Боги

Since every rational nature, although it strives for God and the first cause, nevertheless cannot comprehend it, then, exhausted by desire, being as if in its death throes and not enduring these torments, it sets off on a new voyage in order to either turn its gaze to the visible and from this make something into a god (according to a bad calculation, however, for what is visible is higher and more god-like than the seer, and, moreover, to such an extent that did the seer worship, and the visible receive worship?), or to cognize God from the beauty and goodness of the visible, to use sight as a guide to the invisible, but in the splendor of the visible not to lose sight of God. Because of this, they began to worship, some the sun, some the moon, some the many stars, some the sky itself along with the luminaries, which were given to rule the world both in the quality and quantity of movement; and some to the elements: earth, water, air, fire, since they are necessary for everything, and without them human life cannot last; others - whatever they encountered in a series of visible things, recognizing as God everything that seemed beautiful to them. Some began to worship even picturesque images and statues, first of relatives - and these were people who indulged in grief and sensuality without measure, and who wanted to honor the dead with monuments - and then strangers - and this was done by the descendants of the first, distant from them by time, they did it because they did not know the first nature, and the honoring that came to them by tradition became, as it were, legal and necessary when the custom approved by time turned into law. But I think that others, wanting to please the rulers, glorify power, express surprise at the beauty, over time they made the one they revered as a god, and to further the seduction they added some fable. Those of them who were more devoted to passions recognized passions as gods or began to honor anger, murder, lust, drunkenness as gods, and I don’t know, maybe something else close to this; because in this they found (of course, an unkind and unfair) justification for their own sins. And some gods were left on earth, others (which is prudent) were hidden underground, and others (a funny section!) were elevated to heaven. Then, submitting to self-will and the whims of a wandering imagination, they gave each fiction the name of some god or demon and, erecting idols that attracted them to themselves with their great value, legitimized them to be honored with blood and fat, 27 and others even with the most vile deeds and extravagances and murder. For such honors were fitting for such gods! They even disgraced themselves by giving God's glory to sea monsters, four-legged reptiles, to what is most vile and ridiculous in these species, so that it is difficult to determine whether those who worshiped were worthy of greater contempt, or what they worshiped. But it is more likely that the servants of such gods are more despicable, and even more so in the highest degree because, being by nature rational and having received God's grace, they preferred the worst to the best. And this is one of the tricks of the evil one, who turned good itself into evil, as there are many other examples of his evilness. In order to attract people under his power, he took advantage of their misdirected desire to find God and, deceiving them in what they wanted, leading them like a blind man seeking his own path, scattered them along different rapids and cast them into one abyss of death and destruction (1). Fat - fat, lard, oil, everything fatty. – Approx. ed. You might be interested in: