Voices and influences
Origen of Alexandria
The boy who wanted to die with his martyred father, and spent his life laying six Old Testaments side by side.
Summary
This site quotes Origen of Alexandria 623 times across 44 books, and lists 0 works.
- Lived died 253.
- Quoted here most in Romans: 148 of 623.
Origen of Alexandria
- Lived
- died 253
- Tradition
- Early Church
5 of 623 quotations
Own words
Quoted in full, because Origen of Alexandria died in 253 and these works are out of copyright. Each citation below names its edition and its year. A citation naming a modernised text means that edition makes its own editorial changes, and that edition's terms are not in this site's record.
Celsus does not quote any passages from the law which are apparently in contradiction to what stands in the gospel, so that we might compare them. He says, "And to a man who has struck one once one should offer oneself to be struck again."
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But we will say that we are aware that "it was said to them of old time, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,' " and that we have read also the words "But I say unto you, to him that strikes you on one cheek offer the other one also."
Exodus 21:24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, BSB
So then in the book of Numbers we find Moses taking an Ethiopian wife—that is to say, one who is dark or black. Because of her Mary and Aaron speak ill of him and say with indignation, "Has the Lord spoken to Moses only?
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Has he not also spoken to us?" Now on careful consideration the narrative here seems to lack coherence. What has their saying "Has the Lord spoken to Moses only? Has he not also spoken to us?" to do with their indignation about the Ethiopian woman?
Numbers 12:2 “Does the LORD speak only through Moses?” they said. “Does He not also speak through us?” And the LORD heard this. BSB
See what we are generally taught about God: "God is not as a man to be deceived nor as the son of man to be threatened," and we learn that God is not as man.
HOMILY 18.3, 253
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But other texts say that God is as a man: "For the Lord your God has taught you as a man teaches his son," and again, "As a man he takes on the manners of his son."
Deuteronomy 1:31 and in the wilderness, where the LORD your God carried you, as a man carries his son, all the way by which you traveled until you reached this place.” BSB
But consider if perhaps all people participate in him insofar as he is Word. This is why the apostle teaches us that he is sought within the seekers by those who choose to find him.
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He says, "Do not say in your heart, 'Who shall ascend into heaven?' that is, to bring Christ down; or, 'Who shall descend into the deep?' that is, to bring Christ up again from the dead. But what does the Scripture say? The Word is near you, even in your mouth, and in your heart."
Deuteronomy 30:14 But the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you may obey it. BSB
But meanwhile Jesus [Joshua] destroyed the enemies, not teaching cruelty through this, as the heretics think, but representing the future sacraments in these affairs, so that when Jesus destroys those kings who maintain a reign of sin in us, we can fulfill that which the…
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apostle said, "Just as we presented our members to serve iniquity for iniquity, so now let us present our members to serve righteousness for sanctification."What is it then that is condemned by them in this place as cruelty? It is this, it says, that is written, "Set your feet upon their necks and slay them."
Joshua 10:24 When they had brought the kings to Joshua, he summoned all the men of Israel and said to the army commanders who had accompanied him, “Come here and put your feet on the necks of these kings.” So the commanders came forward and put their feet on their necks. BSB
Influence, on the record
This site quotes Origen of Alexandria 623 times across 44 books.
This site’s own count of what it does with the voice
The life, in order
The life told as one accountfrom this site's record
Origen was about seventeen when the persecution under Septimius Severus took his father. Leonides was arrested at Alexandria in 202 and beheaded, and his property was confiscated, leaving a widow and seven children with nothing. Origen was the eldest. Eusebius says he wanted to go and die with his father and wrote him a note in prison telling him not to change his mind on the family's account, and that his mother stopped him by hiding all his clothes. He supported the family by teaching. Within a year, with the Christian teachers of Alexandria scattered or dead, converts were coming to him for instruction, and the bishop Demetrius put him in charge of the catechetical school. He was eighteen. He lived like an ascetic — one coat, no shoes, little sleep, fasting — and Eusebius reports that as a young man he took Matthew 19:12 literally and castrated himself. Modern scholars are divided on whether the story is true or a later slander, and Origen's own commentary on that verse argues firmly against reading it literally. His output was without parallel in the ancient world. A wealthy convert named Ambrose, whom Origen had won back from gnosticism, supplied him with seven shorthand writers working in shifts, copyists, and calligraphers. Jerome says he wrote more than any man could read. The Hexapla was the labor of decades. Origen set the Old Testament out in six parallel columns: the Hebrew text; the Hebrew transliterated into Greek letters; and then four Greek translations — Aquila, Symmachus, the Septuagint, and Theodotion — with marks showing where the Greek had more or less than the Hebrew. It was the first critical edition of the Bible ever made, and the ancestor of every apparatus in a modern study Bible. The complete work was too large ever to be copied; it sat in the library at Caesarea until it was lost. On First Principles was the first systematic theology. Against Celsus answered the most intelligent pagan attack on Christianity ever written, quoting Celsus so fully that the lost original can largely be reconstructed from it. His commentaries and homilies covered most of the Bible. He was ordained a presbyter by bishops in Palestine without Demetrius's consent, and Demetrius deposed and exiled him for it. Origen moved to Caesarea in 232 and rebuilt his school there. Under Decius, in 250, he was arrested and tortured deliberately and at length — stretched on the rack, iron collar, threat of fire — with orders that he not be killed. He did not recant. He was released when the emperor died, broken by it, and died at Tyre around 253 or 254, about sixty-nine years old. Some of his speculations were condemned three centuries after his death. His scholarship has never stopped being used. Sources: Eusebius, Church History VI; Jerome, On Illustrious Men 54; Origen, On First Principles and Against Celsus (Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 4); Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, vol. 2.
