Against Celsus 5.32

And from this let those who are able to see such great things learn that the one to whom fell those who formerly had not sinned is far more powerful than the others; since he has been able, taking chosen ones from the portion of all, to withdraw them from those who received them for punishment, and to bring them to laws and a life that contributes to the forgetting of their former sins. But, as we said before, let these things be said by us in a hidden way. They show what was misheard by those who said that "the parts of the earth were from the beginning allotted to different overseers and divided into certain dominions, and are administered in this way"; from whom Celsus too took the words set out above. But since those who moved "from the east" were, because of their sins, handed over "to a base mind" and "to dishonourable passions" and "in the desires of their hearts to impurity," so that, glutted with sin, they might hate it, we will not submit to Celsus's opinion when he says that because of the overseers allotted to the parts of the earth the things done among each people are rightly done; rather, we wish not to do what is done among them in the way that pleases those overseers. For we see that it is holy to abolish what has been customary in each place from the beginning by better and more divine laws, which Jesus, as the most powerful, laid down, rescuing "us from the present evil age" and from "the rulers of this age who are being brought to nothing"; and that it is unholy not to throw oneself upon the one who has appeared and been shown to be purer and more powerful than all rulers, to whom God said, as the prophets foretold many generations before: "Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, and the ends of the earth as your possession." For "he himself" has become the "expectation" of us who are from "the nations" and have believed in him and in the God over all, his Father.