On First Principles

290 Pages·2013·63.867 MB·English

by  Origen, G. W. Butterworth (ed.)

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On First Principles
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"Origen of Alexandria truly was a figure crucial to the whole
development of Christian thought."
Pope Benedict XVI
"Vatican II taught that scripture is the soul of theology. Few
so fully embraced that conviction as did Origen. In this he
remains an inspiration for all who see the vital connection
among proclamation, catechesis, and theology. Thus it is good
to have Origens theological masterpiece, On First Principles,
available again. As Henri de Lubac writes in his splendid
introduction: 'It is the work of a good and brave man whose
supreme desire was to know the truth. '"
On First Principles
Rev. Robert Imbelli
Boston College
ORIGEN
Foreword by John C. Cavadini
Introduction by Henri de Lub3c
Christian Classics Notre Dame, Indiana
This edition ofOrigen's On First Principles is based on G. W. Butterworth's English CONTENTS
translation, which was first published in 1936 and then reprinted in 19G6 and
1973. The original footnotes have been converted into endnotes, scripture citations
have been changed to in-text citations, and occasionally the spelling and punctu Foreword by John C. Cavadini .......................................... vii
ation of the original text have been altered. Please consult the foreword by John
C Cavadini for additional editorial notes. Introduction by Henri de Lubac ......................................... xi
Translator's Introduction by G. W. Butterworth ........ xxxiii
Project Editor: Tania M. Geist
Preface of Rufinus ........................................................... lxxvii
List of Abbreviations ...................................................... .lxxxi
BOOK I
Preface .................................................................... 1
I. The Father .............................................................. 9
II. Christ .................................................................... 21
© 2013 by Ave Maria Press, Inc.
III. The Holy Spirit .................................................... 39
Foreword © 2013 by John C Cavadini
IV. Loss, or Falling Away .......................................... 51
V. Rational Natures .................................................. 57
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner VI. The End or Consummation ............................... 69
whatsoever except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews, without written VII. Things Corporeal and Incorporeal ................... 77
permission from Christian ClassiesT", Ave Maria Press", Inc., P.O. Box 428, Notre
VIII. The Angels ............................................................ 85
Dame, IN 46556,1-800-282-1865.
Founded in 1865, Ave Maria Press is a ministry of the United States Province of
BOOK II
Holy Cross. I
I. The World ............................................................ 93
I;
www.christian-classics.com II. The Perpetuity of Bodily Nature ..................... 101
Paperback: ISBN-lO 0-87061-279-4, ISBN-l3 978-0-87061-279-4 III. The Beginning of the World and Its Causes .. 103
IV. That the God of the Law and the Prophets,
E-book: ISBN-I0 0-87061-280-8, ISBN-I3 978-0-87061-280-0
and the Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ,
Cover image © Joel Carillrt f gettyimages Is One .................................................................. 117
V. The Just and the Good ...................................... 125
Cover and text design by John R. Carson.
VI. The Incarnation of Christ ................................ 135
Printed and bound in the United States of America.
VII. Th e H0 Iy Sp'l rl. t .................................................. 145
VIII. The Soul .............................................................. 151
IX. The World, and the Movements of
Rational Creatures Both Good and Evil,
and the Causes of These Movements .............. 161
X. The Resurrection and the Judgment ............... 173
XI. The Promises ..................................................... 183
.. 1 _._-------------------------
...........
