wrath” would not have been applied to him. It would, therefore, be necessary to consider the limit of our thinking and the insufficiency of our language. Indeed, someone might say to him: “What are you doing, dear sir? You blame those who talk about God for their habit of speaking of his prop-erties in a manner that is inferior to what was required. In that case, indict your own nature since it doesn’t know how to rival the intelligible heights of the divine preeminence and falls short of the honors of sovereignty, lacking words sufficient to express things that transcend intellect.”

Furthermore, let Julian answer this question for me: if in fact someone made his goal the duty of living mildly and temperately, which of his gods should he imitate to avoid missing his goal? Perhaps Julian would say “murderous Ares,” to use Homer’s epithet, the god whom he has in fact called “blight to mortals” and “stormer of walls,” as well as “bloodthirsty,” and, as I said, “rager” and “one born for evil”?! But let us pass him by if you wish to do so and examine instead Athena “of a mighty father,” who is shameless and a “dog fly,” always “making the gods clash in strife,” since she too is always concerned with military tactics and they call her the most warlike of daemons. And they give a venerable account about her, since they say she doesn’t rage like that god, I mean the “stormer of walls,” but rather conducts matters related to battles and warfare in a thoughtful and reflective way. But it seems to me that this won’t help her at all to gain the appearance of mildness that is required. For do those who weave together prudence with courageous deeds in battle and war really intend to be weaker than the enemy force when they come to face them, or do they make the crucial victory their first priority, even if it happens to be true that they wage battle against their enemies in a thoughtful manner?

Isn’t the answer obvious? For when they march forth – and it is not without wrath that they do so, even if they are said to do this thoughtfully – how could they possess within themselves the beauty of an authentic and sound mildness? Moreover, we shall easily observe that the Athena they so admire has reached such a point of pusillanimity as to make sudden changes of mind in one direction and then the other, with the result that she is ridiculed for this reason even on the tragic stage. For Euripides in the Trojan Women says she rushed off to Poseidon and said the following to him about the Trojans and Achaeans: I want to cheer the Trojans who were once my enemies, and to inflict a bitter homeward return on the army of Achaeans. Why do you thus jump to different habits at different times, And why do you show such excessive hatred and love to whomever it happens to be? And Athena responded to this: Don’t you know that I and my temples have been violated? And to this Poseidon [responded]: I know: when Ajax dragged Cassandra [from your temple] by force. And the aggrieved goddess said to him: He suffered nothing from the Achaeans, nor did he hear anything from them. Consequently, if the one who violated Cassandra had suffered something grievous from the Greeks, Athena would not have been provoked against the whole army.

If so, then how can [Julian] blame Phineas for checking the wrath directed against everyone by carrying out against one person a punishment entirely in keeping with the law? Nevertheless, you will say that everything on the stage was fabri-cated by the poets. If so, then how can it be that the account of this story is treated with respect both by the rest of the elite ranks and by those who are not poets? In any case, let’s leave the tales of Athena and that “bloodthirsty” “blight to mortals” and “rager” here. But what about the [goddess] who squandered the prosperity of Oeneus and brought every kind of evil upon the affairs, lands, and cities of the Aetolians and the Curetae, I mean the “arrow-pouring” sister of Apollo? Did she not take the trivial and banal fact that Oeneus did not sacrifice to her “the firstfruits of his threshing floor” as a pretext for shattering, as it were, his entire hearth? And didn’t [Apollo], who was of the same blood as her and equally prone to anger, “send an evil disease throughout the army” when a priest was wronged at Troy by one of the sons of Atreus, and didn’t a great many people die in agony? If, therefore, someone should “imitate the gods” of the Greeks, will that person be mild and civilized or quick-tempered and heaving with wrath?

As for myself, I say that the latter is true. But if this is not so, let him come forward and teach us how someone eager to imitate the gods of the Greeks, who are so terrifying and so extremely warlike, could move beyond rage and anger and have a mind that is calm and tranquil. And if Athena raged at the Argives, while Artemis was punishing Oeneus for being lax about sacrificing, and if a great many “pyres of the dead were burning” among the Greeks because a maiden captured by the spear was not released from the tents of Agamemnon and “the [priestly] garlands” were being dishonored along with [the priest] Chryses, then how can it follow that “those who were initiated into the mysteries of Beelphegor” and grieved the God of the universe with their unholy mind, who had been caught with extreme folly in the net of apostasy by pleasures that lead to shameful and lecherous behavior – how does it follow that they should be allowed to do this with impunity instead of being justly convicted of committing the worst evils? But Julian goes on to say, Finally, observe from the following that God was not concerned only for the Hebrews, but, although he cares for all nations, he gave nothing excellent or great to the Hebrews, while to us he gave [gifts] that were greater by far and distinctive.

The Egyptians too, on the one hand, in counting among their own number the names of not a few wise men, are able to say that they have had many in the succession of Hermes – I mean Hermes who sojourned three times in Egypt. The Chaldeans and Assyrians, on the other hand, have those who are in the succession of Ninus and Belus and the Greeks have myriads of those who are in the succession from Chiron, since from him have come all those who are naturally experts in the mysteries and the theologians, an area in which the Hebrews think it worthwhile to venerate only their own traditions. Next, he mocks the blessed David and Samson, saying that they weren’t at all the bravest in battle but were inferior by a long shot to the strength of the Greeks and Egyptians, and that the scope of their kingdom was limited to the borders of Judea alone. Well then, I would once more love to inquire what sort of god he claims cared for the nations such that while the Hebrews had “nothing at all excellent or great,” nevertheless the Greeks have the best and most exceptional gifts? Is it the one testified to by the all-wise Moses as the Craftsman of the universe, of heaven and earth, and quite simply all that has been called by him into existence, and the one who alone has authority and rules over the universe, keeping creation under his feet and being worshipped by it?

Or is it that one whom [Julian] and those who were the forefathers of his impiety, after having first posited “the Good” in their speech and contemplations as a first cause, name as a lower-ranking and “second” God, the one they call the “Craftsman proximate to the world”? Now then, if the God Julian is referring to is “the one who has been proclaimed by the all-wise Moses,” how can he say that he gave nothing beneficial or most essential to the Hebrews, despite the fact that he “was made known” to them; he made his own preeminence and glory manifest to them; he permitted them to share in the true vision of God; and he then established for them a legislator who was both older in time than the Greek sages and who, by incomparable differences, was as distinct from them in wisdom, understanding, and also virtue, as light is thought to be in relation to darkness, and who also defined the best laws of all for them, with the result that, were each of their deeds in fact to be perfectly attuned to the blameless state [prescribed therein], those living under the law would easily be able to know the path that is the highest of all forms of bliss? Yet what indeed is better than these gifts and what do the gifts of the Greeks have that is equal to them?

Is it not the case that among us there is one first principle over all things, one glory, and one lordship, beyond which there is absolutely nothing else? Is it not the case that every wicked and bad habit is condemned by the law’s verdicts? Isn’t that which is shameful shunned and isn’t every form of virtue held in supreme and worthy admiration? But as for the teachings of the Greeks, let us learn from him what they comprise. There are so many gods among them, more than can be counted, who differ from one another in their intentions and judg-ments; each of them has obtained their own allotted domain, “governing the nations” and educating them with diverse laws, so that some people are seen to have no control over their rage and anger, they cling to murder with impunity, they seize and carry off others’ property, and they throw lands and cities into disarray, while other people are in the grip of wild and strange pleasures to such a degree that they are frequently stung [with desire] for their mother and sister and whet their appetites for their own daughters. These are the wise lessons of the ethnarchs! It is to them that the task of ruling has been entrusted by that one among the Greeks who is the Craftsman “proximate to the world,” to use their own words.

Won’t they therefore be found guilty of blaspheming the one whom they revere as God? Furthermore, as to the question of whether there have been some among Egyptians or Greeks who obtained the noble appearance of worldly wisdom, this has nothing to do with Christianity. For the books of Moses are older, possessing a philosophy which is the precise, most true, and unadulterated knowledge of both divine and human affairs. And he should not behave like a drunken sot towards the generals or kings of the Hebrews if they fall behind others in force or strength in battles and war. For such matters were not a significant concern for them, but they used to oppose those who wanted to lay waste their country, defending it and seeking merely to preserve it, not aiming to lunge wildly towards the property of others. For indeed the law that came from God through Moses had presided over them as a judge and administrator of justice. 5.G Moreover, because he actually thinks that God gave every kind of good thing to the herds of the Greeks but nothing at all to the Hebrews, Julian prides himself in the creative words of the philosophers and says, But did he give a starting point for a science or a philosophic learning to you? And what kind? In fact, theoretical knowledge of celestial phenomena was perfected among the Greeks after the first observations were made among the barbarians in Babylon.

And theoretical knowledge of geometry, having taken its start from the land surveys in Egypt, has grown to such a great magnitude [among the Greeks]. The [knowledge] of numbers, which began from Phoenician traders, eventually became a showpiece of knowledge among the Greeks. In fact, along with music, which is likewise arithmetical, the Greeks combined the three into one, having interwoven astronomy with geometry and adapted arithmetic to both; and after recognizing the harmony inherent in them, they posited on this basis the measures for their own music, discovering an infallible agreement – or at least something extremely close to this – between the harmonic ratios and the sense of hearing. Such, therefore, are the [ideas] he lifts aloft and admires. But I for one would say in reply that he completely ignores the factors that would make it reasonable and appropriate to admire those people who cultivate the best view and who are believed to have arrived at true well-being. For what renders a man enviable and admirable is not only of course a facility with words and elegance and rhythm in their articulation, so as to be able to speak well and be fastidious about the profundity of pointless but nevertheless subtle ideas, to weave tapestries of words with precision, and furthermore to attempt to seek what transcends intellect and all the things that falsify even our own true knowledge that comes through the senses.

But the person who would be truly wise – and who would be called wise by us – is someone who abounds in a clear and unambiguous view of the God of all and has accurately understood so far as possible the qualities of God – at least, I mean, as far as it is attainable by humans – and who has also gathered together infallible knowledge related to every essential topic, with the result that he can be counted among those men who have attained the right of being exalted for their pursuit of virtue. For why must I busy myself with the subjects of geometry, harmonics, arithmetic, and the other fields of knowledge, which are the only things they think have value and which cause them to raise a supercilious eyebrow? Indeed, I would say that when it comes to orderly conduct and being blameless in one’s habits and character, zeal and eagerness in such subjects are useless. For [through these] one will not become superior to censured pleasures, nor a despiser of superfluous wealth and empty opinion, nor free from the waves of anger, nor far removed from the love of slander and envy, nor someone devoted to the practices conducive to self-control, nor, certainly, to all the other good qualities, which, when closely attached to someone, render them most especially renowned, more than anyone else, but render those in whom they are absent and not inwardly present worthy of no account.

For it is possible, yes, it is possible to see someone who is naturally clever and endowed with well-turned speech, who is extremely talkative, well-versed in Attic, and most skillfully equipped for eloquence, but is unholy in character and caught in the nooses of the most shameful desires. But the person who is truly wise and perfectly sensible would possess such a state not in bare words alone, nor would their ability to come up with creative little words and an invincible cleverness in perverted ideas be enough to attain a good reputation. For while such a person is an artisan when it comes to words, he is certainly not yet good as well. Accordingly, geometry, astronomy, and other such fields of knowledge could not render the one trained in them reputable and worthy of emulation, but instead only the precise, subtle, and blameless knowledge of God can do so. And, indeed, the duty of zealously maintaining the good and of rejecting its opposite, these I would say are the boasts of the pure and faultless philosophy, while, in my view, the traditions of the Greeks are insipid, largely pointless, and cost a lot of sweat for nothing. And perhaps you will refuse to believe our words, but your Plato, Your Excellency, will be called in for assistance, since he has written in the fifth [book] of the Republic as follows: [Glaucon:] Shall we set down as philosophers all these people, and others who are learned in such areas, even those learned in the insignificant arts?

[Socrates:] Not at all, I said, but they are similar to philoso-phers. [Gl aucon :] Who, he said, are the true philosophers? [Socrates:] Those, I said, who love the sight of truth.” For there is no philosophy in geometry’s having postulates and theorems nor in music, at least when it is scholastic, nor in astronomy, stuffed as it is with natural, fluid, and merely plausible claims; rather it comes through “knowledge” of “the Good itself,” “and truth,” since these [disci-plines], while being other than the Good, are nonetheless paths as it were to the Good. Accordingly, the practice of philosophy does not consist in those insignificant arts that are mocked in the manner we have seen above, but rather in knowing the truth, that is, the being that truly exists which is none other than God. And indeed, even Julian’s own gods have testified to the doctrines of the Hebrews on this very point. For when someone came to Pythia to the temple of Apollo to ask a question of the oracle, wanting to learn which of the nations was the wisest, they say that the daemon there uttered, Chaldeans alone have obtained wisdom, and Hebrews, reverencing God himself the self-begotten king. And Porphyry too mentions the Essenes in Judea and says the following about them: Due to such a regimen and training in truth and piety, there are understandably many among them who even foreknow the future, since they have been brought up in sacred books, distinctive acts of purification, and the sayings of prophets.

It is rare that they ever err in their prognostications. Now as for the so-called “cycle of studies” which causes Julian to boast and think highly of himself, we will find that those people who were most supercilious in their worldly wisdom dismissed them as being not beyond reproach or accusation, a fact that one can learn both from what they themselves have written on this topic as well as from the writ-ings of others. For, to take one example, Xenophon the Athenian at one point says the following: No one ever saw Socrates do or heard him say anything impious or unholy. For he used to dialogue neither about the nature of the universe nor about the other subjects most [sophists] discuss, investigating the condition of what the sophists call the cosmos and the necessary factors that give rise to each of the heavenly phenomena; instead, he used to prove that those who thought about such things were fools. And after other things: He used to be amazed that it was not obvious to them that it is impossible for humans to discover these things, since even those thinking most highly of their talk about such matters did not have the same views as each other, but conducted themselves towards each other like raving lunatics. For among lunatics, there are some who do not fear what is terrifying while others fear what is not fearful […].

For when it comes to those who are anxious about the nature of the universe, some hold that it is only one thing, while others hold that it is infinite in number; and to some it seems that everything is always in motion, while to others it seems that nothing could ever have moved; and to some it seems that everything comes to be and passes away, while to others it seems that nothing could ever have come to be or pass away. But what would those who investigate celestial phenomena say in response, those who despite not knowing things on earth, nevertheless busy themselves with things in heaven? Wouldn’t one congratulate Socrates for saying that in such attempts they are like “raving lunatics,” thoughtlessly lunging towards superfluous little suppositions, standing at odds with each other, and making war upon each other’s inventions? To take another example, Plato, in addition to declaring that interest in these things is superfluous and useless, continues this accusation in his On the Soul, where he says, In fact, dear Cebes, when I was young, I had an astonishing longing for the wisdom they call the investigation into nature; for it seemed to me to be splendid to know the causes of each thing, why each thing comes to be, why it passes away, and why it exists. And often I waffled back and forth when investigating first […]: Are animals nourished at that time when heat and cold undergo a certain kind of putrefaction, as some used to say?

And, is it blood that we think with or air or fire? Or is it none of these things, but is it rather the brain which produces sensations of hearing, seeing, and smell, and is it from these senses that memory and opinion would arise, and is it from memory and opinion becoming stable that knowledge thereby arises? And further, when investigating the decomposition of these things and what happens in both heaven and earth, in the end I seemed to myself to be as naturally unsuited to this investigation as anything could be. And I shall give you a sufficient proof of this: for, as to what I so clearly knew beforehand, at least as it seemed to me and to others, I then became so extremely blinded by the investigation itself that I unlearned even what I thought I knew before. If, therefore, superfluous investigations and the desire to busy oneself 224 with topics that are subtle and lofty and utterly inaccessible to the human intellect bring with them no benefit, but instead harm, blindness, and the inevitability of “unlearning even” the things already stored in our mind, the one boasting against us ought to lower his brow. The knowledge of the truth is a divine lesson useful for living and this is what Moses announced in advance long ago. Nevertheless, the account of this knowledge has reached us in a more subtle and unmixed manner, since Christ the Savior of us all has illumined us, through whom and with whom be glory to God the Father with the Holy Spirit forever, Amen.

G. This is the right moment to state again the words of the God-breathed scripture. For it said: “Death and life are in the power of the tongue; those who control it will eat its fruits.” For, although it is possible for those who wish to think well to derive benefit from the goods of the tongue, provided that it were somehow to be attuned to orderliness and the duty of speaking words that would earn everyone’s admiration for having used it best, [nonetheless] some redirect their own words towards what is inappropriate. Their perverse and wicked words have even reached such a point that they think nothing of those things that exceed the bounds of every vice, they let loose their wanton tongue against God, and they take up their weapons against the ineffable glory. The inevitable result of these actions will certainly be that they are convicted for the most extreme vices. One such person was His Excellency Julian: for, although he had a talented tongue and a not unremarkable eloquence, he denounced the holy scripture and acts defiantly against the multitude of saints – and this, very frequently – so that he may also be rebuked by the Holy Spirit: “Why do you, who are powerful in lawlessness, boast in wickedness? Your tongue has planned injustice all day long.” And again further on it states: “You loved all the words of your deluge, your treacherous tongue.”

So much abuse, then, has he shouted against the book of the all-wise Moses. But behold, even now he adds to his prior allegations, speaking as follows: Should I also name one by one the professions or the people: for instance, Plato, Socrates, Aristides, Cimon, Thales, Lycurgus, Agesilaus, Archidamus, or instead the class of philosophers, of generals, of craftsmen, of legislators? For the most wicked and loathsome of our generals will be found to have treated the greatest wrongdoers more fairly than Moses treated those who had done nothing wrong. So, I suppose, he again takes issue with the fact that some of the Moabites paid the penalty for secretly introducing to the men of Israel female prostitutes who with the beauty of their bodies trapped in licentiousness not a few of God’s people, and, implicating them in charges of apostasy, prepared those who were deceived to “be initiated into Beelphegor.” Next, Julian claims that those daring these things did not err at all since he apparently deems impiety towards God to be insignificant and, for this reason, claims the hierophant Moses was cruel and harsh. For, as I said, he supposes that making some people apostatize from the God over all is an insignificant fault and not completely intolerable; but instead, he thinks it is morally superior to persuade people that they ought to be attached to the false worship of idols.

Let him hear from us, therefore, that of those accustomed to do such things, […] not even the one whom a mother bears as a child in her womb, may even he not escape […]. For I say it is right that those who have prepared a net of death for others ought to be destroyed entirely, root and branch, as one of those famed on the stage says, It isn’t terrible for those who have done terrible things to suffer them. Or wouldn’t it be a truly most grievous and intolerable thing to act in a drunken and reckless manner against the divine glory and cause considerable offense to the ineffable nature, insofar as their attempts could even do this? How, then, can this be disputed? Furthermore, since he holds in great admiration those of the ancients who were like-minded to himself and dares to compare them with the saints, come, let us for our part say what is reasonable, pitting the truth against his slanders. For though he supposes those whom he admires to be better than those on our side, he is deprived of the truth and has gone far astray from his purpose. Come now, even before the others, let’s see what sort of person their far-famed Socrates was. For he has been admired for worldly wisdom and they say he was one of the most eloquent of men, but in terms of his habits and morals one can observe that he was no better than those who have wasted life among the common herd and vagabonds.

Even if every single person should perhaps disbelieve the accounts about him, nevertheless they will not likewise dispute the writings of Porphyry who sketched out the life of each of the ancients. In fact, this was his aim and he deemed it a matter worthy of much seriousness. Accordingly, he said the following about him: Aristoxenus, in narrating the life of Socrates, says he had heard the anec-dotes about him from Spintharus, who was one of those who met him. [Aristoxenus reports] that he said that he himself had not met with many people more persuasive [than Socrates], and that such was his voice, his speech, his outward bearing, and in addition to everything just mentioned his distinctive appearance. [Aristoxenus says] this is more or less what he was like when he was not angry; but whenever he would flare up with this passion, his shameful manner was terrible, for there wasn’t anything he wouldn’t say or do. Well then, what is more disgraceful than anger? Or wouldn’t uncontrolled anger, an untamable impulse, and terrible bitterness be the worst mental illness to have? For when a furious wind beats down, the sea does not rage and break upon both land and rocks with the waves’ unbearable onslaughts as much as the soul of a man suffering bad temper and unbridled anger. The divine scripture, therefore, also exhorts us with the following words: “Cease from rage, and put aside anger.”

For “rage destroys even sensible people.” And, indeed, [it says] that, “A man of anger lacks decorum.” From what reckless acts will such a man abstain? Will he not give free rein to his tongue and instead violently deride with imprudent words even those very ones perhaps who have done him no wrong? For in the very manner, I suppose, that a rock hurtles downhill with uncontrollable momentum over everything which falls in its path and is carried wherever it happens to go, likewise in the same way, I think, if someone should be brash and bitter and tyrannized by a beastly temper, he will not only spare neither word nor deed, perchance, but will also let loose his own tongue’s lack of restraint and the onslaught of his raging deeds even against God just as he would every human. Where, therefore, shall we place Socrates, sick as he was with this most shameful of all the vices? In contrast, the inspired “Moses” was most “exceedingly,” exceedingly gentle “compared to all persons”; for so it has been written about him. And at one point the Savior and Lord of the universe also spoke to us, “Learn from me, since I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls”; and indeed, he also said, “Blessed are the gentle, since they will inherit the earth.” And so, if they say that having a steadfast character and being adorned with the tranquility of gentleness, as well as possessing a well-practiced moderation with words are more valuable than anything, let us with all justice indict Socrates, since he failed miserably in both areas.

But if someone praises bad temper and a wanton tongue, then he has disparaged gentleness and he not only blames that which is full of praise, but also has awarded the winning verdict to what is more shameful. Such a man would quite reasonably be ridiculed. So then, Socrates was sick with a piercing anger, but will we find him free of the other [vices] that would plunge him into extreme disrepute? Not at all. For he was so girl-crazy and so wholeheartedly captured by tendencies towards it that he thought there was nothing better. Indeed, Porphyry has again written about him as follows: In his way of life, he was otherwise easily satisfied and needed little provision for ephemeral things, but, in the area of lovemaking, he was rather excessive – although not to the point of wrongdoing, since he made love only to his wives and common women. He had two wives at the same time: Xanthippe was a citizen and in some ways rather common, while Myrto was the granddaughter of Aristides the son of Lysimachus. Also, while Xanthippe fell into his embraces in secret and from her Lamprocles was born to him, Myrto did so in marriage and from her Sophroniscus and Menexenus were born to him. What, then, would the admirer of Socrates say to this? For, as they themselves say, he was not only “rather excessive” in lovemaking, but was also caught in the very act as a very lascivious, uncontrolled person, insatiable in such immensely loathsome pleasures; at any rate, although both wives were joined to him in wedlock – and even this was arguably not in proper order – he used to fall into the embraces of other women as well, shameful women, that is, and girls for hire, who offered the beauty of their bodies for sale to lovers.

And yet how could these things not be foreign to the philosophical way of life and practical virtue? Well then, did he censure the young if they ever chose to live contrary to reason? If so, what appeal of any weight could he have made to them, when it is readily clear that he not only was caught in such utterly foul enterprises when he was decked with white hair but already had a mind that was also tyrannized by them? I learned from the writing of Plato somewhere that one of his friends said to him: “Where have you come from, Socrates? Surely not from hunting the youthful beauty of Alcibiades?” Well then, that is all I want to say about the affairs of Socrates. G.G But let’s now look into the [morals] of Plato himself and see if he hasn’t likewise admired those of Socrates and whether his very own words don’t convict him of having suffered the same lack of restraint towards desires as him. For on the one hand, in the Philebus he says, Pleasure is the most pretentious thing of all, as they say, and with respect to the pleasures of lovemaking, which are thought to be the greatest, even perjury has received pardon from the gods, since pleasures are like children in the fact that they have not acquired the least bit of sense.

And, on the other hand, in the Symposium he says, What is most astounding, as the many say, is that the gods pardon a [lover] if he has broken even an oath which he has sworn. For the vow of one in love is, they say, not a vow. So much have both gods and men made every allowance for the lover. It is therefore with good reason that he is ashamed and embarrassed at his own words, claiming that they belong to others, but how can one doubt that he praises this thing? For he never once censures those who have chosen to think like this. O the learning of philosophers! How truly great is the benefit it contains as it keeps the licentious pleasures from young people and persuades them to live the self-controlled and noble life. Surely, if they really came to think that gods also pardon lovers, even if they were somehow to become unjust and uncontrolled lovers of either women or boys, then they would entirely and in every way be granted allowance likewise to swear falsely with impunity, if they should want to do so. And furthermore, there would be no opportunity for piety towards God, when laxity goes unpunished. Accordingly, why ought one who has obtained so illustrious and famous a reputation for having the ability and the knowledge to practice philosophy cast aside the reverence towards the divine as less important than a shameful and reproachable pleasure?

G. And the one who raises such a lofty eyebrow in pride over all-virtuous Cimon should surely take another look at what sort of person he was in his habits. For he fell into the nuptial embraces of Elpinike, who was of the same blood and seed as him, and shared his sister’s bed in imitation of Persian custom or rather Zeus the Highest himself. And when Cleon issued him an indictment for tyranny, he stood trial for this at Athens and was convicted, paying the penalty set forth by the laws. Theopompus writes about him that he was a most thievish person and more than once exposed as succumbing to shameful profit; learning how to be corrupt apparently insinuated itself among the Athenian generals following his lead. And yet how would it not be all-shameful and perhaps the ultimate disease among vices to have a weakness for unjust gain and to be such a money-lover, to be incited to nuptials with one’s sister, and to come a close second to barbaric insanity so as even to wrong the very laws of nature? Moreover, Aristides, for his part, having been openly convicted of embezzling money, was forced to pay the penalty. He was so bitter and envious and raving mad for the accolades of others that when he was asked one time by the Athenians how they might best be governed and how the affairs in the city might proceed with a fair wind, he said that this could not happen in any other way unless they cast him together with Themistocles into a pit.

Themistocles presumably used to cause him grief because he was excellent at naval battles and won a better reputation for his generalship. Although it is possible to say a great many true things also about the others, I am omitting this material for the moment. But instead, I shall turn towards the necessary discussion of the manly deeds of the saints. Who of their own men could he claim was equal to the most excellent Moses? Indeed, even the Greek history-writers have testified that he was the first of legislators and was held, moreover, in great admiration. Furthermore, from the God-breathed scripture anyone might see the other aspects of this man’s excellence: when God apportioned power to him, he turned the Egyptians’ rivers into blood, caused damage to the inhabitants by unbearable hail and a long and deep darkness, and he delivered his kinsmen from the greedy clutches of Pharaoh as they crossed through the middle of the sea. And after him Joshua, upon being proclaimed commander and receiving the generalship, shone forth with equally manly deeds. For he restrained the Jordan from its onrush as it hurtled in unrestrained torrents of water and he transported the sons of Israel across, arguably with their feet still dry. Sending up a prayer to God, who holds sovereignty over the universe, he stopped the course of the sun and moon. Although I could add a great many more things worth hearing to what I have said, I am omitting them for the moment.

But I shall make use of the words of the blessed Paul. For, in writing to the Hebrews, he says the following at one point: “[I do not have time to give a narrative] about Gideon, Samson, Barak, Jephthah, David, and Samuel, and the prophets who by faith contended against kingdoms, practiced justice, attained the promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were empowered out of weakness, were made strong in battle, and turned aside foreign hosts. Women received their own dead by resurrection.” And in addition to this: “They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, crushed, abused, people whom the world did not deserve, wandering in deserted places, moun-tains, caves, and holes in the ground.” Tell me then, what is of greater renown than these deeds? What rivals the brilliance that arises from their virtues? “The world did not deserve” them; conquered by the superiority of their manly deeds, it yields the preeminence to them. Moreover, “the world” in this passage should be understood as those in the world. Furthermore, since Julian says the “most loathsome of generals” among the Greeks “treated the greatest wrongdoers more fairly than Moses treated those who had done nothing wrong,” let him hear also from us: “Your Excellency, you are completely disregarding the crime of impiety against God. It seems to you an insignificant thing, as I said, to walk away from service under him and to dishonor the yoke of his rule, and to choose instead to be willingly yoked to unclean spirits as though it were something better.”

If, however, he himself and the apostates with him had not been caught up in such crimes, he would have deemed the matter to be something truly grievous and worthy of the worst punishment of all. But, since he has fallen into the devil’s trap and has dishonored the ineffable glory of God, he thought perhaps that he could absolve his own actions along with the others by saying that those who had acted in a drunken and unholy manner against his divine glory had done no wrong. Yet it seemed right to the laws of the Greeks that one ought neither to introduce other gods besides those that existed and were recognized, nor indeed to say anything shameful and discordant about them, and they used to think they were being pious in threatening those who habitually did so with actual punishment in blood and not a mere monetary fine. For example, when Anaxagoras said the sun’s globe was a fiery rock, the judges at Athens condemned him to death. And they brought an indictment for impiety against Diagoras when he wrote about the gods things deemed to be wrong by those who heard them. He was also nearly killed, except that he anticipated them and went away to others after leaving the land of the Greeks. And indeed, they also say that the overseers of sacred laws once got so angry at Diagoras of Melos himself when he mocked their initiations, festivals, and mysteries that they even settled on a talent of silver as a kind of prize for those who killed him.

And I pass over the fact that Socrates said a spiritual being gave certain oracles to him and that he swore by an oak and by a dog, and for this reason, as I also said earlier, he was convicted by the indictments of his accusers. And so, the Greeks paid so much attention to the issue of falsely called gods that they even let loose their undiluted anger against the sages themselves and sharpened, so to speak, all their laws against them. But yet you accuse Moses and claim that he was hardhearted in his chastisement of the multitude, which was beyond number, since he permitted a few to suffer who had completely neglected reverence towards the divine and were “initiated into Beelphegor.” And yet shouldn’t he instead have been crowned with the utmost accolades as pious and God-loving? G.o But Julian did not do this – and what is the reason? While slandering the generals, or rather kings, of the Hebrews, he speaks in the following way: Which [Greek] kingdom, therefore, shall I cite for you? That of Perseus or that of Aeacus or Minos of Crete, who cleared the sea of pirates, expelling and driving out the barbarians as far as Syria and Sicily, extending the borders of his empire on each side, and who used to control not only the islands but the coastlands as well?

And, after dividing with his brother Rhadamanthys not the land but the care of humanity, he himself set up laws, receiving them from Zeus, while he left it to Rhadamanthys to fulfill the role of a judge. Now then, I already said that those who at times ruled over the people of Israel, because they had quite rightly been made wise by the decrees of Moses and were admirably trained in every form of justice, did not wish to go and carry off what belonged to other people, nor indeed did they arm themselves against neighboring or distant cities and lands, but, preserving their own land and defending that which bore them, they preferred to stay at home and this was a prayer come true for them. In contrast, Your Excellency, your Minos, despite receiving “the laws” as you said “from Zeus,” was not content with only directing the affairs of the Cretans with whose rule he had been invested, but was so excited to get a bigger share and mad for things that in no way belonged to him that he not only seized the islands by the law of war and led free people away as captives won by the spear, but even against those furthest away he let loose the onslaught of his own inherent perversity, which circumstances and experience itself showed to be unholy. Homer, for example, says he was “destructive-minded.”

He states, For [Odysseus] saw Phaedra and Procne, and fair Ariadne, daughter of destructive-minded Minos. And Callimachus [says], Minos stretched a heavy yoke over the neck of the islands. Yet if, in fact, it was truly just that the duty of ruling belonged to him, the best of poets would not have called him “destructive-minded,” nor would he have been criticized for laying upon the islands the burdensome and unbearable “yoke” of his own greediness. But enough about these matters. Now as to his domestic affairs, wouldn’t it be worth looking at how they were conducted? For his wife was Pasiphae and his daughters were Phaedra and Ariadne. His wife, for her part, was sick with a desire for what was unnatural and is said to have had intercourse with a bull and to have birthed something monstrous. His daughters meanwhile fill the tragic stages, brought into disrepute for their licentiousness. Let’s pass over the accounts of Perseus since they possess mythic elements, are full of nonsense, and have an excess of falsehood. But, after his discussion about Minos, Julian heads out into the wide sea of narrative and makes mention of Greek historical accounts, claiming that Dardanus was born from Zeus and Electra, the daughter of Atlas, and that furthermore he became the founder of Dardania and even ruled with Zeus when he was dead, and he mentions certain other things as well that are full of nonsense and babbling.

Having in the midst of this discussion also mentioned Christ the Savior of us all, he again lifts “the horn” of his ignorance “aloft” and speaks about him: But the name of Jesus, who persuaded the worst element among us, has been known for little more than three hundred years, and during the time when he was living he performed no deed worthy of mention, unless someone thinks it is a great achievement to heal the deformed and blind and to exorcize the daemon-possessed in the villages of Bethsaida and Bethany. So about Dardanus he was able to say nothing noble or worthy of memory, although he could have made up stories and considers doing so tantamount to an illustrious and manly accomplishment. But nonetheless, when he says that a “few” have been ensnared by Christ the Savior of us all, he belittles the inhabited world and considers those throughout all the earth to be easily numbered. Where then will we ever find the many if everyone is a “few”? And, those who accept the word of the Gospels have not been deceived, but rather are shaking free of the deception of the Greeks and shifting anchorage to the truth, as the facts themselves will shout out if we ourselves should be silent. And when he dares, at any rate, to disparage the signs from God, namely those performed by Christ, Julian does not know how to admire what surely ought to be admired.

For how else was he to be recognized as God even when he became a human, having remained what he was? Was it by unfurling this exceedingly great and boundless heaven and by ordaining that a land, different from the present one, emerge out of the waters for us? Was it by creating something new in the realm of the sun, moon, and other stars? No, this was not his aim in the incarnation: rather he pitied humanity since it had been reduced to extreme wretchedness by the tricks of daemons and was utterly ignorant of the identity of the one who is by nature truly God and the Craftsman of the universe, and since it had instead been carried off towards an ignorant and corrupt frame of mind because of their choice actually to worship “the creation instead of the Creator” and to attach their veneration to “things made of wood and stone.” Therefore, in order that they might shift their mind towards the duty of knowing the truth, Christ appeared in a form like ours, declaring that he himself was the Son of the one who constructed this whole universe through him. Since the miraculous nearly always tends to draw us to faith, he used to heal those with sicknesses and send light into the blind and he would order unclean daemons to cast themselves into the recesses of the abyss and they had to fulfil his command, and so he would free those bullied by them.

He used to command the seas and winds to be calm at his rebuke, and the creation was not unaware of the authority belonging to the one who gave such orders. He used to call the dead from tombs, although they already smelled and were decomposing; with the most God-befitting nod of his head, he would grant the ability to regain life. What, tell me, is more spectacular than these miracles? What is of such a grand nature? If, therefore, this wonder-working was a demonstration of medical expertise, then Julian need not in fact consider it venerable and his lack of admiration is excusable. But, on the contrary, since it possesses a clear proof of a power that is most supremely appropriate to the divine, how is what I said not true? In fact, he fails to practice and wholeheartedly pursue, it seems, the duty of marveling at things that surely ought to deserve all consideration. And yet, dear sir, we shall find that your highest Zeus and those others with him that you actually call gods are unable to snatch from the nooses of death the people who have been caught in them. The best of poets confirms our point, too, when he says, But in truth the gods are unable to ward off death, as it comes for all alike, even from a man who is dear, whenever the devastating fate of grievous death should take him.

G. Having completed his empty recitation on Dardanus as it pleased him, he proceeds immediately to the flight of Aeneas and offers a clear narrative of his departure from Troy towards the nations of Italians, and furthermore makes mention of both Romus and Romulus and of how Rome was founded. And stretching out his words at length for this purpose, he says the most wise Numa was given to them by Zeus and indeed, he also says about him, But when Rome was beset by many wars after its foundation, yet kept conquering and prevailing over all and needed greater security as it grew ever greater in proportion to those very dangers, Zeus in turn set the most philosophical Numa over it. This was the noble and good Numa who spent his time in deserted groves and was always communing with the gods in his pure thoughts. And after other things: He is the one who established most of the priestly laws. Since therefore, to use his own words, Numa was “noble and good” and with “pure thoughts” “established most of the priestly laws,” we should for a moment investigate what sort of character his worship had. Accordingly, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, who has composed very fine histories of the Romans, has recorded about him that, although he built sanctuaries and temples, there was nonetheless no image in them. For, since he thought it right to praise Pythagoras’ philosophy and was completely given to his teachings, he supposed the divine to be formless and entirely without shape, and he affirmed that it took pleasure in intelligible sacrifices, not material ones.

And so, when he set up temples, he would name them temples of Faith, through which alone the divine is seen, insofar as it is even accessible to humans, and he enjoined upon his subjects to swear in their oaths by Faith. But Julian, who has certainly admired him and crowned him with the highest praises, is not ashamed to deify a swarm of idols in every form, both wood and stone, after making unholy insults against faith in God, and he did not cease slaughtering oxen for them in droves, in order that he might make war even against the very laws of Numa. G. Furthermore, adding yet certain other insipid and nonsensical old-wives’ tales, he goes on to say, Zeus has clearly given these things to the city, therefore, by divine possession and inspiration and by the [oracles] of the Sibyl and others who were diviners in their native language. But as to the shield that fell from the sky 99 and the head that appeared on the crest of the hill, which, I suppose, is also where the seat of Zeus the Great 100 has received its name, shall we count these among his primary or secondary gifts? And yet, O ill-fated people, although the heaven-sent shield is still preserved among us, which either Zeus the Great or father Ares sent – giving us a pledge, not in word but in deed, that he will shield our city in perpetuity – do you, while failing to worship and reverence it, instead worship the wood of the cross, tracing images of it on your forehead, and inscribing it on the front of your houses?

Wouldn’t anyone rightly hate the more intelligent among you or pity the more stupid who in following you have come to such a point of ruin that they have given up the eternal gods and changed sides to that corpse of the Jews? 104 Now then, I would not at all deny that he was “possessed” by a wicked spirit that fights against God, when he supposed that this was the state of things and opened his big mouth, uncontrolled and profane, against our Savior’s preeminence and glory. For “no one says Jesus is accursed,” “except by Beelzebul,” as the all-wise Paul says. But, when he further says that “the heaven-sent shield” and, yes, the helmet, too, or rather the “head,” were found – I know not how – it is only natural, I think, that he should incur laughter, since this is adolescent prating and prattling, nothing more. Nevertheless, we don’t pay too much attention to such things. G.G Since he calls “wretched” those who are mindful of the honorable cross and take care to ensure they must always draw its sign on their houses and foreheads, we shall easily show that he is emitting from his fallacious reasoning words that reek of an extreme stupidity. For, to begin with, although he who is the Savior and Lord of the universe could lay claim to being seen “in the form” and in equality with the Father in every way whatsoever and could pride himself in the seats of divinity, “he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave.”

And then he even “endured the cross, despising its shame,” in order that he might nullify the power of corruption. One person died and was raised for the sake of all, in order that he might snatch the human race from the nooses of death; in order that he might destroy the tyranny of the sin which prevailed over us; in order that he might tame the law that ran wild in the limbs of the flesh and might render us spiritual worshippers, and, by putting to death “the mind of the flesh” in us, might render those who believe in him to be sons of God and might sanctify them through his Spirit; and finally in order that he might frighten from their greedy grasping after everyone both Satan, that sinful beast who is the source of evil, and also the wicked powers under him, those powers that, indeed, are named “ethnarchs and city-guarding” gods by the one who revels in slandering us. The wood that procures our salvation brings us back to the remembrance of all these things, and in addition it makes us understand that, as Paul says, “One died for the sake of all, in order that those who live would live no longer for themselves, but for the one who died and rose for them.” It is clear to everyone that living for God, namely, conducting ourselves in a reverent and holy manner, renders those who have chosen to do this thrice-blessed.

As for ourselves, therefore, as I said, we take the wood of the honorable cross as a reminder of every good thing and every virtue. But since he doesn’t suppose this practice to be free from slander and blame, he ought once more to explain himself. For I shall put the question: “If you want, after hanging panels on the walls of our rooms, let’s call a painter of expert hand and then let’s say to him: ‘O painter, our aim is to support boys in their physical prime learning how lack of restraint contributes to their ruin and our purpose is to persuade the women at the hearth that disorderliness is not without consequence for them. But verbal instruction from their usual teachers is probably insufficient to get them to choose to live rightly and blamelessly. A painting should also be set up in their view as comrade in arms alongside the words of those in charge of them. Surely, therefore, we should have Zeus the highest of the gods painted on the panels before anything else, and settled beside him, if you’d like, should also be his boy from Phrygia, I mean Ganymede, his venerable and noteworthy plaything and the proof of his uncontrolled licentiousness. Alcmene, too, should be painted, with whom he spent nine nights in his insatiability for even the most shameful deeds. Semele, likewise, should be present and the great crowd of women [who had been consorts of Zeus].

Poseidon, too, should be seen beside him, with the women standing at his side whom he corrupted in unholy manner, Amymone, Alope, Hippothoe, and the others. Yes indeed, and the Lydian boy should be painted with him, I mean Pelops. Smiling Aphrodite should be prominent on the panels consorting with her many lovers. That sweet-smelling tree, O painter, nearly eluded me, I mean Daphne, and the stories babbled about her. Paint for me Apollo being overcome by a child virtuous in her dignified conduct. And let the young girl escape, despising defilement; but nonetheless, have Phoebus pursue, even if he cannot catch his beloved; let him be crowned with her branches lest his crime be forgotten.’ So do you want us then, noble sir, to neglect the wood that reminds us of every virtue and, pushing it aside, to present these images of yours to the boys and women instead? No doubt the gods and goddesses in their lewd behavior and indeed also the corruptions of boys and women would be conducive to the benefit of viewers? Isn’t this now, in fact, a cause for laughter and a clear proof of the ultimate madness?” But he says we came to complete “ruin,” first because we departed from “the eternal gods” and then because we chose instead “that corpse of the Jews.” If so, then how, tell me, can you say that those who are generated and have been brought into existence in time are “eternal”?

For didn’t your own Plato say that the more visible and intelligible gods have been crafted? How, therefore, can something be “eternal” when it has been brought into generation and set in motion in time, and also is susceptible to corruption in accordance with its inherent natural prin-ciples, if it is really true that everything generated would invariably and without exception also be subject to an inevitable process of corruption? Now when he mentions a “corpse,” he is referring to Christ and this is not surprising: for he has gone astray and fails to see the venerable mystery of the incarnation, since otherwise he would not have referred to the one who “tasted death” in the flesh for the purpose of destroying death as a “corpse.” For how could he who gave new life to many others succumb to corruption? In fact, it was part of his plan to allow the flesh that had become his through deliberate appropriation to encounter death, and yet he came back to life and has trampled upon corruption, in order that in him first the ability to overcome death and corruption might become accessible for human nature and easily traversed. For this reason he has been named “the firstborn from the dead” and “the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep,” since, as the divine Paul says, “Just as all die in Adam, so also in Christ all will be made alive.”

But Julian’s mind has reached such a point of ignorance and extreme sickness that he prides himself even in those very matters where he could expect to face the most serious accusations. “For,” he says, “I refrain from mentioning the mysteries of the Mother of the Gods < … > and I am seeking to emulate Marius.” That’s good! Because aren’t these mysteries the plaything of Dardanus? For he himself was the founder of the madness of the Corybantes, the clandestine initiations in the caves of Ida, and licentious mysteries. And yet aren’t things that are full of obsolete and unholy narratives always and inevitably harmful to those who hear them? Moreover, he himself counts it a divine blessing that Marius was given to the Romans, a man who ruled for a time but then became most superstitious and cruel, and indeed even descended to such a savage state of mind that he slaughtered upon the altars of daemons his charming and sweet little girl, whom he cherished and held dearest of all. For he knew for sure that this was the way, yes this was the way the good gods wanted to be honored and that they were delighted at their own servants adopting a mindset that went beyond every evil so that they considered nothing better than for the parents themselves to become murderers of their own dearest children!

If, therefore, he praises Marius and holds him in admiration, he should accuse those who do not want to do the same things as him. He should persuade the worshippers of the “ethnarch and city-guarding [gods]” to desire the generation of children, not so that their children might call them papa at home and their family extend to their children’s children, but so that, with their children’s blood, they might enchant those gods who are so very civilized, since these are presumably the most special of sacrifices for them! And even if someone is a murderer of his own children he should be free from indictment. But since anyone, I think, would quite rightly say that such a man was untamed, wild-tempered, and more cruel than the wild beasts themselves, and since indeed also the universal law of nature itself indicts him for having arrived at the most cruel and unholy idea of all, why does Julian admire him and why does he say that he was the most special of the gifts given by the gods when, if anyone were to choose to “emulate him,” that person would be unholy and hated by all humanity? Tell me, is this the gift of the gods? Or would it perhaps actually be right to affirm what he had said? For this gift of friendship is a good fit for [the gods], and they freely grant to their own [worshippers] the things that they have also decided to honor.

G.o And at any rate, not only does he say Marius was given by the gods but that, in addition to this, the modes of false-divination were invented by them too. He writes as follows: The spirit that comes to humans from the gods occurs rarely and only among a few, and no one easily or always has a share of it. Surely it is for this reason that the spirit among the Hebrews has failed and is, of course, no longer preserved among the Egyptians. And even the native oracles seem <to have become silent,>135 yielding to the cycles of time; indeed, our humane master and father Zeus, considering that we shouldn’t be altogether deprived of fellowship with the gods, has granted us inspection [of divinatory signs] through the sacred arts, by which we shall have help sufficient for our needs. So, by “spirit from the gods” he here means the spirit of the false-diviners, since it was their habit to feign being inspired and to appear to have been possessed by a mantic spirit so that their deception would be readily accepted. There were a great many of them and the method of their sorcery was varied. For there were bird-watchers and fire-diviners, and barley-diviners as well; besides them, there were liver-inspectors and those who busied themselves with the puffs of smoke leaping into the air from sacrifices; there were also necromancers, belly-mythers, and augurs.

So then, he says the diabolical spirit in them has left. And I certainly applaud his words, but he has ignored the reason the falsehood has stopped working, and the fact that, to use his own words, “the native oracles” have “become silent.” For, when Christ shone on the world, all the tyranny of daemons was shaken, and like some stage full of child’s play, the deception has been completely destroyed, and the entirely profane and sinful daemons have become “possessed” by the gates of Hades, although they had formerly wandered the whole earth. Nevertheless, Julian ought to explain the following for us: in what way “have the native oracles become silent,” in his view, “yielding to the cycles of time”? And furthermore, if he who was attempting to indicate future events to people long ago actually was well and truly a god, why does he succumb to the times, no doubt with the knowledge in him being dimin-ished to a smaller amount than before? If so, how can Julian say they are “eternal” when they are subject to time and all but experience growing old, so as to differ but little from our own condition? Accordingly, he says, since “the oracles” have “become silent” and the Pythian, now senile, has no doubt lost his wits and no longer knows his habitual modes of deceptive falsehoods, Zeus “has granted us inspection [of divinatory signs] and assistance through the sacred arts.”

What are you doing, noble sir? Are you saying that the accursed forms of false-divination and no doubt of sorcery, too, are venerable and “sacred arts” and that the knowledge of how to perform them confers benefit to those on earth? Are you saying that these things “have been given” to humanity to assist them and that this gift has come to them as if it were a most advantageous assistance “from Zeus”? Quite right, dear sir; for it was necessary, yes necessary, that your “father” and emperor make use of such shameful munificence in order that he might clearly be seen granting things that are inconsistent with the established laws and might make those who are practiced in them, or arguably even those who have merely been privy to others doing them, liable to the worst forms of punishment. Furthermore, whereas Julian says that the prophetic “spirit” “among the Hebrews” themselves has also failed, we say that Christ has become “the fulfillment of the Law” and prophets. For they have all heralded in advance the mystery of Christ, those ones who have at various times become holy and received knowledge of the future, since God implanted it in them through the Holy Spirit. But when he himself came into our midst and became manifest to those on earth, the grace of ancient prophecy went quiet, though even now God makes future events reverberate within the saints as he pleases and he abides in holy souls.

Accordingly, he should not say that the Spirit has failed, but rather that our affairs were transformed into a newness of grace. Acting as though his argument had won approval for its previous claims, he also adds something else and says, I had nearly forgotten the greatest of Helios’ and Zeus’s gifts. But with good reason I have saved it until the end. For it is not peculiar only to us [Romans], but is, I think, held in common with our kinsmen the Greeks. <Indeed>, Zeus gave birth to Asclepius from himself in the intelligible realm and revealed him to the earth through the life of nurturing Helios. Having advanced 152 to earth from the sky, Asclepius at first appeared at Epidaurus singularly 153 in the form of a human, but multiplying himself from there in stages, he stretched out his saving right hand over all the earth. He went to Pergamon, to Ionia, and afterwards to Tarentum. Later he went to Rome. He departed to Cos and from there to Aegae. Accordingly, he is everywhere on land and sea. He does not visit us individually, and yet he restores souls that have a discordant disposition and bodies that are sick. So then, he gives himself airs when he says that Asclepius was born of Zeus “in the intelligible realm” and yet appeared “in the form of a human.” For surely the story told by everyone would have it that he was born from Coronis and Apollo, when she committed adultery in all likelihood with one of the priests in the temple of Apollo.

But this man, on the other hand, since he is always a liar, is both thinking about and relating a tall and solemn tale about him, even though a great many things inconsistent with this have been written about him by the elite ranks of Greeks. For, indeed, Apis the Egyptian is said to have been one of the better-known temple-dwellers there and to have accumulated the knowledge of so-called natural philosophy. And they say that he was first to pursue expertise in medicine and was better at making discoveries [in that field] than those who came before him, and moreover that he passed it on to Asclepius who, when he became good at the art, was no longer content to loiter among the Egyptian cities but, being a lover of money and extraordinarily weak when it came to shameful profit, wandered about in every land, so to speak, collecting donations from many people and putting his practice up for sale to those who were suffering. And being exalted by his art and having high and mighty thoughts because of it, he both began to name himself a god and to fantasize absurdly that he was capable of resurrecting certain persons from the dead. When he came to the people of Epidaurus and snatched an impressive reputation among them of even being some god, he was struck by lightning as God sent a punishment that was most appropriate to him and proved by his suffering that he was nothing at all except earth and ash.

Would it not be worthwhile to see what sort of things the lyric poet Pindar says about him? Gold shining in his hands influenced that man with his headstrong heart. […]164 With his hands, the son of Cronus, hurling [his lightning] through the chests of both [Asclepius and the man he raised], swiftly destroyed them, and the fiery thunderbolt brought doom upon them. Moreover, Euripides the tragic poet maintains that Apollo said, For Zeus is to blame, having killed my son Asclepius by hurling fire into his chest. Then why did God completely burn up with fire the greatest and most special “of Zeus’s and Helios’ gifts,” to use Julian’s words, despite the fact that he weighs human affairs in the balance with a just verdict and knows how to distribute either rewards, perchance, or penalties according to due proportion and what is fitting to each person’s character? “Nevertheless,” Julian says, “the medical art benefited our life.” Is it, then, for this reason right to proclaim that those who become good at it are gods? Yet one might observe that there are also other fields of knowledge and arts involving manual labor that are not pointless inventions, but rather supremely beneficial to those in this life. Shall we then crown with the honor of divinity those who were first to practice them or those who have obtained a more illustrious reputation than others in each domain?

