Dialogue with Heraclides

1When the bishops present had opened a discussion of bishop Heraclides' faith, so that he might confess before them all how he believes, and each had said what came to him and had asked his questions, bishop Heraclides spoke.

Heraclides said: I too believe what the divine scriptures say: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. This was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him not even one thing came to be. Do we then agree in the faith? And according to this, do we also believe that Christ has taken flesh, that he was born, that he went up into the heavens in the flesh in which he rose, that he sits at the right hand of the Father, about to come from there and judge the living and the dead — God and man?

Origen said: Since an examination is taking place once for all, I will speak to the point under examination. The whole church is present and listening. One church ought not to differ in knowledge from another church, since you are not a church that lies. I ask you, Bishop Heraclides: God is the Almighty, the unbegotten, the one who has made the universe over all things. Are you content with this?

Heraclides said: I am content. I too believe this.

Origen said: Christ Jesus was in the form of God, and he is other than the God in whose form he was. Was he God before he came into a body, or not?

Heraclides said: He was God before.

Origen said: Was he God before he came into a body, or not?

Heraclides said: Yes.

Origen said: Another God besides this God in whose form he himself was (John 1:1–3) (2 Timothy 4:1) (Philippians 2:6) (Mark 16:19) (1 Peter 4:5) (Psalm 110:1)?

2Heraclides said: Clearly he is of another, and being in that one's form he belongs to the one who created all things.

Origen said: So then the only-begotten Son of God, the firstborn of all creation, was God, the Son of God — and we need not be over-scrupulous in saying, in one respect, two Gods, and in another respect, one God?

Heraclides said: What you say is clear. But we say that God is the Almighty, God without beginning, without end, containing all things and not contained; and that his Word is the Son of the living God, God and man, through whom all things have come to be — God according to spirit, man according to his birth from Mary.

Origen said: What I asked, you do not seem to have answered. Make it clear, then; perhaps I did not follow. Is the Father God?

Heraclides said: Entirely.

Origen said: Is the Son other than the Father?

Heraclides said: How can he be a son, if he is also father?

Origen said: The Son, being other than the Father — is he also God?

Heraclides said: He too is God.

Origen said: And do the two become one?

Heraclides said: Yes.

Origen said: Do we confess two Gods?

Heraclides said: Yes; the power is one.

Origen said: But our brothers take offense at there being two Gods. So the wording must be tended with care, and we must show in what respect they are two, and in what respect the two are one God. The divine scriptures have taught that many twos are one — and not only two. Even some things more than two, and even things far more in number, they have taught to be one. The task before us now is not to take a problem and skip past it and string words together, but to chew it, for the simpler people, as if it were meat, and to put the word into the hearers' ears little by little (Colossians 1:15) (John 1:18) (John 1:3) (Philippians 2:6).

3Origen went on: The task is not to take a problem and skip past it and string words together, but to chew it, for the simpler people, as if it were meat, and to put the word into the hearers' ears little by little.

Many twos, then, are said in the scriptures to be one. Which scriptures? Adam is one person; the woman is another. Adam is other than the woman, and the woman other than the man. And it is said at once in the Making of the World that the two are one: For the two shall be into one flesh. So then it is possible at times for two to be one flesh.

But keep this for me: in the case of Adam and Eve it is not said that the two shall be into one spirit, nor that the two shall be into one soul, but the two shall be into one flesh.

The righteous man again, being other than Christ, is said by the apostle to be one toward Christ: For he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit. Is it not that the one is of a lesser, lower, inferior substance, and Christ of a more divine, more glorious, more blessed? Therefore they are no longer two?

For the man and the woman are no longer two but one flesh, and the righteous human being and Christ are one spirit. So our Savior and Lord, toward the Father and God of all, is not one flesh, nor one spirit, but what is above both flesh and spirit: one God.

For it was necessary that, in the case of human beings joined to one another, the name 'flesh' should be set; and in the case of a righteous human being joined to Christ, the name 'spirit'; and in the case of Christ being united to the Father, neither the name 'flesh' nor the name 'spirit' should be set, but what is more honorable than these: the name 'God.' (Genesis 2:24) (1 Corinthians 6:17) (Matthew 19:6) (Matthew 19:5)

4Origen went on: In the case of Christ united to the Father, neither the name 'flesh' nor the name 'spirit' should be set, but what is more honorable than these: the name 'God.' Hence let us understand I and the Father are one in this way.

Let us pray — on account of those who keep the dyad, and on account of those who introduce the monad — so that we neither fall into the opinion of those who have split from the church into a fantasy of monarchy, doing away with the Son from the Father and in power doing away with the Father as well, nor fall into another impious teaching, the one that denies the divinity of Christ.

How then do the divine scriptures speak, as in Before me no other God came to be, and after me there shall not be, and in I am, and there is no God besides me? With these utterances we must not suppose that the 'one' as applied to the God of all [The text is damaged here.] is apart from Christ; nor indeed Christ apart from God. But let us say that they are in the way Jesus says, I and my Father are one.

We have to work at these words, because many things have been stirred in this church. They often write that people should subscribe, and that the bishop should subscribe, and those under suspicion, and subscribe before the whole people, so that there may no longer be faction or any inquiry about this.

With God permitting, then, and secondly the bishops, and thirdly the presbyters and the people too, I will speak again of what is stirring me at this point. The offering is always made to God Almighty through Jesus Christ, as offering his divinity to the Father. Let the offering not be made twice, but to God through God.

I shall seem bold in speaking, as we pray to remain in the covenants. If it does not happen, you shall not take a man's face nor marvel at a ruler's face (John 10:30) (Isaiah 43:10) (Isaiah 45:5) (Leviticus 19:15) (Deuteronomy 32:39) (Deuteronomy 16:19).

