Trebonianus Gallus
Trebonianus Gallus known as Gallus, was Roman Emperor from June 251 to August 253, in a joint rule with his son Volusianus. Gallus was born in a family with respected Etruscan senatorial background, he had two children in his marriage with Afinia Gemina Baebiana: Gaius Vibius Volusianus Emperor, a daughter, Vibia Galla. His early career was a typical cursus honorum, with several appointments, both political and military, he was suffect consul and in 250 was made governor of the Roman province of Moesia Superior, an appointment that showed the confidence of Emperor Decius in him. In June 251, Decius and his co-emperor and son Herennius Etruscus died in the Battle of Abrittus at the hands of the Goths they were supposed to punish for raids into the empire. According to rumours supported by Dexippus and the thirteenth Sibylline Oracle, Decius' failure was owing to Gallus, who had conspired with the invaders. In any case, when the army heard the news, the soldiers proclaimed Gallus emperor, despite Hostilian, Decius' surviving son, ascending the imperial throne in Rome.
This action of the army, the fact that Gallus seems to have been on good terms with Decius' family, makes Dexippus' allegation improbable. Gallus did not back down from his intention to become emperor, but accepted Hostilian as co-emperor to avoid the damage of another civil war. Anxious to secure his position at Rome and stabilize the situation on the Danube frontier, Gallus made peace with the Goths. Peace terms allowed the Goths to leave Roman territory while keeping their captives and plunder. In addition, it was agreed. Reaching Rome, Gallus' proclamation was formally confirmed by the Senate, with his son Volusianus being appointed Caesar. On June 24, 251, Decius was deified, but by July 15 Hostilian disappears from history—he may have died in an outbreak of plague. Gallus may have ordered a localized and uncoordinated persecution of Christians. However, only two incidents are known to us: the exile of Pope Cornelius to Centumcellae, where he died in 253 and the exile of his successor, Pope Lucius, right after his election.
The latter was recalled to Rome during the reign of Valerian. Like his predecessors, Gallus did not have an easy reign. In the East, an Antiochene nobleman, Mariades and began ravaging Syria and Cappadocia fled to the Persians. Gallus ordered his troops to attack the Persians, but Persian Emperor Shapur I invaded Armenia and destroyed a large Roman army, taking it by surprise at Barbalissos in 253. Shapur I invaded the defenseless Syrian provinces, capturing all of their legionary posts and ravaging their cities, including Antioch, without any response. Persian invasions were repeated in the following year, but now Uranius Antoninus, a descendant of the royal house of Emesa, confronted Shapur and forced him to retreat. Uranius proclaimed himself emperor and minted coins with his image upon them. On the Danube, Scythian tribes were once again on the loose, despite the peace treaty signed in 251, they invaded Asia Minor by sea, burned the great Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, returned home with plunder.
Lower Moesia was invaded in early 253. Aemilianus, governor of Moesia Superior and Pannonia, defeated the invaders. Since the army was no longer pleased with the Emperor, the soldiers proclaimed Aemilianus emperor. With a usurper, supported by Pauloctus, threatening the throne, Gallus prepared for a fight, he recalled several legions and ordered reinforcements to return to Rome from Gaul under the command of the future emperor Publius Licinius Valerianus. Despite these dispositions, Aemilianus marched onto Italy ready to fight for his claim and caught Gallus at Interamna before the arrival of Valerianus. What happened there is not clear. Sources claim that after an initial defeat and Volusianus were murdered by their own troops. In any case, both Gallus and Volusianus were killed in August 253. Bray, John. Gallienus: A Study in Reformist and Sexual Politics, Wakefield Press, 1997. ISBN 1-86254-337-2 Bowman Alan K. Garnsey Peter, Cameron Averil; the Cambridge Ancient History: The Crisis of Empire, A.
