Biography. Origen was born about 185 in Alexandria. Studied under the guidance of his father, Leonidas, sacred texts. In 202 Leonidas was killed. From 203, Origen began to teach at a theological school, he slept on bare ground, fasted, did not wear shoes, did not have a change of clothes. But he was popular with women and did not want this to be misinterpreted. There is a version that, having taken literally the words of Jesus: “There are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:12), he castrated himself, although there is no official confirmation or refutation of this. Some historians believe that castration is a rumor spread by Origen's enemies.

He studied ancient philosophy (according to some reports, at the school of Ammonius, from which Plotinus also came out). From 217 he headed the Christian school in Alexandria, but in 231 he was condemned at the local council of Alexandria, after which he transferred his teaching activities to Palestine (in the city of Caesarea). During the next wave of anti-Christian repressions under imp. Decius, Origen was thrown into prison in the city of Tire (modern Sur in Lebanon) and subjected to torture, from which he soon died.

Emperor Justinian and the condemnation of Origen. The exemplary holiness of Origen's life and martyrdom contributed to his popularity in monastic circles. The most authoritative centers for the dissemination of Origenism are the Palestinian monasteries of Mar-Saba (the Lavra of Savva the Sanctified) and the New Lavra in Fekoy near Bethlehem. However, Bishop Peter of Jerusalem sends a report to Emperor Justinian about "the origenic illness of his monks." At the same time, the Apocrysiary of the Pope, Deacon Pelagius, arrives in Constantinople and actively opposes Origenism. Wishing to save the religious unity of the empire, Justinian "decided to use fully his right as a Christian basileus to put pressure on the hierarchical and theological environment, which is prone to raise a dangerous wave of hopeless and lengthy disputes."

So in 543 the emperor Justinian issued an edict condemning Origen as a heretic, and which in the same year was approved at the local council in Constantinople.

The historian Evagrius Scholasticus reports that Origen and his delusions were condemned at the Fifth Ecumenical Council in 553 (Evagrius Scholasticus. Church History. Book 4. p. 38)

School. He studied at the Alexandrian theological school, Didaskaleion, which was headed by Clement of Alexandria. From 203 he taught philosophy, theology, dialectics, physics, mathematics, geometry, astronomy there. After Clement left Alexandria, Origen headed the school and was its mentor in the years 217-232. Origen was a supporter of the idea of ​​the final salvation of all things (apocatastasis is a theological concept used in the sense of "restoration" and in the sense of "restoration of everything", when the doctrine of universal salvation is identified with it.)

Origen's teacher. Neoplatonist Ammonius Saccas.

Origen's disciples. Origen's teaching, which was the first systematic presentation of the ideas of Christianity in a philosophical context, had a significant impact on the work of subsequent thinkers: Eusebius Pamphilus, Gregory the Theologian, Gregory of Nyssa, Basil the Great and others.

Main works. Origen's main work is the Hexapla, the first example of scientific biblical criticism in history. The hexapla consisted of six (hence the name) synchronized Old Testament, in order to establish a critically verified text of Scripture. The text of this (colossal in terms of volume) work has survived to this day only in fragments. As well as the following works: "Hexapla", "Against", "Celsus Two conversations on the Song of Songs", "On the beginnings (in 4 books or hours)", "Comments on the Gospel of John", "Comments on the Gospel of Matthew", "On Prayer", "Letter to St. Gregory the Wonderworker (Bishop of Neocaesarea)", "Letter to Julius Africanus", "Treatise on Demons", "Exhortation to Martyrdom", "Homilies", "Scholias", " Dialogue with Heraclitus", "On the Resurrection".

Origen's teaching. Origenism. Origen completes the early comparative, apologetic Christian theology, which already acted as a system - this is expressed in his polemical work entitled "Against Celsus", in the study of the Bible, in his interpretation of religious monuments using the teachings of the Gnostics and Neoplatonists, especially the doctrine of the Logos.

The list of Origen's writings included about 2,000 "books" (in ancient, see words, that is, parts). The philosophy of Origen is a stoically colored Platonism. To reconcile it with the belief in the authority of the Bible, Origen, following Philo of Alexandria, developed the doctrine of the three meanings of the Bible:

• "bodily" (literally)
• "spiritual" (moral)
• · "spiritual" (philosophical-mystical), which was given unconditional preference.

The system of concepts developed by Origen was widely used in the construction of church dogma (Origen, for example, first encountered the term "god-man").

The eschatological optimism of Origen was reflected in the doctrine of cyclic time, or apokatastasis, which suggests that posthumous retribution and hell are relative, since God, in his goodness, will ultimately save from hellish torments not only the righteous, but also all people, all demons, and even himself. Satan.

Origen taught about the pre-existence of human souls, a doctrine markedly different from the traditional understanding of reincarnation in Hinduism or Platonism. According to the doctrine of the pre-existence of souls, souls did not incarnate in animals or plants - they progressed along the path to perfection, taking on more and more "enlightened" bodies in human life forms. Origen argued that fallen souls are reincarnated in the bodies of angels, in human bodies on earth, or in lower, demonic forms of life, gradually going through a series of reincarnations in the conditional "ladder of hierarchies" of rational beings.

According to the professor of theology, Protodeacon A. V. Kuraev, Origen's teaching on the pre-existence of the soul was not a teaching on reincarnation, in the sense in which Platonists, Hindus or Buddhists understand it. Origen suggested that God creates an infinite succession of worlds; but every world is finite and limited. The worlds do not exist in parallel; at the end of one world, another begins.

In the century following Origen's death, many leading theologians avoided mentioning Origen's name and paraphrased his thoughts in their own writings. In the 4th century, his views were expounded by Evagrius of Pontus, and from him they migrated to the writings of St. John Cassian. Epiphanius of Cyprus, convinced by the opponent of John Chrysostom, Bishop Theophilus of Alexandria, on the contrary, saw in Origen the source of all kinds of heresies and approx. 375 subjected his "free-thinking" to systematic criticism. The translation into Latin of Origen's treatise "On the Principles" by Rufinus at the end of the 4th century caused a fierce dispute with the blessed Jerome (who at first called Origen the greatest theologian since the time of the apostles).

After Jerome's anti-Origenian attacks, orthodox theologians sharply condemned Origen for heretical opinions (the doctrine of apocatastasis) and for including in the Christian dogma the theses of ancient philosophy incompatible with it (in particular, the Platonic doctrine of the preexistence of souls). However, it was not possible to exclude the influence of the philosophical system of Origen. At the end of the 4th century, Origenism was represented by the movement of the "Long Monks", who became victims of the intrigues of the Alexandrian Archbishop Theophilus in the fight against I. Chrysostom. The monks, who disagreed with the wasteful lifestyle and despotism of Theophilus, left Alexandria and began to wander around Egypt and Palestine. As a result, persecuted from everywhere, they came to Constantinople to ask for help from Patriarch John Chrysostom.

In the 6th century, the Origenist movement revived in the Palestinian "new monastery", which prompted the emperor Justinian the Great to issue an edict in 543 in which Origen was declared a heretic, and the local council of the Church of Constantinople in 553 conciliarly condemned Origen and extended the condemnation of Origenism to Evagrius and Didyma .

Basic definitions.

God is an active providence;

Christ is the image of God the Father: "Our Savior is the image of the invisible God the Father: in relation to the Father Himself He is truth; in relation to us, by which He reveals the Father, He is the image through which we know the Father";

The God-man is God incarnate in man, Jesus Christ.

Origen quotes.

"God delivers us from sorrows not in such a way that no more sorrows visit us; (...) but in such a way that by God's help we never find ourselves in sorrows in a difficult situation."

"Don't pray for trifles."

