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1. Introduction to Origen and Early Christian Belief in Reincarnation
Origen Adamantius (185–253 AD) , or simply Origen, was an early Christian scholar, ascetic, and theologian who wrote roughly 2,000 treatises in multiple branches of theology. Origen was a pivotal figure in early Christianity and was considered to be the first Church Father. He was the first Christian theologian after Paul to develop a theological system of the teachings of Jesus. Before Origen, Christian theology was more scattered. Origen was the first to organize Christian beliefs into a coherent system, drawing on Greek philosophy to explain Christian concepts. He produced a massive amount of writings, including commentaries on scripture, defenses of the faith, and systematic theology. This laid the groundwork for later Christian thinkers. Origen developed a method of reading the Bible with multiple layers of meaning, including literal, moral, and allegorical. This approach influenced Christian biblical interpretation for centuries. Christianity faced criticism from pagan philosophers and Gnostics (a different Christian sect). Origen defended Christianity against these critiques, presenting a more intellectual and reasoned faith. Origen has been described as “the greatest genius the early church ever produced.”
Centuries later, some of Origen’s ideas were famously deemed heretical by the Catholic Church such as his doctrines on the pre-existence of the soul, reincarnation, and universal salvation. However, his influence on Christian thought is undeniable. He helped shape core Christian doctrines, biblical interpretation, and the integration of philosophy into Christian theology. Origen wrote of the pre-existence of the soul and its connection to past lives. He wrote of souls being “strengthened by victories or weakened by defeats” from previous lives. Origen rejected the concept of reincarnation of human souls into animal souls called transmigration.
Centuries later, Origen’s teachings on reincarnation became incompatible with the Church’s teachings of a final resurrection and a final judgment at the End of Days. This incompatibility likely led later Church councils to condemn Origen’s views on the soul’s pre-existence and reincarnation.
Origen was one of the most influential and controversial figures in early Christian theology, apologetics, and asceticism. He has been described as “the greatest genius the early church ever produced.” For centuries after his death, Origen was regarded as the bastion of orthodoxy, and his philosophy practically defined Eastern Christianity.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Barbara Robinson and her late husband, Lytle, joined Edgar Cayce’s research organization (A.R.E.) in 1953. She currently hosts Search For God study group meetings in her Tucson, Arizona home.
ABOUT THE MAGAZINE: The Edgar Cayce research organization’s (Association for Research and Enlightenment) quarterly magazine, Venture Inward, offers one of the best ways to study, learn, and grow from the Edgar Cayce material through A.R.E. membership, their Cayce Quarterly newsletter, and access to their exclusive member-only section which includes a monthly Enlightenment Series with videos and lesson plans along with the entire database of Edgar Cayce’s 14,307 documented readings. The following is a reprint of the article “Christianity Today and Yesterday: Reconsidering the Philosophy of Origen” by Barbara Robinson published in the Edgar Cayce magazine “Venture Inward”, November / December 2003, pages 46-49.
2. Christianity Today and Yesterday: Reconsidering the Philosophy of Origen
By Barbara Robinson
The early Christians, a diverse group from backgrounds of Gnosticism, Jewish thought, and Greek philosophy, had no singular organization until 90 A.D. when a liturgy was developed and a loose structure evolved. It was not until 132 A.D. that a Gnostic named Basilides forced orthodox Christianity to define its terms. Schism was avoided only because of Roman hostility toward all followers of Christ.
In this atmosphere, Origen (full name, Origenes Adamantius) was born in 185 A.D. to Christian parents in Egypt. At age 17 he was traumatized by the persecution and subsequent death of his father and other members of the faith. From that day onward, he centered his life on Christianity and later developed a systemic Christian philosophy based firmly on the Bible.
Though most of his prolific writings were destroyed, those remaining are De Principiis, Contra Celsum, Florileg I, Catenae and Commentaries on John and Matthew.
Origen acquired a teaching position at the catechetical school of Alexandria under the supervision of renowned Greek theologian, Clement. An apt student himself, described later as “Clement’s greatest pupil,” Origen headed the school a year later when his mentor fled the city to avoid persecution.
Beyond academic interest in the fields of archaeology, geography, astronomy, medicine, and Greek philosophy, he studied the Scriptures and prayed for divine guidance.
