#celsus

 Library of Celsus, Ephesus, Turkey

This guy's already been garnering attention from other Osvald fans, superficially because he's the designated "old" man among the new cast of Octopath Traveler 0. I'd point out however that he also has some intriguing contradictory traits, in the same way that Osvald is an inexplicable hunky math nerd. Celsus is a thief bodyguard, which in itself is nearly an oxymoron, and we know that one of his skills is a dodgetanking taunt (ignoring that tanking of any sort is rarely worth it in Octopath when multi-hit attacks are so common). He's also a religious thief, to make things even stranger. That actually leaves me wondering what type of magic he'll use since thief has shuffled through different elements before. I very much doubt the self-insert's version of thief gets light magic since scholar and as always cleric have it, but it would be kind of funny if Celsus uses light.

And then comes the question: with whom should we (gay) ship him? I still have low expectations for OT0's traveler interactions when so much seems to revolve around the self-insert, but then it's not like OT2 had to do a ton to get me all-in on Osvitio. Technically there are CotC characters on the table here as well as all the travelers from the first game - so go Olberic/Celsus for an easy almost-middle-aged man yaoi route - but I wanted to consider the possibilities of the other new male travelers.

Ludo's pretty meh to me currently. He essentially sounds like Tressa as a guy, down to being underestimated because he's young. Undoubtedly would be a huge age gap with Celsus, but as I've explored with Osvitio there needs to actually be something to that to interest me. Does Ludo, for example, have any daddy issues?

Viator is looking fairly bland so far in contrast to Olberic and Hikari and even Crick for that matter whom he most physically resembles. More information is needed...but as mentioned if Celsus wants to fuck a warrior Olberic is right there...

Celsus, as quoted by Origen, accused Christians of impiety by posing an adversary to God - that being The Devil, or rather Satan. Celsus argued that Christianity poses a God that desires to do good but is helpless to do it because he has someone (Satan) counterveiling his will. Then, Celsus discusses ancient mythology concerning war among the gods. He focuses specifically on a myth told by Pherecydes of Syros, in which in the gods Kronos and Ophioneus raise their armies against each other in a battle to determine who will rule the cosmos.

At this point we need to step back a bit. Ophioneus, or Ophion, is the name of a serpent deity who seems to represent the forces of chaos. In some myths, Ophioneus is presented as the first divine ruler of the cosmos, though Pherecydes doesn't agree with that. As for Kronos, it is possible that in Pherecydes' myth this refers to both the Titan Kronos and Chronos the personification of time. The two figures are not traditionally conflated with each other, but it seems that Pherecydes probably did interpret them as being the same deity. In Pherecydes' myth, Kronos and Ophioneus battle each other before the ordering of the cosmos begins, though the full account of this battle is not entirely clear. Celsus believed that the loser of this battle, Ophion, was cast into the ocean (or rather Oceanus).

Some fragments seem to support the notion that it is Oceanus rather than Tartarus that Ophion is cast down into. But Ophioneus seems to also be considered identical or parallel to Typhon, who, in Greek mythology, was cast down into Tartarus or under Etna after his defeat by Zeus. It is possible that Ophion may have been thought to be born in Tartarus, which Pherecydes depicts as a cave below the earth, whereas Typhon was also born in a cave as the son of Gaia (earth) and Tartaros.

One thing to note is that, for Pherecydes, unlike many other ancient cosmogonies, it seems there is no primordial chaos that precedes an act of primeval demiurgy resulting in cosmic order. Instead, the forces of order and chaos existed besides each other forever and in conflict. For Pherecydes there was also no creation out of nothing. Instead, three gods were the first to exist all along: Zas (Zeus), Chthonie (Ge/Gaia), and Kronos/Chronos. He believed that these gods existed eternally, and that Chaos somehow came to be with no explanation.

Anyway, Celsus brings up Pherecydes' myth while discussing the concept of Satan, and then says that the Greek myths concerning the Titans and/or the Giants, and the Egyptian myths concerning Typhon (obviously meaning Set in this context) shared a similar symbolic meaning. He also relates that Hepheastus told Hera that he once felt the might of Zeus and hurled down from Olympus, and that Zeus boasted to Hera of how he bound and hung her in golden chains and hurled all the gods who opposed him from Olympus, as if to relate these to the Fall.