BOOK III
Preface of Rufinus ............................................. 193
I. Free Will ............................................................. 195
II. The Opposing Powers ....................................... 275
III. The Threefold Wisdom ..................................... 291 FOREWORD
IV. Whether the Statement Made by Some
by John C. Cavadini
Is True, That Each Individual Has
Two Souls ........................................................... 301
V. That the World Took Its Beginning
in Time ............................................................... 311 G.W Buttetworth's translation ofOrigen's On First Principles,
VI. The Consummation of the World ................... 321 originally published in 1936 and twice reprinted (1966, 1973),
is the only complete English translation based on the critical
BOOK IV edition of the text (Koetschau, 1913). Though the standard
I. The Divine Inspiration of the Scriptures ........ 333 English translation, dassic in its own right, Buttetworth's has
II. Many, Not Understanding the Scriptures
been unavailable for many years. For reasons unrelated to its
Spiritually, and Interpreting Them
quality, teachers and individual readers found it increasingly
Erroneously, Have Fallen into Heresies .......... 353
hard to use.
III. Illustrations from the Scriptures of
Buttetworth translated the only complete attestation of
the Method in Which Scripture Should
the text remaining from antiquity, Rufinus's Latin translation.
Be Understood ................................................... 383
But, following Koetschau's edition, Buttetworth supplemented
IV. Summary of Doctrine concerning
it with translations of Greek fragments taken from various
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
sources. Where there was a Greek fragment, he divided the
and of the Other Matters Discussed
in the Foregoing Chapters ................................ 417 page between "Latin" and "Greek" columns, or even alternated
"Latin" and "Greek" sections, making for a presentation that
Original Bibliography ....................................................... 432 was difficult for any but the most advanced readers to follow.
Additional Bibliography by John C. Cavadini ............... 434 Further, Koetschau's presentation was predicated on a
Notes ................................................................................... 437 hermeneutic of thoroughgoing suspicion regarding Rufinus's
Index of Names and Subjects ........................................... 467 translation, alleging a systematic purge of opinions of Origen
Index of Scriptural Quotations and Allusions ............... 471 that by the late fourth century were not considered orthodox.
Buttetworth fully adopted, and even extended, Koetschau's her
meneutic of suspicion, as anyone who reads his Introduction
will easily discover. The average reader could miss the fact that
the "Greek" columns and supplements were not taken from
a continuous ancient source, but were, in effect, a running
vii
viii ON FIRST PRINCIPLES Foreword ix
polemic against the translation of Rufinus, using texts from tentative results; of the boldest possible speculation under
sources as hostile as the anathemata of Justinian as though taken in a spirit of loving self-effacement that chose, like
they were unbiased, objective witnesses to the original Greek. Moses, rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than
In the seventy-five years since initial publication, scholarly to enjoy the pleasures of worldly prestige (1.P'I); of the most
consensus regarding the reliability of Ru fin us's translation has specialized inquiry on behalf of the educated in which, nev
considerably shifted. Instructors who wanted to use Butter ertheless, the needs of the "simplest" among believers preserve
worth's On First Principles found the bias governing the origi the work from the impersonal coldness of elitism and fill it
nal presentation of the text increasingly glaring. This, coupled with warmth. Thus does this work display its configuration to
with the desire for an easier-to-read, more free-flowing text, the mystery of the Incarnation that forms its heart.
gave rise to other expedients, such as the use of partial trans In Book II, Origen offers perhaps the most sublime evo
lations, or the substitution of other texts by Origen, omitting cation of the Incarnation in patristic literature, the mystery in
On First Principles altogether. Many individual readers gave the face of which, "the human understanding with its narrow
up too. limits is baffled, and struck with amazement at so mighty a
This new presentation retains Butterworth's division of the wonder knows not which way to turn." Therefore, "we must
page into "Greek" and "Latin" columns only where there is a pursue our contemplation with all fear and reverence" (II.vi.2).
substantial, continuous attestation of the text preserved in the This "fear and reverence," diffused from contemplation of the
Philocalia, the anthology of Origen's texts assembled by Basil Incarnation into every nook and cranny of the text, also passes
of Caesarea and Gregory of Nazianzus. Otherwise the text of into the soul of the reader, and, almost imperceptibly, elevates
Rufinus stands alone. All other instances where Butterworth it. Such is the benefit of reading the most breathtaking work
included the translation of a Greek fragment are omitted from bequeathed to us by Christian antiquity.
the text, but the place of omission is noted in the text, and a
reference to the discussions of each fragment in erouzel and August 6,2013
Simonetti's Sources Chritiennes version is provided. Feast of the Transfiguration
We hope this reader-friendly and inexpensive edition John C. Cavadini
inspires its renewed presence in classrooms. We also hope it Department of Theology
will find its way more easily into the hands of individual read University of Notre Dame
ers, who can now read one free-flowing text rather than nego
tiating a thicket of columns, lines, and asterisks and daggers.