D. 193–337, Cambridge University Press, 2005. ISBN 0-521-30199-8. Potter, David S; the Roman Empire at Bay AD 180–395, Routledge, 2004. ISBN 0-415-10058-5. Metropolitan Museum of Art: Bronze of Trebonianus Gallus Media related to Trebonianus Gallus at Wikimedia Commons
Gospel of John
The Gospel of John is the fourth of the canonical gospels. The work is anonymous, although it identifies an unnamed "disciple whom Jesus loved" as the source of its traditions, it is related in style and content to the three Johannine epistles, most scholars treat the four books, along with the Book of Revelation, as a single corpus of Johannine literature, albeit not from the same author. The discourses contained in this gospel seem to be concerned with issues of the church–synagogue debate at the time of composition, it is notable that in John, the community appears to define itself in contrast to Judaism, rather than as part of a wider Christian community. Though Christianity started as a movement within Judaism, it separated from Judaism because of mutual opposition between the two religions; the Gospel of John, the three Johannine epistles, the Book of Revelation, exhibit marked similarities, although more so between the gospel and the epistles than between those and Revelation. Most scholars therefore treat the five as a single corpus of Johannine literature, albeit not from the same author.
The consensus of modern scholars is that the Gospel of John was written in the genre of Greco-Roman biography. John contains many characteristics of those writings belonging to the genre of Greco-Roman biography, a) internally; the gospel of John went through two to three stages, or "editions", before reaching its current form around AD 90–110. It speaks of an unnamed "disciple whom Jesus loved" as the source of its traditions, but does not say that he is its author. Christian tradition identified this disciple as the apostle John, but for a variety of reasons the majority of scholars have abandoned this view or hold it only tenuously; the scholarly consensus in the second half of the 20th century was that John was independent of the synoptic gospels, but this agreement broke down in the last decade of the century and there are now many who believe that John did know some version of Mark and Luke, as he shares with them some items of vocabulary and clusters of incidents arranged in the same order.
Key terms from the synoptics, are absent or nearly so, implying that if the author did know those gospels he felt free to write independently. Many incidents in John, such as the wedding in Cana and the encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well, are not paralleled in the synoptics, most scholars believe he drew these from an independent source called the "signs gospel", the speeches of Jesus from a second "discourse" source. Most scholars agree; the gospel makes extensive use of the Jewish scriptures. John quotes from them directly, references important figures from them, uses narratives from them as the basis for several of the discourses, but the author was familiar with non-Jewish sources: the Logos of the prologue derives from both the Jewish concept of Lady Wisdom and from the Greek philosophers, while John 6 alludes not only to the exodus but to Greco-Roman mystery cults, while John 4 alludes to Samaritan messianic beliefs. The majority of scholars see four sections in this gospel: a prologue.
The prologue informs readers of the true identity of Jesus: he is the Word of God through whom the world was created and who took on human form. John 1:10-12 outlines the story to follow: Jesus came to the Jews and the Jews rejected him, but "to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God." Jesus is baptised, calls his disciples, begins his earthly ministry. He travels from place to place informing his hearers about God the Father, offering eternal life to all who will believe, performing miracles which are signs of the authenticity of his teachings; this creates tensions with the religious authorities. Jesus prepares the disciples for their coming lives without his physical presence, prays for them and for himself; the scene is thus prepared for the narrative of his passion and resurrection. The section ends with a conclusion on the purpose of the gospel: "that may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, that believing you may have life in his name."
Chapter 21 tells of Jesus' post-resurrection appearance to his disciples in Galilee, the miraculous catch of fish, the prophecy of the crucifixion of Peter, the restoration of Peter, the fate of the Beloved Disciple. The structure is schematic: there are seven "signs" culminating in the raising of Lazarus (foreshadowing t
Four Marks of the Church
The Four Marks of the Church known as the Attributes of the Church, is a term describing four distinctive adjectives—"one, holy and apostolic"—of traditional Christian ecclesiology as expressed in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed completed at the First Council of Constantinople in AD 381: " in one, holy and apostolic Church." This ecumenical creed is today recited in the liturgy of the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Churches, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, the Church of the East, the Moravian Church, the Lutheran Churches, the Methodist Churches, the Presbyterian Churches, the Anglican Communion and by members of many Reformed Churches. While many doctrines, based on both tradition and different interpretations of the Bible, distinguish one denomination from another explaining why there are so many different ones, the Four Marks, when defined the same way, represent a summary of what many clerical authorities have considered to be the most important affirmations of the Christian faith.