"The devil is capable of virtue, but does not yet want to follow virtue"

“If the world began to exist from a certain time, then what did God do before the beginning of the world? After all, it is impious and at the same time absurd to call the nature of God idle or motionless, or to think that goodness never did good, and omnipotence once [over nothing] had no power.(...) God first began to act not when he created this visible world; but we believe that just as after the destruction of this world there will be another world, so before the existence of this world there were other worlds.

"Perhaps a person can never defeat an opposing force on his own, without using divine help. That is why it is said that an angel fought with Jacob (Gen., 32, 35). We understand this so that the struggle of an angel with Jacob - not the same as wrestling against Jacob."

(~185–~254)

Childhood and youth

Origen was born in a pious Christian family, presumably in 185 or 186, in Egypt, in Alexandria. Father, grammarian Leonid, died for his belief in the persecution of the North, when his son was not yet seventeen years old.

From childhood, Origen was distinguished by success in learning and high self-discipline. Inborn talents and good parenting also affected. Along with general education disciplines, he studied the Holy Scriptures with particular attention, memorizing certain places by heart. At the same time, Origen was not content with a superficial perception of the text, but sought to comprehend the depth of the content, asking his father not childishly serious questions, which put him in a difficult position. It happened that Leonid pointed out to his son that he be content with a simple, obvious meaning, meanwhile, in the depths of his heart, of course, he rejoiced at his curiosity and thanked God.

WITH young years attended classes at the Alexandria Catechetical School, glorified by the works of Panten and Clement.

After his father was taken into custody during the persecution, Origen was inflamed with even greater zeal for the Lord. Mother, knowing how much her son neglects danger, more than once begged him to pity her maternal feeling. It happened that she hid clothes from him, trying to keep him with her. Driven by a fiery spiritual impulse, Origen wrote to his father, urging him not to renounce his thoughts because of fear for his family.

After Leonid was martyred, the family's property was confiscated, leaving her without a livelihood. During this period, he found shelter with a noble woman who sympathized with him. Everything would be fine, but this woman showed attention to heretics. Origen shied away from prayer meetings held in her house and after some time left it.

After the death of his father, he continued to improve his educational level. And soon he began to teach grammatical sciences in private. By doing this, he earned money to support an orphaned family.

Activity as a Christian teacher

When, as a result of persecution, the Alexandrian Catechistic School lost its leader, many, driven by the desire to comprehend the truths of the Christian dogma, began to seek help from.

Fame young teacher grew every day. In addition to his education, his behavior also contributed to this: he, not afraid of the threats of idolaters, as if challenging them, regularly visited Christian prisoners, was present at the announcement of sentences, courageously accompanied them to the places of execution. The pagans repeatedly tried to organize attacks on the meetings organized around, and he was forced to change the places of such meetings.

Bishop Demetrius of Alexandria, appreciating the zeal and abilities of the young teacher, officially called him and offered him the post of head of the Catechistic School in Alexandria.

Origen accepted the offer. He sold the books he had accumulated with great difficulty. The man who bought them began to pay him four ovols daily, which at that time was the wage of an ordinary day laborer. A strict ascetic life allowed him to be content with such a small amount.

According to tradition, Origen subjected himself to voluntary castration. It is believed that he decided to take this difficult step by literally taking the words of the Redeemer about eunuchs). Meanwhile, there is reason to believe that he did this in order to avert possible suspicions of unlawful relationships with women who were part of the circle of his students.

Around the year 211-212, Origen, driven by a good desire to see the “oldest”, went to Rome, and upon his return from this trip again indulged in teaching.

At some point, in view of the large number of catechumens, he was forced to take on an assistant. The choice fell on Heracles, the brother of Plutarch, who mistook for Christ. Since then, Heracles has been teaching primary knowledge to the beginners, while Origen himself has been studying with a more prepared audience.

Over time, Origen's fame began to attract to him both philosophers and even heretics who wanted to know his opinion on a particular issue.

About 212 or 213 God's providence brought Origen together with Ambrose. Before they met, Ambrose was an adherent of one of the Gnostic sects. Origen managed to find the right words and turn him to Light and Truth. Soon a partnership began between them. By mutual agreement, Ambrose organized the recording of Origen's speeches and took on the material costs. At the same time, he received the right to dispose of the compiled manuscripts. In addition to shorthand writers, Ambrose kept scribes who copied texts for distribution.

Around the year 214, Origen, with the blessing of Bishop Demetrius, undertook a journey to Arabia, where he was invited by the local prefect. He stayed in Arabia for a relatively short time.

Origen's activities in Palestine

After a popular unrest broke out in Alexandria, which was suppressed by the authorities, the city was plundered by soldiers, and then the aliens were expelled from it. Ambrose, being an Antiochian and forced to leave Alexandria, moved to Caesarea of ​​Palestine. During this period, Origen also moved to Caesarea.

Here he established relations with the clergy, including Bishop Feoktist of Caesarea. Out of respect and trust, Origen, as a Christian teacher, was given the opportunity to publicly preach in the Church. Upon learning of this, Bishop Demetrius of Alexandria was indignant. In his message to the church leadership there, he insisted that it was unsuitable for a layman to preach in the presence of bishops. In a response message, the bishops objected and reminded Demetrius that even the apostles attracted people from the people capable of preaching.

Soon Bishop Demetrius, needing him as a teacher, sent people after him and demanded his immediate return. Origen, obeying the will of the bishop, returned to Alexandria.

A few years later (probably around the year 230), Origen was sent by Bishop Demetrius to Greece, with an assignment for church affairs. During this period, another event occurred that caused indignation in Dimitri.

Either out of old memory, or in connection with some other reasons, Origen laid his route through Palestine and lingered there. Bishops Alexander and Feoktist gave him a warm, cordial welcome. Moreover, mindful of past misunderstandings associated with the preaching of Origen (as a layman), he was ordained a priest.

Bishop Demetrius, who was initially amazed at Origen's decision to castrate himself, and as if he did not see anything contrary to piety in this, suddenly spoke of this as a canonical obstacle to the priesthood.

There is reason to believe that Demetrius experienced banal envy. In 231, he initiated the convocation of the Council. The Council was attended by Egyptian bishops and Alexandrian priests. The definition that they issued in relation to Origen was quite harsh: to remove him from teaching, to prohibit living in Alexandria. Another Council, convened a few months later, declared the consecration of Origen as a presbyter illegal.

The following time, Origen lived and worked in Palestine under the auspices of friends. After the death of Demetrius, Heracles occupied the Alexandrian see, and Origen was counting on a change in attitude towards him, but his expectations did not come true.

The theological school formed in Caesarea soon became one of the centers of education. Origen's fame reached even to the imperial court. The mother of Emperor Alexander, Mammaya, invited him to her place, wanting to listen to his speech.

The last period of Origen's life was full of preaching and literary activity.

During the next persecution against the Church, deployed in the reign of Decius, Origen was captured and imprisoned. He had to experience humiliation and torture for Christ. A chain was put on his neck, and his legs, for many days, were stretched on a special tool. In addition, they threatened to burn. He endured and even received freedom, but the consequences of the torment were so painful that he died. It happened in 253 or 254.

Scientific and writing activities

Despite his lifetime respect, ascetic life, confession, Origen was not counted among the host of holy fathers of the Church. This is due to his departure from the purity of the dogma on a number of essential issues concerning the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, the creation of the world, the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the future fate of sinners. Meanwhile, he is recognized as one of the outstanding and most fruitful church writers.

Among the priority areas of Origen's scientific and theological creativity was the study of the Holy Scriptures. In this regard, Origen even learned the Hebrew language. The fruit of his many years of research was the fundamental work "Exapla" (Gekzapla), containing a set of biblical texts presented both in Hebrew and in various translations. Unfortunately, this work has not reached our days.