If, therefore, the son of Coronis accomplished something appropriate for a god, if he sent light into the blind when their eyes had worn out, if he commanded the dead to return to life, if he told those maimed in their legs to return home rejoicing after making them sound in their joints, then he deserves to be enriched with due admiration from us as well. But if, on the contrary, he became famous for some sick people [who got better], he ought to be praised for best pursuing medical expertise, but yet not dishonor the saying “Know thyself.” Hence, this most excellent man has deified a doctor who is a lover of wealth and a braggart, and indeed, raising his arrogant eyebrow because of him, he again says the following: But what sort of thing like this can the Hebrews boast that God has given them, those for whom you are persuaded to desert us? At least if you were adhering to their discourses, you would not have fared so completely wretchedly, and, though worse off than before when you were together with us, nevertheless you would have suffered in a bearable and tolerable manner. For you would at least be worshipping one god in place of many, instead of a human being, or rather many wretched humans. And while in other areas you would be worse by living under a harsh and rough law containing much savagery and barbarity instead of our noble and humane ones, nonetheless in the performance of sacred rites you would be more holy and pure.

But now it has turned out that you have sucked the worst blood from them like leeches and neglected that which is purer. G.G Now the gifts that were given to the Hebrews were many and precious, the very sort one would admire and show to have most justly come from God who has authority over the universe, and not at all like what those who have wandered from the truth boast of having personally received from “Helios and Zeus.” For it was inevitable, yes inevitable, that those whom they call “city-guarding and ethnarch gods” or rather daemons would give gifts befitting their own abominations, while, on the contrary, the one who is the sovereign ruler of the universe, truly being God by nature, would appoint those who reverence his sovereignty and are like loyal shield-bearers to be menders of souls and bodies for the inhabitants of the earth: Elijah, that man who was a Tishbite; Elisha; the others who were allotted a most illustrious reputation at that time for their virtues; those who lived at the time of Christ, I mean Peter, John, and the others, whose mere shadows were sufficient for the removal of what was detrimental to the sick; the eminent Paul; as well as those who came after him. I shall refrain from mentioning them individually, but anyone who wants to can even to this day see venerable and holy men censuring wicked daemons in the power of Christ through the Holy Spirit, and using the power of prayer to crush the beings whom those people believe to be gods and saviors, maiming them with a touch of their hand and indeed also managing to free those held down by diverse infirmities.

But since he won’t let go of those who have despised falsehood and who all but shouted down the Greeks’ deception, those who have wisely chosen the truth instead and have recognized the one who is both God by nature and Craftsman of the universe, and since he says, “You were deceived when you adhered to the discourses of the Christians and you do not worship one God but rather a human being and many other wretched ones, and you were yoked to a harsh law, both savage and barbaric,” I suppose it necessary also to confront this attack with cogent counterarguments. Now when he says “a human being” he is refer-ring to Christ, and by “many wretched ones” he means the holy martyrs, who he says are also under “a harsh law,” because our Lord Jesus Christ declared: “Have no fear of those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; fear rather the one who is able to destroy both body and soul in Gehenna.” Our response, Your Excellency, would be as follows: We have not deified a human being, as you have supposed, nor do we think it right to worship one who is not God by nature. Rather, we say that the Word himself who has shone forth from God the Father, the one through whom all things were brought into existence, having decided to preserve the human race, became flesh and was incarnate and he came forth as a human being from the holy virgin.

Since, after all, his divine and ineffable glory is both unapproachable and in no way bearable, and even more is entirely beyond the reach of our sight, he became incarnate in order that by living with those on earth for a certain definite period of time in an accommodating manner like one of us, insofar as he was manifest as a human being, he might persuade us to know who is by nature the sole God of the universe, and, in order that, by rendering us experts in every virtue, he might join us to himself through sanctification, destroying every rule, authority and wicked power, and releasing us from the falsely named gods. So then, it is not a matter of worshipping a human being as you suppose and say and deem it right to think. How could it be? Recognizing that the Word of God was manifest as a human being, we approach him as God insofar as he is God as well and has shone forth from God the Father, remaining unchanged and unalterable, as the mystery about him was declared in advance by the all-wise Moses with subtlety and precision, while the holy prophets also made a prediction that agreed with Moses’ words. With respect to the holy martyrs, however, we do not say that they are gods nor are we accustomed to worship them. On the contrary, we crown them with highest honors for being genuine athletes for the truth and safeguarding the authenticity of their faith to such a degree that they disregarded even life itself and, bidding farewell to fears of death, they not only prevailed over all danger but also erected their own achievements like images, as it were, of such admirable bravery for the benefit of human life.

Therefore, it was not unreasonable, but doubtless even necessary, that those who boasted of such illustrious accomplishments be crowned with undying honors. And we shall find that doing so was likewise irreproachable among the ancient Greeks themselves. For it was customary for the Athenians, when they were assembled at the very tombs, to crown with yearly encomia those who “at Marathon were foremost in daring” in defense of all Greece and those who later fought nobly against the army of Xerxes, since they endured a glorious death. If so, then why can’t this most excellent man let the obligation of honoring the saints go free of critical scrutiny? And yet, even Plato himself says about those who have chosen to live in the best way and have died not ignobly: Certainly for the rest of the time, we shall serve them on the understanding that they have died and become daemons and we shall worship at their graves. And certainly, we shall practice these same customs whenever anyone of those who have been judged distinctively good in life should die in old age or in some other way. So says your Plato, Your Excellency. But, as I said, we ourselves do not claim that the holy martyrs became gods but are accustomed to treat them with all respect and we honor their graves, establishing an unfading memorial for them as a kind of prize and recompense for such illustrious bravery.

Furthermore, since he groundlessly rails at those who are faithful to Christ for senselessly choosing many godless humans instead of dutifully serving one God, we shall attempt to show that he has drenched the worshippers of truth in an unholy flood of accusations that better characterize Greek ignorance. For they have sacrificed to humans, and shameful and licentious ones who are sick with every kind of reproachable conduct, at that! – like the renowned Heracles who they say was born to Alcmene and Zeus and to whom they ascribe that great and special prize of deflowering fifty virgins in one night. And likewise, others have been honored by them with the glory of God: the Hermes of Thebes, the Asclepius of Memphis, and besides them the Dioscuri, and Apis and Osiris. I won’t even mention the licentious and profane son of Semele; but I will add Cleomedes who they say was cruel, harsh, and scarcely different from a wild animal when it came to boxing, and for this very reason, as they themselves say, the Pythian praised him and exclaimed from his sacred tripods, Last of the heroes is Cleomedes the Astypalaean, whom you should honor with sacrifices as no longer mortal. Illustrious are the honors for inhumanity you bestow on athletes, O Pythian! O the gentleness of the gods! O their generosity! He who is bloodstained and bloodthirsty is registered among the gods.

For this activity is sweet, yes sweet, to them. And those who lived at that time decided to name Alexander, son of Philip, a thirteenth god; and indeed, Alexander himself likewise deified a certain one of his associates who procured disreputable women for him – I mean, Hephaestion – and he ordered that he be honored with an altar and sacrifices. But, indeed, if one wanted to give all the details they would waste a lot of words doing so, since those who have filched the name of divinity are too many to count. G.o Anyone can see from the following that it was common practice for them to give the name of gods freely to any persons they wanted. For indeed Clement, having followed the holy apostles at every turn and listening to a very great amount of Greek history, says in his Stromateis that the Jew Josephus, who obtained a not unremarkable reputation for his education, translated the history of Senchoniathon, which had been composed in the language of the Phoenicians, into that of the Greeks. Accordingly, this Senchoniathon, albeit full of Greek superstition, says, For, the most ancient of the Greeks, but particularly the Phoenicians and Egyptians, from whom the rest of humanity borrowed [their tradi-tions], used to believe that those who discovered things essential for sustaining life or who benefited the nations in some way were the greatest gods.

Considering such persons to be benefactors responsible for many good things, they used to worship them as gods and, constructing temples that were established as necessary, they used to consecrate pillars and staffs in their name and, showing them great reverence, the Phoenicians used to assign the greatest festivals to them. And, in particular, they naturalistically assigned the names of their own kings as well to the elements of the cosmos and to some of those they believed to be gods. They used to recognize as gods only the sun, moon, the planets, the elements, and whatever was related to these, and they recognized some to be mortal and others immortal. And so, it is hardly us, but rather the Greeks who would be unmasked as those who worship human beings and uncritically attach the glory of God to whomever they might wish throughout time. G. The wise Julian adds to this certain other points, constantly denouncing the Christians’ worship. He writes as follows: For, if he has mentioned ritual purity, you do not know it; instead, you emulate their 198 rage and bitterness by overturning temples and altars and you have slaughtered not only those of us who abide by the ways of our fathers but also those sectarians who have gone astray just as much as you but do not mourn over the corpse in the same manner as yourselves.

Nevertheless, these actions are instead your own doing. For nowhere did either Jesus or Paul pass them down in their exhortations to you. The reason is that they didn’t even expect that you would ever reach such a degree of power, since they were content if they should delude maidservants and slaves, and through them the women and men such as Cornelius and Sergius. But if one of the people well-known at the time should appear to have mentioned them – for these events occurred under Tiberius or Claudius – then take me as speaking falsely about everything. Once more, this well-bred man speaks with an insolent mouth and says those setting sail from Greek deception and shifting anchor to the truth are impure. Well then, isn’t this the ridiculous prattling of old women? Come then, let’s quote to him the words of his own elite ranks: You are mad, Menelaus Zeus-nourished, and there is no need for your mindlessness; restrain yourself, though you enjoy it. Now as for us, in testing the habits of true “purity,” we are practitioners of every virtue and are accustomed to consider a good reputation in all the most excellent matters something that ought to be pursued with an impressive zeal. But as for you, you all are so far removed from our approach that you admire your gods when they are licentious and you worship goddesses who are shameless courtesans.

And yet he claims that we have succumbed to “rage” and have an unjust thirst for murder. Where shall we find that this has happened? In fact, the opposite, I think, is true and is manifest on the basis of the facts themselves. For it was the blessed martyrs who were destroyed by them, although they hadn’t been found guilty of any great evil at all and instead endured indictment because they had maintained their genuineness towards the God over all and been loyal to him. Moreover, why does he blame those who lay hands on their sanctuaries and altars and dig up the workshops of their impiety? And yet we heard him saying just a moment ago that we ought to worship one God alone – for whom then did you all construct temples and set up the altars therein? For not even they would say that the divine is anthropomorphic, and yet, for some unknown reason, they contradict their very own views about it. For, having dedicated statues of diverse shapes and forms in their sacred precincts, they would command them to worship them uncritically, while not unaware of the fact that they were honoring decayed corpses. If so, then how is he not embarrassed to name Christ, the Savior of the universe, a “corpse,” although he suffered in the flesh and for our sakes tasted death in order that he might restore human nature to incorruptibility?

For he has not remained among the dead, but instead he came back to life after destroying the power of death and removing from us the corruption that tyrannized us due to Adam’s transgression. Nevertheless, because women have believed and because domestic servants as well as some of those who are rather unremarkable in this life have been called, Julian does not permit the kindness of the Savior to pass without censure. And yet, would it not be better to hold the view that one human will not differ from another human in any respect, insofar as one is by nature what one is, but on the contrary a single definition of human substance extends to everyone? “There is one entrance into the world for all, and equal are the exits,” as it is written. But some people sometimes have an advantage over others in externals, for instance in abundance of wealth, or in superiority of offices, and one person is a domestic servant, another is served. But, whatever is the case with these circumstances, all human beings have a single nature. And furthermore, a capacity for every kind of praiseworthy thing is inherent in human nature, since it is both wise and capable of distinguishing the worse from the better. There is, therefore, nothing preventing the person in a lowly position in this life from becoming wise, someone in a state of poverty from practicing justice, or someone with the rank of a domestic servant from showing himself to be kind and decorous.

Why indeed, therefore, does Julian bring a baseless accusation against those ensnared by the divine proclamation, who have been drawn towards the true and blameless vision of God and towards the knowledge of everything good, if it is not their lot to enjoy wealth, if they do not have advantage over others in external dignities? For my part, I would hold that the one in a state of poverty, if he should choose to live rightly and lawfully, is in an incomparably better situation than a wealthy person with privilege, and that a wise domestic servant is better off than a master who speaks nonsense. For it is written: “A wise domestic will rule over mindless masters.” One might even see among the elite ranks of the Greeks that those who were especially distinguished beyond the rest, though they were at first people who worked with their hands and practiced a craft of common manual labor which they had inherited in succession from their fathers, nonetheless became not unremarkable in what they consider to be wisdom. I will pass over many people and go straight to Socrates himself, the son of Sophroniscus, whose mother was a midwife by trade and whose father was a stonemason, and indeed, they say that he even reached the highest point of his craft and considered the matter to be of no disgrace. Porphyry writes as follows about him, in the third [book] of his Philosophical History: Now that these matters have been thus clarified, let’s discuss what others thought was worth mentioning about Socrates, briefly selecting those legends variously told by learned men for the sake of praise or blame, but nevertheless omitting as uninvestigated the issue of whether he worked in stonemasonry with his father or only his father himself did; for none of this <chipped away at> his pursuit of wisdom, as it was engaged in for just a short time anyway.

But if in fact he was a Hermes-carver, all the better; for this craft is pure and not deserving of reproach. And after other things: For Socrates was a craftsman [Aristoxenus? says], having taken up the art of sculpting from his father. Timaeus likewise claims in the ninth [book] that Socrates had learned stonemasonry. But if the former [Aristoxenus?] is not a credible source on account of his hostility, while Timaeus isn’t either because of his age – for he was younger than Aristoxenus – we should consult Menedemus of Pyrrha, who was both a student of Plato and older than Aristoxenus and says in his Philocrates that Socrates would never stop talking about how his father was a stonemason and how his mother was a midwife. Tell me then, did stonemasonry or being born of a father who was a stonemason do Socrates any harm with respect to his ability to accomplish what he thought was worthwhile? Did his birth from a working-class mother render the practice of philosophy inaccessible to him? For she was, as I said, a midwife. Nevertheless, didn’t the renowned Plato who is held in awe by them, after having consorted with athletic trainers and in the beginning loitering at the wrestling-grounds, pass from athletic exertions to philosophy? Indeed, Porphyry also says about him: “Plato was taught letters by Dionysius, but athletics by the wrestler Ariston of Argos.

Some also say that he wrestled at the Isthmian and the Pythian games.” What, then, is more low-brow than such a life? For none of those who think rightly would, I think, bear to disgrace themselves, exposed and in the nude, with a bared body, before so great a crowd and no doubt for a small wage. Nevertheless, Julian says philosophy is inaccessible to domestic servants and mocks them if it is said that they have been called to the truth. And yet Zamolxis the Thracian was a domestic servant of Pythagoras and is, nonetheless, admired by them for having reached the acme of all knowledge. Porphyry has mentioned him too, and indeed even speaks in the following way: “He also had another youth whom he acquired from Thrace named Zamolxis; and, cherishing him, Pythagoras taught him the contemplation of the heavens.” Surely, therefore, nothing prevents domestic servants from being wise and good, provided they have chosen to endure “sweat for the sake of virtue” and to be illuminated most rightly by the rays of the true vision of God. G.G Nonetheless, the fact that our divine proclamation benefits women – even this he turns into a pretext for his love of slander. And yet even Plato himself when he put in at Sicily began to beckon Dionysius’ wife to philosophy. And Porphyry says that he both greatly admired Marcella for philosophy and also readily took her into his home and chose to live together with her in marriage.

And when expounding the life of Pythagoras, he also writes the following: He had such an effect on the city of Crotona that, after he had captivated the board of elders by many fair discourses, he in turn gave youthful counsel to the young men when invited to do so by the rulers, and then to the children who gathered in droves from their schools, and finally to the women – even an assembly of women was made ready for him. When these things happened, his reputation increased greatly and he took many disciples from this city, not only men but also women. Why indeed does Julian criticize the Savior’s disciples for broadcasting the divine proclamation to all without distinction and calling both women and men, illustrious and obscure, the wealthy and the needy, and surely even some domestic servants, to the duty of learning the identity of the one who is by nature the God, Craftsman, and Lord of the universe? And, at a whim, he circles his insults back around against us, speaking as follows: Nevertheless, I don’t know what inspired me to utter this. But, to return to where I left off, what made you so ungrateful to our own gods that you deserted 230 to the Jews? Was it because the gods granted to Rome an empire, but to the Jews only a little time to be free, and then to be forever slaves and immi-grants?

Consider Abraham: wasn’t he an “immigrant in a foreign land”? Consider Jacob: wasn’t he a slave, first in Syria, then in Palestine after that, and then in Egypt in old age? Doesn’t Moses say that he “led them” from Egypt “out of ” the house of “slavery,” “with an out-stretched arm”? And after they settled in Palestine, didn’t they change their fortunes more frequently than the chameleon changes its color, as those who have observed it say, at one time submitting to the judges, at another being slaves to foreigners? And when they became a monarchy – but let’s omit for now how this happened, since God did not willingly allow them to have a monarchy, as the scripture states, but only after having been compelled by them and warning that they would fare poorly under the monarchy – but nonetheless they inhabited their own land at any rate and farmed it for a little more than four hundred years. From that point on, they were slaves first to the Assyrians, then to the Medes, later to the Persians, and then to our own selves [the Romans] at the present time. Now it is true that he has written such words under the possession of the unclean spirit of this world, as anyone at all who has a sound mind would, I think, affirm. For no one at all will accuse the supreme and ineffable glory of God, if in fact they are in a good state of mind and heart, free from the inspiration of the spirit of the devil.

But when he asks why we are inclined towards the irreproachable customs and laws of the Jews and “deserted” to their side, and also wants to learn the reason why we are “ungrateful” to his gods, we must say: “With the Jews, in fact, or rather, with the God-breathed scripture, we have found the subtle and well-chiselled <conception> of the true and only deity, which is full of every form of noble language, and we have found the laws and instruction that direct the lover of virtue straight towards every good, the exhortations of the saints that bring us to self-control, the promises of rewards, the true hope of life for eternity, the forgiveness of sins, the abundant provision of the Holy Spirit, the grace of adoption – and which of those things beyond thought and word haven’t we found there?” For it says, “Eye has not seen and ear has not heard and it has not entered into the heart of a human being what God has prepared for those who love him.” We have quite reasonably been ensnared by our appetite for these things into inevitably choosing them instead of the playthings of the Greeks and into loving the teachings of the God-breathed scripture. And, furthermore, we are totally “ungrateful” to those who are, I know not how, believed to be gods. For indeed, although long ago they were conspicuous in the choirs of the holy angels, they have become wicked and apostate.

And not “preserving their own authority,” they slipped away from existence with God and, having entirely lost their intimacy with him, they have deceived the earthly realm under heaven and divvied up the inhabitants of the earth, and, plunging them down into pits of ignorance, they contrived for them to give up the better in exchange for the worse and rendered them lovers of every defect. They have persuaded people to worship not only themselves but also the elements of the cosmos and carvings of irrational animals, as well as birds and fish. Aren’t we then justified in saying that it was our duty to be ungrateful to them and also that they have been the corruptors and abusers of all the land under heaven? And surely no one would say that it is when we are deprived of abundant possessions that we are upset, but rather when we have been injured in our wretched soul itself and are endangering it. Accordingly, we departed from their supposed gods since we found among them absolutely nothing that did not deserve the most serious censure. For sex between males, prostitution of women, and the pursuit of every kind of licentiousness constitute their myths and mockery; their mysteries are tall tales; and in the rank of virtue are falsehood and every form of impurity, both of physical perception and of intellect. And not only is it by no means difficult to discover this, but on the contrary, as I said, the proof is self-evident.

For behold, yes behold: although the God who prevails over everything is controlling the affairs of the Romans by his own will, Julian says that those who are not gods bestowed upon them their renown. Nevertheless, Your Excellency, I would say, how is it that those very beings who know how to go to such lengths of generosity and have granted to others the ability to rule have themselves been deprived of their own honor and glory? For the glory they stole long ago by their deception and lying they have entirely lost when Christ stripped naked their falsehood. How, therefore, have they granted rule to others when they have been deprived by force of the ability to rule, have all but been buried in recesses under the ground, and are awaiting the time of inescapable judgment? For it says, “Those angels who did not preserve their own authority he cast into Tartarus and committed to chains of gloom, to keep them to be punished for judgment on the great day.” G.o Furthermore, since he also says the company of inspired Abraham were “immigrants” and under the rule of others, let him now explain again what harm this would do them or how it would force us to have to think and say, absolutely and without exception, that they are not good. He has not yet shown whether they were shameful in character or whether they succumbed to unjust gain, or were slanderers, lovers of accusation, and cultivators of greed, envious, charlatans, and keen at working evil, a menace, and braggarts – these are the ones who are called before judges, these are the ones all the laws censure, these are the ones fittingly prosecuted and subject to the indictments of their prosecutors.

But being under the rule of someone, as strangers and foreigners, does not in any way make them evil. Indeed, just look at the empire of the Romans extending over all the land under heaven: for it is not only the Jews that they have conquered but every nation and race of humans. Then should we say that, because the nations have been conquered and continue to endure submitting to their most lawful yokes, they are ill-bred and worthless? Has the fact that they are under emperors become an occasion of unexpected misfortune for them? On the contrary, no one would suppose this to be correct; for they are, yes, they are even now more than before in a situation better than they could have hoped for and abounding in all contentment, and we shall grant that the way things have turned out has brought them renown more than disgrace. Julian ought, therefore, to release the company of Abraham from all accusation, indictment, and blame, even if they were foreigners and even if, having left the land that bore them, they migrated to another one and took possession of the whole of Judea by God’s help. “But,” [he says], “the children of Israel ‘have been slaves’ to ‘Persians’ and ‘Medes’ and indeed also to some of the other nations who were their neighbors.” Do you, then, know the reason or do you want to learn it?

For, since they left the pious service under God and sacrificed to their gods, they were deprived of all mercy and became the object of barbarian cruelty and submitted to the most grievous yoke of slavery. Therefore, it is right to be “ungrateful” to the gods of the Greeks also for this, for they save none of their subjects. It will be beneficial to add the following to what I have said. Does it seem to Julian shameful and disgraceful that Israel was ruled by Saul contrary to the good pleasure of the God over all? It was, on the contrary, necessary and incomparably better, he will probably say, to be ruled by God alone. Well said! For his understanding is spot on and I shall agree with his words. Accordingly, it would be against God’s will for anyone to withdraw themselves from being yoked under him and to submit the neck of their understanding to others instead of him. If so, then why does he, churning everything up from top to bottom, claim that God allotted universal empire to certain “ethnarch” gods and “city-guarding” daemons, despite the fact that God does not pass off to others the duty of ruling over the inhabitants of the earth but instead preserves it for himself in the way that he deems best? For when they asked for Saul, God was embittered and actually said through one of his prophets: “And I gave them a king in my anger.”

Now all would agree that Julian is telling empty myths and, taking pride in the rotten ideas he has invented, he brings indictments against whomever he chooses for things that incur no blame. Nevertheless, acting like he hasn’t been as irreverent as he should be against the saints and can’t get his fill of slandering everything, this brazen man also comes against Jesus himself and says the following: The Jesus you herald was one of Caesar’s subjects. If you do not believe this, I will prove it a little later; or even better, it should be stated now. You of course say that he registered himself in the census under Quirinius with his father and mother. But what benefits did he cause to be bestowed upon his own kindred just by being born? Well, that’s because, so he says, they were unwilling to obey him. Why was that? How did that hard-hearted and stone-necked people obey Moses? But Jesus, who ordered the spirits, walked on the sea, drove out daemons, and, as you yourselves state, fashioned heaven and earth – for in fact none of his disciples has dared to say this about him, except John alone, and not even he said so clearly or unambiguously, but for the sake of the argument let’s grant that he said it – was this Jesus unable to transform the choices of his own friends and relatives for their salvation?

260 As the prophet says, “The fool will speak foolish things and his heart will think vanities.” If, then, it had been someone else from the Greek herd who had confidently relied on such insipid arguments fit for old women, I would probably have said that, yes, possessing no knowledge of the sacred teachings they missed the truth – and likewise, they were totally unaware of the mystery of the only-begotten’s economy with the flesh. But since Julian, on the contrary, is so extraordinarily proud of himself and supposes also that he has mustered for himself a not unimpressive knowledge of the God-breathed scripture, he should hear from us: “You have a façade of wisdom, noble sir, and you think that whatever is valued among us humans is no doubt also held in high regard by God as well. But you are entirely ignorant of the separation, the transcendence of the divine glory, and the poverty of our reasoning. For if it had been altogether necessary for Jesus, being God, to take care not to appear to trail behind human fame and to join with us in aiming for these momentary paltry glories, for a modicum of success, and for pointless ostentation, wouldn’t it have been better for him to bypass his mode of accommodation and not become a human like us, given that he was enthroned together with the Father, adorned with the highest glories and illustrious in God-befitting dignities?”

Accordingly, if someone wants to make accusations and say, “Why hasn’t he instead been designated a son of some emperor here on earth and indeed why wasn’t he also born of a royal mother, born, that is, in the flesh?,” that person should come forward to denounce the mere fact that he has become a man and has “emptied himself, taking the form of a servant.” For, if dishonor was entirely unbearable and onerous to him, although the timing and state of affairs were beckoning him to this, it would have surely been better for him not to acquiesce to the economy [in the flesh]. But, on the contrary, human standards were nothing at all to him as God and the scale of earthly empire was also insignificant to him, even though among us it is very well crowned with the highest honors. For example, when he was conversing with Pilate, he demon-strated clearly the highest transcendence of his own glory by saying: “My kingdom is not of this world.” Why, therefore, are you rebuking the one who is God by nature but nonetheless has chosen to endure the emptying in accordance with his mode of accommodation? And yet how could anyone doubt that we [humans] are less than the wisdom residing in God to the same degree that we are also inferior to his nature? This, too, he himself says through the prophet Isaiah: “For my plans are not like your plans, nor are my ways like your ways; but as heaven is far from the earth so are my ways far from your ways and your thoughts from my way of thinking.”

“Nevertheless,” he says, “what benefits did he cause to be bestowed upon his own kindred just by being born?” Simply put, all of them, even if some are disobedient. For this is the very reason why he became human, so that we too might be designated his family. Consequently, for those on earth, what could be equal to such a thing in terms of the significance of its renown? We have been proclaimed participants in the divine nature; we have been filled with the Holy Spirit, gaining intelligible intimacy with God through [Christ]; he lowered himself to brotherhood with us, despite being God by nature, Craftsman and Lord of the universe; we are designated sons of the God over all. So then, after all this are you actually asking “what benefit” did he “cause to be bestowed upon us”? Or perhaps such a special thing is considered by you trivial and worthy of no account? And if anyone happens to be numbered either with the children or brothers of one of the emperors on earth, would this person seem to you to have reached the pinnacle of the highest renown of all, while, on the contrary, it would be entirely of no benefit for us to be named gods and children and brothers of God? “Nevertheless,” he asks, “why wasn’t he seen by those on earth ensconced in the seats of an earthly kingdom and indeed conspicuous with exceedingly lofty and supreme perquisites?”

You will learn then, insofar as it is possible, the aim of his economy. For the whole earth had gone astray and that which was pleasing to each person was a god and an object of worship. In fact, some had worshipped creation and dedicated their service to the elements of the cosmos, while others fashioned their own gods. Therefore, the only-begotten Word of God appeared from heaven in a form like us, in order that he might persuade everyone to pursue the truth and, as it were, to push through the fog and darkness of their innate ignorance to reach the light of the pure vision of God. And since the Craftsman of the universe wanted humanity to rule themselves and to be steered by their own acts of will towards what must be done, for this reason it seemed to Christ, the Savior of all, to be a good idea (and quite rightly so) for humanity, not with compulsion hanging over them but rather by persuasion, to be released from the shameful things of the earth and instead to choose a superior way by which one could reasonably become a better person. If he, therefore, crowned with a king’s glory and possessing an irresistible authority, had ordered those on earth to believe in him, belief would no longer be the fruit of “full assurance,” but instead a product of unavoidable and oppressive commands, and he would arguably be like one of those who have been fraudulently honored with the glory of divinity by human decrees.

But because he, as one of us, has adopted a restrained and submissive mindset and dispensed with human glory, and thus transferred to a better state those who have voluntarily attained a “full assurance” due partly to his all-wise teachings and partly to suprarational divine signs, Julian’s indictment of his mode of accommodation is ultimately no longer in order; but instead he is discovered to have spoken empty nonsense against Christ the ruler of all. For surely, he should not make the census a reproach against us, but along with this point should fully consider the following. The one who did indeed endure the census under Caesar along with us in fact also performed deeds that are beyond Caesar’s power and, even more, beyond that of every human. For he raised the dead from their tombs, he rebuked raging winds, he crushed Satan with a word, and he accomplished other miracles as well. Therefore, while Caesar was recognized by the tokens of earthly rule and by extrinsic good qualities that were not substantially inherent in him, Christ the master of all, possessing an intrinsic glory not imported from an external source, was recognized by the preeminence of his accom-plishments and could even be considered the God of Caesar himself. For the fact that some people have bucked off his yoke and indeed even insolently lifted up their neck will in no way deprive the Emperor and Lord of all from rightfully ruling the universe; on the contrary, their unbridled behavior counts against them, while he prides himself in his own superior qualities and would keep the glory of his preeminence over all unshaken.

G.G Moreover, his claim that “He could not change the choices of his own friends and relatives” is exceedingly puerile, since it seems to me that he has forgotten, despite hearing it many times, that a human person is a voluntary being and willingly goes after anything whatsoever that pleases him, given that the Craftsman of all thought this was the best way for things to be, in order that those who have chosen to be doers of good might receive their due praise and those who go down a different path might justly be the object of everyone’s mockery. Now as for the fact that the only-begotten Word of God is also the Craftsman of heaven and earth and quite simply everything in them, even the all-wise John is sufficient proof since he says: “All things came to be through him and without him not one thing came to be.” And also the agreement of the other apostles on this will be of no less assistance. For, in confessing once and for all that he is God, they were certainly also not at all unaware of the dignity of both his inherent power and his preeminence. In fact, the most sacred Paul calls Christ, who is from the Jews “according to the flesh,” the “God over all” and says he is “blessed forever.” And furthermore, some of the other disciples, when they saw him coming on the sea itself, were not only amazed at the marvel but also made their confession on oath, saying to him, “Truly you are the Son of God.”

How could the one who is like this not be the Craftsman of the universe, since the God-breathed scripture confirms it and the matter is not inharmonious even with the elite ranks of the Greeks themselves, as also our argument showed earlier in what was already said beforehand? Book 7 7. His Excellency Julian has not only denounced the holy scriptures; he furthermore speaks so impudently and has gone so far in his love of casting blame as to reach a point where nothing we do escapes his slander. Perhaps he thought doing so would bring him a good reputation. But some might well say about people opting for this mindset, “their glory is in their shame,” as well, I would suggest, as that statement made in the voice of David, “Why do you, who are powerful in lawlessness, boast in wickedness? Your tongue has planned injustice all day long; […] you loved all the words of your deluge, your treacherous tongue.” But, since he takes no account of such verses, he leaps at the saints. He even rises up against Jesus Christ himself, the Savior of us all, and says, Therefore, I shall also touch on these matters a little later when I begin to give a specific examination of the tall tales and intrigues of the gospels. But for now answer me on this point: is it better continually to be free and to rule the majority of the land and sea for a full two thousand years, or to be slaves and live under foreign control?

No one is so devoid of self-respect as to prefer the latter. Or will someone, on the contrary, think it worse to conquer in war than to be conquered? Who is so oblivious? If what I say is true then show me a single general among the Hebrews like Alexander, a single one like Caesar. Surely there aren’t any among you. By the gods, I know indeed that I am insulting these men, but I have mentioned them since they are famous. For those who in fact are not as great as Alexander or Caesar are not recognized by the hoi polloi, but each one of them is more admirable than all who have been [generals] among the Hebrews taken together. He is “oblivious” to the fact that his argument digresses from what is pertinent and has, with utter folly, passed on to irrelevant topics. For he intended to show that the worship of the Christians is not undefiled and indeed that those who introduced us to the sacred doctrines did not attain the pure vision of God, but that it was the elite ranks of the Greeks who were close observers of the essential matters and who have subjected both divine and human affairs to subtle investigation. If so, then he has incomprehensibly abandoned the straight path, has bid farewell to his stated purpose, and is cast adrift upon the rotten and irrelevant contrivances of his mind.

“But Your Excellency,” I would say, “if the traits of others do not appear an equal match for the glory and empire of the Romans, if none among them have been noble and suited to command, dedicated to and trained in tactics, capable of prevailing in battles and wars and of overpowering the force of attackers – tell me, is this sufficient grounds for thinking it would be necessary and reasonable for you to vilify the pious and worthy doctrines of the Hebrews or the Christians?” Yet how is it not obvious to everyone that arguments about these two topics are entirely unrelated to one another? For if his argument was proposing to seek what sort of kingdom someone would not be off-target in admiring, whether that of the Romans or that of the Hebrews, it would be straightforward and incontrovertible to state the truth, namely, that the God who rules the universe, because he was aware of what was going to happen in the future, granted to the Roman empire the ability to govern all, in order that every land and city and those distinguished in the sacred council chambers of the empire along with everyone else would worship him. One can see from the facts themselves that this has been brought to completion. But since, as I said, his argument is dedicated to investigating our divine doctrines and the question of whether that which is true and above reproach resides among us or them, why does Julian mix what is unmixable and attempt to treat topics that have no relation to one another as though they were the same?

So what if the government of the Hebrews has been taken over and now submits to the laws of the Romans? Would this show them to be evil, misled, and incorrect in their doctrine of God? Yet as for living under the ordinance of laws and being required to submit to the supremacy of rulers, if this is something that brings shame upon some people, then haven’t those who desire to rule mistreated those over whom they rule? And furthermore, since Julian himself was numbered among the rulers, why didn’t he cease from greediness [for power], if the requirement to be subordinate is harmful for those who have been subjugated? In my own opinion one should blame the laws least of all; rather, it would be nothing extraordinary – and I claim instead that it would even be necessary – to bring an indictment for unholiness against those practiced in shaking off any intention of living under the laws. So, if guidance by laws towards a wholly praiseworthy life is something beneficial, why then did Julian slander living under their command? For it wasn’t plausible that all those on earth should revel in the insignia of empire, since in that case where would the subordinate [class] be? Nevertheless, he makes this matter an excuse for reproaching even Christ himself. Then how does he fail to recognize that it was for the sake of the economy with the flesh that even Christ himself submitted to the laws that came through Moses, although he himself was the lawgiver and declared through angels the commandment given through Moses?

For example, he said through one of the holy prophets, “I myself am the one who speaks, I am present.”

7. Nevertheless, the one who yielded to the laws of Moses for a time, as was necessary, who tolerated, as you say, the most servile census of Quirinius under Caesar, has become Emperor of the realm under heaven and is served even by Caesar’s royal insignia themselves and he crowns those allotted to hold them. The Macedonian [Alexander the Great] was a very brave general and has been admired by all, and after him Caesar and certainly some others were as well – I don’t begrudge them. But they were neither pious nor indeed trained in the doctrines of the true vision of God; they too have erred, honoring the innumerable crowd of unclean spirits and venerating the gods made of wood and stone that were set up in their sanctuaries. “Then how,” Julian says, “did the God of the universe allow those who were his enemies to arrive at such a degree of fame and to prevail over so many?” 17 So, then, you are blaming his gentleness and persecuting him for being long-suffering, and you have indicted his philanthropy. Do you accuse him, then, for other things as well? For he hasn’t prohibited the sun from rising; he used to send showers on those who ignored him, provide gushes of spring water, and make the earth a fruitful mother. For he knew, yes, he knew the conversion of everyone that would occur in the last times.

Accordingly, whenever the accuser of the Christians’ worship says with the utmost stupidity, “show me one general among the Hebrews like Alexander or like Caesar” – then indeed, and with good reason, he will hear the following response from us: our argument, dear sir, is not about generals and those achieving this degree of distinction through physical bravery, but rather is about divine and true doctrines.

7. Furthermore, since he boasts in his own gods and says it was thanks to them that the aforementioned generals attained such a point of strength and certainly of fame too, his argument would first of all be impaired by a complete lack of support. For it would be impossible for him to prove his claim with facts, and the gods’ inability to defend themselves when their sanctuaries were torn open, when their altars were uprooted, when every sacrifice was destroyed and their statues burned, and, finally, when all the realm under heaven has come to consider them as worthy of no account – all of these occurrences would quite satisfactorily reveal that he is speaking nonsense on this point. If anyone wanted, moreover, they could easily observe from the sacred scriptures that fearful and unconquerable ranks of enemies have often been defeated by the God who rules all. When foreigners were marshalled against Judea and were bringing a harsh attack that was difficult to counter, the inspired Samuel sent up a prayer to God and made a great hailstorm descend from heaven that was so heavy and unbearable that the infantry fell along with the cavalry and handed an effortless victory to Israel and heaven mobilized its weapons, as it were, on behalf of those fearing God. And the Assyrians, who at one time dwelt in the land towards the dawn and the [sun’s] brightness, along with the Medes and Persians, besieged Jerusalem, and, surrounding the holy city once with a countless host, were threatening that they could burn it all without delay.

But since the general – he was Rabshakeh – was uttering abusive words against the ineffable glory, Hezekiah, being a pious king, was troubled and, being at a disadvantage, was beseeching God for aid; and indeed there fell in one night 185, of the Assyrian army. Has anything like this been done by Julian’s gods – if, as I said, they actually exist? Instead, they are not even able to help themselves as the very facts confirm. 7.G But since he, in his role as a fellow-shieldsman for the doctrines of the Greeks, uses up every method and attempts to show that they are sound, introducing into the middle of his discussion brave men’s deeds – even if some among them became experts in the practical arts they were nevertheless superstitious like him – there was no obstacle to him taking this, too, as proof that his [doctrines] must prevail, despite the fact that they are sick with an endemic lack of beauty and have failed to achieve the true vision of God. Carrying his argument away once again from the straight path, he straightaway recalls other facts that he probably thought would enable him to show quite easily that Christianity is inferior to the superstition of the Greeks and says, But, as for the institution of government and the form of law courts, the administration and beautification of cities, advancement in learning and training in the liberal arts – weren’t these things brutish and barbarous among the Hebrews?

And yet the wretched Eusebius maintains that they even produced some hexameter poetry and he ambitiously claims that logic was practiced among the Hebrews, a term he had heard being used among the Greeks. What type of medical art appeared among the Hebrews like that of Hippocrates among the Greeks and of certain other schools after him? 29 This, despite the fact that the multitude of arguments we have already used against Julian’s claims have proven that the writings of Moses are older than all the books of the Greeks together and every legislative document. For he is seen to be the first of all legislators, and those after him who defined the most beneficial laws for their societies are highly esteemed when they have established any laws in agreement with his. Which particular area of divine and human affairs did he pass over in silence? Did he not display the habits characteristic of devotion to God, the path of good order, and an unimpeachable knowledge of what to do and what not to do? Did he not commend every form of good deed, while defining appropriate punishments for each shameful deed? Did he not punish theft, did he not reject adultery and licentiousness, polluted and profane pleasures? Did he not moderate the habits of those called to rule? For he ordained that they be upright, wise, alert, superior to profit and all animosity, habitually mastering anger and wrath, maintaining an impartial judgment, but always measuring out justice in equal measure to those under their control and proceeding down a straight path in their laws.

Why, then, does Julian dismiss books that are so venerable and ancient and grant the better verdict to what came last? Indeed, how could this not be an accurate description of what he is doing, in light of what I have said? For it is reasonable to assume that those who come last imitate and repeat the [teachings] of those that are older and were born earlier, not that those who came earlier imitate the [teachings] of those who came last. Moreover, since Julian deems worthy of all admiration “training in the liberal arts and advancement in learning,” which supposedly exist among the elite ranks of the Greeks, but names that of the Hebrews “brutish and barbarous,” despite the fact that they have obtained God’s law as a wise judge and a guide for whatever ought to be done, it would be reasonable for me to say that, insofar as it comes to the sound and quality of the verbalized speech alone, while the Greeks hold the eloquence of their own language in high regard, in exactly the same way the Hebrews too hold their own native eloquence in high regard. Or rather, if he censures the Hebrews for something, he should also disparage the strangeness and difference in sound of the Romans’ language, since it agrees in no way with that of the Greeks. But whatever the case might be, this argument ought to be dismissed as overflowing with silliness, and we should look at something else.

Should it emerge that an aptitude for eloquence and the use of a formidable ostentation in diction are traits specific to certain people, would they invariably be correct in their opinion about God and furthermore would they be noble in character, decent and temperate, reverent and just, and dedicated to the excellent life? Or is it the case that a facility with language can be found among many people who nevertheless lack a familiarity with the best opinion about God and cannot claim any distinction in terms of virtue? The facts themselves, I suppose, will confirm for us that this, too, is true. Why then is he so amazed and why does he crown with the highest honors those who possess a tongue affecting the Attic dialect and quite nicely shorn of all impurities but a heart that is darkened and estranged from the pure vision of God? Nonetheless, he prefers to blame and slander those ignorant of the Greek language, though they have been made wise by the divine laws and successfully achieved the truly desirable life. Does the divine then seek in us a mere brilliance of words alone? Does it take delight in subtle and well-honed tongues? Or does it look for and consider as a friend the one who is habitually well-ordered and pursues an excellent life? And I am delighted that he mentions Hippocrates and takes the other doctors’ good reputations to be something that will help his side win an inevitable victory and pour down a tasteless flood all over the Christians’ worship.

Now, let it be granted that some of the doctors have also attained excellence in their art and were skilled experts in the requisite method for healing bodily illnesses: what, Your Excellency, would this contribute to a discussion about worship? Were there no doctors, then, among the Hebrews, since Hippocrates was among the Greeks? Begone with such bad ideas! But since he only takes pride in this issue and raises his eyebrow against us over nothing important, I will attempt to give a reasonable account of this, too. It is true that, out of forethought especially for the weakness of our bodies, the Craftsman made “medicines from the earth”; for the sacred scripture has mentioned this as well. But our doctors, at any rate, have not needed any of the medicines from the earth; on the contrary, making use of a divine and ineffable power and activity, they used to enable those seized in death’s snare to regain their life, they used to set lepers free from such a cruel disease, and, having done still other remarkable deeds besides these, they would be worthy of all admiration. What then is your Hippocrates or any later member of the Asclepiads seen to have accomplished like this? For the present I will omit speaking of the things done miraculously by the hand of the holy apostles: the lame man at the Beautiful Gate, Aeneas in Lystra, and other [miracles] besides these, which also surpass all speech and amazement.

I shall return to this topic again. Now those women who are shameful and are accustomed to hire themselves out, even if they are ugly, get rid of any offending imperfection with plastered-on makeup and the artistry of beauticians. And the adversary of our undefiled worship, although probably blushing at the Greek deceptions, nevertheless takes every route imaginable, borrowing from any source he can material that will aid these deceptions, in one place venerating the doctors while in another pursuing other people who, in his view, were wise and attained a well-deserved reputation for their wisdom. And indeed he also says, Is the wisest Solomon anything like Phocylides, Theognis, or Isocrates among the Greeks? How could he be? If you were to compare the moral advice of Isocrates with Solomon’s proverbs, I am quite sure you would find that the son of Theodorus is superior to their wisest king. But, he says, Solomon was trained also in theurgy. So what then? Was it not, as they themselves admit, because his wife seduced him that this Solomon came to serve our gods? O the magnitude of his virtue! O the wealth of his wisdom! He did not overcome lust, and the words of a woman led him astray. If, therefore, he was deceived by a woman do not say he was wise. But if you have come to believe that he was wise, then you should not suppose that he was seduced by a woman but that he served the other gods as well because he was persuaded by his own judgment and intelligence and by the teaching received from the god who appeared to him.

For envy and rivalry don’t even touch the best human beings, much less come close to the angels and gods. But you fixate upon particular powers, which it would be correct to call daemons. For ambition and vanity exist there, but among the gods there is nothing even like this. Cyril 7.o In a supremely cunning move, he has omitted all the others who were surely also revered and illustrious and attacks the life of Solomon. For just as those who have chosen to lay waste to a very well-designed city set their siege-engines against those towers lower to the ground, so also he has driven past the renowned choir of the saints and goes against Solomon alone. But “a treacherous man will not catch his prey.” For if someone has slipped up and is discovered to have suffered an unexpected turn, this in no way will impugn the teachings of the Christians. But since Julian says that, in terms of being wise, Solomon was inferior to his own teachers and not as sophisticated as they were, let him again learn that in the first place he was a contemporary of Homer. For when the 160th year after the sack of Troy had been reached, Homer was composing his poetry and was speaking in tragic tones about the misfor-tunes of Troy. And at the same time, Solomon was held in admiration because he finished weaving his book of Proverbs and had established the temple in Jerusalem.

Then, after a long intervening time had passed, in the fifty-eighth Olympiad, Phocylides and Theognis were both born, and they also composed useful instructions, simply put and neatly phrased, such as both nurses for little girls and surely tutors, as well, might recite when admonishing young boys. Furthermore, we in fact agree that Isocrates was a sophist with natural talent. And surely if he has contributed anything beneficial for young men he ought to be praised for it, but he should yield the better verdict to Solomon who has written before him things that would, I think, also suffice to give both young and old the required knowledge of how to conduct themselves in an orderly fashion or likewise how someone might live splendidly, knowledgably, and in harmony with both divine and human laws. Now if someone [like Solomon] out of lust slipped into inappropriate behavior, the accuser should not openly laugh at us, but should instead consider well that we do not typically number him among holy prophets nor indeed among apostles and evangelists. For while he was shrewd and wise, with claims to being the best, at least among those who lived throughout all the land of Judea, he nevertheless had been raised with the sort of wealth and abundance that would be typical of people in positions of such privilege, dining on Sybaritic tables, awash with other advantages, and illustrious with the highest honors.

The goad of hedonism is perhaps more intense among those who have been so successful, and, when desire has been stirred, their mind will go after it with free rein, so to speak, with nothing to restrain it. For hedonism nearly always keeps pace with luxury, just as the sophist Isocrates himself likewise says: “Wealth is more the servant of wickedness than of what is good and fair.” It is to be expected, then, that the one against whom Julian levels his slander, who was so illustrious and elevated above everyone else, was rich and lived a life of luxury. If so, then why, dear sir, is it surprising if he was somehow tossed about and yielded to pleasures, being full of luxuries, wealth, and the haughtiness that comes from these? Socrates, the son of Sophroniscus, despite being raised in philosophy, possessing little, initially gaining expertise in manual labor, habitually eating little, being unavoidably oppressed, it seems, by the most extreme needs, and “walking on the ground” (to use Homer’s words), nonetheless used to get “tied in knots” with his wives, Myrto and Xanthippe, and he used to fall into the embraces of prostitutes and lacked restraint when it came to shameful and quite loathsome impulses. Come, therefore, let us also say about Socrates: “O the magnitude of his virtue! O the wealth of his wisdom! He did not overcome lust.”

Let Julian answer this question for me: Does he say that his supposed gods are wise or exceedingly stupid and small-minded? Well, if he contends that they are unwise, then he has accused his own gods of ignorance, but if, on the contrary, he contends that they are wise and quite full of understanding, why then do they lust and fall madly in love with beautiful young things, both male and female? Accordingly, I suppose someone might with good reason say in their case too: “O the magnitude of the virtue of Julian’s gods! O the wealth of their wisdom! They did not overcome lust and the love of bodies, something I would regard as entirely worthwhile. If indeed a person, despite being exceedingly wise, lived in luxury and has thereby fallen away from virtue, the teachings of the Christians should not be mocked on that account. For, as I said, the accused is not held by us to be a prophet or for that matter an apostle or evangelist, but rather a man raised in privilege who due to luxury allowed his mind to become easily led astray into inevitably making the occasional concession also to natural impulses in a careless manner. Furthermore, Julian delights in Solomon’s failures and indeed even says that he served the gods of the Greeks, having been carried away by the twitterings of foreign women.

Then, composing what he no doubt imagined to be a stinging and mischievous argument, he says, “If he was deceived, he should not be called wise; but if you say that he was wise, it would certainly be clear that his choosing to worship other gods too was an inevitable result of his wisdom, for which he has also been admired.” Now it is true that, on the basis of what he has written, we would both say and certainly think that Solomon truly was wise. And no one would deny that he has admittedly erred by serving the falsely named gods. Nonetheless, we maintain that he was carried away by his foreign wives. For a woman is a twittering thing and is capable of bewitching those who have once been caught in her snares because her ally is pleasure, which overpowers the mind. Moreover, he was captivated when he was also at the very threshold of old age, with his mind all but past its prime and no longer at its original peak, but having, as it were, grown old together with his body. For just as a child’s mind does not like to suffer pain, so neither does that of an elderly person, and just as children run off with reckless abandon after any activity whatsoever and fail to examine their every inclination – “for youths always act thoughtlessly” as Homer’s line has it – so also the mind of a man goes past its prime.

So then, when Solomon was still young and in the vigor, as it were, of his intellect, he built that renowned temple in Jerusalem and was driven to accomplish things for the glory of God. But when he came to the very end and sunset of his life and was failing in both strength and intellect, Satan at last arranged a trap for him through his wives and carried him away from what was reasonable. Moreover, the fact that the God of all was greatly moved against him and immediately issued a punishment for his offense would readily prove that he was not pulled down into apostasy and brought to the summit of vice on the basis of a revelation he received from God, as Julian contends. For it has been written in Third Kingdoms: “And it came to pass when Solomon had become an old man that his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God as the heart of David his father, and his foreign wives led his heart away after their gods. […] And the Lord said to Solomon, ‘Because these things were with you and you have not kept my commandment and ordinances that I commanded you, tearing, I shall tear the kingdom from your grasp and shall give it to your servant.” And what was it that was commanded to him and all those under the law?

Not to marry [a woman] off to a foreign man. For he says: “You shall not give your daughter to his son and you shall not take his daughter for your son; for she will make your son apostatize from me, and he will be carried off to worshipping other gods.” Solomon, therefore, became forgetful of such a command and used to fall into the embraces of the daughters of foreigners. “Therefore,” [God] states, “because you paid no heed to the commandment I gave and, slipping into apostasy, served the gods of foreigners, and because, even though you knew that the creation is my servant, you have allotted it the honor and glory that are fitting for me and me alone, therefore I shall shatter your kingdom and give it to your servant so that you may learn what you have done from the very outcome that follows.” So then, when did the one who was so grieved [at Solomon’s apostasy] reveal to him that he also ought to worship other gods? For Julian, hunting high and low for an explanation that he finds persuasive, shouldn’t say, “For envy and rivalry don’t even touch the best human beings, much less come close to the angels and gods.” There was no envy, Your Excellency. How could there be? Nor indeed do we assert that it was a result of jealousy that the divine and pure Intellect did not put up with those who have fallen into error and were for some unknown reason eager to worship others, but it was rather the result of guarding the dictum: The rule of many is not good; let there be one ruler, One king.

7. Since, therefore, “envy doesn’t even touch the best men,” as he himself says, it ought to make no difference to earthly rulers if anyone should operate outside the bounds of their kingdom and even more should choose to seize their honors. But in fact, Julian himself was not like this when he held the insignia of empire and would have punished quite bitterly anyone caught in an indictment. Accordingly, that which we are able legally to possess could be acquired by someone else as well, without anyone being envious of him. Jealousy in these cases would be promptly denounced – and quite reasonably so. But when those subject to [God’s] rule have assaulted the very glory of God or even intended to rebel against it, they deserve to be punished without hesitation. And anyone with intelligence would not suppose that the God of the universe takes this course of action with “envy and rivalry” but rather in a most beneficial and necessary manner, lest the truth go unrecognized. For the Savior himself taught that it is life-giving to know blamelessly and without error who the Craftsman and Ruler of the universe is, when he said the following to his Father in heaven: “This is eternal life: that they might know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you sent.” Accordingly, since it is agreed that it is life-giving to have clear knowledge of the one who is by nature truly God, no one should doubt that missing the truth and slipping away from the life-giving service will be filled to the brim with nearly every kind of evil.

