The sausage making involved in creating Christian "Tradition"
Jul 14, 2019 22:42:56 #
I received the following personal insight by David Bentley Hart, into the making of Christian Tradition in today's email version of "First Things," published every Sunday, and advertising itself to be: "America's most influential journal of religion and public life."
It explains why I rely only on the word of God, as His Holy Spirit inspired Prophets and Apostles recorded it in the Bible, for all pertinent and necessary spiritual truth.
Saint Origen
by David Bentley Hart
"A month or so ago I found myself hovering at the edges of a long, rambling, repetitive intra-Orthodox theological debate over the question of universal salvation, and specifically whether there exists any genuine ecclesial doctrine hostile to the idea.
It is an issue that arises in Eastern Christian circles with some frequency, for a number of reasons, some of them reaching back to the first five centuries of the Church, some the middle of the nineteenth century in Russia. Not that there really is much of an argument to be had on the matter.
Orthodoxy’s entire dogmatic deposit resides in the canons of the seven ecumenical councils—everything else in Orthodox tradition, be it ever so spiritually nourishing, can possess at most the authority of accepted custom, licit conjecture, or fruitful practice—and the consensus of the most conscientious and historically literate.
Orthodox theologians and scholars over the past several decades (Evdokimov, Bulgakov, Clément, Turincev, Ware, Alfeyev, to name a few) hold that universalism as such, as a permissible theologoumenon or plausible hope, has never been condemned by the Church. Doctrine is silent on the matter. So live and let live.
There are those who find this an intolerable state of affairs, because of an earnest if misguided devotion to what they believe Scripture or tradition demands, or because the idea of the eternal torment of the derelict appeals to some unpleasantly obvious emotional pathologies on their parts. The fiercest on this score are certain converts from Evangelicalism who bristle at the thought that Orthodox tradition might be more diverse, indeterminate, and speculatively daring than they signed on for. And so the argument went on, a familiar pattern.
Those keen to defend the gates of hell against every assault of hope cited the small handful of New Testament verses seeming to threaten everlasting damnation; those opposing responded that none of those periscopes, when correctly interpreted and translated, says what the “infernalists” imagine, and cited the passages proclaiming universal rescue. The eternal-damnation party invoked various “binding” authorities, such as the 1583 edition of the Synodikon; the total-reconciliation party pointed out quite correctly that Orthodox dogma is the province of the Seven Councils, not of some hoary collection of canonical pronouncements and para-canonical opinions. The hellions made vague appeals to “holy tradition;” the empyrealists (knowing “holy tradition” can mean unshaven priests to crypto-gnostic superstitions about departed souls rising through “aerial tollhouses” supervised by devils) were unimpressed.
I expect my own sympathies are showing, however. I found the debate boring, except at the one juncture where it infuriated me. It should not have done, but it touched upon an old sore point with me, and it was voiced by two of the disputants. It is the one argument that the membership of the Hellfire Club (as I came fondly to think of that merry band) believes unassailable: Did not the Fifth Ecumenical Council, in 553, name Origen of Alexandria (a.d. 185–254) a heretic, and condemn “Origenism,” and the very idea of universal salvation?
In point of fact, no—absolutely not.
It is true that something remembered by tradition as “Origenism” was condemned by someone in the sixth century, and that Origen was maligned as a heretic in the process; and that for well more than a millennium both those decisions were associated with the Council of 553 by the official record. Embarrassingly, we now know, and have for quite some time, the record was falsified. This is a considerable problem not only for Orthodoxy, but for the Catholic Church as well, inasmuch as the authority of the ecumenical councils must in some way be intimately—if obscurely—bound to some notion of the indefectibility of the Church’s transmission of the faith. (the prejudices of ecclesial fundamentalists are as impervious to historical fact as are the naivetes of young-earth creationists to science.)
It is the most shameful episode in the history of Christian doctrine. To have declared any man a heretic three centuries after dying in the peace of the Church, in respect of doctrinal determinations not reached during his life, was a gross violation of all legitimate canonical order; but in Origen’s case it was especially loathsome. After Paul, there is no single Christian figure to whom the whole tradition is more indebted.
