Catechetical Lectures 6.11–6.25

Where does the many-gods error of the Greeks come from? God is incorporeal; how then are adulteries charged against those whom they call gods? I say nothing of the changes of Zeus into a swan; I am ashamed to speak of his transformations into a bull; for bellowings are unworthy of God. The god of the Greeks has been found an adulterer, and they are not ashamed; for if he is an adulterer, let him not be called God. They also speak of deaths, and falls, and thunderbolt-strikings of their gods. Do you see from what greatness to what depth they have come down? Was it for nothing, then, that the Son of God came down from heaven to heal so great a wound? Was it for nothing that the Son came, so that the Father might be acknowledged? You have learned what moved the Only-begotten to come down from the throne at the right hand. The Father was despised; the Son had to correct the error; for he through whom all things came into being had to offer all things to the Master of all. The wound had to be healed. For what was worse than this disease, that a stone should be worshiped instead of God?

And not only among the pagans did the devil contend in this way; already many of those falsely called Christians, wrongly named after the most fragrant name of Christ, have impiously dared to estrange God from his own works. I mean the children of the heretics, men of ill name and most godless, who pretend to love Christ but hate Christ utterly; for he who blasphemes the Father of Christ is an enemy of the Son. These have dared to speak of two godheads, one good and one evil. O great blindness! If it is a godhead, it is certainly good; if it is not good, why is it called a godhead? For goodness belongs to God. Since love for humankind, beneficence, and almighty power befit God, then one of two things: either let them call him God together with the name and the working; or, if they mean to strip him of his workings, let them not call him by the bare name.

Heretics have dared to speak of two gods, and two sources of good and evil, and to say that these are unbegotten. If both are unbegotten, they are certainly also equal, and both mighty; how then does the light destroy the darkness? And are they ever together, or are they separated? They cannot be together; ‘For what fellowship has light with darkness?’ says the apostle. If they are far from each other, they certainly also have their own places; and if they have their own places, we are certainly in the region of one God, and certainly worship one. For this must follow, even if we go along with their folly: that one must worship one. Let us examine also what they say about the good God. Is he powerful or powerless? If he is powerful, how did evil come about against his will? And how does the evil substance come in, if he does not will it? For if he knows but cannot prevent it, they accuse him of powerlessness; if he can but does not prevent it, they accuse him of betrayal. And see their folly: at one time they say that the evil one has nothing in common with the good God in the making of the world; at another, that he has only the fourth part. And they say that the good one is the father of Christ; and Christ they call this sun. If, then, according to them, the world came into being from the evil one,

and the sun is in the world, how is the Son of the good one an unwilling slave in the realm of the evil one? We befoul ourselves in saying these things, but we do it so that none of those present may fall from ignorance into the filth of the heretics. I know that I have defiled my own mouth and the ears of my hearers; but it is useful. For it is much better to hear absurdities in the charges against others than to fall into them from ignorance; much better for you to know the filth and hate it than to fall into it unknowing. The godless teaching of the heresies has many branches; for when anyone falls away from the one straight road, then he falls again and again over cliffs.