7.G Furthermore, I am amazed that he, being himself a worshipper of unclean powers or rather daemons, says, I know not how, that we “fixate upon” them. It seems to me that what was uttered by one of those among the elite ranks of the Greeks applies quite well to each and every situation: … It is difficult, Pamphila, for a free woman to fight with a prostitute. Having no grounds for bringing charges against the manner of life that is by nature good, free, and beyond all defilement, prostitutes wipe the filth of their own reproachable deeds off onto those who are virtuous, letting loose their scurrilous and disgusting tongue against them. This is, I suppose, what His Excellency Julian strives after and indeed has chosen to do. For he exalts his own side while once more railing furiously at the God-breathed scripture and even daring to say, Why do you snack on the teachings of the Greeks if reading your own scriptures is sufficient for you? Indeed, it would be better to bar people from their teachings than from food offered in sacrifice. For the person who partakes of the latter is not harmed, as even Paul says, though the conscience of the brother who sees him might be offended as you, O wisest of all, say. But it is through these teachings that every noble creature nature has produced among you has apostatized from atheism.

Hence, any person who had even a small fraction of natural capacity has very quickly undergone apostasy from your atheism. Therefore, it would be better to bar people from these teachings than from sacrificial victims. However, it seems to me that even you yourselves know the difference in the insight found in your “God-breathed” 80 writings and ours “that belong to the evil one” and you know that no one can become a noble person – or even a decent one for that matter – on the basis of your writings. But, on the basis of ours, every person could gain mastery over himself, even if he were entirely lacking in natural capacity. And if he is naturally inclined and has in addition received education from our writings, he becomes a bona fide gift of the gods to humanity, either by kindling the light of knowledge, or <by establishing>81 a kind of political constitution, or by routing many enemies and traversing many lands and seas and thereby proving he ranks among the heroes. And after other things: There is clear proof of this: Select children from all of you and furnish them with training in the scriptures. If they prove to be morally superior to slaves after reaching manhood, then you should consider me to be speaking nonsense and to be spiteful. Then, you are so unfortunate and mindless that, on the one hand, you regard as divine that literature of yours by which no one could become wiser, braver, or gain mastery over himself, while on the other hand, the literature by which one might gain bravery, prudence, and justice you attribute to Satan and to those who serve Satan.

“Hear, O heaven, and take heed, O earth.” For behold, the mouth of Rabshakeh is again opening wide to attack the glory of God and speaks “injustice up to the height” as it has been written; nor, so it seems, does he consider anything to be better than his endless banter against us. It is true that the God-breathed scripture is sufficient also for the required demonstration that those trained in it are wise, entirely trustworthy, and possess a fully competent understanding. And so, consequently, we stand in no need whatsoever of external teachers. But since “it is sweet to know all,” therefore, we quite reasonably also busy ourselves with the opinions of the Greeks, which they have collected on each subject and, above all else, on God. Having done so, we regard as a cause for laughter those who have chosen to honor myriads of innumerable gods, who venerate the crowd of unclean daemons, which is perhaps unknown even to their own worshippers, and who have in their sacred precincts statues of many shapes and forms, which have been fashioned after the pattern not only of men and women but also of wild beasts, cattle, and creeping things, birds and fish. And I am not even mentioning creation, I mean the sky, the sun, the moon, and the other stars, to which they have assigned the divine and transcendent glory, confusing everything from top to bottom.

We find that those among them who speak about God have written about their own gods the sort of things that merely hearing about would immediately fill a person’s mind with shamefulness and uncleanness. It is, therefore, precisely when we “snack on the teachings of the Greeks,” as Julian says, and then discover that there is great harm therein, that we become still even more amazed at the sacred and divine discourses, I mean the God-breathed scripture. What edifying thing is not stated there? For first – and this is more precious than everything else – anyone can perceive the words of the true vision of God flashing forth within it. But what’s more, they are subtle, precise, and sublime, both lifting the mind of those undergoing initiation beyond everything created, and placing the one, transcendent, and ineffable nature in a realm, so to speak, whose conception surpasses everything that is subject to the judgment of the senses and even everything knowable and intelligible, that is, all visible and invisible creation; and they have preserved quite well for it alone the duty of ruling over everything else, and indeed also its ability for crafting and bringing into existence things that at one time did not exist, as though this were some splendid and exceptional prerogative, or rather its proper and natural dignity, a dignity that does not naturally belong to anything else.

In addition to these things, it next introduces the habits of well-being, and it directs one towards justice with divine and sacred laws, and indeed it also establishes a clear path of all goodness for us.

7. We shall call to mind the holy prophets, who had no share at all in Greek learning and yet were holy, most pleasing to the virtue-loving God, and doers of signs that defy reason. I shall now also turn to Moses the hierophant himself. So then, let [Julian] teach us who is wiser than him – or even slightly comes close? He was in his speech a Hebrew but he was marvelously well-versed in contemplation and in reasoning. “Eupolemus” the historian, for example, when composing books about him, “says” clearly “in his treatise On the Kings in Judea that Moses was the first sage and handed on to the Jews an alphabet,” which was no doubt the one customarily used at that time; “the Phoenicians” obtained this knowledge “from them” since they were also neighbors of the Jews, and they transmitted it to the children of “the Greeks,” when, that is, Cadmus lived among them and taught them the very alphabet. Clement, an eloquent and learned man who investigated the depths of Greek literature like few before him, has given his own version of this story in the Stromateis. Since, therefore, the very knowledge of the alphabet came to the Greeks from the Hebrews through the mediation of Cadmus, Julian – the one who dared to say, “Why do you snack on the teachings of the Greeks if reading of your own scriptures is sufficient for you?”

– ought to lower his raised brow. 7.o Nevertheless, perhaps someone will say the divine scripture’s diction is common, low-brow, and completely banal, while the writ-ings of the Greeks are eloquent, abounding with charm, and furthermore, melodious. In response, then, we say that the writings of the prophets and of Moses were spoken in the Hebrew tongue, and, in order that they might be intelligible to the small and the great, were transformed in a beneficial way into an easy and entirely accessible form of diction. In contrast, if the writings of the Greeks have much grandiloquence and discrimination in sound, they nevertheless have manifestly diverged from what is fitting and have erred from the truth, since they tell myths about so many myriads of gods while being entirely ignorant of the one true God by nature. And someone, if he were sensible, would praise not the person who knows how to be eloquent and is an expert in embellished words, boasting brilliance only in this very skill, but instead the person who might be seen to possess a less well-prepared string of words but nonetheless has the correct view, namely, the view about God the ruler of all, and is not a novice in any good habit but has access to every form of virtue, as easily as riding a horse. Indeed, anyone at all could “gain mastery over himself” on the basis of the God-breathed scripture, and indeed also become useful for bringing edification to others; yet by merely speaking with eloquent words on the basis of Greek learning, he will gain no additional profit at all that would contribute to his being pious and good, a lover of self-control and reverence.

For as I have already often said, I find that their gods despise not a single inordinate action but bypass everything good to seek pleasures pertaining to shamefulness and licentiousness. I will refrain from saying anything further about what sort of person he will be who has learned that the beings he worships are apprehended in all the most shameful of deeds. But if Julian has allotted the requisite victory to the discourses of the Greeks because wittiness is widespread among them but not among us, he owes an explanation to the one who is curious for an answer to the following question: if someone poured hellebore in a golden cup while putting honey in another cup not at all like it but instead made of the cheapest material, and [someone else] then commanded him to drain freely the one that seemed best, would, then, that person, upon looking at the materials [out of which the two cups were made], give the better verdict to the cup that was worse? Or would he rightly condemn the one that by nature caused harm and prefer the beneficial one despite the fact that it came in the cheapest possible cup? But since Julian says it would be better for us to prohibit believers from “Greek teachings” than “from sacrifices,” let him hear in response that while we are accustomed, for good reason, to scare believers off from the eating of sacrifices, we do not prohibit them from becoming conversant with Greek literature.

If someone should want to learn the reason, we say that, since there is only one God in truth, we deem it odious even to know the mere name of the others and we believe it produces all loathsomeness. The all-wise Paul shall teach this as well since he has written: “For we know that there is no God except one and that no idol in the world really exists.” For, if some people think this is a game – or rather, they have even gone mad and become perverted in their mind – and they label “gods” whomever they happened to choose as they see fit and if they, in their error, have erected seated statues in their sanctuaries, we must not likewise join them in their mindlessness, both maintaining and thinking that there might be others who are truly gods besides the one who is by nature Craftsman of the universe. Accordingly, having entirely done away with the existence of the idols we say that there is no such thing as a sacrificial offering; we eat with a pure conscience, ascribing glory to God for having kindly given us the free use of all foods without punishment. But if anyone is weak in these matters and their mind is not yet healthy and robust but supposes that there actually is such a thing as a sacrificial offering, we stand together with the person who does not have a firm footing when it comes to the genuineness of their faith, like certain physical trainers who subject youths to exercise and gradually bring them to a fully developed proficiency in their discipline.

Paul, for example, uses a supremely skillful mode of accommodation when he says: “If I take part with thanks, why am I slandered for that for which I am thankful?” Accordingly, to touch the sacrificial offerings themselves, if someone should happen to do this, will do no harm at all to those established in their faith. For, since the idol does not exist at all, so too there is no such thing as a sacrificial offering. So, busying ourselves with the literature of the Greeks, we praise their turn of phrase and verbal elegance, but we stand aloof from the doctrines in them and incline more towards the holy scriptures; for the beauty of the truth flashes forth in them and they are packed with precise doctrinal knowledge and every form of good advice, which might enable someone immediately to become full of all virtue and quite well distinguished in the boasts arising from good works. And when he afterwards objects and mocks the holy and God-breathed scripture for being written in the Hebrew tongue, one might, I suppose, say to him: “Your Excellency, will you then along with it condemn any other tongues, too, that happen to be estranged from the Greek tongue? And would you surely number along with them your own, which you in fact value so highly (i.e., the language of the Ausonians)?” And yet, would it not be true to say that, if we chose to think rightly and reasonably, we would hardly catalog the Greek language as an invention of <Greek>114 worship, but say that it was one of the tongues divided at a certain point by the ineffable power of God into the clamorous noise of those who had erected the tower reaching to heaven?

For the elite ranks of the Greeks understandably believed that they were the inventors of eloquence and have assigned to themselves the works of [God’s] indescribable power. But the blessed David curses them saying: “May the Lord destroy all the deceptive lips and those who say with a boastful tongue, ‘We shall magnify our tongue, our lips are ours,’” in other words, “We ourselves are the inventors of eloquence.” So then, while tongues are gifts from God and arguably each one has a distinctive beauty, at least when taken on its own terms, we say that the Attic tongue is admirable in sound in comparison to them. But this very fact alone would not help its users become reverent and know the path of good living. Or do you not see those flute-players and cithara-players on the stage, who typically charm with their auspicious words those who love to hear their songs, but who nevertheless often belong to the ranks of miscreants and lead a life liable to criminal charges? Accordingly, someone might praise them on the one hand, since they have attained the zenith of eloquence, but, on the other, it would be reasonable for him to criticize them since they have not attached themselves to excellent pursuits. Children trained in sacred scriptures, however, would straightaway find themselves among those who are most God-beloved of all, even if they are not seen to possess expertise in words.

Yet he says that there is no difference between them and slaves, since they do not possess a fine tongue, presumably positing that obligatory admiration depends on this attribute alone, while disregarding every other virtue through which one might both become a confidant of God and gain honorable possession of the highest glory. Therefore, he ought to explain whether you should admire a talented and very eloquent person even if he is morally disgusting, or rather a good and decent person even if he is not magnificent in speech. We have accordingly been educated in every virtuous habit on the basis of the sacred writings of the God-breathed scripture, and yet we borrow the discourses of the Greeks, making this material a kind of preliminary exercise for the true education, and, since we have not been trained in the language of the Hebrews, we have pressed the Attic tongue into service for the declarations of pious doctrines. For, as I said, this tongue is a gift of God along with the others, and no one would say it is an invention of Greek superstition. For “all wisdom is from the Lord,” as it has been written, and every word comes from him, since he is the giver of both words and their meaning. He also attempts to assist the stupidity of the Greeks in another way when he speaks as follows: Asclepius heals our bodies; the Muses along with Asclepius, Apollo, and the learned Hermes educate our souls; in the sphere of war Ares and Enyo join in the struggle; Hephaestus apportions and distributes skills pertaining to the arts; and all these things Athena the motherless maiden governs along with Zeus.

Consider, therefore, whether we are not better than you in each of these areas, I mean the spheres of the arts, wisdom, and understanding. For [this is true] whether you consider the arts serving some need; or those that are imitative for the sake of beauty, such as statue-making, [and] painting; <or> the administration of the household; [or] the medical art from Asclepius whose oracles are in every land, given to us by the god as a perpetual allotment. Often, at any rate, when I was sick Asclepius healed me by prescribing medicine. And Zeus is my witness in this. If, therefore, we who have dedicated ourselves to the “spirit of apostasy” 126 have a better condition in soul, body, and external matters, why do you reject these things and march over to the other? 127 It is, therefore, clear that, among his gods whom he actually admires, some are doctors by art; others are skilled in the realm of words, just like, to be sure, the best sophists are as well; others teach the business of murder, being both experts at slaughter and practitioners of cruelty; still others are craftsmen and inventors of the artisans’ pursuits; and quite simply each of the aforementioned gods corresponds to what his nature is said to be and since each has been allotted only one activity, they could not, I suppose, be active in the rest.

If so, then how could such beings be gods? Indeed, who would dare to say that the divine lacks any of the best qualities? For it is all-sufficient, all-powerful, and perfect in itself, being complete in respect of each and every thing that would naturally be fitting for the highest nature. Someone therefore could, I suppose, say, “If the son of Coronis is truly a god, why then, good sir, does he not heal the sick and why has he not shown that his own nature is completely sufficient by supplementing it with other functions? But each of the gods is active in a partial way and shows the respective technical knowledge inherent in each of them, since, as I said, some are doctors by art, others, too, are trained in handi-crafts, still others are honorably trained in culture and words and are experts in military tactics. If so, then in what way is human nature inferior to them, or how could our experience fall behind theirs? For there are among us a very great many excellent teachers of the arts and sciences, or rather, to tell the truth, not a few of those among us would be superior even to the very gods of the Greeks, assuming that it is in the realm of possibility for a certain person to have some share of, say, the healing art and yet be famous for military tactics and, furthermore, be illustrious and remain admirable in the other pursuits.

Do we not then have to conclude that the gods are to be given second place to our own ingenuity if they are well-suited to only one thing, while, as I said, one may see all the arts combined collectively in a single human being? 7.G Moreover, Julian contrives yet something else, raising up a kind of insuperable assault tower against the more simpleminded, and he says the plaything of the Greeks is better than the pure worship of the Christians, presenting as proof the fact that there are among them some who are excellent painters, sculptors, and doctors. Well now, tell me, are you not embarrassed to have written these things? So, expert painters and highly skilled stoneworkers can prove that those who are not gods, but rather unclean daemons or even decomposed humans, are really gods! For he seems to me to have forgotten that Asclepius was struck by fire and lightning at Epidaurus, as we said earlier. Perhaps he thinks that there is no Christian either among the excellent doctors or among the supremely eloquent, or among those who know how to distinguish themselves in military tactics. But, Your Excellency, if it was necessary to assign gods to all of life’s pursuits, both in the arts and sciences, as their inventors or even as those obliged to teach them, what size of a crowd would be big enough to cover them all?

For there are so many myriads of activities in this life and kinds of pursuits, going all the way down to the most insignificant of them. Yet someone would surely see the unpleasantness of the Greek doctrines, provided that he has a wise intellect dwelling within him. And Julian admires Asclepius for – to use his own words – “prescribing medicine” for him when he was sick, and he claims that Zeus knows this. Then why has he presented [Zeus] to us as his “witness” for doctors and why doesn’t [Zeus] himself heal the sick instead? Or, perhaps [Zeus] has, along with you, admired the experts because he does not know the [medical] art and perhaps Asclepius has prescribed the medicine just like, I suppose, some run-of-the-mill doctor? And yet, if he is a god, as you say, shouldn’t he rather have released people from sicknesses in a godlike manner, not so much prescribing the same sort of medicine a person might use, but authoritatively ordering the afflicted to be restored? Accordingly, someone would understandably be laughed at for saying that those who are skilled in one of the human arts or pursuits and who have obtained only a limited technical knowledge are gods. Nevertheless, as for us, dear sir, we have worshipped the one true God and claim that he has given to human nature wisdom, understanding, and the use of all speech, and indeed also a nature possessing a capacity for every single praiseworthy thing; and we claim that the sciences and the arts are inventions of the intellect.

Accordingly, it would be reasonable to agree that the Maker is the source and giver of all fair things to us; but this man would carry us away from the truth by distributing each [of them] individually to Ares, Hephaestus, the Muses, learned Hermes, and Asclepius, saying that they have divvied up technical knowledge among themselves like some kind of assignment. As though he had sufficiently proven that the [doctrines] of the Greeks are better than ours because they know how to paint and, indeed, because they have been well-trained in masonry, Julian states, “If, therefore, we who have dedicated ourselves to the ‘spirit of apostasy’ have a better condition in soul, body, and external matters, why do you reject these things and march over to the other?” Lower your brow, Your Excellency! Your bombast on this matter is in vain and you have put forward a laughable objection. But let’s yield for a moment to your arguments and concede that the painters, doctors, and masons among the Greeks are better than those among us; will this suffice for you as proof that the Christians have erred from the truth and do not know the God who is true by nature or the habits of the most excellent life? On the contrary, let him have many fine painters and stoneworkers and doctors; it is to us that the inevitable victory belongs, since we are crowned by truth itself 138 and consequently know the one who is by nature the generator and Lord of all.

But he who wants to keep none of these points in mind continues his questions and says, Why do you neither abide by the Hebraic books nor love the law that God gave them? Instead, having abandoned the ancestral ways and giving yourselves over to what the prophets proclaimed, you apostatized more from their [teaching] than from ours. For, if someone should want to look into the truth about you, he will discover that your impiety is composed of both Jewish audacity 140 and the indifference and vulgarity that exists among the nations. For by drawing not the most beautiful but the inferior from both sides you have woven a fringe of vices. For in fact, when it comes to the Hebrews they have exact regulations around worship and countless holy objects and observances requiring a priestly life and disposition. Yet, although their legislator prohib-ited their serving all the gods but a single one whose “portion is Jacob” and whose “allotted inheritance is Israel,” 142 – saying not only this but also, in my view, adding, “You shall not speak evil of the gods,” 143 – [nonetheless] later generations in their disgracefulness and audacity, wanting to wipe out all the reverence for the multitude [of the gods], imagined that not ministering to the gods entailed blasphemy of them. And indeed, it is this alone that you have drawn from them, since none of the other practices are similar between you and them.

From the innovation of the Hebrews, therefore, you snatched the practice of blaspheming the gods honored <among us>, while from our worship you have abandoned its piety and love for God, along with the reverence simultaneously directed towards every superior nature and devoted to the ancestral ways, and you acquired for yourselves only the practice of eating everything, “as the herbs of grass.” And, if I must speak the truth, you have endeavored to intensify among yourselves the vulgarity that exists among us (this, I suppose, occurs quite naturally in all nations) and you thought that your ways should also accommodate the lives of people of varied character, hucksters, tax-gatherers, dancers. Cyril 7. Notice for me how he has again spoken nonsense at random and heaps up absurd indictments against us, as though he can say everything he wants without being refuted. For he claims that we wandered away from the books of the Hebrews and slighted the law although it had been given by God, while instead we concern ourselves with the proclamations that came through the holy prophets. Let him come forward, therefore, and show that the prophets’ teachings have been put forth in a manner discordant with the writings of Moses. Only then should he accuse us of apostasy and indict us for wandering away from the sacred laws. But, if there is no disagreement at all between them, but rather both the prophets and the writings of Moses say the same things and anyone may see that they everywhere agree with each other, then he should stop unjustifiably persecuting us and that censorious man should instead free from blame and indictment those who have been convicted of nothing whatsoever.

Indeed, one can see the holy prophets using the greatest number of words as they cry out high and low against the people of Israel for advancing to such an extreme arrogance that they even consider as nothing the law delineated for them by Moses and instead have turned to commandments of human teaching. But it is highly unlikely to think that the same persons who criticize certain people for slighting the laws of Moses would be caught doing so themselves. Hence, as I said just now, the prophets and law agree with each other. And since “Christ is the fulfillment of the law” and prophets as the God-breathed scripture states, we have been guided to faith in him on the basis of what has been written about him in both the law and the holy prophets. And indeed, to the present day we continue honoring the prior declaration that came through the law and prophets and sprinting towards the very beauty of the truth by means of the worship rendered in types; and we proceed directly to our goal and have come to know the savior and redeemer of the universe. 7. o But the one who, so it seems, prefers absolutely nothing to his compulsive obsession with faultfinding states, “We shall find the impiety among you composed of both Jewish audacity and Greek vulgarity.” If, then, he supposes it is something admirable to be obsessed with faultfinding and to feel compelled to make groundless accusations at those whom it is doubtless more reasonable to deem worthy of all praise, then I say that he has been quite successful in this endeavor.

But if, on the contrary, he assumes it is a good idea that proofs must in every case accompany any claims someone might make, I am unable to imagine where he got the idea of calling the worship of the Christians “impiety” or in what manner we have become emulators of the “audacity” of the Jews and lovers of the “vulgarity” among the Greeks. “Yes,” he says, “for the regulations among the Hebrews and their precepts are exact, and indeed also require a supremely priestly life. But, because the law prohibits worshipping other gods except one only, you thrust aside and spit upon the duty of living lawfully and you have snatched only the practice of insulting the gods, despite the fact that the law clearly states: ‘You shall not speak evil of the gods.’” When our book has proceeded a bit further we shall clearly display, when we discuss these topics with him, that our life is moreover both lawful and exact, honed to a straight edge, and indeed also filled with all virtue, even if it happens not to be carried out in a Jewish manner by means of the worship rendered in types. Nevertheless, he ought to know that the law, or rather the Lord of the law, enjoins upon the people of Israel to dig up altars and to burn down the sanctuaries along with their seated statues.

He spoke thus in Deuteronomy: These are the ordinances and judgments, which you shall be careful to do in the land that the Lord the God of your fathers gives you as an inheritance all the days that you live upon the earth; you shall destroy with destruction all those places in which the nations there worshipped their gods, those places which you will inherit upon the lofty mountains and upon the coastlands and under the thick forest; you shall utterly destroy their altars and crush their pillars and cut down their sacred groves and burn with fire their carvings of gods, and you shall destroy their name from that place. Tell me, would the one who provoked Israel against altars and sanctu-aries, saying that the gods in them must be burned to ashes, declare about them: “You shall not speak evil of the gods”? And further, is it not right to think that the divine and pure Intellect would never err from what is reasonable and from what is especially befitting him, nor would he ever be caught at variance with himself and legislating contradictory things? Doing so is shameful and ridiculous even among us humans. What, then, would the meaning of this legal command indicate? Or how else should the statement, “You shall not speak evil of the gods,” be properly understood? Since the God over all honored human nature with the appellation “god” – for it has been made according to his image and likeness – the law applies the name “gods” to those who perform the priestly work of divine sacrifices and are greatly exalted on high by digni-ties surpassing others, inasmuch as they possess a life that is entirely good, reverent, and holy, and it crowns them with respect and with the highest honors.

On the basis of the law’s own words, we shall know that my words are not false but rather true and irrefutable by adding what comes next in the verse. For it has been written: “You shall not speak evil of the gods.” And then making clear the meaning of the divine utterance it continues by saying immediately, “You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people.” I maintain that the sentence, “You shall not speak evil of the gods,” refers to this. For how could those who had been commanded to apply fire to the temples and the things in them have restrained their tongue [from speaking evil of the gods], being prevented from doing so because of the sacred utterances? Furthermore, since Julian also deems our indifference to fine dining to be a charge against Christians, it is necessary for us to respond to this point as well. The laws declare exceptional deeds to be worthy of all praise, they highly honored the habits of good behavior, and they have placed the highest value upon those who have chosen to live in an excellent manner; but, on the other hand, they consider every form of badness to be corrupt and make every effort to render those who wish to live immorally more prudent by threatening them with appropriate punishments. Tell me, whom do the laws call to account: those who commit adultery or those who eat?

Whom do the laws regard as liable to punishment? Those who are greedy and disparage others, cheaters, cringing buffoons, and those accustomed to do the worst things of all? Or those whose practice it is to taste fish and meat freely, if it should be the right occasion for doing so? But, you will say, they are irreverent towards the gods, for they defile themselves when they eat. Tell me how this could be? Is, then, the refusal of certain foods sufficient for the purification of a human soul and for the complete well-being that is required, even if it should manifestly not be free from the passions that lead to vice and sacrilege, even if it should lead a life condemned by the verdicts of the law? Who would dare to say this? Wouldn’t he deserve to be laughed at by those who are accustomed to thinking rightly? Next, he owes us an explanation of the following point as well: Who is the Craftsman of the universe, the one who brought into existence animals that dwell on land and animals that swim and dwell in water? For, as for us, we say the Maker of all is the living, active, and subsistent Word of God, and it is apparent that none of the things made by him is capable of causing defilement or is objectionable in its nature insofar as it has come to be by nature what it is.

For it says, “God saw everything that he made, and behold everything was very good.” But they, on the contrary, would probably say the “proximate Craftsman” of the world commanded the gods made by him to fashion in addition the three mortal races; for this seemed to the Greek wise men to be the case. Why then would they have brought such despicable creatures into being and existence at all, creatures which would naturally lead to the genuine defilement of those making contact with them? For they doubtless should have instead prevented the birth of things that would in no way benefit the inhabitants of the earth, but would rather contribute to vice, defilement, and harm. Still more foolish than this is the following: those in fact who busy themselves with the positions of the stars, according to their own thinking and audacious speech, depict in the sky a certain Capricorn and Pisces and other animals, which are held to be loathsome by them and incur their own denunciation because of their extreme impurity. We ourselves, therefore, acting excellently and most sensibly, have placed the highest value upon the duty of living rightly and blamelessly, and we condemn the practice of vice: we regard adultery, sexual immorality, false speech, slander, greed, and additionally the other vices as detestable, knowing that only these things could taint those caught in them. So, we refuse no dishes as profane; laying to rest bodily pleasures by acts of moderation and blunting the goad of the love of the flesh, our custom is to eat little and we say that living luxuriously in no way belongs among the most excellent practices.

Furthermore, Julian thinks it right to liken us to “hucksters, dancers,” and indeed even “tax-gatherers” ignoring the freedom of the Christians’ worship and its meticulous approach towards each and every thing that ought to be done. For it is not the case that we have, in sheer stupidity, consulted the traditions of those accustomed to pointlessly blather and adopted a ridiculous mode of life, but instead, being tutored by divine and sacred laws, we have highly honored the habits of the truly good way of life. And we have called to mind Paul who wrote: “Food will not draw us near to God; we will neither be better off if we eat nor will we lack anything if we do not eat.” And indeed elsewhere he also states: “All food is good and none is to be rejected; for it is made holy through God’s word and prayer.” “Hear and understand” Christ himself, the master and legislator of the universe: “It is not what is brought into the mouth that renders a person unclean, but that which comes out of the mouth that renders a person unclean […] For from the heart come wicked thoughts, murders, adulteries, thefts, acts of sexual immorality. These are the things that render a person unclean.” Perhaps he will also invalidate such statements even though a consideration of necessary concepts supplies a good deal of support to this position.

But he ought to teach us what are the grounds upon which it would be reasonable for him to censure those things that he finds objectionable (I know not how!), even though the common verdict of everyone, as well as their very own nature, testifies to the fact that they are edible and belong in this category of things. I mean something like this: there is a very large number of different kinds of land animals, birds, and sea crea-tures, and nature defines the role that each one plays, since some are useless when it comes to being taken for food while others are good for this purpose. Accordingly, whenever one of these animals that deserves no criticism on the basis of its nature should be censured by them, [these accusers] ought to come forward and state the true grounds for their accusation; otherwise, they should know that, while imputing irrational habits to us, they would themselves be unmasked as suffering from the disease of extreme irrationality.

7. Furthermore, I am amazed that among them there are multitudes of those that appear to be gods (for I wouldn’t call them gods), and they also differ in their mindsets and proceed without a unanimous verdict concerning everything worthy of praise or blame. And anyone might see that they rise up in opposition against each other, so to speak, and that what some of them regard as detestable yet others consider reasonable and acceptable. And yet, wouldn’t everyone, no matter who they are, agree that something truly profane would not be such to some people while being clean to others, even if precision [in such matters] outpaces the human mind? But then if they are gods, as they nonsensically claim, they shouldn’t have erred from what is reasonable or become ignorant of the truth. Why, then, don’t they have a single view on everything, instead of one that is varied and torn asunder, which denounces the stupidity inherent within them? But, perhaps they might say, “We have abstained from every animal and have honored the nonsense of Pythagoras.” We recall also that Empedocles, lacking all sense, has written, I have already been at some time both a girl and a boy Both a bush and a bird, and a glistening fish in the sea. Therefore, if they hold such opinions about themselves it would not be unreasonable to think and to say that they too were perhaps once girls and boys, and fish and birds; and it is, I suppose, an acceptable thing that they were born as ignoble girls, or perhaps even as one of those who dance upon the stage or one of those condemned for banditry who make a habit of doing what is for good people neither right to speak aloud nor in fact safe merely to consider!

So then, the expositor of the doctrines that are, in their eyes, excellent claims that he had been Euphorbus who fought at Troy. But, if it makes them happy, let them pointlessly rhapsodize about which ancient persons or what sort of winged creature or bird they say they were, and let them fill their life with wretched and musty narratives and the most unseemly little fables, which might perhaps also be recounted by nurses anxious to charm restless babies fully to sleep.

7. G Accordingly, as I said, there are a great many among us who have arrived at the pinnacle of every good and have reached such a degree of self-control, rushing forward motivated by their own goodness, that they even sometimes with youthful enthusiasm choose to forego the very things most essential for life, I mean bread, and oil too of course, and choose to tame the inexorable needs of the stomach with vegetables and bitter vetches and to drink mere water and to take such delight in the toils of asceticism that they consider there to be nothing better. And they have not criticized any food but instead take on great suffering in their endeavor, as I said, to cut off from the mind the impulse towards inferior things, to beat down the instincts of the flesh, and to fine-tune the eye of the mind so it can examine what is blameless and in harmony with the sacred laws. By contrast, those caught in the grip of the ignorance of the Greeks, who with utmost folly say to themselves and to others, “Do not grasp, do not taste, do not touch,” plunge themselves into other things that they no doubt should instead be putting far from their mind, assuming that they give any thought at all to true well-being. For, calling sexual activity “the gifts of Aphrodite,” they make every effort to avoid offending the goddess, and indeed also practice the other acts of evil without being called to account, I mean sorcery and mingling with males – and this inside temples with the gods watching!

An examination of the evidence has shown that this was also attempted in our own times. For in the temples of Cronus the temple-wardens have been caught as thieves of marriages between free persons, while the god who is worshipped hunts for women they can violate. O, what tears – and how many – will suffice for the women hunted down! A woman who had been given a dignified upbringing used to be called from the virgins’ chambers into the workshop of licentiousness, since, as they themselves used to say, the god made an oracular utterance and requested unlawful sex. And what is unbearable in these acts and what is the most shameful aspect of all their vices is the following: this crime which is so terrible and is utterly shameful had been honored with such long-established custom and openness that not even the very men who had the legitimacy of their own marriages despoiled thought this fact should be kept secret; for a man was positively glad to send the wife who shared his bed off to commit adultery, while [Cronus], apparently indicting his own nature for being unable to commit bodily acts, was pimping her out to others. For daemons are always loathsome and profane. Would it, then, be reasonable for someone to criticize those who taste pig or have eaten fish, or instead to criticize those who lure women into the net of adultery and do what is inappropriate in the very presence of the statues of the gods?

Julian attempts to accuse the Christians’ worship of being fraudulent in other ways also, having written the following: The fact that not only our contemporaries but even those who in the beginning first received the word from Paul were people such as this is clear from the testimony Paul himself provides when he writes to them. For I do not think he was so shameless as to write to them about their many disgraceful deeds without being aware of what those very people had done. Mentioning these things ought to have him feeling embarrassed, even if he wrote so many praises of them, and even if they happened to be true; but if these praises were false fabrications, he ought to have slunk away, escaping the appearance of making his appeal with lascivious adulation and servile flattery. This is what Paul writes to his auditors about themselves: “Do not be deceived: neither idolaters nor adulterers nor effeminates nor those who lie with men nor thieves nor greedy people nor drunkards nor slanderers nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God. And, brothers, you are not unfamiliar with these things because you too used to be like this; but you washed yourselves, you were consecrated in the name of Jesus Christ.” You see that he states that they were these sorts of people, but that they were consecrated and washed themselves, having obtained water which penetrates as far as the soul, sufficient to wash and purify them!

And baptism does not remove leprosy from the leper nor blight nor pimples nor warts nor gout nor dysentery nor dropsy nor whitlow, and neither small nor great bodily faults. So, will it then remove adulteries and robberies and quite simply all the unlawful acts of the soul? 184 My noble sir, Paul was not accustomed to practicing adulation or flattery, since he was a minister of the truth. And, moreover, those who accepted the word of faith and received him as an initiator and mystagogue used to be idolaters and servants of wicked daemons, as well as unholy and loathsome in their habits, and they used to succumb to every pleasure – fornicators and those who lie with men, effeminates, alco-holics, and practitioners of quite simply every form of wickedness. For it was not possible for them to appear holy and consecrated – those who, in following their own gods, have opened themselves to every kind of accusation lest they should appear better than the ones they worshipped by their zeal to live in a self-controlled and virtuous manner and by their eagerness to outrun every fault! Therefore, Your Excellency, so long as they were servants of your gods, the wretches continued to wallow about like pigs in the mud of sin. However, once they departed from the daemonic error and dispelled the darkness of deception from their mind, and once they had been enriched with the light of the true vision of God and had come to know the sovereign Emperor and Lord of the universe (namely Christ), only then, at that time, did they wash off all their filth and opt for what is entirely praiseworthy instead of what is more disgraceful, and only then were they called to the holy life in Christ, namely the evangelical life.

Since the all-wise Paul, therefore, was an “apostle to the nations,” catching many in the net of faith and extri-cating them from the snare of the devil, he used to regard this as a lesson essential to their benefit, namely that one must make virtue an accompaniment to faith and must reject error along with the conduct that comes with it, I mean sexual immorality, adultery, mingling with males, and the other vices. He quite rightly affirmed that in this way the kingdom of heaven would be accessible to them. 7. o Furthermore, if Julian thinks one must bring a baseless accusation against our Lord Jesus Christ for accepting wicked people and idolaters, he ought to explain to an inquisitive person whether they must remain unshakably rooted in their vices and in no way be manifestly better by coming back from such reproachable habits, or should choose to think in a better way and attempt with all their strength to attain the entirely good life. Well, someone would, I think, say that it was doubtless better for them to let go of shameful deeds and treat vices as worthless, and to shift to a better course and cultivate the life in Christ that is worth imitating. Why then does he accuse Christ for saving those who were ruined and, extending his saving hand to them, raising them up when they lay in the dust, healing them when they were sick, and bestowing freedom from the passions in their heart?

For he said, “I did not come to call the just but sinners to repentance.” And again: “The healthy have no need of a doctor but those who are faring poorly.” For whom would it be appropriate for practitioners of medical expertise to heal, those who are ill or those who are free from sickness? And whom in the cities or country districts do the best generals usually free, those already caught and put in the status of captives or those surrounded by walls who have not yet become the victim of barbaric cruelty? For whom would the required washing be appropriate: those who are defiled, or if not them, would he say it is appropriate for those who are clean? And yet how would someone not rightly be mocked unless he says that such assistance is more appropriate for those who have suffered, not for those unacquainted with suffering? Why indeed, therefore, does he dare, as I said, to accuse the gentleness of our savior and indict him for loving humanity? He released those on earth from sick-nesses, freed them from sufferings, rescued them from the devil’s tyranny, and rendered those who were extraordinarily filthy pure and scrubbed clean. Honor him with odes of thanksgiving and make the words of the prophet Habakkuk your own: “Lord, I heard your message and was afraid; Lord, I contemplated your works and was astounded.”

Nevertheless, Julian the wise takes as a pretext for mockery those things in which it would be better and more reasonable to take delight. Completely ignorant of the power of holy baptism, he sarcastically mocks the most venerable matters and says believers in Christ have been scrubbed clean once they obtained “water sufficient to wash.” He adds to these comments certain other insipid old wives’ tales. For he says that the water of baptism is entirely useless for those with bodily illnesses and that we nonsensically think and say that it releases us from the filth residing in souls. But I would say, Your Excellency, saving baptism is certainly by no means taken by us as a healing of bodily sufferings, nor indeed does the mystery of Christ extend as far as matters that are perceptible and visible as you suppose and deem it right to think, but the account of it is quite subtle and deep and cannot be apprehended by the minds of those who are in error. And so, for instance, the prophet Isaiah says, “If you do not believe, neither shall you understand.” For faith is the beginning of understanding and our divine and venerable mystery has this as its entryway. Therefore, to avoid betraying what is hidden to the ears of the uninitiated and so offend Christ who says, “Do not give sacred things to dogs nor cast your pearls before swine,” I shall pass by the deeper things and now turn myself instead to those topics that will allow us to see that our enemy, who loves criticizing us more than knowing the truth, is stuttering about at random.

It is not the bartering away of bodily sufferings that is promised by saving baptism. Hence, you should not be too surprised if it does not accomplish this. For, when we take into account his indescribable and supernatural power, we shall, without any difficulty and with nothing standing in our way, realize that, when Christ assents, the water will be sufficient for us even for this purpose. For is there any exceedingly marvelous thing that has not come to pass by his doing? What kind of divine sign has he not displayed? For by his all-powerful nod he made lepers clean, those suffering from dropsy he used to set free from this evil, and by his mere will he made the one maimed in both feet sound in limb and quite capable of running; for he leapt forth like a deer. He ordered the blind man to wash his eyes in the waters of Siloam; when he did this, an unfamiliar light flashed in him and the deep darkness of his eyes was taken away. Given that he effortlessly accomplished such exceptional deeds and instils his own efficacious power into the water itself, how could he not have displayed the grace that comes through holy baptism to be more powerful even than every bodily illness? Nevertheless, we maintain the grace [of baptism] has been given to us for other purposes.

For, after first removing from our minds the darkness of Greek stupidity, saying farewell to the herds of daemons, and with great wisdom spitting upon all their pomp and worship, we then open the intelligible eye of our heart to the light of truth, come to know the one who is truly and by nature the generator, sovereign Lord, and God of the universe, and finally confess our faith in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And as though coming to the beginning of another life and embarking upon the paths of true piety, we are justified as Christ gives an approving nod. For through him the Father is gracious to us. And, since the lawgiver justifies and releases us from every indictment, remitting the punishment for our transgressions, and furthermore since he sanctifies us intellectually through the Holy Spirit and transforms us – in a manner that he himself knows – into “newness of life,” which is both self-controlled and virtuous, I could not tell you “who is the one who still condemns” or what sort of dirt is still upon us. I might have said many other true things on this topic as well, confirming that the mystery was rendered beforehand in types by Moses and the prophets and is not something new, or something invented by us that has only just now appeared, except I was afraid, as I already mentioned, of the ears of the uninitiated.

For those things that most people have a hard time understanding nearly always tend to be mocked because they do not admit the impotence of their own mind. And they deem worthless those things that it would have been better to regard as worthy of all admiration, just as this most excellent man undoubtedly does as well. For when considering the extent of the mystery, he limits it merely to the sight of the water, although John expressly and clearly says to those who came for the baptism of repentance: “I baptize you with water, but the one who is stronger than me is coming after me, and I am not worthy to carry his sandals; that one will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” For he is comparing to fire, I think, the power of the Holy Spirit and the cleansing activity he accomplishes within us. For just as fire, when it comes into contact with those vessels made from silver, melts down the filth clinging to them, in this same way, I believe, the power of the divine Spirit also frees us from every stain by licking at our souls like a fire – intellectually, that is, and in a manner befitting God. As though he were reversing the nature of our situation to its complete opposite, Julian says that those who have been caught in Christ’s net by faith in him and carried to the knowledge and worship of the one God who truly exists, are like captive slaves who depart from their masters’ home and, greatly vexed at the yoke of slavery, suppose that running away will prove to be beneficial to them or, failing in that expectation, that nothing worse than what they’ve had can result for them.

But I would say in response that it is more fitting to liken them to domestic slaves who thought little of showing affection for their master, and indeed even rushed with complete abandon into apostasy and had an untimely thirst for an unlawful freedom. Then, having been caught in dreadful and inescapable evils and being punished with unceasing horrors, they fell without warning into bitter poverty, were oppressed by the lack of life’s necessities, and were compelled to work for others as menial servants. But finally and with much difficulty, they settle on a better plan and come once again to prefer their original condition and run back to their first master who is good. Or isn’t it true to say that the only true God by nature is the generator and Lord of the universe?

7. Therefore, when it comes to those who worship daemons, if in fact they should choose to repent, the reasonable view would be to regard them not like people who have abandoned their own masters, but as those who have submitted themselves to God the master of all and been led to do so by the brightest expectations. For the gift of adoption is presented to them as a promise and they expect to obtain even the resurrection from the dead in Christ. But the enemy of truth mocks this most of all, in addition to everything else, as if it were impossible for the God who is all-powerful also to render superior to death that which, according to its own nature, is subject to the principle of corruption. And this, despite the fact that Plato clearly depicted the Craftsman of the world saying to certain “gods of gods” that, though they are “not immortal” nor indeed “altogether indissoluble,” they will not be dissolved thanks to his will. And in addition, Plato has written that a certain Er of the Armenians returned to life although he was utterly destroyed and defeated by death. For, perhaps it seemed to him, too, that the principle of the resurrection of the dead is correct and should be accepted as true. For the one who brought humanity into existence in the beginning, although it at one time did not exist, could easily give life to the one suffering dissolution from death.

Indeed, to bring something into existence from nonexistence and to restore that which had fallen into corruption back to its original state would, I think, be the product of the same activity and a clear demonstration of it; or perhaps, to keep to precise and correct reasoning, the second would be inferior to the first. For I suppose it is a greater thing to bring into existence that which at one time did not exist than to restore again to its original state that which was already brought forth and had endured something unexpected. Since the one who is beyond every intellect is life and life-giving according to his nature, it certainly must in every way follow that there is nothing preventing him from transmitting life to certain people if he wants, since his activity is irresistible. But if some people disbelieve, since this marvel is beyond reason and is accomplished in some way that our minds cannot comprehend, they ought not overlook the fact that they will have this same experience in many other cases as well. For it is not possible to say how each of the created things, both the perceptible and the intelligible, or rather the visible and the invisible, have come to be; instead, it is appropriate that those things that leap beyond the limit of our minds should be honored with faith, at least among those who are truly sensible.

Book 8 8. Although the clever Julian undertakes a war against the ineffable glory and lets loose the arrows of his own understanding against matters that transcend [our] intellect, nonetheless they all miss the target. For he lies and boasts and makes mention of the God-breathed scripture, pretending indeed to know what is in it, but he is exposed as in fact understanding nothing at all, as an examination of the actual facts would demonstrate for us. For those who have recently been gathered together into “a holy people” by their faith in Christ and who are also doers of good works and experts in radiant and admirable pursuits, these he has called defiled, extremely disgusting, pitiable, disreputable, good for nothing, and every other term of abuse like this! Moreover, as if this tirade against us was not enough, in still other ways too he tries to prove that we do not realize just how demented we are, nor indeed do we know how to walk straight down the path of truth, but that we, so to speak, jump off the highway, disregarding the commandment delivered through Moses – and this entirely – and diverging from the views of Moses and the holy prophets who came after him. So he again writes as follows: Now since [the Galileans] say that, although they are at variance with present-day Jews, they are nonetheless, to be precise, Israelites in accordance with their prophets and are persuaded by Moses most of all, as well as by the prophets in Judea who came after him, let us see in what respect they especially agree with them.

It is necessary for us to begin with the writings of Moses, who, they say, proclaimed in advance the future birth of Jesus.

8. So then, Moses, not once or twice or three times, but many times, deemed it right to honor one God only, whom he also in fact names “God over all,” 8 and nowhere did he deem it right to honor another God. Moreover, he mentions angels and lords and indeed many gods as well. So he had a notion of the first God who is preeminent, but not of another second god, either “like” or “unlike” the first, such as you have concocted to add to him. And if there is somewhere among you a single word from Moses on this matter, you are obli-gated to bring it forward. For the passage that reads, “The Lord our God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers. You shall listen to him,” 11 certainly does not refer to the one born from Mary. And even if someone were, for your sake, to concede that the passage actually is about him, still Moses says he will be like himself and not like God, a prophet born from humans, just as he was, not from God. And the passage “A ruler from Judah will not be wanting nor a leader from his thighs” 12 is certainly not said about him, but about David’s kingdom, which actually manifestly ended with King Zedekiah. And in fact the scripture exists in two versions: “until there comes what is reserved for him” and your own falsification of it that reads “until the one for whom it is reserved comes.”

14 It is obvious that none of these passages apply to Jesus. For he is not even from Judah – how could he be when, according to you, he came not from Joseph but from the Holy Spirit? For in recounting Joseph’s genealogy you trace it back to Judah, and even this you were unable to fabricate well. For when it comes to his genealogy, Matthew and Luke are refuted because they contradict one another. Well now, the fact that we who have been justified through faith in Christ are truly Israelites is shown by Paul, who was himself learned in the law and wrote, “For not all of those who are from Israel are Israel, nor are they Abraham’s children because they are his offspring. […] Rather, the children of the promise are regarded as Abraham’s offspring.” And in keeping with the promise, we ourselves are children of our forefather Abraham, inasmuch as we follow in the footsteps of his faith. So then, given that these children of the promise and they alone would be counted as Abraham’s offspring, it follows that it would be appropriate that we too should unambiguously and truly be Israelites and be called such. Moreover, when it comes to the question of whether the Christians’ theological doctrines agree with those of Moses as well as those of the holy prophets, anyone who wishes to do so can, without any effort at all, see that this is true.

For we draw from that source, as if it were a spring, knowledge that carries us off to each and every excellent thing. Accordingly, this is what the God of the universe himself has also expressly promised to us, saying through the voice of Isaiah, “You shall draw water with rejoicing from the springs of salvation.” For he likens to life-giving water the sacred and divine word, which is poured forth by the springs of salvation, that is, by Moses and the prophets, as well as by the apostles and evangelists. One should, therefore, be able to see that we have never stood opposed either to Moses’ doctrines or to those of the holy prophets. For, as I said, we regard them as instructors who offer us lessons in the doctrinal and ethical knowledge that leads to piety. Furthermore, as for the fact that Moses affirmed and has made manifest even to us that there exists one true God by nature, the Craftsman and Lord of things seen and unseen, this is something that no one could deny. For Moses portrayed him as clearly saying, “There shall be no other gods for you but me.” And once more, “You shall not make for yourself an idol or an image of anything whatsoever, whether those things in the heaven above, or in the earth below, or in the waters beneath the earth.”

Furthermore, through the voice of the prophets he says the following, “You shall say to them, ‘Let the gods who did not make the heaven and the earth perish from the earth and from under this heaven.’” Additionally, “You shall know no God besides me, and there is no one who saves except me.” Moreover, the divine David at one point sings, “All the gods of the nations are daemons, but the Lord made the heavens.” Hence, because we follow the words decreed exceedingly well through Moses, along with the prophetic proclamations, we confess that he who is truly God by nature is one. And in addition to this, we know and believe without any doubt that “all the gods of the nations are daemons.” On what point then do we differ from these holy men? Or in what way do we rise up in opposition to their views, as though we thought or said something else? Let him come forward! Let him show us! This clever adversary of ours who denounces the truth should not inundate us with baseless claims. I am astonished that although Julian insists that the most excellent Moses “not once” but “many times” knows and indeed also confesses one God and no other at all besides him, he nevertheless dares <to say>27 – how I do not know – that Moses mentions “lords” and “angels” and indeed also “many gods” and says that the first God is “preeminent” in comparison with the others.

Yet for the purpose of doing away with the other gods, it will not suffice for the first God merely to surpass them. Rather, only if he himself is said to be and really is one by nature would it then follow that no one else is truly God along with him.

8. Why, then, does Julian distort the Mosaic writings, despite the fact that Moses clearly says, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one”? For Moses did not hold that it is right to think and say the one God over all is “preeminent” in comparison with others, but instead knew that, thanks to his incomparable superiority, he is lifted up on high in an intelligible sense, is beyond every intelligible thing, and is self-originate and alone ungenerated. Therefore, given that the Lord God is one and alone, how and on what grounds could anyone doubt that, even if some beings should be called “gods” and “lords” [by Moses], they have been dignified with a bare title, belonging as they do to another nature besides his own, a subservient nature, that is, which at one point did not exist and has been moved by him into existence? For example, the God of the universe bestows this property even upon us when he says, “I said, ‘You are gods and are all sons of the Most High.’” Does this mean that we who have received this honor and have been called “gods” as a gift from his kindness should ignore the finitude of our own nature? Hardly! For we regard being wise as a serious matter worthy of attention. 8.G Now in due time, once our discussion of these topics has advanced a little further, we will show in turn that, even if Moses should speak of one God (that is, the Father), he certainly confesses along with him God the Word, who is from him and in him and is the Father’s own Word, that is, the Son who eternally exists with him, subsists with him outside of time, and is worshipped along with him, and indeed that Moses also confesses the Holy Spirit (although we have already laid out extensive arguments against Julian on this very topic).

For it is not in fact true, as Julian claims, that we have “concocted ” some new innovation and have added our own unexamined ideas to the words that came through the all-wise Moses; rather, we hold the Mosaic writings to be our measuring rod and plumb line. Moreover, he busies himself with Christ’s birth and picks apart the law of the all-wise Moses (for he adamantly maintains – how I do not know – that he does not speak about these topics); therefore, he ought to learn from us that the aim of Moses’ treatise is directed towards the mystery of Christ and that Moses has written about Christ in many places. Aware of this fact, the divine Paul said, “For Christ is the fulfillment of the law” and the prophets. And Christ himself should suffice on this point, since he cried out to the Jewish crowds, “If you believed Moses, you would believe me. For he wrote about me.”

8. Come then, although it would be possible to introduce an abundance of true testimonies – and this without any effort – let us pass over all the others and put to the test those passages he has raised, and thus let us show that he is spreading lies on this matter too. The hierophant Moses said to those descended from Israel, “The Lord your God will raise up from among your brothers a prophet like me. You shall listen to him in all matters that you asked from the Lord your God in Choreb on the day of the assembly, when you said, ‘We shall not continue to hear the voice of our God and we shall no longer see this great fire, and we shall not die,’ and the Lord said to me, ‘They are right in all that they have said; I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers and I will place my speech in his mouth and he will speak to them just as I have commanded him. And a person who does not listen to everything that prophet shall say in my name, I will exact vengeance from him.’” Observe, therefore, how well the mystery of Christ was signified at just the right time. For the God of the universe came down in the form of fire on Mount Sinai, and “a loud sound of the trumpet rang out,” as it is written, but those looking on could not approach the sight and the din of the trumpets was impossible to bear.

Hence, having been overcome by an oppressive dread, they cried out, “We shall no longer see this great fire, and we shall no longer hear the voice of the Lord our God.” For since they were coming out of the Greeks’ stupidity, they thought that the God of the universe is the perceptible fire visible to us and that they were hearing a voice coming from it. But much later and with difficulty they began to learn that, being slow-minded and dense, they were actually ignorant of the truth, as Christ says to them about God the Father, “You have never heard his voice nor seen his form.”