It was Origen who taught the Church how to read Scripture as a living mirror of Christ, who evolved the principles of later trinitarian theology and Christology, who majestically set the standard for Christian apologetics, who produced the first and richest expositions of contemplative spirituality, and who—simply said—laid the foundation of the whole edifice of developed Christian thought. Moreover, he was not only a man of extraordinary personal holiness, piety, and charity, but a martyr as well: Brutally tortured during the Decian persecution at the age of sixty-six, he never recovered, but slowly withered away over three years. He was among the greatest of the Church Fathers,the most illustrious of the saints, and yet, disgracefully, official church tradition—East and West—commemorates him as neither.
I cannot really say what irks me more: that it happened or that, in fact, it really never did. The oldest records of the council (which was convened to deal solely with certain Antiochian theologians) make it clear those fifteen anathemas were never even discussed by the assembled bishops, let alone ratified, published, or promulgated. Since the late nineteenth century various scholars have convincingly established that neither Origen nor “Origenism” was ever the subject of any condemnation by the “holy fathers” in 553. The best modern critical edition of the Seven Councils—Norman Tanner’s—simply omits the anathemas as spurious interpolations.
The evidence suggests they were prepared beforehand by the vicious and insidiously stupid Emperor Justinian, who liked to play theologian, who saw the Church as a pillar of imperial unity, and who took implacable umbrage at dissident theologies. A decade earlier, he had sent ten similar anathemas of Origen (or what he imagined Origen to have taught) to Patriarch Menas; and on the council’s eve he apparently submitted the fifteen anathemas of 553 to a lesser synod of bishops, in hope of securing some kind of ecclesial approbation for them.
Or they may have been proposed at a synod nine years before. Whatever the case, it was only well after the Fifth Ecumenical Council’s close that they were attached to its canons, and Origen’s name inserted into its list of condemned heretics. In this way the anathemas “went on the books,” where they remain: peremptory, garbed in immemorial authority, and false as hell.
The fifteen anathemas are an odd relic of disputes of which we can now glimpse only the shadows. Few of them are even remotely reminiscent of Origen’s actual ideas, except in comically distorted form, and he is never named in any of them. Some of the ideas denounced vaguely echo aspects of the thought of Stephen bar Sudhaile (late fifth century); others have a faintly “gnostic” or “orphic” hue; still others might have been concocted by Aristophanes and Edward Lear during a long night’s assault on a distillery; but they all emanate from schools with no other historical traces. If the anathemas had actually been approved by the council, they no more constitute a serious condemnation of Origen than they do a recipe for brioche.
I am not certain why anti-universalists cling to them so pertinaciously, since they do not really condemn universalism as such. The first anathema speaks of the idea of a “monstrous restoration” (apokatastasis), but only the version of that idea from a particular “fabulous” account of the soul’s preexistence. The succeeding anathemas fill in the details: an undifferentiated substantial unity of all rational natures at the beginning and then, identically, at the end; the spherical shape of resurrected bodies (Christ’s included); christological speculations that more parody than promote Origen’s beliefs; caricatures of Origen’s views of angels and demons; and so on.
In any event, I stopped following the debate when I was sent a link to a fatuous screed by some converso polemicist who not only defended the fifteen anathemas, but insisted on praising “St Justinian’s” rebukes of “Origen.” Admittedly, technically he was within his rights. East or West, all Christians are burdened with the absurdities of Christian imperial history.
Any conception of orthodoxy that obliges one to grant the title of “saint” to a murderous thug like Justinian while denying it to a man as holy as Origen is obviously—indeed ludicrously—self-refuting. And one does not defend tradition well by making it appear not only atrociously unjust, but utterly ridiculous."
First Things
It explains why I rely only on the word of God, as His Holy Spirit inspired Prophets and Apostles recorded it in the Bible, for all pertinent and necessary spiritual truth.
Saint Origen
by David Bentley Hart
"A month or so ago I found myself hovering at the edges of a long, rambling, repetitive intra-Orthodox theological debate over the question of universal salvation, and specifically whether there exists any genuine ecclesial doctrine hostile to the idea.
It is an issue that arises in Eastern Christian circles with some frequency, for a number of reasons, some of them reaching back to the first five centuries of the Church, some the middle of the nineteenth century in Russia. Not that there really is much of an argument to be had on the matter.
Orthodoxy’s entire dogmatic deposit resides in the canons of the seven ecumenical councils—everything else in Orthodox tradition, be it ever so spiritually nourishing, can possess at most the authority of accepted custom, licit conjecture, or fruitful practice—and the consensus of the most conscientious and historically literate.
