the doctrine of the Gnostic emanations, that he appears to have rejected their terminology principally because he supposed that it might involve something of a corporeal nature in it ;* while, on the other hand, he opens to us the prospect, by our own future Tổ ngòs tòv deòv elvai, i. e. intimate communion with God, of becoming divine and like to the Logos.† This hope he checks and moderates merely by insisting, that it is only by the unceasing contemplation of the deeps of God from all eternity, that the Logos became and continues to be God; and that he is in the same way exalted beyond comparison above all else which becomes divine, yet still, without diminishing at all the distance between him and the Father, or the superiority of the latter.‡ After all, remarkable as these passages are which thus magnify the difference between the Father and the Son, there are not wanting passages in Origen, wherein he speaks almost entirely in the same manner as those do who deny such a discrepancy. Thus when he wishes to distinguish the generation of the Son from the production of the Gnostic Tooßolaí (emanations or offspring), he says that "the Father is the Father of the Son without division or separation." This might be explained as merely asserting, that the Father does not produce Εἰ γὰρ προβολή ἐστιν ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ πατρός, καὶ γεννᾷ μὲν ἐξ αὑτοῦ ὁποῖα τὰ τῶν ζώων γεννήματα, ἀναγκὴ σῶμα εἶναι τὸν προβάλλοντα καὶ Tov поßeßinμévоv. De Princip. IV. Tom. I. p. 190. ['For if he is the offspring of the Father, and produces from himself all the various kinds of living creatures, that which produces, and that which is produced, must necessarily be corporeal.'"] † Comp. 1 John 3: 2. f On this account he calls him τὸν ἀγέννητον καὶ πάσης γεννητῆς QUσεWS лOWτÓTоXov ['the unbegotten and first-born or head of all produced nature']; although he immediately afterwards names the Father, tov yevvyoarta autóv ['him who begat him.'] Cont. Cels. Tom. I. p. 643. In like manner, πάντων μὲν τῶν γεννητῶν ὑπερέχειν, οὐ συγκρίσει, ἀλλ ̓ ὑπερβαλλούσῃ ὑπεροχῇ, φαμεν τὸν σωτῆρα. Comm. in Johann. p. 235. ['We affirm that the Saviour is preeminent over all created beings, not in the way of comparison, but by an exceeding preeminence.] The addition here in the original of καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα τὸ ἅγιον shews, that the expression σwrig is to be referred to the Godhead of the Redeemer. § Περὶ πατρός, ὡς ἀδιαίρετος καὶ ἀμέριστος ὢν υἱοῦ γίνεται πατήρ. Vol. I. p. 190. ['Respecting the Father, that he is the Father of the Son without division or separation.'] the Son out of his own substance. But one must remember, that Origen holds the generation of the Son to be eternal, and always continued, and therefore never completed.* The Father is always begetting; the Son is never completely begotten and fully produced from the Father. Why then could not Beryll have used this view to his own advantage? Or rather, why could he not shew that Origen was still more remote than himself from the real doctrine of the Trinity; inasmuch as, according to Origen's view, the Son never yet since his incarnation has truly had his ἰδία τῆς οὐσίας περιγραφή, i. e. his own circumscription of being or personality? For if the being begotten is the circumstance which is to explain the relation of the second person of the Trinity to the first, i. e. of the Son to the Father, then we may say, that the Father is not truly Father, so long as the generation is incomplete; nor is the Son truly Son, so long as the being generated is not complete, but only after this is completed. So long then as the generation continues, the Father is named Father without actually being so; and so the Son also is called Son without actually being so; in accordance with what Origen says in a passage already cited: "The Father is the Father of the Son without division or separation." If therefore the generation is incomplete, and is from all eternity, then Father and Son have never yet been fully developed as such, and the Godhead after all is to be divided only in imagination into plurality of persons, while in reality it remains but one and the same. According to Origen's principles, then, we might pass by Beryll, and go back even to Noetus, and say with him, that since the incarnation, the Godhead of the Redeemer does not * Αλλ' ὁ συμπαρεκτείνων τῇ ἀγεννήτῳ καὶ ἀιδίῳ αὐτοῦ ζωῇ, ἵνα οὕτως, εἴπω, χρόνος ημέρα ἐστὶν αὐτῷ σήμερον, ἐν ᾗ γεγέννηται ὁ υἱός. Comm. in Johann. p. 23. [But he continues to