Wonders the Greeks Borrowed

So they stand convicted not only of borrowing their teachings from the barbarians, but also of retelling as marvels of Greek myth the wonders that are found in our own records — wonders worked by the divine power from above, through men who lived holy lives and gave themselves to our way. And we will ask them whether the things they tell are true or false. They will not say false; they will not willingly convict themselves of the enormous silliness of making up stories, so they are forced to admit them true. And in that case, how can the wonders worked by Moses and the other prophets go on looking unbelievable to them? For God Almighty, in his care for everyone, turns some toward salvation by commands, some by threats, some by miraculous signs, and some by gentle promises. [a]

Here, then, is one of the Greeks’ own stories. A drought had wasted Greece for a long stretch and the crops had failed, and it is said that the survivors, driven by the famine, came as suppliants to Delphi and asked the Pythian priestess how they might be released from the disaster. She announced that there was one help and one only for their trouble: they must make use of the prayers of Aeacus. They talked him into it, and Aeacus climbed the Hellenic hill, stretched out washed hands toward heaven, called on the God who belonged to them all, and begged him to pity ruined Greece. As he was praying, thunder sounded out of the ordinary course of things, and the whole sky around was covered over with clouds. Violent rains burst down and would not stop, and filled the entire region. What came of it was a rich and generous harvest, farmed by the prayers of Aeacus.

“And Samuel called on the Lord,” it is written, “and the Lord gave out his voice, and rain in the day of harvest.” Do you see that the one who “sends his rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous,” through the powers under him, is the one God? And the whole of our Scripture is full of cases of God listening to the prayers of righteous men and doing each thing they ask for.

Again, the Greeks tell how, when the Etesian winds once failed, Aristaeus offered sacrifice on Ceos to Isthmian Zeus. There had been terrible devastation: everything was burnt up with the heat, because the winds that used to cool what was growing were not blowing. And he called them back without difficulty.

And at Delphi, when Xerxes marched against Greece, the Pythian priestess answered:

So they put up an altar and sacrificed to the winds, and had them as their allies; for the winds blew hard around Cape Sepias and shattered the whole apparatus of the Persian expedition. Empedocles of Acragas was called “the wind-stopper.” The story goes that a wind once blew off the mountain of Acragas, heavy and sickening for the people there, and the cause as well of barrenness in their wives, and that he made the wind stop. That is why he writes of it himself in these lines:

And they say he was followed about by people who practiced divination and by people who had long been troubled by grievous diseases. So they plainly believed that cures and signs and wonders happened — and they got it from our Scriptures. For if certain powers move the winds and hand out the rain, let them listen to the psalmist: “How lovely are your dwelling places, Lord of the powers!” This is the Lord of the powers and rulers and authorities that Moses speaks of, and the point of it is that we may be with him. “And you shall circumcise your hard heart, and shall not stiffen your neck any more. For he is Lord of lords and God of gods, the great and strong God” — and so on. And Isaiah says, “Lift your eyes up on high, and see who produced all these things.”

And some say that plagues and hailstorms and violent weather usually come about not only because matter has been disturbed, but also through the anger of demons and bad angels. For instance, they say that the Magi at Cleonae watch what happens in the sky, and when the clouds are about to let hail loose, they turn the threatened wrath aside by spells and sacrifices. And if at some point there is no animal to be had, they are satisfied with bleeding their own finger for the sacrifice. The prophetess Diotima, when the Athenians sacrificed before the plague, got the sickness put off for ten years. The sacrifices of Epimenides of Crete put off the Persian war for the same length of time. And it is reckoned to make no difference whether we call these spirits gods or angels. Men skilled in the business of consecrating statues have set up tombs of the dead in many of the temples, calling the souls of those men daemons and teaching people to worship them — on the ground that, because their lives were pure, they were granted by God’s foreknowledge the power to roam the space around the earth and serve human beings. For they knew that some souls are by nature held inside the body. But we will take these matters up as the work goes on, in the treatise on the angels.

Democritus, who predicted many things from watching what happens in the sky, was called “Wisdom.” When his brother Damasus gave him a warm welcome, he predicted from certain stars that there would be a great deal of rain. Some were convinced by him and got their crops in; it was summer, and the grain was still on the threshing floor. The rest lost everything, when heavy and unlooked-for showers burst down.

How, then, can the Greeks go on refusing to believe in the divine appearing on Mount Sinai — the fire that burned and consumed nothing of what grew on the mountain, and the sound of trumpets that came out with no instruments breathing it? For what is called God’s coming down on the mountain is the arrival of divine power, spreading through the whole world and announcing “the light no one can approach.”