The ideas behind the Four Marks have been in the Christian Church since early Christianity. Allusions to them can be found in the writings of 2nd century early Church Father and bishop Ignatius of Antioch, they were not established in doctrine until the First Council of Constantinople in 381 as an antidote to certain heresies that had crept into the Church in its early history. There the Council elaborated on the Nicene Creed, established by the First Council of Nicea 56 years before by adding to the end a section that included the affirmation: " in one, holy and apostolic Church." The phrase has remained in versions of the Nicene Creed to this day. In some languages, for example, the Latin "catholica" was substituted by "Christian" before the Reformation, though this was an anomaly and continues in use by some Protestant churches today. Hence, "holy catholic" becomes "holy Christian."Roman Catholics believe the description "one, holy and apostolic Church" to be applicable only to the Roman Catholic Church.
They hold that "Christ established here on earth only one Church" and they believe in "the full identity of the Church of Christ with the Catholic Church". While "there are numerous elements of sanctification and of truth which are found outside her structure", these, "as gifts properly belonging to the Church of Christ, impel towards Catholic Unity"; the eastern Churches not in full communion with the Catholic Church thereby "lack something in their condition as particular Churches". The communities born out of the 16th-century Protestant Reformation "do not enjoy apostolic succession in the sacrament of Orders, are, deprived of a constituent element of the Church."The Eastern Orthodox Church, in disagreement with the Roman Catholic, regards itself as the historical and organic continuation of the original Church founded by Christ and his apostles. The Oriental Orthodox Church disagrees with both and claims to be the historical and organic continuation of the original Church founded by Christ and his apostles, the "One, Holy and Apostolic" Church of the ancient Christian creeds and the only Church that has always kept the true Christology and faith declared by the first three councils, Nicaea and Ephesus affirmed by the Church Fathers and the Holy Tradition.
The Augsburg Confession found within the Book of Concord, a compendium of belief of the Lutheran Churches, teaches that "the faith as confessed by Luther and his followers is nothing new, but the true catholic faith, that their churches represent the true catholic or universal church." When the Lutherans presented the Augsburg Confession to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor in 1530, they believe to have "showed that each article of faith and practice was true first of all to Holy Scripture, also to the teaching of the church fathers and the councils." As such, the Lutheran Churches traditionally hold. "There is one body and one Spirit just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, over all and through all and in all." This list in the Pauline letters of factors making Christians one body, one church, is doubtless not meant to be exhaustive, says Francis Aloysius Sullivan, but it affirms the oneness of the body, the church, through what Christians have in common, what they have communion in.
Elsewhere, Paul the Apostle says: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus". This statement was about Christians as individuals, but it applied to them as groups, as local churches, whether composed of Jewish or Gentile Christians. In 1 Cor. 15:9, Paul spoke of himself as having persecuted "the church of God", not just the local church in Jerusalem but the same church that he addresses at the beginning of that letter as "the church of God, in Corinth". In the same letter, he tells Christians: "You are the body of Christ and individually members of it", declares that, "just as the body is one and has many members, all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ"; the word holy means set apart for a special purpose for God. Christians understand the holiness of the universal Church to derive from Christ's holiness; the word "catholic" is derived from the Greek adjective καθολικός, meaning "general", "universal".
It is associated with the Greek adverb καθόλου, meaning "according to the whole", "entirely", or "in general", a combination of the preposition κατά meaning "according to" and the adjective ὅ
Eastern Orthodox Church
The Eastern Orthodox Church the Orthodox Catholic Church, is the second-largest Christian church, with 200–260 million members. It operates as a communion of autocephalous churches, each governed by its bishops in local synods, although half of Eastern Orthodox Christians live in Russia; the church has no central doctrinal or governmental authority analogous to the Bishop of Rome, but the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople is recognised by all as primus inter pares of the bishops. As one of the oldest religious institutions in the world, the Eastern Orthodox Church has played a prominent role in the history and culture of Eastern and Southeastern Europe, the Caucasus, the Near East. Eastern Orthodox theology is based on the Nicene Creed; the church teaches that it is the One, Holy and Apostolic church established by Jesus Christ in his Great Commission, that its bishops are the successors of Christ's apostles. It maintains, its patriarchates, reminiscent of the pentarchy, autocephalous and autonomous churches reflect a variety of hierarchical organisation.
