For the devising of idols was the beginning of spiritual fornication, and the invention of them the corruption of life.
Read Chapter 14
Epiphanius of Cyprus
AD 403
Condemn idols, openly denouncing their error. Indeed, do not even consider them to be dead, because they were never alive. Teach clearly everywhere and to all that these are vain and foolish things. Not existing and never having existed, there is no possibility of their being what they are said to be. They are the products of wicked demons and of the human mind full of impulses to pleasure, since each of us is led to make his own passion an an object of veneration. Thus in the beginning idolatry was born of the wicked work of demons and by human conception, through a commingling that was called "the first fornication." At first they designed the figures of the idols, then they began to give gods to their own children as objects of veneration, made of various materials according to the art that each one possessed for providing for his needs with his own hands: the potter with clay, the carpenter with wood, the goldsmith with gold, the silversmith with silver. - "Ancoratus 102.5–7"
