駁瑟蘇斯 第 1 章 第 10/42 段

But this is what must be examined: whether anyone who had truly died ever rose again in the very same body;

[Do you think these others' tales are myths, while you have invented the cry on the cross when he was breathing his last, the earthquake, and the darkness?] For while alive he could not help himself, but when dead he rose and showed the marks of his punishment and his hands as they had been pierced—who saw this? A frenzied woman, as you say, and perhaps someone else of the same sorcery, who either by some disposition dreamed it, or by his own wish was deluded by a mistaken opinion into a fantasy (which has already happened to countless people), or—what is more likely—wished to astound the rest by this prodigy and, through such a falsehood, to provide an opening for other charlatans.

Since then it is a Jew who says these things, we make our defense concerning our Jesus as to a Jew, making the argument common still with regard to Moses, and saying to him:

How many others tell such marvelous tales as Moses, working upon those who listen foolishly, exploiting their error for the sake of persuasion? And it is more possible, for the one who disbelieves Moses, to set beside him Zalmoxis and Pythagoras who told marvelous tales, than for the Jew, who is not at all fond of learning the histories of the Greeks.

And the Egyptian, disbelieving the marvels concerning Moses, will plausibly set beside him Rhampsinitus, saying that this man is far more credible as having gone down to Hades and diced with Demeter and, having snatched a golden napkin from her, displayed it as a token of having been in Hades and come up from there—than Moses, who recorded of himself that he entered into the thick darkness where God was, and that he alone drew near to God beyond all the rest.

And: Moses alone shall draw near to God, but the rest shall not draw near. We then, the disciples of Jesus, shall say to the Jew who says these things:

Make your defense to us then, since you accuse us regarding faith in Jesus, and tell us: what will you say to the Egyptian and to the Greeks in answer to the charges you have brought against our Jesus—charges which would extend even to Moses? And even if you should strive hard to defend Moses—as indeed the things about him do furnish a striking and clear argument—you will unwittingly, in the very things by which you defend Moses, against your will establish Jesus as more divine than Moses.

And since the Jew in Celsus says that the heroic histories concerning those said to have gone down to Hades and come up again are marvelous fictions—the heroes having become invisible for a certain time and stolen themselves away from the sight of all men, and afterward shown themselves as having come up from Hades (for such seems to be what his words suggest concerning Orpheus among the Odrysians, Protesilaus in Thessaly, Heracles at Taenarum, and Theseus too)—come, let us show that what is recorded of Jesus' rising from the dead cannot be compared with these.

For each of the so-called heroes of those localities, had he wished, could have stolen himself away from the sight of men, and, when he decided, return again to those he had left;

but since Jesus was crucified in the sight of all the Jews and his body taken down before the eyes of their people, how could one fashion a story like those told of the heroes who are said to have gone down to Hades and come up again? And we say that perhaps, by way of defense of Jesus' having been crucified, even this might be said—especially because of the things recorded about the heroes who are supposed to have gone down to Hades by compulsion—namely, that if, hypothetically, Jesus had died an obscure death, in such a way that it was not clear to the whole Jewish people that he had died, and then after this he truly rose from the dead, there would have been room for the suspicion raised about the heroes to be said of him too.

[But the disciples] gave themselves over to such teaching for the life of men—a teaching which, had they been fabricating Jesus' rising from the dead, they would not have taught so vigorously; and along with this, they not only prepared others to despise death, but themselves did so long beforehand.

But notice whether it is not in utter blindness that the Jew in Celsus says, as though it were impossible for anyone to rise from the dead in the very same body:

But this is what must be examined: whether anyone who had truly died ever rose again in the very same body.

For the Jew would not have said these things if he believed what is recorded in the third book of Kingdoms and in the fourth concerning the children, one of whom Elijah raised and the other Elisha.

And for this reason, I think, Jesus also sojourned among no other nation than the Jews, who had become accustomed to marvels, so that, by comparing the things they had believed with what was done by him and recorded about him, they might accept that this one—concerning whom greater things came to pass and by whom more marvelous things were accomplished—was greater than all those.

