Origen, AGAINST CELSUS, Part III, Complete

Translated from the Greek original by Frederick Crombie.

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This Part: 128 Pages

Page 60

Chapter XXXVIII.

In the next place, as it is his object to slander our Scriptures, he ridicules the following statement: "And God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof. And the rib, which He had taken from the man, made He a woman," [3849] and so on; without quoting the words, which would give the hearer the impression that they are spoken with a figurative meaning. He would not even have it appear that the words were used allegorically, although he says afterwards, that "the more modest among Jews and Christians are ashamed of these things, and endeavour to give them somehow an allegorical signification." Now we might say to him, Are the statements of your "inspired" Hesiod, which he makes regarding the woman in the form of a myth, to be explained allegorically, in the sense that she was given by Jove to men as an evil thing, and as a retribution for the theft of "the fire;" [3850] while that regarding the woman who was taken from the side of the man (after he had been buried in deep slumber), and was formed by God, appears to you to be related without any rational meaning and secret signification? [3851] But is it not uncandid, not to ridicule the former as myths, but to admire them as philosophical ideas in a mythical dress, and to treat with contempt [3852] the latter, as offending the understanding, and to declare that they are of no account?

[3849] Cf. Gen. ii. 21, 22.

[3850] anti tou puros.

[3851] choris pantos logou kai tinos epikrupseos.

[3852] mochthizein.

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