extend it to his unbegotten and eternal life; so that thus, as I may say, [all] time is today in which he is begotten']. Here, plainly, this day has as little a morning as an evening, and as little a morning as a yesterday. In other words, the generation is ever continued, but never completed. + Εὰν οὖν ἐπιστήσω σοι ἐπὶ τοῦ σωτῆρος, ὅτι οὐχὶ ἐγέννησεν ὁ πατὴρ τὸν υἱόν, καὶ ἀπέλυσεν αὐτὸν ὁ πατὴρ ἀπὸ τῆς γενέσεως αὐτοῦ, ἀλλ ̓ ἀεὶ yevvğ aviór • x. t. λ. Homil. IX. in Jer. Tom. III. p. 181. ['If then I should reply to you concerning the Saviour, that the Father has not begotten the Son, and made him free from being born, but is always begetting him, etc."] exist appropriately in a κατ' ἰδίαν οὐσίας περιγραφήν, but (at the most) it is only in reference to the human nature in which it dwells and on account of which it is called Son, that we can speak of person in respect to it; for God, in himself considered, is a simple unity, without distinction and without plurality. The passages already quoted from Origen do not stand alone, but are intimately connected with many other like formulas of the same author. Origen could not comprehend how God could exist without continually creating; inasmuch as he would then have been destitute of the glory of dominion, up to a certain point; and must also have passed over from a state of previous inaction, to a state of activity in creating; which would be to suppose him mutable.* In like manner, he supposed, the Fa Quemadmodum pater non potest esse quis si filius non sit, neque, dominus quis esse potest sine possessione, ita ne omnipotens quidem Deus dici potest, si non sint in quos exerceat potentatum: et ideo, ut omnipotens ostendatur Deus, omnia subsistere necesse est. Nam si quis est, qui velit saecula aliqua transiisse, cum nondum essent quae facta sunt, per hoc videbitur Deus profectum quendam accepisse, et ex inferioribus ad potiora venisse, si quidem melius esse non dubitatur, esse eum omnipotentem quam non esse. De Princip. I. 2. 10. ['As a father cannot be a father who has no son, nor any one be lord without some dominion; so God cannot be called omnipotent, unless those are in existence over whom his power may be exercised and consequently it is necessary that all things should have an existence, in order that God may be exhibited as omnipotent. If now there be any one, who supposes that some ages passed away before things were called into existence; his opinion will make out that God has made some advances, and come out of an inferior to a more perfect state; since it cannot be doubted, that it is better he should be omnipotent, than not to be so.'-That is, if I rightly understand this last sentence, it is much better to suppose that things have always existed, and so have evidence that God has always been omnipotent, than it is to deny their perpetual existence, and thus disrobe the divine Being of his attribute of omnipotence, without which he would no longer be God. On the sentiment of this whole passage it is difficult to say, whether the weakness of the reasoning, or the extravagance of the mode of thinking, is the predominant quality. If the reasoning is true; then every event that happens, must have been happening from all eternity; or else it involves the supposition, that God has advanced from one state of being and acting to a different one, and is therefore mutable. The death of Jesus, then, must have been happening from all eternity; or else it never could happen. And so of every event which we are accustomed to call new or strange. Such is the logic. The extravagance of the whole supposition; the egregious over ther could not dispense with the glory of having a Son; nor could he pass from a state of not begetting to a state of begetting; which would imply change or mutability in him. Nor did he looking (what less can we name it?) of even the first principles of intelligent, rational, and free agency, whose essence consists in powers and attributes, not in the mode of their development; astonishes one who has been taught to look with veneration upon the profound learning of Origen. Just as if this or that particular direction given to the powers of a free agent, (be this God or any other free agent), would make a change in the nature of the Being, and this because a change is produced as to things which are ad extra? But such statements do not need refutation. Certainly the intelligent reader does not need any effort to refute such weak and extravagant assertions. Seldom indeed do we meet with a writer of such singular