{"id":2734,"date":"2016-09-06T23:56:31","date_gmt":"2016-09-06T23:56:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/?p=2734"},"modified":"2016-09-06T23:56:31","modified_gmt":"2016-09-06T23:56:31","slug":"origen-on-adam-part-3-origen-on-the-bible-and-adam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/2016\/09\/06\/origen-on-adam-part-3-origen-on-the-bible-and-adam\/","title":{"rendered":"Origen on Adam, Part 3: Origen on the Bible and Adam"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"800px-Origen\"<\/a>This is the third\u00a0post in my series about Origen and “Adam.”<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n

Origen\u2019s Interpretive Strategies: Impossibilities and \u201cStumbling Blocks\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Any discussion of Origen\u2019s view of Adam and the Fall must begin with Origen\u2019s strategies for interpreting the Biblical creation narratives.\u00a0 Origen is often cited, and faulted, for an excessive reliance on fanciful allegorical Biblical interpretation.\u00a0 But Origen\u2019s method was crafted in significant part because of the challenges the Hebrew scriptures presented to any highly educated Greek Christian in the Second or Third Centuries.\u00a0 Origen read the Biblical texts carefully and knew, well before modern historical criticism or Darwinian science, that many of the narratives could not constitute literal history.\u00a0 At the same time, Origen did not simply write off those narratives as merely non-historical.[1]<\/a>\u00a0 Instead, Origen suggested that elements of the narratives should be taken as essentially historically accurate, while other elements should be understood as \u201cstumbling blocks\u201d intentionally included by the Holy Spirit.<\/p>\n

In On First Principles<\/em>, for example, Origen states that<\/p>\n

If the usefulness of the law and the sequence and case of the narrative were at first sight clearly discernible throughout, we should be unaware that there was anything beyond the obvious meaning for us to understand in the scriptures.\u00a0 Consequently, the Word of God has arranged for certain stumbling-blocks, as it were, and hindrances and impossibilities to be inserted in the midst of the law and the history, in order that we may not be completely drawn away by the sheer attractiveness of the language, and so either reject the true doctrines absolute, on the ground that we learn from the scriptures nothing worthy of God or else by never moving away from the letter fail to learn anything of the more divine element.[2]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

These \u201cstumbling-blocks,\u201d Origen said, included things \u201cwhich did not happen, occasionally something which could not happen, and occasionally something which might have happened but in fact did not.\u201d[3]<\/a>\u00a0 In particular, Origen argued that parts of the creation narratives obviously were not literal:\u00a0 \u201cwho is so silly,\u201d he asked, \u201cas to believe that God, after the manner of a farmer, \u2018planted a paradise eastward in Eden,\u2019 and set in it a visible and palpable \u2018tree of life,\u2019 of such a sort that anyone who tasted its fruit with his bodily teeth would gain life; and again that one could partake of \u2018good and evil\u2019 by masticating the fruit taken from the tree of that name?\u201d[4]<\/a>\u00a0 Nevertheless, he thought parts of the narratives might still be historically true:\u00a0 \u201c[s]ometimes a few words are inserted which in the bodily sense are not true, and at other times a greater number.\u201d[5]<\/a>\u00a0 Origen never fully articulated a method for separating the historical from the non-historical other than to \u201ccarefully investigate how far the literal meaning is true and how far it is impossible\u201d and then to \u201ctrace out from the use of similar expressions the meaning, scattered everywhere through the scriptures of that which when taken literally is impossible.\u201d[6]<\/a><\/p>\n

Adam and Eve as Historical, Or Not?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Although Origen did not regard the \u201cTrees\u201d in the \u201cGarden\u201d as literal things, in On First Principles<\/em> he did seem to suggest that Adam and Eve were both<\/em> real individuals and <\/em>symbolic of larger dimensions of humanity.\u00a0 For example, in DP<\/em> IV.III.7, in a complex passage commenting on Paul\u2019s distinction between physical and \u201cspiritual\u201d Israel in 1 Corinthians 15, Origen traces the historical lineage of the Israelites and says Jacob was \u201cborn of Isaac, and Isaac descended from Abraham, while all go back to Adam, who the apostle says is Christ . . . .\u201d\u00a0 Origen then noted that \u201cthe origin of all families that are in touch with the God of the whole world began lower down with Christ, who comes next after the God and Father of the whole world and thus is the father of every soul, as Adam is the father of all men.\u201d[7]<\/a>\u00a0 Further, Origen suggested, \u201cEve is interpreted by Paul as referring to the Church [and] it is not surprising (seeing that Cain was born of Eve and all that come after him carry back their descent to Eve that these two should be figures of the Church; for in the higher sense all men take their beginnings from the Church.\u201d[8]<\/a>\u00a0 In texts such as these Origen seemed to assume that Adam and Eve were real people even as they symbolize larger truths.<\/p>\n