The rewards for those who read, not in the first instance
to wade into controversy, but to allow this work to settle into
their soul on its own terms, are great. The encounter with this
text leaves the soul with a memory of greatness-of archi
tectonic ambition tempered everywhere by declarations of
INTRODUCTION
by Henri de Lubac1
ORIGEN'S WORKS
When Origen died he left behind a massive body of writings
numbering close to a thousand tides. This vast treasure, con
sisting chiefly of explications of holy Scripture, was widely
used for more than a century without serious obstacles to
its diffusion. There was of course no lack of criticism. It had
appeared even during Origen's Alexandrian period, and it
redoubled immediately after his death. In subsequent gen
erations men like Methodius of Olympus, Peter of Alexan
dria, Eustathius of Antioch and Pacomius proved resolute
and sometimes violent opponents. In any event it was inev
itable that, as the labor of theological reflection proceeded
and orthodoxy was progressively defined, the imprecisions
and inadequacies in the exposition of the faith given by this
greatest of ante-Nicene fathers should grow increasingly more
noticeable. His very genius, which had made him play such
an important part in the elaboration of the dogma, made
him correspondingly more vulnerable afterwards. Nor, how
ever, did Origen lack defenders from the very start. Apologies
for him multiplied apace with the attacks against him. The
admiration expressed by men as significant and as different
as Athanasius and Eusebius of Caesarea could be taken for a
xi
..J
xii ON FIRST PRINCIPLES Introduction xiii
definitive guarantee of his position. His works spread rapidly purpose well. They are fluent, clear and pleasant to read, which
in the West as well as in the East, emerged unscathed from in itself is an advantage. Though their author claims to be
every skirmish and went on spreading. But from about 375 "incapable of rendering the movement of Origen's sentences
on everything changed. The massive offensive launched by with the eloquence" of Jerome, he does in fact often seem
St. Epiphanius's Panarion unleashed the first of the storms in to render the original with a genuine felicity. Of course, we
which Origen)s writings were to founder. In the sixth century, would want them to be more faithful, more literal. Still, there
the onslaught was still worse. The doctrinal excesses of the Syr is hardly a translation except that of the Periarchon which poses
ian monk Stephen Bar Sudaili, who had concocted a strange any really serious problems for the historian of dogma. The
system, by mixing various traits borrowed from Gnosticism translation of the commentary on the Epistle to the Romans
and the Cabbala with certain ideas taken from the Periarchon, is an abridgment, and openly admits it. What is more, it was
provoked Justinian's thunderbolts. The list of fifteen anathe done from a corrupt text and Rufinus himself tells us that
mata, drawn up by the Council Fathers of 553 outside their it caused him exceedingly painstaking labor. In other cases,
official sessions, was not the worst by far; for their sources are the translator does not hesitate to make slight adaptations.
in fact not Origen's works at all. There followed the physical Sometimes he paraphrases; less frequently he gives extracts.