8. Therefore, since those at that time who were undergoing an elementary education could not approach the sight of those things molded to convey God’s glory, then subsequently the manner of the only-begotten’s incarnation needed to be proclaimed in advance. For it was not otherwise possible for him, being God by nature, to live together with those on earth, unless he became a human, appearing in our state while remaining God. For the divine and supreme nature, which surpasses all things, boasts the properties of eternal steadfastness and immutability. Furthermore, he was called a prophet, although he was the master of the prophets. For it was necessary, yes necessary indeed, that, having descended into self-emptying and having assumed human finitude, he should not regard human experiences as contemptible. And prophecy is something entirely in keeping with human limitations while also reck-oned as one of its highest privileges. Nevertheless, Julian says, “it clearly does not refer to the one born from Mary. And even if someone were, for your sake, to concede that the passage actually is about him, still Moses says he will be like himself and not like God, a prophet born from humans, just as he was, not from God.” Now as for the fact that the Son is God and from God according to nature, this we will discuss shortly. But since Julian says these words were not written about the one born from Mary, let him point out for us another person who corresponds to Moses, and not just in terms of the features that he might prefer, since he is utterly ignorant of the truth.

For Julian imagines that the one foretold will be raised up like Moses solely in the sense that he was a prophet and a human, but he has missed the truth entirely. For one could immediately reply, “But many prophets came after Moses who were human like he was. So then, which one did he have in mind when he spoke these words?” We, therefore, have no choice but to understand the phrase “like me” in terms of multiple features. Come, then, yes come, and let us make every effort to articulate clearly the import of the prophecy about him by comparing Moses’ ministry, as far as we can, with the Savior’s economy.

8. Moses set free those descended from Israel, who were weighed down by an unbearable slavery, and he led them through the midst of the sea while those who formerly ruled over them drowned in it; he nour-ished them in the wilderness as the manna came down; he commended them to God, became a mediator between God and humans, and was an executant of the law, attuning the people exceedingly well to their various moral duties. One must move on from here, as if from a type and a shadow, to the very beauty of the truth. In his greed, Satan ruled like a tyrant over us and bound the human race to the yokes of sin. And there was no one in all the world without some experience of his perversity; consequently, he was supercilious, thought highly of himself, and, with no sense of moderation, acted defiantly against everyone’s weakness, saying, “With my hand I will take the entire world like a nest and I will seize it like abandoned eggs, and there is no one who will escape me or speak against me.” But his blustering in this undertaking was in vain. For he supposed that no one would speak out against his ravaging of the earth and that it would be easy, as it were, to place beneath his own feet the realm lying under heaven. But the wretch was foiled in his hope.

For Christ has spoken out and risen up against him; he has rescued us from Satan’s snares; he has brought us out from our intellectual slavery and taken those who were stuck in the swamps of sin and placed them out of the reach of the evil one; he has led us across the Jordan; he is the one who comes to destroy the enemies intent on persecuting those determined to live well and who brings to life and saves those subject to God who are eager to set their minds on what pleases him. He has given us, not manna perceptible by the senses, but rather himself as food that is really holy and life-giving and entirely pure. Moreover, through him we have been brought to God the Father, and he has become a mediator between God and humans. In addition to these things, the laws he has ordained no longer consist in types and shadows but are instead the best means of attaining the most excellent life of all. Hence, while the law indeed has within it the “form of truth,” the truth itself has finally shone forth. 8.o Consider, moreover, the fact that Moses was not unaware that the only-begotten Word of God would become human and ordain for those on earth laws that were incomparably better than the ancient commandment. For although he wrote the following about those laws decreed through himself, “It is not possible to add to them and it is not possible to take away from them,” nevertheless when Moses considers the preeminence of the only-begotten’s lordly honors and the loftiness of his glory and the greatness of his divinely fitting authority, he exhorts the people by saying, “You shall listen to him in all matters that he might speak to you.”

“For,” Moses is saying, “even if it should happen that God himself resolves to issue laws that would actually render otiose the commandment that came through my ministry, we should take no account of this fact; let him legislate with authority, for he is God and master, and it is only reasonable that issuing the required laws is a task appropriate for him and him alone.” Furthermore, lest Moses should appear to be all alone in bringing forward the prophecy about him in this passage, the Father himself has ratified it too. He makes clear that Moses spoke most excellently by saying, “He is right in all that he has said; I will raise up for them a prophet like you from the midst of his brothers, and I will place my speech in his mouth and he will speak to them everything I have commanded him.” What is the point of these words, dear sir? For in fact no intelligent person would say God gave his speech to all the holy prophets who brought his words down from above and clearly said, “Thus says the Lord.” What then might God be intending to indicate about this person when he says, “I will place my speech in his mouth”? In this you should recognize, good sir, our Savior’s preeminent status over all. For while the divine prophets, considering their ministry to be precisely that of a servant, used to say, “Thus says the Lord,” this person does not do so.

Why? Because he himself is the Lord. He, in contrast, used his Father’s words for each undertaking, for example in saying to the leper, “I am willing; be cleansed,” and in commanding that those who had died be restored to life; for he says, “Young man, I say to you, rise,” and “Lazarus, come forth.” Moreover, rebuking the creation and restraining the gusts of the savage wind, he calmed the raging sea by a voice and speech that was especially appropriate for one who is God. For he said, “Silence! Be quiet!” This, I think, is what is meant by “I will place my speech in his mouth.” For as the all-wise Paul writes, “He sustains all things by the speech of his power,” that is, the Father’s power. This indeed above all shows plainly that the import of the prediction is directed not at one of the prophets, but clearly at the one who, on the one hand, was, with respect to his nature, ineffably generated as God from God the Father, and who, on the other hand, also did not disdain the fleshly birth from the holy virgin. Furthermore, Julian again imposes what is arguably his own idiosyncratic and untested opinion upon the passage “A ruler from Judah will not be wanting nor a leader from his thighs until the one for whom it is reserved comes” – or “what is reserved for him” – “and he will be the expectation of nations”; for he claims that these words were written not about Christ, the Savior of us all, “but about David’s kingdom, which in fact,” he says, “ended with King Zedekiah.”

Now, I myself would also say that the prophetic statement made in this passage recalls for us those from the tribe of Judah who ruled over Israel. However, someone should realize from what follows that Julian is lying when he claims David’s kingdom “ended with Zedekiah.” For Saul was the first to have ruled. Then, after a long time had passed, the trappings of rulership arrived at Zedekiah. And when Jerusalem fell and the country of the Jews had been ravaged as a result of an invasion of the Babylonians, Israel was carried off captive, along with its king, I mean Zedekiah. But once seventy years had passed, God, through Cyrus, freed them from their captivity. When they were brought back to their country and were once again zealous to be instructed in the law that came through Moses, then, yes then, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel from the tribe of Judah received the scepter among them. How, then, can he say that David’s kingdom “ended with Zedekiah,” when, as I said, after the period of captivity, Zerubbabel, who was from the tribe of Judah and David, was established on the royal seat and passed on the scepter through those who succeeded him all the way to the kingdom of Herod whose mother was Jewish, though his father was a foreigner? For, when those from the tribe of Judah who had been allotted to rule came to an end in this way, Christ was born, and he also became the expectation of the nations, since they too have been called through faith.

And this was also what was said about them through the voice of Jesus Christ, the Savior of us all: “And I have other sheep, who are not from this fold. I must bring them too, and there will be one flock, one shepherd.” Consequently, Jesus Christ our Lord was born, as I said, when the kings from Judah had completely come to an end, and he became the hope of nations, since this was “reserved for him.” For they were called in not through one of the holy prophets, nor indeed through the all-wise Moses, nor through any other person whatsoever; instead, the rightful rule, no longer over only Judea but rather over all the nations, was, as I said, “reserved for him.” For at one point the prophet Zechariah also said about him, “And there will be one Lord and his name will be one, encompassing the whole earth.” And at one point David too sings, “The Lord became king; let the earth rejoice!” But our clever debater says once again: “It is obvious that none of these passages apply to Jesus. For he is not even from Judah – how could he be when according to you he came not from Joseph but from the Holy Spirit?” It is true that anyone at all who is intelligent will, I think, say that his immaculate body was not from Joseph but was fashioned through the Holy Spirit.

But, even so, he was also from the tribe of Judah and from the bloodline of David, since he was, according to the flesh, born from the holy virgin and was publicly registered with Joseph as his father. Moreover, they both belonged to the tribe of Judah, from which Jesse and David came. Julian will, however, probably say, “You could not demonstrate that the virgin who bore him was from the bloodline of David or from the tribe of Judah.” In that case, you will have to learn what the sacred writings say about this topic. The Israelites did not practice the custom of taking a woman from whatever tribe one might choose into one’s home for the purpose of marital union; rather, even those who did not want to do so had to take for themselves women from their own tribe. And this custom was strengthened by the divine law. For the following is written in the book called Numbers (this is one of the books of the all-wise Moses): “And Moses commanded the sons of Israel through an ordinance of the Lord, saying, ‘This is the word that the Lord instructed for the daughters of Salpaad, saying, “Let them be wives of whomever is pleased with them; except let them be wives from their father’s people, and an inheritance for the sons of Israel shall not rotate from tribe to tribe, since the sons of Israel shall stick together, each one in the inheritance of his paternal tribe.

And as for every daughter who as next of kin receives an inheritance from the tribes of the sons of Israel, let them be wives for one who is from her father’s people, in order that the sons of Israel, each of them, might be entitled as next of kin to his paternal inheritance.”’” Surely you think it a good idea now to concede, even on the basis of this very law, that they both – Joseph and the virgin – were from one tribe, the tribe of Judah, I mean, and of David? Julian, however, says Joseph was “not from Judah” and “sets aside” the examination [of this claim]. Accordingly, I will discuss these issues with him too at the proper time.

8. Julian nevertheless pursues his argument to such a degree of insolence that he even dares to overthrow, as much as he possibly can, the manner of the only-begotten’s incarnation and even the existence of the Word himself. For he says the hierophant Moses, along with the holy prophets who came after him, recognized only one God, the Father, and numbered with him absolutely no one else. And he writes as follows: Nevertheless, since I am going to examine closely the truth of this matter in my second book, I am setting it aside. But for now let it also be granted that he is “a ruler from Judah,” 80 not “God from God,” 81 as the saying among you goes, nor is it the case that “all things came to be through him and without him not one thing came to be.” Rather, it was also said in the book of Numbers, “A star from Jacob will arise and a man from Israel.” It is surely obvious that this applies to David and to those who came from him. For David was the child of Jesse. If, therefore, you are going to try to infer something from these writings, point out just one supporting passage, drawing it from the same source from which I have drawn so many. But Moses says in Deuteronomy that he acknowledged one God, the God of Israel: “So that you know that the Lord your God, he is one, and there is no other besides him.”

Additionally he also says, “And you shall bear in your mind that the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above and on the earth below, and there is no other besides him.” And again: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.” And again: “See that I am he, and there is no God besides me.” So, then, these are the words of Moses, who maintained that there is only one God. 8.G Nevertheless, perhaps these people 89 will reply, “But we do not say that there are two or three gods.” I will prove that they do say this as well, intro-ducing as a witness John who says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” You see that he is said to be “with God”; whether this is the one born from Mary or someone else – so that I may answer Photinus 92 too at the same time – makes no difference at present. I leave that fight to you. Indeed, the fact that he says “with God” and “in the beginning” is sufficient evidence. How, then, do these words agree with those of Moses? Nevertheless, he says, it does agree with the words of Isaiah. For Isaiah says, “Behold, the virgin will conceive and will bear a son.” Let it be granted that this too is said about Jesus, even though it by no means was.

For a married woman who had lain with her husband was not a virgin even before she had conceived. But let it be granted that this was said about him. Isaiah doesn’t actually say, does he, that God will be born from the virgin – since you do not cease calling Mary “God-bearer”? Nor does he actually say, does he, that the one born from the virgin will be the only-begotten Son of God and “firstborn of all creation”? But as for what was said by John – “All things came to be through him and without him not one thing came to be” – is anyone able to prove that this is in the prophetic utterances? But listen to the series of passages we are highlighting from those same books: “Lord, our God, take possession of us. We know no other besides you.” And the king Hezekiah too has been portrayed by them as praying, “Lord, God of Israel who sits upon the cherubim, you alone are God.” He doesn’t leave any room for a second God, does he? 100 Now as for the passage that says “a ruler from Judah will not be wanting nor a leader from his thighs until the one for whom it is reserved comes,” I have, I believe, already said enough about the fact that it must be regarded as suitable and appropriate especially for Christ.

8. But, since Julian touches upon another prophecy as well – I mean the one that was delivered through Balaam, who said, “A star will arise from Jacob and a man from Israel and he will shatter the rulers of Moab and he will plunder the sons of Seth. And Edom will be his inheritance” – and indeed since Julian says such words must also be connected to David or to those who ruled over Israel at various times, he should realize that once again he is attempting to uncouple something that seems right to everyone and is viewed as correct by people who are not ignorant of the God-breathed scripture. For those who were kings over Israel did not rule over the so-called nations, but rather were continuously being attacked and attacking, and were a band of irreconcilable brothers at odds with one another on every occasion. And we could look at this in another way as well: if, as he says, the import of the prophecy calls to mind David or the other kings, shouldn’t he have instead said, “stars shall arise from Jacob and leaders from Israel”? Yet the prophecy has in view one person who has been singled out, who is, as it were, preeminent among the stars, and clearly this is Christ, who arose from Jacob or from Israel according to the flesh. To produce a great many more arguments in addition to these would not be difficult, but for now I will refrain from doing so and will reserve the fuller account for the appropriate occasion.

But since, as I said previously, he dares to overthrow entirely the Son’s ineffable birth from God the Father and indeed also says that the Son neither exists at all nor is he God, and since, in addition to this, he derides the manner of the incarnation as well, it seems that I have no choice but to muster the doctrines of piety and wrestle vigorously with his argument on both fronts. So then, to begin with, the former topic should be subjected to examination. For I think it is necessary first to prove clearly that the Word is God and is from God. Then, next in turn, it remains to establish from the holy and God-breathed scripture that the Word became human, without trading away the existence that he had (for he is unchangeable and immutable in terms of his nature), but by assuming a likeness to us by the addition of flesh and blood. So then, Julian has selectively gathered together into a heap a great many passages that make mention of the one and only God, both from Moses’ book and from the prophetic proclamations, and has mixed them up with his own words. Moreover, he similarly thinks we are opposing the views of the holy men and are confessing there to be three gods, if we think rightly and determine that God the only-begotten Word, who is from God the Father and in him and belongs to him, has always coexisted with him, and so too has the Spirit that is consubstantial with him.

For in fact the one nature of the divinity is understood in three hypostases – in the Father and in the Son and in the Holy Spirit. Yet in no way is it chopped up by us into an alterity of natures, nor do those three who are named lapse into a state of alienation from one another in terms of their essence. Rather, one and the same principle proceeds through the entire holy Trinity, gathering them together into one nature of divinity, even if we understand that each of them subsists distinctly; consequently, even if someone should say there is one God, such a person could nonetheless never form a notion of the Father apart from his own offspring nor apart from the Spirit who is naturally poured forth from him, which is also his own Spirit. For just as when someone talks about a human, he will certainly in every case also recall those properties that essentially inhere within him (properties which, if naturally present, cause him to be a human, but no longer do so if they are not present in him), in the exact same way, so it seems to me, the meaning of other words also associates with the corresponding reality an unavoidable mental image. Therefore, someone who says God is a Father indicates along with him also his own Son who is from him and in him according to nature.

For if it is accurate to say that he did not become a Father at some point in time (for he has no contingent attributes at all, but is perfect in himself), then one absolutely must conclude that what is proper to him, that to which he is a Father, coexists with him. And if indeed he is always Craftsman and did not acquire this role at some point in time, then there certainly exists along with him the one through whom he fashioned everything, the one who is the “radiance of his glory and the imprint of his hypostasis.” For so he has been called in the statement of those who have spoken of God. Is light, then, ever perceived apart from its radiance? And when did the imprint of the Father’s hypostasis not exist? Therefore, though we ourselves also confess that there exists one Craftsman and Lord of the universe, we acknowledge God the Word, who coexists with him as his own and who, in terms of his nature, was ineffably begotten from him, blazing forth like light from light or like a word from intellect to intellect. For his birth is exceedingly subtle, appropriate to the divine, and transcends all corporeal imagery. Therefore, the person who denies the Son is depriving the light of its radiance and is determining that intellect does not possess a word. Though adducing such comparative examples is very slight, it nevertheless suffices to draw our intellect to those realities that are beyond reason.

For if something is brought into existence, it is situated below the glory of the substance above all substances, and there is nothing that corresponds exactly to that essence and is invariably like it. We, therefore, quite reasonably collect what we need from these examples, assembling barely a single paltry idea from this multitude to give a vague and modest representation of the realities under investigation. And the all-wise Paul, for example, says, “We see now in a mirror and in a riddle.” Moreover, the Son himself provides us with further confirmation of the fact that we are entirely unable to apprehend the Father without the Son. For he says, “The one who denies the Son does not have the Father either.” In addition, he says to the crowds of the Jews, “You know neither me nor my Father. If you knew me, you would know my Father also.” For the term “Father” would truly make no sense unless he has the Son as the offspring of his own nature. For in keeping with the meaning of relational terms, just as there would never be a son unless, of course, there is always understood to be a father, so in exactly the same way one could never imagine a father if there was no son. 8.o So, to reiterate, the divine and ineffable birth of the Word is lifted up on high beyond the limits of the creation.

For there was never a time at which point we could conceive of him as not existing; rather he is the maker of the ages and possesses an existence that dwells beyond all time. For example, he said to Moses, “I am the one who exists. […] This is my name.” Hence, the existing Word that subsists together with the existing Father is reasonably understood to be from him, in him, and consubstantial with him. For the offspring of the substance of one who exists could not possibly be something that did not exist. And indeed, given that created beings – all those endowed with the power of being able to give birth – customarily give birth not to things that differ in essence, but rather to things that are like themselves in terms of each and every one of those properties essentially rooted in their nature, would it not then be utterly absurd for the Craftsman to be inferior to his own creations in this respect? Thus, the Father has begotten the Son from himself, who is also his own Word, Wisdom, and Power. Through him he fashions all things and brings them into existence, and similarly he makes wise what is receptive to wisdom and empowers what is in need of power. For the Father’s character is rendered completely lucid and transparent in the Son. And just as he depicts in his own nature the one who bore him, so also he himself exists in the Father and is one with him by an identity of nature, differing only in the fact that he is the Son.

Thus, the existing one is from an existing one and this is the name most in keeping with his nature. For example, in the following passage the divine David shows clearly that the Son is invariably in the same state: “The heavens will be destroyed, but you will remain; they will all wear out like a garment; like a cloak you will roll them up and they will be changed, but you are the same, and your years will not fail.” And actually you should not be surprised to find that the Spirit-bearers have cried out with such words about him. For these ideas also seemed right to the elite ranks of the Greeks. Plutarch, for example, in his own book says that, when speaking to the divine, people must address it as “E” and “One.” And he adds these words: Therefore, it seems to me that the letter signifies neither number nor order nor conjunction nor any of the subordinate parts of speech. But it is an address and invocation of God that is complete in itself and makes the one who utters the word mindful of God’s power. And after some other material he once more says, But God exists – if one even needs to say so – and he exists without reference to time, but in terms of eternity, which is motionless, timeless, and unceasing, and in which there is neither before nor after, neither future nor past, neither older nor younger.

Rather, existing as one in a single “now,” he has also filled eternity, and he alone is that which truly exists in an identical manner, since it has neither come into existence nor is it about to come into existence, having neither beginning nor end. Therefore, those who wish to address it must do so accordingly, with the words “You are” and […]128 as some of the ancients did, “You are one.” For the divine is not many things, as each of us consists of hundreds of different components […], but that which exists must exist as one. Hence, the nature of the divinity is one, and the attribute of existence would be especially appropriate for it. And, for example, in the Timaeus Plato says, “Are we then correct in having said previously that heaven is one, or is it more correct to speak of many and infinite heavens? It must be termed one, if indeed it is to be created after its pattern. For that which contains all intelligible living creatures could never be second along with another.” And there is a single account that knows a single God. Therefore, God is one, as I said, and does not exist in all things but is understood to be, and in fact is, other than everything and possesses a supreme nature. For if he contains all things, how could he himself not be outside of all things?

Our opponent, however, will perhaps eagerly clap his hands together at this very point and indeed also say, “You, sir, have made my argument for me. For I said that Moses, the instructor from whom you receive your doctrines, whom you so admire, mentions only one God. For he said, ‘Before me there was no other God and after me there will not be another.’ And once more, ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one,’ along with other passages similar to these.” So then, we ask, who, good sir, do you think and say is being indicated by these statements for believers in the holy and consubstantial Trinity? Undoubtedly, he will say “the Father.” For he does away with the Son’s existence once and for all and the aim of his argument is intensely focused on this very goal. So then, Moses spoke about God by the Holy Spirit, as did also the holy prophets who came after him. Moreover, the statements of the saints must never be false in any way. In light of this, although Moses wrote as follows – “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one” – and added other statements similar to this, another one of the holy prophets said the following about Christ, the Savior of us all, “This is our God; no other will be reckoned along with him.

He procured every path of knowledge and gave it to Jacob his servant and to Israel, his beloved. And after these things he appeared on earth and lived together with humans.” Did not the Son who became human live together with those on earth, and yet procure for the ancients every path of knowledge? For he it was who legislated the law that came through Moses. If so, then how could this be open to dispute? But since, as the prophet says, “This is our God” and “no other will be reckoned along with him,” what are we to do, good sir? Should we deny the Father in light of the fact that the Son too is the only God? Or should we refuse to accept the Son, on grounds that the Father is the one and only God? If we were to take either option, where then would the faith of those who have been called end up? It is for this reason that one nature of the divinity is worshipped in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, since he said it is from Moses that we are obliged to provide at a bare minimum a “single passage” on this topic (for he probably imagines that we would have none at our disposal), let him have many such passages, even those that he himself, I suspect, admires on the assumption that they clash with the Son’s existence, though we will discover that in fact they agree perfectly well with what I was just now saying.

Observe, then, yes, observe the hierophant Moses indicating for us the fullness of the holy Trinity in many passages. For he has intro-duced the God of the universe as saying, “Let us make humankind according to our image and according to our likeness.” Therefore, the phrase “Let us make” offers an intimation of the coexistent Son and Holy Spirit, and in the declaration “according to our image” one quite rightly sees the indistinguishability of their natural identity. For if there is only one underlying substrate, how could it receive the image of beings with different natures? Nor was God speaking to angels or rational powers when he said, “Let us make humanity according to our image,” if indeed it is the case that no created being is essentially and indistinguishably identical [to him]. Otherwise, there would arguably be nothing to prevent someone from recklessly claiming that God and creation are in no sense severed apart into a difference of natures. And indeed, when the tower was being built by those who at that time had profane intentions, Moses again claimed the God of the universe said, “Come, let us go down and confuse their tongues there.” Moreover, recalling the sin of the Sodomites, he once more said, “And the Lord rained down fire and brimstone from the Lord upon Sodom.” And Moses also says that when Abraham was sitting at the Oak of Mamre three men were seen by him, who figuratively represent the holy and consubstantial Trinity, and then the divine Abraham did not address them as “Lords” but instead, using the singular, he said, “Lord, if I have found favor in your eyes.”

Now we also included these passages in another book, but necessity required that we mention them cursorily at this point as well. Furthermore, I think it is also necessary to clarify the murkiness of Julian’s internal reasoning using those very passages he has adduced. So then, since Israel had only just been led out from the Egyptian error (for in Egypt they had worshipped the falsely named gods that Julian desig-nates “ethnarchs” and “city-guardians,” God lifts them up to a knowledge of the truth and makes his identity clear to them, saying, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one,” and once more, “So that you may know that I am God and there is no one besides me,” and again, “There shall be no other gods for you but me.” We hold that these words were wisely said for the destruction of the Greek delusion. For by naming himself “one God” on every occasion, he does not permit them to imagine that there are many gods. Nevertheless, even if he says he is one, he does not thereby preclude the Son from being God and being called so. For, as I said, the Son is in him and from him according to nature, as his own Word, Wisdom, and Power, the one through whom and in whom he exercises authority over the universe. For you have discovered that Moses says on every occasion, “The Lord your God, the Lord is one,” and again, “So that you may know that the Lord your God, he is God in heaven and on earth.”

But Paul, who was learned in the law and a priest of the divine mysteries at one point also wrote to us, “For there is for us one God, the Father, from whom are all things and from whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.” You should, therefore, recognize that though he names the Father “one God,” still he calls the Son the “one Lord.” Yet even though the Son is one Lord, the Father, as God, is also understood to be the Lord. And indeed, though the Father is called the “one God,” the Son is God insofar as he too is Lord by nature. For the property of being divine by nature undoubtedly entails the property of being Lord, and the property of truly being Lord entails the glory of being divine. Therefore, no one could doubt that the Word “existed in the beginning” and that the Word both “was God” and “was with God.” Now the phrase “he existed in the beginning” would indicate to us the quality of timelessness. For as I said, if the Father always exists as a Father (for he did not come to be [a Father] in time), then the unavoidable conclusion is that the one who is by nature in him and from him coexists with him. Furthermore, the phrase “with God” must not be understood in a spatial sense, since the divine is beyond all corporeal imagery, but should instead be understood as “together with God,” meaning that he is in the nature of the divinity.

For the one who has ineffably been begotten from God according to nature must himself be God. Moreover, Plato himself would also leap upon this man who disbe-lieves the words of the saints, since he has written as follows about the Greeks’ gods: As for the other daemons, to know or to talk about their origin is too great a task for us, and we must believe those who have previously discussed it, indeed those who claimed to be descendants of gods; let us believe them on the grounds that they know their own progenitors. It is, therefore, impossible to disbelieve children of gods, although they speak without plausible or compelling proofs; and inasmuch as they claimed to be reporting family affairs, let us follow custom and believe them. He does not permit us, human as we are, to subject to examination topics that surpass intellect and reason, but said one must ascribe to them an unquestioning faith, despite the fact that their detailed accounts of such matters lack “plausible or compelling proofs.” But if Plato does not permit us to rebuke those who represent the polytheistic error, those who speak “from their heart and not from the mouth of the Lord,” as it is written, but rather have been brought to do so by a diabolical spirit, and if Plato says unbelief does not go unpunished, then to rise up against the statements of the saints and to say that they are poorly made and to declare the words of the Holy Spirit a lie – what sort of extreme madness would this be?!

For the Spirit-bearers would be venerable and trustworthy sons of the truth, as their inherent good life and performance of divine signs have testified. 8.G The Word, therefore, was God and indeed, as I said, was also with God, that is, he was subsistent, alive, and powerful and, even if he is a Son, he is not other than the Father – I mean in terms of his existence as God. He is living and life-giving, and through him everything has been brought into existence. Moreover, we hold that he is invisible, impalpable, incorruptible, unchangeable, perfect in himself, pure in perfection, beyond all intellect and reason. Furthermore, we are also aware that those persons who are especially supercilious and take arrogant pride in their worldly wisdom, though they have busied themselves with subtle investigations, have not done so in an entirely blameless manner. For the light of the truth has not flashed upon them. For Christ at one point said, “No one knows who the Son is except the Father, nor does anyone know <who> the Father <is> except the Son and the one to whom the Son reveals him.” In what way, then, could they possibly understand such subtle and ineffable reali-ties belonging to the realm of contemplation when the Son has not revealed it to them? Nonetheless, even these people themselves also agree with the views of the Christians, since they set forth three primary hypostases, insist that the substance of God reaches as far as three hypostases, and sometimes even use the word “Trinity.”

They would have had everything needed for the correct view had they been willing to apply the principle of consubstantiality to the three hypostases, in order that the nature of the divinity also be understood as one, not having a tripartite division into different natures and the inevitable appearance of the hypostases being inferior to one other. For they situate the first cause as standing in the highest place, unmoved and entirely inert. Moreover, they say that this is the Good from which comes Intellect, which is perfected by contem-plating the Good and is even named by them the second god and the “proximate Craftsman” of the world; and this one they place in a lower position and reckon as second in rank to the first. In addition, they even fabricate an account of a third, the World Soul, which has by no means been allotted perfect existence on its own, although, by its relation to the superior Intellect, it is rendered more divine and more powerful in its ability to give life.

8. I will make mention of their actual statements and will put their own ideas on the table, so that my readers may realize that the Christians’ view of God has been sharpened to a straight edge and that the most excellent and wise persons among the Greeks, who have won an illustrious and much talked-about name precisely for their wisdom, may be exposed as lagging behind our own doctrinal precision, though they nonetheless do not entirely fail to follow our views. Accordingly, Porphyry, in the fourth book of his Philosophical History, writes, For Plato said the substance of God proceeded as far as three hypostases, with the highest god being the Good, and after it in second place the Craftsman, and the World Soul as the third; for divinity proceeded as far as Soul. Finally, separation from God begins from the point of bodily distinction. But those people we spoke about previously oppose this idea, claiming that one must not number the Good with those realities that come from it since it is removed from all communion on account of the fact that it is simple in every respect and does not accept concurrence with anything else; and [they say that] from Intellect onwards (for this is [their] first principle), the Trinity is preserved as one. So then, we ourselves hardly confess three gods, but rather completely repudiate polytheism.

Nevertheless, we have placed our faith in one consubstantial Trinity that consists in the Father and Son and Holy Spirit, and, indeed, by gathering together those named into a single nature of divinity, we rush down the straight and unerring path. We hold neither that the Son is inferior in some respect to the Father, nor that the Holy Spirit is inferior to the Son, but instead that they have equality and likeness in each and every respect. For how could a single nature admit difference in itself ? So once and for all, it is sufficient for us that we are not misleading people when we say that the elite ranks of the Greeks themselves also held this view and thought the deity, or rather the divine and ineffable nature, proceeded as far as three hypostases, and that they too have made mention of the Trinity. Furthermore, we will see as clear as day that they also believe that the Word of God exists and they call God “Father.” For Plato said the following in the Epinomis: And let us render them honors, not assigning the year to one of them, the month to another, and to still others no share or any time in which it trav-erses its orbit, as it joins in completing the cosmos which the Word, the most divine thing of all, has ordained; the happy man first admired it and then conceived a desire to learn fully all that a mortal can.

And he has also written in his letter to Hermias, Erastus, and Coriscus, There being three of you, you must all read this letter, together if possible, but, if not, by twos as often as you possibly can in common, and you must treat it as a covenant and a law and an authority, which is just; and with an earnestness in concert with the Muses, combined with the training that is sister to earnestness, you must swear by the God of all, the Ruler of what is and what shall be, and by the Father and Lord of the Ruler and Cause, whom we shall come to know, if we practice philosophy correctly. Observe how clearly he says the cosmos was set in order by the divine Word. For he fashions all things, applying order and harmony to them, since he is the “power and wisdom” of the Father, and with the Father he rules over all those things that came to be through him. Moreover, Plato says that person is “happy” and blessed who “marvels” at him and “desires to learn” who he is and how great he is. Yet the fact that the human intellect proves inadequate for an exact contemplative vision of the Word is hinted at when he says, “then he conceived a desire to learn all that a mortal can.” For “we see” matters pertaining to God “in a mirror and in a riddle,” according to the statement of the blessed Paul.

Moreover, he has also explicitly and clearly made mention of “the Lord” and “Father” of the Word, whom, he says, we too “shall come to know if we practice philosophy correctly.” Consequently, if someone does not know him, he is not practicing philosophy correctly, but raises his eyebrow in vain, is in an ignorant and delirious state, and does not perceive that he has charged ahead to the fullest extent of stupidity. In fact, we hold that the most excellent Julian must have been suffering from this condition, since he dared to do away with the existence of the Word of God as far as he was able. And it would do no harm if, in addition to those passages we have just cited, we were to pile up other quotations from philosophers which in no respect oppose Plato’s views. Numenius, for example, at one point says the following: Someone who is to gain an understanding of the first god and the second must first distinguish each part of the question with some sense of its order and proper placement and then, but only then, once these several parts should seem well disposed, he must attempt to speak in an orderly manner, or else not at all. […] Calling upon god to be his own guide and to show us by the Word the treasury of his thoughts, we begin as follows: […] The first god, existing in himself, is simple, due to the fact that, being entirely together with himself, he can never be divided.

The second god and the third [god], however, are the one. A little later he says, Indeed, the first god must be considered the father of the god who is the Craftsman. Observe that not only does he too say that God exists, being “one” and “simple,” and, in addition to this, also indivisible, but he also says that both the second and third are “the one,” presumably because he gathers together those named into a unity of natures as we do, even if he incorrectly names them “second” and “third god,” thereby contradicting his own ideas, at least so it seems to me. For although Numenius says they are one, he in turn separates them into three, treating each individually one-by-one, despite the fact that he said God must be named “father of the Craftsman.” 8.o And, in addition, Plotinus, who was extremely inquisitive and had, so to speak, traversed practically every kind of subtle argumentation, at one point says the following about the Good: What, then, must we say about that which is most perfect? Nothing can come from it except what is next greatest after it. And the greatest thing after it, the second greatest thing, is Intellect. For Intellect sees the One and is in need of it alone. But the One has no need of Intellect. And that which is generated from something greater than Intellect is Intellect; and Intellect is greater than all other things, because other things come after it.

For example, Soul is an expressed principle derived from Intellect and a certain activity, just as Intellect is an activity of the One. But since Soul is a reflection of Intellect, its expressed principle is murky, and, for this reason, it must look to Intellect. Similarly, Intellect has to look to the One, in order for it to be Intellect. It beholds the One not as though it were separated from it, but because it comes after it and there is nothing in between, just as there is nothing in between Soul and Intellect. Now by “Intellect” he means the one who, according to us, is God the Word, since we ourselves in fact also call it “Wisdom,” though not at all taking it to be in some respect inferior or second to the Father’s preeminence and glory. Nor indeed do we maintain that God the Word, as if lacking self-perfection, is made perfect by beholding the Father, as the Greeks think: [they hold that], on the one hand, Intellect is in need of the first cause and contemplates it, in order that it might be greatly enriched with a perfect state of being as far as its own conditions are concerned, while, on the other hand, Soul, said to be the third from the first cause, is analogously in need of contemplation and participation in Intellect (which they also name the “second cause”) in order that it too might receive some benefit.

Nevertheless, by holding such views and degrading these realities, which they find so marvelous, into dissimilar natures, the Greeks are in fact merely exulting in insipid and puerile ideas. We, in contrast, maintain that the Father exists in pure perfection, and so also does the Son, as perfect from perfect, and indeed the Holy Spirit does as well. For the divine and ineffable nature stands in need of absolutely no external supplement but is enriched with perfection, and this derives from its own nature and applies for every single one of those dignities that are suitable to it and it alone. Nonetheless, we will find an awareness of the holy Trinity also among these very Greek wise men. For they hold that they are joined with one another in the closest proximity and without anything intervening, and the position that the Intellect would have in relation to the first is, they maintain, the same as the position the Soul, which is third, has in relation to the Intellect, which is second after the first. And, in turn, we will see that they even allow the imagery of an offspring and indeed also of a parent, since Plotinus has written as follows: Everything longs for its begetter and loves it, especially whenever the begetter and that which is begotten are one. And whenever the begetter is that which is also inseparable, it necessarily follows that [what is begotten] coexists with it, such that it is separated [from it] solely by being different.

You hear how he said that what is begotten certainly must in every respect coexist with its begetter, due presumably to their inseparability or natural proximity and the fact that nothing lies between them, and that they are separated by difference alone, and this is presumably not at all a difference in terms of nature; rather, the begetter seemingly has just one difference with the begotten – the fact that one of them has done the begetting while the other one has been begotten. Furthermore, Hermes, their Thrice-Greatest, also says at one point about God, the sovereign artificer of the universe, For, as a perfect and wise being, he imposed order upon the disorder, so that the intelligent entities might rule and occupy the first rank as eldest and superior, while things sensible might be subject to these as second. Thus, that which is weighed down and heavier than the intelligent possesses within itself a wise craftsman-like Word, and its Word abounds in a craftsman-like nature, since it is generative and life-giving. As for the claim that the Word of God, being life-giving, is in all things that have been set in motion, this is something we ourselves maintain too. And the all-wise Paul will confirm this, since he has written, “There is one God who is over all and through all and in all.” For there would be no other way for that which has been brought into existence and set in motion from nonexistence to possess an unshakeably permanent well-being, if it did not have participation in the incorruptible and truly existent God.

Hermes, therefore, knows that the “generative” and “life-giving” Son belongs to a creative nature, and belongs to a nature that is other than all those things receptive of the life that comes from him. And he makes everything in need of life alive in the Holy Spirit. For, as the Son himself at one point says, “The Spirit is the one who gives life,” and the entire process of stabilizing what has come to be is accomplished by the Father through the Son in the Spirit. The divine David, for instance, sings in the psalm, “By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established and by the Spirit of his mouth all their power.” So when it comes to our own view, we are accustomed to inspect such matters in detail and from all angles with the keen eye of our understanding. But as for the elite ranks of the Greeks, in place of the Holy Spirit they introduce Soul, as I said, as a third, under whose influence every living being is animated, since it infuses them with life, and they have assigned to it the powers and activities of the Holy Spirit. Plotinus, for instance, writes as follows about it: So, let every soul first consider the fact that it made all living beings by breathing life into them, those that are nourished by the earth and those by the sea, those in the air, and divine stars in the sky.

Soul itself made the sun and this great heaven, and it ordered it, and makes it revolve in a regular way, being a different nature from that which it orders and from that which it moves and makes alive. And it is necessarily more valuable than these, since, while these are generated and fall into corruption whenever Soul, which supplies them with life, departs from them, Soul itself exists forever by not departing from itself. So, as I said, God the Father acts upon the creation through the Son and in the Spirit, and he moves into existence those things that at one time did not exist and sustains in well-being those things that have come to be, and he ordained a perfectly beautiful order for them, along with proper rhythm and laws in accordance with which individual things may exist. For example, he has set the sun as the ruler of the day, and the moon as ruler of the night. Furthermore, it is established that the divine and life-giving Holy Spirit is “a nature different” from everything that has been put in motion by it; for it is the Spirit of the ingenerate God, being proper to him and proceeding from him with its own hypostasis and possessing life and eternal existence because it belongs to the one who exists, and it fills all things and contains the universe, since it indeed is also consubstantial with the one who fills all things and is indivisibly everywhere; for all things are full of it.

For it is written, “The Spirit of the Lord has filled the world.” Plotinus, for instance, once again says the following about the “World Soul,” using this term, I believe, in place of “Holy Spirit”: Its power and nature would be more manifest and clearer if one were to consider how Soul encompasses heaven by its own acts of will. For Soul has given itself to the entire extent of heaven, however much that is, and every interval both great and small is ensouled, with different bodies moving in different directions, one existing here and another there, some in mutual opposition while others are dependent upon one another in other ways. Soul, however, is not like that, and it does not make things alive by a portion of Soul, as though it were chopped up into individual parts; rather, all things are alive by the whole of it, and it is present everywhere, being likened to the Father who begat it both in its oneness and in its omnipresence. Is he not then in this passage quite clearly describing for us in the plainest terms the craftsman-like, life-giving operation of the Holy Spirit? For, as I said, he moves those things that are moved and sustains, ensouls, and gives life to the universe, and is not a nature different from that of the Father or the Son, but is like the spirit in us – I mean in terms of having the properties of connaturality and consubstantiality.

Furthermore, one could also learn the point I am making from what Plotinus himself sees fit to think and say. For he writes as follows: So, take Soul’s higher neighboring region, after which and from which Soul comes, as more divine than this divine thing. Even though Soul is one thing, as our argument has shown, it is an image of Intellect. Just as a word uttered is an image of a word in the soul, so, too, Soul is the Intellect’s word and its whole activity, which it sends forth as life to make something else really exist, just as fire has heat that it retains and heat that it furnishes [to others]. Observe that in this passage he even says Soul is an image of Intellect and, in addition, he also thinks it a good idea to liken it to the spoken word that emerges from the intellect, so that it even “sends forth life” to make other things really exist, just as, for example, also happens with heat that goes forth from fire. So the Greeks themselves have also used such exceedingly subtle examples, without which it is impossible to speak about theology, since it is beyond language and darts past every intellect. Given the rather lengthy digression we have been through, it is now necessary to bring our discussion back to the original point. The fact that the God-breathed scriptures name God “one” does not preclude the Son being God by nature.

Rather, the naming of God as “one” is an attack on those who stand for the polytheistic error. For it keeps us from being led away from the God who truly exists according to nature and prevents us from worshipping the creation and going off in some other direction, far from the path that leads straight to the truth. Hence, even if God should say, “I alone stretched out the heaven and have established the earth,” the person who is eager to learn must recognize the identity of the one who stretched out the heaven and established the earth, as I said previously. As the saying of the psalmist has it, “By the word of the Lord the heavens were established,” and “he founded the earth upon its secure foundation.” But if, Julian says, the Word is “God from God,” as you claim, and was “begotten from the Father’s substance,” 214 why do you say that the virgin is God-bearing? For how could she give birth to God, when she is a human like us? 216 And in addition to this he says, When God plainly states, “I am <God> and besides me there is no one who saves,” 218 do you dare say that her son is a savior? For he has also added the latter question to his own arguments. We must, therefore, make a thorough inquiry into the manner of the only-begotten’s incarnation, speaking with as much brevity as possible.

But since we are casting into the ears of the Greeks the mystery – or rather our exposition of the Christological mystery – we will refrain from examining topics that are more ineffable and will instead discuss just a few things with them, gathering together some points based on plausible reasoning, with the God-breathed scripture helping us in this endeavor. It seems to me necessary and very prudent that I should first lay out the reasons why, in our view, the mystery of the incarnation had to come to pass. When heaven and earth and altogether everything in them had been brought into existence, the human body was fashioned from earth. This body, being ensouled by the ineffable strength of the Craftsman of all, was immediately a rational living creature, most God-like in form, since he was made according to the image of his Creator. And no one would doubt that, since he is the handiwork of a good God, he was brought into existence, not to do the basest of deeds, but to do all those that are praiseworthy. He was, however, made autonomous and free, with the permission to rush about according to the incli-nations of his own will, to whatever he might choose, whether something good or bad. Next, though he had received from God the command that he must not eat from the tree “in the middle of paradise” as a sort of regimen to train him in ready obedience and the exercise of virtue, he proved careless and easily distracted.

For he was caught having failed to keep the order that was given, yielding to such a slight pleasure, and suffering from impotence with respect to self-control. And since he thought, in addition to this, that he might even become a god (for Satan had tricked him by saying this), he was put under a curse, seeing that he in fact had both committed an offense against a divine law and had designs that went beyond his nature. Next, he was sentenced to death and exposed for who he is by nature, even though he was created not to be subject to the bonds of death and easily captured, but so that he might, contrary to nature, even transcend evil. And absolutely nothing is impossible for the Craftsman of all, nor would it be hard for him to render even that which is tyrannized by corruption (insofar as it depends upon the princi-ples of its own nature) superior to corruption and to preserve it for a life that is long-lasting. For he is the same one who, as seemed good to him and him alone, also defined for the very natures themselves the laws that determine whether or not they should be the kind of thing they happen to be. And absolutely nothing is difficult for him or able to resist him. G Therefore, when the first man, that is Adam, had been convicted of the charge of disobedience and found himself unexpectedly enmeshed in the snares of death and indeed even ruined by sin thanks to the unholy scheming of that foul dragon who is the source of all evil – I mean Satan (for he was the one who set the entire trap for Adam) – and when this evil had ravaged the entire race that came from Adam, with death reigning even up to Moses, or rather up to the period of the law, the Craftsman then, taking note of our injured state, deigned to help us and he showed compassion towards us who were living miserable lives.

For it was necessary, yes necessary, that God, being also good, should come to the aid of those who had been utterly destroyed and should render the devil’s envy ineffective; that he should reconstitute earthly humanity that had been disfigured, forging it anew into incorruptibility and rendering it beyond suffering, with humanity having received amnesty from its ancient errors; and that he should make it a steward of virtue and every good deed. For “there was no one who does good, not even one,” as the statement of the psalmist goes. Indeed, the multitude of the Greeks were entirely unaware of the Craftsman and bereft of the God who exists according to nature, and, foolishly turning aside from the straight path, they were even led astray into the inevitable worship of those gods who do not exist at all, living a hedonistic life more appropriate for animals. As for the Jews, being burdened by the condemning law and neglecting in no small measure the commandment that came through Moses, they were subject to the penalties for their transgressions but nonetheless could scarcely stop sinning. Hence, when all the inhabitants of the earth had been carried off into the most extreme miseries of all, and when Moses had explicitly admitted that he was insufficient to save them (for he says clearly, “Please, Lord, appoint another capable person whom you shall send”), and when the holy prophets themselves had also lost heart in this endeavor (for the divine David had cried out, “You who sit upon the cherubim, appear!

[…] raise up your dominance and come to save us”; and once again Isaiah, “Lord, who has believed our report?”; and in addition Jeremiah was grieved because his preaching failed to accomplish swiftly the goal he had hoped for, since no one repented, and thus cried out, “Woe is me, O mother! What sort of person have you given birth to?! A man condemned and at variance with the whole land! I neither gave help nor did anyone help me”) – in light of all this, what then was the Craftsman of the universe supposed to do? Should he have surrendered the inhabitants of the earth to be ruled by the unclean daemons, and let the devil’s envy prevail over his own plans? Should he not have saved those who were in danger? Should he not have stretched out his saving hand to those who were lying wounded? Should he not have conducted those who were trapped in the most shameful deeds to something better? Should he not have illuminated the intellect of those in darkness? Should he not have turned back that which had been misled? How then could he have been good if he took no account of us despite having it within himself to do all these things without any effort at all? Why in the first place did he even bring us into existence and life at all, if he has no compassion towards us when we have suffered such unexpected misfortunes and fared badly?

Since, therefore, every holy person had given up on coming to the aid of the inhabitants of the earth and indeed they had a well-founded excuse for doing so (since it was his task and his alone to unsettle death’s oppressive reign, to remit humanity’s penalty, to free them from their errors, to cheer their hearts, to tame the wild beast who was the avenging spirit, to unnerve the foul mass of daemons, and to set straying humanity upon the paths of well-being), the Father helped by sending from heaven his own Son, who in fact even put on a human form, in order that, by living together with us as a human, he might render us thrice-blest and beyond every evil. For since the living and subsistent Word of the Father is unchangeable and immutable in terms of his nature as God, he did not fashion a body united with himself from his own nature, but instead received it from us, and not from the sleep and pleasure of a virile man, but from the holy virgin, in a strange and novel manner beyond the laws of nature. For it was necessary, yes necessary, that he should have such a birth – I mean his birth in the flesh from a woman – in order that his arrival into the world and manifestation might have an appropriately divine character.

Moreover, as I said, there is nothing whatsoever that is hard to set aright for one who is omnipotent, and to disbelieve those things he is said to have done is inexcusable, even if it should seem to someone that it does not directly follow from what is plausible. For this is simply how it is when it comes to matters that are miraculous. Therefore, even if the limit of our mind should perhaps be surpassed by the extraordinary quality of what was done, one must not for this reason dishonor the supernatural and ineffable nature by accusing it of impotence; it would instead be more appropriate to honor with uncritical approval whatever it should be said to have accomplished. Otherwise, it would argu-ably not be unreasonable even to refuse to believe that he is the Craftsman of the universe at all. For who among us is able to understand and explain in what manner this immense heaven, along with the sun and moon and all the rest, were raised up and became visible? Therefore, taking from the holy virgin the all-holy body animated with an intellectual soul, he came forth as a human, though without destroying his existence as God or indeed casting off the dignity of his own preeminence, since he exists, as I said, knowing no change. For as Plotinus says, For why should it seek to change when it is in a good state?

Where could it go when it has all things within itself? Nor does it seek growth since it is absolutely perfect. For this reason, all the things in it are also perfect, in order that it might be perfect in every way, having nothing which is not like it, nothing in itself that it does not think. And it thinks not by seeking but by having. Its blessedness is not acquired, but rather is possessed for all eternity. The only-begotten Word of God accordingly became incarnate while not abandoning his existence as God. Moreover, the manner of the economy with the flesh was miraculous and beyond both our intellect and language. And this truly great and sacred mystery did not just appear yesterday, nor was it something new or the invention of a mind that loves innovation, but was most ancient, existing in God’s foreknowledge “before the foundation of the world.” We should in fact be able to perceive this point through the God-breathed scripture. For we certainly do not claim that the divine and pure intellect, “in which,” as it is written, “are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,” did not know that the human race, after sliding into error, would be subject to punishment and a curse, and would be subjected to death and corruption. Rather, the human race would not carry the damage resulting from this as something indelibly and permanently stuck to it, but would through faith in Christ strip off its sin along with death and would run back to its original state and settle into a life that is sacred and pure.

o We therefore hold that knowledge of the mystery was given to Abraham before anyone else. The Son himself, for instance, addressed the crowds of the Jews, “Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day, and he saw it and was glad.” Moreover, those persons who came from him, I mean Isaac and Jacob and those after them all the way up to the all-wise Moses, used to learn in riddles the meaning of the mystery “in many and varied ways.” Moses, for instance, was prefiguring it when he commanded those descended from Israel in Egypt to sacrifice the lamb as a type of Christ, and to smear themselves with the blood, thereby inducing them to put the destroyer to shame with a mere shadow – the very thing that actually did happen. For they were saved, and he rendered them superior to the inevitable process of corruption. And this was still a mere type of the truth! And then there is also Jesus the child of Nave, who had the same name as the true one. For he led the children of Israel across the Jordan and circumcised them with stone knives, and he also guided them “into the land of promise.” After him, you will also see Samuel, who was best at giving prophecies, sacrificing a lamb and dedicating it “as a pleasing aroma” to God and also pouring water over the sacrifices.

Then, when wars were impending and an innumerable phalanx of foreigners was ravaging Judea, he conquered them without a fight and saved those who were in danger. For the mystery of Christ is lifesaving for those who believe in him.

8. And, in addition, all the rest of the chorus of the holy prophets have proclaimed the mystery in advance. For instance, God made a pledge to the divine David and said, “From the fruit of your loins I will place [an heir] upon your throne,” and because he had an unwavering conviction that the promise in all its fullness would certainly come to pass no matter what, David proclaims far and wide the manner of the incarnation, saying at one point, “God will come in visible manner, and he will not pass by in silence,” and again on another occasion he says to God, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. A rod of uprightness is the rod of your rule. You loved justice and hated injustice. Therefore, O God, your God anointed you with the oil of rejoicing in the presence of your companions.” You see that God is anointed by God. How then do we say this was done? When he became human, while remaining exactly what he was before, it was then that he, as a human, was anointed for a mission just like we are. He became “the high priest and apostle of our confession,” as it is written. For he existed eternally and is in heaven and in this world here, and in short there is no place void of his presence. For he fills all things by the nature of his divinity.

Yet the invisible has come to us in visible manner when he put on a form like ours. Moreover, David himself will once more confirm that this one was destined to prevail over the earth under heaven and place the entire human race under his scepter, for he said the following to him, “All the nations that you made, they will come and worship before you, Lord.” And once more he said, “And let all the kings of the earth worship you; all the nations will serve him.” And again, “Bless our God, O nations.” And again, “Clap your hands, all you nations; cry aloud to God with a voice of rejoicing, because the Lord Most High is awesome, a great king over all the earth.” Do you see how he calls the one who has appeared in the flesh “God” and “Lord Most High” and “King”? Furthermore, the son who was born from him, Solomon, was not unaware of the pledge given by God, for at one point he says the following as he lifts up supplications to God, “And now, Lord God of Israel, let your word to David my father be confirmed, if God really is going to dwell with humans upon the earth.” Baruch also indicated this when he said, “This is our God; no other will be reckoned along with him. He procured every path of knowledge and gave it to Jacob his servant and to Israel, his beloved.