Yet it is unclear whether in these texts Origen was simply reading off the literal sense of the Biblical text without commenting on its historicity.\u00a0 In other texts, Origen seemeed to limit the historical content of the Biblical references to Adam. \u00a0Most notably, in his major apologetic work, Against Celsus<\/em>, Origen responded to an early philosophical objection against what would seem a forerunner of Augustine\u2019s biologistic view of original sin by noting that the Hebrew term \u201cAdam\u201d is used generically for all of humanity.[9]<\/a>\u00a0 Here Origen said that \u201cthe subjects of Adam and his son will be philosophically dealt with by those who are aware that in the Hebrew language Adam signifies man; and that in those parts of the narrative which appear to refer to Adam as an individual, Moses is discoursing upon the nature of man in general.\u201d[10]<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0He concluded that \u201c[f]or in Adam (as the Scripture says) all die, and were condemned in the likeness of Adam’s transgression, the word of God asserting this not so much of one particular individual as of the whole human race.\u201d[11]<\/a><\/p>\n

Even here, Origen seemed to hedge his bets about the historicity of Adam.\u00a0 The apparent qualification in the translation quoted above from Contra Celsus <\/em>that scripture asserts the universality of sin \u201cnot so much<\/em> of one particular individual as of the whole human race\u201d is interesting. This could suggest that the historical reference is real, or probably real, but of secondary importance.\u00a0 In Migne\u2019s Greek version text, this phrase reads \u201c\u03bf\u1f50\u03c7 \u03bf\u1f55\u03c4\u03c9\u03c2 \u03c0\u03b5\u03c1\u1f76 \u1f11\u03bd\u1f79\u03c2 \u03c4\u03b9\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2 \u1f61\u03c2 \u03c0\u03b5\u03c1\u1f76 \u1f45\u03bb\u03bf\u03c5 \u03c4\u03bf\u1fe6 \u03b3\u1f73\u03bd\u03bf\u03c5\u03c2\u201d \u2013 \u201ctruly in this way about anything belonging to the former as about the entire race\u201d (my literal translation).[12]<\/a>\u00a0 Whether Origen meant here that the reference to Adam signifies primarily the entire human race and only incidentally a historical man, or that the reference is \u201ctruly\u201d only symbolic of the entire human race, is unclear. In any event, as Bouteneff notes, Origen could on different occasions speak of \u201cAdam\u201d both as a generic term for humanity and as an actual person in the genealogical line of Israel.[13]<\/a>\u00a0 It is probably best to conclude that Origen saw no reason to think a historical Adam was \u201cimpossible\u201d and that therefore that the literal sense should be taken as historical.<\/p>\n

A Dual Fall, Or Not<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

At the same time, in this passage in Contra Celsus<\/em> Origen also hints at a notion of the human fall that extends beyond the \u201chistorical\u201d:<\/p>\n

And the expulsion of the man and woman from paradise, and their being clothed with tunics of skins (which God, because of the transgression of men, made for those who had sinned), contain a certain secret and mystical doctrine (far transcending that of Plato) of the souls losing its wings, and being borne downwards to earth, until it can lay hold of some stable resting-place.[14]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

References such as this one led many ancient critics, and still convince many modern scholars, to conclude that Origen believed in a two-stage Fall:\u00a0 a first fall of preexistent souls from paradise and \u201cinto\u201d physical bodies, and a second fall of physical \u201cAdam.\u201d[15]<\/a>\u00a0 Bouteneff, however, sides with another line of scholarship that views these apparent \u201cstages\u201d of the human fall simply as different modes of discourse through which Origen seeks to explain the spiritual meaning of the diverse Biblical texts.[16]<\/a><\/p>\n

A full effort at resolving this interpretive disagreement is beyond the scope of this post, but there are passages in On First Principles<\/em> that could support either or both views.\u00a0 For example, at one point Origen seems to understand the cycle of fall and return as an allegory of every person\u2019s spiritual journey: \u201cwhen each one, through participation in Christ in his character of wisdom and knowledge and sanctification, advances and comes to higher degrees of perfection,\u201d God is glorified. [17]<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0Because God always offers forgiveness, \u201c[a] fall does not therefore involve utter ruin, but a man may retrace his steps and return to his former state and once more set his mind on that which through negligence had slipped from his grasp.\u201d[18]<\/a>\u00a0 In other places, though, Origen\u2019s text seems to echo the Platonic mythology more literally.\u00a0 For example:\u00a0 \u201cAll rational creatures who are incorporeal and invisible, if they become negligent, gradually sink to a lower level and take to themselves bodies suitable to the regions into which they descend; that is to say, first, ethereal bodies, and then aeriel.\u201d[19]<\/a><\/p>\n