The inventor of every heresy was Simon the magician: that Simon who in the Acts of the Apostles expected to buy with money the grace of the Spirit, which cannot be bought, and heard: ‘You have neither part nor lot in this matter,’ and what follows; of whom it is written: ‘They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us.’ This man, after being cast out by the apostles, came to Rome, and, taking about with him a certain prostitute, Helena, was the first to dare to say with blasphemous mouth that he himself was the one who appeared on Mount Sinai as the Father; and who appeared afterwards among the Jews, not in flesh but in seeming, as Christ Jesus; and after that as the Holy Spirit, whom Christ promised to send as Paraclete. And he so deceived the city of Rome that Claudius set up a statue of him, inscribing it in the language of the Romans SIMONI DEO SANCTO, which translated means ‘To Simon the holy god.’ [15] As the error spread, a good pair, Peter and Paul, … the leaders of the Church, corrected the fault; and when the supposed god Simon showed himself off, they at once showed him to be a corpse. For when Simon promised to be lifted up into the heavens, and was being carried through the air on a chariot of demons, the servants of God knelt down and, showing the agreement of which Jesus spoke, ‘If two of you agree about anything that they ask, it will be done for them,’ sent the arrow of concord through prayer against the magician and cast him down to the earth. And this is no wonder, though it is wonderful; for it was Peter, who carries the keys of heaven. Nor is it worthy of amazement; for it was Paul, who was caught up to the third heaven and into paradise, and heard unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man to utter. These brought down from the air to the earth the supposed god, who was to be brought down to the regions below. This was the first dragon of wickedness; but when one head was cut off, the root of wickedness was found many-headed again. [16] For Cerinthus ravaged the Church, and Menander, and Carpocrates, and the Ebionites, and Marcion, the mouth of godlessness. For he who proclaimed different gods, one the good and another the just, contradicts the Son, who says: ‘Righteous Father.’ And he who says again that the Father is one and the maker of the world another, opposes the Son, who says: ‘If God so clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven,’ and ‘who makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.’ This Marcion, again, was the inventor of another wickedness. For being refuted by the testimonies from the Old Testament quoted in the New, he was the first to dare to cut out those testimonies, and to leave the proclaimed word of the faith without witness, leaving God out; and, as if there had been no heralds, he wanted to make the Church’s faith unsound.

He in turn was succeeded by another, Basilides, a man of ill name, most dangerous in his ways, a preacher of licentiousness. Valentinus too joined the contest of wickedness, the preacher of thirty gods. The Greeks speak of few; and the one who is called, or rather is not, a Christian extended the error to a full thirty. And he says that Bythos, the Deep (it was fitting that he, being a deep of wickedness, should begin his teaching from the Deep), begot Sige, Silence, and from Silence begot Logos, the Word. This is worse than the Zeus of the Greeks, who united with his sister; for Silence was said to be the child of the Deep. Do you see absurdity clothed in the outward form of Christianity? Wait a little, and you will hate the impiety; for he says that from this were born eight Aeons, and from those ten, and from those another twelve, male and female. And where is the basis of these? See the nonsense from the constructions themselves. Where do you get the proof of the thirty Aeons? Because, he says, it is written that Jesus was baptized when he was thirty years old. And what kind of proof is this from the thirty years, even if he was baptized at thirty? Since he broke five loaves for five thousand, must there then be five gods? Or since he had twelve disciples, must there also be twelve gods?

And this is still small compared with the rest of the impiety. For he says that the last of the gods, being male and female, as he dares to say, is Wisdom. O the godlessness! For Christ is the Wisdom of God, the only-begotten Son; and that man, in his teaching, brought the Wisdom of God down to a female, a thirtieth element, the last construction. And he says that Wisdom tried to see the first God, and, not bearing his brilliance, fell from the heavens and was cast out of the number thirty; then, groaning, she begot the devil from her groans, and, weeping over her fall, she produced the sea. Do you see the impiety? For how is the devil begotten from wisdom, and wickedness from understanding, or darkness from light? And he says that the devil begot others, some of whom made the world; and that Christ came down to make people revolt from the world-maker. [19] Hear what they say Christ Jesus is, so that you may hate them still more. … [20] … having composed one heresy full of blasphemies and every lawlessness, he ravages the Church (or rather those outside the Church), walking about like a lion and devouring. Do not pay attention to their fair speech, nor to their supposed humility; for they are snakes, a brood of vipers. Judas too said, ‘Hail, Rabbi,’ and was betraying. Do not heed the kisses, but beware of the venom. [21] And so that we may not seem to accuse him without cause, let us say by way of digression who this Manes is, and in part what he teaches; for not even the whole age could describe all his filth worthily. Store up in your memory, for help in time of need, these things which were said also to those before you and will be said to those now, so that those who do not know may learn and those who know may be reminded. Manes is not from the Christians, God forbid! Nor was he cast out of the Church as Simon was, neither he nor those who taught before him; for he is a thief of other men’s evils, making the evils his own. How and in what way, we must hear.