And after this he appeared on earth and lived together with humans.” Observe with what splendid clarity this man too says God was seen on earth and lived together with those on it! Furthermore, Isaiah announced the good news of his miraculous birth according to the flesh, for he says, “Behold, the virgin will conceive and will bear a son, and they will call his name Emmanuel,” that is, “God with us.” And once more, “Be strong, you weak hands and feeble knees! Give comfort, you who are faint of heart and mind! Be strong; do not fear! Behold our God, behold the Lord comes with strength and his arm with authority.” And once again, “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall hear. Then the lame will leap like a deer and the tongue of stammerers shall be clear.” And once more, “The voice of one calling out in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord; make straight the paths of our God,’” which is in fact what the divine John the Baptist did. So when the Jews asked him who he was and what was the purpose of his mission, he clearly pointed out the answer by saying the following: “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord.’” Moreover, Isaiah confirmed that, once the only-begotten had become incarnate, the calling of the nations was also soon to be accomplished, since he says, “Nations that do not know you shall call upon you, and peoples that do not understand you shall flee to you for refuge.”

Furthermore, another of the holy prophets says, “‘Be glad and rejoice, daughter of Zion, since behold I am coming and I shall dwell in your midst,’ says the Lord. And many nations will find refuge in the Lord on that day and will be a people for him.” And at one point even the God of the universe himself says to the holy prophets, “Say to the daughter Zion, ‘See, your King is coming to you, saving and just is he, humble and mounted upon a beast of burden and a young foal.’” For Christ went up to Jerusalem in this manner, sitting upon a foal. Furthermore, the most wise Daniel says, “And I saw in a vision of the night, and behold, as it were a son of man was coming upon the clouds of heaven. And he came all the way up to the ancient of days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and honor and kingship. And all tribes and languages shall serve him.” Now I would have piled up, as I said, a great many other passages from the holy men as well (for the God-breathed scripture is full of such statements), had I not thought that doing so would be tedious beyond measure for everyone. Moreover, I think that even those that have been cited should be sufficient for “those who love the sight of the truth.”

Moreover, we will see from the following that the mystery also seemed marvelous to some of the Greek philosophers who were not insignificant and who acquired a reputation among them for being worthy of emulation. For instance, Amelius the Platonist, whose floruit coincided with Plotinus and Gentilianus at Rome (for this is what Porphyry says about them), is said to have written the following:276 And this then was the Word, in accordance with whom, being eternal, the things that come to be were coming to be, as indeed would be the view of Heraclitus as well. And, by Zeus, the barbarian considers [this one] to be established in the rank and dignity of a first principle and so to “be with God and to be God,” the one “through whose agency everything” has simply “come to be,” and the one in whom that which comes to be is a living creature and “life” and comes to exist by nature. Next [he considers this one] to have fallen into bodies, and, having put on “flesh,” to have appeared as human, while also showing the grandeur of his nature at the same time. And of course, after suffering dissolution, he is once more divi-nized and is God, such as he was prior to being drawn down into body and flesh and a human. I suspect he probably calls the divine John “barbarian” since he spoke a different language (for he was “a Hebrew from the Hebrews” and did not come from the country or land of the Greeks).

Nevertheless, he is aware of the incarnate Word and confesses this, and he does not regard the word of the divine preaching as something to be rejected. So then, the mystery of Christ was announced in advance through oracles, and a multitude of the holy men predicted this, even though they did not all live at one and the same time. Therefore, since ensuing events matched the statements of all of them and experience itself also confirms this loud and clear, it is incredible, in my view at least, that certain people choose total disbelief and, rising up in opposition to things that actually happened, almost rival deranged people, despite the fact that the elite ranks of the Greeks themselves arguably also thought doing so to be incredible. Plato, for example, said about their gods, As for the other daemons, to know or to talk about their origin is too great a task for us, and we must believe those who have previously discussed it, indeed those who claimed to be descendants of gods, since they know their own progenitors. It is, therefore, impossible to disbelieve children of gods, although they speak without plausible or compelling proofs; and inasmuch as they claimed to be reporting family affairs, let us follow custom and believe them. Well, then, my dear friends, can you really admire the son of Aristo – even though he says that one must, “without plausible or compelling proofs,” reward with credence the descendants of gods when they give reports about them – and at the same time be justified in invalidating the statements of the holy prophets and claiming that the words that came through the Holy Spirit are false?

For although trustworthiness is not a quality one would in any sense reasonably ascribe to the descendants of the falsely named gods – for they have not done anything amazing! – nevertheless, when it comes to the holy prophets, the very beauty of their manner of life bears witness to them, as does their conspicuous relationship with God and the fact that they possessed a most abundant supply of power from him and so were able to accomplish things beyond our reach.

8. G Yet our opponents will probably say, “But why did he become incarnate at all and put up with the flesh and filth that is in us, when in fact he had the ability – without any difficulty if indeed he truly is God, as you insist – by a mere nod of his head to change the hearts of the inhabitants of the earth with his ineffable power so that they would choose to adhere to what pleased him in their actions and thoughts and would feel a duty to live their lives as friends of God?” My reply to this objection would be as follows. Did then the divine and pure Intellect miss its target, and did it go somewhat beyond what is plausible? And are we saying that it was not carried directly towards what is appropriate? Are we then superior in understanding to perfect Wisdom? Will a lamp compete with the sun? Will one drop of water be equal to this entire sea, wide and immeasurable as it is? Yet how could someone not admire the divine prophet Isaiah who cried out clearly and most sensibly, “Who measured the water with his hand and the sky with the span of his fingers and all the earth by the handful? Who weighed the mountains with a scale and the valleys with a balance? Who knew the mind of the Lord?”

For just as measuring the heaven with a span and all the earth with a handful is impossible, as is placing the mountains and forests on scales, so also it is out of the reach of every human being, or rather every rational creature, to delineate and measure out the supernatural and supreme Intellect. Therefore, if there is someone who dares to say he is able to envision a better plan than perfect Wisdom can, let him go ahead and rebuke God, but he should know he is speaking nonsense. For this is madness and these are the words of a delirious man who is out of his mind. But if each and every person would agree that the human intellect is inferior to perfect Wisdom to the same degree that it also appears to fall short of it in terms of its nature, would it not then be wise to concede to it and to it alone the business of knowing what is most appropriate for it? For it would not have done something that did not have to be exactly as it happened. We can respond to this objection in another way also, since it seems to me that I must consider and discuss something else as well. Every rational and intelligent creature in heaven possesses a voluntary impulse towards whatever action it should choose and an inclination that in each instance is not constrained by necessity.

For this was the only way possible for the good to be justly deemed worthy of approbation and rewards, and for the required censure to be decreed against the bad. Hence, in order that we ourselves too might voluntarily embark upon each and every good thing, God permitted humanity to conduct its life on earth with an uncoerced faculty of judgment. And this is the state in which he created humanity in the beginning. For humans are attached to the reins of their own will and carried along in either direction by incli-nations under their command – either towards the good, that is, or its opposite. Therefore, if God had used a certain ineffable and most divinely fitting power and operation to transport the intellect of each person towards good deeds and then made the good something involuntary and impossible to escape, the matter would no longer be a product of the faculty of judgment, nor would it be worthy of praise, but would instead be a result of necessity and involuntary instincts. How then could we free the Craftsman from blame and indictment, if in the beginning he permitted humans to be steered by the reins of their own impulsive acts of will, but, after this point, yoked them to necessary changes in direction and tied them, as it were, with the rope of certain inescapable instincts to the inevitability of perfectly carrying out whatever was pleasing to them?

And if it was better for humans to exist in this state, why did he not make them so from the beginning, instead of changing his plans later with hindsight and struggling to bring them back to what is able to save them and changing them, not freely, but instead by coercion, so that they would inevitably have the appearance of being faithful? How then could it still be doubted, or rather how could it not be clear to everyone, that we will unavoidably and doubtlessly be accusing the divine and ineffable will of badly managing human affairs, of somehow getting diverted, as it were, from what is plausible, and of not seeing the blameless path at the outset? Away with such ill counsel! For it is pious to recoil at such musings. It was, therefore, necessary that, not by coercion but instead by persuasion, he should lead to tractability those who had neglected the sacred pursuits and who had all but raised up the stiff and arrogant neck of their mind against God. For this reason, the only-begotten Word of God came forth as a human in a miraculous manner transcending human intellect and lived together with those on earth: partly by signs and wonders beyond human nature and ability he persuaded them to realize that he was God, born, as I said, in a form like us to meet our every need; and partly by instructions going beyond the law he indicated to them the habits of true well-being, established them beyond Jewish pedantry, and illuminated the hearts of believers with the knowledge of the true understanding of God.

For he is himself the truth, the genuine offspring of God the Father. So then, if we were to claim that a mere common human has been made into God and if we were to introduce another god into the holy and consubstantial Trinity, then doing so would be nothing other than worship of a human. If, however, the God-breathed scriptures, on the contrary, prophesy that the one who is truly Son by nature, the Word who shone forth from the substance of God the Father, the generator of the universe and designer of things visible and invisible, things sensible and knowable – if it says that he in an ineffable manner transcending intellect assumed a likeness to us, and yet also remained God at the same time (for he is unchangeable by nature), what could appear altogether incredible or worthy of criticism or even out of reach in the doctrines we maintain? But of course, they say the human body is insignificant and full of filth. This is true and I will not deny it. Yet consider this: he came to be, as I said, “in the likeness of humans,” as it is written, and truly in a form like ours.

8. Nevertheless, we hold that the one who is uncontainable was neither confined nor indeed was he encompassed by the body’s limitation. For it would be altogether silly and entirely senseless to say such a thing about the one who is truly God according to nature. For being the one and only Son, who is utterly beyond all corporeal imagery, he is wholly everywhere and in everything through participation and in each individual in a relational sense, not by being divided up into parts or being cut up, but instead being, as God, outside of all things and in all things by nature. But in that all hallowed and holy body, which possessed a rational soul, “the fulness of the deity dwelt bodily,” as it is written, and he was in his own flesh, even though he was also filling all things while in this state. For just as the rays of the sun incur no damage when they strike stagnant water or some other foulness, so also the undefiled and inviolate nature, even if it should come into contact with bodies from earth, instead bestows a benefit upon them and it will not receive into itself an impression from any of those things that naturally cause harm. Furthermore, it is, I think, appropriate for me to add the following. Our bodies are overcome by passions and easily fall into the love of pleasure, and they are in fact sick with the law of sin in themselves.

Yet we hold that in the divine and holy body of Christ there were no such disturbances, but the most inordinate of the passions were all entirely absent, and, since the body had come to be the property of the indwelling Word united to it, it was abounding in sanctification. For it was a holy temple of the one who sanctifies all the rest of creation. 8.o And I am astonished that among the children of the Greeks there is a great admiration for the doctrines as well as the words of Porphyry and Julian, yet they laugh at those of the Christians, in spite of the fact that they are pregnant with the truth in all that they contain. For, as we just said a moment ago, we ourselves believe that the only-begotten Word of God took on human form in order to save the realm under heaven. But Porphyry, in contrast, insists there is a certain race of gods who, he says, are also changed into humans at certain times, as if they are playing a game in which they live like we do. Hence Julian – I do not know what he was thinking – says about Asclepius, I had nearly forgotten the greatest of Helios’ and Zeus’s gifts. But with good reason I have saved it until the end. For it is not peculiar only to us [Romans], but is, I think, held in common with our kinsmen the Greeks.

Indeed, Zeus gave birth to Asclepius from himself in the intelligible realm, and revealed him to the earth through the life of nurturing Helios. Having advanced to earth from the sky, Asclepius at first appeared at Epidaurus singularly in the form of a human, but, multiplying himself from there in stages, he stretched out his saving right hand over all the earth. Yet who doesn’t know that, since Asclepius had perfected the science of medicine, this was the sole reason why he was admired by those who saw him, and that he did nothing that was astonishing? For which of Asclepius’ deeds is worth hearing about? Or rather, who perished in such a miserable way as he did?! For he was burnt to ashes by a lightning bolt and indeed even lies as a corpse to the present day, while those who worship him don’t even know where on earth he is.

8. So even if someone like us did not point this out, the events themselves would cry aloud that Julian is lying when he says Asclepius came forth “from heaven” and “stretched out” “his saving right hand upon all the earth.” For where are his deeds and what sort of memorial does he deserve? For his genealogy is in fact traced by the children of doctors inasmuch as he was eminent in this craft, and they say that he was born from Coronis, a rather pitiful and insignificant woman. So then, will Julian be allowed to fashion whatever myths he intends, and this with impunity, and go on record against us with nonsensical words, which are afflicted with a great turpitude, dressed up without any plausibility, and stripped of any proofs based on truth and accepted facts? And will he be allowed to treat as an excuse for running his mouth such a remarkable and truly venerable mystery that was spoken about beforehand through both the law and the holy prophets and was brought to its consummation when the only-begotten became human? If, then, the very consummation of the events did not confirm what was announced beforehand, they would have an understandable excuse for their unbelief. But if, on the contrary, one can see from the plausible [events] themselves that the ancient announcements made in advance all attained their consummation and that Israel slipped away from its relationship with God as Christ-killers, while the multitude of the nations have been accepted through faith, I cannot imagine what could induce them to disbelieve.

Or rather, as the divine Paul writes, “The god of this age” – that is, the one who is thought to be god in the present age – “has blinded the minds of unbelievers to prevent them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ,” who shines in our hearts with the light of the knowledge of him, through whom and with whom be glory to God the Father with the Holy Spirit forever and ever. Amen. Book 9 9. So then, by taking up our shield alongside the doctrines of the truth with the utmost endurance, so it seems to me, we have held our own against the nonsensical words of those who know only how to disparage our doctrines. But because our opponent bears down upon the ineffable glory with all his sails unfurled and dares, as it were, to lead forth his profane ideas in unbearable assaults, expending his most effective resources on the task of stripping the nature of God the Father of his progeny and stripping the true Son, who came from his nature, of his hypostasis (for he does away with his existence and engages in such extremely perilous undertakings), come now, “putting on the breastplate of justice,” while also lifting up “the shield of faith” and whetting against him “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,” let us show that he is a liar and in his extreme arrogance all but kicks against the goads and leaps down into the deep pit of destruction.

As I said, we have already woven together a valiant tapestry of words against him and have plainly shown that coexisting with the Father and ever subsisting along with him is the Word who is from him with respect to his nature and is in him in terms of a union and an identity of essence, the one through whom all things were brought into existence. Yet because Julian has also devised another insipid and impotent argument – though in his view it is a terrifyingly clever denunciation, a denunciation, that is, of the only-begotten – we have no choice but once again to oppose vigorously what he has attempted to say and thereby rein in the raging onslaught of his endless banter against Christ. For once more he writes as follows: And hear from his own words that Moses calls the angels “gods”: “Now when the sons of God saw the daughters of humans, that they are beautiful, they took wives for themselves of all that they chose.” And a little later: “And after that, when the sons of God used to go in to the daughters of humans, they produced offspring for themselves, and these were the giants from of old who were renowned.” Now the fact that he is talking about angels is obvious and does not rely on a variant noted in the margin, but is also clear from his statement that it was not humans but giants who came from them.

For it is clear that if he had thought their fathers were humans rather than beings of some superior and more powerful nature, he would not have said the giants were begotten from them. For it seems to me that he has declared that the race of the giants began from a mixing of the mortal with the immortal. Wouldn’t he who refers by name to many “sons of God” – and these are not humans but angels – wouldn’t he have informed humanity about “God the only-begotten Word,” or “the Son of God,” or whatever you call him, if in fact he had known about him? And because he regarded doing so as a trifling matter, he says about Israel, “Israel is my firstborn son.” So why did Moses not also say these things about Jesus? He used to teach that there is only one God and that there are many sons of God who have divided the nations among themselves. But the “firstborn Son” or “God the Word” or any of those things falsely concocted later by you he neither knew in the first place nor did he ever teach openly. Listen to Moses himself and the other prophets. Moses frequently says many such things as this: “You shall fear the Lord your God and serve him alone.” Why, then, is it reported in the gospels that Jesus commands, “Go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,” 14 assuming that would have meant them serving him too?

And you yourselves also, as you reflect upon the implications of these words, speak of the Son as God along with the Father. So then, Julian is on the hunt and is making a serious effort to appear well-educated and to assemble true and thoroughly researched information about our doctrines. Nevertheless, we will, without any effort, reveal that here as well he is in no small measure uneducated and is ignorant of the deeper meaning in the sacred writings. Now his aim is, as I said, to prove that there are many gods. But he apparently thinks the tactic that would best advance his cause, and something he could reasonably hope to achieve, would be to prove with the utmost clarity that the all-wise Moses refers to God as “one” and “only,” while having hardly anything at all to say about the Son along with him. Indeed, the whole aim of Julian’s perversity is bent upon this one thing. Now over the course of the long discourse we have already brought forward, it has been shown that the Son also subsists together with God the Father and that [the Father] could never be thought of apart from his own Word. Nevertheless, the task now at hand is to prove the same thing on the basis of what Moses himself said. For Julian insists that Moses made absolutely no mention of the Word and that he was unaware of the Son who coexists with God the Father, but instead has mentioned many other gods or, in his own words, “city-guarding” angels who have divided the nations among themselves.

So then, Your Excellency, when you hear the sacred writings naming as “gods” some of those beings belonging to the class of created things, you ought to realize that the one who is true God by nature has honored the entire rational creation with such an appellation. For example, the divine Paul says that he is aware that though there are “many” who are called “gods and lords,” both “in heaven and on earth,” none of them are such in actual fact except one – he who is by nature God the Father over all and with him his own inseparable Word innate to him and coexistent with him, who we say is also named the “firstborn of all creation,” since he has taken up the rational creation into a kinship with himself, a kinship understood as a gift, based on their being made “according to his likeness and image.” Therefore, not only angels, but even we ourselves are styled “gods” and “sons,” due to our status as images of the one who is truly God and Son. “For,” he says, “I said, ‘You are gods and are all sons of the Most High.’” Therefore, even if the title of sonship has been bestowed upon some of those beings brought into existence, still there is only one who is truly God by nature and we have been molded according to his form, thereby gaining from him such a renowned and most eminent title as a gift.

I will now attempt to demonstrate that Moses knew that God the heavenly Father is not without progeny and in fact “frequently” also makes mention of the Word who came forth from him and addresses him with various names, as do also the holy prophets who came after him. Hence, he understood that the Word is the image of God the Father and, as the most holy Paul says, “the imprint of his hypostasis.” For he has written clearly in the book of Genesis, “And God made humanity; according to the image of God he made it.” Do you hear in this passage how exceedingly well he has actually said that God crafted humanity according to the image of God? For we have been molded, as I said, according to the form of the Son, while the Spirit, through sanctification, stamps us with a godlike and preeminent beauty, in an intellectual and spiritual manner, that is. And anyone could see that the Son is the image and likeness of God the Father through the statement he himself makes at one point: “And everyone who spills a person’s blood will have his own blood spilled in return for this blood, since I made humanity in God’s image.” For the one who dares to commit murder would, since he insults the divine image, understandably have to pay a just penalty that was equivalent to the offense.

9.G Furthermore, from the Father’s own voice in the following passage you can recognize that Moses also understood that he is named “Word.” For Israel was living in the wilderness, delighting in the provision of manna, but when a desire for the meat of Egypt came upon them, they cried out against the most excellent Moses, and he drew near to God saying, “Where can I get meat to give to this people for them to eat?” And when God promised to provide this too and in fact said it would suffice, even so Moses was still disheartened. Then the God of the universe said to him, “Will the Lord’s hand not be sufficient? Now you shall know whether my Word will overtake you or not.” For the entirety of the Father’s activity is, as I said, mediated by him. It is for this reason that he is named his “power” and “right hand” and “arm.” For example, Moses mentioned that God said in Deuteronomy, “I will lift up my hand unto heaven and I will swear by my right hand.” For in this passage he says the Son through whom are all things and in whom are all things is his hand and indeed also his right hand. Moreover, he will confirm that the Son who is both from him and in him with respect to his nature is not another alongside him, for he says once more in another place, “I have sworn by myself, says the Lord.”

For in swearing by his own right hand, which is the Son, he doubtless swears by himself. For nothing at all intervenes – I mean insofar as it concerns the natural unity and identity understood with respect to the two of them – besides the sole fact that one of them is Father and has begotten, while the other has appeared from him in the manner of begetting and is co-eternal with him, since the Father is eternally Father and was not brought to this condition at some point in time. The divine David also understood that the Son is the right hand of the Father, saying, “The Lord’s right hand has acted in power, the Lord’s right hand lifted me up.” And indeed also Moses himself [said], “Your right hand, O Lord, has been glorified in strength. Your right hand, O Lord, shattered your enemies.” And once more, “May fear and trembling fall upon them; by the greatness of your arm let them be turned to stone, until your people should pass by, O Lord.” And he has called out at one point among the peoples of the Jews, “For as the Lord our God did to the Red Sea, which the Lord our God dried up until we went across, so that all the nations of the earth may know that the power of the Lord is mighty.”

And indeed also another of the holy prophets says to the Father in the heavens, “Be exalted, O Lord, in your power.” For he is glorified in the Son. And again, “Command, O God, by your power; make powerful, O God, that which you have done among us.” For we are made powerful in the Son. And indeed also the Son himself commanded the holy apostles not to depart from Jerusalem until they were “clothed with power from on high.” And once again Paul will clarify what this “power from on high” should be understood to be when he says, “Clothe yourselves with our Lord Jesus Christ.” And I once more hear Moses writing the following: “You shall not fear other gods and you shall not worship them and you shall not serve them any longer, but only the Lord who led you up from the land of Egypt by his great might and by his uplifted arm.” The divine David thought and spoke in agreement with what Moses said, since he sings in a psalm, “He sent forth his Word and healed them.” Therefore, it was by the divine Word that ancient Israel was redeemed and set free from maladies of the soul. Furthermore, anyone ought to be able to recognize, based upon what has been written in Exodus, that Moses calls the Son by the name “Lord” too, in full awareness of the fact that the Father himself also exists as Lord.

For it reads as follows, “And Moses, rising early, went up to Mount Sinai, just as the Lord commanded him. And Moses took with him the stone tablets. And the Lord descended in a cloud and stood beside him there and he spoke by the name of the Lord and the Lord passed by from the face of the Lord.” So then, which Lord is it that spoke in the name of the Lord and which Lord is it that passed by from the face of the Lord? Or is it not clear that we will doubtless believe the Father appeared and spoke in the Son? Are there then two Lords, existing separately, as one would understand two humans to be? Certainly not. For there is a single lordship and divinity belonging to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, although each of those named is understood in a hypostasis unique to it. The sacred writing everywhere reveals the properties and select features of the single nature, while also teaching that they adhere to each of them perfectly. The Son, for example, since he possesses in himself the entire set of the Father’s natural properties and also exists in the Father together with those properties the Father is understood to have, clearly says to the Father, “All that is mine is yours and yours is mine.” And once more, “All that the Father has is the Son’s.”

Therefore, if the all-wise Moses points to the Son in so many passages and not just in one way, [Julian] should refrain from saying, “Wouldn’t he who refers by name to many ‘sons of God’ – and these are not humans but angels – wouldn’t he have informed humanity about ‘God the only-begotten Word,’ or ‘the Son of God,’ or whatever you call him, if in fact he had known about him?” He has pointed it out, O wise man, and with exceptional frequency and clarity! Yet you yourself hardly understand it, although he has written it down, and quite rightly so: “You shall worship the Lord your God and serve him alone,” and all the other passages that agree with this one. Next, supposing that such things were said for the purpose of abol-ishing the Son rather than overthrowing your gods, you were not afraid to say, “Moses, therefore, in many places says many such things as this: ‘You shall fear the Lord your God and serve him alone.’ Why, then, is it reported in the gospels that Jesus commands, ‘Go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit’?’ ” Accordingly you yourself will learn from us the answer to this question too. If Moses and the prophets confessed the holy and consubstantial Trinity and your own elite ranks were not ignorant of it, how, pray tell, can you not recognize that you are suffering from an intractable and stubborn arrogance?

For they themselves also grant the existence of three principal hypostases, though they separate them from one another and arrange them in a descending hierarchy. For they were apparently unaware of the pure account of God, though they were not entirely devoid of a pretense of fastening upon the truth. Nevertheless, I once again perceive that some of those who have a mindset identical to Julian’s will probably have a response to this argument as well, saying, “Yes, dear sir, Moses has given the Son the names ‘word’ and indeed also ‘power’ and ‘arm’ and ‘right hand of the Father,’ but he knew nothing of the manner of the incarnation.” 9.o Observe, therefore, yes observe that that all-wise man has written truly about these very things too in the following account. For he said Jacob departed from Laban’s home and longed for the country that bore him. But when he came to the Jabok (and this means “a swollen river”), [Moses] says he led his children across, but “Jacob was left alone and a man was wrestling with him until morning.” And further on, “Jacob asked him and said, ‘Tell me your name.’ And he said, ‘Why do you ask this, my name?’ And he blessed him there. And Jacob called the name of that place Form of God. ‘For I have seen God face-to-face, and my soul was saved.’”

The divine Moses added, “And the sun rose upon him, when he passed by Form of God.” O what a great marvel, what a pure mind, what a well-refined intellect that subtly understands the import of the mystery concerning Christ! Though “a man” was wrestling with him face to face, he says he has seen “God” and he gives him the name “Form of God.” For the Word truly was and is God, even if he became flesh according to the scriptures. Moreover, he has also remained the “imprint of the hypostasis” of the Father, although he has put on the “form of a servant” for the sake of the economy; for he is unchangeable and immutable in terms of his nature. From what Moses has written anyone ought to be able to see without any difficulty at all that the man wrestling with Jacob is the only-begotten Word of God, who is indicating in advance to the holy fathers that at the appropriate time he will exist in a form like us. For [Moses] said, “And the Lord said to Jacob, ‘Arise and go to the place of Bethel and dwell there and make there an altar for the Lord who appeared to you when you were running away from the face of Esau your brother.’” In light of this passage, will anyone then still say Moses was unaware of the manner of the only-begotten’s incarnation?

9. Furthermore, since His Excellency Julian has also mentioned angels and says they have descended into such a lack of self-control that they – I cannot fathom how – leaped upon the beauty of women and were fearfully ensnared by bodily desires for pleasures contrary to their nature, come and let us show that also with this claim he has entirely missed the point. Now I know that we have taken up an argument that is tangential, but, since the story has already been introduced into the discussion, there is no harm in us submitting a plea on behalf of the nature of the holy angels, since even it has been slandered by Julian, especially since it would negatively affect our listeners if one were to say that even the holy angels themselves melted at the sight of bodily beauty, or rather that they were thrilled with such profane and inordinate pleasures. Otherwise, if we are to believe that even the holy angels themselves have been made abjectly subservient to passion, is it not likely that many people will then give up and, disregarding the better option, choose hedonism instead, once they realize the longing to resist the movements of the flesh will most certainly be a difficult burden and an uphill climb for them? Hence, we shall show without any difficulty that Julian is ignorant of the meaning of this text.

For the divine Moses has written for us, “And it came about when human beings began to become numerous on the earth, that daughters were also born to them. Now when the sons of God saw the daughters of humans, that they are beautiful, they took wives for themselves of all that they chose.” And indeed they also gave birth, he says, to the giants. Julian, however, confidently maintained that “the angels of God” is an additional reading “in the margin,” despite the fact that the more accurate version of the scripture in the center [of the page] reads “the sons of God.” Moreover, it should be noted that after the publication of the Seventy’s translation, when the others came to translate the same passage, they said “the sons of the rulers” in place of “the sons of God.” I will, therefore, attempt to provide a good explanation of what the aim of this passage is. For two sons were born to Adam – Cain and Abel – but Abel, having fallen prey to Cain’s madness, departed from our present condition while still childless, since he was murdered, as the sacred writings would have us believe. The race of Cain, however, extended even as far as Lamech, who was a murderer. For he confesses, “I have killed a man for wounding me and a young man for bruising me.” Eve then gave birth to Seth from whom came Enosh, about whom it has been written, “He hoped to receive the surname ‘the Lord God.’”

For since he attained the full measure of all good deeds and so understandably became something of a marvel, he was honored by his contempor-aries with the appellation “God”; for he is named “God,” since he was assigned to be steward of all justice and virtue. Now the race of people descended from him extended even as far as the days of Noah, who was “a just man”; for he “was well pleasing to God,” as it has been written about him. Therefore, the race that came forth from Cain, following the habits of its ancestor, practiced an unholy and abominable way of life, yet those from Enosh who was surnamed “God,” walking in the footsteps of their ancestral virtue even as far as Noah, were manifestly good and just and in possession of all other such things. Now the races were unmixed with one another, and the clean, who in fact used also to be called “sons of God,” used to hold themselves aloof from the profane. For, as I said, they maintained the bloodline of Enosh who was surnamed “God” into the days of Noah. “The sons of God” – that is, those from the bloodline of Enosh – having seen “the daughters of humans” – that is, daughters from the bloodline of Cain and those after him – “that they are beautiful, took wives for themselves of all that they chose.”

Hence, when the races had come together with one another and when the good race had been utterly destroyed through intercourse with the worse one, and when justice and well-being no longer existed among those dwelling upon the earth, the God of the universe let loose the flood, ordaining a single sentence of death for all with no distinction. For he, with holiness, weighs our affairs on his scales, and regards impiety as unbearable. Moreover, the women, he says, were giving birth to giants, meaning that the divine wrath ultimately debased even the very beauty of their bodies since they had trampled upon justice for the sake of base passions and the most abominable pleasure. So while the giants were most likely stocky and most brazen men, they were deformed with an extremely horrible appearance. And it is customary for the God-breathed scripture to call those with a savage mind and an exceptionally stout constitution “giants.” For example, the God of the universe said about the Persians and the Medes who were about to take Judea captive, “Giants are coming to fulfil my wrath, rejoicing and reviling at the same time.” For in fact we ourselves do not maintain, as do the Greeks’ poets, that the giants were supremely large and lifted up so high in terms of their bodies that they even seized islands from the midst of the sea and threw them up into heaven; rather they were ugly in appearance and monstrous and impetuous, though not as far beyond the limits of humanity as the elite ranks of the Greeks thought it right to say in their lying tales.

So enough of this indictment of the holy angels, as well as the blame and accusations against them about base pleasures. Now as for the fact that we are not at odds with the doctrines of the all-wise Moses but have adopted a view on all matters that corres-ponds with them and, as it were, fits together exceptionally well with them, this is something an earlier argument of ours has demonstrated clearly and sufficiently. Nevertheless, Julian imagines he can prove that we in no way agree with Moses or even try to reflect his ideas, though in fact he has spoken pointless nonsense, pouring out upon us so very many words. For indeed he says that the Christian tradition does not agree with Moses’ laws, nor do Christians think it worthwhile to live according to the customs of the Jews, although the [customs] among the Greeks harmonize with those of the Jews. For they too, he says, use laws and customs that are no different from the Greeks’ but rather are the same, with the exception of maybe two or at most three points – the fact that they do not recognize other gods or the form of sacrifice they call “soothsaying” – since he contends that all other practices are common to both and indistinguishable. For, he says, while circumcision is most important among the Jews, the more holy of the temple-wardens in Egypt, in addition to the Chaldeans and Saracens, do not deem it unacceptable.

Furthermore, “the sacrificial methods” as well, he says, are equally respected by both, such as firstfruits, whole burnt offerings, vows, thank offerings, and, as he sees it, honorary offerings, as well as also purifica-tions for faults committed in ignorance. For, having selected from Moses’ writings the names of sacrifices, Julian then incorporates them into his own explanations, presumably so that nothing in our tradition might seem to be left uninspected by him. For he above all longs to be thought of as someone who appears wise and he is desperately hunting for a reputation for being erudite. But he is apparently ignorant of the fact that, while it is not difficult to be acquainted with the letter of the law, the import of the concepts within it is entirely inaccessible to him or those like him. For example, God at one point said through one of the holy prophets, “Who will be wise and understand these things, or intelligent and comprehend them? For the ways of the Lord are straight and the just will walk in them, but the impious will falter in them.” Therefore, even if Julian adduces for us many passages from the God-breathed scripture, he ought nevertheless to know that he understands nothing. For example, he supposed that the hierophant Moses performed sacrifices to polluted and abominable daemons and – what is even more unbearable – Julian said the lawgiver himself permitted [Moses] to do this, so that we might catch him contradicting himself with regard to the laws he gives.

For [Moses] said, “The one who sacrifices to other gods aside from the Lord alone shall be utterly destroyed.” Yet if, as Julian says, [Moses] is seen commanding them to make customary dedications to abominable daemons, how could [Moses] manage to divert us from this evil when in fact he himself is clearly setting us on the path that leads to it? So we must observe what sort of slanderous attack on God Julian once again has made. For, as he was enumerating “the sacrificial methods,” he said, And listen also to what he says about the evil-averting [beings]: “And he shall take two rams from the goats for sin and a single ram for a whole burnt offering. And Aaron shall bring forward the bull calf for sin, which is for himself, and he shall make atonement for himself and for his house. And he shall take the two rams and place them before the Lord at the door of the tent of witness, and Aaron shall place upon the two rams one designation for the Lord and one designation for the one who sends away,” so as to send him forth, [Moses] says, as “a sending away” and “to let it go into the wilderness.” So then, the ram that is sent to “the one who sends away” is sent forth in this manner, but as for the other ram he says, “And he shall slay the ram for the sin of the people before the Lord and bring its blood inside the curtain […] and he shall sprinkle the blood upon the foot of the altar and he shall make atonement for the holy places, because of the unclean things of the sons of Israel and because of their wrongs – concerning all their sins.”

99 Now when he says “evil-averting,” Julian is referring to “the one to be sent off,” thereby introducing a new word that is not found in the sacred laws, though it is apparently a word familiar to him. And I cannot help but be amazed at this: though the law actually consists in shadows and riddles, he restricts it to its more obvious sense and thinks it has no concealed meaning. Yet it would presumably be clear to everyone that a parable and a riddle would be reflections of a different reality rather than whatever they might appear to be. I mean something like the following (and here one must proceed via examples that in Julian’s eyes possess not inconsiderable esteem). They say that some of those who serve idols are designers of riddles who have even been trained in this art with cleverness and skill, and it is customary for them also to call these people “hieroglyph carvers.” These people engrave markings on temples and obelisks and think it best not to use letters like ours; instead, by means of other figures they grant forms to the natures of things and thereby build up a kind of secret knowledge in those who have greater understanding. For wishing to make manifest the divine, or rather the nature that is supreme and surpasses all, they draw an eye and place under it a straight staff, in order that in this [symbol] one might perceive its all-seeing nature and surely its royal honor.

For the scepter is almost always taken to be a symbol of a kingdom, and indeed they intend for the staff’s upright stature to signify that the divine nature is unable to buckle with weariness, but is always, as it were, standing as though sustaining and propping up all things. Furthermore, word has it that they inscribe a cobra as a type for heaven on account of its circularity. Yet they also use a serpent for time, since it is long with many coils, and also creeps along without any sound. In addition, hinting at anger in a riddling manner, they used to carve a censer, as well as a fire kindled within it and then a heart hanging over it. 9.G Furthermore, Pythagoras did not despise riddling communication but held it in high regard. For Porphyry has written about him as follows in the first book of his Philosophical History: But there was also another kind of symbol, such as, “Do not step over a scale,” that is, do not be covetous; “do not poke a fire with a sword,” which meant that you should not incite an angry man swollen with rage by provocative words; “do not pluck a crown,” that is, do not violate the laws, since laws are the crowns of cities. And there are others in addition to these: “do not eat the heart,” that is, do not afflict yourself with sorrows; “do not sit upon a choenix,” that is, do not live in a lazy manner; […] “do not receive swallows into your house,” that is, do not take as housemates loquacious people who cannot control their tongues; “help someone to take up a burden but not to lay it down,” by which he was encouraging people not to help anyone become indolent, but to help them become virtuous and work hard; “not to carry images of the gods on rings,” that is, one’s opinion about the gods and conversations about them should not be offhand or manifest, nor should they be made known to the multitude.

So then, if someone were to look at hieroglyphic letters or Pythagorean riddles and then claim that there is no surplus of meaning in them beyond their more overt aspects, wouldn’t [Julian], who in our case restricts Moses’ law to its mere letters, immediately say in frustration, “What on earth are you doing, sir? Don’t focus your mind only on their more overt aspects and don’t distort the usage of riddles, which is most necessary for the affairs of this life. Instead, investigate their concealed meanings and what is hinted at through them in a very oblique manner.” Julian ought, then, to realize that he is distorting the law if he does not make an effort to regard it in the same manner. For we ourselves refine the crude materialism of the story and, making a diligent search for the secret import of its ideas, we claim that the mystery of Christ has been figuratively imprinted in the literal text in a riddling manner. This mystery is indeed also presented by Paul with great clarity when he says, “Each of you should have the mindset in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant and being made in the likeness of humans. And being found in appearance as a human, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

For although it was possible for him to indulge himself in the privileges of his own nature and to show off, in a manner appropriate to his divinity, his incomparable excellencies over all things (for we hold that this is what is meant by “the joy set before him”), he emptied himself by descending into our condition, in order that, having endured a fleshly death on behalf of all and then trampling upon it by his resurrection from the dead, he might enable us to sprint back to life, even making it a smooth journey for us. For as the priest of his mysteries himself says in another passage, “For just as through a man came death, so also through a man came resurrection from the dead, […] and just as we carried the image of the earthly man, let us also carry the image of the heavenly man.” Yet when he had been raised from the dead, he graciously gave himself to the herds of the nations since Israel behaved towards him like a drunken person and drove headlong into the deep pit of ill counsel. For as Moses has written, “the beloved one kicked away,” meaning that he has somehow jumped off and, having completely run away from the love that was shown to him, has been left behind without any share in divine goods. Observe then, yes observe, the mystery and how it was skillfully sketched in outline in the two rams.

For a young goat or a ram used to be slaughtered on behalf of the sins of the priest and of the people, in accordance with what the law stipulated. And since “Christ has been sacrificed” on behalf of our sins, he is comparable to a ram. For as the prophet Isaiah says, “All of us like sheep have gone astray, a man has gone astray in his own way, and the Lord gave him over to our sins.” Now two rams are taken, not on the understanding that there are two Christs or two sons, as some maintain, but rather because the same one had to be seen, on the one hand, being slaughtered for our sake and dying in the flesh while, on the other hand, living in the Spirit. And the “designa-tions” and names for the rams are “the Lord” for one and “the one to be sent off ” for the other. For it was not the case that [Moses] commanded them to release the goat that avoids slaughter to a kind daemon that “sends away” and “averts evil,” as His Excellency Julian, says; instead it was called “the one sent off,” seeing that it was also sent away from the slaughter, just as was doubtless also true of the Lord who was slaughtered. So, by means of both goats, as I said, there was depicted the one Christ who both died for our sakes according to the flesh and is shown to be superior to death, that is, with respect to the nature of his divinity.

Furthermore, he was sent out into the wilderness, since land that is wild and uncultivated typifies in itself the barrenness of the nations. For we will find it also to have been named such by the holy prophets. For example, it has been written, “Rejoice, O thirsty wilderness! Let the wilderness be glad and let it blossom like a lily.” And again, “Rejoice, O barren one who does not bear; break forth and shout, you who are not in labor! For the children of the wilderness are more than the one who has a husband.” And once more another example: “And I will make water in the wilderness and rivers in a dry place. I will make the wilderness into marshlands and will provide the thirsty land with water channels. I will put in the dry land a cedar and a box tree and a myrtle tree and a cypress and a white poplar.” For indeed the synagogue of the Jews, which was yoked to the law almost as if it were a husband, bore its fruit and in fact had many children, although, as the sacred writing says, “the children of the wilderness are more than the one who has a husband.” For those from the nations who have believed greatly outnumber those from the synagogue of the Jews. And though they were desolate and dry, they have born as fruit the lofty heads of the saints who are very appropriately compared to a cedar, a box tree, and the other kinds of trees.

And also rivers and canals have appeared in this wilderness, that is, the apostles and evangelists, along with the interpreters and teachers of the sacred doctrines, who implant the divine word from heaven into the souls of those who are undergoing initiation and, as it were, irrigate the hearts of believers with intellectual streams. Moreover, the riddle in the case of the rams could be appropriately understood by us in another sense as well; for while it is undoubtedly true that the goat is taken for the sake of sins and is dedicated to God as the law requires, sometimes a goat can also intimate the sinful people themselves. For because a sheep has fleece and produces wool as a kind of fruit, it typifies in itself the character of the saints. But since these qualities do not hold true for goats, they usually signify people who are sterile in an intellectual sense. And the Son does not leave us in doubt on this point since he asserts that he will come from heaven as a judge and, sitting on “the throne of his glory,” “he will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.” And he plainly shows that he likens the righteous to sheep and the others to goats, since he says to those standing on his right, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father; inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,” yet to those on his left, “Depart from me, you who are accursed, into the eternal fire.”

With that point established, come now and let us give a cursory overview of the manner of the economy with flesh. “There was no one who does good, not even one,” as the psalmist says. And all of us were in sin, since neither was the law able to make those from the bloodline of Israel to be just, nor was the multitude of the Greeks acquainted with the path of the blameless life. Hence, with everyone being sinful, the only-begotten Word of God, without undergoing any change or variation, became flesh, that is, a human. And he “committed no sin,” though “he appeared to us in the likeness of sinful flesh” and was “reckoned among the lawless,” insofar as he became flesh and bore the title of “human.” For example, the all-wise Paul has written at one point about God the Father and also about the Son himself, “He made the one who knew no sin to be sin for our sake.” That is, he became a sacrifice for sin. Now those animals slaughtered on behalf of sins used to take on the name “sins,” and this was especially true for rams and young goats more than the rest. For example, through one of the prophets God has at one point said about the divine priests, to whom were assigned the perquisites from the sacrifices, “They will eat the sins of my people,” meaning those offerings from the sacrifices on behalf of sins.

And so, as I said, the only-begotten appeared to us in a form like ours and was “reckoned with the lawless,” and indeed, in keeping with the meaning of the law’s riddles, he became a kid among kids or a ram among rams. 9.o The law has thus commanded that two kids or rams be taken, so that through this detail Christ might be understood as one of us in the sense of having a nature and form identical to a human in relation to another human, just as, of course, is true also for a goat in relation to another goat. And having become like us, he endured the same death that hangs over us, that is, death according to the flesh, in order that he might send us away from death and corruption. Someone might observe that this very thing too is fulfilled in the fact that there were two rams, since of the two, one was slaughtered and offered to God “as a pleasing aroma,” while the other was sent away from the slaughter. For “one” who is more worthy than all “died on behalf of all,” and Christ’s death was the dissolution of death. And this is what the import of the law’s riddles is hinting at for us. But as for those people whose minds are fixated on the mere letter and who understand nothing that is hidden within it, we can take as the starting point for our argument the very ideas we are currently handling and show without any difficulty that they have both completely abandoned the truth and are making a laughable objection.

For Julian himself says, So then, the ram that is sent to “the one who sends away” is sent forth in this manner, but as for the other ram he says, “And he shall slay the one for the sin of the people before the Lord and bring its blood inside the curtain and he shall sprinkle the blood upon the foot of the altar and he shall make atonement for the holy places, because of the unclean things of the sons of Israel and because of their wrongs – concerning all their sins.” Well then, if he thinks there is such great potency in the blood of slaugh-tered rams that it can even set those for whom they were slaughtered free from every impurity and indeed every injustice as well, why did the law ordain penalties and punishments for offenders? For when it comes to adulterers and murderers, in addition to pederasts, sorcerers, enchanters, and indeed also apostates, it has commanded that from them all there must be exacted a payment in blood, without mercy. Why, then, was it necessary for those who had sinned to be in dire peril if the slaughter of the ram, or rather its blood, sufficed for the washing away of every impurity? For surely no one would say that those in peril had a lack of rams! Rather, as the most wise Paul says (and he had Christ, who is the truth, in him), “The blood of bulls and goats is powerless to take away sin.”

We will, then, precisely define the law’s falsity. For if the blood of bulls and goats did not suffice for the washing away of sin, why does the one who legislated it say, “and he shall make atonement for the holy places, because of the unclean things of the sons of Israel and because of their wrongs – concerning all their sins”? Was he therefore mistaken in his speech? Perish the thought! What, then, are we to make of these considerations? It is probably clear and evident to everyone that the truth is brought to light not in the riddles themselves but rather in the realities signified through them. For Christ is the blameless sacrifice, the sacred victim, and, since he has died in the flesh for us, we ourselves have become “sent-off,” meaning we have left behind death and corruption. For we have been redeemed by his blood and have been set free from every impurity, “being made just freely by his grace,” as it is written, and gaining the gift of amnesty by God’s mercy. Furthermore, this man, who understands nothing of such sacred mysteries, imagined that Christians completely disregard the inspired utterances that came through the all-wise Moses and have even chosen to depart from them as if they tended to bring contamination and were plagued with disrepute for that very reason, despite the fact that Paul has clearly written, “So then the law is holy and the commandment is holy and just and good,” and Christ himself, the Savior of us all, says, “Do not suppose that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.

I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” But he, as I said, understands nothing! Therefore, he says, it is clear from what has been said that Moses was an expert in the sacrificial methods. But hear again from his own words that he did not regard them as impure, as you do: “But the soul, which, if it should eat any of the meat of the sacrifice of deliverance, which is the Lord’s, his uncleanness will also be upon him – that soul shall be utterly destroyed from his people.” This is how cautious Moses was in the case of eating holy things. So then, the one responsible for subjecting believers in Christ to such insipid accusations will again have to learn the truth from us: we have abstained from the decrees in the law not because they are unclean; instead we proceed from the types to the truth. And, in my view, it ought to be clear to every person that anything employed as a type of something else does not exist for its own sake but in order that it might introduce a certain foreshadowing of what will later come to pass for the benefit of those who observe it. But when the truth is seen, the type is in a sense now superfluous and to continue prefiguring it is useless. And since the law that came through Moses gives birth to the form of the truth, it too is holy.

For the truth (that is, Christ or rather his mystery) is holy. But he once more indicts us on the grounds that we regard worship in Spirit and truth as more important and superior to worship in shadows and types, and he says, Finally, it is appropriate that I should recall what I said previously, since that is also the reason I have said these things. Why is it that, having deserted us, you neither cherish the law of the Jews nor adhere to what it says? No doubt some sharp-sighted person will say, “Neither do the Jews sacrifice.” But I will prove that he is actually terribly shortsighted, in the first place because you do not preserve any of the other Jewish customs either, and in the second place, because the Jews in fact do sacrifice in < … >169 and even to this day eat all their offerings and pray before sacrificing and give the right shoulder to the priests as firstfruits, but since they have been deprived of the temple and the altar – or, as they customarily call it, “the holy place” – they are prevented from offering the firstfruits of the sacrificial victims to God. But you who have invented the new sacrifice and as far as I can tell have no need of Jerusalem, why do you not sacrifice? And yet it is superfluous for me to have asked you this, since I already said as much at the outset when I was attempting to show that the Jews agree with the nations except for supposing that there is only one God (for that is peculiar to them and alien to us), since all the rest is, in a sense, common to us: temples, sanctuaries, altars, purifica-tions, and certain precepts; with respect to all these things we differ from one another either not at all or in trivial details.

Now if his intention was to join in with the Jews’ frivolity and if he values above all being completely ignorant of what is essential for edification, let him take the spoils and may no one begrudge him! As for us, we will stick to the highway and will take the straight path to the truth, having said farewell to the pointless counsel of them both. But since he has directly asked us a question, saying, “Why is it that, having deserted us, you neither cherish the law of the Jews nor adhere to what it says?” and “Why do you not sacrifice?”, we answer that, since he has not had the light of the truth shine upon him, he regarded as lawbreakers those who in fact scrupulously follow it, using sacrifices that are pleasing to God and not carrying out a worship that he does not want, that is, a worship via flesh and blood. Or perhaps for some reason Julian supposed that the God who truly exists by nature revels in the slaughter of animals, even though some who came before him, despite being stuck in superstitions identical to his own, said with the utmost clarity that approaching [the divine] through blood is somehow detestable even to their own gods. For example, at one point in the second book of his On Abstinence from Ensouled Things Porphyry says the following: “The fact that those who studied the powers in the universe were bringing their blood sacrifices not to gods but to daemons is something the theologians have also confirmed.”

And he also adduces a certain saying of a poet that goes as follows: Who is so stupid, and so extremely lax, Who among men so credulous to hope all the gods rejoice, When bile and fleshless bones are burnt, And take that as their prize, Which is inedible even to ravenous dogs? And indeed he also elsewhere says sacrifices in blood are detestable to the gods, writing once more as follows: “Although in ancient times divine law did not arrange these things in this manner, they nevertheless honored each of the divine beings with crops. For those rituals were pleasing both to nature and to the overall perception of the human soul.” And he also joins together these words with the saying of the poet: The altar was not drenched by the indiscriminate murder of bulls Rather, this was viewed by humans as a great pollution, To wrench away their spirit and to devour their limbs as prey. One may also see this from the altar at Delos which is preserved to the present day: since no animal is brought to it by them or sacrificed upon it, it has been called the Altar of the Pious. Thus, not only did they abstain from animals when sacrificing, but they also gave a share of piety both to those who founded the altar and likewise to those who use it.

9. So then, when the altar among the Delians has been called “altar of the pious,” though no animals were slaughtered upon it, why does Julian bring baseless criticisms of our acts of virtue that transcend the law and why does he arraign those who say God does not revel in blood sacri-fices but instead longs for veneration and worship “in Spirit and in truth”? Yet he likely will respond, “Why, then, do we see him making such divine utterances? Or has Moses perhaps tricked the ancients by adding to each of the laws the phrase ‘Thus says the Lord’?” We will respond to this point also. Moses was no liar, but rather was an authentic minister of words from God. Nevertheless, the law, in its literal sense, was “an instructor of the foolish” and “a teacher of children” – so at least said Paul, who is well educated in the law – and, by commanding them to use its more overt meaning as the basic elements and first princi-ples of their lessons, it permitted [them] to rehearse the truth by means of types and to be drilled with exercises befitting children, at least for a time. For it was nearly impossible for those descended from Israel, whose mind had only recently been established in piety, to succeed in rendering veneration and worship “in Spirit and in truth” and to endure the sweat required for such a holy and most pure kind of life – I mean the life that accords with the gospel.

For virtue is hard to achieve and is not won by meager efforts. It seems to me that one of the Greek poets has put it best: How can one accomplish great achievements with slight exertions? It is stupid even to wish for such things. Furthermore, the lawgiver himself would declare that exceptional precision with respect to being able to live well and in terms of doctrinal subtlety was a burden nearly too heavy to bear for the minds of the Jews; for he says at one point through the voice of Isaiah, “You have neither known nor understood, nor did I open your ears from the beginning. For I knew that, disbelieving, you would disbelieve.” For the Israel of old suffered from ignorance, disobedience, and an extreme fickleness to such a degree that, when Moses was receiving the law from God and dwelling on the mountain, they turned to apostasy and dared to ascribe veneration to a calf and indeed even sang praises to it with the words “These are your gods, Israel, who led you up from the land of Egypt.” Having such an impotent mind that was so easily swayed to the worse course, how could they have handled the lessons of the gospel, and consequently even dedicate to God intellectual worship as a form of spiritual sacrifice, and, in place of the slaughter of animals, the fragrance from the virtues?