And since, after the Greek histories he set forth concerning those who, as it were, told marvelous tales and those who, as it were, rose from the dead, the Jew says to those of the Jews who believe in Jesus:

Or do you think that the tales of others are and seem to be myths, while the catastrophe of your drama has been gracefully or plausibly devised—the cry on his cross when he was breathing his last? We shall say to the Jew: those tales which you set forth we too have regarded as myths, but the contents of our common Scriptures—shared with you, in which not only you alone but we also take pride—we by no means call myths.

Therefore we believe also those who wrote about the ones who rose from the dead there, as not telling marvelous fictions; and we believe the one here, as one both foretold and prophesied and risen.

And this one is more marvelous, as having risen from the dead, than those, because those the prophets Elijah and Elisha raised, but this one no prophet raised, but the Father who is in the heavens.

Therefore the resurrection of this one accomplished greater things than the resurrection of those.

For what so great thing came to the world from the children raised by Elijah and Elisha, such as came through the proclaimed resurrection of Jesus, believed by divine power?

He thinks too that the earthquake and the darkness were a marvelous fiction;

concerning which we made our defense, as far as possible, in the foregoing, citing Phlegon, who recorded that such things happened at the time of the Savior's passion; and that while alive he could not help himself, but when dead Jesus rose and showed the marks of his punishment and his hands as they had been pierced.

And we ask him: what is this "he could not help himself"? For if it refers to virtue, we shall say that he most certainly did help himself;

for he neither said nor did anything improper, but truly, as a sheep led to slaughter, and as a lamb dumb before its shearer,

and the gospel testifies that thus he did not open his mouth. But if he takes "could not help himself" in reference to outward and bodily things, we say that we have shown from the gospels that he came to these things willingly.

Then, next to these, after stating the things from the gospel—that he showed the marks of his punishment, having risen from the dead, and his hands as they had been pierced—he inquires and says:

Who saw this? And slandering the things concerning Mary Magdalene, who is recorded to have seen, he said:

And since not she alone is recorded to have seen the risen Jesus, but others too, the Jew of Celsus, slandering these things, says:

and if anyone else of the same sorcery.

Then, as though this could happen—I mean, that a fantasy of the dead man as living should come to someone—he adds, like an Epicurean, and says that someone, having dreamed by some disposition, or by his own wish having been deluded by a mistaken opinion into a fantasy, reported such a thing—which, he says, has already happened to countless people.

[Here he overlooks] the necessary doctrine, namely that the soul of the departed continues to exist;

and not in vain has the one who has received this doctrine believed in its immortality, or at least in its continuance;

as Plato too says in his treatise On the Soul that shadowy phantoms of those already dead have appeared to some about their tombs.

Now the phantoms that occur about the tombs of the dead come from a certain substrate, namely from the soul subsisting in what is called the luminous body.

But Celsus, unwilling to admit such a thing, wishes that certain people both dream while awake and, by their own wish, are deluded by a mistaken opinion into fantasies;

which, to believe happens in a dream, is not unreasonable, but in waking life—in the case of those not altogether out of their minds, deranged, or melancholic—is not plausible.

And foreseeing this too, Celsus called the woman "frenzied";

which the recorded history does not indicate—from which, having taken it, he accuses the facts.

Jesus then, after death, was—as Celsus thinks—sending out a fantasy of the wounds on the cross, and was not truly thus wounded;

but as the gospel teaches—some parts of which, those he wishes in order to accuse, Celsus believes, while others he disbelieves—Jesus called to himself one of the disciples who was disbelieving and thought the marvel impossible.

For that disciple agreed with her who said she had seen him, since it was not impossible that the soul of the dead man should be seen, but he no longer considered it true that he had risen in a solid body.

Unless I see, I will not believe—and he added also:

Unless I put my hand into the print of the nails and feel his side, I will not believe.

These things were said by Thomas, who judged that a soul's body can appear to the senses of the eyes, being in every way like the former form, both in size and "with eyes like hers," and in voice, and often "having such garments about the skin." And Jesus, having called Thomas to himself, said:

Bring your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving but believing. And it was consistent with all that had been prophesied concerning him—among which this too was included—and with the things done by him and the things that befell him, that this should come to pass as the most marvelous of all.

For it had been spoken beforehand, in the person of Jesus, through the prophet:

My flesh shall dwell in hope;

and you will not abandon my soul to Hades, nor will you allow your Holy One to see corruption.