There was in Egypt one Scythianus, a Saracen by race, who had nothing in common either with Judaism or with Christianity. He lived in Alexandria and, imitating the life of Aristotle, composed four books: one called the Gospel, containing not the acts of Christ but only the bare name; another called the book of Chapters; a third, of Mysteries; and a fourth, which they now circulate, the Treasure. He had a disciple named Terebinthus. But when the aforesaid Scythianus came into Judea and was ravaging the country, the Lord put him to death by disease and stopped the pestilence.

But his disciple in wickedness, Terebinthus, heir to his gold, his books, and his heresy, came to Palestine; and being recognized and condemned in Judea, he decided to move to Persia; and so as not to be recognized there also by his name, he renamed himself Buddas. But there too he had opponents, … the priests of Mithras; and many arguments and disputes having been set in motion, he was refuted; and at last, hard pressed, he took refuge with a certain widow. Then, going up onto the housetop and calling on the demons of the air, whom the Manichaeans invoke to this day over their abominable fig, he was struck by God and thrown down from the housetop, and breathed his last; and so the second beast was cut off.

But the books recording his impiety remained, and the widow was heir both of the books and of the money. Having neither kinsman nor anyone else, she decided to buy with the money a boy called Cubricus; and adopting him as a son, she educated him as a son in the learning of the Persians, and sharpened an evil arrow against humankind. Cubricus, the wicked slave, grew to maturity among philosophers; and when the widow died, he inherited both the books and the money. Then, so that the name of slavery might not be a reproach, instead of Cubricus he called himself Manes, which in the language of the Persians means ‘conversation.’ For since he thought himself something of a debater, he named himself Manes, as if an excellent conversationalist. But he contrived a good name for himself in the Persian tongue; God’s providence, however, made him his own accuser even against his will, so that, thinking to honor himself among the Persians, he proclaims himself among the Greeks by the name of madness.

He dared to say that he himself was the Paraclete. And it is written: ‘Whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit has no forgiveness.’ He blasphemed, then, by calling himself the Holy Spirit. Let anyone who has fellowship with them see with whom he ranks himself. The slave shook the world, since ‘through three things the earth is shaken, and the fourth it cannot bear: if a slave becomes king.’ And coming into public view, he then promised things beyond human power. The son of the king of the Persians was sick, and there was a great abundance of physicians; but Manes promised, as if he were pious, to set it right through prayer. The physicians withdrew, and the child’s life withdrew with them; the man’s impiety was exposed. And the would-be philosopher was in chains, thrown into prison, not for rebuking the king on behalf of the truth, nor for destroying the idols, but for promising to save and lying; or rather, if the truth must be told, for murder. For the one who could have been saved by medical care, this man killed by sending away the physicians, putting him to death by neglect.

When I tell the very many evils about him, remember first the blasphemy; second, the slavery (not that slavery is a disgrace, but that, being a slave, to pretend to be free is evil); third, the falsehood of the promise; fourth, the murder of the child; and fifth, the disgrace of the prison. And there was not only the disgrace of the prison, but also the flight from the prison. For he who called himself the Paraclete and the champion of the truth ran away; he was no successor of Jesus, who went readily to the cross, but was the opposite, a fugitive. Then the king of the Persians ordered the jailers to be led away to execution; so Manes was the cause of death to the child through his arrogance, and the cause of death to the jailers through his flight. Should one who shares the guilt of death, then, be worshiped? Ought he not to have imitated Jesus and said, ‘If you are looking for me, let these men go’? Ought he not to have said, like Jonah, ‘Take me up and throw me into the sea; for because of me this storm has come’?