In a zealous attempt to lead an ascetic life, Origen underwent castration but later regretted that decision. There is speculation that in teaching he had contact with young women and resorted to self-mutilation to protect their reputations as well as his own. (Castration was not an uncommon practice in the East during that time and even alluded to in Scripture: “And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that the whole body should be cast into hell.” (Matthew 5:29)
Since Origen accepted that all souls would eventually become reconciled with God, the label “Origenism” became associated with belief in “universal salvation” or “universal reconciliation.” He wrote:
“Every soul has existed from the beginning. It has passed through some worlds ahead and will pass through others before it reaches the final consummation. It comes into the world strengthened by the victories or weakened by the defeats of its previous life.” (De Principiis)
Relative to the account of creation in the Old Testament, Origen explained, “… I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history being apparently — but not literally — true… “
In Genesis 2:7, therefore, we have the allegorical story that man is given the “breath of life” and becomes a “living soul.” (Genesis 2:7)
There is no further mention throughout all of Scripture that this same process is repeated on a routine basis. It appears as one single event. Therefore just as most of nature “recycles” — the plant dies, drops seed and new sprouts appear — a similar sequence of events happens to the soul (with the soul as seed, and the plant the physical body).
Origen wrote: “If it can be shown that an incorporeal and reasonable being has life in itself independently of the body and that it is worse off in the body than out of it; then beyond a doubt bodies are only of secondary importance and arise from time to time to meet the varying conditions of reasonable creatures. Those who require bodies are clothed with them, and contrariwise, when fallen souls have lifted themselves up to better things, their bodies are once more annihilated. They are thus ever vanishing and ever reappearing.” (De Principiis)
Similarly, the Edgar Cayce readings state: “All souls were created in the beginning, and are finding their way back to whence they came.” (Edgar Cayce reading 3744-5)
Since man has free will, the law of cause and effect operates as an integral part of that plan: “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” (Galatians 6:7)
Origen asked, “Is it not rational that souls should be introduced into bodies in accordance with their merits and previous deed?”
He goes on to say: “Everyone, therefore, of those who descends to the earth is, according to his deserts or to the position that he had there, ordained to be born in this world either in a different place, or in a different nation, or in a different occupation or with different infirmities, or to be descended from religious or at least pious parents; so as sometimes to bring about that an Israelite descends among the Scythians, and a poor Egyptian is brought down to Judea.” (De Principiis)
By no means an all-inclusive list, New Testament passages alluding to the rebirth of the soul (similar accounts repeated) include: Matthew 11:7-15; Matthew 16:13-14; Matthew 17:9-13; Mark 6:14-16, Mark 8:27-28, Mark 9: 9-13; Luke 9:7-9, Luke 20: 35-36; John 1:19-23, John 9:1-3 and Revelation 3:12, but the Bible in its entirety chronicles the spiritual evolution of souls.
Origen noted the difference between Jehovah of the Old Testament and the Heavenly Father shown by Jesus: “To know God in this way [through Christ] is to know him as Father. Moses and the prophets knew Him only as God.” Apparently, a stern Lawgiver was needed to rein in immature souls.
Reflecting this maturation process, throughout the Old Testament, characters — with few exceptions — were childlike, disobedient, and had to be controlled through numerous laws and commandments. “Thou shalt not … ” is the tone used with children. Rigid laws as “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” needed to be enforced.
Yet as these souls awakened during many experiences on earth, they evolved spiritually and became less willful.
The teaching of Jesus, “Be ye perfect,” is the admonition to return to oneness with the Father. And his astounding promise, ” I say unto you, if a man keep my saying, he shall never see death,” (John 8:51) is echoed by Origen, “Let us therefore take up eternal life. Let us take up that which depends upon our decision. God does not give it to us; He sets it before us.”
Being “saved” from the birth / death cycle for a richer existence occurs slowly.
“For each entity in the earth is what it is because of what it has been! And each moment is dependent upon another moment. So a sojourn in the earth, as indicated, is as a lesson in the school of life and experience.” (Edgar Cayce reading 2823-3)
Salvation, therefore, is cyclical as explained by Bishop Synesius, (370-430 A.D.): “The soul, which did not quickly return to the heavenly region from which it was sent down to earth, had to go through many lives of wandering.”
In Origen’s time, Jewish scholars were using a variety of Old Testament translations to question Christians about the expected Messiah. It became difficult to answer these queries with one voice because of the wide variations in texts. Origen took on the monumental task of comparing six versions of the Old Testament. To do so, he developed a graph, then in parallel columns listed contrasting biblical accounts, passage by passage. Included were comparisons of: (1) The Hebrew text; (2) Hebrew text put into Greek, the Septuagint; (3) Greek translation of Aquila (about 128 A.D.); (4) Greek translation of Symmachus (about 193 A.D.); (5) Septuagint text developed by Origen (about 225 A.D.); (6) Greek translation of Theodotion (between 190-192 A D ).