That is the allegory, according to the Scripture. But the fire was seen, as Aristobulus says, while the whole crowd — not less than a million, besides those under age — was gathered around the mountain, and the circuit of the mountain was not less than a hundred miles. Over the whole place of the vision the burning fire was seen by all of them, camped around it as it were; so the coming down was not a matter of place. For God is everywhere.

Now those who compile such reports say that on the island of Britain there is a cave lying under a mountain, with a cleft at the top; and so, when the wind falls into the cave and rushes into the hollow of the cleft, a sound is heard like cymbals clashing in time. And often in the woods, when the leaves are moved by a sudden gust, a sound comes out like the singing of birds.

The men who wrote the Persian histories say that in the uplands, in the country of the Magi, three mountains stand on a wide plain; and that travelers going through that country, when they come to the first mountain, hear a confused noise, as of tens of thousands of men shouting as though drawn up for battle; and at the middle one they hear a louder and clearer din; and at the last they hear people singing a victory song, as though they had won. In my opinion the cause of the whole sound is the smoothness of those places and the caves in them: the air goes in, is thrown back, comes around to the same point, and sounds with considerable force. Let that stand as it is.

But God Almighty can also produce a voice and a vision through the ear with nothing in between, showing that his greatness has an order of its own beyond what is usual — and doing it so as to turn a soul that up to then had not believed, and to get the command taken in. Yet with a cloud there and a high mountain, why should it not be possible to hear a different sound, the wind being moved by the active cause? That is why the prophet says, “You heard the sound of words, and saw no likeness.” You see how the Lord’s voice — the Word, which has no shape; the power of the Word; the shining word of the Lord; the truth from heaven, from above — came to the assembly of the church, and did its work by that shining ministry which needs nothing in between.

We will find another piece of evidence confirming this. The best of the philosophers helped themselves to their finest teachings from us, and then boast that certain of the doctrines belonging to each school were picked up from other barbarian peoples — chiefly from the Egyptians. Other teachings came that way, and above all the one about the soul passing from body to body. For the Egyptians pursue a philosophy of their own, and their sacred ceremonial shows it better than anything else. [o]

First the Singer comes forward, carrying one of the emblems of music. They say he has to learn two of the books of Hermes: one containing the hymns of the gods, the second the rules for the king’s life. After the Singer comes the Hour-watcher, with a timepiece in his hand and a palm branch, the emblems of astrology. He must have the astrological books of Hermes, four in number, always on his lips. One of them is about the order of the fixed stars that can be seen, another about the meetings and the shining appearances of the sun and moon, and the rest about their risings. Next in order comes the sacred Scribe, with wings on his head, and in his hand a book and a ruler that holds the writing ink and the reed they write with. He must know what are called hieroglyphs, and the description of the world and the mapping of the earth, the positions of the sun and moon, and the five planets; also the description of Egypt and the chart of the Nile; the account of the priests’ equipment and of the places set apart for them; and the measures and the things used in the sacred rites.

Then the Robe-keeper follows the ones already named, carrying the measuring rod of justice and the cup for drink offerings. He knows all the points called Paideutic, which have to do with training, and Moschophatic, which have to do with sacrifice. There are also ten books about the honor they pay their gods, containing the worship of Egypt: sacrifices, firstfruits, hymns, prayers, processions, festivals, and the like. And last of all walks the Prophet, with the water jar carried openly in his arms, followed by the men who carry the loaves that go out. He is the governor of the temple, and he learns the ten books called Hieratic, which contain everything about the laws and the gods and the whole training of the priests; for among the Egyptians the Prophet is also over the distribution of the revenues. So there are forty-two books of Hermes that cannot be done without. Thirty-six of them, containing the whole philosophy of the Egyptians, are learned by the men just named; the other six, which are medical, by the shrine-carriers — on the structure of the body, on diseases, on instruments, on medicines, on the eyes, and the last on women. Such, in short, are the customs of the Egyptians.

The philosophy of the Indians has been much talked about too. Alexander of Macedon took ten of the Indian gymnosophists who seemed the best and the sharpest with an answer, and set them problems, threatening to put to death any one of them who did not answer to the point; and he ordered the oldest of them to judge.