Orthodox theologians and scholars over the past several decades (Evdokimov, Bulgakov, Clément, Turincev, Ware, Alfeyev, to name a few) hold that universalism as such, as a permissible theologoumenon or plausible hope, has never been condemned by the Church. Doctrine is silent on the matter. So live and let live.
There are those who find this an intolerable state of affairs, because of an earnest if misguided devotion to what they believe Scripture or tradition demands, or because the idea of the eternal torment of the derelict appeals to some unpleasantly obvious emotional pathologies on their parts. The fiercest on this score are certain converts from Evangelicalism who bristle at the thought that Orthodox tradition might be more diverse, indeterminate, and speculatively daring than they signed on for. And so the argument went on, a familiar pattern.
Those keen to defend the gates of hell against every assault of hope cited the small handful of New Testament verses seeming to threaten everlasting damnation; those opposing responded that none of those periscopes, when correctly interpreted and translated, says what the “infernalists” imagine, and cited the passages proclaiming universal rescue. The eternal-damnation party invoked various “binding” authorities, such as the 1583 edition of the Synodikon; the total-reconciliation party pointed out quite correctly that Orthodox dogma is the province of the Seven Councils, not of some hoary collection of canonical pronouncements and para-canonical opinions. The hellions made vague appeals to “holy tradition;” the empyrealists (knowing “holy tradition” can mean unshaven priests to crypto-gnostic superstitions about departed souls rising through “aerial tollhouses” supervised by devils) were unimpressed.
I expect my own sympathies are showing, however. I found the debate boring, except at the one juncture where it infuriated me. It should not have done, but it touched upon an old sore point with me, and it was voiced by two of the disputants. It is the one argument that the membership of the Hellfire Club (as I came fondly to think of that merry band) believes unassailable: Did not the Fifth Ecumenical Council, in 553, name Origen of Alexandria (a.d. 185–254) a heretic, and condemn “Origenism,” and the very idea of universal salvation?
In point of fact, no—absolutely not.
It is true that something remembered by tradition as “Origenism” was condemned by someone in the sixth century, and that Origen was maligned as a heretic in the process; and that for well more than a millennium both those decisions were associated with the Council of 553 by the official record. Embarrassingly, we now know, and have for quite some time, the record was falsified. This is a considerable problem not only for Orthodoxy, but for the Catholic Church as well, inasmuch as the authority of the ecumenical councils must in some way be intimately—if obscurely—bound to some notion of the indefectibility of the Church’s transmission of the faith. (the prejudices of ecclesial fundamentalists are as impervious to historical fact as are the naivetes of young-earth creationists to science.)
It is the most shameful episode in the history of Christian doctrine. To have declared any man a heretic three centuries after dying in the peace of the Church, in respect of doctrinal determinations not reached during his life, was a gross violation of all legitimate canonical order; but in Origen’s case it was especially loathsome. After Paul, there is no single Christian figure to whom the whole tradition is more indebted.
It was Origen who taught the Church how to read Scripture as a living mirror of Christ, who evolved the principles of later trinitarian theology and Christology, who majestically set the standard for Christian apologetics, who produced the first and richest expositions of contemplative spirituality, and who—simply said—laid the foundation of the whole edifice of developed Christian thought. Moreover, he was not only a man of extraordinary personal holiness, piety, and charity, but a martyr as well: Brutally tortured during the Decian persecution at the age of sixty-six, he never recovered, but slowly withered away over three years. He was among the greatest of the Church Fathers,the most illustrious of the saints, and yet, disgracefully, official church tradition—East and West—commemorates him as neither.
I cannot really say what irks me more: that it happened or that, in fact, it really never did. The oldest records of the council (which was convened to deal solely with certain Antiochian theologians) make it clear those fifteen anathemas were never even discussed by the assembled bishops, let alone ratified, published, or promulgated. Since the late nineteenth century various scholars have convincingly established that neither Origen nor “Origenism” was ever the subject of any condemnation by the “holy fathers” in 553. The best modern critical edition of the Seven Councils—Norman Tanner’s—simply omits the anathemas as spurious interpolations.