Hence, they used to sacrifice sheep, oxen, rams, turtle-doves, and doves. 9.G One can, however, also observe the skill of the divine accommodation even in these rituals and consider it worthy of complete admiration. For because they had become accustomed to perform these rites while in Egypt, he permitted them to perform their sacrifices, and, drawing them up, as it were, little by little to a blameless state, he was fashioning “the sacrificial methods” not in the form familiar to them, but instead planned with such skill and wisdom that they would give birth to the form of the intellectual worship in themselves. Here is an example: the lamb was sacrificed when those from Israel quite rightly performed all the requirements of the festival at the time of the Passover in Egypt. However, it was not sacrificed in a simple manner but, as I said, with wisdom. For it was taken on the tenth day of the first month and was slaughtered on the fourteenth day at evening under the light of lamps, and the very dress of the participants was stipulated as the law saw fit. For it says, “This is the manner in which you shall eat it: let your loins be girded, with sandals on your feet and with staffs in your hands and eat it with haste. It is the Lord’s Passover.” And, for each of the sacrifices, a certain “method” was prescribed, not haphazardly, but with some secret sketched within it.

And were we to choose to discuss fully the purport of the details of each of them, our account of these sacrifices would become a lengthy one. But now we must go on to something else, for I think it is necessary to prove that the worship prescribed in the law was not something God wanted, at least, that is, insofar as it concerns the letter and types. For frequently one can hear him clearly saying things like this through the voice of the prophets: “For who sought these things from your hands? You shall not continue trampling upon my court. If you should bring fine wheat flour, it would be futile. Incense is abhorrent to me. My soul hates your new moons and your Sabbaths and I cannot bear the great day. My soul hates your fasting and holidays and feasts.” And again, “Your whole burnt offerings are not acceptable, and your sacrifices do not delight me.” And through the divine David, “I will not accept calves from your house nor young goats from your flocks. […] Surely I shall not eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats, will I? Sacrifice to God a sacrifice of praise.” And again, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice, and knowledge of God more than a whole burnt offering.” And indeed even the Son himself has been introduced through the voice of David saying to God the Father in the heavens, “Sacrifice and offering you have not desired, but a body you have prepared for me.

[…] Then I said, Behold I have come […] to do your will, O God.” But our adversary will probably reply, “Yet surely the one who is God according to nature should manifestly be superior to having second thoughts; he should have chosen the better course at the outset and not have instilled in the minds of those under the law a sacrifice that he now repudiates.” On the contrary, Your Excellency, we respond as follows: he has, as I said, ordained laws in shadows and types through the all-wise Moses, since he knew that presenting them in types would be a lesson appropriate to the minds of those being tutored, certainly not so that they would dwell forever upon such gross, material meanings, and thus slip away from the intellectual worship in the Spirit, but in order that they would, by receiving a foreshadowing of truer meanings in types, become well acquainted with the [correct] manner of approaching [God], rushing down the path of true well-being with the utmost skill and expertise. For it is like those experts in the coppersmith’s craft who have obtained a marvelous reputation in it: they usefully give a preview of the shape of what they will make by melting wax, not so as to stop there with their artistic aspirations, but so that, as I said, the beauty of those things that are about to be made might, in anticipation, shine forth in them (yet when their projects have attained their perfection, we no longer have a right to censure the artisan for disregarding the types).

I think that, according to the same method and rationale, now that Christ, who is the truth, has shown forth and now that the worship through him has been introduced, it is only reasonable for us to determine that the types are inadequate. For they are images of intelligible realities. Come now and let us consider the following: what things might God take delight in and what might be pleasing to him? A calf kneeling down for the slaughter? Or, say, a sheep that has been brought forward for this purpose and the smoke of incense spiraling upwards from the censer? Or a soul conspicuous for its diverse array of virtues? Let us consider, if you like, someone who is enrolled among the Jews, a circumcised lover of sacrifice, who does not yet have good habits, who isn’t a companion of reasonableness, but is instead lascivious, a doer of shameful things, lacking self-control in his speech, who has not left any disreputable thing untried. And let us consider someone else who does not belong to those descended from Israel, who is uncircumcised according to the flesh and does not perform blood sacrifices but is instead admirable in his habits, self-controlled, reasonable, impervious to greed, succumbing to none of those deeds condemned by the law and, in general, quite full of every virtue. So then, of these two, which one will surpass the other and which one will walk away with the winning verdict, crowned with votes of approval from above?

I think it is only reasonable that the second one would. But if Julian thinks and claims that I have misrepresented the situation, he ought to know that he is opposing his own forebears and is attempting to corrupt what they deemed worthy of complete admiration. For example, Porphyry, following the opinions of the ancients, says the following at one point: Hence it is necessary for us to purify our character and then proceed to sacrifice, offering sacrifices to God that are dear to him but not expensive. These days people suppose that putting on splendid clothing […]207 is insufficient for the purity needed for sacrifices but they suppose that, when they come to the sacrifices, it makes no difference whether they have made the body resplendent with clothing or have a soul cleansed of vices, as if God did not take delight in that most divine part of us when it is in a state of purity, since it has a natural relation to him. For example, there is an inscription at Epidaurus: Pure one must be to enter within the temple filled with incense. And purity is the thinking of holy thoughts. So you can see that he says purity in one’s habits is above all most dear to the all-holy God. He confirms this in another passage too. For he again said, For given that the sandals on our feet must be clean and spotless in the sanctuaries people have set apart for the gods, when it comes to the temple of our father, which is this universe, is it not proper to keep holy our last external garment, which is this tunic of skin, and to live with it holy in the temple of the father?

For if the risk lay in defiling it alone, one could disregard this and not take it seriously, but, as it is, since the entire sensible body carries effluences from material daemons, the impurity arising from flesh and blood exists together with this power that is its friend and companion due to their similarity and kinship. I do not think anyone will object if I shed light on the present topic by setting forth for those with clever minds the ideas some of the Platonists have made public. They say the following: that the first God, being incorporeal, unmoved, and indivisible, neither contained in anything nor bound to himself, needs nothing external, as has been said. […] As for the remaining gods, the universe and the fixed stars and planets – visible gods composed of soul and body – they must be thanked in the aforemen-tioned manner, with inanimate sacrifices. Hence, given that the incorporeal God stands in need of nothing at all external to himself, and given that approaching him through blood has been discredited even among those who were Julian’s instructors, why then does he bring an accusation and indictment against those who know how to sacrifice in a manner that is in tune with God? For it has been written, “Honor the Lord from your righteous labors and offer to him the first portion from the fruits of your justice.”

And the divine David also said, “Make justice your sacrifice and put your hope in the Lord.” And again, “I went around and offered in his tent a sacrifice of praise and acclamation.” Moreover, the lawgiver himself will confirm for you that, when the resplendence of good deeds is not present in people, the power of blood sacrifice is entirely useless; for he says to the prophet Jeremiah when Israel had stumbled, “And you shall not pray on behalf of this people for their good, because, if they fast, I will not hear their petition, and, if they offer whole burnt offerings and sacrifices, I will take no delight in them.” And again, “Upon whom will I look except upon the one who is gentle and quiet and who trembles at my words? But the lawless who sacrifices to me a calf is like one who kills a dog, and the one who offers fine wheat flour is like one who offers the blood of swine.” And indeed the most miserable Job says, “For the Lord shall not reject the innocent person but he will accept no gift from the impious.” And at one point another wise man also said, “The sacrifice of the unrighteous is a reproachable offering.” And again, “The Most High is not pleased with the offerings of the impious.” For in fact, maintaining a reverent life and being prepared to exercise each and every virtue, in addition to inclining towards better things and trying to avoid what is worse – all of this would be a kind of sacrifice to the all-holy God, one bearing the sweetest fragrance, just as the blessed David says, “It will be pleasing to God more than a young calf bearing horns and hoofs.”

And the all-wise Paul incites us towards this goal by saying, “I therefore exhort you: present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, which is your rational service.” Therefore, it is not in fact because Israel has stopped sacrificing that we have abstained from sacrificing; rather, even if they were to sacrifice, and even if they should choose to fulfil the divine decrees given to the ancients in shadows, we ourselves will proceed along the highway and come directly to what is reasonable, successfully reaching our destination of the intellectual worship in the Spirit. 9. o But since Julian says the reason Israel has ceased performing the religious duties prescribed in the law is that they are unable to do so as long as they are excluded from Jerusalem, he will have to learn from us the divine purpose for which this has come to pass. For why, someone might say, did he command that these rites be performed for him not in all the earth under heaven or even wherever they happened to be while they remained yoked to the law, but instead in Jerusalem alone, as if there was something significant and essential about this place? Was it because the God over all exists only in this land or does not want to be honored everywhere? No one would doubt that the first option is completely nonsensical.

For the divine is unbounded and the incorporeal does not exist in a particular place, but it extends everywhere, and everything is full of it. And, to take the other option, the claim that he does not want to be honored in every place would expose current practices to a not inconsiderable critique. For he is venerated by us everywhere, and, as the prophet says, “His name is great among the nations, and in every place incense is offered to his name and a pure sacrifice.” And it is also written about us, “They will venerate the Lord, each from his own place.” Hence, given that God is glorified in every place and does not reject it, but instead even regards negligence in this as a punishable offense, why do the descendants of Israel themselves not seem also to share in the freedom of making the customary dedications to God everywhere, if they should choose to do so? The answer is that with perfect foresight the lawgiver perceived in advance what would come to pass in the future and so issued a command that they must sacrifice in Jerusalem alone, in order that they would be forced to abandon their ancient customs and progress to what is better. For in the future they were going to be sent forth from their country, once they had become Christ-killers, and were to live among the lands of the nations.

But it would have been incredible, or rather it would arguably have even been harmful to converts from the nations, if they were to continue sacrificing after they had spread to every place. For if some people called through faith were destined to cease prac-ticing their ancient customs, while others were destined to keep approaching God with blood offerings as though these were most dear to him, the latter group would have harmed to no small degree those who had only recently been caught in the net of the truth and who were receiving instruction in intellectual and immaterial worship by the lessons of the gospel.

9. Therefore, since circumstances have been channeled towards the truth and since what was presented in types and riddles has undergone a transformation into something better, we hold that the law has not been abolished, but has instead reached its final goal at that critical moment when the truth (that is, Christ) shone upon us. But if he accuses our position on the grounds that we have given up the types and, having perceived the light of the truth with the acute eyes of our mind, have opted to carry out a way of life not practiced by the Jews (since we place great value upon the spiritual worship), he ought also to rebuke the other domains of knowledge and those eager to go through them, since those who move on from introductory lessons for beginners do so because they have focused all their attention upon becoming excellent in what they are studying. In the crafts of the artisans too you may see how great the progress leading to improvement has been, but no one indicts them for this! The first craftsmen, using a different method [to the one used later], used to draw pictures on boards, but those who came after them, with a skill surpassing their predecessors, began to mold statues, and the earlier craftsmen were never capable of the exceptional precision attained by those who came later.

What need is there for me to talk further about the art of weaving or of stonemasonry and the inventions of those craftsmen? How could anyone fail to recognize how much more advanced their current creations are in comparison with the initial stages of these crafts? If, then, [Julian] still insists that we have degraded the law of the all-wise Moses to a worse condition, let him go ahead and indict us for breaking the law, deliberately scorning the divine precepts, and placing no value upon what is most important of all. But if, on the contrary, we refine the materiality of the shadow found in the law and transpose it into the beauty of the truth, and if what was obscurely announced to the ancients in riddles has now instead obtained a clearer contemplative sense, our opponent deserves to hear this response from us: “Do not be a lover of fault-finding, since it is irksome, nor be censorious, since it is exasperating.” Nevertheless, his argument against us does not stop here. Striving left and right to align the customs of the Greeks with those of the Jews (except, he says, in one respect since the Jews worship one God alone while the Greeks say there are many gods as well), he imagines that our customs diverge from the views of both groups, since we neither accept that there are many gods nor indeed one in accordance with the law, but instead confess three gods in place of one.

Perhaps he imagined that the holy and consubstantial Trinity or the nature of the single divinity has been severed by us into three gods. But our valiant argument has, I think, already shown that, by lodging in our heart and mind the correct and entirely blameless view on this topic, we have been set free from the silliness existing among them both and indeed we even hasten to pursue, without any deviation, the aim of the sacred writings. It is reasonable for me now to mention the further accusations Julian makes in addition to those already discussed. For on these topics he once again says, Why, when it comes to diet, are you not clean like the Jews, but claim that we ought to eat “everything just like the vegetable of the field,” putting your faith in Peter because – so [Peter] claims – that [voice]240 said, “What God has made clean, do not make common”? What is your evidence for this assertion that God long ago regarded certain things as defiled but now has made them clean? For Moses, when he was laying down distinctions about four-footed creatures, says every one that “divides the hoof” and “chews the cud” is clean and the ones not like this are unclean. Therefore, if, following Peter’s vision, swine have now obtained the ability to chew the cud, we ought to be persuaded by him, since it would be truly miraculous if, after Peter’s vision, they obtained this ability.

But if that man was lying when he said he saw in the tanner’s workshop this “revelation” (to use your way of putting it), why would we be so quick to believe him in such important matters? For what did he impose upon you that was so difficult, when, in addition to swine, he forbade you from eating winged things and sea creatures, declaring that these animals too, in addition to swine, have been excluded by God and shown to be unclean? Tell me then, are you so amazed at the customs of the Jews and are you saying that their practice of dietary regulations is clean and that Christians are inferior to the Jews’ healthy dietary regime? Well, let us consider, if it pleases you, from what kind of delicacies the law of the all-wise Moses drove them away and what he commanded them to regard as edible. It has been written in Leviticus, “And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron saying, ‘Speak to the sons of Israel saying, “These are the animals you shall eat from all the animals on the earth: every animal that divides the hoof and splits the two parts of the hoof and brings up the cud among the animals, these you shall eat. However, among those that bring up the cud and among those that divide the hooves and among those that split the hooves you shall not eat from these: you shall not eat the camel, because this animal brings up the cud but does not split the hoof – this one is unclean for you; and the hare and the coney and the pig, because this animal splits the hoof and divides the parts of the hoof and does not bring up the cud – this one is unclean for you.”’”

This is what he said about those animals. Shifting his discussion to genera and species of marine animals and of winged animals and indeed of some other kinds as well, he once again says the following: “And these animals you shall eat from those in the water: everything whatsoever that has fins and scales in the water and in the seas and in the streams, these you shall eat. And everything whatsoever that does not have fins or scales is an abomination for you and shall be abominable to you.” And further on: “And these you shall regard as abominable among the birds, and they shall not be eaten: the eagle, the bearded vulture, the osprey, the vulture and kite and those like it, and a sparrow and a sea gull and a raven and those like it, and a falcon and those like it, and a long-eared owl and a cormorant and an ibis and a water-hen and a pelican and a swan and a little owl and a heron and water plover.” And once more after other words: “And these will be unclean for you from the creeping things that creep upon the earth: the weasel and the mouse and the dry-land crocodile, the field mouse and chameleon and gecko and lizard and mole rat.” How utterly amazing is the cleanliness of the Jews and indeed also their healthy dietary regime!

For they regard as inedible the camel, the coney, the eagle, the bearded vulture, the cormorant, the hoopoe, and the little owl, and, in addition, they repudiate ravens, ibises, and bats, along with a heron, the timid mouse, a weasel, a field mouse, a gecko, and a mole rat. Is there any such excellent food they have not set aside as worthless in their reverence for the law? O how virtuous of them! It seems they don’t even think twice about overruling their stomach and giving up such fine dining in exchange for miserable fare to avoid offending the lawgiver! On the other hand, it would be reasonable and just to censure the practices of the Christians! For, as though they were bidding farewell to the law, they have decided to abstain from none of the aforementioned animals; rather for them “everything” is edible, “just like the vegetable of the field,” and the prized dishes on their tables are ravens and ibises and the rest! We should, therefore, praise the law, because in legislating such excellent guidelines for a fastidious diet for the people of Israel, it bade them keep away from things that no one values anyway, but indeed are so detestable to all humanity that even the mere sight of them is something utterly abhorrent. “But,” Julian says, “it is true that everyone would regard those animals as shameful and despicable, and quite rightly so.

However, it is still possible to praise those who live under the law and to marvel at their self-control. For they have also abstained from the meat of pigs as well as a great many kinds of other birds and fish, such as the sparrow and fish lacking scales and fins. For the law proscribed viewing these animals as edible.” If, therefore, on the one hand [the lawgiver] knows that [such animals] are good, then eating these numerous [animals] that are more delectable would be natural – and if among gastronomists they are not in fact viewed as more delectable than all the other animals, then let them receive a more shameful verdict along with the others! But if, on the other hand, although they are good for being used as food, they have nevertheless been declared by the law to be invalid, then let us investigate the reasons the [lawgiver] condemned foods that are not actually shameful. So then, [the law] regards the pig as despicable because, [Julian] says, it splits the parts of the hoof and does not bring up the cud. But, besides the pig, [the law] has censured some of the marine animals too, since they have neither scales nor indeed protruding fins. Are, then, the intrinsic natural features of the aforementioned animals sufficient to force [the law] to bring this reproach against them? Why does it matter at all whether the pig does in fact divide the hoof into two parts yet fails to chew the cud?

Why does it matter if some of those animals who customarily live in water lack fins and indeed also scales? Did, then, the law make an incorrect statement and randomly denounce some things as impure that were not actually shameful? We are not claiming this. For [the law] provides no small amount of benefit to those who are able to perceive, by subtle reflection, the profundity of the ideas hidden within it. For since the aim of the lawgiver was to introduce those undergoing instruction to the topic of who, more than anyone else in the world, they ought to associate with and whom they should avoid, he employs each of the aforementioned animals as an illustration of people similar to it, in terms, I mean, of the quality of their morals. I will now make clear the meaning of these ideas. He proscribes the use of the camel and the pig for food, the former because it chews the cud but does not split its foot into a divided hoof, and the latter because it cleaves the hoof into two parts but it obviously does not chew the cud. Indeed, one could say each of them has something the other lacks. For the pig, as I said, parts the hoof but does not chew the cud, and the inverse is true for the camel. So then, did the law calculate their degree of offensiveness in relation to one another, so that they are bad and profane by half?

Yet how is this true? If it pleases you, dear sir, let us discern what is at stake here, what riddle is present. 9.G The God-breathed scripture customarily takes the stepping of the foot and sometimes the whole foot itself as a riddling indication of the path formed by each deed someone performs, such as the passage in the book of Proverbs, “Make straight tracks with your feet and straighten your paths.” And indeed also through the voice of David, “And I turned my feet towards your testimonies.” Observe, therefore, how the foot is taken to be a type of the path formed by each deed someone performs. And in our experience this path is, in a way, twofold: for either we become accustomed to benefit ourselves by acts of virtue, always gaining something better, and we obtain pure knowledge, hiding it away in the treasuries of our heart; or we direct our zeal in these matters towards other people as well, as a gift, proceeding through many methods. Therefore, the duality in the stepping of the foot would signify the ability to walk in both these directions. As for the chewing of the cud, it would be a symbol of the capacity for rational thought. For, in my view, I would say that those who would be revered and would attain wisdom and would investigate true doctrines must, not once, but many times turn over and over the ideas relevant to each problem, and, as it were, extensively chew them again and, as it were, press on by increasing precision to refine those objects of contemplative knowledge that are hard to understand.

For in fact something simply accepted without examination and without being thrashed out through inquiries can sometimes even prove to be harmful. Hence, the law pronounces as invalid the person who knows how to benefit himself and others in practical terms yet does not have the ability to reason in addition to this. And, conversely, [the law] declares impure the person who, despite being an especially dear friend of reason, is not consistently distinguished in their actions as well. For the Savior says, “Whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” For anyone who is intending to make their highest priority the attainment of the requisite admiration must be skilled at both. Moreover, the animals living in the water that grow neither scales nor fins always, in a sense, love to wallow in the mud at the bottom, hate to swim to the surface, and are sluggish with poor mobility. And these animals too would be types of those people who roll around in the muck of licentiousness and are buried in the mud of hedonism and are accustomed to do everything, so to speak, in nakedness and without any clothes. For this is what would be intimated to us by those animals the law finds fault with for not having scales and natural coverings. As for the fact that they are also without fins, this again intimates that they are not well prepared with the will required to swim to the surface and that they only barely emerge from the vices in which they live.

These people are corrupt, desperate, and enslaved by the pleasures of the belly, and, as I said, they are well acquainted with fornication and licentiousness, being effeminate and profane, the types of womanish people who are despicable to everyone and carry the indelible stain left by all their shameful actions. [The lawgiver] desires that those who revere him have nothing whatsoever to do with people accustomed to live in this manner, nor indeed with other people too whose entire life is spent in greed and avarice and an inordinate love of gain, who are signified exceedingly well by eagles and falcons, as well as cormorants, bearded vultures, and vultures. Furthermore, the raven and the animals like it are likewise types of people who live in trickery, while a hoopoe, an owl, as well as a bat, and, in addition, all those that fly at night in the dark, are types of people who live in ignorance and, as it were, in darkness and night, who abhor the light of understanding. A weasel and a mouse to a certain degree depict in themselves the cowardly and unmanly class of thieves who are frightened at the drop of a pin. So, to sum up, it would not be difficult to connect true and cogent rationales to each of the animals mentioned in the law, since “the law is spiritual” and it does not restrict the interpretation of its ideas to its more overt meaning.

Hence when the divine Peter wanted to continue lingering in the Jews’ customs and, as it were, hesitated to proceed to what was better, since he was terribly overcome by regard for the types, God lowered down from heaven the sheet with those animals depicted in it that, as I said, used to be condemned by the law’s verdicts as profane, albeit in a riddling manner. And God actually ordered him to slaughter them and, if he so chose, to take them for food. At this the disciple became so distraught that he even spoke like a Jew, saying, “By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything common or unclean. Nor has there entered into my mouth any profane meat.” Then a voice came in response, with God all but rebuking him and clearly saying, “What God has made clean, do not make common.” He then immediately understood that the time had come when the shadows must be transfigured into the truth. So the transition of the types into the truth completely fulfills them instead of showing that the laws were baseless, as some think. Therefore, it is not the case that at one time the lawgiver came to realize the pig and the other animals were clean and at another time was unaware of this fact; rather, he knew they were well made, since it has been written, “And God saw everything that he made, and behold everything was very good, and he blessed it.”

For in terms of what each created thing is by nature and has been created to be, it will invariably possess in and of itself the property of being good. Therefore, even if the attribute of chewing the cud happens not to be present in pigs, it nevertheless is not an unclean animal, but instead is edible. And there is no way it will bring defilement upon people, insofar as its own nature is concerned. For, as I said, the law consists of types and has shadows “covering it until the time for its revision.” This is what the most holy Paul has written to certain people. Nevertheless, Julian probably imagined we were delirious in thinking and speaking these things. And, being yet again self-absorbed, he ignorantly dives into the sacred writings and says, But why am I going on at length about these sayings of theirs? We can easily see if they have any force. For they say that, after the earlier law, God instituted a second one, since the former one was created for a specific occasion and restricted by a limited time period, while the latter one has appeared on account of the fact that Moses’ law was restricted in terms of time and place. That this saying of theirs is a lie I will clearly demonstrate from Moses, presenting not just ten but ten thousand pieces of testimony where he says the law is eternal.

Listen now to this passage from the book of Exodus: “And this day shall be a memorial for you, and you shall celebrate it as a feast to the Lord throughout your generations. You shall celebrate it as an eternal precept. For seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, from the first day you shall remove leaven from your houses.” And after piling up other quotations on top of this one and pointing out that all of those he cites call the law eternal (for I think I need to rescue our discourse from going around and around in circles), he again adds: Although there are many more such passages that I have passed over in which Moses’ law <is said>273 to be eternal, I have refrained from citing them because there are so many. But as for you, show me where Moses said that which Paul later boldly asserted – “Christ is the fulfillment of the law.” Where did God promise the Hebrews another law besides the one established? Nowhere! Nor did he promise a revision of the established law. For listen again to Moses: “You shall not add to the word that I am commanding you, and you shall not take away from it. You shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today,” and “Everyone who does not hold fast to all of them shall be accursed.”

But you supposed that it was a trifling matter to take away from or to add to what is written in the law, and that it was more manly and more noble to transgress it completely, since your gaze is fixed, not upon the truth, but upon what will persuade everyone. Cyril 9.o So then, Julian, as I said, imagined that we, despite being ambas-sadors for the truth, babble away pointlessly, or that, since the law is not actually spiritual, we are perhaps even using refined speech in a cunning manner and are trying to redirect the sense of the text to something other than what has actually been written in order to avoid indictment for violating the law. But this is not so. Why? Because in fact we are not foolishly saying the divine law must be altogether rejected as though it had nothing that contributes to our benefit; rather, we are saying that this law was introduced in advance to be a guide for the ancients to the mystery of Christ and that it gave them a glimpse of the truth through riddles. For this is what we mean when we say Christ is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets, and how right we are! For wouldn’t it be reasonable to regard the truth as the fulfillment of every ambiguous riddle? How could anyone doubt this?!

Therefore, the transition of what was in shadows into the truth does not entail the destruction of the laws that came through Moses but instead makes his meaning more manifest. This, therefore, is the sense in which we say the law has been called eternal, since it will hardly have ceased when it is being fulfilled through “the methods” of our intellectual worship. For Christ arrived not that he might “abolish the law or the prophets” but instead to completely fulfil them, as he himself said. And I must now say something to make my case clearer, as I said, by way of giving an interpretation of the law at hand, the one cited by him. It has been written about the feast of unleavened bread, “And this day shall be a memorial for you, and you shall celebrate it as a feast to the Lord throughout your generations. You shall celebrate it as an eternal precept. For seven days you shall eat unleavened bread.” These are the precepts that God was legislating through Moses. Yet through the voice of Isaiah he argues with those descended from Israel and says, “Your new moons and your Sabbaths […] and your feasts my soul hates. You have made me full.” Tell me then, how could the feasts that were abhorrent to God be perpetual and unending? Should we then say that God changed his mind and, through the prophets, made a mockery of what was instituted through Moses and originally thought to be good?

And that he fell short of what was required and suffered from one of the passions we experience? For when someone chooses to hate something that he would otherwise praise, he is tainted with blame for being flippant. What then shall we say to release God from these criticisms? He was right to have passed laws through the all-wise Moses requiring them to fulfil the festivals in types, but he hates the idea that such festivals would be prolonged into the future, since the tendency to be bound up in the types was not beneficial for those who lived in earlier times, and he was intending instead that, by rushing from type and shadow to the beauty of the truth, they might attain the worship that was most delightful to him, and clearly that is the intellectual worship in the Spirit. For example, he commanded them to bake bread when they celebrated the feast, but without using leaven. The Jews thought they were completely fulfilling the law by doing this and nothing more. If so, what sort of benefit came to them from this practice? In what sense would God have taken pleasure in it? You will say that it was of course necessary for them to celebrate the festival in a state of purification. Yet, if the leaven was able to defile those who ate it, why was it not incumbent upon them to forswear it altogether and not merely for seven days, if indeed some of them, being especially devoted to God, were practitioners of the way of life that brings him delight?

But, as I already said above, in this law – as doubtless in the others too – an indication of the intelligible reality has been introduced in riddles for those who, by a sharp and puri-fied mind, are able to perceive such contemplative realities. On the contrary, then, the law about not using leaven is fulfilled above all by us who have been justified in faith and sanctified in the Spirit and who perform the intelligible worship. According to this particular method of ours, the God-breathed scripture occasionally prefers to take leaven as a type for vice. Therefore, he commanded that they had to celebrate the feast well-scrubbed and cleansed, getting as far away as possible from all vice, having none of the leaven of fleshly uncleanness and pointless distractions, I mean those distractions consisting in deeds that bring no benefit. For such a person will prove to be an illustrious guest at the banquet. The divine Paul, for example, writes: “Therefore, let us celebrate the feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of vice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” Hence, the law is eternal: in ancient times among the Jews it was presented in riddles but now among us the same law is understood in an intelligible and spiritual sense in accordance with the truth. And while the time before the Savior’s sojourn was well suited to riddles, the time that came after it, when the truth shone forth, is the moment for truer realities.

For though it was necessary, yes necessary indeed, for Israel to be cared for like a child through the all-wise Moses since it possessed a rather uneducated and childlike mind, it was also necessary that through Christ, the Lord of all, “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” as it is written, the true and most perfect knowledge should be introduced to us, not overturning Moses’ laws but instead transferring them to clearer conceptions of these realities. And, for example, when Moses used to lecture the Jews, he would place a veil upon his face, practically crying out through this very act that the true face of the law was invisible to them. Now our opponents might say, “If the second state of affairs was more desirable than the first and in fact also better by far, why did the lawgiver not instead declare it to the first group in the beginning?” To respond, I will now bring forward what I have also said frequently: those descended from Israel, who did not yet have a mind secure in the knowledge of God, used to be very easily turned aside from what was most appropriate for them, and they were prone to apostasy from God and never stopped provoking him; for they made the calf and dared to say, “These are your gods, Israel, who led you up from the land of Egypt.”

Therefore, because they had a rather ignorant heart that was easily led astray, an obscure law was given to them in the form of a type, one that was able to draw them up a little way towards ideas of truer realities but did not yet bring forth the path of the pure way of life for all to see. And the statement made by God through the voice of Isaiah would teach anyone that he was issuing for Israel a literal form of the law presented in shadows since they were still young children, seeing as how they stumbled and were foolish and unable to walk correctly: “And I raised up my hand against them in the wilderness to scatter them in the countries because they did not perform my ordi-nances and repudiated my commandments and were profaning my Sabbaths and their eyes were after their fathers’ ways of thinking. And it was I who gave them commands that were not good and ordinances by which they shall not live.” For when it comes to those who had bolted away from affection towards God and had been caught in the crimes of calf-making (for this, I think, is indicated by the phrase “they have eyes after their fathers’ ways of thinking”), for such people it was necessary, necessary indeed, that they should slip away from intimacy with God entirely and wander “in the countries of the nations,” entirely deprived of his care.

Now since he is good and used to honor the supplication of the all-wise Moses, he was giving them legal customs that could function pedagogically, though they were “not good,” as he himself says, nor were they able to instill life in those who kept them. Now in what manner were the legal customs “not good”? I maintain that they were “not good” with respect to the beauty of the truth. For the truth is incomparably more excellent than riddles. Even if it is correct that those descended from Israel derived no benefit at all from the requirement of eating bread that was not leavened, nevertheless when it comes to those who have banished the leaven of vice, those who have a heart scrubbed clean and who love nothing defiled or profane, to them God has granted a destined share in eternal life as their outstanding reward. Moreover, one can observe in Isaiah that it was not possible to attain true well-being through the shadow in the law nor indeed to progress onwards towards God via a straight path; for he speaks to God in the persona of the descendants of Israel: “You, Lord, caused us to wander from your way.” And the blessed David says, “And you diverted our paths from your way.” For, as I said, the type was not a clear and easily traveled path carrying one to God, although, dear sir, it did have sketched within it the truth.

Furthermore, since that accuser of the sacred scriptures says the God of the universe nowhere promised to give “another law” to the descendants of Israel nor indeed did he institute some kind of “revision” of the legislation that came through Moses, I will attempt to show that he is lying with respect to both points, adducing the prophet’s saying which reads as follows: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, and I will execute a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I arranged with their fathers in the day when I took them by their hand to lead them out from the land of Egypt, because they did not persevere in my covenant and I had no concern for them, says the Lord, because this is the covenant that I will arrange with them in those days, says the Lord: placing my laws in their minds, I will also inscribe them on their hearts.” It was, I think, because he understood this point so very well that the all-wise Paul wrote to certain individuals and said, “You yourselves are our letter, known and read by all people, showing that you are a letter of Christ resulting from our ministry, which has been written not in ink, but by the Spirit of the living God.” For given that God instills within us the knowledge of his own will, and, thanks to this knowledge, even inscribes upon the hearts of believers those things that can make them become supremely venerable, how could the shadow not be useless?

And so, the law will not suffer any addition or subtraction but will stay the same, being fulfilled no longer in terms of what is visible on the surface but instead in an intelligible and spiritual sense. 9.G Now, someone would, so it seems to me, say that this response of ours is also beautifully conceived. Nevertheless – under the effects of who knows what sickness – Julian approves of the traditions of the Jews, but then again rebukes them, since, although attached to all the other [religious customs], for some totally irrational reason they have scruples about sacrificing, despite the fact that, he says, Elijah sacrificed on Carmel 300 and not in the holy city, meaning of course in Jerusalem. And I myself would also add the divine David who sacrificed on the threshing floor that was called Araunah, even though the law explicitly says, “Whoever sacrifices a calf or a sheep in the camp […] and <does not bring>301 it to the doors of the tent, […] that soul shall be exterminated from its people.” But, good sir, someone could, in my view, respond by saying, “When Elijah was sacrificing, the temple existed, though it did not yet exist when the divine David did the same. What, then, was there to prevent David from complying with the law and sacrificing in the tent?” Nevertheless, I say the following: behold, yes, behold, how clearly it is demonstrated that even the saints themselves saw nothing wrong with neglecting to focus a most subtle eye on the literal aspects of the law and not being perfectly meticulous in fulfilling them.

9. Furthermore, Julian has also mentioned the letter of the holy apostles that they wrote by way of accommodation to those called from the nations, whose minds were all but just beginning to bloom. They said, “For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than <the following> requirements: you are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of a strangled animal, and from blood.” So, Julian says, in this passage too there is an indication that it did not seem good to the Holy Spirit that Moses’ law ought to be undone. So tell me, did it seem good [to the Holy Spirit] to make them keep [Moses’ law] and is this what he commanded? Yet is it not correct to say that the order he gave those called to the truth through faith was that they must ultimately regard the law’s shadow as something of no significance? For through the voice of the holy apos-tles he was ordaining the sort of laws one would naturally expect those who were still children to be capable of carrying out. So when they said “to lay upon you no greater burden,” they were thereby teaching that the law was indeed burdensome and altogether hard to bear even for those from Israel, and that they would not impose it upon them.

Therefore, it seemed good to the Spirit that the law should be kept by them only to a very limited degree, and that they should try to fulfill the more bearable parts of the law that are easy to follow, since they were not yet strong enough in mind to endure the sweat required for yet greater regulations, given that their mind was still feeble and had barely gained the strength needed for citizenship and life in Christ. And in addition to this, that excellent fellow mocks Peter, the most eminent among the holy apostles, and says he was a hypocrite and was rebuked by Paul for being keen to conduct himself on one occasion according to the customs of the Greeks, and on another according to the customs of the Jews, though Julian is completely ignorant of Peter’s supremely skillful accommodation on these occasions. For it is not the case that the disciple could not make up his mind, but rather his concern was to employ accommodations appropriate to each occasion and thereby to benefit those who came to him in every way possible. And since the blessed Paul used only a single method for himself, he reminded [Peter of this] when they were together. For he was fearful that some people might be unaware of Peter’s policy and could be harmed by his method of accommodation. Book 10 1o.

We have, I believe, given an account of the shadow in the law that is precise, since the enemy of the truth attempted – I do not know why – to persecute us and bizarrely brings the indictment of lawlessness against people who, more than anyone else, have made a firm determination to fulfill those divine laws in a more rational and precise manner than those who are conversant with the bare types alone. But since he takes us to task for absolutely everything we say and do, observe how he plunges us, so to speak, into yet more accusations, and says we stand in opposition even to the holy mystagogues themselves and have given no regard to the apostolic tradition, but instead have turned wherever our whim might carry us – and what’s more, without being taken to task for it! For he again writes as follows:1 Moreover, you are so ill-fated that you have not even stuck with the teachings handed down to you by the apostles, but these too have been further devel-oped into something even worse and more impious by those who came later. Paul at least did not dare to say Jesus is God, nor did Matthew, or Luke, or Mark, but that good fellow John, because he sensed that a great multitude in many of the Greek and Italian cities had already caught this disease, and because he heard, I think, that even the tombs of Peter and Paul were being revered – although it was done in secret still he heard about it – he then was the first to dare to say [that Jesus is God].

And after saying a few things about John the Baptist, he returns to the Word he was proclaiming and says, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,” 7 but he was ashamed to say how this happened, and he nowhere calls him either “Jesus” or “Christ” in the section where he calls him “God” and “Word.” And, as it were, quietly and surreptitiously stealing our ears, he says John the Baptist gave the following testimony about Jesus Christ, that he is the one whom we must believe to be God the Word. Cyril 1o. Now, tell me, which of the apostolic precepts, whether great or small, have we not kept? What has been corrupted into a worse condition by those who subsequently were entrusted by God with the ministry of the word and did a fine job advocating for the sacred doctrines? For if those intent on unjustifiably railing against people guilty of no improper conduct are to have a license to do so without censure or being held accountable, then let Julian take pride in his attacks on us, since a person who cares so little about appearing scurrilous finds nothing easier than lying and denouncing others without any grounds for doing so. If, however, he thinks the claims one makes and the people against whom one makes them should be tested, Julian ought not to delight in being unjustifiably censorious but should instead put them to such a test.

For it is in this way that his words will gain credibility. And I am amazed that, even though in many places he analyzes from every angle the passages from the God-breathed scripture in his hunt to acquire a respectable reputation as a lover of learning, he has succeeded in missing the truth and done so completely. For he actually claims that neither “Paul nor Mark nor Matthew nor Luke” say that Christ is God. But those willing to closely examine the statements made about him can see with the utmost clarity that these authors crown him with divine dignities and, whatever qualities would be suitable solely for that supreme nature above all natures, these they everywhere assign to him, and in fact they do name him “God” as well. For example, the all-wise Paul says, “For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ on behalf of my brothers, my kindred according to the flesh, who are Israelites and to whom belong the adoption, the giving of the law, the covenant, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs and from them, according to the flesh, is Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.” What further quotation in addition to this will you need? For behold, yes behold, he says the one who is from the Jews according to the flesh, that is Christ, is also “God over all” and indeed also “blessed forever.

Amen.” And in another passage he also said, “And those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if someone does not have the Spirit of God, he does not belong to Christ.” And once more he says, “I am reminding you on account of the grace given to me by God that I should be a minister of Christ Jesus to the nations with my priestly duty being the gospel of God.” Hence, in light of the fact that those who have been enriched with the Spirit of Christ have a divine Spirit; and that he says he himself has been appointed a priest of Christ among the nations, as though he were a priest of God; and that he calls the message about Christ the “gospel of God”; and that he gives him the name “Lord of glory” (for he says, “If they had known they would not have crucified the Lord of glory”) – in light of all this, how can you avoid the obvious conclusion that our opponent has made libelous accusations and would seem to any reasonable person to be himself liable in no small degree to charges of making false statements? Moreover, although they knew that he is truly God according to nature, the inspired writers had as their aim and goal to name him Son of God and genuine offspring of the substance of the one who engen-dered him, as one who always coexists and subsists together with his begetter and is understood in the category of the single nature of the divinity, real and with a distinct hypostasis.

It was for this very reason that the wise John too says the Word existed in the beginning, was God, and was with God, and then, after this, says he also became flesh, that is, became a human. Therefore, the singular aim of the inspired writers – and a not unwise one – was the necessary task of saying he is the Son of God by nature, since this statement invariably and unavoidably entails that the one who is from God with respect to nature is truly God. 1o. So then, we have now adduced the statements of the divine Paul who clearly and indisputably names Christ, the Savior of the universe, “God.” Yet I think it is still necessary for us to bring forward also the passages from the other authors in which they have mentioned Christ as God. So, Matthew said about Joseph, “While he was pondering these things, behold an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a Son and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’” And [Matthew] also claimed that the admirable John said, “I baptize you with water for repentance but the one who is coming after me is stronger than me and I am not worthy to carry his sandals; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

His winnowing fork is in his hand and he will cleanse his threshing floor.” And indeed [Matthew] also main-tains that at one point the Lord himself says to us, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you.” And again, when telling us in advance about the end of this age, he said, “Therefore, just as the weeds are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels.” Well then, Your Excellency, would the ability to set people free from their sins be appropriate to anyone else besides the one who alone is truly God? For those who have issued the laws would have authority over them and no one else besides them. And how could it also be said that he saves his people, when God alone exercises authority over the inhabitants of the earth? Furthermore, I would also point out that the ability to “baptize with the Holy Spirit” those who have believed in him is something that exceeds the limits and grasp of a human, and indeed also that possessing this threshing floor (with the inhabitants of the earth, that is, being understood as harvested wheat) would not be suitable for any human, but would be appropriate to Christ alone.

For he was God become flesh (that is, human). And, tell me, whose yoke should the inhabitants of the earth carry? Would it not be reasonable for someone to say that they are yoked to God alone? How then could Christ have commanded us to take upon ourselves the yoke that belonged to him unless he is God and from God according to his nature? And how too could the angels who exist in heaven be his? For he says, “He will send his angels.” 1o. So these are the statements Matthew has made for us, though in fact there are a great many other passages I have passed over in silence to avoid giving the impression of crowding my argument with a heap of witnesses beyond what is sufficient. Nonetheless, Mark everywhere runs through the same ideas and agrees with Matthew’s words. For example, he writes, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, Son of God.” And how could it not be clear to everyone that the one who is truly the Son of God by nature is himself certainly God too? And, to take another example, [Mark] claimed that the Lord said to his holy apostles, “He will be given over into the hands of sinful humans and they will mock him and crucify him”; and that when the divine Peter nevertheless responded by shouting, “God forbid it, Lord!

This shall not happen to you!”, Christ then also replied, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me because you are setting your mind not on the things of God but on the things of humanity.” For Peter did not set his mind on the things of Christ when he spoke in opposition to him. Therefore, [Mark] too named Christ “God,” insofar as he said Peter was setting his mind on the things of humanity and not on the things of Christ, as though they were the things of God. And, again, [Mark] claimed [Jesus] said, “For whoever is ashamed of me and my words, that person the Son of Man will be ashamed of when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.” But unless he was aware that Christ is God, how could he have said he will come in the glory of the Father flanked by holy angels? How could a son of man come in the honor of deity? How could Jesus Christ, that is, the one born from a woman according to the flesh, come in the supreme preeminence that stands over all creation? Therefore, could those who have wholly committed themselves to their ardent love for hunting down the truth possibly doubt that, because [these authors] knew the Lord is truly God, they say that he proudly displays his divine dignities once the appointed time for the economy had passed?

And that, during the economy, it was appropriate that, once he had come to possess a likeness to our condition, he did not regard human limitations as something contemptible? 1o. Furthermore, the fact that the divine Luke also had the same ideas about Christ ought to be clear and very easy [to observe] from what he has written. For he claimed an angel of God said to Zechariah, who was John’s father, “And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth,” and further on, “And he will turn many of the sons of Israel to the Lord their God.” Whom, then, was the divine Baptist proclaiming throughout all Judea? Was it not Jesus, whom he pointed to and said, “Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world”? <To whom>40 was he turning [them] as though to the Lord God? Was it not to him, saying, “I have seen and have testified that this one is the Son of God”? And indeed [Luke] also says Zechariah himself spoke prophetically about his own child: “And you, child, shall be called a prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins.” And once more [Luke] said the holy angel spoke to the holy virgin about Christ: “He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High.”

Observe, therefore, how John’s father prophetically said he will be called “the prophet of the Most High,” meaning that Jesus is the Most High. And the divine angel also named him “Son of the Most High.” For the Son who has shone forth from his begetter would naturally be understood to be equal in glory to him, possessing in equal measure absolutely every one of his attributes. For the fact that he became a human for the purpose of the economy does not at all imply that he would be inferior to his Father in any respect; instead the mode of the economy is accounted for on its own terms. But since the Word from God the Father is unchanging and immutable in his nature, he incurs no harm in his own nature from the fact that, for our sakes, he has come to be like us; rather, as Paul says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” 1o.G Furthermore, I think it is incumbent upon me to convict Julian of fighting in an impious manner against John’s statements too. For it is simply not true that, as he claims, John observed people “revering” “the tombs” of the saints (I mean those “of Paul and Peter”), and thus was led to say that Jesus Christ is God. For it would be implausible to suppose that this is the reason why he was inexorably provoked to ascribe divinity to [Christ], when in fact it was the Holy Spirit that was prompting him.

For Christ at one point said to the holy mystagogues, “It is not you who are speaking, but the Spirit of your Father who is speaking in you.” Nor was he the first who said Jesus was God. Rather, those who wrote before him – I mean Luke, Matthew, and indeed also Mark – were naming him “Lord” and “God,” everywhere assigning the supreme glory to him. Furthermore, because Julian apparently puts lying on equal footing with the most excellent acts of virtue, he maintains that the divine evangelist said, “And the Word became flesh,” though without also saying “how” this happened – being somehow “ashamed” I suppose – “and he nowhere,” claims Julian, “calls him either ‘Jesus’ or ‘Christ’ in the section where he calls him ‘God the Word.’” Yet is it not rather the case that [John’s] discourse on these topics is exceedingly subtle and very nuanced, with its edge honed to razor-sharp truth? For to prevent someone from surmising that the incarnate Word came into being at the time of his birth in the flesh or to prevent someone from saying that God has only just appeared recently, he had to explain in detail at the outset that “he existed in the beginning,” being God the Word, and that, since he was coeternal with the Father, he was “with God” (for he is one with his begetter thanks to a natural identity, although he exists and is understood to be in his own hypostasis), and that “all things came to be through him.”

For this reason, after masterfully stating all this in his preface, he lowered his discourse for the task of narrating the mystery of the economy with the flesh. For he said “the Word became flesh” (that is, human), though not by undergoing an alteration into what he was not, since the divine is free from change and its stability in this state is not something it receives externally, but is rather rooted essentially in its nature. And [John] has confirmed that, having taken his all-hallowed flesh from the holy virgin, he came forth as a man and remained what he was. For he says, “And he dwelt among us.” This would not imply that via alteration or change he was converted into the nature of the flesh, but rather that he dwelt, or came to be, in his own body as though it were a holy temple. 1o. But that man who understands none of these passages brings an all too hasty condemnation of the inspired writer and, in addition to this, says [John the evangelist] has made his discourse about the only-begotten because he placed his trust in the words of John [the Baptist] without subjecting them to examination, and yet he still did not name him “Christ” or “Jesus.” But it is possible to see from the sacred scriptures themselves that he is now pointlessly blathering and hasn’t put any thought whatsoever into the accusation he is making.

For [John the evangelist] accepts as true the statements made by the holy Baptist about Christ, the Savior of us all. Yet after saying “The Word became flesh,” then and only then at that critical moment does he name him “Christ” and “Jesus” and say that he possesses divine dignities, even though he had come to be like us for the purpose of the economy. Consequently, he himself has also written as follows: “Now when he was <in> Jerusalem during the Feast of Passover, many people believed in his name because they saw the signs he was performing for the sick. But Jesus himself did not entrust himself to them because he knew all people.” And again, “Therefore when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors where his disciples had gathered were locked out of fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.’” And at one point he said the Lord himself also spoke to God the Father in heaven: “And this is eternal life: that they might know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you sent.” So one can learn through his own words that [John the evangelist] has retained divinely appropriate descriptions also for the one who has come to be like us. For he names him “life” and “light” in many places, and indeed also says he does the same acts as the Father with the same majesty and is quite appropriately crowned with the incomparable superiority over all things.

1o. Now that man who loves faultfinding and runs through every bad idea, who is forever on the hunt attempting to find something that might allow him (so he thinks) to ruin Christianity, also proceeds down another path, as it were, and says, Nevertheless, I am not disputing that John says this about Jesus Christ. Yet some of the impious think it best to hold that Jesus Christ is one person while the Word proclaimed by John is someone else. That, however, is not the case. For the one who he says is God the Word is the same one he says was acknowledged by John the Baptist as being Jesus Christ. Observe, then, how discreetly, quietly, and surreptitiously he inserts into the drama an impious finishing touch, and how he is such a huckster and scoundrel that he backtracks from his earlier statement and adds, “No one has ever seen God. The only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he has explained him.” Is, then, this only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father also God the Word who became flesh? And if he is, which is my view, then you, too, no doubt have in fact seen God. For “he dwelt” among you and you have seen “his glory.” Why, then, do you also say that “no one has ever seen” God? For you yourselves have seen, if not God the Father, at least God the Word.

But if the only-begotten Son is someone other than God the Word, as I have heard from some of your sect, then it appears that not even John had yet dared this. Cyril 1o. So then, someone could perhaps suppose that Julian, with a mind apt for learning, agrees with orthodox considerations and so identifies the incarnate Word of God with Jesus Christ. However, from the words I have cited one can see that his present undertaking is once more a cunning ploy. For he thought he could demonstrate that the most excellent evangelist was marching out against his own words and making battle against what he himself had said. But “a treacherous man will not catch his prey,” as it has been written. For [John] said, and this very sensibly, that “No one has ever seen God,” since everyone would agree that the divine cannot be seen, but with the eyes of our mind we have seen the Son who is resplendent with the glory of God the Father and radiates the beauty of his begetter. And this has been shown through the very things that have been accomplished; for he is indeed the “imprint” and “radiance of his glory,” and it is not with respect to bearing our image that he resembles him (for, as I said, the divine is incorporeal, formless, without quantity or size, and quite simply beyond mind and speech); rather, this description holds true insofar as he is understood as God, being everything the Father is with the sole exception of being a father.

For instance, when one of the holy apostles at one point said, “Lord, show us the Father and it will be enough for us,” he answered with the words, “Have I been with you for such a long time, Philip, and you still do not know me? The one who has seen me has seen the Father.” Yet wouldn’t one, I think, quite rightly conclude that, if indeed his aim was to say that his begetter resembles the form of his body, why did he instead say, “If I am not doing my Father’s works, do not believe me; but if I am doing them, even if you do not believe me, believe my works”? For those beings that possess an invariably identical activity would of course also have the exact same definition of their nature. 1o.o Therefore, Your Excellency, I would say we will not find the divine evangelist opposing his own words even if he says, “no one has ever seen God.” Nor is it the case that, if we have indeed seen Jesus in the sense explained above, this would make the shield-bearer of the truth a liar; rather, the matter is true in both respects: the Son is invisible with respect to the nature of his divinity, and yet is visible in a divinely appropriate glory, even when he had become human. For it was at that time that we saw both him and “his glory, glory as of the only-begotten from the Father full of grace and truth.”

In any case, the divine David also loudly shouted the mystery of the incarnation in advance with the words, “God, our God, will come in visible manner, and he will not pass by in silence.” And indeed the prophet Isaiah as well, almost as if stretching out his hand, points to his enfleshment and says, “Behold our God, behold the Lord comes with strength and his arm with authority.” Likewise, I would bring into the discussion the blessed Baruch as well who agrees with Isaiah’s words. For he himself at one point also said, “This is our God; no other will be reck-oned along with him. He procured every path of knowledge and gave it to Jacob his servant and to Israel, his beloved. And after these things he appeared on earth and lived together with humans.” Therefore, we have in fact seen the Son as a human on earth going through life together with humans, being invisible with the Father in terms of the nature of his divinity but visible in an intelligible sense, also with the Father, by the preeminence of his divinity and mighty works. For he used to perform divine signs with a mere nod. 1o. Next that accuser of everything holy, who runs willy-nilly after every single one of his concoctions, indicts us for being overly attached to reverence for the holy martyrs and says, Nevertheless, this evil idea did take its origin from John.

