So it is in the race of our life, with our salvation; we ourselves have to expend labor and be diligent and zealous; but it is from God that salvation is to be hoped for.
- Origen
A Patristic Treasury: Early Church Wisdom for Today, edited by James R. Payton, Jr.
The Trinity
The highest perfection, of course, is never to sin in any least way; but this can be said of God alone.
- Clement of Alexandria
Were Jesus merely human, He would not have lived His sinless life.
But what is said about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit must be understood above all time, above all ages, and above all eternity. The Trinity alone surpasses every sense of our understanding, not only temporal but also eternal.
- Origen
Outside of time….
There is nothing uncreated except the nature of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
- Origen
We…believe that Christ…is both God and man.
- Origen
We do not say, as the heretics imagine, that there was a time when He [the Son of God] was not.
- Origen
God the Father
[St. Paul] … did not say that it was difficult to search out the judgements of God, but that it was altogether impossible. Nor did he say that it was difficult to investigate His ways, but that they could not be investigated.
- Origen
Again, perhaps making as secondary any debates or discussions about such matters. Certainly not always points to cause division.
The Son
Christ our triumphant King… You are the holy Lord, the all-subduing Word… You are the great High Priest…
- Clement of Alexandria
…we remember no lawgiver so influential that he was able to inspire the minds of other nations with zeal either to adopt his laws willingly or to defend them with the entire effort of their mind.
- Origen
Taking the above two together, a powerful statement of just how different Jesus is from any other “founder” of any other religion.
The Word forcibly draws people from their natural, worldly way of life and educates them to the only true salvation, which is faith in God. … He guides us to a life of virtue, not merely to one of knowledge.
- Clement of Alexandria
The Word is our educator who heals the unnatural passions of our soul with his counsel.
- Clement of Alexandria
Christianity is to be lived, not merely understood.
The Word adapts Himself completely to the disposition of each, being strict with one, forgiving another.
- Clement of Alexandria
The right way of understanding Scripture is to observe the rule and discipline which was delivered by Jesus Christ to the apostles and which they delivered in succession to their followers who teach the Church.
- Origen
Origen On the Lord’s Prayer
Regarding “Our Father,” Origen searched and found nowhere else such a boldness in prayer to call God “our Father,” as Jesus instructed.
…the certainty and immutability of sonship cannot be seen in the Old Testament.
As the Lord’s name being “hallowed”:
The one who fits his idea of God to things he ought not, takes the name of the Lord in vain.
Hence, care and caution when it comes to describing God or the Trinity.
The one who prays that the Kingdom of God may come prays that the Kingdom of God may spring up in him, bear fruit and be rightly perfected.
On Prayer
The person who is about to come to prayer should withdraw for a little and prepare himself, and so become more attentive and active for the whole of his prayer. … [he should] remind himself so far as he is able of the majesty who he approaches….
- Origen
Origen continues: the preferred position in prayer is with the hands outstretched and eyes lifted up. However, kneeling is necessary when someone is going to speak of his sins.
Now concerning a place [for prayer], let it be known that every place is suitable for prayer if a person prays well.
- Origen
Origen adds: If possible, set aside a holy place in your house for prayer.
…we should make our prayers facing east, since this is a symbolic expression of the soul’s looking for the rising of the true Light…
- Origen
Prayer should be organized as follows, per Origen: praise of God through Christ, general thanksgiving, blame ourselves for our sins, then a request for great and heavenly things. Finally, conclude with a doxology.
It is fitting to bless the Maker of all things before we partake of food.
- Clement of Alexandria
Man
Other things God made by a simple word of command, but humanity He fashioned by His own direct action and breathed into him something proper to Himself.
- Clement of Alexandria
This speaks to man’s uniqueness in creation.
A human being’s duty is to cultivate a will that is in conformity and united throughout life to God and Christ, properly directed to eternal life.
- Clement of Alexandria
To know oneself has always been, so it seems, the greatest of all lessons. For, if anyone knows himself, he will know God; and in knowing God, he will become like Him.
- Clement of Alexandria
The aim for which we hope is that so far as it can happen, we may be made participants in the divine nature by imitating Him….
- Origen
The above point us to focus our lives on sanctification – becoming ever more Christ-like.
Those deceive themselves who suppose that it is sufficient for gaining the goal in Christ to believe with the heart for justification, even if confession with the mouth for salvation is not added.
- Origen
Origen wrote this against those who would escape martyrdom. But what of us, when the earthly consequences are not nearly this high?
Baptism
…it is impossible to receive forgiveness of sins apart from baptism….
- Origen
Charity
It is unbecoming that one person lives in luxury when there are so many who labor in poverty. How much more honorable it is to serve many than to live in wealth!
- Clement of Alexandria
One of the most supreme virtues according to the divine Word is the love of neighbor.
- Origen
…He demands in return that we lay down our lives for one another.
- Clement of Alexandria
The very thing which is supposed to be good and praiseworthy is defiled when we act so that we may receive glory from others or so that we may be seen by others. And consequently we receive no reward from God for it.
- Origen
It is still unbelievable to me to see a church where every wall, every painting, every pew, every hall, and every office, has the name of a donor who provided the funds for these.
Sin
There is nothing more important for us than to first be rid of sin and weakness and then to uproot any habitual sinful inclination.
- Clement of Alexandria
It is impossible to eradicate inbred passions all at once; but by God’s power and human intercession, the help of brothers and sister, sincere repentance, and constant care, they are corrected.
- Clement of Alexandria
The Promise
Perfection lies ahead, in the resurrection of the faithful, but it consists in obtaining the promise which has already been given to us.
- Clement of Alexandria
Biographies / Sources
Clement (c. 150 – 215) became head of a Christian catechetical school in Alexandria, the intellectual center of the ancient Roman Empire. His approach was less confrontational, more winsome, showing how Christianity meshed with the best of ancient pagan philosophy. He was well-educated, citing from over one hundred pagan authors, as well as from both the Old and New Testament Scriptures.
Origen (c. 185 – 254) became head of the catechetical school in Alexandria. He was a humble, yet wide-ranging scholar who excelled in textual critical scholarship. His bent for speculation led him to espouse several ideas that were later repudiated by the Church as untenable. Yet his contributions to Christian thought could not be denied.
Again, I am appreciative of your observations on this site. I especially esteem Origen's Biblical commentaries. For instance, after his murder of St. John the Baptist, Herod thought the Lord Jesus to be, perhaps, John risen from the dead. Why? Origen says that the two men looked very much like each other, since they were closely related on their mothers' side as cousins. You can see this resemblance in the Byzantine iconic depictions of the Forerunner. As a pioneer in theology, Origen apologizes to his readers for any errors in his speculations. As an Orthodox priest and friend (Memory Eternal!) once told me, that did not stop the Fathers of the Fifth Ecumenical Council from condemning his writings, As Fr. Pavel stated, but they had to wait until he was dead for five hundred years. As for Clement, he is one of the first church fathers in the East to view Christianity through a philosophical lens, just as St. Justin Martyr had done in the West.