Hippolytus

“ In order, then, that these impious (heretics) may no longer belie Mariamne or James, or the Saviour Himself, let us come to the mystic rites (whence these have derived their figment) ,—to a consideration, if it seems right, of both the Barbarian and Grecian (mysteries) ,—and let us see how these (heretics) , collecting together the secret and ineffable mysteries of all the Gentiles, are uttering falsehoods against Christ, and are making dupes of those who are not acquainted with these orgies of the Gentiles. ”

“ Allegorizing, he says, he speaks of the creation of the man. The rock is interposed (within) the teeth, as Homer [47] says, “enclosure of teeth,” that is, a wall and fortress, in which exists the inner man, who thither has fallen from Adam, the primal man above. And he has been “severed without hands to effect the division,” [48] and has been borne down into the image of oblivion, being earthly and clayish. ”

“ For since the foundation of the doctrine with them is the man Adam, and they say that concerning him it has been written, “Who shall declare his generation?” [2] learn how, partly deriving from the Gentiles the undiscoverable and diversified [3] generation of the man, they fictitiously apply it to Christ. ”

“ For Mercury is Logos, who being interpreter and fabricator of the things that have been made simultaneously, and that are being produced, and that will exist, stands honoured among them, fashioned into some such figure as is the pudendum of a man, having an impulsive power from the parts below towards those above. ”

“ For, says (the Naassene) , Attis has been emasculated, that is, he has passed over from the earthly parts of the nether world to the everlasting substance above, where, he says, there is neither female or male, [15] but a new creature, [16] a new man, which is hermaphrodite. ”

“ For, professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into images of the likeness of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore also God gave them up unto vile affections; for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature.” What, however, the natural use is, according to them, we shall afterwards declare. “And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another ”