Book Review: Become like the Angels: Origen's Doctrine of the Soul

Abstract

Become Like the Angels: Origen's Doctrine of the Soul. By Benjamin P. Blosser. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2012. x + 290 pp. $69.95 (cloth).None of the early church fathers has been more obscured by faulty reporting than Origen of Alexandria. This volume by Benjamin P. Blosser, a faculty member at Benedictine College, reintroduces Origen to todays scholars and practitioners through a close study of his neglected doctrine of the soul. Origen s pioneering and systematizing role has rendered his thought, in the words of Hans Urs von Balthasar, invisibly all-present in Christian theology, meaning that understanding him will yield an improved grasp of our theological origins. This careful examination of Origen s theology also has some surprising significance for matters of ecclesiastical history.Blosser argues that Origen carefully charted a course that allowed him to borrow Platonic vocabulary and philosophical framework, which he then filled with Christian content. Even as Origen borrowed from this tradition, his self-consciously Christian interpretive grid led him to oppose many of that tradition's teachings. This foundation is, of course, not startlingly new for anyone familiar with Origen. However, Blosser demonstrates how this was applied to Origen s theology of the soul, which is revealed as central to his system. At every stage, Blosser places Origen's theology into context with a review of Middle Platonist teachings and his response to them. He notes that the gap between Plato's teachings on the soul in Phaedo and Republic was filled in different ways by his followers. The results included monist, dualist, and tripartite views of the soul, to which Origen added a more complex and distinctively Christian solution.Blosser argues that Origen rejected the idea that material was inherently evil, holding instead the view that matter is necessary for beings created by God, even though they might use their free will for evil, which could in turn corrupt matter. Origen avoided a conflict dualism view of two souls by consciously portraying flesh opposed to the spirit in what appears to be a hierarchy of soul. He further developed Plato's concept of nous, by equating it with the kardia of the Christian scriptures. His anthropology placed the transcendent pneuma as something of a buffer between the immanent nous and God. According to Blosser, Origen harmonized the vital and cognitive principles in humanity by positing a soul that performed two functions. …