The evidence suggests they were prepared beforehand by the vicious and insidiously stupid Emperor Justinian, who liked to play theologian, who saw the Church as a pillar of imperial unity, and who took implacable umbrage at dissident theologies. A decade earlier, he had sent ten similar anathemas of Origen (or what he imagined Origen to have taught) to Patriarch Menas; and on the council’s eve he apparently submitted the fifteen anathemas of 553 to a lesser synod of bishops, in hope of securing some kind of ecclesial approbation for them.
Or they may have been proposed at a synod nine years before. Whatever the case, it was only well after the Fifth Ecumenical Council’s close that they were attached to its canons, and Origen’s name inserted into its list of condemned heretics. In this way the anathemas “went on the books,” where they remain: peremptory, garbed in immemorial authority, and false as hell.
The fifteen anathemas are an odd relic of disputes of which we can now glimpse only the shadows. Few of them are even remotely reminiscent of Origen’s actual ideas, except in comically distorted form, and he is never named in any of them. Some of the ideas denounced vaguely echo aspects of the thought of Stephen bar Sudhaile (late fifth century); others have a faintly “gnostic” or “orphic” hue; still others might have been concocted by Aristophanes and Edward Lear during a long night’s assault on a distillery; but they all emanate from schools with no other historical traces. If the anathemas had actually been approved by the council, they no more constitute a serious condemnation of Origen than they do a recipe for brioche.
I am not certain why anti-universalists cling to them so pertinaciously, since they do not really condemn universalism as such. The first anathema speaks of the idea of a “monstrous restoration” (apokatastasis), but only the version of that idea from a particular “fabulous” account of the soul’s preexistence. The succeeding anathemas fill in the details: an undifferentiated substantial unity of all rational natures at the beginning and then, identically, at the end; the spherical shape of resurrected bodies (Christ’s included); christological speculations that more parody than promote Origen’s beliefs; caricatures of Origen’s views of angels and demons; and so on.
In any event, I stopped following the debate when I was sent a link to a fatuous screed by some converso polemicist who not only defended the fifteen anathemas, but insisted on praising “St Justinian’s” rebukes of “Origen.” Admittedly, technically he was within his rights. East or West, all Christians are burdened with the absurdities of Christian imperial history.
Any conception of orthodoxy that obliges one to grant the title of “saint” to a murderous thug like Justinian while denying it to a man as holy as Origen is obviously—indeed ludicrously—self-refuting. And one does not defend tradition well by making it appear not only atrociously unjust, but utterly ridiculous."
First Things
Jul 15, 2019 00:54:13 #
To summarize this article: "Do not judge lest you be judged." Excellent history of the inner machinations of the Church and their conclusions. Fascinating how the mind of even the most religious can obscure truth in the name of truth. That Origin was labeled as he was is simply wrong by the word of God and needs no greater explanation.
Jul 15, 2019 10:15:57 #
Thanks for your comment, rumi,
Origen is quite complex:
https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/people/scholarsandscientists/origen.html
"We who by our prayers destroy all demons which stir up wars, violate oaths, and disturb the peace are of more help to the emperors than those who seem to be doing the fighting." (Origen)
...and who was Origen?
This third century "religious fanatic" gave up his job, slept on the floor, ate no meat, drank no wine, fasted twice a week, owned no shoes, and reportedly castrated himself for the faith.
He was also the most prolific scholar of his age (with hundreds of works to his credit), an early Christian philosopher, with a pagan education in the philosophy of men, which he combined with his knowledge as a profound student of the Bible.
Child prodigy Origen Adamantius ("man of steel") was born near Alexandria about A.D. 185. The oldest of seven children in a Christian home, he grew up learning the Bible and the meaning of commitment. In 202 when his father, Leonidas, was beheaded for his Christian beliefs, Origen wanted to die as a martyr, too. But his mother prevented him from even leaving the house—by hiding his clothes.
To support his family, the 18-year-old Origen opened a grammar school, copied texts, and instructed catechumens (those seeking to become members of the church). He himself studied under the pagan philosopher Ammonius Saccas in order to better defend his faith against pagan arguments.
When a rich convert supplied him with secretaries, he began to write.
Timeline:
110
Ignatius of Antioch martyred
115
Polycarp martyred
180
Irenaeus writes Against Heresies
185
Origen born
254
Origen dies
303
"Great Persecution" begins under Diocletian
Bible student and critic:
Origen worked for 20 years on his Hexapla, a massive work of Old Testament analysis written to answer Jewish and Gnostic critics of Christianity. An examination of Biblical texts, it had six parallel columns: one in Hebrew, and the other five in various Greek translations, including one he found at Jericho in a jar. It became an important step in the development of the Christian canon and scriptural translation, but unfortunately it was destroyed. So massive was it that scholars doubt anyone ever copied it entirely.