Of its innumerable sacred mysteries, it recognises seven major sacraments, of which the Eucharist is the principal one, celebrated liturgically in synaxis. The church teaches that through consecration invoked by a priest, the sacrificial bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ; the Virgin Mary is venerated in the Eastern Orthodox Church as the God-bearer, honoured in devotions. The Eastern Orthodox Church shared communion with the Roman Catholic Church until the East–West Schism in 1054, triggered by disputes over doctrine the authority of the Pope. Before the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451, the Oriental Orthodox churches shared in this communion, separating over differences in Christology; the majority of Eastern Orthodox Christians live in Southeast and Eastern Europe, Cyprus and other communities in the Caucasus region, communities in Siberia reaching the Russian Far East. There are smaller communities in the former Byzantine regions of the Eastern Mediterranean, in the Middle East where it is decreasing due to persecution.
There are many in other parts of the world, formed through diaspora and missionary activity. In keeping with the church's teaching on universality and with the Nicene Creed, Orthodox authorities such as Saint Raphael of Brooklyn have insisted that the full name of the church has always included the term "Catholic", as in "Holy Orthodox Catholic Apostolic Church"; the official name of the Eastern Orthodox Church is the "Orthodox Catholic Church". It is the name by which the church refers to itself in its liturgical or canonical texts, in official publications, in official contexts or administrative documents. Orthodox teachers refer to the church as Catholic; this name and longer variants containing "Catholic" are recognised and referenced in other books and publications by secular or non-Orthodox writers. The common name of the church, "Eastern Orthodox Church", is a shortened practicality that helps to avoid confusions in casual use. From ancient times through the first millennium, Greek was the most prevalent shared language in the demographic regions where the Byzantine Empire flourished, Greek, being the language in which the New Testament was written, was the primary liturgical language of the church.
For this reason, the eastern churches were sometimes identified as "Greek" before the Great Schism of 1054. After 1054, "Greek Orthodox" or "Greek Catholic" marked a church as being in communion with Constantinople, much as "Catholic" did for communion with Rome; this identification with Greek, became confusing with time. Missionaries brought Orthodoxy to many regions without ethnic Greeks, where the Greek language was not spoken. In addition, struggles between Rome and Constantinople to control parts of Southeastern Europe resulted in the conversion of some churches to Rome, which also used "Greek Catholic" to indicate their continued use of the Byzantine rites. Today, many of those same churches remain, while a large number of Orthodox are not of Greek national origin, do not use Greek as the language of worship. "Eastern" indicates the geographical element in the Church's origin and development, while "Orthodox" indicates the faith, as well as communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople.
There are additional Christian churches in the east that are in communion with neither Rome nor Constantinople, who tend to be distinguished by the category named "Oriental Orthodox". While the church continues to call itself "Catholic", for reasons of universality, the common title of "Eastern Orthodox Church" avoids casual confusion with the Roman Catholic Church; the first known use of the phrase "the catholic Church" occurred in a letter written about 110 AD from one Greek church to another. The letter states: "Wheresoever the bishop shall appear, there let the people be as where Jesus may be, there is the universal Church." Thus from the beginning, Christians referred to the Church as the "One, Holy and Apostolic Church". The Eastern Orthodox Church claims that it is today the continuation and preservation of that same early Church. A number of other Christian churches make a similar claim: the Roman Catholic Church, the Anglican Communion, the Assyrian Church and the Oriental Orthodox.