Separate fragments of writings came from the explanations on the Books of Scripture:,

Origen of Alexandria, a Christian philosopher and defender of the faith of the third century, is a man of a very interesting fate. Anathematized 300 years after his death, and in extremely harsh terms, at the same time he was a Christian martyr, and even the Church Fathers were among his disciples! What did he do so wrong? What is the essence of the heresy, which is often called by the name of the "author" - Origenism?

Probably the most famous accusation that can be heard against Origen is the doctrine of apocatastasis, that is, the salvation of all rational beings, which we have already written about earlier. However, the "heretical" status of this doctrine is still questioned by authoritative church authors. Another thing is important - the apocatastasis was only a particular moment of the whole system of the Alexandrian teacher. But all of it, indeed, had little in common with church orthodoxy.

Origen was both lucky and very unlucky: he was a pioneer. Moreover, a pioneer of thought, and this is especially dangerous. As a pioneer, he was admired during his lifetime and after death, he was called the greatest Christian theologian since the time of the apostles, his system of theological concepts, surprisingly accurate and successful, was used by the Fathers of the Church, his approach to the interpretation of Holy Scripture became classical ... But very many answers and theological insights of Origen turned out to be not at all like those that crystallized at the Councils of the Church, as a result of long reflections, disputes and revelations. There is nothing surprising here: as they say, one head, even a very smart one, is good, but two is better. And even more so, not two, but hundreds and thousands, and also far from stupid.

Another thing is insulting: a man who sincerely and unusually talentedly defended the Christian faith all his life was anathematized after his death. Emperor Justinian the Great even claimed that Origen deliberately penetrated the church fence in order to sow opinions and teachings alien to Christianity. So there were fighters against the "Masonic conspiracy" (based on the realities of the 6th century, when the troubled emperor lived - with the Hellenic one), at all times! Of course, such a "theory" does not withstand any criticism - the great Alexandrian proved not only by life, but also by death, his right to be called a Christian and a faithful son of the Church.

Even in his youth, when his father, Leonidas, was arrested and led to death for the Christian faith, Origen wanted to go and accept the execution with his father. But the mother, knowing the extraordinary modesty of her son, hid all the clothes that were in the house, and the young man did not dare to go out naked. Much later, Origen had to go through no less terrible than physical, moral suffering. According to the imperial laws of that time, people who were already Christians were not touched, but if someone converted to Christianity from the state pagan cult, death awaited him.

Origen could not but preach his faith, which, in his opinion, opens up for people the possibility of salvation and life with God. But the result of this sermon was often the execution of disciples - in case they were exposed by the imperial authorities. At the end of Origen's life, the laws changed, and the already elderly man was seized and subjected to severe torture. Origen was released, but his health was irreversibly undermined, and he soon died. Such a life and such a death does not fit well with the image of a conscious enemy of Christianity and the Church.

It must be said that the great Alexandrian never insisted on the indisputable truth of his theological assumptions. This favorably distinguishes him from most heresiarchs, who were distinguished by fanaticism and intolerance of other opinions. Unfortunately, Origen's cautious remarks were not heeded in the 6th century.

Perhaps the main misfortune of Origen, which led to the anathemas of the Council, was that the Alexandrian teacher was a hostage to the philosophical system, which he tried to combine with Christianity. Speaking in the language of the Gospel, he tried to pour the "new wine" of Christianity into the "old wineskins" of his former ideas. From here, sometimes even funny incidents were born. For example, the idea that the bodies that people will receive in paradise after the resurrection will be ... spherical! By the way, Origen was also reminded of this trifle, having singled out a separate item in the list of anathemas. But within the framework of the philosophical system that Origen adhered to, the ball was the ideal form; Well, in paradise, of course, everything will be perfect, including the form.

The very idea of ​​infinity caused Origen rejection - such a view was also dictated more by philosophical premises than by common sense. As a result, the image of God in the understanding of Origen turned out to be greatly distorted: “It is necessary to think that the Power of God is limited; and one should not, under the pretext of eloquence, remove its circumscription. its boundless."

But, perhaps, the main thing that made Origen's picture of the world incompatible with the Christian one was the idea of ​​the world being cyclical. From the correct biblical thesis that God is the Creator of our world, Origen concludes that being the Creator is an integral, eternal property of God, expressing the very essence of His nature. That is, Origen subordinated God to the principle of creativity: without this, God is no longer God. In the works of other Fathers of the Church there is a very important thought that God is in no way dependent on our world, that He was not at all "obliged" to create this world, and the creation of the world was an entirely voluntary, unconditional act. Unfortunately, in Origen's system there is a dependence of God on certain philosophical principles.

His second trip to Arabia was no longer at the call of the proconsul, but was caused by the monarchian heresy of Bishop Beryl, who was the bishop of Arabia of Arabia (now Basra in Iraq). There were many controversies about his false teaching that were difficult to resolve. Eusebius:

“Among others, Origen was also invited, who tried, first of all, to find out the views of Beryl, then established their heretical character, and, finally, with his evidence put him on the true path and returned him to his former healthy way of life.”

This dispute took place perhaps around the year 244. After that, rumors spread about Origen's non-Orthodoxy, about subordinationism in his doctrine of the Holy Trinity, so Origen was forced to write a protective letter to the Roman Bishop Fabian, who reproached him for being non-Orthodox. many of his views. From whom these accusations came, and we cannot say about all the points of the accusations. In addition, after the competition with Beryl, quite often Origen was asked for help in the fight against the delusions that arose. In particular, a doctrine arose in Arabia, according to which the human soul dies and is destroyed along with the body, and only after resurrection with the body does it come to life again with it. On this occasion, a Council was convened, to which Origen was invited. He successfully completed his mission, so that the deluded left their thoughts. This is interesting: he was so successful in his word that he could convince erring people; True, apparently, those who were mistaken were mild heretics, were not possessed by demonic pride.

In 254 the persecution of Decius began. Bishop Alexander of Jerusalem was brought to Caesarea of ​​Palestine to be judged by the proconsul. Alexander was tortured, thrown into prison, and died in chains. Origen was also captured, bound, and subjected to bodily torture; an iron ring with chains was put on his neck, his legs were stretched in some kind of machines "up to the fourth degree" (Eve.). Origen endured everything courageously and did not renounce Christ. After that, Origen could hardly walk. The torture proved unbearable, and The 69-year-old elder soon died either in Caesarea or Tire. Torment made him a confessor, but not a martyr. I wonder if he had become a martyr, would they have ranked him among the saints? Hard to say. There was a martyr Lucian, and Arius and his followers called themselves "Solucianists". Obviously, Arius found some basis for his teaching in the teachings of Lucian;

hard to say for sure. Lucian is numbered among the saints. It is believed that Origen died most likely in Tyre. In Caesarea, he was only judged. The youthful dream of dying a martyr did not come true, but Origen belongs to the number of confessors, although he never reconciled with the Bishop of Alexandria.

3.2 Origen's creations

The bulk of Origen's work is exegetical. Many of Origen's writings perished irretrievably, some came down in Latin translations of his students and like-minded people, who often tried to soften Origen's views in translations, and sometimes distorted the meaning of his teachings. Origen was an extremely prolific writer. Only the works that have come down to us in Min's patrology occupy 4 volumes. This is very little. Writer IV - beg. In the 5th century, Epiphanius of Cyprus, in his essay “Against Heresies”, speaking of Origen, says that he wrote 6,000 works, and Epiphanius is surprised how such a number of works can be written, because even reading such a number is impossible.

The most important part of Origen's heritage is his exegetical writings - interpretations and comments.

I.Hexapla. Fundamental biblical work. This is a list of the OT which was divided by Origen into 6 columns.

