Against Celsus 3.43

After this he says of us that we laugh at those who worship Zeus because his tomb is shown in Crete, and yet we revere no less the one from the tomb, “not knowing how and in what sense the Cretans do such a thing.” Notice, then, that in these words he defends the Cretans, Zeus, and his tomb, hinting at figurative meanings according to which the myth about Zeus is said to have been fashioned; but he accuses us, who acknowledge that our Jesus was buried but declare that he also was raised from the tomb, which the Cretans do not go on to relate about Zeus. And since he seems to speak up for the tomb of Zeus in Crete when he says, “not knowing how and in what sense the Cretans do this,” we shall say that even Callimachus of Cyrene, who read a great many poems and gathered up nearly all Greek history, knows no figurative interpretation in what is said about Zeus and his tomb. That is why he accuses the Cretans in the hymn he wrote to Zeus, saying: “Cretans are always liars; for the Cretans even built a tomb, O lord, for you; but you did not die, for you are forever.” And he who said, “you did not die, for you are forever,” while denying the burial of Zeus in Crete, relates that the beginning of death happened to Zeus; for the beginning of death is birth on earth. He says this: “And in Parrhasia Rhea bore you, having lain in love.” But he should have seen, since he denied the birth of Zeus in Crete because of his tomb, that from his birth in Arcadia it followed that the one who was born also died. Callimachus says such things about these matters too: “Zeus, some say you were born on the Idaean mountains, Zeus, others in Arcadia; which of them, father, lied? Cretans are always liars,” and so on. Celsus has led us into these things by being unfair about Jesus, agreeing with what is written, that he died and was buried, but thinking it a fiction that he also rose from the dead, and that although countless prophets foretold this too, and there are many signs of his appearance after death.