In the Eastern Orthodox v
Gallienus
Gallienus known as Gallien, was Roman Emperor with his father Valerian from 22 October 253 to spring 260 and alone from spring 260 to September 268. He ruled during the Crisis of the Third Century. While he won a number of military victories, he was unable to prevent the secession of important provinces, his 15-year reign was the longest since the 19-year rule of Caracalla. Born into a wealthy and traditional senatorial family, Gallienus was the son of Valerian and Mariniana. Valerian became Emperor on 22 October 253 and had the Roman senate elevate Gallienus to the ranks of Caesar and Augustus. Valerian divided the empire between him and his son, with Valerian ruling the east and his son the west. Gallienus defeated the usurper Ingenuus in 258 and destroyed an Alemanni army at Mediolanum in 259; the defeat and capture of Valerian at Edessa in 260 by the Sasanian Empire threw the Roman Empire into the chaos of civil war. Control of the whole empire passed to Gallienus, he defeated the eastern usurpers Macrianus Major Mussius Aemilianus in 261–262 but failed to stop the formation of the breakaway Gallic Empire under general Postumus.
Aureolus, another usurper, proclaimed himself emperor in Mediolanum in 268 but was defeated outside the city by Gallienus and besieged inside. While the siege was ongoing, Gallienus was stabbed to death by the officer Cecropius as part of a conspiracy; the exact birth date of Gallienus is unknown. The 6th-century Greek chronicler John Malalas and the Epitome de Caesaribus report that he was about 50 years old at the time of his death, meaning he was born around 218, he was the son of emperor Valerian and Mariniana, who may have been of senatorial rank the daughter of Egnatius Victor Marinianus, his brother was Valerianus Minor. Inscriptions on coins connect him with Falerii in Etruria. Gallienus married Cornelia Salonina about ten years before his accession to the throne, she was the mother of three princes: Valerian II, who died in 258. When Valerian was proclaimed Emperor on 22 October 253, he asked the Senate to ratify the elevation of Gallienus to Caesar and Augustus, he was designated Consul Ordinarius for 254.
As Marcus Aurelius and his adopted brother Lucius Verus had done a century earlier and his father divided the Empire. Valerian left for the East to stem the Persian threat, Gallienus remained in Italy to repel the Germanic tribes on the Rhine and Danube. Division of the empire had become necessary due to its sheer size and the numerous threats it faced, it facilitated negotiations with enemies who demanded to communicate directly with the emperor. Gallienus spent most of his time in the provinces of the Rhine area, though he certainly visited the Danube area and Illyricum in the years from 253 to 258. According to Eutropius and Aurelius Victor, he was energetic and successful in preventing invaders from attacking the German provinces and Gaul, despite the weakness caused by Valerian's march on Italy against Aemilianus in 253. According to numismatic evidence, he seems to have won many victories there, a victory in Roman Dacia might be dated to that period; the hostile Latin tradition attributes success to him at this time.
In 255 or 257, Gallienus was made Consul again, suggesting that he visited Rome on those occasions, although no record survives. During his Danube sojourn, he proclaimed his elder son Valerian II Caesar and thus official heir to himself and Valerian I. Sometime between 258 and 260, while Valerian was distracted with the ongoing invasion of Shapur I in the East, Gallienus was preoccupied with his problems in the West, governor of at least one of the Pannonian provinces, took advantage and declared himself emperor. Valerian II had died on the Danube, most in 258. Ingenuus may have been responsible for that calamity. Alternatively, the defeat and capture of Valerian at the battle of Edessa may have been the trigger for the subsequent revolts of Ingenuus and Postumus. In any case, Gallienus reacted with great speed, he left his son Saloninus as Caesar at Cologne, under the supervision of Albanus and the military leadership of Postumus. He hastily crossed the Balkans, taking with him the new cavalry corps under the command of Aureolus and defeated Ingenuus at Mursa or Sirmium.