1. Ancient Hebrew text with Masoretic vocalization.

2. Hebrew text in Greek transliteration.

3. Translation of Akila.

4. Translation of Symmachus.

5. Translation of 70 ( LXX ).

6. Translation of Theodotion.

The translations of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion were little known. Eusebius says that Origen found them in some dark corner (Eusebius does not know where Origen could find these translations). Origen did not consider LXX to be the only authoritative text and provided it with critical remarks that pointed out differences from the Hebrew text. Origen's work represents the first attempt in history to critically examine a biblical text. Many subsequent scholars of the SP text used the writings of Origen. To facilitate the use of comparative tables, Origen used the text LXX in the 5th column. He drew attention to the deviation of LXX from the original text and marked it with special conditional grammatical signs is (asterisk) - (ovel). Origen himself writes in his commentary on Matthew:

“With the help of God, I could eliminate the differences in the manuscripts of the Old Testament by using other translations. What seemed doubtful in 70 because of the difference in manuscripts, I reviewed from other translations and withheld what was in agreement with them. What I did not find in the Hebrew text, I marked with an oval, because I did not dare to completely cross out what the 70 had. I added something else, which I designated with an asterisk, so that it was clear what the 70 did not have and what we added from the Hebrew text. Whoever wants to, let him attach importance to it, whoever is tempted by it, let him refrain from accepting it as he pleases.

Origen pointed out that he made the most use of Theodotion's translation. Where the LXX text is unstable or seemed corrupted, Origen either simply changed it in accordance with the Hebrew text without any indication of this change, or in the LXX text marked with an oval, inserted the appropriate parallels from the Hebrew text or another translation.

In carrying out this gigantic work, Origen pursued an apologetic goal - to protect lxx from the reproaches of Jews and heretics that this text suffers from significant shortcomings, i.e. the absence of something, or interpolations. He tried to show what the LXX has in excess of the Hebrew text and what it lacks. Having completed the task, Origen made possible the critical use of the Old Testament by all means available in his time, created for researchers a kind of critical manual of rather great importance.

Around the year 600, hexaplas perished along with a huge valuable library, the foundation of which was laid by the martyr Pamphilus, the teacher of Eusebius of Caesarea. Both Pamphilus and Eusebius took measures to disseminate the text corrected by Origen, but the reproduction of the entire work in all its parts was very difficult and, no less important, was very expensive. The 5th column was rewritten very often, i.e. LXX with Origen critical badges.

In 617, this column was translated into Syriac by the Jacobite Bishop Paul, retaining the critical signs, so literally that it accurately reflected the original. This translation has survived to the present day.

From Origen's original, only fragments remained, which were found and published by a Benedictine monk from the congregation of St. Maurus, the famous publisher Montfauquebe.

In the New Testament text Origen also saw the shortcomings of handwritten tradition. In his writings, he often complains about this, arguing that the manuscripts, especially the Gospel of Matthew, do not always agree with each other in many ways. He attributes the reason to the frivolity of scribes or the ill will of those who allow additions during proofreading. Sometimes in Matthew, who often quotes the prophets, the prophecies do not always correspond to the Hebrew original. He points out the difference in the texts of the lists in his exegetical works. These remarks led some researchers to the conclusion that he had compiled some kind of critical review of the NT text, although it is impossible to state this with complete certainty. After his death, not only the text of his hexapl was distributed, but also copies of the New Testament that he had or copies from them. His authority as an exegete served as a guarantee of the quality of the text he explained. When the martyr Pamphilus and Eusebius prepared lists of the New Testament, which originated from copies of Origen and concluded the text of his exegetical works, they believed that this was the most accurate text, and their example was imitated later. At present, it is not possible to reconstruct the NT text of Origen on the basis of commentaries alone, because the text of the quotations exhibits great diversity. The reason for this diversity was that New Testament quotations were inserted by scribes, while Origen gave only general designations of biblical places without specifying the verses.

P. Commentaries on Holy Scripture they embrace almost the entire Holy Scripture of both the New and the Old Testament and are divided into 3 groups:

1. Scholia(marginal notes), imitation of the works of the Alexandrian grammarians, who so studied the originals of the ancient classics. Scholia are brief exegetical remarks that explain difficult-to-understand words and passages in the biblical text.

2. Homilies - sermons delivered during the service, either addressed to those who were read out or to the baptized, for which the topics were borrowed for the most part from the readings of the SP.

3. Comments - detailed interpretation of entire books, as opposed to the popular exposition in homily. The comments were for scientific purposes; he wanted to communicate to more knowledgeable Christians a deeper understanding of the Holy Scriptures and to reveal the hidden truths in it.

We have reached 574 homily and scientific commentaries on the Song of Songs, the Gospels of Matthew and John, and Origen's commentary on Romans.

In these interpretations, Origen uses the traditional Alexandrian method of allegory. We can criticize him, and he was criticized by all and sundry, but for a correct assessment of the allegorical method, it must be remembered that Origen wrote for people brought up in Greek culture, often for Greeks and by nationality. Origen was careful about the smallest details of the Old Testament, at the same time, he was well aware that for his Greek contemporaries to get acquainted with the history of the OT is by no means an obvious thing. Origen understood that without this they could not become Christians, correctly understand the Christian doctrine, therefore Origen believes that all the details of the OT books, even insignificant ones, have an eternal meaning, but they must be understood symbolically, as abstract spiritual allegories about very important events that relate to Christ and to the Church. This method is fraught with certain dangers, and Origen did not escape these dangers. He was so fond of allegorism that he very often neglected the historical meaning, and he is not the first - last year we got acquainted with the message of Barnabas and noted how artificial the allegorism of the author of the message was sometimes. But in many cases his spiritual interpretation of the OT text has entered the Christian tradition and has become the traditional Christian interpretation of the Bible. Examples of approach to the Holy Scriptures. In the homily on Lk. 1 Origen testifies that in his time there are many apocryphal writings along with canonical

“You should know that many gospels have been written, and not just the 4 that we read, which were chosen and entrusted to the Churches. We know this directly from the chapter of the Gospel of Luke, where it is said: “as many have already begun to compose narratives about events that are completely known between us.” Who are these many?

Origen notes that there were many apocryphal gospels, about which the Evangelist Luke speaks. In the commentary on the Beatitudes: "Blessed are the peacemakers" - Origen argues that in order to understand the sacred text, a special kind of knowledge is needed, which is bestowed by the Holy Spirit. This knowledge reveals, as it were, a single spiritual meaning of outwardly contradictory texts of Scripture.

“Peace is given to him whom we can call a peacemaker. Nothing in the divine Scriptures appears to him either distorted or perverted, everything is clear to him who is endowed with understanding.

This is a rather characteristic method of interpreting the text, which does not need such an interpretation because of its impeccable clarity: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God."

In homily on the epistles of the Apostle Paul, especially on message to Hebrews he raises the still current question of the authorship of the apostle Paul in relation to the epistle to the Hebrews. Referring to the style, the syntax of the epistle, Origen concludes that the apostle Paul could not be the author of this epistle, i.e. He did not write this message with his own hand. The one who wrote it was an educated Greek, well acquainted with the thoughts of the holy Apostle Paul, was, obviously, his disciple:

“The style of the language of the epistle entitled “To the Hebrews” does not reveal that lack of literary skill that is characteristic of the apostle. He (Paul) himself admitted that he did not know the literary art. But from the way the phrases are composed, the Hellenic education of the author is felt, as anyone who is able to judge the difference in style will agree. I wish. to express the opinion that the thought of the epistle is undeniably the apostolic, of Paul, but that the style and composition belong to someone who expounded the apostle's doctrine. If any Church believes that the epistle was written by Paul, let it remain in its opinion, for it was not without reason that our predecessors transmitted it to us as the epistle of Paul. Who actually wrote it, only God knows. Some say that Clement, Bishop of Rome, wrote it, others that Luke, the author of the Gospel and Acts.

Origen is more inclined towards the authorship of the Evangelist Luke, finds parallels in the Gospel and Acts with the epistle to the Hebrews. Many modern scholars of the New Testament agree with Origen's proposal. By the way, when Origen quotes the pastoral epistles of St. Paul, then he has no doubts about their authenticity, he believes that there is the language and style of the Apostle Paul, and not someone else.

Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew. Origen raises a significant question: how to explain to the unprepared pagan reader the meaning and significance of such OT books that are referenced in the Gospels, such as Leviticus, Deuteronomy. In a commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, Origen argues that there is harmony in the sacred Scriptures, that when reading in parts, the meaning of a single whole is often lost, and the Bible is a whole book, which, as it were, is united by a common meaning and design. In the Bible, individual books do not give an idea of ​​God's plan. He offers a comparison: just as one instrument cannot express the musical intent of a work; at the same time, as a set of tools gives a complete picture; the abolition of this instrument also impoverishes the music of the orchestra.

One can cite very many examples of a serious scientific approach to the text and, on the other hand, passion for artificial allegory, which actually discards the actual meaning of the text. There is his commentary on the book Joshua Nun.The death of Moses here is interpreted by Origen not as the physical death of the leader of the Jewish people, but as the death of the OT religion, which gives way to a new, Christian religion, and the new Christian religion is symbolized by Jesus crushing -type of Jesus Christ. In fact, this is rather the beginning of religion, the establishment of the priesthood:

“Now we must tell about the death of Moses. If we do not understand what the death of Moses means, then we cannot comprehend what the power of Joshua means, i.e. Jesus Christ. If you remember the fall of Jerusalem, the desolation of the altars, the cessation of sacrifices, burnt offerings, the absence of priests, the high priest, the fading of the ministry of the Levites, when you see that all this is coming to an end, then say that Moses, the servant of the Lord, died. But when you see the conversion of the pagans to the faith, the building of new churches, not altars sprinkled with the blood of animals, but altars sanctified by the blood of Christ, when you see that the priests and Levites do not sacrifice the blood of bulls and goats, but the Word of God by the grace of the Holy Spirit then say that it was not Joshua the son of Nun who replaced Moses, but Jesus the Son of God.”

III. apologetic works.

The main apologetic work of Origen is his book "Against Celsus" ("Contra Cels"). The pagan philosopher Celsus was the author of a rather famous book: The True Word, in which he tried to refute Christianity. Celsus wrote this book in 178, Origen writes the book Against Celsus in 248 - 70 years later. This is a response work, it is valuable both in content and in the logic of presentation, and because it contains many quotations from the book of Celsus, which has not reached our time. These quotes are honest.

Celsus was a serious pagan scholar who studied the Bible and Christian doctrine well. Against Celsus represents the first serious controversy between an educated Christian and an educated pagan. True, one can recall the dialogue of Justin the Philosopher with Trypho the Jew, but Against Celsus is a much deeper and more serious book. What did not satisfy Celsus in Christianity?

1. Christians yield to pagans in the cult - the cult is too poor. The Christians, however, very quickly corrected this poverty and enriched themselves, and in the time of Origen, apparently, the Christian worship was very modest. As far as Russia is concerned, we have left Byzantium behind in this regard, especially with regard to hierarchical services.

2.cels: Christians rely on Jewish Scripture - primitive, barbaric, completely unphilosophical. Christian doctrine is not philosophical, it is accessible to many, and not only to the elect.

In the same time. Celsus approved of the gospel doctrine of the Logos and highly valued Christian ethics. Celsus witnessed the torment of Christians and their courage, in which he found a positive aspect of loyalty to his faith. In his work, Celsus suggested that Christians integrate into the pluralistic Roman society, maintain faith in Jesus Christ, but not differ from others - if you need to sacrifice to someone, then bring it. He represented Christ as a kind of magician who performed a series of miracles. Celsus dealt with the issue of idolatry. Celsus accused Christians of the fact that, despite the fact that Christians accuse pagans of fetishism, they themselves are much worse, because they worship a God who was born of a woman and appeared on earth in human form. Pagans, Celsus said, erect statues to the gods, but they understand that the statues are not gods, but only their image (Celsus believed this, and a simple pagan believed that something was sacramentally connected with the statue). Celsus did not understand what the problem was. throw incense on the altar?

IV. "About the Beginnings". The totality of theological views on the main dogmatic problems is set forth in this very large work. The work consists of 4 lengthy books. The title indicates the comprehensive nature of this work. The work was written in Alexandria, it was written from 220 to 230 when Origen was already a mature theologian. A follower and admirer of Origen, Rufin translated the work into Latin language, softened something, distorted something.

Book 1 contains the doctrine of God;

the 2nd outlines the cosmology of Origen;

in the 3rd Anthropology of Origen;

in the 4th principles of Christian exegesis.

The product is quite versatile. "On the Principles" had a fairly wide circulation in the Church and had a great influence, both positive and negative.

V. Dialogue with Heraclitus. In this treatise, Origen expounds the doctrine of the Holy Trinity so ambiguously that in the fourth century, during the Arian controversy, both heretics and Orthodox alluded to it (later we will determine why).

VI. Compositions of spiritual and moral content.They were very popular in the monastic environment of a later time.

3.3 Origen's theology

3.3.1 Cosmology

From his cosmology comes his anthropology, and soteriology, and even triadology. This is the 2nd book of "On the Beginnings". Central is the doctrine of the creation of the world. Origen encountered rather serious difficulties in trying to understand the biblical position that the created world had its beginning with the Platonic and already at that time developing Neoplatonic doctrine, which recognized the reality of only eternal ideas. For the Platonist, as for the philosopher, what matters is that which exists eternally, and not what happens in time, because time itself is a kind of pale shadow of eternity. If we take the biblical narrative, the biblical way of thinking, then for the OT history and time itself are the underlying reality. The OT is permeated with the idea of ​​the reality of the living God. The OT does not raise the question of whether how why There is a God, and the question is not raised why He initiated the world and history. Origen wanted to convince his contemporaries of the truth of the Bible, to make the sacred text understandable. He tries to build a philosophical system and explain the root causes of being. Speaking about the root causes of being, he wants to connect his teaching with the biblical.

The OT does not say How God exists, Why God exists, why He initiated the world and history. We now say: for your love; the love of God could not remain closed and began to pour out - real Gnosticism - an outpouring from the pleroma. We do not know why the world and man were created; the Word of God does not speak of this, it speaks only of God's relation to the world and man. The answer to this question is not found.

Reflecting on cosmogonic topics, like a Neoplatonist, Origen believed in the eternity of all things, therefore, from his point of view, God Himself never became the Creator, He always was, therefore the created world is eternal, however, in its ideal, and not physical being. Origen was also a Neoplatonist. Plotinus was a prominent Neoplatonist, and Plotinus was a contemporary of Origen. When we encounter Christian elements in Plotinus, this is not surprising, he was already familiar with Christian doctrine on a philosophical level. It is not surprising that Origen, like many other fathers, was impressed by something from Neoplatonism. The starting point for Origen's exact reasoning about the physical empirical world was the assertion that inequality reigns in this world. For any Neoplatonist, inequality itself is a sign of imperfection. God could not be the creator of imperfection, because He is absolute justice, and He cannot be the source of either injustice or inequality. Origen says that the reason for this lies not in God, not in the primordial nature of the creature, but in its freedom. Every Christian will agree with this. There was nothing defective in God's creation, but the world of spirits and the human world became defective due to the fall into sin.

Speaking of the diversity of the surrounding world, Origen says that the fall is the cause of this diversity.

