On the works of Jesus

Many times we have been told Jesus was a great moral teacher and performer of wonderful deeds, Celsus doesn’t buy this and this is so close to when the said events should have been known to everyone who cared to inquire. He asks

What beautiful or admirable thing have you said or done, though you were called upon in the temple to give some manifest sign that you were the son of god?

He then continues in the same manner and says

Let us grant that these things were performed by you; but they are common with the work of enchanters, who promise to effect more wonderful deeds than these, and all with those who have been taught by the Egyptians to perform in the middle of the forum for a few oboli; such as expelling demons from men, dissipating diseases by a puff, evocating the souls of heroes, exhibiting sumptuous suppers, and tables covered with food, which have no reality. These magicians also represent animals as moving, which are not in reality animals, but merely appear to the imagination to be such.

Is it fit, therefore, that we should believe these men to be the sons of god, because they worked this wonders? Or ought we not rather to say, that these are the arts of depraved and unhappy men?

From the arguments of Celsus against the Christians

On the baptism of Jesus

When you were washed by John, you say the spectre of a bird flew to you from the air. But what witness worthy of belief saw this spectre? Or who heard a voice from heaven adopting you for a son of god, except yourself and some of your associates, who was equally a partaker of your wickedness and punishment?

Arguments of Celsus against the Christians