God did not make vice
But we may also find bodily and external things called goods and evils in a looser sense: those that contribute to life according to nature are regarded as goods, and those that work against it as evils. It is in this sense that Job says to his wife: “If we have received good things from the hand of the Lord, shall we not endure evil things?” (Job 2:10). Now in the divine Scriptures we find, in one place, God saying in his own person, “I am he who makes peace and creates evils” (Isaiah 45:7), and in another place, again about him, “that evils came down from the Lord upon the gates of Jerusalem, the noise of chariots and horsemen” (Micah 1:12–13). These texts have troubled many who read Scripture, since they cannot discern what Scripture means by goods and evils. It is likely, then, that Celsus took his start from these texts: either he raised a further difficulty and said, “How did God make evils?”, or else he heard someone who held rather untrained views on this subject and set down the words quoted above.
But we say that God did not make evils, meaning vice and the actions that spring from it. For how could the preaching of judgment speak boldly, teaching that the wicked are punished for their vicious actions in proportion to their sins, and that those who have lived by virtue, or done virtuous actions, are blessed and will receive rewards from God, if God had made the things that are truly evil? I know well that those who want to venture the claim that these too came from God will take up certain texts of Scripture. They cannot show that Scripture is woven as one whole: Scripture that blames those who sin and welcomes those who do well, and yet no less says those other things, not few in number, which seem to unsettle those who read the divine writings without learning. I did not think it suitable to the present treatise to set out now the unsettling texts, which are many, together with their interpretations, which need much argument.
So God has not made evils, if one understands evils in the proper sense; but some, which are few compared with the ordering of the whole, have followed as consequences of his principal works. Just so, the curling shavings and the sawdust follow upon a carpenter’s principal works, and builders seem to make the debris that lies beside their buildings, a kind of rubbish falling from the stones and the mortar.
Greek
Εὑρεθείη δ᾿ ἂν καταχρηστικώτερον καὶ τὰ σωματικὰ καὶ τὰ ἐκτὸς, τὰ μὲν συμβαλλόμενα εἰς τὸν κατὰ φύσιν βίον νομιζόμενα ἀγαθὰ τὰ δ᾿ ἐναντιούμενα τούτῳ κακά. οὕτω γὰρ ὁ Ἰὼρ λέγει πρὸς τὴν γυναῖκα τό· „εἰ γὰρ τὰ ἀγαθὰ ἐδεξάμεθα ἐκ χειρὸς κυρίου, τὰ κακὰ οὐχ ὑποίσομεν“; ἐπεὶ οὖν εὑρίσκεται ἐν ταῖς θείαις γραφαῖς ὅπου μὲν ἐκ προσώπου θεοῦ τὸ „ἐγὼ ὁ ποιῶν εἰρήνην καὶ κτίζων κακὰ,“ ὅπου δὲ πάλιν περὶ αὐτοῦ „ὅτι κατέβη κακὰ παρὰ κυρίου ἐπὶ πύλας Ἱερουσαλὴμ, ψόφος ἁρμάτων καὶ ἱππευόντων,“ ἅπερ ἐτάραξε πολλοὺς τῶν ἐντυγχανόντων τῇ γραφῇ, μὴ δυναμένους καθορᾶν τὰ κατ᾿ αὐτὴν περὶ ἀγαθῶν καὶ κακῶν σημαινόμενα· εἰκὸς ἐντεῦθεν ἤτοι τὸν Κέλσον ἐπαποροῦντα εἰρηκέναι· πῶς μὲν κακὰ (ὁ) θεὸς ἐποίει; ἢ ἀκούσαντά τινος ἰδιωτικώτερον πρεσβεύοντος περὶ τῶν κατὰ τὸν τόπον τὴν ἐκκειμένην λέξιν τεθεικέναι. ἡμεῖς δέ φαμεν ὅτι κακὰ μὲν, τὴν κακίαν καὶ τὰς ἀπ᾿ αὐτῆς πράξεις, ὁ θεὸς οὐκ ἐποίησε. πῶς γὰρ οἷόν τ᾿ ἦν τὸ περὶ κρίσεως κήρυγμα παῤῥησίαν ἔχειν, διδάσκον κολάζεσθαι μὲν ἐπὶ ταῖς κατὰ κακίαν πράξεσι κατ᾿ ἀναλογίαν τῶν ἡμαρτημένων τοὺς φαύλους, μακαρίους δ᾿ εἶναι καὶ τεύξεσθαι τῶν ἀπὸ θεοῦ γερῶν τοὺς κατ᾿ ἀρετὴν βιώσαντας ἢ τὰς κατ᾿ ἀρετὴν πράξεις ποιήσαντας, εἰ τὰ ὄντως κακὰ πεποιήκει ὁ θεός; εὖ οἶδα ὅτι ῥητά τινα παραλήψονται τῆς γραφῆς οἱ καὶ ταῦτα βουλόμενοι τολμᾶν φάσκειν ἀπὸ θεοῦ γεγονέναι, μὴ δυνάμενοι ἓν ὕφος ἀποδεῖξαι τῆς γραφῆς, αἰτιωμένης μὲν τοὺς ἁμαρτάνοντας ἀποδεχομένης δὲ τοὺς εὖ πράττοντας καὶ οὐδὲν ἧττον κἀκεῖνα λεγούσης, ἅτινα περισπᾶν δοκεῖ (οὐκ) ὀλίγα ὄντα τοὺς ἀμαθῶς τὰ θεῖα γράμματα ἀναγινώσκοντας. ἐκτίθεσθαι δὲ νῦν τὰς περισπώσας λέξεις, πολλὰς τυγχανούσας, καὶ τὰς ἑρμηνείας αὐτῶν πολλῆς κατασκευῆς δεομένας οὐχ ἡγησάμην εἶναι ἁρμόζον τῇ προκειμένῃ συντάξει. κακὰ τοίνυν, εἰ μὲν τὰ κυρίως οὕτως ὀνομαζόμενα ἐξακούοι τις, ὁ θεὸς οὐ πεποίηκεν, ἀλλὰ τοῖς προηγουμένοις αὐτοῦ ἔργοις ὀλίγα ὡς πρὸς τὴν τῶν ὅλων διάταξιν τυγχάνοντα ἐπηκολούθησεν, ὥσπερ ἐπακολουθεῖ τοῖς προηγουμένοις τοῦ τέκτονος ἔργοις τὰ ἑλικοειδῆ ξέσματα καὶ πρίσματα καὶ τοῖς οἰκοδόμοις ποιεῖν δοκεῖν τὰ παρακείμενα ταῖς οἰκοδομαῖς ὡσπερεὶ κόπρια ἀποπίπτοντα τῶν λίθων καὶ τῆς κονίας.