The first, then, was asked whether he thought the living were more in number than the dead. The living, he said, since the dead are not. The second was asked whether the sea or the land supported the larger animals. The land, he said, since the sea is a part of it. The third was asked which animal is the most cunning. The one that has not been found out yet, he said — man. The fourth was asked why they had made Sabbas, their prince, revolt. Because they wanted him to live well rather than die badly. The fifth was asked whether he thought day or night came first. One day, he said; for puzzling questions have to have puzzling answers. The sixth was put the question, how a man may be loved most. By being the most powerful without making himself feared. The seventh was asked how any man could become a god. If he does what it is impossible for a man to do. The eighth was asked which is stronger, life or death. Life, he said, since it carries such loads of trouble. The ninth was asked how long it is good for a man to live. Until he stops thinking that to die is better than to live.

Then Alexander told the tenth to say something, since he was the judge, and he said: “Each one spoke worse than the last.” And Alexander said: “Then will you not be the first to die, for handing down a verdict like that?” And he answered: “And how, O king, will you prove a man of your word, when you have said you would kill first the man who answered worst?”

And that the Greeks are called pilferers of writing of every kind has been shown, I think, well enough, by proofs in plenty.

And that the men of highest reputation among the Greeks knew God, not by direct knowledge but by a roundabout way of speaking, is what Peter says in the Preaching: “Know, then, that there is one God, who made the beginning of all things and holds the power over the end; the Invisible, who sees all things; the Uncontainable, who contains all things; needing nothing, whom all things need and by whom they are; beyond understanding, everlasting, unmade, who made all things by the word of his power” — that is, taking the writing with knowledge, by his Son. [v]

Then he adds: “Worship this God, not as the Greeks do” — which plainly means that the best of the Greeks worshiped the same God we do, but had not learned by full knowledge what was handed down by the Son. He did not say, do not worship the God the Greeks worship, but do not worship “as the Greeks” — changing the manner of worshiping God, not announcing another God. And Peter himself will explain what “not as the Greeks” means, for he goes on: “Since they are carried away by ignorance and do not know God” — as we know him, that is, by full knowledge — “but they give shape to the things over which he gave them power for use: wood and stone, bronze and iron, gold and silver, mere matter. And they set up the things that are slaves for use and possession, and worship them. And what God gave them for food — the birds of the air, the fish of the sea, the creeping things of the earth, the wild animals along with the four-footed cattle of the field, weasels and mice, cats and dogs and monkeys — and their own proper food they offer up as sacrifices to mortals; and by offering dead things to the dead as though to gods, they are ungrateful to God, denying by these things that he exists.”

And that we and the Greeks know the same God, though not in the same way, he draws out like this: “Neither worship as the Jews do. They think they alone know God, and they do not know him: they give worship to angels and archangels, to the month and the moon. And if the moon is not seen, they do not keep the Sabbath that is called the first; nor do they keep the new moon, nor the feast of unleavened bread, nor the feast, nor the great day.” Then he gives the question its finishing stroke: “So you too, learning in a holy and righteous way what we hand on to you, keep it, worshiping God in a new way, through Christ.”

For we find in the Scriptures, as the Lord says: “Look, I make a new covenant with you, not like the one I made with your fathers at Mount Horeb.” He made a new covenant with us; what belonged to the Greeks and to the Jews is old. But we, who worship him in a new way, as a third race, are Christians. For he showed plainly enough, I think, that the one and only God was known by the Greeks in a Gentile way, by the Jews in a Jewish way, and in a new and spiritual way by us.

And further, he shows that the same God who supplied both covenants was the one who gave Greek philosophy to the Greeks, the philosophy by which the Almighty is glorified among the Greeks. It is clear from this. So then, out of the Greek training, and out of the training of the law as well, those who accept faith are gathered into the one people that is saved. Not that the three peoples are separated by time, so that anyone might suppose three natures; they are trained under different covenants of the one Lord, by the word of the one Lord.

And that, just as God wished to save the Jews by giving them prophets, so also he raised up prophets of their own among the Greeks, in their own language, as they were able to take in God’s kindness, and so marked off the most excellent of the Greeks from the common herd — this the apostle Paul will show, over and above the Preaching of Peter, when he says: “Take up the Greek books as well. Read the Sibyl, and see how it is shown that God is one and how what is to come is disclosed. And take Hystaspes and read, and you will find the Son of God described far more clearly and plainly, and how many kings will draw up their forces against Christ, hating him and those who bear his name, and his faithful ones, and his patient endurance, and his coming.” Then in a single question he asks us: “Whose is the world, and everything in the world? Are they not God’s?”

That is why Peter says the Lord told the apostles: “If anyone from Israel is willing to repent and to believe in God through my name, his sins will be forgiven him. After twelve years, go out into the world, so that no one may say, We did not hear.”