The work, titled the Hexapla, consisted of 50 volumes and took Origen 27 years to complete. It became prized and some groups accepted his fifth column as the most authoritative and copied it as their official version.
As far as the New Testament, two books were removed (in 367 A.D.) from those considered authentic by Origen: Shepherd of Hermas and Letters of Barnabas. The first was penned by Hermas, a Christian theologian, and Barnabas was a preacher who traveled with Paul. Both books allude to the doctrine of successive lives since one emphasized the need to attain “perfection” and the other affirmed that Christians become God’s sons through “adoption.”
The renowned Greek Bishop Athanasius had a powerful influence over the Christian faith in the fourth century A.D., and he is responsible for their removal.
Origen is considered to be the founder of Christian philosophy. His writings (numbering 6,000 works, rolls, or chapters) centered primarily on commentary of Bible passages which he considered to have both esoteric meanings of truth as well as the literal. He was so admired that a man of wealth, Ambrose, sponsored him by providing him with secretaries and copyists.
Saint Gregory recognized him as ” … the prince of Christian learning in the third century.”
Origen died in 253 A.D. following imprisonment because he would not make a sacrifice to the officially pronounced gods of Rome as decreed by Emperor Decius. Although Origen had become Bishop of Caesarea during his lifetime, an ordinance was eventually passed stating that men who had mutilated themselves (as he had earlier with castration) were not eligible for the priesthood. Therefore when this fact became publicized, his superiors stripped him of that position, a forerunner of events to come.
Few could match Origen’s mind and ability to communicate, but the candle of enlightenment he lit, shining for several hundred years, gradually flickered although movements teaching his philosophy survived underground and were revitalized in the Middle Ages.
Jerome (340-420 A.D.), instrumental in developing the most ancient version of the complete Bible, spoke passionately of Origen’s accomplishments, as follows: “What reward has he received for so much toil and sweat? He is condemned by Bishop Demetrius and, excepting the bishops of Palestine, Arabia, Phoenicia, and Achaea, he is unanimously condemned by all. Even Rome assembled her Senate (that is, her synod) against him; not that he taught new dogmas, not that he held heretical opinions as those who bark after him like furious dogs would persuade us, but because they could not bear the brilliancy of his eloquence and learning, and because when he spoke, all the others seemed dumb.”
The debate regarding the humanity versus the divinity of Jesus would eventually lead to the decline of Origenism and consequently to the dismissal of the belief in reincarnation.
3. The Great Debate: Was Jesus Human or Divine?
In the early Christian era, there were two opposing lines of thinking about the nature of Jesus.
A renowned Greek bishop, Athanasius (296-373 A.D.) asserted that He was God on Earth based on the passage (John 1:1-14): “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God …”
Conversely, Arius, (256-336 A.D.) a Libyan priest, disagreed, proposing that if the Father begat the Son, “… then he that was begotten had a beginning of existence.” He described Jesus as one who “became perfect God,” and therefore individuals could follow the pattern of His life. (In his writings, Origen expressed that when Jesus was referred to as “Logos” or “Word,” it revealed that He was in a subordinate position to the Father but a mirror image of Him in the world.)
The unity of Christianity was threatened as intense, prolonged debates between the varying opinions of Athanasius, Arius, and their adherents persisted. Opinion vacillated but ultimately favored the opinion of Athanasius at the First Council of Nicaea (325 A.D.) where all in attendance were then forced to sign the Nicene Creed. Arius and two bishops refused and were banished by Constantine.
The Nicene Creed affirms that Jesus Christ is the “only Son” of God even though New Testament passages contradict that statement, including: “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name…” (John 1:12); “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.” (Romans 8:14); and, “Behold, what manner of love the Father bath bestowed upon us, that we should become the sons of God. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:1-2)
Along the same lines, Edgar Cayce suggested that although Jesus was the first begotten of the Father and thus, an example to the world, he was not the “only” begotten son. In fact, the readings suggest that each individual would eventually become “as the elder brother to all who are born in the earth.” (Edgar Cayce reading 1158-5)
On another occasion, the readings described the difference between the terms “Jesus” and “Christ,” as follows: “Jesus is the man, the activity, the mind, the relationships that He bore to others. Yes, he was mindful of friends, He was sociable, He was loving, He was kind, He was gentle. He grew faint, He grew weak — and yet gained that strength that He has promised, in becoming the Christ, by fulfilling and overcoming the world! You are made strong — in body, in mind, in soul and purpose — of the power in Christ. The power, then, is in the Christ. The pattern is in Jesus.” (Edgar Cayce reading 2533-7)
The Nicene Creed does not convey the sense of closeness advocated by Jesus when he prayed that all might become ‘one’, “…as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us… I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one…” (John 17:20-23)
In his work, A History of Christianity, Paul Johnson emphasizes that the survival of the Christian Church depended on the imperial goal of keeping order in the Roman Empire.