This first Bible scholar analyzed the Scriptures on three levels: the literal, the moral, and the allegorical. As he put it, "For just as man consists of body, soul, and spirit, so in the same way does the Scripture." Origen, in fact, preferred the allegorical not only because it allowed him more spiritual interpretations, but many passages he found impossible to understand literally:
"Now what man of intelligence will believe that the first and the second and the third day … existed without the sun and moon and stars?"
Rather than literally believing God's word as written, he chose often to spiritualize it allegorically, into a meaning of his choice, thus obscuring the meaning of many prophecies that had been inspired by the Holy Spirit.
In any event, Origen's method of interpretation became the standard in the Middle Ages, and is to this day in the "sacramental" hierarchies/congregations. Origen's main work, De Principiis (On First Principles), was the first systematic exposition of Christian theology ever written. In it he created a Christian philosophy, synthesizing Greek philosophical technique and biblical assumptions.
Add to these massive works his homilies and commentaries, and it's clear why he was reputed to have kept seven secretaries busy and caused Jerome (c.354–420) to say in frustrated admiration, "Has anyone read everything that Origen wrote?"
Heretical church father?
Origen has always been controversial. His reported self-mutilation, in response to Matthew 19:12 ("… there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven….") was condemned as a drastic misinterpretation of the text. In Palestine he preached without being ordained and was so condemned by his bishop, Demetrius. When on a second trip, he was ordained by the same bishops who had invited him to speak the first time, Demetrius sent him into exile.
Some of his writings are thought to have been hypothetical, Origen did teach that all spirits were created equal, existed before birth, and then fell from grace. Furthermore, "those rational beings who sinned and on account fell from the state in which they were, in proportion to their particular sins, were enslaved in bodies as punishment"—some demons, some men, and some angels. He also believed that all spirits, even Satan, could be saved. "The power of choosing between good and evil is within the reach of all," he wrote.
Most notably, however, Origen described the Trinity as a hierarchy, not as an equality of Father, Son, and Spirit. Although he attacked Gnostic beliefs, like them, he rejected the goodness of material creation.
Three centuries after his death, the Council of Constantinople (553) pronounced him a heretic: "Whoever says or thinks that the punishment of demons and the wicked will not be eternal … let him be anathema."
Some contend that Origen was merely trying to frame the faith in the ideas of his day; still his works were suppressed following his condemnation, so modern judgment is impossible.
Despite such condemnation, Origen said, "I want to be a man of the church … to be called … of Christ." His Contra Celsum, in fact, is one of the finest defenses of Christianity produced in the early church.
Answering the charge that Christians, by refusing military service, fail the test of good citizenship, he wrote, "We who by our prayers destroy all demons which stir up wars, violate oaths, and disturb the peace are of more help to the emperors than those who seem to be doing the fighting."
The authorities, however, were not convinced: in 250 the emperor Decius had Origen imprisoned and tortured. He was deliberately kept alive in the hope that he would renounce his faith. But Decius died first and Origen went free. His health broken, Origen died shortly after his release.
Christianity Today
From: 131 Christians Everyone Should Know
The First Bible Teachers;
Related Christian History Issue 80
2003
Origen is quite complex:
https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/people/scholarsandscientists/origen.html
"We who by our prayers destroy all demons which stir up wars, violate oaths, and disturb the peace are of more help to the emperors than those who seem to be doing the fighting." (Origen)
...and who was Origen?
This third century "religious fanatic" gave up his job, slept on the floor, ate no meat, drank no wine, fasted twice a week, owned no shoes, and reportedly castrated himself for the faith.
He was also the most prolific scholar of his age (with hundreds of works to his credit), an early Christian philosopher, with a pagan education in the philosophy of men, which he combined with his knowledge as a profound student of the Bible.
Child prodigy Origen Adamantius ("man of steel") was born near Alexandria about A.D. 185. The oldest of seven children in a Christian home, he grew up learning the Bible and the meaning of commitment. In 202 when his father, Leonidas, was beheaded for his Christian beliefs, Origen wanted to die as a martyr, too. But his mother prevented him from even leaving the house—by hiding his clothes.