The Importance of \u201cMatter\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

One hint at a constructive resolution of the ambiguities in Origen\u2019s views about the Fall might lie in Origen\u2019s lengthy discourse on \u201cmatter\u201d in Book IV, Chapter IV of On First Principles<\/em>, which serves as a summary of the entire treatise.\u00a0 Origen understood \u201cmatter\u201d to be \u201cthat substance which is said to underlie bodies.\u201d[20]<\/a> Origen noted that humans exist bodily in various states, such as \u201cawake or asleep, speaking or silent,\u201d that do not comprise a human person\u2019s \u201cunderlying substance.\u201d[21]<\/a>\u00a0 The philosophical problem Origen was confronting here is the relationship between the \u201cone\u201d and the \u201cmany\u201d (or the \u201cuniversal\u201d and the \u201cparticular\u201d), which is so central Greek thought, and his division between substance and particulars was classically Platonic.[22]<\/a>\u00a0 However, in this part of his treatise, Origen also was attempting to show how the Christian doctrine of creation differed from the Aristotelian idea, which may also be present in Plato\u2019s Timaeus<\/em>, of the eternity of the cosmos.[23]<\/a>\u00a0 Origen, like other early Christian writers, sought to counter this reasoning in light of the Biblical revelation about the temporality of the immaterial creation.[24]<\/a><\/p>\n

Although Origen wanted to deny the eternity of the material cosmos, he recognized that a radical disjunction between God\u2019s eternal being and the purposes of creation \u2013 as though at some defined point in time God suddenly decided to create matter \u2013 would compromise God\u2019s eternity and simplicity by introducing a temporal sequence into God\u2019s own life.\u00a0 Origen therefore borrowed another move from Platonism that would become a classically Christian<\/em> \u2013 indeed, eventually an Augustinian<\/em> \u2013 move:\u00a0 he located the unchangeable substance, the \u201cone,\u201d in the eternal mind of God, and separated it from the created matter that will receive its form.\u00a0 Here is how Origen summarized his conclusion:<\/p>\n

since, then, as we have said, rational nature is changeable and convertible, so of necessity God had foreknowledge of the differences that were to arise among souls or spiritual powers, in order to arrange that each in proportion to its merits might wear a different bodily covering of this or that quality; and so, too, was it necessary for God to make a bodily nature, capable of changing at the Creator\u2019s will, by an alteration of qualities, into everything that circumstances might require.\u00a0 This nature must needs endure so long as those endure who need it for a covering; and there will always be rational natures who need this bodily covering.[25]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Concerning Adam, in other words, from eternity past God knew Adam would fall, and therefore God created a material body for Adam appropriate to a fallen creature.\u00a0 While \u201cAdam\u201d is a changeable and imperfect being, God\u2019s intellect and foreknowledge are perfect and unchanging.\u00a0 Consistent with the \u201ctwo-stage fall\u201d reading of Origen, then, it is probably true that Origen envisioned the pre-material fall of Adam as an actual event in the ontology of creation, but there is also a sense in which that pre-material ontology of creation for Origen is an ideal<\/em> in God\u2019s eternal mind rather than a series of events in the \u201chistorical\u201d timeline of creation.\u00a0 The \u201cpre-material\u201d fall therefore was not so much part of a sequence of \u201chistorical\u201d events as a trans-historical reality that is manifested in history.\u00a0 As discussed in my next post, this ontological connection between the trans-historical and the historical ties directly into the relationship between Christology and theological anthropology.<\/p>\n

______________________________________<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> See <\/em>Bouteneff, Beginnings<\/em>, 103-107.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Origen, On First Principles<\/em>, trans. G.W. Butterworth (Notre Dame:\u00a0 Ave Maria Press 2013), IV.II.9.\u00a0 Following scholarly convention, this text will be referred to hereafter as DP<\/em>, the initials for the Latin title of the text, De Principiis.<\/em>\u00a0 The Section, Chapter and Paragraph numbers to the standard scholarly division of the text will be provided.\u00a0 Unless otherwise indicated, Butterworth\u2019s translation is from a Greek version of the text.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> DP<\/em> IV.II.9.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> DP<\/em> IV.IV.1.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> DP<\/em> IV.II.9.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> DP<\/em> IV.III.4.<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a> DP<\/em> IV.III.7.<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a> Ibid.<\/em><\/p>\n

[9]<\/a> Origen, Contra Celsus<\/em>, trans. Frederick Crombie (Buffalo:\u00a0 Christian Literature Publishing 1884), available at http:\/\/www.newadvent.org\/fathers\/0416.htm<\/a>, 4:40.\u00a0 Citations to this text will use the standard scholarly abbreviation C. Cels.<\/em> and will refer to the standard scholarly section and paragraph divisions.<\/p>\n

