The New Gospel

Their [Christians’] injunctions are like this.  “Let no one educated, no one wise, no one sensible draw near.  For these abilities are thought by us to be evils.  But as for anyone ignorant, anyone stupid, anyone uneducated, anyone who is a child, let him come boldly.”  By the fact that they themselves admit that these people are worthy of their God, they show they want and are able to convince only the foolish, dishonorable and stupid, and only slaves, women, and little children. 

All things have not been made for man any more than for the lion or the eagle or the dolphin, but so that this world, as God’s work, may be made complete and perfect in all its parts.  For this purpose, all things have been proportioned, not for one or another except incidentally, but for the universe as a whole.

For just as … scoundrels frequently take advantage of the lack of education of gullible people and lead them wherever they wish, so also, this happens among Christians … some do not even want to give or to receive a reason for what they believe, and use such expressions as “Do not ask questions; just believe” and “Thy faith will save thee.” [Others quote the Apostle Paul,]  “The wisdom in the world is an evil, and foolishness a good thing” (1 Corinthians (1:25-26)).

It is an ordinary and common custom for each one to say: “I am God (or a son of God, or a divine Spirit).  And I have come.  Already the world is being destroyed.  And you, O men, are to perish because of your iniquities.  But I wish to save you.  And you shall see me returning again with heavenly power.  Blessed is he who has worshipped me now!  But I will cast into everlasting fire upon all the rest.  

Although you [disciples of Jesus] lied, you were not able to conceal plausibly your fictitious tales … some believers, as though from a drinking bout, go so far as to oppose themselves and alter the original text of the gospel three or four or several times over, and they change its character to enable them to deny difficulties in face of criticism.