Origenes: Grieche und Christ in römischer Zeit. By Alfons FÜrst

Abstract

This book has the taut density of an encyclopaedia article, and in fact is based on the author’s entry, ‘Origenes’, in Reallexikon fur Antike und Christentum 26, pp. 460–567. There are few students of Origen who will not learn many interesting details from the opening biographical chapter, or whose memories will not be sharpened. The author has read thoroughly the six hundred items in his bibliography of secondary literature, and on disputed issues helpfully footnotes the strongest representatives of positions opposed to those he espouses. The second chapter surveys Origen’s writings with much fine detail; it warns against uncritical use of fragments; it does not discuss the possibility of reconstructing lost works from Origen-based commentaries of Eusebius or Jerome. Next come chapters on Origen’s relations with Gnostics, Jews, Greek learning, and Greek philosophy, and one on philosophy and exegesis. On the Jews, Fürst sees a the ‘gulf’ between Origen’s appreciation of their lore as a scholar and his theological hostility as a preacher (p. 48); but it might be more fruitful to interrogate tensions within the theology itself.