destruction of his writings. It had begun at the end of the He does not hesitate to add to a passage what explanations he
fourth century; but this time it was carried out systematically. considers necessary for Latin readers. But since he honestly
The emperor-theologian was in earnest and so was the zealous informs the reader of the kind of liberty he is taking, we may
faction which had alerted him. Nearly all of Origen's work trust him when he writes on occasion "Simpliciter ut invenimus
perished. Only two letters and a few fragments remain of his transtulimus." These words refer to the homilies on Joshua, on
vast correspondence which originally had had four or five Judges, and on Psalms 36-38. With respect to the homilies on
sections. Of the exegetical works-although the principles Genesis, Exodus, and Leviticus the translation admits to some
of exegesis had not been involved in the controversy-barely expansion of the original, but without giving us any reason to
twenty have come down to us in the original. Searches through doubt its faithfulness to the substance. Together, the transla
the libraries of the Middle East could produce no more than tions are of incalculable value to us. When Rufinus set to work
"a few insignificant scraps." There is no way to measure such at the urgent request of his friend Macarius, convinced though
a loss. Epiphanius and Justinian have served the enemies of he was that his work could be of real value, he had no inkling
Christian civilization well. of the unrivaled importance of his task. It is fortunate indeed
Luckily there was a number of Latin translations. Some that he did not let himself be discouraged by the quarrel that
were made by St. Hilary, St. Jerome, and several others. The Jerome was trying to pick with him. He saved from final ruin
greater part came from the pen of Rufinus of Aquileia. Rufi some of the most precious monuments of Christian antiquity,
nus's translations have been unjustly maligned. Recent histo works destined to mold Latin minds for a long time to come.
rians who studied them have rightly reacted against an unduly Even so, more than one historian has refused to make use
severe evaluation of their worth: the translations served their of these translations. Such purism would be excessive even if
xiv ON FIRST PRINCIPLES Introduction xv
the translations were ten times more suspect than they are: evident as can be that not everything which came from the
it is too much of an invitation to laziness and simple lack of lips or the pen of this great man bears the same features, and
inquiry. All kinds of precautions are necessary of course. One that we cannot attach equal importance to it all. But nothing
must not press a particular expression too far. One cannot entitles us to think that all does not have the same sincerity,
rely upon a specific detail for fear that it may be a gloss. But the same conviction. One must not forget that the books on
when it is a question, not of a precise statement made in pass St. John's gospel and the Exhortation to Martyrdom are both
ing or of a specific point of doctrine, but of what constitutes dedicated to the same Ambrose. Origen was not one of those
so to speak the texture of thought and discourse, one stands curious and detached minds who "enter into sacred science
on firmer ground. In this case more than elsewhere, the real like a tourist goes into a city to look up its monuments." His
cure does not lie in abstinence but on the contrary in massive Christianity was not a speculation removed from life, nor a
utilization. In order to have a chance to reach the authentic dream in the margins of the concerns of the great Church. In
Origen, one must pile citations on citations. In that way the his highest meditations as in his most practical exhortations,
parallel passages control, define, and comment on one another, his Christianity was "committed," to use the language of our
especially when one examines, for example, a phrase in Rufi day. We shall see the proof below. Historians who have failed
nus's Latin, another in the Latin ofJ erome, and finally a third to recognize this fact imagine him an intellectual who put
preserved in the original Greek. Indeed such confrontations on a mask to speak to the common people, a man whose
are not rare; and from them there emerges an impression of interior life had its place outside the Christian community;
unity. Through all the variety of his works and through all these historians have gone astray in both their method and
the diversity of the versions in which they come to us, Origen their interpretation. In trying to pick the trump cards out of
looks most of the time surprisingly like himself Origen's work, they have not merely deprived themselves of
By the same token, this consideration rules out another sources of the first order; they have also distorted the meaning
sort of suppression. Scholars at times have depreciated and of the very sources they retained.
