Testimonia

{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p class=\"c005\">I think, then, that it has been pretty well established not\r\nonly that our Saviour was to be born of a virgin, but also\r\nthat there were prophets among the Jews who uttered not\r\nmerely general predictions about the future,—as <i>e.g.</i> regarding\r\nChrist and the kingdoms of the world, and the events\r\nthat were to happen to Israel, and those nations which were\r\nto believe on the Saviour, and many other things concerning\r\nHim,—but also prophecies respecting particular events; as,\r\nfor instance, how the asses of Kish, which were lost, were to be\r\ndiscovered, and regarding the sickness which had fallen upon\r\nthe son of the king of Israel, and any other recorded circumstance\r\nof a similar kind. But as a further answer to the\r\nGreeks, who do not believe in the birth of Jesus from a\r\nvirgin, we have to say that the Creator has shown, by the\r\ngeneration of several kinds of animals, that what He has done\r\nin the instance of one animal, He could do, if it pleased\r\nHim, in that of others, and also of man himself. For it is\r\nascertained that there is a certain female animal which has\r\nno intercourse with the male (as writers on animals say is\r\nthe case with vultures), and that this animal, without sexual\r\nintercourse, preserves the succession of race. What incredibility,\r\ntherefore, is there in supposing that, if God wished to\r\nsend a divine teacher to the human race, He caused Him to\r\nbe born in some manner different from the common?<a id=\"r1187\"></a><a class=\"c007 pginternal\" href=\"#f1187\"><sup>[1187]</sup></a> Nay,\r\naccording to the Greeks themselves, all men were not born of\r\na man and woman. For if the world has been created, as\r\nmany even of the Greeks are pleased to admit, then the first\r\nmen must have been produced not from sexual intercourse,\r\nbut from the earth, in which spermatic elements existed;\r\nwhich, however, I consider more incredible than that Jesus\r\nwas born like other men, so far as regards the half of his\r\nbirth. And there is no absurdity in employing Grecian\r\nhistories to answer Greeks, with the view of showing that we\r\nare not the only persons who have recourse to miraculous\r\n<span class=\"pageno\" id=\"Page_438\">438</span>narratives of this kind. For some have thought fit, not in\r\nregard to ancient and heroic narratives, but in regard to\r\nevents of very recent occurrence, to relate as a possible thing\r\nthat Plato was the son of Amphictione, Ariston being prevented\r\nfrom having marital intercourse with his wife until\r\nshe had given birth to him with whom she was pregnant by\r\nApollo. And yet these are veritable fables, which have led\r\nto the invention of such stories concerning a man whom they\r\nregarded as possessing greater wisdom and power than the\r\nmultitude, and as having received the beginning of his corporeal\r\nsubstance from better and diviner elements than others,\r\nbecause they thought that this was appropriate to persons\r\nwho were too great to be human beings. And since Celsus\r\nhas introduced the Jew disputing with Jesus, and tearing in\r\npieces, as he imagines, the fiction of His birth from a virgin,\r\ncomparing the Greek fables about Danae, and Melanippe,\r\nand Auge, and Antiope, our answer is, that such language becomes\r\na buffoon, and not one who is writing in a serious tone.</p>","headings":["The Writings of Origen, Vol. 1 of 2","ORIGEN CONTRA CELSUM.","ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. BOOK I.","Chapter XXXVII."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg70561-paragraph-435"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"86699a40798667bf19c7e91f49c3a8d866e03947a734c6404f34bc29cff5e774","edition_title":"The writings of Origen, Vol. 1 (of 2)","edition_translators":["Frederick Crombie"],"edition_year":1869,"explicit_reference_candidates":[],"headings":[],"id":"pg70561-f1187","license_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html","public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"original-editor-translator-note","review_required":["work and recension attribution","original-work chronology","Bible reference numbering and citation kind","English edition rights and attribution"],"review_status":"needs_review","rights_evidence":"Project Gutenberg metadata: Public domain in the USA. Existing 1869 English translation; translator died 1889. Electronic transcription subject to Project Gutenberg reuse terms.","source_anchor":"f1187","source_ebook":70561,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\" id=\"f1187\">\n<p class=\"c006\"><span class=\"label\"><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#r1187\">1187</a>.  </span><span lang=\"grc\">Πεποίηκεν ἀντὶ σπερματικοῦ λόγου, τοῦ ἐκ μίξεως τῶν ἀῤῥένων ταῖς\r\nγυναιξὶ, ἄλλῳ τρόπῳ γενέσθαι τὸν λόγον τοῦ τεχθησομένου.</span></p>\n</div>","source_sha256":"de125e213d16053354f22b34a1c8d477ac23f201e660e4f4841b2ed7e05bb367","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/70561/pg70561-images.html#f1187","text_sha256":"0eac2512395f36925e9462f5575eebcf320e38db8c2a791d0facd0df64840b00","verified":false,"work_id":null}

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