And indeed at his resurrection he was, as it were, in a certain middle state between the density of the body before the passion and the appearing of a soul stripped of such a body.

Hence, when his disciples and Thomas were together in the same place with them, Jesus comes, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst and said:

Bring your finger here, and the rest.

And in the gospel according to Luke too, while Simon and Cleopas were conversing with each other about all the things that had befallen them, Jesus came up to them and journeyed with them.

And their eyes were held from recognizing him;

What are these words which you are exchanging with each other as you walk? And when their eyes were opened and they recognized him, then in these very words the Scripture says:

And he became invisible to them. So even if Celsus should wish to make the things concerning Jesus and those who saw him after the resurrection common to other apparitions and others who saw phantoms, yet to those who examine the facts fair-mindedly and prudently the more marvelous character will become apparent.

After these things Celsus, not contemptibly disparaging what is written, says that it was necessary, if Jesus really wished to manifest divine power, that he should have appeared to those very men who had insulted him, and to the one who condemned him, and in short to all.

For truly to us also it appears, according to the gospel, that he did not after the resurrection appear in the same way as he formerly appeared publicly and to all.

But in the Acts it is written:

to the disciples he proclaimed the things concerning the kingdom of God;

while in the gospels it is not that he was always with them, but in one place he appeared after eight days, the doors being shut, in their midst, and in another place in certain such manners.

And Paul too, in the closing part of the first epistle to the Corinthians, as showing that he was not seen publicly in the same way as in the time before the passion, writes such things:

For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and rose, and that he was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve.

Then he was seen by more than five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain until now, but some have fallen asleep.

Then he was seen by James, then by all the apostles.

And last of all, as to one untimely born, he was seen by me also. Now I suppose that the matters connected with this place are great, marvelous, and beyond the worth not only of the many believers but even of those who have made considerable progress in the word—matters in which the reason might be disclosed why, having risen from the dead, he did not appear in the same way as in the former time.

But of the many points, as in such a treatise—written against the discourse aimed at Christians and their faith—see whether we may be able, by reasonably setting forth a few things, to reach those who will hear our defense.

Jesus, being one, was many according to the conceptions of him, and to those who beheld him he was not seen alike by all.

And that he was many according to conception is clear from the words: I am the way and the truth and the life; and I am the bread; and I am the door; and from countless others.

And that, even when seen, he did not appear alike to those who beheld, but according as the beholders had capacity, will be clear to those who attend to why, when about to be transfigured on the high mountain, he did not take all the apostles but only Peter and James and John, as alone able to behold his glory at that time, and able too to discern Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory, and to hear them as they conversed with him, and the voice from the cloud out of heaven.

And I think that even before he went up into the mountain—where the disciples alone came to him and he taught them concerning the beatitudes, when, being somewhere down below the mountain in the evening, he healed those who came to him, delivering them from every disease and every sickness—he did not appear the same to those who were sick and needed his healing as to those who, being healthy, were able to go up with him into the mountain.

But also, even if privately to his own disciples he explained the parables that had been spoken with concealment to the outside crowds, then just as in their hearing those who heard the explanation of the parables were superior to those who heard the parables without explanations, so too in their sight—certainly that of the soul, but I think also that of the body.

And that he did not always appear the same is shown by Judas, who was about to betray him, having said to the crowds going along with him, as though they did not know him:

Whomever I shall kiss, he is the one. And I think the Savior himself also indicates such a thing through the words:

Daily I was with you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize me. We then, who carry such a view of Jesus—not only as to the inner divinity hidden from the many, but also as to the body that was transfigured when he wished and for whom he wished—say that those who had not yet stripped off the principalities and powers, and who had not yet died to sin, all had the capacity to behold the Jesus who had not put off the principalities and powers; but the one who had stripped off the principalities and powers and no longer had anything capable of being seen by the many—him those who had formerly all seen him were not able to behold;

wherefore, sparing them, he did not appear to all after rising from the dead.

And why do I say "to all"? For not even to the apostles themselves and to the disciples was he always present or always appearing, since they were unable to bear the continual contemplation of him.

Matthias having been appointed in place of Judas, and after those to the five hundred brethren at once; then he was seen by James, then by the rest of the apostles besides the twelve, perhaps the seventy; and last of all by Paul, as by one untimely born, who knew how he said:

To me, the least of all saints, was this grace given. And perhaps "the least" is equivalent to "one untimely born."

