On Bk. VI. chap. 2 (note 1, continued). Origen’s Life and Writings.
Origen Adamantius (on the second
name, see Bk. VI. chap. 14, note 12) was of Christian parentage and
probably of Greek descent on his father’s side (as stated in the
previous note), but whether born in Alexandria or not we do not know. Westcott suggests that his mother may have been of Jewish descent, because in an epistle of Jerome (ad Paulam: Ep. 39, § 1, Migne’s ed.) he is said to have learned Hebrew so thoroughly that he “vied with his mother” in the singing of psalms (but compare the stricture of Redepenning on this passage, p. 187, note 1). The date of his birth may be gathered from the fact (stated in this chapter) that he was in his seventeenth year at the time of his father’s death, which gives us 185 or 186 as the year of his birth (cf. Redepenning, I. p. 417–420, Erste Beilage). We learn from the present chapter that as a boy he was carefully trained by his father in the Scriptures and afterward in Greek literature, a training of which he made good use in later life. He was also a pupil of Clement in the catechetical school, as we learn from chaps. 6 and 14 (on the time, see chap. 6, note 4). He showed remarkable natural ability, and after the death of his father (being himself saved from martyrdom only by a device of his mother), when left in poverty with his mother and six younger brothers (see § 13 of this chapter), he was able, partly by the assistance of a wealthy lady and partly by teaching literature, to support himself (§ 14). Whether he supported the rest of the family Eusebius does not state, but his thoroughly religious character does not permit us to imagine that he left them to suffer. In his eighteenth year, there being no one at the head of the catechetical school in Alexandria, he was induced to take the school in charge and to devote himself to the work of instruction in the Christian faith. Soon afterward the entire charge of the work was officially committed to him by Demetrius, the bishop of Alexandria (see chap. 3). He lived at this time a life of rigid asceticism (ibid.), and even went so far as to mutilate himself in his zeal for the prosecution of his work (see chap. 8). His great influence naturally aroused the hostility of unbelievers against him; but though many of his pupils suffered martyrdom (see chap. 4), he himself escaped, we do not know how. Eusebius ascribes his preservation to the providence of God (ibid.). During these years in which he was at the head of the catechetical school, he devoted himself with vigor to the study of Greek philosophy, and was for a time a pupil of the Neo-Platonist Ammonius Saccas (chap. 19). He studied non-Christian thought, as he tells us, in order that he might be the better able to instruct his pagan and heretical pupils (ibid.). His labors in the school in time grew so heavy that he was obliged to associate with himself his friend and fellow-pupil Heraclas, to whom he committed the work of elementary instruction (chap. 15). It was during this time that he seems to have begun his Hexapla, having learned Hebrew in order to fit himself the better for his work upon the Old Testament (chap. 16). During this period (while Zephyrinus was bishop of Rome, i.e. before 217) he made a brief visit to Rome (chap. 14), and later he was summoned to Arabia, to give instruction to the governor of that country, and remained there a short time (chap. 19). Afterward, on account of a great tumult in Alexandria (see chap. 19, note 22), he left the city and went to Cæsarea in Palestine, where, although only a layman, he publicly expounded the Scriptures in the church (chap. 19). The bishop Demetrius strongly disapproved of this, and summoned him back to Alexandria (ibid.). Upon his return to Alexandria he entered upon the work of writing Commentaries on the Scriptures (see chap. 23). During this period he wrote also other important works (see chap. 24).