even systematically brushed aside not only the homilies which
we have only in translation but even those of which the Greek
HIS PIETY AND ORTHODOXY
text still exists, and also such writings as the Exhortation to
Martyrdom. These were considered simply as signs of a "popu
We must rid ourselves of the view, still far too common,
lar Origenism"; they were "popularizations," written for public
which presents Origen as almost entirely an intellectual, eso
consumption, and unworthy to have a share in the recon
teric and rationalizing, and see him as the man of the spirit,
struction of the true Origen synthesis. Only the Periarchon,
the apostle, the man of (he Church which he was above all
the Contra Celsum and up to a point the major commentaries
else. The daring of his genius must not blind us to the drives
could supply tried and true material. ... Discrimination of
of his piety. The shortcomings of his doctrine-inevitable in
this sort is willful. It stems from a mistaken idea of Origen's
a thinker of the third century who was the very first to build
personality and of the very nature of his thought. It is as
,
xvi ON FIRST PRlNCIPLES I In troduction xvii
a theology-must not make us mistake the pure quality of only "in the Church" which is filled with his splendor-the
his faith. Church, pillar and firm support of the truth, where the Son of
His intellectual formation, we must not forget, was Man dwells in fullness. From the moment when he becomes
entirely Christian; we might even say entirely ecclesiastic. a priest, he is aware that he "exercises the teaching office of
Many features of his homilies remind us of it, if need be. "We the Church, of which he bears the authentic character"; he
of the Church," he says; "I, a man of the Church, living in the wishes to be "the faithful steward of the divine mysteries."
faith of Christ and set in the midst of the Church. ..." Justin, He compares the writings of the apostles to the trumpets of
Tatian, Clement and others like them were converts; because Israel's army which reduced to rubble the walls of Jericho, the
of a turn of mind due to their early formation they remained whole machinery of paganism, and the systems of its thinkers.
philosophers. But when Origen affectionately proclaims him These, to him, are real idolaters because "they worship the
self "a man of the Church," he underlines something like an inventions of their own mind." He sees these Doctors of the
inborn quality that is the mark of his whole genius. When world in league with the heretics against the Christian faith,
he speaks of the "world," the word is often used in the sense an insult to its simplicity. This "simplicity of faith" is, in his
it has in the gospels-the world that passes away, especially view, altogether different from a simple adherence to "the bare
the evil world from which Jesus Christ comes to set us free. letter"; it is a positive virtue, a form of perfection. It is this
Despite the testimony of Eusebius, one may well ask whether simplicity which renders the bride of Christ so glorious, which
he ever figured among Clement's disciples-we are far too causes her to be without spot or wrinkle. Origen professes for
much accustomed to see him in Clement's tow. Clement after it a real worship; it is, he says, "the virginity of the soul." A
his conversion kept the vocabulary of the Greeks that had childlike and humble spirit follows in its wake.
already imposed itself on Philo, and then on Tatian; he still In Origen's devotion to the Person of the Savior one dis
called the doctrine of Moses and of Christianity itself by the cerns a note of tenderness that is all his own. It is not just
name of "barbarian philosophy." But Origen contrasts the that in his apology against Celsus he spoke of Christ with a
"barbarians" who were the Egyptians, with the "saints" who nobility mindful of Pascal. It is not just that in the Periarchon
were the great men of Israel. He had been introduced to the he exalted in particularly solemn terms the mystery of the
Bible on his father's knees, and he always maintained that Incarnation, that mystery more wonderful and more disturb
outside the Bible "there is nothing holy." Except in Contra ing than all the others, which "we must contemplate with
Celsum he almost never quotes from profane authors. He is fear and trembling." It is not only that in his commentary on
not a man who professes in private, a lecturer, but above all the Song of Songs he adopted the voice of the Church which
a catechist and preacher. He is one of those who ecclesiastice comes from the Gentiles, to cry out: "For because of thy word,
o
docent verbum. He is quite willing to include idolaters, here Christ, which I recognized as the true word, I came to thee.
tics and "philosophers" in a single sweeping condemnation. For all the words which were said to me, and which I heard
He knows that "the knowledge which converts men to lead a while I was in my own country, from worldly teachers and
holy life comes only from ... Chrise' and that Christ is found philosophers, were not true words. That only is the true word,