Just as, then, no one could easily blame Jesus for not taking all the apostles up into the high mountain, but only the three previously mentioned, when he was about to be transfigured and to show the splendor of his garments and the glory of Moses and Elijah as they conversed with him, so neither could anyone reasonably find fault with the apostolic words for introducing that Jesus appeared after the resurrection not to all, but to those whom he knew to have received eyes capable of seeing his resurrection.

And I think it useful, for the defense of the matters before us, also what is thus spoken concerning him:

For to this end Christ died and rose, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living. For see in these words that Jesus died in order to be Lord of the dead, and rose in order to be Lord not only of the dead but also of the living.

And the apostle indeed knows the dead, over whom Christ is Lord, to be those thus enumerated in the first epistle to the Corinthians:

For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible; and the living to be those, themselves and those who shall be changed, who are other than the dead who shall be raised.

And concerning these the wording stands thus:

And we shall be changed, said next after, The dead shall be raised first.

But also in the first epistle to the Thessalonians, presenting the same distinction in other words, he says there are some who are asleep and others who are living, saying:

But we do not wish you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who sleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.

For if we believe that Jesus died and rose, even so God will bring with him through Jesus those who have fallen asleep.

For this we say to you in the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall in no way precede those who have fallen asleep. And the explanation that has appeared to us on these points we have set forth in the expository notes we dictated on the first epistle to the Thessalonians.

And do not marvel if not all the crowds who have believed in Jesus behold his resurrection;

since Paul, writing to the Corinthians as to those unable to bear more, says:

But I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And such too is this:

but neither yet now are you able, for you are still carnal. Thus then, doing all things by divine judgment, the word recorded concerning Jesus that before the passion he simply appeared to the many, and this not always, but after the passion no longer appeared in the same way, but with a certain judgment measuring out to each what was fitting.

And just as it is recorded that God appeared to Abraham or to some of the saints, and this appearing did not happen always but at intervals, and not to all did he appear,

so understand for me that the Son of God was seen in a manner closely resembling the appearing of God to those, that he was seen by them by a judgment.

We have therefore made our defense, as far as was possible for us in such a treatise, against the claim that it was necessary, if he really wished to manifest divine power, that he should have appeared to those very men who had insulted him, and to the one who condemned him, and in short to all.

It was not necessary, then, for him to appear to the one who condemned him, nor to those who insulted him.

For Jesus spared both the one who condemned him and those who insulted him, lest they be struck with blindness, such as that with which those in Sodom were struck when they plotted against the hospitality shown to the angels entertained by Lot.

And this is shown by these words:

But the men stretched out their hands and drew Lot to themselves into the house, and shut the door;

and they struck the men who were at the door of the house with blindness, from the small to the great;

[his appearing] being available to each of those able to see it, and to see according to the measure of what each could contain.

And surely it was for no other reason that he guarded against being seen, except on account of the capacities of those unable to bear the sight of him.

And it was idly assumed by Celsus that for he no longer feared any man, having died and being, as you say, a god, nor was he sent for this in the first place, that he should be hidden.

For he was sent not only that he might be known, but also that he might remain hidden.

For not all that he was, was known even to those by whom he was known, but something of him remained hidden from them;

and to some he was not known at all.

And he opened the gates of light to those who had become sons of darkness and night, but who had given themselves over to becoming sons of day and of light.

And the Lord our Savior came rather as a good physician to those full of sins than to the righteous.

Let us see in what manner the Jew in Celsus says that if at any rate he ought to have done this much for the display of his divinity, he should at least have vanished straightway from the cross.

And this too seems to me like the argument of those who array themselves against providence and sketch out for themselves things other than what exist, saying that it would have been better if the world had been as we have sketched it.

For where they sketch out things possible, they are convicted of making the world worse, as far as in them lies and by their sketch; but where they seem not to be depicting things worse than what exist, they are shown to be wishing for things naturally impossible;

so that in either case they are ridiculous.

And here too, then, that it was not impossible for the more divine nature to become invisible whenever it wished, is both evident of itself and clear from the things written about him—to those who do not, while admitting some of the things written in order to accuse the word, suppose others to be fabrications.