Celsus then does something interesting: he identifies the words of Zeus to Hera with the word of God to matter, arguing that this signifies matter that was originally was in discord before God then took and bound it together and arranged it with law, and then banished disorder. Demons who create disorder in the cosmos are related in Celsus' analogy to Titans and rebelling gods: they are chastised and hurled down. Tartarus, according to both Celsus and Pherecydes, is the place where Zeus banishes disorderly or insolent gods: in a word, prison.

Origen seems to actually agree with this analogy. In fact, in Book 4 of Against Celsus, Origen referred to "earthly demons, who delight in frankincense, and blood, and in the exhalations of sacrificial odours, and who, like the fabled Titans or Giants, drag down men from thoughts of God". Moreover, Origen argued that the writings of Moses mentioned a "wicked one" and his "falling from heaven" before the time of Homer and Pherecydes. Origen believed that Satan was the serpent that tempted Adam and Eve and that this was the original myth behind Ophioneus. If Origen interprets Satan as Ophioneus, then I would argue that he implies this connection for Typhon, and the Titans and Giants in relation to his demonic host. Origen also says that Satan is the "destroying angel" and the scapegoat Azazel.

This is interesting to consider in light of Plutarch and other sources whereby Typhon Seth is represented as a sacrificial animal. For Plutarch, Typhon is destined to never be completely defeated, and his power resides in the sacrificed animals and their slain blood, which, for Plutarch, ultimately nourishes the cosmos at least in the act of sacrifice, which pleases the powers of Osiris and Isis.

In any case, Origen seems to agree with Celsus on the Titanic-Satanic analogy, with the difference being that Celsus thinks the Christians were simply imitating pre-Christian myths while Origen thinks the Christian narrative preceded those same myths.

The Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus (A.D. 37-100), is the first non-Christian author to mention Jesus. In the Antiquities, Josephus writes:

There was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works—a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was Christ; and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him, for he appeared to them alive again the third day, as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him; and the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day (Antiquities 18:3:3).

Tacitus (A.D. 56-120), the Roman historian confirms that the crucifixion of Jesus actually took place. Writing in his Annals, he records:

 Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judæa, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind.

Pliny the Younger (A.D. 62-113), Roman governor in Asia Minor, established that early Christians worshiped Jesus as a god:

They (Christians) were in the habit of meeting on a certain fixed day before it was light, when they sang in alternate verses a hymn to Christ, as to a god, and bound themselves by a solemn oath, not to any wicked deeds, but never to commit any fraud, theft or adultery, never to falsify their word, nor deny a trust when they should be called upon to deliver it up; after which it was their custom to separate, and then reassemble to partake of food, but of an ordinary and innocent kind (Epistles 10.96).

Suetonius (120 AD) was a Roman historian and court official.  When recounting the history of the emperor Claudius some years before him, he said,

“Because the Jews at Rome caused constant disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus [Christ], he [Claudius] expelled them from the city [Rome]” (Life of Claudius, 25:4).

Lucian, born (c. AD 125 – 180), the pagan author Samosata, while ridiculing Christians, accepted that Jesus actually existed:

The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day—the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account. … You see, these misguided creatures start with the general conviction that they are immortal for all time, which explains their contempt of death and voluntary self-devotion which are so common among them; and then it was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are all brothers, from the moment that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws. All this they take quite on faith, with the result that they despise all worldly goods alike, regarding them merely as common property. (Lucian, The Passing of Peregrinus)

Celsus (2nd century), the Greek philosopher, while arguing against Christianity, also accepted that Jesus existed:

O light and truth! He distinctly declares, with his own voice, as ye yourselves have recorded, that there will come to you even others, employing miracles of a similar kind, who are wicked men, and sorcerers; and Satan. So that Jesus himself does not deny that these works at least are not at all divine, but are the acts of wicked men; and being compelled by the force of truth, he at the same time not only laid open the doings of others, but convicted himself of the same acts. Is it not, then, a miserable inference, to conclude from the same works that the one is God and the other sorcerers? Why ought the others, because of these acts, to be accounted wicked rather than this man, seeing they have him as their witness against himself? For he has himself acknowledged that these are not the works of a divine nature, but the inventions of certain deceivers, and of thoroughly wicked men.