To support his family, the 18-year-old Origen opened a grammar school, copied texts, and instructed catechumens (those seeking to become members of the church). He himself studied under the pagan philosopher Ammonius Saccas in order to better defend his faith against pagan arguments.
When a rich convert supplied him with secretaries, he began to write.
Timeline:
110
Ignatius of Antioch martyred
115
Polycarp martyred
180
Irenaeus writes Against Heresies
185
Origen born
254
Origen dies
303
"Great Persecution" begins under Diocletian
Bible student and critic:
Origen worked for 20 years on his Hexapla, a massive work of Old Testament analysis written to answer Jewish and Gnostic critics of Christianity. An examination of Biblical texts, it had six parallel columns: one in Hebrew, and the other five in various Greek translations, including one he found at Jericho in a jar. It became an important step in the development of the Christian canon and scriptural translation, but unfortunately it was destroyed. So massive was it that scholars doubt anyone ever copied it entirely.
This first Bible scholar analyzed the Scriptures on three levels: the literal, the moral, and the allegorical. As he put it, "For just as man consists of body, soul, and spirit, so in the same way does the Scripture." Origen, in fact, preferred the allegorical not only because it allowed him more spiritual interpretations, but many passages he found impossible to understand literally:
"Now what man of intelligence will believe that the first and the second and the third day … existed without the sun and moon and stars?"
Rather than literally believing God's word as written, he chose often to spiritualize it allegorically, into a meaning of his choice, thus obscuring the meaning of many prophecies that had been inspired by the Holy Spirit.
In any event, Origen's method of interpretation became the standard in the Middle Ages, and is to this day in the "sacramental" hierarchies/congregations. Origen's main work, De Principiis (On First Principles), was the first systematic exposition of Christian theology ever written. In it he created a Christian philosophy, synthesizing Greek philosophical technique and biblical assumptions.
Add to these massive works his homilies and commentaries, and it's clear why he was reputed to have kept seven secretaries busy and caused Jerome (c.354–420) to say in frustrated admiration, "Has anyone read everything that Origen wrote?"
Heretical church father?
Origen has always been controversial. His reported self-mutilation, in response to Matthew 19:12 ("… there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven….") was condemned as a drastic misinterpretation of the text. In Palestine he preached without being ordained and was so condemned by his bishop, Demetrius. When on a second trip, he was ordained by the same bishops who had invited him to speak the first time, Demetrius sent him into exile.
Some of his writings are thought to have been hypothetical, Origen did teach that all spirits were created equal, existed before birth, and then fell from grace. Furthermore, "those rational beings who sinned and on account fell from the state in which they were, in proportion to their particular sins, were enslaved in bodies as punishment"—some demons, some men, and some angels. He also believed that all spirits, even Satan, could be saved. "The power of choosing between good and evil is within the reach of all," he wrote.
Most notably, however, Origen described the Trinity as a hierarchy, not as an equality of Father, Son, and Spirit. Although he attacked Gnostic beliefs, like them, he rejected the goodness of material creation.
Three centuries after his death, the Council of Constantinople (553) pronounced him a heretic: "Whoever says or thinks that the punishment of demons and the wicked will not be eternal … let him be anathema."
Some contend that Origen was merely trying to frame the faith in the ideas of his day; still his works were suppressed following his condemnation, so modern judgment is impossible.
Despite such condemnation, Origen said, "I want to be a man of the church … to be called … of Christ." His Contra Celsum, in fact, is one of the finest defenses of Christianity produced in the early church.
Answering the charge that Christians, by refusing military service, fail the test of good citizenship, he wrote, "We who by our prayers destroy all demons which stir up wars, violate oaths, and disturb the peace are of more help to the emperors than those who seem to be doing the fighting."
The authorities, however, were not convinced: in 250 the emperor Decius had Origen imprisoned and tortured. He was deliberately kept alive in the hope that he would renounce his faith. But Decius died first and Origen went free. His health broken, Origen died shortly after his release.
Christianity Today
From: 131 Christians Everyone Should Know
The First Bible Teachers;
Related Christian History Issue 80
2003
rumitoid wrote:
To summarize this article: "Do not judge lest you be judged." Excellent history of the inner machinations of the Church and their conclusions. Fascinating how the mind of even the most religious can obscure truth in the name of truth. That Origin was labeled as he was is simply wrong by the word of God and needs no greater explanation.