qualities as Origen. It may well he said of him: "Quod sentit, valde sentit." When he is contending with views like those of Sabellius, he becomes a downright Arian; I mean, that his language is incapable of being fairly construed so as to mean any thing short of absolute Arianism. Such clearly are the passages already cited above; and many more of a similar tenor might be easily produced. Then on the other hand, when he comes to contend with those who infringed upon the honour or worship due to the Redeemer, he expresses himself almost in the manner of a Patripassian. How little ought such vehement feelings to be trusted, without sober judgment and discretion to guide them? Whither must the ship go, which has passion and vehemence to hoist her sails when the wind is blowing with violence, and has no sober and steady pilot at the helm? What incalculable mischief has been done in theology, by vehement assertion made by reason of excited feeling, and made without any due regard to the symmetry or harmony of the whole system of religious truth! As an illustration of this we may say, that Arians, Patripassians, Trinitarians, and even Unitarians, may all find what seem to be proof-passages for their respective systems in Origen. Such must be the fate of those who have more sail than ballast or steerage. TR.] * Οὐ γὰρ ὁ Θεὸς πατὴρ εἶναι ἤρξατο, κωλυόμενος, ὡς οἱ γινόμενοι πατέρες ἄνθρωποι ὑπὸ τοῦ δύνασθαι μήπω πατέρες εἶναι. Εἰ γὰρ ἀεὶ τέ λειος ὁ Θεός, καὶ πάρεστιν αὐτῷ δύναμις τοῦ πατέρα αὐτὸν εἶναι, καὶ καλὸν αὐτὸν πατέρα εἶναι, καὶ καλὸν αὐτὸν πατέρα εἶναι τοῦ τοιούτου υἱοῦ, ἀναβάλλεται καὶ αὑτὸν τοῦ καλοῦ στηρίσκει; Orig. apud Euseb. cont. Marc. I. 4. [For God did not begin to be a Father, having before been prevented; as men who are fathers cease from being so by reason of inability. For if God is always perfect; and the power belongs to him of being a Father; and it is good that he should be the Father of such a Son; could he put off such a thing, and deprive himself of a good?'-Here is the same extravagance and futility of stop with this. Assuming the principles already mentioned, he proceeded to the position, that God cannot pass from a state of creating to one of not creating, i. e. to one of destroying, (for the continued preservation of things he regarded as equivalent to a continued creation); and in like manner, that he could not pass from a state of begetting to one of not begetting. In accordance with this principle, he represented the Son as continually and eternally begotten, because, if he once admitted that the hypostatical state of the Logos was complete and had fully its own separate state of existence, then it would follow that the Son would no more continue to be begotten; which would contradict his theory. If now Origen, from one stand-point, came in this way as near as he could to that Arianism which assigns to the Son a separate existence, and yet he did not give up the eternity of the Logos; and from another stand-point, assuming the perpetual identity of the divine perfections, he identified the Logos almost numerically with God, even as nearly as it is possible to go, if in truth any mutual relation between Father and Son is to be preserved; how can it be explained, that the much more simple positions of Beryll did not commend themselves to his approbation; for these would have freed him from such a state of oscillation? Hardly any other answer can be given to this question, than that Origen, as well as all the earlier ecclesiastical fathers, who contributed to the formation of the Symbol in after times in respect to the doctrine of the Trinity, were especially influenced in their representations of the Logos, by their views of John 1:1-3. One might doubt of this in respect to Origen, if he should consult merely his treatise лì dozov; although what has just been said is quite clear in respect to Hippolytus and others. In the treatise лɛоì άoxшv,* Origen, in the Christological part, appears to have taken his ground-work, as to the divine hypostasis of the Logos, more immediately from those passages which represent him as the power and wisdom of God. But this passage in the epistle to the logic, as before. Any thing which is good, must on this ground have been always in existence from eternity. So then, because the Scriptures are a blessing, they were given us from eternity! And thus of all other blessings; for all are good in the sight of God, as really and truly as the having of a Son, although not in the same degree. TR.] 1 Cor. 1: 24. * Lib. I. cap. 2. |