On the Resurrection

Name: On the Resurrection
Author: Origen of Alexandria

De Resurrectione

Origen of Alexandria (c. 185–c. 254 AD) · written c. 230–250 AD · PG 11

Origen of Alexandria (c. 185–c. 254) is the author of these fragments on the resurrection. Methodius is the writer who reports the words. This is not Chrysostom's treatise on the resurrection of the dead.

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Contents4 passages

1Lazarus, the rich man, and bodies after death
2Soul-form like the earthly body; Samuel visible
3Before the resurrection the soul still uses a body
4Those of the resurrection will be as angels—without flesh

Author

Origen of Alexandria (c. 185–c. 254 AD) — Teacher at Alexandria and later Caesarea, and the first great Christian scholar of the Bible. He wrote commentaries, sermons and treatises on nearly every book of Scripture and compiled the Hexapla, a six-column Old Testament. He was tortured in the Decian persecution and died soon after.

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About this text

Fragments from Origen on the rising of the dead: Lazarus and the rich man, the soul's bodily form after death, and the risen being like the angels.

He takes up the story of Lazarus and the rich man. Simpler readers treat both men as still in the body. More careful readers say the scene is not yet the resurrection, because after the rising no one is left living in this age. The rich man speaks of his five brothers.

The fragments then speak of the form the soul has at death, of Samuel seen in a body, and of the saying that those who reach the resurrection will be as the angels, and so without flesh. The citations use the old names of the biblical books.

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Translated from PG 11 (Greek)

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Lazarus, the rich man, and bodies after death§1

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1One may raise a difficulty about Lazarus and the rich man. The simpler readers take the story as if both men, still with their bodies, receive what their lives deserved. More careful readers deny that the scene belongs to the resurrection: after the rising, no one is left still living in this age.

The rich man says, "I have five brothers; send Lazarus to tell them what is here, so they do not come into this place of torment." From that speech people hunt for tongue, finger, Abraham's bosom, and the reclining place.

Perhaps, then, the soul's shape at departure is of like form to the dense…

Greek · §1

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Soul-form like the earthly body; Samuel visible§2

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2…and earthly body can be taken that way. Whenever someone among those who have fallen asleep is reported as appearing, he is seen in a form like the one he had while he still wore flesh.

Samuel too, when he appears and is plainly visible, shows that he was clothed with a body—especially if the proofs force us to say the soul's substance is incorporeal. So also the rich man under punishment, and the…

Greek · §2

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Before the resurrection the soul still uses a body§3

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3…poor man resting in Abraham's bosom—spoken of before the Savior's coming, before the world's consummation, and so before the resurrection—the one punished in Hades, the other at rest in Abraham's bosom—teach that even now, at departure, the soul uses a body.

From Methodius. Origen, having put it this way…

Greek · §3

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Those of the resurrection will be as angels—without flesh§4

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4…to declare the Lord, as when the Sadducees tempt him: "those who attain the resurrection will then be as angels." He adds: "Angels stand outside flesh in the height of blessedness, and for that reason they also have glory; so we who are to be made equal to angels must likewise be without flesh as they are."

Greek · §4

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