And who could feel a sufficient amount of disgust at everything you subsequently invented, piling so many recent corpses upon that corpse from long ago? You have filled the world with sepulchers and tombs, even though nowhere in your scripture does it say that you ought to haunt sepulchers and treat them with honor. And you have proceeded to such a degree of depravity that you don’t even think it necessary to listen to the words of Jesus of Nazareth on this topic. Hear, then, what he says about the tombs: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you are like white-washed sepulchers. The outside of the sepulcher appears beautiful but inside it is filled with the bones of the dead and with every kind of pollution.” If, then, Jesus said sepulchers are full of pollution, how can you invoke God at them? Moreover, [Julian] adds to this that when one of the disciples said, “Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father,” [Jesus] said, “Follow me and let the dead bury their own dead.” 84 Cyril 1o. Now we have already said much in dispute with Julian about these topics and have expended many words in the preceding sections, but I think I must say a few things to him now as well. Indeed, we admit that graves containing bodies are not free from pollution, although this is not a sufficient reason to forget the virtue of the dead.

Rather, the fact that those who practiced to perfection the admirable life had a body “from the earth” that has been dissolved by the law of nature “into earth” does not imply that we take lightly our duty of honoring them, since one would in some way praise those who chose to live in an excellent and most renowned manner and in many cases disregarded even death itself, so that some noteworthy aspect of their story might be inscribed in the memories of people to come. For I’ve heard of someone in Homer’s poems who says, Let me not perish without struggle and without glory, But by doing something great for later generations also to hear about. So then, when it comes to someone who has departed from the human realm “not without struggle and without glory” and has accomplished “something great” that one might rightly be proud of, is it right to abandon such a person to silence and forgetfulness or to crown them with the best kind of admiration of all – to gladden them with a lasting and undying honor, and thereby practically join in their exploits and share in their courage? For don’t those who are determined to praise the martyrs’ complete disregard for suffering as they traveled down the exceptional path in life deserve to become partners in their brave deeds? 1o. And what I already said above I will now say once more.

They say that, for those furnished with an especially sophisticated tongue and given to delivering eulogies, annual competitions were held at Athens dedicated to the people who bore the brunt of warfare for the sake of Greece and who rose up against the pretension of the barbarians despite being few in number. Although there were fewer of them than their enemies’ innumerable column, nevertheless, since victory was impossible, they seized a courageous death as a substitute for victory and made themselves worthy of remembrance and eulogies among the Athenians, with the result that this fact even came to function for some as an oath. For they used to say: “no, by our forefathers who bore the brunt of warfare at Marathon”; “no, by those who fought in the navy at Salamis”; “no, by those [who fought in the navy] at Artemisium”; “no, by those who stood ready for battle at Plataea”; and “no, by the many others who repose in our public tombs.” Hence, given that the most eloquent elite ranks at Athens, despite being idolaters, thought it a good idea to fulfill their duty of granting honor and rewards to those who did not flee from a glorious death and indeed even to visit the very graves where their bodies lay – for they used to give their speeches at the very place where those who carried out the courageous deeds were laid to rest – was not His Excellency Julian then incorrect to cry out against the Christians’ sense of what is virtuous, on grounds that they attach great value to revering and honoring the holy martyrs, all of whom achieved <self-mastery> and by their blood exchanged this temporary life for that which is secure in faith and for the glorious achievements of their devotion to Christ?

Or maybe the reason he has become so incredibly angry and thinks he must mock them is that they themselves did not become cowardly apostates throwing down their shields, they were not careless, they did not retreat, and they did not disparage devotion to God – the exact thing, of course, which that man himself did who is denouncing the fortitude inherent in them. 1o. “That’s all very well,” Julian says, “but one must avoid those sepulchers that even Christ himself said were full of pollution, and Christ knew the dead were so disgusting that he did not permit his disciple to bury his father.” Now, first of all, we will easily see that he is utterly ignorant of the import of the Savior’s words. For he did not command them to keep away from sepulchers, even though he knew they were filled with “the bones of the dead and every kind of pollution”; rather, it seemed to him a good idea to liken to whitewashed sepulchers the dissembling and hypocritical band of the Pharisees who stole the outward appearance of virtue yet had hearts full of every kind of vice and pollution, in an intelligible sense that is. Furthermore, by telling his disciple that he must instead follow him and leave the burial of the dead to others, he taught that it would be appropriate and reasonable for our concern about our own affairs to take a back seat to our love of God, since divine matters are more important even than reverence for one’s parents, since he is the generator and maker of the universe.

And by deigning to visit the dead and even their very tombs, [Christ] clearly shows that he realized neither sepulchers nor corpses are able to produce any defilement in the souls of humans. So it was that he commanded that Lazarus, who was even at the point of stinking, should come back to life. So it was that the synagogue ruler’s little girl miraculously came back to life; for it says that he touched her hand and said, “Child, arise.” And indeed also at Nain (this is one of the cities in Judea) he raised the widow’s son by “touching his coffin” and calling out, “Young man, I say to you, rise.” For, what defilement could the remains of a dead man produce in our minds? Could that which fills our sense of smell with stench pollute the mind that is in us or could it even divert us towards what is not right? Wouldn’t this be a completely naïve thing to say? Besides, one can observe that the remains of the departed are not carelessly cast into the ground naked but are well-clothed, since they are concealed in holes in the ground, as if hidden in the bosom of a mother. 1o. And if someone wanted to speak on behalf of the dead, he might say, “Why do you regard sepulchers and corpses as disgusting? What harm could, say, a body or a sepulcher impart to those who draw near to them?

Can it render the lover of justice unjust? Can it make the virtuous and self-controlled person licentious and undisciplined? Can it make someone who is superior to greed succumb to wealth? Can it make the affable and gentle person cruel and savage, the person who loves God to be impious?” Obviously not! For the remains of the departed, I think, can hardly corrupt the goods of the soul; instead, it is the inclination of the will towards what is utterly shameful that does so. Do you see these laws here which guide human affairs towards well-being? They are the ones that punish adulterers, the unjust, rapists, and those caught in still other crimes. Obviously, however, there are no laws stating that someone who goes off to sepulchers or visits corpses deserves punishment. “Nevertheless,” [they claim], “sepulchers render certain people defiled and suffice to lead them astray and are full of a pollution that touches the soul through the foul smell they contain.” If so, then perfume shops and loitering in them ought to prove beneficial for the wicked and set them free from their wicked behavior, and someone caught in an indictment for adultery should just crown himself with roses, anoint his body with perfume, and so be free of every charge. For if the pollution of sepulchers renders people bad, then the places that smell most pleasant, and indeed the most fragrant of flowers too, should cleanse them from their badness!

Nevertheless, they will probably think to themselves that they have grasped and are stating something essential in fabricating the following objection: “Indeed every corpse and even death itself are among those things most abhorred by the gods. So we share the gods’ viewpoint on this matter and are depending upon the same norms as them.” Well, the first thing that must be said is that the God-breathed scripture has declared to us that there is one true God by nature, and our custom is to worship no one else at all besides him. However, if, as you would have it, there exist gods, and if, as you say, they too regard death with hatred, then presumably they are struggling and suffering alongside the inhabit-ants of the earth who have fallen under the sway of corruption and death. If, nonetheless, there are gods and if they have truly shared in the suffering of those under the sway of corruption, why do they not instead remove from its influence those who are caught in its clutches and are living miserable lives – even if perhaps not everyone, why don’t they at least show compassion towards their own worshippers? But the one who holds the first place among the poets knew that they were terrified of Hades and consequently he even regarded it as a place to be used in oaths of abjuration; for he introduced one of the gods as swearing and saying, Now let Earth and broad Heaven above be my witness And the downward flowing water of the Styx, which is The greatest and most terrible oath for the blessed gods.

And at one point he has Hera say to Zeus, her brother and husband, Most dreadful son of Cronus, what’s this plan you have uttered! A man that is mortal, doomed long ago by fate, How could you intend to deliver him from ill-sounding death? Do what you will, but all the rest of us gods do not approve. For why, she is saying, do you not realize that your attempt is futile and you are seeking something out of reach? If so, do you then really think you are invariably staying completely within the bounds of sound reasoning and indeed do you not realize you have lost your claim to any praise? 1o.G Hence, when those among the Greeks inspired by the Muses, who have won a reputation for speaking the words of God and who are well acquainted with divine matters, say that the gods are inferior to death and the fates, why does Julian call Christ a “corpse” when in fact he was superior to death and the destroyer of corruption? For by his ineffable and divinely fitting mandate and by his life-giving power he has driven death away from others while also willingly permitting his own flesh to encounter death, not to ratify our existence as corpses but instead to loosen the bonds of corruption and destroy death. For since the body of the very Son who “gives life to all things” is itself a body of life, for this very reason it could not countenance the bonds of death, and quite reasonably so.

Indeed, how could the living and life-giving one, who has rendered the power of death impotent, be a corpse? Furthermore, Julian commits no less of an offense when he names as “corpses” those who, hoping in life, endured the temporary death of the flesh, I mean the holy martyrs about whom it has been written with exceptional clarity, “In the eyes of humans they seem to have died, and their departure was considered to be a suffering and their going from us to be an affliction, but they are at peace and their hope is full of immortality”; for, as the Savior himself says at one point, “they are alive with respect to God” and are destined to live in the future. For they exhib-ited such brilliant fortitude for the sake of the one who is not “the God of corpses but the God of the living.” I think, then, that we have given a very sensible response to him on this point. 1o. Nevertheless, that man, who either does not understand or does not think it right to admire such extraordinary deeds, once more lies and says, Therefore, in light of this why do you haunt the tombs? Do you want to hear the reason? I am not the one who will tell you, but the prophet Isaiah will: “They sleep among the tombs and among the caves for the sake of dreams.”

You see, therefore, how ancient this practice of magical trickery was among the Jews, to sleep among the tombs for the sake of dreams. It is likely that your apostles, after their teacher’s death, also practiced this and handed it down to you who at the outset first believed, and that they performed for you magic tricks with greater skill and displayed openly to those who came after them the workshops of this magical trickery and loathsome behavior. Cyril 1o. So then, it is true that Christ came to life again for the purpose of the economy, having, as I said, permitted his own body to taste death, since death was rendered impotent through this act. Julian, however, ought to come forward and prove where the divine disciples “handed down” to us that we must both “haunt tombs” and seek visions or “dreams” from the dead. He will not be able to do so – how could he?! Here again he is being deceptive. Yet this good fellow does not realize that on this very point he is pouring forth accusations, not against us, but rather against the superstition of the Greeks, and that he is attempting to mock what he himself in fact welcomes as a serious pursuit. For both the Jews and we who came after them follow the holy and divine laws and thus do not have a custom of seeking visions in dreams, nor for that matter of delighting in pointless products of the imagination like a child; rather, our custom is to regard the interpreters of such things as detestable.

So says the law about them in Deuteronomy: “If a prophet or a dreamer should arise among you and give you a sign or portent, and the sign or the portent that they say to you comes to pass, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods whom you do not know,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet nor the person with that dream.” While we have therefore been commanded to turn away from “shadowy dreams,” these things are nevertheless regarded by the serv-ants of daemons as cherished and serious pursuits of the utmost importance. 1o. Porphyry, for example, in giving a clear account of Pythagoras’s life, at one point says the following: And Antiphon, in his book On the Life of those Foremost in Virtue, also relates his perseverance while in Egypt and says that, when he was following the way of life of the Egyptian priests and was eager to participate in it, Pythagoras requested that the tyrant Polycrates write to Amasis, king of Egypt who was his friend and host, so that he might be admitted into the education of the aforementioned people. And he explains what kind of instruction this was when he adds, And Pythagoras, he says, also visited the Egyptians, the Arabs, and the Chaldeans from whom he both attained a precise knowledge about dreams and became the first to practice divination by incense.

And in Egypt he lived together with the priests and became well acquainted with their wisdom and the Egyptian language. Hence, practicing magical trickery was not a secondary concern for Julian’s forebears but was instead viewed as a serious matter, one reckoned to be among those pursuits worthy of the highest admiration, so much so that many people made journeys to foreign lands for the sake of this sorcery. But since he puts forward the words of Isaiah as a confirmation of his lies, thinking that by them he could convict those who have been instructed in the divine law on grounds that haunting tombs and longing for dreams was something dear to them, he will hear this response from us: during those times when they yielded their neck to the sacred laws with the intent of serving the one true God by nature, who is the generator and Lord of the universe, you will discover that they are entirely exempt from an indictment on the grounds you propose. Yet during the period when they served other falsely named gods, at that time, at that time indeed, one can observe them both dwelling amidst the unclean tombs and becoming lovers of dream-divination. And as proof of what I’m saying I will use the prophet’s words, since he spoke the following as though from the mouth of God: “These are the people who provoke me to my face continually, they burn incense in gardens and offer incense on bricks to the daemons that do not exist, and they sleep among the tombs and among the caves for the sake of dreams.”

Hence, when they neglected their duty to affix themselves to the one who is God by nature and offered sacrifices and service to Julian’s gods (that is, the unclean daemons), then it was that they even slept in tombs and regarded the apparitions of dreams as a kind of divination and sorcery. 1o.o Moreover, I am amazed that, although the history of the Greeks is available for everyone to read and it is also possible for anyone who wishes to do so to see without difficulty what is written in it about Julian’s gods, this man reproaches us about corpses and sepulchers when he too has corpses as objects of worship and tombs as temples (for they are piled up in their temples). And though mere empirical observation would suffice as a proof of this point, it can also be easily shown through both ancient documents and histories. For in fact Dinarchus, being no insignificant poet, in relating the deeds of Dionysus and all his labors in the land of the Indians and indeed also how he had murdered Actaeon and Lycurgus, gives a very clear account and contends that he was also killed by Perseus, yet was buried at Delphi in the presence of the so-called golden Apollo. Furthermore, Porphyry once again says the following about Pythagoras: And after these things, when the tyranny of Polycrates had seized the Samians, [Pythagoras] considered it inappropriate for a man of philosophy to live under such a government and decided to leave for Italy.

And when in the course of his voyage he landed at Delphi, he inscribed an elegy on the tomb of Apollo in which he explained that Apollo was the son of Silenus but was killed by Pytho and was buried in the so-called Tripod which had obtained this name on account of the fact that it was there that the three young daughters of Triopas mourned for Apollo. The renowned Tripod, which gave oracles for the cities and regions of the Greeks and was admired by them, was the tomb of the one said to have proclaimed the oracles, whom the three daughters of Triopas had pitifully lamented when they saw him destroyed and over whose prostrate corpse they wailed mournfully, as I said. And the deeds of Pythagoras do not end here, for Porphyry again wrote about him, And descending into a cave called Idaeus, carrying black sacrifices, he stayed there for the customary three and nine days and made offerings to Zeus and saw the throne that is annually furnished with cushions for him and he carved an epigram upon the tomb, inscribing “Pythagoras to Zeus” which begins with “Here lies the great Zan whom they call by the name Zeus.” Therefore, if they think Pythagoras spoke nonsense when he engraved “Here lies Zan” upon Zeus’s tomb, why do they regard him with such admiration? But if in fact they do say he is worthy of all admiration, then one can no longer suppose or claim he made an erroneous statement, since what he has written is true.

Thus, the highest of their gods has died, and the Cretans have even built his tomb. 1o. In addition, Clement, an eloquent and indeed also very learned man, said the following about the gods and temples: For we shall by no means keep silent about this. But when it comes to them as well, we shall disclose that though they are euphemistically named “temples,” they are in fact tombs, that is, the tombs have come to be called “temples.” And I call upon you, even now, to utterly forget superstition out of shame at honoring the tombs. In the temple of Athena in the acropolis in Larissa there is the tomb of Acrisius, and in the acropolis at Athens there is the tomb of Cecrops, as Antiochus says in his ninth book of Histories. And what of Erichthonius? Is he not buried in the temple of Athena Polias? And is not Immaradus, the son of Eumolpus and Daeira, in the enclosure of the Eleusinium that is beneath the acropolis, and are not the daughters of Celeus buried in Eleusis? Why should I recount for you the Hyperborean women? They are called Hyperoche and Laodice, and they are buried in the Artemisium at Delos; it is in the temple of the Delian Apollo. And Leandrius says that in the Didymaeum at Miletus there is buried Chleochus. Here, following Zeno of Myndus, it would not be right for us to pass over the sepulchre of Leucophryne (she is buried in the temple of Artemis in Magnesia), nor indeed the altar of Apollo in Telmessus (they record that it is the tomb of Telmessus the soothsayer).

And Ptolemy, the son of Agesarchus, in the first book of his work About Philopator says that both Cinyras and Cinyras’ descendants are buried in the temple of Aphrodite at Paphos. Will you then still dare to reproach us about tombs and corpses? Or will you subdue your laughter out of sullen-faced pity for your own dead gods in the realization that those places you suppose are sacred are in fact graves for their corpses? 1o. In addition, Julian indicts us on the grounds that we pay no regard to the commands of the law and indeed he goes on to say, But as for you, you not only pursue those things that God in the beginning said were detestable through both Moses and the prophets, but you also repudiate bringing victims to the altar and sacrificing them. “Yes,” he says, “because fire does not descend from heaven as it did in the case of Moses, consuming the sacrifice.” This happened to Moses once, and again after much time had passed it happened to Elijah the Tishbite. For I will show in a few words that Moses himself in fact thought it necessary to introduce fire from an external source, as did the patriarch Abraham even earlier than him. And after calling to mind the story about Isaac, Julian takes “Abel and his contemporaries” as a further example and indeed also says, “When they sacrificed they too did not have fire from heaven but they used to bring fire to the altars from elsewhere themselves.”

In addition to this, Julian investi-gates the rationale in both cases (for while God praises Abel’s sacrifice, he regarded Cain’s as unacceptable), as well as what the following verse might be trying to indicate: “If you offer correctly but do not divide correctly, have you not sinned? Be silent!” And he attempts to harmonize some such rationale with his own theories. “For,” he says, “rather than sacrifices of ripe fruits and produce from the earth, it is the sacrifice of animals that is altogether more pleasing to God, since he himself is a living being.” Cyril 1o. His entire argument is presented in my preceding summary of it. For, despite promising that he will keep his account short, he goes on pointlessly and at great length so that at every turn he might show himself to be a truth-hater. For the fact that we ourselves are in no way at all opposed to the divine decrees is something anyone can see. Rather, we yield to the words that came through Moses, fulfilling the law spiritually, and by the proclamations of the holy prophets we are steered towards the requisite knowledge of the truth and to a state of blamelessness in our knowledge of the sacred doctrines. Nevertheless, because Julian says the practice of blood sacrifices has been shunned among us and because he seemingly thinks we refrain from such service of the divine because “fire does not descend from heaven,” we must say that he has completely missed the truth.

For the reason we don’t practice the sacrifice of cattle is not because God does not send down fire, but because, following the transformation of what was in types and shadows into the truth, we have been commanded to devote to the God over all a service that is spiritual and blameless. For he says, “God is Spirit and those who worship him must worship in Spirit and in truth.” Julian ought, however, to know that the descent of fire upon the divine altar was a prediction of the mystery in Christ: God, the best artisan of all, sent it down and gave shape to intelligible things that surpass sense perception by means of what is perceptible and visible. For it is true that God provided fire when the holy tent was erected in the wilderness by the most excellent Moses and commanded that it be a perpetual and unceasing fire, and, in contrast, that the introduction of “strange fire” was prohibited and punished by the divine law (for Aaron’s sons perished in this manner). Yet, as I said, these shadows are giving birth to the import of the mystery in Christ, since the sacred scripture always regards the divine in the form of fire. For it says that the divine appeared in this way to the sons of Israel at Mount Sinai. Therefore, the fire on the altar was special and not mixed with anything else.

For the one who is beyond all things, being the only God by nature, is not to be classed together with another god. For how could the sacred and divine tent have been harmed by the chance application of fire from elsewhere to the sacrifices, unless one were to consider that, if “strange fire” were to be introduced, the type would harm the truth by forming it in an inappropriate manner? Assuming, that is, that there is only one who is the true God by nature and no one at all is to be classed with him, he who illuminates the truer tent, that is, the church, with an intelligible light and also accepts rational sacrifices from everyone. Therefore, we are not to conceive of any other god besides him, and we are to keep any other god away from us as “strange fire.” For there is no other nature of divinity besides the one that exists. 1o. Furthermore, the same explanation would apply also to the sacrifices that were offered at one point through Elijah. For, at that time too, the God of the universe sent down fire, while the prophet performed a type of the mystery of Christ that was appropriate to those days. Hence, it is not because “fire does not descend” that we “repudiate” the slaughter of sheep. For it is enough for us that, through the rituals performed back then, we can see with the eyes of our mind the beauty of the truth being formed as if on a canvas.

Moreover, we ourselves now offer a sacrifice that is better by far than the people of old did. For now there “descends” from heaven, not a “fire” perceptible by the senses that provides an image of the ineffable nature, but instead the Holy Spirit that shines from the Father through the Son upon the church and accepts sacrifices from us too, that is, our spiritual and intelligible sacrifices. For those descended from Israel used to offer to God cattle, sheep, turtledoves, pigeons, along with seasonal fruits, fine wheat flour soaked in oil, round cakes, and incense, but we, for our part, have put away such coarse service and have been commanded to celebrate a service that is subtle and sharpened, intelligible and spiritual. For “as a pleasing aroma” to God we offer every kind of virtue – faith, hope, love, justice, self-control, obedience and tractability, ceaseless doxologies, and the other virtues. For this is a supremely immaterial sacrifice that is suitable for the God who is by nature simple and immaterial, and the habits of true well-being are offerings of intelligible “aroma.” For he himself at one point says as much: “I desire mercy and not sacrifice, and knowledge of God more than whole burnt offerings.” And indeed the most excellent Samuel also says, “Behold, is not hearing better than sacrifice and listening better than the fat of rams?” And the divine David also sings in the psalms, “Sacrifice to God a sacrifice of praise.”

And once more, “I went around and offered in his tent a sacrifice of shouting.” And Paul too commanded this, saying, “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, which is your rational service.” 1o. Furthermore, we can even discern from the sacred writings themselves that God did not permit the descendants of Israel to linger foolishly in the law’s shadows. For although he commanded them to sacrifice a lamb as a type of Christ, he says, “Nevertheless, this is the manner in which you shall eat it: let your loins be girded, with sandals on your feet and with staffs in your hands.” Observe, then, how he commanded them to eat dressed like travelers, with this fact itself effectively indicating quite well that what was given in types would not stand in place for all time, but would, as it were, hasten on to the truth. Therefore, since the type has flowed into the truth, we also understand the Spirit to take the place of fire perceptible to the senses and we fulfil “a service” that is spiritual and “rational.” For it is in this way that Christ is said to baptize us “in the Holy Spirit and in fire.” Moreover, if a ram was shown to Abraham, which he did in fact sacrifice in place of Isaac, we maintain that it was a type of Christ who endured death in the flesh because of us and for our sake, in order to free us from death and corruption.

And if, as Julian says, Abraham sacri-ficed with “fire from an external source,” by applying to the sacrifices fire that certainly did not come from heaven, this is completely irrelevant to us. For if it were directed against people who refuse to dedicate to God what was dictated by the law and rely on the absence of fire descending from heaven above as a pretext for “indolence with respect to this command,” Abraham’s use of “fire from an external source” would indeed have amounted to a compelling proof that we have disregarded the divine laws. But since we offer a service that is better than theirs, presenting spiritual sacrifices to God and being enriched with the Spirit instead of a sensible fire, he ought not accuse us by asking why we do not “bring victims to the altar.” For the divine Paul will rise up and all but cry aloud with the words, “The old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” For we have been transformed into “the newness of the life” according to the gospel and we have taken our fill of perfect lessons, having given up the instruction residing in the letter of the law, since it is especially suitable for those who are still children but no longer for us who have attained “perfect manhood” and have also reached the complete “stature of the fullness of Christ.”

1o.G Furthermore, in addition to these things he mentions also the pair of brothers – I mean Abel and Cain who were born from Adam – and in fact he even says, And this is not all, but also when the sons of Adam gave their firstfruits to God it says, “God looked upon Abel and upon his gifts, but he did not take notice of Cain and his sacrifices, and it distressed Cain greatly and his face fell. And the Lord God said to Cain, ‘Why have you become so deeply distressed, and why did your face fall? If you offer correctly but do not divide correctly, have you not sinned?’” Do you now want to hear what their offerings were? “And it came to pass after some days that Cain offered up a sacrifice to the Lord from the crops of the earth. And Abel, he too brought from the firstborn of the sheep and from their fat.” 155 You see, he says, [God] found fault, not with the sacrifice but with the way it was divided, saying to Cain, “If you offer correctly but do not divide correctly, have you not sinned?” This is what one of the very wise bishops said to me. But this man first deceived himself and then others too. For when he was asked in what way the division was reproachable, he did not know how to give a more detailed explanation of the matter nor even how to give me an insipid answer.

And when I saw him at a loss, I said, “God was right to find fault with this same thing that you have mentioned. For the two men showed the same degree of eagerness since they both thought it was necessary for them to offer gifts and sacrifices to God. Yet in terms of the way they were divided, one of them hit the mark while the other one missed it. How, or in what way did he do so? Since among those beings upon the earth, some are ensouled while others are without a soul, and since the ensouled are regarded by the living God who is the cause of life as more valuable than those without a soul, insofar as those things that are more akin to him partake of both life and soul – it was for this reason that God took delight in the one who brought the perfect sacrifice.” 158 Cyril 1o. So then, as support for his slanderous accusation that we have shunned sacrificing in the Jewish manner Julian thought it sufficient to prove that, when Abraham sacrificed, fire did not come down from heaven and light upon the offerings, but was instead introduced from elsewhere and was of the common sort. But we have, I believe, bravely repelled his accusations and proven that, rather than knowing and stating something true, he instead lacks understanding.

However, in addition to Abraham, whom he mentioned first, he introduces “Abel and his contemporaries” and says they too sacrificed in this manner, expecting to prove through this fact as well that Christians stand in opposition to the sacred laws. Now since he busies himself 160 with “the sacrificial method,” and imagined he possessed some secret knowledge about it, come, yes come indeed, and let us show that in this claim too he is once more – to use his own words – speaking “insipid ” nonsense. For the God-breathed scripture said Abel offered sacrificial victims while Cain brought seasonal fruits, and that Abel’s offering received the honor of God’s approving glance, while Cain’s sacrifice was somehow slighted by God turning away from it. Then, when that holy man explains that the division of the sacrifice was the cause of what happened next, Julian does not accept his explanation but arrogantly attempts on his own to state something he naïvely and uncritically assumed to be correct. For since, he says, God is life and life-giving, he delights in offerings of “ensouled beings” and not in those “without a soul ” that are from the earth. Well then, the first thing to be said is that, in taking such a position, Julian himself is making war against his own instructors. For in fact Pythagoras says all over the place that sacred offerings of animals are detestable to his gods, while in contrast those consisting of crops and incense are honored and very highly regarded by them.

And Porphyry, for example, lectures the children of the Greeks on this topic in many places and says, The sacrifice of animals in fact was something that came later and only very recently and originated not in gratitude as was the case with the sacrifice of crops, but instead in a context of famine or some other misfortune. Hence, he says even those gods among the Greeks take delight not in blood sacrifices since they are “very recent” and do not arise from “gratitude,” but in flowers, herbs, and seasonal fruits. 1o. So much for that man’s arguments. Yet we should still subject the law that came through Moses to an investigation: so let us investigate “the sacrificial methods” in it. It commanded people who had the means of doing so to consecrate to God those of the animals that are undefiled, yet for those in more impoverished circumstances to consecrate fine wheat flour soaked in oil. “For,” it says, “if his hand does not have it, his offering shall be fine wheat flour and he shall pour oil upon it.” And we can also learn from Moses’ laws that the ancients used to honor God, the giver of all good things to us, with crops from the earth and indeed with seasonal fruits. For it said the following: “And the Lord spoke to Moses saying, ‘Speak to the sons of Israel and you shall say to them, “When you enter into the land that I am giving you and you reap its harvest, you shall also bring a sheaf as a first fruit of your harvest to the priest, and he shall offer up the sheaf before the Lord as acceptable for you.”’”

And it says in Deuteronomy, And it will be, if you enter into the land the Lord your God is giving to you as an allotment and you take possession of it and dwell in it, that you shall take from the first fruit of the crops of your land that the Lord your God is giving you, and you shall put it in a basket and go to the place that the Lord your God shall choose for his name to be called upon there. And you shall go to the priest who shall be in those days and say to him, “Today I proclaim to the Lord my God that I have entered into the land that the Lord swore to our fathers to give to us.” And the priest shall take the basket from your hands and place it before the altar of the Lord your God. Hence, given that [the law] ordained the consecration of the firstfruits of corn and of ripe crops, how could it be the case that he rejected the sacrifice offered by Cain because it was carried out not with “ensouled” creatures but instead with those “without a soul ”? For it has been shown from the law – and with exceptional clarity – that God used to accept offerings without a soul together with those that have a soul. For example, since those in former times were permitted to offer up crops along with irrational animals, the divine David has the lawgiver say to those from Israel, “I will not accept calves from your house nor young goats from your flocks.

For all the wild beasts of the forest are mine, herds in the mountains and cattle. I know all the birds of the sky and the beauty of a field lies with me.” For he calls the fruits in season “the beauty of a field.” 1o. Moreover, one would not be mistaken, I believe, in saying that it was “in terms of the division” of his sacrifice that Cain came to experience failure. For God found fault with his sacrifice, not because he did not sacrifice lambs, but because, in setting aside the portion of his seasonal crops to offer, he was not presenting to God the exceptional part, while Abel, in contrast, was not careless but instead thoughtful when he presented his lambs as a whole burnt offering. For it says, “He brought from the first-born and from their fat,” that is, those that were better nourished than all the others, almost as if they were intoxicated with full-fat milk. Now I maintain that we must honor God by ensuring that he receives, not our substandard possessions, but the finest and most exceptional things of all. For example, at times those from Israel used to bring sacri-fices but they were nothing special. God then indicted them for doing so, saying, “And you bring as offerings what was taken by violence and the lame and animals that are overworked, and you say, ‘These are toilsome,’ and I snorted at them, says the Lord Almighty.”

He next integrates this with something even more burdensome to them, adding the following condemnation: “Indeed, bring them to your governor if he will take them, if he will accept your presence, says the Lord Almighty.” For if someone set out to honor those assigned to rule, he would surely insult them by bringing what is substandard, since things that are deformed and defective are rejected and hated by humans too. If so, then isn’t it necessary to act with careful thought and bring to the Emperor and God of the universe those things in one’s possession that are preeminent and specially chosen? He also, for example, made this point through one of the prophets: “Cursed is the person who has a male in his flock upon which he has placed a vow and yet sacrifices to the Lord one that is crippled. For I am a great king, says the Lord Almighty.” 1o.o Therefore, when the first humans – “Abel and his contempor-aries” – offered sacrifices, it was necessary, yes necessary indeed that they should be quite well attuned to the requisite knowledge of “the sacrificial methods” and also of the right way to honor God, in order that those who came after them – namely us – might know the path that will lead to being renowned in these matters. And if the former people sacrificed sheep and crops, what is there to keep us, who have received superior instruction, from now sacrificing in a manner superior to that of the ancients?

But if Julian thinks one must follow the customs of the former people without deviation, come and let us imitate their actions and make sure we do not neglect anything they did. They used to tend flocks and were experts in tilling the ground and using clothing made from sheepskin. For it says, “And God made skin tunics for Adam.” Our life too should therefore be one of tending sheep; we ought to make tilling the ground our pursuit; and everyone should renounce fine clothing and wear sheepskin clothes instead! There was no account of medical science among them, nor of any of the other sciences, no use of letters, no experience in artisanal crafts, no cultivation of the arts; rather, the passing of time has brought these to light. Hence, even though they missed the mark by not knowing how to sacrifice correctly and in a divinely pleasing manner (for they did not yet know “the methods” used in intelligible service), God nevertheless used to accept them, not by looking at the rite itself but instead by testing the motivation of the person intending to honor him. And, as time moved on, it made us experts in the practices that are pleasing to God. For we offer intelligible and spiritual sacrifices, devoting to him the fragrance of the virtues, as it were. 1o. Is Julian then not embarrassed to be mocking the progress towards a superior state that has occurred in life’s affairs?

Your Excellency, you are committing an injustice, and you love criticizing and are entirely ignorant of what is essential! This too should become clear to every person through what he says next. For he has written as follows: Now I must take up another point with them: Why do you not practice circumcision? Paul, he says, said that “a circumcision of the heart” 189 was given but not a circumcision of the flesh, and that this was what applied to Abraham, but not yet the matters pertaining to the flesh; he also said he believed the impious words proclaimed by Paul and Peter. Hear once more that God is said to give circumcision in the flesh as a covenant and sign to Abraham: “And this is the covenant that you shall keep, between me and you and between your seed throughout their genera-tions: […] you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin and it shall be the sign of a covenant between me and you and between me and your seed.” 191 And Julian adds to these words the fact that Christ himself too said it was necessary that the law be kept, saying at one point, “I have not come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfil them”; and again in another place, “Whoever annuls one of the least of these commandments and teaches people to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.”

193 So then, Julian says, given that he has unambiguously commanded that you ought to keep the law and threatened punishment for those who transgress a single commandment, how will you who have, to put it simply, transgressed them all find any kind of defense for yourselves? For, he says, it must be the case that either Jesus is a liar or you certainly have failed entirely to observe the law. And, in addition, Julian brings an accusation against us on grounds that we neither keep the Sabbath nor indeed sacrifice a lamb in the Jewish manner nor indeed eat unleavened bread over it. And he says the one excuse you have left for your indolence in this matter is that it is not possible for those who are outside of Jerusalem to sacrifice. Cyril 1o. Now Julian uses many words to discuss all these topics. We, however, for our part have grouped together the ideas he discusses, to ensure that our book will be free of excessive and useless quibbling. And we must, I think, lead forth the truth in battle against each of his “insipid” claims and show that he is once more making a baseless mockery of Christian practices and ideas. It is true that the divine Paul said “circumcision” in the flesh “was given to Abraham” as “a sign” of “his faith while he was uncircumcised.”

For he was aiming to lower the upraised eyebrow of the Jews and to prove that the justification obtained in faith is older than the instruction in the law, saying quite rightly that justification came to Abraham “not when he was circumcised” but instead “when he was uncircumcised.” Nevertheless, even though Paul sufficiently resolved the question of circumcision in this manner, with his usual exceptional skill, he still also knew that it was an image of an intelligible reality. “For,” he says, “a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision something outward and done in the flesh. Rather, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision of the heart is in the Spirit not in the letter, and such a person receives praise not from people but from God.” Indeed, come, if it pleases you, and let us investigate what kind of rationale there is for circumcision in the flesh when we remove its mystical aspect. And yet – if it is in fact the case that those categor-ized as male were better off with a circumcised reproductive organ and if God rejects the foreskin – why did he not instead fashion it in the beginning in the way that pleased him? And, to take another avenue of investigation, in human bodies undamaged by pathology one cannot find anything at all that is either superfluous or deficient, but everything is serviceable, most necessary, and essential by nature, such that, as far as I can tell, a body is not in a correct state unless everything intrinsic to its nature is present.

Could it, then, be the case that the Craftsman missed the mark of what was useful and appropriate and that his plans were frustrated only when it came to the human body, given that he, as God, casually improvised the entire rest of the created realm, which is serviceable and without defect in terms of whatever its purpose might be? 1o. What kind of benefit, then, could come from circumcision? Or will some perhaps propose that common and ridiculous rationale which they say is on the lips of both the more ignorant of the Jews as well as the servants of idols? For, they say, in order that the body might appear free of physical pollutions and dirtiness, it is necessary that this part be stripped of the covering put there by nature. But I would say that they are committing a grave injustice by censuring nature given that it contains nothing superfluous or redundant, but in fact fulfils decorum by providing a sort of clothing for the part that seems, in a sense, to be shameful. Yet if they have a strong inclination to run away from the filth of the flesh, how can they endure the flesh and what comes from it and the spring hidden within that produces children? For they should instead have directed their energies against the actual source of contamination, and not hurt the organs through which it passes by cutting them off.

Yet the nature of the body does not defile a soul, even if it functions according to its own laws. Being circumcised for reasons of bodily cleanliness, as these people recommend, is therefore pointless. If so, then someone might, I imagine, ask, “What is the point of circumcision?” In fact, dear sir, it is beautiful and beneficial, provided that you believe it is a type of an intelligible reality. For in an allusive fashion it indicates the removal of inordinate desires and pleasures that have to do with the human mind, which Christ brought about in us through the Holy Spirit. For an innumerable host of pleasures bewitch the human mind, with some of them diverting it to fleshly devotion while others lead it to feeble and evanescent delights – to inordinate greed, foolish ostentation and, to sum up, every kind of perverse action which even the divine law itself has denounced. It is from all of these that the grace of the Holy Spirit frees us as it inhabits our mind and cuts away every form of uncleanness; this is the circumcision that God desires most of all. The prophet Jeremiah, for example, used the following words to dispute with the Jewish peoples who had little regard for fulfilling their customary obligations: “Be circumcised to God and circumcise your hardheartedness, O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem.” 1o.

Hence, no one could doubt that, if someone is completely freed of passions in his heart, such a person is quite appropriately circumcised “to God” and not to mere flesh. It was because they could not bear to do this that the God of the universe holds those descended from Israel highly culpable, saying, “Because all the nations are uncircumcised in the flesh and the entire house of Israel are uncircumcised in their heart.” And at one point he also said through the voice of Jeremiah, “To whom shall I speak and bear witness and he will listen? Behold their ears are uncircumcised and they are unable to hear.” And indeed, the divine Stephen faults them for their obstinacy and disobedience and says, “You are uncircumcised in your ears and hearts.” Paul, who was learned in the law, therefore, said it best: “Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing; rather, keeping God’s commandments is what matters.” But since Julian is always making a habit of accusing and implicating in bad morals those determined to think correctly, he makes his attack with the following words: “Circumcision has to do with your flesh,” it says. “We disobey this command,” he says, “and we circumcise our hearts.” Of course you do! For among you will be found no criminal, no scoundrel, so circumcised of heart are you! Well said! 213 “We cannot keep the commandment about unleavened bread and perform the Passover,” he says.

“For Christ has been sacrificed for us once and for all.” Did he then prevent you from eating unleavened bread? And yet, by the gods, I myself am among those who avoid celebrating feasts with the Jews, although I do always worship the god of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, who, being Chaldeans and belonging to a sacred race that practiced theurgy, learned circumcision while sojourning among the Egyptians, but revered a god who has shown kindness to me and to those who revere him, just as Abraham revered him, since he is very great and powerful, but he has nothing to do with you. For you do not imitate Abraham, by raising up altars for him and building sacrificial altars and worshipping him, as they did, with sacrifices. Cyril 1o. So then, good sir, will those deeds that are excellent above all else lose their good standing in your eyes simply because certain people responded to them incorrectly? Is there any good that is of equal weight to circumcision in the Spirit and can anything rival it? Will you then declare that which is so exceptional and useful to be wicked? Does that which frees us from all uncleanness seem to you to be pointless and reprehensible? “For,” he says, “there are in fact many among you who are criminals and scoundrels.” Yet isn’t this state of affairs naturally an indictment, not of circumcision, but rather of those who are not habitu-ated to following the best way of life?

For do you deny that the benefit of medical expertise is most useful and essential for all the inhabitants of the earth, taming as it does the ferocity of our pathologies? Nevertheless, even though the person skilled in this area bestows his assistance upon the sick, still those who cede inevitable victory to their undisciplined appetites rush headlong into that which causes them pain and thereby fight against the medical art, with the result that what is able to save them even seems to be useless. Should we, then, who have opted to hold correct and just ideas, conclude that medical expertise is impotent? Or should we say that those who resist the treatment are themselves the reason they do not experience any of the benefits that come from it? For while the art of medicine was able to assist them in their suffering, they were nevertheless overcome by their own pleasures and utterly failed to obtain the good things that come from it. In light of this, why does Julian bring accusations against the God-given circumcision in the Spirit simply because there are some people who, generally speaking, are among our number, who have chosen the impure manner of life instead of the one that is pure and, by their own fault, nullify that thrice-desired and much prayed for gift that so fittingly belongs to the generosity from above?

Those from Israel slaughtered the lamb; they consumed unleavened bread with it in accord with the ancient prescriptions of the law, but, as I said, intelligible realities were depicted for the ancients in shadows. The truth has shone forth, since Christ, the true lamb, who is the truly sacred and undefiled sacrifice, has been slaughtered for us. We have given up the types, since the present season calls us to do so. We have made our food the purest thing of all – I mean the food that comes through the evangelical oracles – and among us the task of putting off, in an intelligible sense, all leaven – that is, diabolical evil – has become a serious and important undertaking. Hence, as I said, though we have ceased prac-ticing what was presented in types, we fulfil the true worship. For “the fulfillment of the law” and the prophets is Christ, who was not being deceitful when he said, “I have not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it.” And again, “I say to you, not the smallest letter, not the least pen stroke, will pass from the law until everything comes to pass.” For just as preliminary outlines sketched on tablets are hardly destroyed when the whole range of colors are added at the appropriate time but instead are transformed into a more realistic picture, in the same way we hold that the shadows of the law were not overturned but instead were brought to their goal as though they had been progressing towards the truth, assuming that they, being pregnant with the beauty of the truth, reached this point at the appropriate time when Christ shone forth.

1o.G Julian should, therefore, acquit us of this indictment and the charge that we do not stick to the types and indeed are not in the habit of celebrating feasts in a Jewish fashion, given that our practices have come into a superior state. But if he is vexed at this fact and regards progress in the realm of practices – I mean progress towards what is better – as something contemptible, it is arguably time for him impiously to rebuke also all the other practices throughout life that have undergone improvement towards a better condition, something that an examination of each case would demonstrate is true. Furthermore, Julian feigns the appearance of someone who is pious and says he reveres the God of Abraham and that he is great and powerful, probably meaning that he too is one of those “particular” gods honored in specific places and regions, whom he frequently calls “city-guarding” and indeed also “ethnarchs.” Hence, it seems to me that with great cunning he slips into the appearance of showing reverence to God, when in fact he does not believe he is the one true God by nature over all, but instead places him among the number of his own gods. Moreover, Julian again brings a charge against us for not fulfilling our sacred duty to God by “raising up altars” like the divine Abraham did.

For, he says, “you do not imitate him,” not realizing that we in fact abound with a true and essential similarity to his habits, since, though we are uncircumcised as of course he too was, we have believed in God and have been justified, just as happened to him too. For it is written, “And Abraham believed God and it was considered as his justice.” And we too are considered as his children <and> have made it our aim to emulate <him>. For we ourselves also sacrifice, in a better manner now than he did then, since the types used to prevail at the time appropriate for types, but, now that the truth has been exhibited, the true worship must prevail. 1o. In addition to this, Julian disparages the divine Abraham and indeed says, For just like us Abraham too was always sacrificing without ceasing. Moreover, he used divination based on shooting stars – this too is equally a Greek practice – and even more he practiced augury from birds while also having over his household a steward who was able to interpret signs. And if any of you don’t believe me, I will highlight the very things said by Moses on this point: “And after these words, the Lord’s word came to Abraham speaking in a vision in the night: ‘Do not be afraid, Abraham; I am protecting you.

Your reward will be exceedingly great.’ But Abraham was saying, ‘Master, what will you give me? I am passing away childless and the son of Masek, my homebred servant, will be my heir.’ And immediately the voice of God came to him saying, ‘He shall not be your heir but the one who is to come forth from you, he will be your heir.’ And he led him outside and said to him, ‘Look up into the sky and number the stars, if you are able to count them.’ And he said, ‘So shall your offspring be.’ And Abraham believed God and it was considered as his justice.” Tell me, on the basis of this passage, why did the angel or god with whom he was negotiating lead him outside and show him the stars? Didn’t he know, while he was still inside, how great is the multitude of stars that are always visible and twinkle at night? Yes he did, but in my view he wanted to show him shooting stars in order that he might set forth as a clear assurance of his words the verdict of heaven, which ordains and sanctions all things. Cyril 1o. Now it is true that the divine Abraham was devoted to sacrifice and was extremely pious, though it was not in keeping with the custom of the Greeks that he used to carry out his sacred rites.

For while they have ascribed honors to unclean spirits, he, albeit in a manner still befitting the types and gross materiality of Jewish worship, nevertheless was zealously making offerings and erecting altars throughout the land to the one who is truly God by nature. But Julian is probably thinking this man used divination and investi-gated the courses of the stars on the assumption that they sometimes indicate some essential matter. But this is in fact an accusation against the folly of the Greeks and is nothing more than a juvenile game and pointless quackery. Contrary to what he says, the all-wise Abraham did not practice divination in any form. And one can observe what I am saying from the very simplicity with which the sacred writings recount this episode. For on reaching senescence, the old man began to lament his childlessness, even though he did have an illegitimate child named Ishmael. But the God who is all-powerful promised him offspring from a free woman that would rival the stars and grow to a multitude beyond counting. For he showed him the stars and said, “So shall your offspring be.” Hence, anyone who wants to can see that the stars were taken as a clear illustration of this immeasurable multitude. Furthermore, nowhere is it said that he saw shooting stars or stars that confirmed the promise by their courses and intimated something hidden with God by their shifting positions.

So why else would he have been called out to view them, so that he might be told at that perfectly timed moment, “So shall your offspring be”? And that most excellent man is giving his untested speculation the force of truth when he says, “Yes he did, but in my view he wanted to show him shooting stars in order that he might set forth as a clear assurance of his words the verdict of heaven, which ordains and sanctions all things.” Very well. For no future event escapes the notice of you people who have been educated in “shooting stars” and in “the verdict of heaven” that “ordains all things”! Do you see these people running workshops of deceit and market stalls selling lies? They are nearly always marveling at shooting stars, sometimes telling people the mysteries in the heavens in exchange for pennies, and, by taking weak women captive and beguiling the mind of the common herd, they fatten their own wallets, or rather, their petty theft yields tiny profits and they try to scrape together a wage for themselves in exchange for their insipid fantasies, even though, as the adversary of truth claims, by the movement of the stars they apparently discover “the verdict of heaven” that “ordains all things.” But they would be convicted as quacks and liars who know nothing of what is true.

“For,” as it has been written, “who has known the mind of the Lord?” Now we maintain that the chorus of the stars has not been made by him to be invested with the dignity of the holy prophets, nor indeed for any other purpose besides merely “giving light” to those “upon earth” and also serving as signs “of the seasons.” For the sacred scripture serves as a witness to this fact. Julian is, therefore, randomly twittering away and drawing futile inferences when he says Abraham used the stars for divination. For we hold that it was not in fact shooting stars that were pointed out to him but rather their vast number. For it says, “So shall your offspring be.” 1o. In addition, Julian says [Abraham] “practiced augury from birds,” writing as follows: And lest someone suppose that such an interpretation is forced, I will convince him by setting forth the text that immediately follows. For next is written, “And he said to him, ‘I am the God who brought you out of the land of the Chaldeans, so as to give you this land for you to inherit it.’ And he said, ‘Master, Lord, how will I know that I will inherit it?’ And he said to him, ‘Take for me a three-year-old heifer and a three-year-old goat and a three-year-old ram and a turtledove and a dove.’

And he took all these for him and divided them in the middle and placed them facing one another, but he did not divide the birds. And birds came down upon the cut halves and Abraham sat with them.” Behold how the preceding proclamation of the angel or god who appeared to him was confirmed by means of augury from birds, while the divination was carried out with sacrifices and not treated as a mere sideshow, as it is with us. Moreover, [Julian] says, “He showed that the promise was reliable by means of the birds flying down onto it.” And [Julian] accepts Abraham’s faith, adding, “Faith in the absence of the truth seems to be a sort of folly and madness. And it is not possible <to see>249 the truth from a mere statement; rather it is necessary that some sort of clear sign should accompany the words, a sign that, by its occurrence, will confirm the prediction made regarding the future.” Cyril 1o.o In this passage once more the faith of the sacred scriptures has been hawked about. For he redirects the import of the ideas they contain towards what he and he alone has – I don’t know how – conjectured without any reflection at all. Indeed, I believe he has experienced the sort of thing that might frequently happen to those who focus their gaze upon the clouds darting across the sky.

For those who habitually do this think they sometimes see things like centaurs and lions and indeed even humans, as their mind creates the shapes of such things and, as it were, imprints upon the outlines of clouds something that isn’t actually there. I, however, think the task before me is to clarify the sense of the divine scripture for my audience. For this is the only way they can come to recognize that once more he is speaking “insipid” nonsense. For the God of the universe had promised to grant to Abraham a land that would soon be full of his offspring and would be suitable as a habitation for them. But, since the magnitude of the promise seemed somehow to surpass what could be hoped for – for unexpected events also have a tendency to be disbelieved – he requested a sign, continuing with the words, “Master, how will I know this?” Now the old man ought not to have doubted in any way at all, since it was God who was speaking to him. Yet because he was still in the initial stages of having faith, God came down to his level, establishing in him a sturdy basis and foundation for piety, and from his inherent and exceedingly great tranquility he decided to confirm the promise with an oath, bestowing on one who was weak something that would remedy faintheartedness.

Now the Chaldeans had a custom that those oaths which were to be more secure than usual should be made by having the persons pass through “cut halves,” a practice that was sanctioned by their local law. This is what God is commanding Abraham to do when he says, “Take for me a three-year-old heifer and a three-year-old goat and a three-year-old ram and a turtledove and a dove.” Because the divine Abraham understood this quite well, even though the only command God gave him was to take the animals, he himself added the rest and, in keeping with the custom about oath-making, he began cutting them in two and placing the slaughtered animals in rows, as though God was at any moment about to dart through the middle of them. Even up to the present day one can see certain oaths like this being made among the barbarians or even among some of those who lived in ancient times. Sophocles, for example, in the Antigone has one of the messengers assigned to guard the body of Polynices say the following to the person who ruled over Thebes (this was Creon): And we were ready to take even red-hot iron into our hands And to walk through fire and to swear oaths by the gods. For passing through the middle of fire and “taking red-hot iron into their hands” is how they used to make oaths.

Therefore, as I said, the God of the universe actually came down to the level of the old man’s faintheartedness and, by way of accommodation, he framed the oath in accordance with the practice of the Chaldeans. For the text says that, as the sun was “setting,” “torches of fire” passed through “the middle of the cut halves.” And once again the divine and undefiled nature was represented in the form of fire. Julian neglected to mention this part of the account because, in my view at least, he was afraid of being refuted, though for our part we have added it in order to provide some benefit by proving that the cut halves were actually used for the purpose of the oath instead of being, as Julian says, some sort of sacrifice performed according to “the methods” of divination. 1o. Furthermore, if it is the case that those birds that are most detestable, with an instinct for eating flesh, flew down upon the sacri-fices and that Abraham then scared them off, what, dear sir, is so strange about that? For it was inappropriate for the items used for the purpose of the oath to be cast aside to be mistreated by those most detestable of birds, especially given that the oaths had not yet been completed. Furthermore, to Julian’s statement that “Faith in the absence of the truth seems to be a sort of folly and madness,” we say, first of all, good sir, what is taken on faith must not be subjected to scrutiny.

For how could something subjected to testing still have been a matter of faith? Nevertheless, the quality of truth had been added to his faith. For the descent of foul and detestable birds upon the sacrifices was not something even better than oaths; rather, his faith was more steadfast as a result of being accompanied by the certainty arising from the oaths. Moreover, Julian claims Abraham had a servant who was also “able to interpret signs,” having been led to this view based on the following event. The divine Abraham selected one member of his household and commanded him to go to Mesopotamia and bring back a bride for Isaac and to search for a companion for him from among his relatives. [The servant] wanted to carry out the command in all its details and, in keeping with his master’s wishes, when he arrived in Haran (this was Abraham’s first city) he sent up a prayer and asked God to help him do this. For he understood quite well that his master was predisposed to acts of generosity towards those who visited him from a foreign land. For he valued hospitality above all else. Thus, he was searching for a girl who had the same kind of character and was not at all selfish, lest she should somehow spoil the old man’s reputation if it turned out that she had a different mindset from his own.

