Origen of Alexandria
Origen was the most productive scholar of the early church and was condemned three centuries after his death. Born in Alexandria around 185 into a Christian family, he was educated in Greek philosophy and scripture. His father was martyred under Septimius Severus when Origen was about seventeen, and he is said to have wanted to join him and been prevented by his mother hiding his clothes. He supported his family teaching grammar, and was appointed head of the catechetical school in Alexandria while still very young. Eusebius reports that he castrated himself on a literal reading of a verse in Matthew, and modern scholars doubt it. He wrote on a scale that has no parallel. Estimates run to two thousand works, produced with a team of stenographers funded by a wealthy patron. The Hexapla was his major scholarly project: the Old Testament in six parallel columns — Hebrew, a transliteration, and four Greek versions — so that translations could be compared. It was the first work of textual criticism on the Bible. On First Principles is the first systematic Christian theology. He read scripture on three levels, literal, moral and spiritual, and used allegory extensively, and he speculated that souls existed before birth and that all beings, possibly including the devil, would eventually be restored to God. He quarrelled with his bishop, moved to Caesarea, and was tortured under the Decian persecution, dying around 253 of the injuries. The Second Council of Constantinople anathematised his positions in 553. Much of his work survives only in Latin translations made by admirers who quietly corrected him.
- Lived: 185 CE – 253 CE
- Nationality: Greek
- Roles: religious_leader, writer, theologian
