Against Celsus 6.80

Next Celsus saw fit to call the Chaldeans a most divinely inspired nation from the beginning, the Chaldeans from whom deceptive astrology has spread among men. And Celsus ranks the Magi too among the most divinely inspired nations, the Magi from whom magic, named after their nation, has come to the other nations too, to the corruption and destruction of those who use it. And earlier, even in Celsus, the Egyptians were in error, as having solemn enclosures for what they consider temples, but inside nothing but apes or crocodiles or goats or asps or some other animal; yet now Celsus has seen fit to call the nation of the Egyptians most divinely inspired, and that from the beginning, perhaps because they have made war on the Jews from the beginning. And the Persians, who marry their mothers and have intercourse with their daughters, seem to Celsus a divinely inspired nation, and so do the Indians, some of whom he said earlier had even tasted human flesh. But the Jews, especially those of old, who did none of these things, he not only did not call most divinely inspired but said they would soon perish. This he says of them now as though he were a prophet, not seeing the whole dispensation of God concerning the Jews and their venerable ancient commonwealth, and how by their “trespass salvation” has come “to the Gentiles,” and “their trespass is the riches of the world, and their failure the riches of the Gentiles,” until “the fullness of the Gentiles comes in,” so that after this “all Israel,” which Celsus does not understand, may be saved.