Edition ausblenden
De civitate Dei (CCSL)

Caput XXVIII: Quod doctrina Varronis de theologia in nulla sibi parte concordet.

Quid igitur ualet, quod uir doctissimus et acutissimus Varro uelut subtili disputatione hos omnes deos in caelum et in terram redigere ac referre conatur? non potest; fluunt de manibus, resiliunt, labuntur et decidunt. dicturus enim de feminis, hoc est deabus: quoniam, inquit, ut primo libro dixi de locis, duo sunt principia deorum animaduersa de caelo et terra, a quo di partim dicuntur caelestes, partim terrestres: ut in superioribus initium fecimus a caelo, cum diximus de Iano, quem alii caelum, alii dixerunt esse mundum, sic de feminis scribendi facimus initium a Tellure. sentio quantam molestiam tale ac tantum patiatur ingenium. ducitur enim quadam ratione uerisimili, caelum esse quod faciat, terram quae patiatur, et ideo illi masculinam uim tribuit, huic feminam, et non adtendit eum potius esse qui haec facit, qui utrumque fecit. hinc etiam Samothracum nobilia mysteria in superiore libro sic interpretatur eaque se, quae nec suis nota sunt, scribendo expositurum eisque missurum quasi religiosissime pollicetur. dicit enim se ibi multis indiciis collegisse in simulacris aliud significare caelum, aliud terram, aliud exempla rerum, quas Plato appellat ideas; caelum Iouem, terram Iunonem, ideas Mineruam uult intellegi; caelum a quo fiat aliquid, terram de qua fiat, exemplum secundum quod fiat. qua in re omitto dicere, quod Plato illas ideas tantam uim habere dicit, ut secundum eas non caelum aliquid fecerit, sed etiam caelum factum sit. hoc dico, istum in hoc libro selectorum deorum rationem illam trium deorum, quibus quasi cuncta conplexus est, perdidisse. caelo enim tribuit masculos deos, feminas terrae; inter quas posuit Mineruam, quam supra ipsum caelum ante posuerat. deinde masculus deus Neptunus in mari est, quod ad terram potius quam ad caelum pertinet. Dis pater postremo, qui Graece πλούτων dicitur, etiam ipse masculus frater amborum terrenus deus esse perhibetur, superiorem terram tenens, in inferiore habens Proserpinam coniugem. quomodo ergo deos ad caelum, deas ad terram referre conantur? quid solidum quid constans, quid sobrium quid definitum habet haec disputatio? illa est autem Tellus initium dearum, Mater scilicet Magna, apud quam mollium et abscisorum seseque secantium atque iactantium insana perstrepit turpitudo. quid est ergo quod dicitur caput deorum Ianus, caput dearum Tellus? nec ibi facit unum caput error, nec hic sanum furor. cur haec frustra referre nituntur ad mundum? quod etsi possent, pro deo uero mundum nemo pius colit; et tamen eos nec hoc posse ueritas aperta conuincit. referant haec potius ad homines mortuos et ad daemones pessimos, et nulla quaestio remanebit.

Übersetzung ausblenden
The City of God

Chapter 28.--That the Doctrine of Varro Concerning Theology is in No Part Consistent with Itself.

To what purpose, then, is it that this most learned and most acute man Varro attempts, as it were, with subtle disputation, to reduce and refer all these gods to heaven and earth? He cannot do it. They go out of his hands like water; they shrink back; they slip down and fall. For when about to speak of the females, that is, the goddesses, he says, "Since, as I observed in the first book concerning places, heaven and earth are the two origins of the gods, on which account they are called celestials and terrestrials, and as I began in the former books with heaven, speaking of Janus, whom some have said to be heaven, and others the earth, so I now commence with Tellus in speaking concerning the goddesses." I can understand what embarrassment so great a mind was experiencing. For he is influenced by the perception of a certain plausible resemblance, when he says that the heaven is that which does, and the earth that which suffers, and therefore attributes the masculine principle to the one, and the feminine to the other, not considering that it is rather He who made both heaven and earth who is the maker of both activity and passivity. On this principle he interprets the celebrated mysteries of the Samothracians, and promises, with an air of great devoutness, that he will by writing expound these mysteries, which have not been so much as known to his countrymen, and will send them his exposition. Then he says that he had from many proofs gathered that, in those mysteries, among the images one signifies heaven, another the earth, another the patterns of things, which Plato calls ideas. He makes Jupiter to signify heaven, Juno the earth, Minerva the ideas. Heaven, by which anything is made; the earth, from which it is made; and the pattern, according to which it is made. But, with respect to the last, I am forgetting to say that Plato attributed so great an importance to these ideas as to say, not that anything was made by heaven according to them, but that according to them heaven itself was made. ¹ To return, however,--it is to be observed that Varro has, in the book on the select gods, lost that theory of these gods, in whom he has, as it were, embraced all things. For he assigns the male gods to heaven, the females to earth; among which latter he has placed Minerva, whom he had before placed above heaven itself. Then the male god Neptune is in the sea, which pertains rather to earth than to heaven. Last of all, father Dis, who is called in Greek Plouton, another male god, brother of both (Jupiter and Neptune), is also held to be a god of the earth, holding the upper region of the earth himself, and allotting the nether region to his wife Proserpine. How, then, do they attempt to refer the gods to heaven, and the goddesses to earth? What solidity, what consistency, what sobriety has this disputation? But that Tellus is the origin of the goddesses,--the great mother, to wit, beside whom there is continually the noise of the mad and abominable revelry of effeminates and mutilated men, and men who cut themselves, and indulge in frantic gesticulations,--how is it, then, that Janus is called the head of the gods, and Tellus the head of the goddesses? In the one case error does not make one head, and in the other frenzy does not make a sane one. Why do they vainly attempt to refer these to the world? Even if they could do so, no pious person worships the world for the true God. Nevertheless, plain truth makes it evident that they are not able even to do this. Let them rather identify them with dead men and most wicked demons, and no further question will remain.