The victory must be attributed to the cavalry and its brilliant commander. Ingenuus was killed by his own guards or committed suicide by drowning himself after the fall of his capital, Sirmium. A major invasion by the Alemanni and other Germanic tribes occurred between 258 and 260 due to the vacuum left by the withdrawal of troops supporting Gallienus in the campaign against Ingenuus. Franks broke through the lower Rhine, invading Gaul, some reaching as far as southern Spain, sacking Tarraco; the Alemanni invaded through Agri Decumates followed by the Juthungi. After devastating Germania Superior and Raetia (parts
Eucharist
The Eucharist is a Christian rite, considered a sacrament in most churches, as an ordinance in others. According to the New Testament, the rite was instituted by Jesus Christ during the Last Supper. Through the Eucharistic celebration Christians remember both Christ's sacrifice of himself on the cross and his commission of the apostles at the Last Supper; the elements of the Eucharist, sacramental bread and sacramental wine, are consecrated on an altar and consumed thereafter. Communicants, those who consume the elements, may speak of "receiving the Eucharist", as well as "celebrating the Eucharist". Christians recognize a special presence of Christ in this rite, though they differ about how and when Christ is present. While all agree that there is no perceptible change in the elements, Roman Catholics believe that their substances become the body and blood of Christ. Lutherans believe the true body and blood of Christ are present "in, under" the forms of the bread and wine. Reformed Christians believe in a real spiritual presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
Others, such as the Plymouth Brethren and the Christadelphians, take the act to be only a symbolic reenactment of the Last Supper and a memorial. In spite of differences among Christians about various aspects of the Eucharist, there is, according to the Encyclopædia Britannica, "more of a consensus among Christians about the meaning of the Eucharist than would appear from the confessional debates over the sacramental presence, the effects of the Eucharist, the proper auspices under which it may be celebrated"; the Greek noun εὐχαριστία, meaning "thanksgiving", appears fifteen times in the New Testament but is not used as an official name for the rite. Do this in remembrance of me"; the term "Eucharist" is that by which the rite is referred to by the Didache, Ignatius of Antioch and Justin Martyr. Today, "the Eucharist" is the name still used by Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Roman Catholics, Anglicans and Lutherans. Other Protestant or Evangelical denominations use this term, preferring either "Communion", "the Lord's Supper", "Memorial", "Remembrance", or "the Breaking of Bread".
Latter-day Saints call it "Sacrament". The Lord's Supper, in Greek Κυριακὸν δεῖπνον, was in use in the early 50s of the 1st century, as witnessed by the First Epistle to the Corinthians: When you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper you eat, for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another gets drunk; those who use the term "Eucharist" use the expression "the Lord's Supper", but it is the predominant term among Evangelical and Pentecostal churches, who avoid using the term "Communion". They refer to the observance as an "ordinance"; those Protestant churches avoid the term "sacrament".'Holy Communion' are used by some groups originating in the Protestant Reformation to mean the entire Eucharistic rite. Others, such as the Catholic Church, do not use this term for the rite, but instead mean by it the act of partaking of the consecrated elements; the term "Communion" is derived from Latin communio, which translates Greek κοινωνία in 1 Corinthians 10:16: The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ?
The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? The phrase appears in various related forms five times in the New Testament in contexts which, according to some, may refer to the celebration of the Eucharist, in either closer or symbolically more distant reference to the Last Supper, it is the term used by the Plymouth Brethren. The "Blessed Sacrament" and the "Blessed Sacrament of the Altar" are common terms used by Catholics and some Anglicans for the consecrated elements when reserved in a tabernacle. "Sacrament of the Altar" is in common use among Lutherans. In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the term "The Sacrament" is used of the rite. Mass is used in the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church, the Lutheran Churches, by many Anglicans, in some other forms of Western Christianity. At least in the Catholic Church, the Mass is a longer rite which always consists of two main parts: the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist, in that order; the Liturgy of the Word consists of readings from scripture (the
Origen
Origen of Alexandria known as Origen Adamantius, was an early Christian scholar and theologian, born and spent the first half of his career in Alexandria. He was a prolific writer who wrote 2,000 treatises in multiple branches of theology, including textual criticism, biblical exegesis and biblical hermeneutics and spirituality, he was one of the most influential figures in early Christian theology and asceticism. He has been described as "the greatest genius the early church produced". Origen sought martyrdom with his father at a young age, but was prevented from turning himself in to the authorities by his mother; when he was eighteen years old, Origen became a catechist at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. He devoted himself to his studies and adopted an ascetic lifestyle as both a vegetarian and teetotaler, he came into conflict with Demetrius, the bishop of Alexandria, in 231 after he was ordained as a presbyter by his friend, the bishop of Caesarea, while on a journey to Athens through Palestine.
