The First Apology

And the philosophical discussion about the Son of God in Plato's Timæus, where he says, "He placed him crosswise in the universe," was similarly borrowed from Moses. In Moses' writings, it is told how, when the Israelites left Egypt and were in the wilderness, they encountered poisonous creatures like vipers and asps, and all kinds of serpents that killed the people. By the inspiration and influence of God, Moses took brass, shaped it into a cross, set it in the holy tabernacle, and said to the people, "If you look to this figure and believe, you will be saved by it." When this happened, it is recorded that the serpents died, and it is handed down that the people thus escaped death.

Plato, reading this and not understanding it accurately, nor recognizing it as a figure of the cross, thought it to be a positioning crosswise. He then claimed that the power next to the first God was placed crosswise in the universe. About his mention of a third, he did so because he read, as we mentioned earlier, what Moses said: "that the Spirit of God moved over the waters." Plato gives the second place to the Logos that is with God, whom he said was placed crosswise in the universe, and the third place to the Spirit, who was said to be borne upon the waters, saying, "And the third around the third." Listen to how the Spirit of prophecy indicated through Moses that there would be a conflagration.

He spoke this way: "Everlasting fire shall descend, and shall devour to the pit beneath." So, it is not that we hold the same opinions as others, but that all speak in imitation of ours. Among us, these things can be heard and learned from people who do not even know the forms of the letters, who are uneducated and rough in speech, yet wise and believing in mind; some even maimed and deprived of eyesight. This should help you understand that these things are not the result of human wisdom but are spoken by the power of God.