He flees from the prison and comes into Mesopotamia; but Archelaus the bishop, a weapon of righteousness, meets him there. And he refuted him before philosophers as judges, having assembled a pagan audience, so that the judges might not seem to show favor, as they would if Christians were judging. ‘Tell us what you preach,’ says Archelaus to Manes. And he, having his mouth like an open grave, began first with blasphemy against the maker of all things, saying: ‘The God of the Old Testament is the author of evils, for he says of himself, I am a consuming fire.’ But the wise Archelaus undid the blasphemy, saying: ‘If the God of the Old Testament, as you say, calls himself fire, whose son is he who says, I came to cast fire on the earth? If you blame him who says, The Lord kills and makes alive, why do you honor Peter, who raised Tabitha but put Sapphira to death? And if you blame him because he prepared fire, why do you not blame him who says, Depart from me into the eternal fire? If you blame him who says, I am God who makes peace and creates evil, explain how Jesus says, I did not come to bring peace but a sword. Since both say the same things, one of two things: either both are good, because they speak alike; or, if Jesus is blameless in saying this, why do you find fault with him who says the like in the Old Testament?’ [28] Then Manes says to him: ‘And what kind of God blinds? For it is Paul who says: In whom the god of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, so that the light of the gospel should not shine on them.’ But Archelaus refuted him well: ‘Read a little before,’ he says: ‘But if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled among those who are perishing. Do you see that it is veiled to those who are perishing? For holy things must not be given to dogs. Then, does only the God of the Old Testament blind the minds of unbelievers? Did not Jesus himself say, This is why I speak to them in parables, so that seeing they may not see? Was it because he hated them that he wished them not to see? Or because of their unworthiness, since they had closed their eyes? For where there is self-chosen wickedness, there is also a withholding of grace; for to him who has, more will be given, and from him who has not, even what he seems to have will be taken away. [29] (And if one must also say it as some interpret it, for it is not a bad saying: even if he blinded the minds of the unbelievers, he blinded them for good, so that they might recover their sight for good things. For he did not say, He blinded their soul, but the minds of the unbelievers. What is said is of this kind: Blind the sexually immoral man’s immoral thoughts, and the man is saved; blind the robber’s grasping and thieving thoughts, and the man is saved. But you do not want to understand it so? There is also another interpretation. The sun too blinds those with weak sight, and those with diseased eyes are blinded, harmed by the light; not because the sun blinds, but because the constitution of their eyes does not see. So also unbelievers, sick in their hearts, cannot look into the rays of the Godhead. And he did not say, He blinded their minds so that they should not hear the gospel, but so that the light of the glory of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ should not shine on them. For to hear the gospel is granted to all; but the glory of the gospel is reserved for Christ’s true disciples alone. So the Lord spoke in parables to those unable to hear, but to the disciples he explained the parables privately: the brightness of the glory for those enlightened, the blinding for the unbelievers.)’ These mysteries, which the Church now explains to you who are passing from the catechumens, it is not the custom to explain to pagans. For we do not explain the mysteries about Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to a pagan, nor do we speak plainly about the mysteries before catechumens; but we often say many things in a veiled way, so that the faithful who know may understand, and those who do not know may not be harmed. [30] … having fled from the prison, and having run away from his adversary as well, he comes to a very mean village, like the serpent in paradise, who left Adam and approached Eve. But the good shepherd Archelaus, taking thought for the sheep, when he heard of the flight, at once hurried at a run in search of the wolf. And Manes, seeing his adversary suddenly, leapt up and fled; but he fled his last flight. For the shield-bearers of the king of the Persians, searching everywhere, caught the fugitive; and the sentence he ought to have received before Archelaus, the king’s shield-bearers carried out upon him. Manes, whom his disciples worship, is seized and brought to the king. The king reproached him for his lie and his flight, mocked his slavery, avenged the murder of the child, condemned him also for the murder of the jailers, and ordered Manes to be flayed according to Persian law. The rest of his body was given to wild beasts for food; but his skin, the receptacle of a most evil mind, was hung up before the gates like a sack. He who called himself the Paraclete and professed to know the future did not know his own flight and capture. [31] He had three disciples, Thomas, Baddas, and Hermas. Let no one read the Gospel according to Thomas; for it is not by one of the twelve apostles, but by one of the three wicked disciples of Manes. Let no one associate with the soul-destroying Manichaeans, who counterfeit the gloom of fasting with chaff-water; who slander the maker of foods, yet gobble down the finest of foods; who teach that one who cuts this or that herb is changed into it. For if one who cuts herbs or some vegetable is changed into it, into how many things will farmers and gardeners’ boys be changed? The gardener has put the sickle to so many, as we see; into which, then, is he changed? Truly their teachings are laughable, and full of condemnation and shame. The same man, being a shepherd of sheep, both sacrificed a sheep and killed a wolf; into which, then, is he changed? Many people have netted fish and limed birds; into which, then, are they changed? [32] Let the Manichaeans answer, the offspring of idleness, who do not work and devour the goods of those who work; who receive with smiling faces those who bring them food, and return curses instead of blessings. For when some simple person brings them something, ‘Stand outside a little,’ he says, ‘and I will bless you.’ Then taking the bread into his hands (as those of them who have repented have confessed), ‘I did not make you,’ says the Manichaean to the bread; and he sends curses against the Most High and curses him who made it, and so eats what was made. If you hate the food, why did you look with a smiling face at him who brought it? If you are grateful to him who brought it, why do you send blasphemy to the God who prepared and created it? And again: ‘I did not sow you,’ he says; ‘may he who sowed you be sown. I did not reap you with a sickle; may he who reaped you be reaped. I did not bake you with fire; may he who baked you be baked.’ Fine returns for kindness! [33] These are great evils, but still small compared with the others. I dare not describe before men and women their washing; I dare not say in what they dip the fig they give to the wretched. Let it be indicated only by hints: let men think of what happens in their dreams, and women of what happens in their monthly periods. We truly defile our mouth in saying these things. Are the pagans more abominable than these? the Samaritans more wretched? the Jews more ungodly? the sexually immoral more unclean? For the one who commits sexual immorality does the act for one hour through desire; but condemning the act as defiled, he knows that he needs washing and recognizes the abomination of the act. But the Manichaean sets these things in the middle of the altar, as he supposes it, and defiles both his mouth and his tongue. Do you receive teaching, man, from such a mouth? Do you greet such a man with kisses when you meet him at all? Even apart from the rest of the impiety, do you not flee the defilement, and those who are worse than the licentious and more abominable than any woman of the brothel? [34] The Church announces and teaches these things, and touches filth, so that you may not be befouled; it speaks of the wounds, so that you may not be wounded. It is enough for you only to know; keep away from learning by experience. God thunders, and we all tremble; and they blaspheme. God sends lightning, and we all bow to the ground; and they have slanderous tongues about the heavens. Jesus says of his Father, ‘Who makes his sun rise on the just and the unjust, and sends rain on the evil and the good’; and they say that rains come from erotic madness; and they dare to say

