Homilies on Numbers
Overview
Origen of Alexandria (185–254), one of the most prolific authors of antiquity and arguably the most important and influential pre-Nicene Christian theologian, was a man of deep learning and holiness of life. Regrettably, many of his works are no longer extant, in part due to the condemnation of his ideas by the Fifth Ecumenical Council in 553. The condemnation, however, took little account of his historical circumstances and the tentative nature of his speculations. The anathemas were more likely directed toward sixth-century Origenist views than to the views of Origen himself, though clearly he expounded some views that would be judged unacceptable today. Origen’s numerous homilies provide the oldest surviving corpus of Christian sermons and shaped exegesis for succeeding centuries. With Jerome he was one of the early church’s great critical and literal exegetes. Devoutly he sought to develop a spiritual exegesis of the Old Testament grounded in the revelation of Jesus Christ. The Homilies on Numbers presented here offer a splendid example of his spiritual interpretation of Old Testament texts. He asks, what foreshadowing, what warning, what instruction, what encouragement, reproof, correction or exhortation, do we find in the narratives of Numbers for our benefit as Christians? Here, based on Baehren’s critical Latin text, is the first English edition of these homilies, ably translated with explanatory notes by Thomas P. Scheck.
Top Highlights
“Well, we have found it written about this in the Psalms: ‘Wretched is daughter of Babylon, blessed is the one who will repay you the repayment with which you have repaid us. Blessed is the one who will seize and dash your infants against the rock.’40 Even if this ‘Babylonian’ that has been conceived within us has not yet done any work, while it is still an infant, you must not pity it or spare it, but kill it at once—for it is worthy of hatred—destroy it, slay it, ‘dash it against the rock.’ ‘But the rock is Christ.’41 Who then is capable of not waiting at all, until the Babylonian offspring grows within him and increases in him into ‘works of confusion’?” (Page 125)
“In this way, then, when the vices of the soul are purged, the ‘hand of Aaron’ is at work within us; and the hand of Moses is in us when we are enlightened from the law to understand these very things. And the reason both hands are necessary for those making an exodus from Egypt is so that there may be found in them not only the perfection of faith and knowledge, but also that of deeds and works. And yet, these are not two hands, but one. For [it says]: ‘by the hand of Moses and Aaron’ the Lord led them forth, and not by the hands of Moses and Aaron. For there is a single work for each hand and a single fulfillment of perfection.” (Pages 173–174)
“This is why I do not think that any man of right sense would deny that in the knowledge of all these things, all wisdom is from God. Now indeed, I do not think this can be doubted concerning the knowledge of medicine. For if there is any knowledge from God, which knowledge will more likely be from him than the knowledge of healing, in which both the virtues of plants, the properties of juices and the differences of their effects are discerned?” (Page 113)
- Title: Homilies on Numbers
- Author: Origen
- Series: Ancient Christian Texts
- Publisher: IVP Academic
- Print Publication Date: 2009
- Logos Release Date: 2017
- Era: era:ante-nicene
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subjects: Bible. O.T. Numbers › Sermons; Sermons, Latin › Translations into English; Bible. O.T. Numbers › Commentaries
- ISBNs: 9780830867394, 9780830829057, 0830867392, 0830829059
- Resource ID: LLS:ACTHOMILIESNU
- Resource Type: Bible Commentary
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-03-25T19:05:32Z
Origen of Alexandria (ca. 182–ca. 251) was a Christian scholar and presbyter in the third century. He is thought to have been born at Alexandria, and died at Caesarea.