623 quotations across 44 books
Where this voice is quoted
But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and take his inheritance.’
“Or we may suppose this fulfilled in the case of those Jews who, knowing Christ, believed in Him.”
“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end,” they replied, “and will rent out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him his share of the fruit at…
“Like Caiaphas (John 11:49) so did they, not from themselves, prophesy against themselves, that the oracles of God were to he taken from them, and given to the Gentiles, who could bring forth fruit in due season.”
“The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son.
“The kingdom of heaven, in respect of Him who reigns there, is like a king; in respect of Him who shares the kingdom, it is like a king's son; in respect of those things which are in the kingdom, it is like servants and guests…”
Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited were not worthy.
“He saith to His servants, that is, to the Apostles; or to the Angels, who were set over the calling of the Gentiles, The wedding is ready.”
‘Friend,’ he asked, ‘how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ But the man was speechless.
“And forasmuch as he who is in sin, and puts not on the Lord Jesus Christ, has no excuse, it follows, But he was speechless.”
One of them, an expert in the law, tested Him with a question:
“All who thus ask questions of any teacher to try him, and not to learn of him, we must regard as brethren of this Pharisee, according to what is said below, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of mine, ye…”
“Teacher, which commandment is the greatest in the Law?”
“He said Master tempting Him, for none but a disciple would thus address Christ. Whoever then does not learn of the Word, nor yields himself wholly up to it, yet calls it Master, he is brother to this Pharisee thus tempting Christ.”
This is the first and greatest commandment.
“If the Lord had given no answer to the Pharisee who thus tempted Him, we should have judged that there was no commandment greater than the rest.”
And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
“Nor did He only teach the first and great commandment, but added that there was a second like unto the first, Thou shall love thy neighbour as thyself. But if Whoso loveth iniquity hath hated his own soul, (Ps. 11:5.)”
All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
“After this you ask how it is that "all the law and the prophets depend upon these two commands." For it seems that the texts show us that whatever was written in Exodus or Leviticus or Numbers or Deuteronomy depend "upon these two commands."”
Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples:
“The disciples of Christ are better than the common herd; and you may find in the Church such as with more ardent affection come to the word of God; these are Christ's disciples, the rest are only His people.”
“The Pharisees and the Scribes then would neither enter in, nor hear Him who said, By me if any man enter in he shall be saved; (John 10:9.)”
You blind men! Which is greater: the gift, or the altar that makes it sacred?
“Anyone who thinks that his own almsgiving, his own fasting, his own psalms and prayers are in themselves great and who, without good judgment, blesses them and does not reflect that it is just from such a heart that his almsgiving or psalms or prayers…”
So then, he who swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it.
“One of the Pharisaical traditions regarded oath taking. Some were swearing by the temple, others by the gold of the temple; some by the altar, others by the gifts of the altar.”
And he who swears by heaven swears by God’s throne and by the One who sits on it.
“In like manner the custom which the Jews had of swearing by the Heaven He reprobates. For they did not, as they supposed, avoid the danger of taking an oath by God, because, Whose sweareth by heaven, sweareth by the throne of God, and by…”
In the same way, on the outside you appear to be righteous, but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.
“As the scribes and Pharisees were previously called "full of robbery and intemperance," likewise here they are said to be "full of hypocrisy and iniquity" and are compared with "the bones of the dead and all uncleanness."”
And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’
“Once the prophets had departed this life, their bodies were in the tomb but their souls and spirits were in the "realm of the living."”
So if they tell you, ‘There He is in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here He is in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it.
“Or, when they allege secret and before unpublished Scriptures, in proof of their lie, they seem to say, Lo, the word of truth is in the desert.”
And they were oblivious, until the flood came and swept them all away. So will it be at the coming of the Son of Man.
“All who listen to the depths of the gospel and live it so completely that none of it remains veiled from them care very little about whether the end of the world will come suddenly and all at once or gradually and little by little.”
Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of his household, to give the others their food at the proper time?
“Or, he that makes progress in the faith, though he is not yet perfect in it, is ordinarily called faithful, and he who has natural quickness of intellect is called prudent.”
Blessed is that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns.
“"Blessed is the servant whom the Lord will find so doing when he comes." A great promise is extended to the Lord's faithful and wise stewards.”
Truly I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his possessions.
“That he may reign with Christ, to whom the Father has committed all that is His. And as the son of a good father set over all that is his, He shall communicate of His dignity and glory to His faithful and wise stewards, that…”
And he begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards.
“And every Bishop, who ministers not as a fellow servant, but rules by might as a master, and often an harsh one, sins against God; also if he does not cherish the needy, but feasts with the drunken, and is continually slumbering because his Lord…”
The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take along any extra oil. But the wise ones took oil in flasks along with their lamps.
“Or, The oil is the word of teaching, with which the vessels of souls are filled; for what gives so great content as moral discourse, which is called the oil of light.”
To one he gave five talents, to another two talents, and to another one talent—each according to his own ability. And he went on his journey.
“Whenever you see of those who have received from Christ a dispensation of the oracles of God that some have more and some less; that some have not in comparison of the better sort half an understanding of things; that others have still less; you…”