that there is a beautiful virgin in heaven together with a beautiful young man; and that at the season of camels and wolves they have the frenzies of shameful desire; and that in the winter season he runs madly after the virgin; she, they say, flees, and he pursues; then, as he pursues, he sweats, and from his sweat comes the rain. These things are written in the books of the Manichaeans. These things we have read ourselves, not believing those who told us; for the sake of your safety we have inquired closely into their destruction. [35] But may the Lord deliver us from such error; and may enmity be given you against the dragon, so that, as they watch for the heel, you may trample on their head. Remember what has been said. What agreement is there between our teaching and theirs? What has light to do with darkness? What has the dignity of the Church to do with the abomination of the Manichaeans? Here is order, here knowledge, here dignity, here purity; here even to look at a woman with desire is condemned; here is marriage with dignity, here the endurance of self-control, here the angel-like dignity of virginity; here food is partaken of with thanksgiving; here is gratitude toward the maker of all things. Here the Father of Christ is worshiped; here fear and trembling are taught toward him who sends rain; here we send up glory to him who thunders and lightens. [36] Herd together with the sheep; flee the wolves; do not depart from the Church. Hate also those who have at any time been suspected of such things; and unless in time you perceive their repentance, do not rashly trust yourself to them. The truth of the sole rule of God has been handed down to you; learn to distinguish the herbs of …; be an approved money-changer, holding fast what is good, keeping away from every form of evil. And if you were ever such as they, recognize and hate the error; for there is a way of salvation, if you vomit it out, if you hate it from the heart, if you depart from them not with the lips only but also with the soul; if you worship the Father of Christ, the God of the law and the prophets; if you acknowledge that the good and the just are one and the same God. And may he keep you all, guarding you from falling and stumbling, firm in the faith, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory … with the Holy Spirit, now and always and for ever …