A just God created completely equal perfect rational creatures. Perfection, from the point of view of Origen, is associated with the concept of spirituality. Perfect means spiritual. He describes the primordial perfection of the creature as spirituality, incorporeality. The life of creatures consisted in the free contemplation of the essence of God - something against which the Cappadocian fathers would categorically oppose, asserting that the essence of God is incomprehensible, God is comprehensible only in His actions, energies emanating into this world. Creations contemplated the divine essence, enjoyed the love of God. Origen believes that gradually this spiritual rational creatures, as it were, "bored" with the contemplation of the Divine, enjoyment of the love of God, as a result of this, having freedom, they began to be "distracted", and in this distraction the fall into sin consisted. As a result of this fall, rational creatures lost their spiritual nature, took on bodies and received different names. Thus arose the physical world with diversity and inequality. But Plato and the whole physical world is nothing but a collection of ideas. Well, did the physical world and the things of the physical world also have an “ideal soul” contemplating the nature of the Divine? and they, too, were distracted from contemplation? About the material world, Origen does not spread much.

“The rational creatures, having cooled to divine love, were called souls and, as a punishment, were clothed with coarser bodies, similar to those that we own, and they were given the name “people”, while those who reached the extreme of evil deeds were dressed in cold dark bodies. and became what we call "demons" or "evil spirits." Strange logic. Demonic malice and rebellion against God is much stronger than the sins that people committed, but for some reason they did not receive a material body - they became cold, dark, but not physical bodies.

In the G-th book "On the Beginnings" he says that the soul receives a body as a result of previous sins as a punishment or vengeance for these sins. You have not yet been born, but you are already bearing vengeance for your sins. Thus, evil and injustice are the result of the freedom of created minds. The further they deviate from the contemplation of God, the more dense bodies they receive (although there is nothing dense in the devil, and he fell more significantly).

In Origen's cosmogony, it is necessary to consider, as it were, 2 levels of creation: at the first, highest level, matter does not exist, it does not have an independent reality, it arises as a result of the fall; there is a certain “thickening” of the spirit, the materialization of the spirit. This condensation is the second level of creation. The first act takes place outside of time, in eternity. God always creates, He is the Creator by nature, because He cannot help creating, He is not free from the creature. He is not transcendent of the creature(means immanent?). From here one step to pantheism.

The second act of creation as a fall, which entailed the diversity of the visible world, takes place in time, i.e. all this materializes in time.

You think that few people knew the Bible like Origen, but how far did he move away from biblical narrative- so know the Bible and create such an unbiblical theology! Among the people in Russia there was an expression "I read the Bible." Origen's attempt to reconcile the biblical understanding of creation with the philosophy of Platonism just led him to these conclusions, unacceptable from the point of view of church and biblical theology. Origen, moreover, perfectly understood the faith of his contemporaries, the people around him, and understood that many Christians would not like his reasoning, his conclusions; Gentiles and Neoplatonists will like it, but Church members won't like it. Therefore, all this metaphysics, which we have presented in a very simplified way, is carefully hidden in the eloquence of the syllable, the loftiness of the style of his writing, a certain poetry of the text. Despite this sublimity, eloquence, poetry, the content was completely captured by his contemporaries.

Therefore, today we cannot say that he was condemned in vain, because soteriology follows cosmogony - salvation is a return to the original state. He draws conclusions that are not those of church theology.

His book "On the Beginnings" is difficult to read, because everything is clothed in such a verbal philosophical form that in order to understand the content, one must strain very hard.

3.3.2 Soteriology of Origen

There was a deepening of the spirit. In Origen's system, a rather important place is given to salvation. For him, salvation is a return to the original contemplation, to unity with God. In this case, St. Irenaeus, for him salvation is a return to the initial state. For him, this is the purpose of creation and the purpose of the Christian faith, and even the ascetic life. How is salvation according to Origen carried out? There is and there was one rational creature that was not distracted from the contemplation of God and which, therefore, did not experience the fall and its consequences - this is Jesus Christ; not the Logos, namely Jesus Christ, who existed from eternity, like all other creatures, i.e. rather the human soul of Jesus Christ. Since He, like other rational creatures, did not abuse His freedom, He remained entirely abiding in love for God, retained His original and inseparable connection with the Logos. In the Incarnation, He simply became His created bearer - i.e. Jesus was that human soul in which the Son of God incarnated on earth at the appointed time. Direct incarnation of the Divine human life in Origen's system is unthinkable (as with the Neoplatonists), so the Logos, if incarnated, then united with something absolutely akin to itself.

What is the significance of Christ in the work of salvation? For Origen, His feat is more of an educational value than a redemptive value. The economy of salvation consists in this, without violating the freedom of the creature, without suppressing this freedom, thanks to exhortation, suggestion, gradually lead the world to a general restoration. Origen preaches this idea of ​​universal restoration in his writings and insists on it (otokktaotayak; wv savtuw ) - restoring everything. Restoration means the restoration of the original state, perfect unity with absolute goodness, the return to the original contemplation of God, to the contemplation of the divine essence. The idea, perhaps, is good, only people go to another world at the end of earthly existence by no means holy and purified, which means that the soul can again appear in this world - this is the idea of ​​​​reincarnation (the echoes come from India, and Origen and Neoplatonists). Origen's system here reveals a certain contradiction. Arguing that in the end the creation will return to unity with its creator, he, at the same time, insisting on the rationality of free creatures, on their transfiguration, does not speak about the element of human healing in this earthly life, in the Church, or even through suffering. Despite the fact that there will be unity and a return to the original, Origen raises the question that these creatures, having become spiritual, remaining free people, before them this freedom inevitably entails the possibility of a new fall and a new restoration - some kind of eternal circulation of time.

But when they (creatures) are purified, they rise again to their former state, completely getting rid of evil and from bodies. Then, for the second and third time, or many times, they are again clothed with bodies in punishment, for it is quite possible that different worlds have existed and will exist - some existed in the past, others will exist in the future.(On principles 2.8).

Again the idea of ​​reincarnation. This is not so much Platonism as Hinduism or Buddhism. In this cycle of reincarnations, history loses its beginning and end, and at the same time, it loses all meaning, because everything in this history is subordinated to the idea of ​​the need for permanent restoration. The cardinal question: if you are thinking about salvation, then it is not clear what place the God-man occupies in these repeating cycles - the Lord Jesus Christ, who descended from heaven for us and for our salvation and was incarnated from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary. How many times should He come, and should He come at all? What is being done with ecclesiology in the light of this soteriology? Is she alone in history or will there be many? All this, hidden behind verbal balancing act, bears the stamp of non-Orthodoxy. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Church reacted in this way to the teachings of Origen. On the one hand, it is not clear why Origen and his works were condemned posthumously in the 6th century under Justinian, this has never been done before. But the logic of the Church's actions can be understood. If all this died in the III century, then they would not return to this, but it continued.

3.3.3 Origen's doctrine of the Holy Trinity

If you look at his teaching on the Holy Trinity, then at first glance they seem to be Orthodox, but if you go deeper, you will see that there are elements of non-Orthodoxy, perhaps not as impious as those of Arius and his followers. In his doctrine of the Holy Trinity, Origen proceeds from the idea of ​​God as a kind of unity, or, as it was customary to say in the language of theology of that time, monads(Aristotle, Plato, Neoplatonists). Origen also uses the theological term "Trinity» He tries to describe the relationship between the Persons of the Holy Trinity. When he talks about these relationships, he uses the Nikeno-Tsaregrad term "ouoouoios". Moreover, it is not known whether he was familiar with the works of St. Yrenaeus of Lyon, this idea was weakly reflected in writing, but as an idea it lived. It is now impossible to find out whether he was quoting St. Yrenaeus, or is it his own reflections.

The Son is the second Person of the Holy Trinity, the "Son of the Father", "the perfect Image that reveals the Father to us." He has a comparison: in the Son, as in a mirror, we see a certain reflection of the Father. From the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father, Origen concludes that the Son is as eternal as the Father. This impressed the children of the Church of Christ. But sometimes he suddenly comes across some remarks that are tempted when reading - he says that the Son is a creation, like the rest of the world. Since in Origen's system God is a creator by nature, He always creates, and in Origen's system it is impossible to draw a line between the creator and the creature, between God and the universe, then both God and creation are eternal, so there is nothing surprising about what he says about eternity of the Son in relation to the Father.