[10]<\/a> Ibid.<\/em><\/p>\n

[11]<\/a> Ibid.<\/em><\/p>\n

[12]<\/a> Jaques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae Cursus Completus, Series Graeca<\/em> (Parise:\u00a0 Imprimerie Catholique \u00a01857), Vol. 11, available on Google Books athttps:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=qAkRAAAAYAAJ.\u00a0 A Greek text file from Migne, from which I made my translation, is available at http:\/\/khazarzar.skeptik.net\/pgm\/PG_Migne\/Origenes_PG%2011-17\/Contra%20Celsum.pdf<\/a>.\u00a0 A good article describing Migne\u2019s collection is available on Wikipedia at https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Patrologia_Graeca<\/a>.<\/p>\n

[13]<\/a> Bouteneff, Beginnings<\/em>, 111.<\/p>\n

[14]<\/a> C. Cels. <\/em>4:40.<\/p>\n

[15]<\/a> See <\/em>Bammel, Caroline P. Hammond, \u201cAdam in Origen,\u2019 in Rowan Williams, ed., The Making of Orthodoxy:\u00a0 Essays in Honour of Henry Chadwick<\/em>, 62-93 (Cambridge:\u00a0 CUP 1989).<\/p>\n

[16]<\/a> Bouteneff, Beginnings<\/em>, 108.<\/p>\n

[17]<\/a> DP<\/em> I.III.8.<\/p>\n

[18]<\/a> Ibid.<\/em><\/p>\n

[19]<\/a> DP <\/em>I.IV.1.\u00a0 He continues:\u00a0 \u201cAnd when they reach the neighborhood of the earth they are enclosed in grosser bodies, and last of all are tied to human flesh.\u201d\u00a0 Ibid.<\/em><\/p>\n

[20]<\/a> DP<\/em> IV.IV.6.<\/p>\n

[21]<\/a> DP <\/em>IV.IV.7.<\/p>\n

[22]<\/a> For a discussion of this problem in Platonism generally, see Gerald A. Press, \u201cPlato\u201d and Lloyd P. Gerson, \u201cPlotinus and Neo-Platonism\u201d in Richard H. Popkin, ed., The Columbia History of Western Philosophy<\/em> (New York:\u00a0 Columbia Univ. Press 1999).\u00a0 For a discussion of the problem of particulars and universals in Platonism, see Balaguer, Mark, “Platonism in Metaphysics”, in Edward N. Zalta, ed., The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy<\/em> (Spring 2016 Edition, Sec. 3 (\u201cThe One Over Many Argument\u201d), available at http:\/\/plato.stanford.edu\/entries\/platonism\/#3<\/a>.<\/p>\n

[23]<\/a> See ibid<\/em>. (noting that \u201cwe absolute deny that matter should be called unbegotten or uncreated\u201d).\u00a0 For Aristotle\u2019s discussion of the eternity of the cosmos see Aristotle, On the Heavens, trans. J.L. Stocks (Oxford:\u00a0 Clarendon Press 1927), Books I and II, available at http:\/\/classics.mit.edu\/Aristotle\/heavens.2.ii.html<\/a>.\u00a0 The Hellenistic Jewish philosopher Philo, with whose work Origen was well-acquainted, was also very concerned about this question.\u00a0 See <\/em>Philo, On the Eternity of the World<\/em>, in The Works of Philo, trans Charles Duke Yonge (London: H.G. Bohn 1854-1890), available at http:\/\/www.earlychristianwritings.com\/yonge\/book35.html<\/a>.\u00a0 For a discussion of the relationship between Origen\u2019s thought and Philo\u2019s, see David T. Runia, Philo and the Church Fathers:\u00a0 A Collection of Papers<\/em>, Chapter Six (New York:\u00a0 E.J. Brill 1995).<\/p>\n

[24]<\/a> See<\/em>, e.g.<\/em>, Harry A. Wolfson, Patristic Arguments Against the Eternity of the World<\/em>, Harvard Theological Review 59:4 (Oct. 1966), 351-367.<\/p>\n

[25]<\/a> DP<\/em> IV.IV.8.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the third\u00a0post in my series about Origen and “Adam.” Origen\u2019s Interpretive Strategies: Impossibilities and \u201cStumbling Blocks\u201d Any discussion of Origen\u2019s view of Adam and the Fall must begin with Origen\u2019s strategies for interpreting the Biblical creation narratives.\u00a0 Origen is often cited, and faulted, for an excessive reliance on fanciful allegorical Biblical interpretation.\u00a0 But […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[37,19,78,50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-early-christianity","category-historical-theology","category-origen","category-science-and-religion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p824rZ-I6","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2734\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}