There is another explanation as well: a good and mild-mannered mistress, one who abounds in generosity, is nearly always a welcome godsend for the servants of a household, but a stingy and malicious mistress is avoided and abhorred. But since knowing hearts would be appropriate only to the God who is over all, the servant begged him many times to point out to him a good and hospitable virgin whose character agreed with that of his master. Thus, as he was praying, he said, “Let this be the person for whom I am searching, the one who, when asked, gives me a drink, with a complete lack of selfishness.” For in this way, the woman’s mindset could be ascer-tained and her action could be taken as a sort of pledge of the qualities he could expect in the future. Hence, the one who knows “hearts and minds” pointed the girl out to him. Therefore, Julian should not say the servant “was able to interpret signs” just because he asked in prayer that God show him the woman who was like-minded to his master, I mean to Abraham and to the child born from him. Since we too in the present day, if we are in fact astute and devoted to God, hasten to make the God who rules over the universe a colleague and helper in all our affairs and we look to him to discover what path we should follow for every undertaking; yet no one would say that in making this kind of request we are practicing divination with signs but would instead praise our reverence for God.

1o. Julian, however, says the call of birds was given to him as well, instructing him that he would sit on the imperial throne. O how exceedingly wise are Julian’s prophets! Presumably the calls of jays and black-birds, and I should add plovers too (for the sparrow is especially loquacious), gave him a foretaste of such august and transcendent deeds! But let the flocks of birds twitter away about whatever they please to those bent on thinking like he does, since deception is ever dear to them. As for us, however, we “have bid a long farewell to the birds circling overhead,” and we assign omniscience solely to the God who rules over the universe, holding that he alone is the Emperor and Lord of heaven and earth, the Craftsman of things visible and invisible, sensible and intelligible. For he brought into existence from nonexistence that which formerly did not exist, doing so through the Son, through whom and with whom be glory to God the Father, along with the Holy Spirit forever. Amen. Sacra: Letter omicron, concerning conceit and appearance, and that being is better than seeming; for this is a hindrance to virtue From the eleventh book of the blessed Cyril’s Against Julian: That saying of the prophet is true which goes, “The conceited and spiteful person – a boastful man – will not likely bring anything to completion.”

For “conceit cuts progress short,” according to that common statement that is on the lips of many people. Sacra: Letter omicron, concerning conceit and appearance, and that being is better than seeming; for this is a hindrance to virtue Conceit cuts progress short. For when someone admits his ignorance one may more easily draw his attention towards what he has not yet discerned; however, for someone who has the appearance of knowledge and is arrogant < … > the fact that he seems to be knowledgeable renders him altogether foolish and completely ignorant. For he does not accept the words of his teachers. Belonging to Saint Cyril, from the eleventh book of Against Julian the Pagan: And, O friend of ours, what is so novel about the fact that, in keeping with God’s will, a star arose contrary to its normal pattern at that time when God the Word took on a body and it went ahead as a herald? Is it not the case that, due to the occurrence of great events all throughout the world, those stars have often appeared that are also called “comets” or “bearded,” though others also give them the name “meteors”? And this star was not one of those known stars, nor was it, as [Julian] claims, the daystar. For it rose in the sky for two years, all the while showing the birth of the Messiah in the body.

And because, among the Chaldeans and above all among the magi, it was regarded as a very important custom to track the precise movements of the stars, since they treated such phenomena as an oracle, people saw a star in the East running its course whose movement changed as it went from the East as far as Judea. And in keeping with their custom, they imagined that some illustrious king had been born. However, since they did not realize it was concealing the mystery of Christ, they thought that instead it was a man who had been born in the kingdom of Judea. And they came and said, “Where is the king of the Jews who has been born?” Herod was alarmed and asked them when the star had appeared to them, and, after he learned that it had arisen two years prior, he ordered the killing of all the boys in Bethlehem from two years old and under. For he thought he would seize him among those he destroyed in his cruelty, although the magi discovered the child in swaddling clothes having just been born and not yet eight days old, and having not yet gone up to Jerusalem for them to offer sacrifices as the law commands. So then, this is how the marvel should be understood and it is worthy of being believed, even if that star did not remain until now.

Moreover, it was not one of the stars that are known – not the daystar or the Pleiades or Aldebaran. And even if it was standing over Bethlehem and over the house and over the place where the child was lying, one should not doubt the story but should instead marvel at God’s miraculous signs which were rightly done for the conversion of those who were in error. For the magi were the first fruits of the calling of the nations and this is a clear manifestation that henceforth the power of Satan was shaken and his weapons were being seized from him. George of B‘eltan, Commentary on Matthew, Vat. syr. 154, ff.v b, 22v b – 23r a And regarding the time of the star’s appearance, John [Chrysostom] in The Explanation of the Gospel and Cyril in the [books] Against Julian say that long before our Savior’s birth the star appeared to the magi so that they might meet him not more than eight days after his birth, as Cyril says. But they both say that the magi found him in a manger in a cave wrapped in swaddling clothes … . It is clear that it was not a natural star but was one of the exalted and intelligent powers. John, Cyril, and Theodotus of Ancyra agree about this. But Julian the pagan said this story of the star is not true because none of the astrologers knew this star, since it did not exist.

But he ought to have known that if those stars that are called “corporeal” and aqidnos and “bearded” appeared on account of great events, it was not out of order that, in keeping with God’s will, a star should arise contrary to its normal pattern at the time of the birth of God the Word and announce his birth in advance, though in fact it was not a star but one of the eight rational powers. Still, [God] drew [the magi] by means of the appearance of a star, stooping down to their weakness so that he might call them by means of things familiar to them, just as he had announced to Saul his death and the death of his son by means of a witch. That the body of Christ needed to grow. From the eleventh book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian, from question six:22 The holy virgin was mindful of the words of Gabriel. But since the body of Christ needed to grow, she did not accurately understand the mystery about him. Sacra: Letter delta, concerning God’s power and that no one is sufficient to stand against God’s might From the eleventh book of Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: Nothing at all is impossible for the God over all; rather, even those things beyond reason yield to his decrees. Sacra: Letter delta, concerning the distinction between God and humans and the fact that the gap between God and humans is great, and concerning the act of sinning against God and the act of sinning against humans From the eleventh book of the same work: No one could be wiser than God nor could anyone know how, in an excellent and irreproachable manner, to create the path of appropriate conduct, as, of course, the Intellect beyond all things does.

Sacra: Letter delta, concerning doubt in God and that one should not doubt God in anything; for all things are possible for him From the eleventh book of Saint Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: Some people quietly tend to disbelieve events that are exceedingly lofty and exceptional, which at present exist only in hope and not yet in our sight, but which we expect to happen in the future. Florilegium Cyrillianum no. 179 Again, from Cyril’s twelfth book found in the same third volume, which begins:26 So then, using the various inventions of his chicanery, our enemy is attempting to lay siege to the truth and force it to surrender. Sacra: Letter mu, concerning repentance and confession From the twelfth book of Saint Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: He welcomes with great gladness the mourning of penitents as something advantageous for regaining their good merit and orderly conduct. And it is better that, before standing before the judgment seat of Christ, we should clear ourselves of every charge, pre-emptively gain the favor of our future accusers, and wash off in advance the filth of every fault, before we should fall into chastisement for these crimes and be dealt our punishments by the one who delivers just verdicts. Sacra: Letter kappa, concerning time, that it is necessary to redeem the time and that everything must be said and done at an appropriate time From the twelfth book of the blessed Cyril’s Against Julian: It seems to me that the best course of action, and a wise one, is not to miss the right time for doing something.

Sacra: Letter iota, concerning equality, that it is necessary to give each their due From the twelfth book of the blessed Cyril’s Against Julian: The judge of a contest does not simply bestow the prizes for excellence upon whichever of the contestants wants them; rather, he distributes the honors in proportion to the athletes’ merits. Sacra: Letter iota, concerning equality, that it is necessary to give each their due To distribute equal rewards to unequal persons is an act of the greatest injustice. Acts of the Third Council of Constantinople (ACO 2.2., pp.316.11–318.) Once more from the same codex there was read the passage from Saint Cyril’s twelfth book found in the third volume of his doctrines Against Julian, which begins “Our enemy is attempting.” It goes as follows: But given that, if [Christ] had not decided to do something he did not want to do, he would not even have suffered at all, he must be showing that, while the disgrace in the act of suffering was, as I said, something he did not want, he nevertheless chose it anyway on account of its benefit for everyone. And while his rejection of the cup implies it was something he did not want, nonetheless what he said to the Father implies he suffered willingly, namely, “Yet not my will, but yours be done.” For with God the Father approving and, as it were, jointly assenting to the Son’s most wise plans, he is said to have endured death in the flesh, in order that, by rising from the dead, he might “do away with death,” destroy corruption, and justify the realm under heaven.

This is what he is teaching when he says, “I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of the one who sent me. And this is the will of the one who sent me, that I should lose none of those he has given me but raise them up on the last day.” Observe, therefore, how for the purpose of raising up that which was given to him (namely us), he made that which he did not want, due to the dishonor in the act of suffering, to be something he freely chose. “For he endured the cross, despising its shame,” as the divine Paul writes. Furthermore, in the gospel narratives one can also see very clearly that the suffering was something he did not want – insofar as the weakness of his human thoughts was concerned – but, despite the enormous disgrace it involved, he chose it anyway since it pleased God, and indeed he seems to be willing to endure anything whatsoever for the sake of saving his many legitimate children. This passage was likewise collated with the volume found here in the collection of the holy patriarchal library, with which it agreed. Severus of Antioch, Philalethes Extract 179 of [our] opponent. From Cyril’s twelfth book found in the third volume … But since this abominable man was intending to harm this correct sense, he took away certain words from the middle of the extract; the words at the beginning he included and the words that were taken away from the middle of the extract and pillaged are these: after citing “he permitted that human nature to experience participation even in pain and sorrow,” he excised, “because he truly had become like us, in the flesh I mean.”

And the fact that he accepted these things in order to provide an example for human nature explains what is written at the end of the extract: “and a useful fact beckons us towards it.” [These words] entirely explain [the extract] when they are included in the quotation, along with the excised words [that occur] prior to the extract. Here are the words prior to the extract, which [our] opponent excised: “Therefore, as the time drew near when the crowds of the Jews were going to rage against him, it was necessary that, by means of how he conducted himself, he should teach that it is fitting that we should act similarly when danger is imminent, temptation is pursuing [us], and the horrors of death are attacking. So then, if he, as God, wanted to put a complete stop to the harm the Jews [were doing to him], there was nothing that could have prevented him from appearing happy and completely disregarding these painful things and from being superior to pain and above all fear. Nevertheless, since the same one while being God, was also human, he does not despise human experiences that were endured for the sake of the economy.” Fragment 1541 Florilegium Cyrillianum no. 179 Again, from Cyril’s twelfth book, found in the same third volume, which begins “So then, using the various inventions of his chicanery, our enemy is attempting to lay siege to the truth and force it to surrender”: Nevertheless, since the same one, while being God, was also human, he does not despise human experiences that were endured for the sake of the economy, but, as it were, permits the nature like ours even to experience participation in both pain and distress < … >.

And in fact, through him, human nature, which was otherwise weak, was able for the first time to rise to a state of courage, as he did, and defy death, since the action that is required beckons us even to this. Severus of Antioch, Letter to Caesaria This is why Saint Cyril also clearly noted the following in the twelfth of the books he wrote against Julian, the wicked servant of the daemons, on behalf of the Christians’ worship: And since [Julian] says the divine Luke included in his account the statement that an angel was present and strengthened Jesus and that his sweat dripped in clot-like drops, that is, like blood, we will have to teach him that we have found nothing like this included in Luke’s narrative, unless it is a matter of an additional reading in the margin which is incorrect. So then, when it comes to those books we have among us, there is nothing at all like this in them. It would, therefore, in my view, be frantic folly for us to respond to him on this point and it would be superfluous for us to oppose him when these words haven’t even been spoken, and [if we were to do so] we would be liable to ridicule, and quite rightly so. Sacra: Letter beta, concerning life and this world, that both we and our life exist in distraction and hardship, and that the love of the world divides and alienates us from God From the twelfth book of Cyril’s Against Julian: I think it is quite clear to everyone that no one would choose to slander someone publicly.

Yet this very thing is popular and occurs in the public square. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning prayer and those things that are accomplished by us through prayer From the twelfth book of Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: It is necessary to pray always, both before contests and during the contests themselves and to seek aid from above. Sacra: Letter delta, concerning doubt in God and that one should not doubt God in anything; for all things are possible for him From the twelfth book of the same work: Exceptional marvels tend to elicit disbelief when recounted but are cred-ited with belief when presented before our eyes, though sometimes even then with difficulty and hesitation. Something like this is what Thomas experienced. Florilegium Laurentianum: Lc cap. A 7, From the twelfth book of Cyril’s Against Julian: The blessedness of the saints truly consists in a hope for things that surpass intellect and reason. “And,” he says, “eye has not seen and ear has not heard and it has not entered into the heart of a human being what God has prepared for those who love him.” Fragment 21 Florilegium Cyrillianum no. 180 From the thirteenth book by the same author found in the same volume, which begins: This accuser of the saints shows an insatiable appetite for criticizing. Catena Graecorum partum in evangelium secundum Marcum collectore atque interprete Petro Possino, p.

“And they were giving him wine mixed with myrrh to drink.” Myrrh is extremely bitter to the taste. Therefore, the other evangelist said “wine with gall,” [while] this one said “wine mixed with myrrh.” Thus says Cyril in the thirteenth book of Against Julian. Oecumenius, Commentarius in Apocalypsin, IV, 412– And it was reasonable that not only should the believers escape, but also those who in their ignorance and deception cooperated in the Lord’s crucifixion, those about whom he said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (despite the fact that Cyril, in the thirteenth book [of ] Against Julian, says this prayer of the Lord is not present in the gospels, it is in fact mentioned among us); and not only these people but also those who were not present at that time or who were not living in Jerusalem, who, for this reason, did not participate in the accursed high priests’ unholy plan to crucify him; or those also who, though present, did not acquire this defilement (even if he himself blessed the whole earth under heaven, it turned out contrary to the plan of that God-hating council of lawless men) – it was fitting that all these should later be sealed by faith in Christ. Fragment 2459 Florilegium Cyrillianum no. 180 From the thirteenth book by the same author found in the same volume, which begins “This accuser of the saints shows an insatiable appetite for criticizing”: “Today,” he says, “you will be with me in paradise.”

But the enemy of the truth does not believe these words. For “how,” he says, “is it possible for him on the same day both to be in paradise and ‘in the heart of the earth’?” Now how could someone not see that in thinking and saying such things he has missed the point and, to be blunt, cannot form in his imagination even a vague notion of the mystery of the only-begotten’s incarnation? For even though his all-holy body lay in the tomb dead and lifeless, he, being God by nature, was still omnipresent, since all things are filled by him and he is not absent from anything at all. So also the blessed David has sung in the psalms: “Where shall I go from your Spirit, and where shall I flee from your presence? If I descend into Hades, you are present.” Fragment 25 Florilegium Cyrillianum no. 178 From the fourteenth book by the same author found in the third volume of Against Julian, which begins: The divine prophet Jeremiah, or rather God through him, to the enemies of the truth as if somehow … Fragment 2665 Florilegium Cyrillianum no. 178 From the fourteenth book by the same author found in the third volume of Against Julian, which begins, “The divine prophet Jeremiah, or rather God through him, to the enemies of the truth as if somehow … ”: How did we come to believe that the Word, being God, truly became incarnate, if it is the case that he recoils from humanity’s insignificance?

Accordingly, he has no need of either growth or wisdom, since, as God, he is completely perfect; but with a supreme accommodation, he wisely allowed the nature of his body to follow its own laws and used to permit his body parts to mature little by little. Moreover, he used to display exactly as much wisdom too as was likely to be appropriate to his body’s maturity, so that no one would believe there to be anything strange and unusual on account of him exceeding and going beyond what was required. From the fourteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: For the holy body was put in the tomb, dead and without a soul. Concerning the fact that the evangelists have written to us about four Marys and do not contradict one another even though one says it was in the evening that the women came to the tomb while another [says it was] in the morning. From the fourteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian the Pagan: [Julian] writes about the holy evangelists, that they contradict one another in what they say. For, in Matthew, Mary Magdalene and another Mary went to the tomb “in the evening on the Sabbath when the first day of the week was dawning,” while according to Mark they [went] after dawn once “the sun had risen.” And these women, according to Matthew, saw an angel, but, according to Mark, it was a young man.

And, according to Matthew, they went and told the disciples about Christ’s resurrection but, according to Mark, they kept quiet, not saying a word to anyone. With these words he brings an accusation against the writings of the saints and claims they contradict one another. Now those who are concerned about the truth must first of all recognize that the evangelists write to us about four Marys: one is the mother of our Lord, another is [Mary] Magdalene, the third is Cleophas’ [Mary], and the fourth along with them is the [Mary] of James and Joses. Matthew, therefore, said that it was Mary Magdalene and another Mary who came to the tomb in the evening, while Mark mentioned [Mary] Magdalene and the Mary of Joses – for she is James’ [Mary] – and said they came and saw where he was laid. And further on [Mark] said, “After the Sabbath had passed, Mary of James and Salome bought spices and came in the morning to the tomb.” So then, the arrival at the tomb of Mary Magdalene and James’ [Mary] happened first at one point in time, and then, at some point after this, there was a subsequent arrival of James’ Mary and Salome. And it is clear from the timing and from the differences [in the two accounts] that they came, as it were, twice … for to them … Matthew says an angel appeared to [the women] and told them that Christ had risen and that they should run to share the good news with the disciples and tell them that Christ had risen.

And further on [Matthew says] Jesus himself appeared to [the women] and told them to tell his brothers that they should go ahead of him to Galilee, and that they did go and told the disciples that they should go to Galilee. But Mark, as I said, says that in the morning as soon as the sun had risen the women came with spices and saw a young man and that they heard that Christ had risen and that they should go and tell his brothers that he was going before them to Galilee. But [Mark] did not say that Christ appeared to them nor that they said anything to the disciples. For “they said nothing to anyone.” Sacra: Letter delta, concerning people who are double-minded and fickle and have a restless mindset From the fifteenth book of the blessed Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Casting aspersions upon others is quite often as easy as riding a horse on the open plain and many people are unable to control their speech. But it is necessary, in my view, that the accusations someone makes about anything whatsoever should be followed by evidence. And if the person intent on condemning someone fails to do so, he will only win for himself a reputation for libel. All these things are confirmed by Saint Cyril as well, who writes the following in the fifteenth book of Against Julian the Pagan: For it is necessary, in my view, that accusations someone makes about some given matter should be backed by evidence.

And if someone is not up to the task when he seeks to accuse someone, he wins a reputation as a libelous person, and especially in court. For it is always a simple matter to find something or other to denounce about a person, and when people can’t stand something they won’t stop talking about it. But only those who know the truth are able to adduce evidence to support what they say. That our Lord ate and drank. From the fifteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian when Julian mocks the fact that our Lord ate and drank:84 For the Savior ate and drank but he [was] not a glutton and drunkard as the Jews dared to say. For the divinely inspired John, when he was speaking in the wilderness, ate locusts and wild honey. But Christ, in a useful and necessary manner, did not eschew any cooked food at all. For the divinely inspired John needed the toils of self-denial so that he might cut off the mind of the flesh and put to death its innate desire for pleasure. And the fact that he kept himself from food, which was [otherwise] beneficial for him and for what he needed for his well-being, was best and useful. But which of these toils did the Savior and Lord of all need, given that he was holy by nature, sanctifies everything, and knows no sin?

But if he too had kept himself from food, there would have been a significant risk that people might assume he did not condescend to touch the sort of things that are unclean and profane, or hence that he too, like us, needed the toils of self-denial to be able, that is, to restrain the pleasures of his flesh, as is required. But this could not have been. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning almsgiving and doing good deeds for the poor From the fifteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: The practice of almsgiving scrubs away sin, “triumphs over condemnation,” quenches the flame of punishment, wins the judge’s sympathies, and, furthermore, joins us to God and causes us to be numbered among the choirs of the saints. Moreover, it also carries us off to the city above, and procures for us a heavenly kingdom, an unfading glory, and a firm and steadfast hope. Indeed, is there anything that contributes to our unflappable contentment that isn’t procured by almsgiving? Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning almsgiving and doing good deeds for the poor The one who distributes his own wealth to those in poverty and need is never himself poor. For he has instead piled up wealth “in heaven.” “For,” it says, “the one who has mercy on the poor is lending to God.” Trustworthy is he to whom you have lent your money; faithful is he who receives it.

He knows how to pay back what was given with interest added to it. He who receives the deposit of the compassionate person is rich and generous. Sacra: Letter iota, concerning clothing, that one must not use fine clothing and a man must not wear feminine attire From the fifteenth book of the blessed Cyril’s Against Julian: Being well-dressed is but an adolescent concern that is pleasing merely in outward appearance and entertains the eyes. Sacra: Letter alpha, concerning self-determination and that self-determination has been given to us From the fifteenth book: The human intellect is managed by its own intentions and pursues each and every action voluntarily, since this too seemed correct to God, the master Craftsman of everything. Consequently, even if one of us comes to participate in the indwelling Holy Spirit thanks to holy baptism, he is not for this reason released from living according to his own judgment and in whatever way seems right to him; rather, with a free rein, so to speak, he assents either to the good or to its opposite. Fragment 35 Sacra: Letter pi, concerning buying and selling From the fifteenth book of the blessed Cyril of Alexandria’s Against In shops they occasionally mix a few valuable things together with lots of worthless junk, using the few valuable items to induce people to come in and persuading them to take the worthless junk as well as what is good.

Sacra: Letter alpha, concerning sins, that our sins procure bad things for us and bring them upon us From the fifteenth book of Cyril’s Against Julian: “We all stumble in many ways.” For our nature is sick with a predisposition to sin thanks to those who in the beginning gave an entrance to passion. Sacra: Letter delta, concerning just people, that they are despised and ridiculed by the unjust and irreverent From the fifteenth book of Saint Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: It is impossible to avoid the fact that good people will appear utterly and in every way abominable and reprehensible in the eyes of those who highly esteem the wasted life of lawless individuals. Sacra: Letter upsilon, concerning a violent person From the sixteenth book of the same work: To act violently towards someone is utterly shameful and disgraceful and is inappropriate for those determined to live well; you would not find this kind of person among those aiming to be respectable and good. From the sixteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian the Pagan, when he accused Christ on the grounds that, despite saying “he came to fulfill the law” and “everyone who repudiates the smallest commandment and teaches people to do so will be called least,” he in fact repudiated the Sabbath and said that “the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath” and that it is not something that goes into the mouth that defiles it, when the law does declare food to be defiled.

Saint Cyril says the following in opposition to these statements: Now the fact that he came in order to fulfill the law is something that I too affirm, along with everyone who possesses accurate and clear knowledge of the sacred scriptures. But if he appears as someone who trans-formed the shadow of the law into the truth and [if ] he changed the [decrees] laid down in ancient types into something clearer, he does so not in opposition to the law, as [our] opponent thinks and says. Rather, on the contrary, he takes that which is, as I said, giving birth to the image of the truth and conveys it to the truth. Therefore, just as those experts in the fine arts, who apply to an outline on a canvas a diverse array of colors and do not thereby damage the outline but bring about a beautiful appearance, so also the Lord of all and Savior who is the epitome of Wisdom [did the same]. And although in the beginning he spoke the law and for those living at that time prefigured the mystery as if in a shadow, at the time of the end of the age he has, through the very things that have happened, demonstrated what was announced beforehand to those earlier people through a myriad of forms and types and riddles. But I will, if it pleases [you], demonstrate that he issued the command-ments that came from him also with a view towards the precise illumination of contemplative realities.

So, the law that came through Moses commands that we rest on the Sabbath and that we use the food that was prepared beforehand for it. This is why, as we understand it, the day before it was named “preparation.” Nevertheless, on the Sabbath they did in fact offer the priestly duties that had been laid down for the priesthood. For they offered to the God over all what was laid down in the law, and they incurred no blame by carrying out this activity. For their desire to do these things was not condemned by the stipulations in the law despite the fact that they were also commanded to have no burden upon their shoulders and not to go outdoors and not to depart from their tents when keeping the Sabbath. For it says, “sit, everyone, in your tents,” and “none of you shall bring forth a bundle from your house on the Sabbath day.” And it allowed circumcision as well on the Sabbath, without penalty. So then what will [our] opponent say in response to these things? What is going on here, my friend? When the law commands that they must keep themselves from all toil and labor, why would the priests be permitted to proceed according to their normal custom and why did they carry out circumcision too? Or what was so significant about the person keeping the Sabbath bringing forth a bundle and going outside of their tent?

And why did they prepare food in advance as someone would do if they were convinced they should not do so on the Sabbath? Is it not then clear to everyone that, unless there is some image of the truth in these [decrees], the law would have no use whatsoever? For we keep the Sabbath in Christ not by abstaining from ordinary deeds and [deeds] that no one would deserve to be censured for, even if we happen to do them, but [by abstaining] from our inclination towards doing evil. For this is a beautiful and admirable rest. But we do not keep ourselves from diligence in holy pursuits which are actually a fragrance that, in an intelligible sense, is pleasing to God. And the fact that every one of us partakes of goods he has labored over in advance is most beautifully illus-trated by the requirement that we prepare food in advance, before the Sabbath. For the type further illustrates that, when we observe the Sabbath in an intelligible sense, we receive the circumcision that is in the Spirit and is not made by hands. And we are delivered from every burden when we cast off the weighty impurity of sin. For we have been justified in Christ and we do not depart from the holy tent but take special delight in abiding in the church’s teaching. For this is truly the holy and divine tent and, in our love for it, we make a petition to God as well as songs of praise when we say, “Lovely are your tents, O Lord of hosts; my soul is longing and lying in wait in the courts of the Lord.”

So then, with respect to the shadow’s impotence, the law that came through Moses is not useful. But if it is transformed into the truth and understood in spiritual terms, then it proclaims the mystery of Christ and introduces us to the knowledge of essential things. Moreover, [it is by virtue of ] the fact that he does things in the body, that the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath. For he, namely Christ, refuted the Jews by pointing out that both he and the Father do not abstain from labor even on the Sabbath: “For my Father works until now and I myself work too.” And we know that the Sabbath rest was manifestly corporeal in nature. We find that the saints did not care very much [about it]. For example, Joshua, who was completely devoted to God, captured Jericho [on the Sabbath] once he had become commander after Moses. But if the Son of Man is not also Lord of the Sabbath as the Savior says, why was Joshua, who conquered on the Sabbath, not cursed? For it is written, “Cursed is everyone who does not pay attention to the things written in this book of the law to do them.” He nevertheless armed himself against Jericho, not contrary to God’s will but rather by becoming a man of arms for him. And they were not prevented from conquering out of respect for the Sabbath but were instead encouraged to ready [their] weapons and cry out against their enemies and do everything according to the custom of war.

And the fact that they did not incur any punishment for their actions is shown by what happened next. So I maintain that even in the eyes of the very one who issued the law about the Sabbath rest, this was not something he wanted. And after other things: For the law provides us with the conception of things that are very useful but does so by means of a riddle. For those [creatures] that are impure – certain < … > animals and certain birds and certain [animals] in the sea – are sometimes taken as an image and a type of people who are unclean and defiled, the sort of people whose company is best avoided by those who desire to live correctly and lawfully. For “bad company corrupts good morals.” And Paul has also written, “If someone who is called a brother should be sexually immoral or a drunk or a slanderer, we should not even eat with such a person.” Therefore, it is necessary for us to keep ourselves from those who are defiled and to run away from bad people. For it is written, “He who walks with a wise person will be wise but he who walks with a fool will be recognized [as one].” “With a holy person you will be holy, and with an innocent person you will be innocent, and with a chosen person you will be chosen, and with a crooked person you will be crooked.”

Therefore, when Christ says, “it is not what enters the mouth that defiles a person,” he is not repudiating the law. For he knows that it is a shadow and a type. On the contrary, it is most beautifully fulfilled when people choose to keep themselves from those who are impure. For “food does not raise us up towards God. For if we eat, we gain nothing, and if we do not eat, we lack nothing,” as it is written. For it is what comes forth through the mouth and the tongue that truly causes impurity: insults, slanders and calumny, blasphemy and seething which [come] from the heart as if from evil intentions. These are what make a person impure according to our Savior’s saying: “For all food is good and there is nothing that is to be rejected as impure by nature. For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.” Sacra: Letter pi, concerning children honoring their parents and the good things that come to those who obey them From Saint Cyril’s sixteenth volume: Children must yield to their parents, but wherever the “word of truth” prevails, let God be honored and let his affairs triumph, even over the power of natural affection. By the same author, from the sixteenth book of Against Julian: For [children] must submit to the parents from whom they came. But wherever the word of truth prevails, let God be honored and let his concerns triumph, even over the natural power of affection.

And even the obligation that sons owe to fathers and fathers to sons ought to be despised. And one must separate oneself from those who are most beloved of all. For he also teaches us this in another place when he says, “He who loves father or mother more than me is not someone worthy of me. And he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” For it is necessary that we should instead first ascribe to God what is required, which triumphs even over the love owed to those who share blood and kinship, since he too is the Father and head and begetter of each person insofar as he is understood as Creator and gives us our existence. And he also has added to these things a stability in our state of well-being. Thus, the love of God indeed causes a division among these which are the greatest of all family relations. Now if [there are] some who are intent upon setting their minds on his concerns, [there are] others who separate themselves from what is beneficial and descend into the pit of destruction. For it is inappropriate that the wise should follow the foolish; rather those who love disgraceful conduct [should follow] those who habitually contemplate the virtues. Now if, on the one hand, Christ commands that those intent on setting their minds on his concerns must guard [their] soul in unison, and afterwards some are not vigilant in every aspect of this [endeavor] and should fall due to their feeble human soul, why would this harm the divine laws or why would it injure the glory of the lawgiver?

For he has given a law that would be useful if they were to carry it out. And as for those who neglected [the laws] when it was incumbent upon them to keep them, they are subject to rebuke and disgrace. And even if they should cling to the feebleness of [their] human soul, they will find not a single word of forgiveness at all. But if, on the other hand, people flee from the truth and sever the bonds of peace, and have sunk down and gone to the point of having nothing good, we should not blame the lawgiver but instead those people themselves, assuming, that is, one intends to be a wise person and an excellent judge. Moreover, the divinely inspired Paul points out quite well that those who are peacemakers like Christ, all of whom have his hand upon them, are ministers of priestly messages. For he says, “Therefore, we have been made ambassadors for Christ as if God were appealing [to you] through us. On behalf of Christ, we beseech you to be reconciled to God.” And we are reconciled to God when we adhere to his divine laws, and we are united through holiness when, as I just said, we cast off the sin that causes disgrace. And those who join to him people who are far off, who do not know him, and who do not want to consider and do what pleases him, they will be called sons of God, and quite rightly so.

That Christ preached also to the spirits in Sheol. From the sixteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: When the only-begotten Word of God became human and appeared in our likeness upon earth, he bestowed forgiveness of sins not only upon those who were alive at that time, but, drawing upon [his] immeasurable love for humanity, he gave an equivalent grace to the spirits in Sheol as well. For he preached to them too and removed the gates of Sheol for those who were in darkness. For Christ was Lord both for the dead as well as for the living, and he rescued both the former and the latter through faith. Tell me then, how can you dare accuse [him] of disre-garding those earlier people and allotting the calling and salvation through Christ to those who just lived in the last days, when, as I said, he foreordained grace both for the dead as well as for the living? For “he preached also to the spirits in prison who formerly disobeyed,” as it is written. Once more from the sixteenth book by the same author: And it is said that Pythagoras descended into the cave that is called Idaeus, stayed at the tomb of Zeus, and offered the required sacrifices according to the custom of the pagans. And when he departed, he wrote upon the place, “Here lies Zan whom they call Zeus.”

And again, when it comes to the son of Semele himself, they say he too is buried next to the Apollo who is called “golden.” From the sixteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: Thus, [Jesus] takes as an example the eye of a needle and a camel, not [meaning] the animal, as the wicked, utterly foolish, and idiotic Julian imagined, but instead the thick rope that is in every ship. For so it is called according to the custom of those who are learned in the affairs of sailors. Sacra: Letter gamma, concerning agriculture, that it is good to work the land From the sixteenth book of Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: It is reasonable that those who are skilled at tilling the ground ought to be commended. Victor Antiochenus, Catena Graecorum patrum in evangelium secundum Marcum Julian, in the sixteenth book of Against Julian, while commenting on the word quadrans, said it is equal to a quarter of an obol. And here it calls two lepta a quadrans. Therefore, an obol is equal to eight lepta. Sacra: Letter upsilon, concerning hypocrisy and dissimulation and feigned piety and those who are sick with these things From the sixteenth book of the blessed Cyril’s Against Julian: The person who “pleases humans” would naturally receive praise from them as his reward. Yet he will receive absolutely none of those rewards that come from God.

For the merit of his courage – I mean earthly courage – didn’t make God take notice but merely the eyes of his [human] onlookers instead. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning God’s coming vengeance for those who have been wronged and that it is necessary to entrust plans for vengeance to God From the sixteenth book of Cyril’s Against Julian: Everyone who has been wronged is consumed by pain. But sometimes, when one is unable to defend himself or to respond in kind on account of being inferior in strength to the person who wronged him, he will call to his aid the sting of the divine hatred of wickedness. Sacra: Letter upsilon, concerning arrogant and pompous people and those who are braggarts and vainglorious Worthy of the highest honor is the person who hates the braggart or rather the act of bragging itself, which is the most shameful of all vices in the eyes of both God and humans, being loathsome and despicable. Who doesn’t regard the disdainful person as onerous? Who doesn’t deplore someone with a bloated ego? Who doesn’t rebuke people puffed up with grand ideas of themselves and say that this ailment is the most shameful of diseases? For the braggart is nearly always rash, stubborn, and untame-able, both quick to anger and implacable, and arguably harsher than rocks, more piercing than thorns, and more burdensome than any stone.

Sacra: Letter upsilon, concerning arrogant and pompous people and those who are braggarts and vainglorious Pretentiousness nearly always has contempt as its root, and in some people it is born when an onslaught of haughtiness and bragging has preceded it. And what does it result in? Enmities, jealousies, and fits of rage, like a fire kindled from a tiny amount of cheap fuel that cannot be extinguished. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning good bishops and those who guard the commandments of God From the seventeenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: The leader who would be blameless must practice a disciplined and regi-mented life and must be experienced in all those things that are pleasing to God. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning good bishops and those who guard the commandments of God Those whose role it is to lead and who, as it were, live in public and are more illustrious than others must surely adorn themselves with the beauty of a good life and must have honed to perfection a truly special way of life. The result will be that they even become models for the people placed under their care, as they do nothing ostentatiously or out of a desire for glory, but are eager to make their own conduct an inspiration also for others, for the sake of their edification. For the life of public and noteworthy figures is almost constantly judged and scrutinized by everyone.

And if he should continue to be beyond reproach, this fact will not be unprofitable for those who know him. But if he should be carried off from what is fitting and fall into what is impermissible, he will be a source, not of good, but rather of loss and damage to others. For if the instructor does not know how to keep to the straight path and follow a refined way of life, what kind of benefit can he provide to those under his instruction? Sacra: Letter delta, concerning those who serve God, that it is necessary for them to honor and revere [him] and make the required offerings From the seventeenth book of Saint Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: If someone among us was to be devoted to the exceptional life and be acclaimed for his brilliant way of living, it would no doubt follow without exception that he would be honored by others and no one would disbelieve him; rather, people would take his “yes” and “no” as having the force of an oath. Sacra: Letter alpha, concerning people whose reasoning faculty is restless and whose judgment is unhinged From the seventeenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: The beginning and root and, as it were, spring and origin of our internal passions is our appetite for vice, which at first calls the mind towards the passions and bewitches it, but afterwards also uses violence and shakes it until it collapses, even sometimes contrary to its will.

For the appetites arise within us like smoke or even like vapors of innate pleasures. Now the sensible and vigorous person rebukes these stirrings and does not permit them to proceed further, and, because the passion is still feeble, he easily conquers it. But, in contrast, the careless and oblivious person admits the incipient pleasures, as though they were mere ideas, and, as he allows them to gain more and more ground, he will discover that the opposing force is incredibly difficult to contain. For the person who has already been taken captive and overpowered is no longer the master of his own inclinations but instead will be subject to the passion that has conquered him like a barbarian. Therefore, the primary method of self-control, which is best of all and most highly regarded, is neither to allow the initial stages of the passion nor indeed to be taken captive by yearn-ings. And after that method of self-control, there is also a second one that is full of filth: to choose to keep oneself from consummating the passion, once the mind is fastened to this yearning and is well acquainted with the defilement it brings. For it is better by far to prevent filth from falling into a jar altogether than to attempt to clean one that has already been defiled. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning enemies and their downfall and that it is necessary not to rejoice at the misfortunes of our enemies From the seventeenth book of Cyril’s Against Julian: [Julian] unjustifiably chastises people who invoke God on behalf of those suffering torment, thinking they have gone beyond what is reasonable, and he says people who show compassion to evildoers are themselves evil.

Yet in saying this isn’t he giving approval to cruelty and savagery, and isn’t he showing admiration for those who are both callous and hate others? For I, at least, maintain that we should instead show compassion towards people who were once caught in their personal failures and have paid the penalty to the laws that punish, on grounds that they are faring miserably, have fallen into this state due to their human weakness, and have become prey to diabolical perversity. We ought not smirk at those who have fallen or, as it were, dance upon people lying on the ground or show them a complete lack of affection. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning enemies and their downfall and that it is necessary not to rejoice at the misfortunes of our enemies Goodness is splendid and worthy of emulation – by which I mean to extend mercy to those bent on hating us, to lend them a helping hand, and even to desire to save them, not by trampling upon them, or even, as it were, dancing on them as they lie on the ground and pitilessly smirking at their inward misery, but instead by doing whatever would help them escape from the noose and offering prayers on their behalf to the God who rules over the universe. Sacra: Letter nu, concerning fasting and self-control From the seventeenth book of Saint Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: It is fitting that people who are fasting should do so motivated by their love for God and not practically shout aloud by their very appearance that they are enduring the hardship of abstaining from food, like some of those showmen in the theatre do who disguise themselves with a mask that appears morose and despondent.

Sacra: Letter omicron, concerning conceit and appearance, and that being is better than seeming; for this is a hindrance to virtue From the same work:153 There are some people, and they are many in this life, who cling tightly to what they themselves have uncritically assumed to be correct, and they suppose that all their words without exception are wise and indisputable. Nevertheless, they steal for themselves the reputation of being wise and clever persons only until the time comes when they encounter an argument from people who hold a different view which rises up against them with more vigorous proofs. Sacra: Letter sigma, concerning a state of equilibrium and being disturbed by nothing From the eighteenth book of Saint Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: Well-being is found in the principle “nothing overmuch,” but excess is grounds for criticism. Sacra: Letter alpha, concerning arguing with God and that one must not argue or plead one’s case with God or say many words about him From the eighteenth book of the blessed Cyril’s Against Julian: Lower your brow, O man. Put a locked door over your tongue. Be done with such insipid nonsense. Leave it to the God over all to know and to do those things that are appropriate for him. Sacra: Letter alpha, concerning the fact that God and his deeds are incomprehensible and that we must not seek after or investigate hidden things and things beyond what has been appointed for us; for the discovery of such things is beyond our reach, humans that we are, and is incomprehensible and also unprofitable From the eighteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: I think we must honor with faith those things that are beyond us, without testing them.

For the human mind is arguably too weak to be able to understand them. Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning almsgiving and doing good deeds for the poor From the eighteenth book by the same author: There is nothing that so cleanses us like the splendor of pious good deeds and showing compassion towards those in poverty who lack life’s necessi-ties. For the author of Proverbs also writes at one point, “Sins are cleansed by acts of almsgiving and acts of faithfulness.” Sacra: Letter epsilon, concerning almsgiving and doing good deeds for the poor No one accustomed to think rightly would doubt that the primary good deed, and the best one, is to distribute your belongings to those in need and suppress the opulence that riches bring and instead to heap up in heaven a future hope, to exchange what is temporary for what is lasting, and to choose what endures instead of what is teetering. Sacra: Letter alpha, concerning self-determination and that self-determination has been given to us From the eighteenth book of the same work: Each of the inhabitants of the earth has been allotted the reins of his own will, and, as a free agent, hastens “hither or thither,” that is, either towards virtue or towards worse actions. Sacra: Letter phi, concerning envy and those who are overcome by such a passion From the eighteenth book of the blessed Cyril’s Against Julian: People who lack a virtuous and admirable way of life understandably find it onerous that others are held in high esteem for their correct living and moral excellence.

For they turn it into an indictment of their own immorality and, feeling weighed down by the good repute enjoyed by others, they harbor within themselves the flame of jealousy. Yet they should have emulated them in choosing the better option and unfurled all their sails in an effort to rival such illustrious deeds, instead of making achievements beyond their capabilities an occasion for disparaging others. Sacra: Letter delta, concerning just people, that their death is honored by the Lord and that their memory is celebrated and when they die they are sought by everyone From the eighteenth book of the same work: We honor the holy men who have kept the faith and have been most appropriately crowned with the glory of their courage, those who have endured the contest to the point of laying down their life and spilling their blood and who bear witness to Christ’s glory and are resplendent with acts of pious virtue. From the eighteenth book by the same author. When Julian ridiculed Christians who honor the martyrs, [Cyril] opposed him as follows:166 For we do not regard those who have died as gods, nor do we ascribe to humans the worship we owe to God, nor do we extend petitions to the holy martyrs or ask them for the good things given to us by God. Instead, we honor [them] as holy men who have kept the faith and have been most appropriately crowned with the glory of excellent bravery, those who have gone as far as to lay down their lives and spill their blood in the struggle for victory and who bear witness to Christ’s glory and are resplendent with the courage of virtue.

And a little further on, when [Cyril] says this is honored among the pagans as well: For at Athens they made sure to crown with annual honors the [warriors] who were foremost in endangering [themselves] on behalf of Hellas. And those who had a more cultivated tongue than the rest would approach them in their tombs and would strive nobly to win [oratorical contests] with [their] words. But they did not, for that reason, honor [them] as gods but as those who struggled for the salvation of everyone and were foremost in endangering [themselves] for the freedom of the Greeks. And a little further on, when [Cyril] says that the pagans’ gods themselves were humans who were born, died, and decomposed, and rehearses the tombs of some of them, he says the following: Therefore, Zeus, who is highest of all, was buried in the cave of the Idaeans and Dionysus [was buried] at the altar of the Apollo who is called “golden,” and this Apollo who proclaimed oracles [was buried] beneath the Tripod that gives oracles. And they say that henceforth it was called Tripod, on account of the three daughters of Triopas who mourned for the Pythian, the son of Zeus and Leto, when he died, as seemed right to Homer. Florilegium Laurentianum: Lc cap. A 7, From the eighteenth book of the same work: But nor do we say that the holy martyrs themselves are gods; rather we know they were good humans and, on grounds that they fought nobly and gladly braved danger for the sake of piety towards him, we crown them with appropriate honors, awarding the verdict of excellence to the brilliance of their good deeds.

For I think we ought to honor with undying memorial those who have won such a magnificent and valuable glory, and who themselves even took no account of death’s approach so that they might preserve for the one who bought them the authenticity of their faith. For we belong to Christ who went so far as to die for us; he obtained us by his own blood and we owe to him our own lives. Fragment 66 Sacra: Letter sigma, concerning worldly wisdom From the nineteenth book of the blessed Cyril of Alexandria’s Against Julian: Beautiful-sounding language and dazzling speech are very widespread among outsiders, despite the fact that these are completely useless. For they do not know the one who is God and Craftsman by nature but introduce innumerable gods into human life. That our Lord ate the Passover according to the law with his disciples. From the nineteenth book of Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: For in the first month, when a lamb was killed in accordance with the law of Moses, he foreknew that he too would suffer, and, as I said, went up to Jerusalem aware of what would happen and kept the feast. For he ate the Passover with his disciples. For his eating of the Passover can only mean they slaughtered a lamb on the fourteenth day of the month towards evening and ate the meat and unleavened bread with bitter herbs.

Fragments of Uncertain Location Sacra: Letter gamma, concerning a courageous, prudent, and wise woman From Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: The female gender is nearly always prone to tears and has a mind that easily crumbles into pity. Sacra: Letter pi, concerning a reckless, shameless, quick-tempered, passionate, and irritable person From Cyril’s Against Julian: What sort of beast is so savage and wild as a quick-tempered man dominated by pure rage? And what sea breaks so furiously upon a rugged and rocky shore when violent winds rush over it, or what bitter and venomous serpent is there that so fiercely lunges at passersby, as an unruly and fierce man with an unbridled temper who has, as it were, given full rein to passion? Sacra: Letter pi, concerning a reckless, shameless, quick-tempered, passionate, and irritable person What could be worse than rage? For it turns a person into an ugly and cruel beast, making him callous and profane and leading him to regard the greatest of goods as of no account. For are there any wicked undertak-ings he would not attempt and are there any words he would hold back when he has within his mind an unquenchable flame and is boiling with wrath? Sacra: Letter upsilon, concerning an insolent person By the same author: Judgment instead sneaks up on those suffering from a lack of self-control in their speech. Philagathos, Hom.

V. (= c. Gal. fr. 1 Bia.) But now that I’ve come to it, I have noticed the Greek nonsense that bears on our discussion. For those who have raged against the church and attempted to tear apart this sacred net have added the following to those other slanders belched forth from their stinking soul. “If the disciples,” he says, “were ordered to catch people like fish, just as in this passage ‘You shall catch people’ and elsewhere ‘Come after me and I will make you fishers of people,’ 174 and if fishermen lead their fish from life into death – for water is life for marine animals, but the air is death, just as the converse is true for land animals – if this is correct, then the disciples of Jesus, by catching people through their preaching, are consigning them to death and destruction like fish.” These are the words put forward by the defiled, reckless, and scornful tongue of Julian the transgressor, who has “the poison of asps under his lips,” and “whose teeth are weapons and arrows,” as the psalm says. Yet such sophisms are nothing more than the barking of mad dogs and the hissings of venomous snakes that fillet the truth with their silly and deceptive fallacies. Philagathos, Hom. LXII (= c. Gal. fr. 2 Bia.) But here again Julian’s loathsome tongue has been honed “like a sharpened razor,” to use the language of the Psalms, mobilizing its customary weaponry of verbal onslaught, and he mocks this statement and ridicules the promise, saying, “If this is true, then those who believe in Jesus and have, <for his sake>, rejected their wives ought to receive a hundred wives in place of the one they rejected.”

Now perhaps one should run past his nonsensical utterances like the barking of a dog. But lest his clever trick should sweep away those who are rather simpleminded, we note that he did not promise a repayment that was of the same form, nor did he say he would in return furnish them with wives and fields, but rather, in place of things that pass away, things that remain, and, in place of sensible things, intelligible things that transcend our sight, hearing, and thought. Philagathos, Hom. LXVI (= c. Gal. fr. 3 Bia.) Here that serpent who in the beginning said slanderous things about God to the human being has once more, through the defiled and spiteful tongue of Julian, given a dreadful hiss. For this man, intending to show the futility of Christ’s mandate, tries to outsmart others with the following hypothetical fallacy: “If all people,” he says, “were persuaded by this mandate and accordingly chose to sell their possessions and distribute the money to the poor, who would there then be to buy what was sold, when, in keeping with the suggestion put forward here, everyone was selling?” You have heard the absurdity of the sophist’s wickedness. Come now, let us crush the liar’s teeth with the cornerstone of the truth. George of B‘eltan’s Commentary on Matthew, Vat. syr. 154, fol. 10v a But Julian raised the following objection to this:186 if Luke recorded the legal genealogy, why does he call Obed the son of Boaz and not the son of Mahlon instead, since it was for Mahlon that Boaz, in accordance with the law, begot [Obed] from Ruth, whom he had taken in order to raise up a descendant for Mahlon?

187 This cunning man does not understand that the dispute concerned Joseph, specifically whether or not he had descended from David. But [for the section of the genealogy] from David to Abraham there was no ambiguity about this point, given that all Jews were descended from Abraham. Thus [it was only for the section of the genealogy] up to David that he was careful to record the succession in keeping with the stipulations of the law, which is confirmed by Eusebius and George. George of B‘eltan’s Commentary on Matthew, Vat. syr. 154, fol. 26r b Julian here says, “Why, when frankincense was offered to Christ, do you yourselves not burn frankincense but a perfume compound instead?” Those who offered frankincense did not offer [it] because our Lord asked this from them, and he accepted their own understanding [of it], not looking at the gift [itself ] but at the intention of those offering it. And we honor the holy temples with the fragrance of sweet perfumes so that those who enter them might enjoy it. Isho‘dad of Merv, Commentary on John But the reprobate Julian, along with others, severely criticizes John at this point for having uttered an obvious falsehood with these words, since the world could record and narrate not only what Jesus did in three and a half years but also all the stories from the beginning [of time] until the present.

And we hold that John sometimes calls the entire creation “the world,” as in the passage “the world came to be through him”; sometimes people, as in the passage “God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son for it”; sometimes people who fear God, as in the passage “I am the light of the world”; and sometimes wicked people, as in the passage “the world will rejoice and you will grieve” and in the passage “the ruler of this world is cast down,” that is, Satan, the prince of the evil ones. This is also the case here. He is calling evil people “the world” that cannot grasp the books of Jesus’ deeds. And this is clear from the fact that they do not grasp even the books they were able to grasp. For just as, for example, the evangelists omitted the many deeds that he, as it is written, did in Chorazin and in Bethsaida, so too they omitted and did not mention the other mighty deeds that he performed elsewhere. Severus, History of the Patriarchs When Cyril received what the emperor had written, he was very happy and started writing the holy treatises to refute the blasphemies of the irreligious Julian. He brought some incisive accusations down upon him, such as: You have defamed Roman power, though God sent you out in battle like Saul.

From the time the Romans sided with Christ, none of their emperors has ever fallen in battle, except you, because you left him, even though you yourself have stood before his sanctuary, and have yourself served before the Lord. What evil have you seen in the church? You have loved the darkness more than the light, you have loved the bad over the good, violence over speaking justice. You loved all talk of baptism […] and a deceitful tongue. This is why the Lord knocked you down until, grabbing you and taking you from where you live, “he has uprooted you from the land of the living,” because you have never seen Jesus; and I say you are an object of hatred to him or that like a high priest he has convicted you, because you have never seen him in his humility, that is, the one you have not known in his wisdom like them; but he is the one you’ve seen the whole world worshipping: it is his divinity you’ve seen everyone believing in, it is his church you’ve seen with the cohort of martyrs who died for him. You trembled, but still didn’t recognize him, nor have you ever seen him. You have hated as something evil the one who molded you, who molded everyone. You didn’t spare the one who treated you well, but rather you insulted him with […] words […].

You sharpened your tongue against God with insulting language – won’t you stop throwing it in his face … ? Concerning excellent men, that their contribution brings salvation both for the ones acting and indeed for the people as well. From Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: For I, at least, maintain that the soundness of the entire commonwealth and its enjoyment of favorable circumstances comes from nowhere else than the good judgment of the best and most outstanding men, just as we have accurately perceived also in the case of those distinguished men in ancient days, who were renowned for their sagacity, the very thing ignored by this noble man who thought his peculiar madness would be all the good judgment he required. Concerning kings, that it is unprofitable for them to march out to war From Saint Cyril’s Against Julian: For it is fitting that kings should lavish frequent gifts upon those of their subjects who excel in prudence and strength, so that when they march out to wars, they would use their tactical skill to manage the people’s commonwealth and ward off enemies, and, when they return, bring the spoils to those same ones who stay at home in palaces.