He uses the word “birth” (yeweois) to the Son, but does not separate birth and creation from each other, for him these are phenomena of the same order. He refers both creation and birth to eternal realities. Origen belongs famous expression, which will later be used by many illustrious fathers of the Church: there was no time when the Son was not, He was always. If God always creates, then this can be said about any creature, including the Son and the Holy Spirit.

How is the birth of the Son from the Father accomplished? Origen finds it impossible to say anything definite:

"The birth of the Son is something exclusive and worthy" of God, for him no comparison can be found, not only in things, but also in the mind itself, so that human thought cannot understand how the unbegotten God becomes the Father of the only-begotten Son.

Affirming the unity of the essence of the Divine hypostases, using the word "6p.oouoi.oi;", characteristic of the Orthodox of a later era, Origen substantiates the relationship between the divine Persons, in which he lays an element of subordinationism. The Son is one being with the Father, but possesses this being "less fully than the Father." The Son is consubstantial with the Father, but the divine essence in the Son is, as it were, weakened, as it were diminished, because it reported the Father, and the Son is God as the only image of the Father. He calls the Father "6 © e6?", and the Son simply calls "Qeoc" - without the article. In one place he calls the Son “bshs; Qwc ,». He, of course, does not say that this is the second God, but an element of subordinationism is clearly outlined.

Speaking about the activity of the Logos, he says that in his activity He fulfills the commands of the Father, and this activity extends only to rational creatures. He is God, but He is inferior to the Father. He tries to clarify his thought: the Son cannot be addressed with prayers “in the highest sense of the word” (he believed that this was some kind of ecstasy). Because The Son is God, they turn to Him so that He, as the High Priest, brings them to the Father. After the Incarnation, people turn to Christ as the High Priest, but to say that the appeal to the Logos is of a secondary order ... Do Christians turn to the Logos as the second Hypostasis of the Holy Trinity? From all this we can conclude that this theology of Origen is not very terrible. This subordinationism is difficult to distinguish and feel, but it exists. Most importantly, Origen did not distinguish between creation and birth. For the first time, a sharp line was drawn between them by St. Athanasius of Alexandria, who made this distinction, which became the cornerstone of Orthodox theology. While Origen teaches about God as the eternal creator, the Church says that He is only the eternal Father. Church theology does not consider the existence of the created world to be a necessity, that God is forced to create, because He cannot help doing this. The Church considers God to be a simple being, i.e. self-sufficient and perfect, and He creates only according to His will. Between the transcendent, essentially absolute God and His creation, there is an insurmountable abyss that the Church Fathers were not afraid to emphasize. Origen tried to overcome this abyss when he affirmed both the consubstantial Son to the Father and a certain created nature of the Son. This is the weakness of his triadology. His errors about the creation of the world became a source of confusion for both Origen and his followers. His follower, who went further than Origen in subordinationism, was Aria.

Mother of Emperor Alexander Severus, he visited her in Antioch and gave her initial instruction in Christianity. In the year he was summoned to Greece on ecclesiastical affairs and, passing through Palestine, received ordination to the presbyter from Bishops Alexander and Theoktist in Caesarea. The Alexandrian bishop, offended by this, at two local councils condemned Origen and declared him unworthy of the title of teacher, expelled from the Alexandrian church and deprived of the priesthood ().

Having communicated this verdict through a district letter to other churches, he received the consent of all, except for the Palestinian, Phoenician, Arabian and Achaian. The acts of the Egyptian councils that condemned Origen have not survived, but according to existing evidence, the grounds for the verdict, in addition to the former guilt of “preaching a layman in the presence of bishops” and the dubious fact of self-mutilation, were the acceptance of ordination from outside hierarchs and some non-Orthodox opinions.

Origen transferred his scientific and teaching activities to the Palestinian Caesarea, where he attracted many students, went on church business to Athens, then to Bostra (in Arabia), where he managed to convert the local bishop Beryl, who taught incorrectly about the face of Jesus Christ, to the true path. The Decian persecution found Origen in Tire, where, after a hard prison term that destroyed his health, he died in the city of Tire.

Origen's life was wholly absorbed in religious and intellectual interests; for indefatigability in work, he was nicknamed adamant; the material side of life was reduced to the smallest: for his personal maintenance, he used 4 obols a day; slept little and fasted frequently; he combined charity with asceticism, especially taking care of the victims of persecution and their families.

Origen's writings

Origen's writings, according to Epiphanius, consisted of 6,000 books (in the ancient sense of the word); those who have come down to us embrace 9 volumes in the Migne edition (Migne, PG, t. 9-17). The main merit of Origen in the history of Christian enlightenment belongs, however, to his colossal preparatory work - the so-called. hexaple [έξαπλα̃, i.e. βιβλία].

It was a list of the entire Old Testament he made, divided into six columns (hence the name): the first column contained the Hebrew text in Hebrew letters, the second - the same text in Greek transcription, the third - the translation of Akila, the fourth - Symmachus, in the fifth - the so-called. seventy interpreters, in the sixth - Theodotion.

Origen's exegetical works embrace scholia (σχόλια) - brief explanations of difficult passages or individual words, homily (όμιλίαι) - liturgical conversations on sections of sacred books, and commentaries (τόμοι) - systematic interpretations of entire books of the Bible or their significant parts, which also differ from homily and greater depth of content.

Remarkable are Origen's comments on the Pentateuch, vol. Joshua (exemplary homily). Song of Songs, book of Jeremiah (Greek 19 homily).

According to Jerome, Origen, having conquered all in other books, surpassed himself in the book of the Song of Songs. Of the interpretations of the New Testament, significant parts of the commentaries on the Gospel of Matthew and especially John have been preserved in the original, in the Latin adaptation of homily 39 on the Gospel of Luke, ten books of commentary on the epistle to the Romans, etc.

Of the apologetic writings, we have come down to us in full form "Against Celsus" in 8 books. Systematic theology is represented by the treatise On the Beginnings (Περὶ ὰρχω̃ν). The treatise survives in a Latin translation by Rufinus, who, wishing to present Origen as more orthodox than he was, twisted many things. Among the instructive writings are "On Prayer" [Περι εύχη̃ζ and "Exhortation to Martyrdom" [Λόγοζ προτρεπτικὸζ ειζ μαρτύριον].

Teachings of Origen

The source of true knowledge is the revelation of Jesus Christ, who, as the Word of God, spoke both before his personal appearance - through Moses and the prophets, and after - through the apostles. This revelation is contained in Holy Scripture and in the tradition of the churches that received it successively from the apostles.

In the apostolic and ecclesiastical doctrine, some points are expressed with completeness and clarity, not allowing any disputes, while others only affirm that something exists, without any explanation of how and where; such explanations the Word of God furnishes to minds capable and prepared for the study of true wisdom.

Origen notes 9 indisputable points of dogma:

1. One God, creator and organizer of all that exists, the Father of Jesus Christ, one and the same in good and in justice, in the New and in the Old Testament;
2. Jesus Christ, the only begotten of the Father, born before any creation, who served the Father at the creation of the world and in the last days became a man, without ceasing to be God, who assumed a real material body, and not a ghostly one, really born of the Virgin and the Holy Spirit, really suffered, died and the risen one, who dealt with his disciples and was lifted up before them from the earth;
3. Holy Spirit, by honor and dignity attached to the Father and the Son, one and the same in all the saints of both the New and the Old Testament; but the rest of the Holy Spirit the apostles left to the scrutiny of the wise;
4. the human soul as having its own hypostasis and life and on the day of resurrection having to receive an incorruptible body - but there is nothing definitive in church teaching about the origin of the soul or the method of reproduction of human souls;
5. free will, which belongs to every rational soul in its struggle with evil forces and makes it responsible "both in this life and after death for everything it has done;
6. the existence of the devil and his servants - but the apostles kept silent about their nature and mode of action;
7. the limitations of the real visible world as having its beginning and its end in time - but there is no clear definition in church teaching about what was before this world and what will be after it, as well as about other worlds;
8. Holy Scripture as inspired by the Spirit of God and having, in addition to the visible and literal meaning, another, hidden and spiritual;
9. the existence and influence of good angels serving God in His accomplishment of our salvation - but there are no clear decrees about their nature, origin and mode of being in the church teaching, as well as about everything related to the sun, moon and stars.

