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Origen, AGAINST CELSUS, Part V, Complete

Translated from the Greek original by Frederick Crombie.

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Page 26

In the next place, as if either the Scriptures made such a statement, or as if we ourselves so spoke of God as having rested from fatigue, he continues: "It is not in keeping with the fitness of things [4600] that the first God should feel fatigue, or work with His hands, [4601] or give forth commands." Celsus says, that "it is not in keeping with the fitness of things that the first God should feel fatigue. Now we would say that neither does God the Word feel fatigue, nor any of those beings who belong to a better and diviner order of things, because the sensation of fatigue is peculiar to those who are in the body. You can examine whether this is true of those who possess a body of any kind, or of those who have an earthly body, or one a little better than this. But "neither is it consistent with the fitness of things that the first God should work with His own hands." If you understand the words "work with His own hands" literally, then neither are they applicable to the second God, nor to any other being partaking of divinity. But suppose that they are spoken in an improper and figurative sense, so that we may translate the following expressions, "And the firmament showeth forth His handywork," [4602] and "the heavens are the work of Thy hands," [4603] and any other similar phrases, in a figurative manner, so far as respects the "hands" and "limbs" of Deity, where is the absurdity in the words, "God thus working with His own hands?" And as there is no absurdity in God thus working, so neither is there in His issuing "commands;" so that what is done at His bidding should be beautiful and praiseworthy, because it was God who commanded it to be performed.

[4600] ou themis.

[4601] cheirourgein.

[4602] Cf. Ps. xix. 1.

[4603] Cf. Ps. cii. 25.

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Reference address : https://ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/fathers/origen/contra-celsum-4.asp?pg=26