Demetrius condemned Origen for insubordination and accused him of having castrated himself and of having taught that Satan would attain salvation, an accusation which Origen himself vehemently denied. Origen founded the Christian School of Caesarea, where he taught logic, natural history, theology, became regarded by the churches of Palestine and Arabia as the ultimate authority on all matters of theology, he was tortured for his faith during the Decian persecution in 250 and died three to four years from his injuries. Origen was able to produce a massive quantity of writings due to the patronage of his close friend Ambrose, who provided him with a team of secretaries to copy his works, making him one of the most prolific writers in all of antiquity, his treatise On the First Principles systematically laid out the principles of Christian theology and became the foundation for theological writings. He authored Contra Celsum, the most influential work of early Christian apologetics, in which he defended Christianity against the pagan philosopher Celsus, one of its foremost early critics.
Origen produced the Hexapla, the first critical edition of the Hebrew Bible, which contained the original Hebrew text as well as five different Greek translations of it, all written in columns, side-by-side. He wrote hundreds of homilies covering the entire Bible, interpreting many passages as allegorical. Origen taught that, before the creation of the material universe, God had created the souls of all the intelligent beings; these souls, at first devoted to God, fell away from him and were given physical bodies. Origen was the first to propose the ransom theory of atonement in its developed form and, though he was a Subordinationist, he significantly contributed to the development of the concept of the Trinity. Origen hoped that all people might attain salvation, but was always careful to maintain that this was only speculation, he advocated Christian pacifism. Origen is a Church Father and is regarded as one of the most important Christian theologians of all time, his teachings were influential in the east, with Athanasius of Alexandria and the three Cappadocian Fathers being among his most devoted followers.
Argument over the orthodoxy of Origen's teachings spawned the First Origenist Crisis in the late fourth century AD, in which he was attacked by Epiphanius of Salamis and Jerome, but defended by Tyrannius Rufinus and John of Jerusalem. In 543, the emperor Justinian I condemned him as a heretic and ordered all his writings to be burned; the Second Council of Constantinople in 553 may have anathemized Origen, or it may have only condemned certain heretical teachings which claimed to be derived from Origen. His teachings on the pre-existence of souls were rejected by the Church. All information about Origen's life comes from a lengthy biography of him in Book VI of the Ecclesiastical History written by the Christian historian Eusebius. Eusebius portrays Origen as a literal saint. Eusebius, wrote this account fifty years after Origen's death and had access to few reliable sources on Origen's life his early years. Anxious for more material about his hero, Eusebius recorded events based on only unreliable hearsay evidence and made speculative inferences about Origen based on the sources he had available.
Nonetheless, scholars can reconstruct a general impression of Origen's historical life by sorting out the parts of Eusebius's account that are accurate from those that are inaccurate. Origen was born in either 186 AD in Alexandria. According to Eusebius, Origen's father was Leonides of Alexandria, a respected professor of literature and a devout Christian who practiced his religion openly. Joseph Wilson Trigg deems the details of this report unreliable, but states that Origen's father was "a prosperous and Hellenized bourgeois". According to John Anthony McGuckin, Origen's mother, whose name is unknown, may have been a member of the lower class who did not have the right of citizenship, it is that, on account of his mother's status, Origen himself was not a Roman citizen. Origen's father taught him about literature and philosophy, about the Bible and Christian doctrine. Eusebius states. Trigg accepts this tradition as genuine, given Origen's ability as an adult to recite extended passages of scripture at will.
Eusebius reports that Origen became so learned about the holy scriptures at an early age that his father was unable to answer his questions. In 202, wh