In the doctrine of God, Origen especially insists on the incorporeality of the Deity, proving (against the anthropomorphites) that God is "light" not for the eyes, but only for the mind enlightened by Him.

In presenting his thoughts, Origen relies mainly on the evidence of Holy Scripture (in his most free philosophical work, Περὶ ὰρχω̃ν, there are 517 quotations from various books of the Old and New Testaments, and in the essay "Against Celsus" - 1531 quotations).

Recognizing all Holy Scripture as divinely inspired, Origen finds it possible to understand it only in a sense that would not contradict divine dignity. Most of the Bible, in his opinion, admits both a literal, or historical sense, and an allegorical, spiritual one, referring to the Deity and to the future destinies of mankind; but some places are sacred. books have only a spiritual meaning, since in the literal sense they represent something either inappropriate to higher inspiration, or even completely unthinkable.

In addition to the letter and the spirit, Origen also recognizes the “soul” of Scripture, i.e. moral or edifying meaning. In all this, Origen shares the view that prevailed before him, and that has been preserved to this day in Christianity, where he passed from the Jewish teachers, who even distinguished four meanings in Scripture. Actually, Origen is characterized only by extreme harshness, with which he attacks the literal understanding of some places in both the Old and New Testaments.

For a general assessment of Origen's teaching, it should be noted that with a real coincidence in certain points between his ideas and the positive dogmas of Christianity, and with his sincere confidence in their complete agreement, this agreement and mutual penetration of religious faith and philosophical thinking exists in Origen only in part: positive truth Christianity in its entirety is not covered by the philosophical convictions of Origen, who, at least half, remains a Hellenic who found in the Hellenized religion of the Jews (the strongest influence of Philo of Alexandria) some firm support for his views, but inwardly incapable of understanding the special, specific essence of the new revelation at the very determined desire to accept it.

For the thinking Hellenic, the opposition between material and spiritual, sensual and intelligible existence remained without real reconciliation, both theoretical and practical. In the flourishing era of Hellenism, there was some aesthetic reconciliation, in the form of beauty, but the sense of beauty was significantly weakened in the Alexandrian era, and the dualism of spirit and matter gained full strength, still sharpened by influences from the pagan East.

The goal of God's work on earth, from the point of view of Origen, is the reunification of all minds with the Logos, and through him with God the Father or Self-God (Αὺτόθεοζ).

But the minds of the flesh and coarsened in sensuality are unable to come to this reunion through thinking and mental illumination, and need sensual impressions and visual instructions, which they received thanks to the earthly life of Christ.

Since there have always been people capable of purely intellectual communication with the Logos, it means that the incarnation of Christ was necessary only for people standing at a low level of spiritual development. With this misunderstanding of Christianity in its main point, Origen also has another feature: the exaltation of the abstract-spiritual meaning of the Bible and the neglect of its historical meaning.

Further, Origen's one-sidedly idealistic individualism made it impossible for him to understand the Christian dogma about original sin or about the real solidarity of all mankind in its earthly destinies.

In the same way, in his view of the meaning of death, Origen is radically at odds with Christianity; for the idealist Platonist, death is a completely normal end of bodily existence as improper and meaningless. Incompatible with such a view, the apostle's statement: "the last enemy to be destroyed is death" Origen bypasses too easily, through an arbitrary identification of death with the devil.

Origen's teaching about the indispensable fatal reunion of all spiritual beings with God, which is difficult to reconcile with Holy Scripture and church tradition and does not have solid reasonable grounds, is in logical contradiction with the principle of free will dear to Origen, for this freedom presupposes: 1) the possibility of constant and the final decision to resist God; and 2) the possibility of new falls for beings already saved.

Although Origen was both a believing Christian and a philosophically educated thinker, he was not a Christian thinker or a philosopher of Christianity; faith and thinking were connected with him to a large extent only externally, without penetrating each other. This split was necessarily reflected in the attitude of the Christian world towards Origen.

His important merits in the study of the Bible and in the defense of Christianity against pagan writers, his sincere faith and devotion to religious interests attracted to him even the most zealous zealots of the new faith, while the antagonism between his Hellenic ideas and the deepest essence of Christianity, which he himself did not recognize, evoked in other representatives of this faith, instinctive fears and antipathies, sometimes reaching bitter enmity.

Shortly after his death, two of his disciples, who became pillars of the church, St. Martyr Pamphilus and St. Gregory the Wonderworker, Bishop of Neocaesarea - ardently defended their teacher in special writings against the attack on his ideas by St. Methodius of Patara.

Since in his teaching on the eternal or transtemporal birth of the divine Logos, Origen actually came closer to the Orthodox dogma than most of the other pre-Nicene teachers, St. Athanasius the Great in his disputes against the Arians. In the second half of the c. some of Origen's ideas influenced two famous Gregory - Nyssa and (the Nazianzus the Theologian), of which the first in the work "On the Resurrection" proved that everyone would be saved, and the second in passing and with great discretion expressed both this view and another thought Origen that under the leather garments of Adam and Eve one should understand the material body in which the human spirit is clothed as a result of its fall.

Through his writings, some of the ideas of Origen, combined with the ideas of the so-called. Dionysius the Areopagite, were transferred to Western soil by John Scotus Eriugena, who read Greek, and entered as an element in his peculiar and grandiose system.

In modern times, the theory of the "soul of Christ", probably borrowed by Origen. from his "Jewish teacher", was renewed by the French Kabbalist Guillaume Postel (XVI century). The influence of Ohbutyf is seen among the Theosophists of the eighteenth century. - Poiret, Martinez Pascalis and Saint-Martin, and in the 19th century. - Franz Baader and Julius Hamberger, who mistakenly took Origen's idea of ​​the final salvation of all for the general dogma of the Greco-Eastern Church.

Origen is the greatest theologian and thinker of the Eastern Church, who left an indelible mark on all subsequent dogmatic development. He was the first to create a system of Christian doctrine. From him come all the major ecclesiastical thinkers of the East during the entire early Middle Ages.

When evaluating Origen, many researchers choose not quite the right point of view. He is hailed as a philosopher and accused of a heap of unreconcilable assumptions. Meanwhile, Origen is only a religious thinker.

He knew Greek philosophy well, borrowed a lot from it; but in his system it plays a decorative role and serves the paramount interests of soteriology. It gives him not principles and not even a method, but a mood, noble boldness, holy freedom, which allowed him not to be a servant of a simplified understanding of Christianity, which grew up on the soil of the lack of culture of the main mass of believers. His constructions sometimes reveal traces of striking coincidence with sections of the Ennead; but, taken from the general treasury of the epoch, they serve Origen differently than Plotinus.

However, despite the fact that Origen's thoughts are directed by religion, his system can be called scholasticism just as little as the philosophemes of Philo and Plotinus.

Inner freedom saves her from the position of a slavishly reasoning ancillae theologiae (slave of theology). More precisely, Origen's system can be defined as a corrected, almost catholicized gnosis.

Origen follows the same path as the Gnostics, and this is the main key to understanding his doctrine. When reading the treatise "On the Beginnings", it is striking that Marcion, Valentinus, Basilides and others are the main opponents with whom Origen is considered, and that all the private topics of his reasoning are dictated to him