And it is written in Luke that after the resurrection Jesus, taking bread, blessed it and, having broken it, gave it to Simon and Cleopas;

and when they had taken the bread, their eyes were opened and they recognized him;

and he became invisible to them.

But we wish to show how it would not have been more useful for the whole economy that he should straightway have become bodily invisible from the cross.

The things recorded to have happened to Jesus do not contain the whole contemplation of the truth in the bare letter and the history;

for each of them is shown, to those who read the Scripture more intelligently, to be also a symbol of something.

Just as, then, his being crucified holds the truth indicated in I have been crucified with Christ, and that which is signified by But far be it from me to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world has been crucified to me and I to the world; and his death is necessary because of For in that he died, he died to sin once for all, and because the righteous one says:

Being conformed to his death, and For if we died with him, we shall also live with him—so too his burial reaches to those conformed to his death and crucified together with him and dying together with him, in accordance with what is said also to Paul:

For we were buried with him through baptism, and we rose together with him.

But the things recorded concerning the burial, the tomb, and the one who buried him, we shall expound more opportunely at greater length elsewhere, where it is more proper to speak about these matters.

But for now, sufficient is the clean linen cloth, in which the clean body of Jesus had to be wrapped, and the new tomb which Joseph had hewn in the rock, in which no one had yet lain—or, as John says, in which no one had yet been laid.

And consider whether the agreement of the three evangelists, who took care to record that the tomb was cut or quarried in rock, may move someone, so that he who examines the words of what is written may see in these things too something worthy of consideration—both concerning the newness of the tomb, which Matthew and John recorded, and concerning the fact that no dead person had been there, according to Luke and John.

[that the body might be] new, so to speak, a dead body coming to be in a new and clean tomb;

so that, just as his birth was purer than every birth in that he was begotten not from intercourse but from a virgin, so too his burial might possess purity, indicated through the symbolic fact that his body was laid in a new tomb already existing, not built up of stones gathered together and having a union that is not natural, but in a single rock, hewn or quarried, unified throughout.

Now the matters of the narrative and of the ascent from the things recorded as having happened up to the realities of which the events were significative, one might also expound in a greater and more divine manner, more opportunely setting forth such things in a preliminary composition;

but as for the wording, one might also render it thus: that for the one who had judged to undergo being hung on the cross, it was also fitting to keep the consequences in accordance with the supposition, so that, as a man taken down, by having died as a man, he might also as a man be buried.

But also, if hypothetically it had been written in the gospels that he straightway became invisible from the cross, Celsus and the unbelievers would have disparaged what was written, and would have accused it, saying even thus:

why then did he become invisible after the cross, and did not contrive this before suffering? If, then, having learned from the gospels that he did not become invisible straightway from the cross, they suppose they may accuse the word—which did not fabricate, as those people demanded, that he straightway became invisible from the cross, but recorded the truth—how is it not reasonable that they should also believe in his resurrection, and that, having willed it, at one time he stood, the doors being shut, in the midst of the disciples, and at another, having given bread to two of his acquaintances, straightway became invisible from them after certain words which he spoke to them?

But from where has it been said by the Jew of Celsus that Jesus was hiding? For he says concerning him:

Who, of those ever sent as a messenger, when it was needful to announce the things commanded, hides himself? For he was not hiding who said to those seeking to seize him:

Daily I was in the temple teaching openly, and you did not seize me. And to the next point repeated by Celsus, we, having once made our defense, shall be content with what has been previously said.

For it has been written in the foregoing also against the point: "Or, when he was disbelieved while in the body, he preached openly to all;

but when he could have furnished strong faith by rising from the dead, he showed himself secretly only to one little woman and to his own devotees?" But neither is it true that he appeared to one little woman only;

for it is written in the gospel according to Matthew that late on the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to view the tomb.

And behold, there was a great earthquake;

for an angel of the Lord, having descended from heaven and come, rolled away the stone. And a little later Matthew says:

And behold, Jesus met them—clearly the aforementioned Marys—saying:

And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. And it has also been said, against the point that while being punished he was indeed seen by all, but having risen he was seen by one, when we made our defense against the point that he was not seen by all.

And now we shall say that his human aspects were visible to all, but his more divine aspects—I speak not of those which have a relation to other things, but of those which are by way of distinction—were not capable of being received by all.