Starting in 313 A.D. when Emperor Constantine reversed the policy of Christian persecution, centers of church power catered to requests of the rulers. The two worked together and, as the official church councils gained power, they also helped to hold the Roman Empire together. In order to maintain order and control, there was no tolerance of inquiring minds in Christendom and controversy was banned. A formal ecclesiastical curse or “anathema” eliminated various beliefs, and dissidents could be excommunicated. A curse was declared on belief in pre-existence of the soul despite the fact that Jesus affirmed that John the Baptist had lived earlier as Elias (Matthew 11:14, Matthew 17:11; Mark 9:11-13) and that He himself had also existed previously, “…Before Abraham was, I am.” (John 8:58)
Orthodox theologians attacked Origen’s view of “divine education,” with Christ as the Teacher, leading eventually to the soul’s mystical union with God. The church was looking for shortcuts and as Edgar Cayce reminded us, “There are none in Christianity!” (Edgar Cayce reading 5749-14)
Also, knowledge of Greek thought was declining, so Origen’s writings became less comprehensible. As part of the decline of Origen’s philosophy, when his writings were first translated into Latin, those working on the project feared that his strong views would be offensive, so they changed his texts. Later amended, the circulating copies were inconsistent with one another and cast doubt on the veracity of his work.
The organized church accepted belief in the future resurrection of the physical body and the return of the soul to it. Yet Jesus asserted clearly (Matthew 22:29-30) that when this event occurs, that individuals would be as “the angels of God in heaven” — or as souls — consistent with Origen’s view.
In complete opposition and with the greater influence, the Creed of St. Athanasius stated that, “all men shall rise again with their bodies.”
Origen’s views were once more maligned. As the ban against this Christian philosopher gained momentum, some in power — desiring to advance their own careers — combined all arguments against Origenism and presented them as their own.
But it was the Emperor Justinian who dealt the final blow. He intensely disliked Greek philosophy and strove to eliminate it, even closing the Athenian schools in 529 A.D. Aided by his wife, Theodora, he meddled in Christian theology issuing edicts and even appointing bishops. They were such a cruel couple that when two opposing political factions joined in a rebellion to overthrow them, they had all 30,000 killed.
In 553 A.D., Justinian called for an ecumenical synod to condemn 15 propositions extracted from Origen’s works. Four of these are aimed at pre-existence (and by inference reincarnation) and his name is listed as being a heretic along with Arius and five others. All are cursed and declared excommunicated. Since Pope Vigilius refused to attend this gathering, the absence of papal approval appears to negate the validity of those decisions. Therefore the way is open for the Church today to reconsider the philosophy of Origen, and the concept of reincarnation and its profound implications.
4. References
[1] Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Origen
[3] Bible Study Tools: Why Was Origen Important to the Early Church?
[4} GotQuestions.org: Who was Origen of Alexandria?
[5] Christian Stack Exchange: Is there any substance to the claim that Origen supported reincarnation?
[6] Richard Finn (2009). “Origen and his ascetic legacy“. Origen and his ascetic legacy, in: Asceticism in the Graeco-Roman World. Cambridge University Press. pp. 100–130.
[7] McGuckin, John Anthony (2004). “The Life of Origen (ca. 186–255)”. In McGuckin, John Anthony (ed.). The Westminster Handbook to Origen. The Westminster Handbooks to Christian Theology. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press.
[8] Grafton, Anthony (2011), Worlds Made by Words: Scholarship and Community in The Modern West, Cambridge Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, ISBN 978-0-674-03257-6, archived from the original on 2021-11-07, retrieved 2020-11-18.
[9] Olson, Roger E. (1999), The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition & Reform, Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, ISBN 978-0-8308-1505-0, archived from the original on 2021-08-31, retrieved 2020-11-18
[10] McGuckin 2004, pp. 25–26, 64.