Jul 15, 2019 12:54:02 #
Zemirah wrote:
Thanks for your comment, rumi, br br Origen is q... (show quote)
Thanks for the research and information.
Jul 18, 2019 23:34:26 #
Zemirah wrote:
Thanks for your comment, rumi, br br Origen is q... (show quote)
Wow! Thank you! I really like this guy. Complicated. A little perverse. But holy.
Aug 1, 2019 20:31:47 #
I believe all God's devoted are complicated to one degree or another, and some more perverse than others. but all our covering of righteousness was bought, paid for, and purchased by Him alone.
An unplanned event occurred on my way to the computer, rumitoid, or I would have responded sooner.
I fell backward in my home on 17th of July, - lost balance when I leaned over to pick something up from the floor, holding onto walker with one hand, struck back of head on edge of computer table (six large metal staples in back of head at emergency room) brain intact - according to scan.
One glance at wrist told me that was worthless for crawling, so I shuffled/crawled over to cell phone providentially recharging on a stand 4' away, and was able to reach 9/11.
I crawled through living room, dining room, vestibule, to front door (blood streaming down both shoulders), and was able to reach up, and unlock deadbolt just as ambulance personnel came running to front door w/long steel tool to force way in, if necessary.
In after thought, it was all rather dramatic, though I remain calm during a crisis (through the grace of God), and pretend to be calm later.
Staples were removed on 7/30, (brain still theoretically intact).
1st scheduled surgery on wrist, was 24th, my birthday, and the 2nd was yesterday on 7/31st.
I've been happily on hydrocodone for pain, since 7/17 fall.
Know you are loved, in Jesus, in whatever circumstances you place yourself.
An unplanned event occurred on my way to the computer, rumitoid, or I would have responded sooner.
I fell backward in my home on 17th of July, - lost balance when I leaned over to pick something up from the floor, holding onto walker with one hand, struck back of head on edge of computer table (six large metal staples in back of head at emergency room) brain intact - according to scan.
One glance at wrist told me that was worthless for crawling, so I shuffled/crawled over to cell phone providentially recharging on a stand 4' away, and was able to reach 9/11.
I crawled through living room, dining room, vestibule, to front door (blood streaming down both shoulders), and was able to reach up, and unlock deadbolt just as ambulance personnel came running to front door w/long steel tool to force way in, if necessary.
In after thought, it was all rather dramatic, though I remain calm during a crisis (through the grace of God), and pretend to be calm later.
Staples were removed on 7/30, (brain still theoretically intact).
1st scheduled surgery on wrist, was 24th, my birthday, and the 2nd was yesterday on 7/31st.
I've been happily on hydrocodone for pain, since 7/17 fall.
Know you are loved, in Jesus, in whatever circumstances you place yourself.
rumitoid wrote:
Wow! Thank you! I really like this guy. Complicated. A little perverse. But holy.
Aug 2, 2019 11:10:31 #
Zemirah wrote:
I believe all God's devoted are complicated to one... (show quote)
Glad to see you on the mend and back!
Aug 2, 2019 15:08:52 #
Thank you, Rose42, my surgeon said being on the computer would help keep my elbow and fingers from stiffening up, although it took most of the day yesterday to type three comments...
every day should make progress, praise God.
every day should make progress, praise God.
Rose42 wrote:
Glad to see you on the mend and back!
Aug 2, 2019 15:41:28 #
Zemirah wrote:
Thank you, Rose42, my surgeon said being on the computer would help keep my elbow and fingers from stiffening up, although it took most of the day yesterday to type three comments...
every day should make progress, praise God.
every day should make progress, praise God.
I would not have had that much patience.
Aug 3, 2019 06:20:09 #
My choices at present are rather limited.
This morning, a Home Health care manager is coming by to allow me to select a routine, from available options for daily visits from nurses, therapists, housecleaning, etc.,
I'm in a "hurry up and wait" mode.
Thank God for options.
This morning, a Home Health care manager is coming by to allow me to select a routine, from available options for daily visits from nurses, therapists, housecleaning, etc.,
I'm in a "hurry up and wait" mode.
Thank God for options.
Rose42 wrote:
I would not have had that much patience.
stainless steel bionic arm
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