5[The text is damaged here.]. If this is not done, [The text is damaged here.] these covenants would give occasions for inquiries [The text is damaged here.]. A bishop or a presbyter is not a bishop, is not a presbyter; if a deacon, he is not a deacon nor a layman; if he is a layman, he is not a layman, nor is he gathered in the assembly. If it seems good, let these covenants be made.

Some add that, as to the matters of the divinity, offering the divinity in this way, in substance, to Jesus Christ, I have confessed the resurrection of a dead body before the church. And since our Savior and Lord took a body, let us examine what the body was.

The church alone, against all the heresies that deny the resurrection, confesses the resurrection of a dead body, as following from the firstfruits having been raised from the dead, that the dead are raised. Christ the firstfruits: for this reason his body became a dead body. For if his body had not become dead — able to be wrapped in linen, to receive myrrh and whatever else belongs to the dead, and to be laid in a tomb — a spiritual body cannot suffer these things. For it is in no way possible for what is spiritual to be made dead, or for what is spiritual to become without sensation. If a spiritual thing can be made dead, there is a fear that after the resurrection of the dead, when our body is raised according to the apostle who says, It is sown a soulish body, it is raised a spiritual body, we may all die (1 Corinthians 15:20) (1 Corinthians 15:23) (John 19:40) (Mark 15:46) (1 Corinthians 15:44).

6Origen went on from the apostle's word — It is sown a soulish body, it is raised a spiritual body — lest, if a spiritual thing can be made dead, we may all die. For Christ, raised from the dead, dies no more. And not only does Christ, raised from the dead, die no more, but also those who are Christ's, once raised from the dead, die no more. If these things please, these too, on the testimony of the people, shall be enacted and fixed. What else concerning the faith? Do these things seem good to you, Maximus, [The text is damaged here.]?

Maximus said: May it come about that all become like me. Before God and the church I both subscribe and anathematize. Only, lest I be wholly in doubt and double-minded, I ask about a certain point corrupt stretch. For the brothers know that I used to say: I have to be benefited by the brother and taught this. If the spirit has been handed over to the Father according to Father, into your hands I commit my spirit, and the spirit is apart, the flesh having died and lying in a tomb — when it is opened, how do the dead rise?

Origen said: We have learned from the holy scriptures that the human being is composite. For the apostle says: May God sanctify your spirit and the soul and the body; and May he sanctify you wholly, and may your spirit and the soul and the body be kept complete, blamelessly, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. This spirit is not the Holy Spirit, but a part of the human being's constitution, as the same apostle teaches when he says: The Spirit bears witness with our spirit. For if it were the Holy Spirit, he would not have said: The Spirit bears witness with our spirit (1 Corinthians 15:44) (Romans 6:9) (1 Corinthians 15:23) (Luke 23:46) (1 Thessalonians 5:23) (Romans 8:16) (Psalm 31:5).

7Origen went on: The Spirit bears witness with our spirit. If it were the Holy Spirit, he would not have said it that way.

Our Savior and Lord, then, wanting to save a human being in the way he wanted to save, for this reason wanted to save a body in this way, as he likewise wanted to save a soul, and he wanted to save the remaining part of the human being as well, the spirit. The whole human being would not have been saved if he had not taken up the whole human being.

They set aside the salvation of the human body when they say the Savior's body is spiritual. They set aside the salvation of the human spirit, about which the apostle says: No one among men knows the things of the man except the spirit of the man that is in him. Wanting to save the spirit of the man, about which the apostle said these things, he took up a human spirit as well.

These three were divided at the time of the Passion; these three were united at the time of the resurrection. At the time of the Passion they were divided. How? The body in the tomb, the soul in Hades, the spirit he committed to the Father. The soul in Hades: You will not abandon my soul to Hades. If he committed the spirit to the Father, he has given the spirit as a deposit. It is one thing to grant as a gift, another to hand over, another to place as a deposit. The one who places a deposit places it in order to receive the deposit back. To whom, then, did the spirit have to commit the deposit, if not to the Father?

This is above me and my condition and my mind; for I am not of such stature as to say that just as the body could not go down into Hades — even if those who call Jesus' body spiritual say this — so neither could the spirit go down into Hades, and therefore he gave the spirit as a deposit to the Father until he should rise from the dead (Romans 8:16) (1 Corinthians 2:11) (Psalm 16:10) (Luke 23:46) (Acts 2:27).

10Origen went on: With the (if we must call them that) unlawful and abominable and defiling things, the apostle seems also to have listed the things despised by the many. For what does he say? Do not be deceived: neither fornicators, nor adulterers, nor the soft, nor men who lie with men, nor thieves, nor drunkards, nor revilers will inherit the kingdom of God. You see: with evils of such size — the man who lies with men, the soft, the adulterer, the fornicator — he numbered the drunkard, the reviler, sins despised by all of us, so that we may be taught that we are not cast out of the kingdom of God for those only, but also for these that are thought to be smaller. Therefore let us neither revile, nor get drunk, nor seize, nor steal, nor do the things that are not lawful, even if we are led astray.

If anything is lacking concerning the rule, remind me. For the rest, we will speak to the scripture.

Dionysius said: Is the soul the blood?

Origen said: It has come to my hearing, and I say it as fully persuaded, that some of those here and of those in the neighboring towns think that after the departure from here the soul perceives nothing, but is in the tomb, in the body. And I know that I was carried more harshly on this matter against the other Heraclides and Celer who was before him — so harshly that he left and wanted to go away. And yet, for the sake of honor and of the word, he had sent for us. We came down into the discussion; he gave a statement, as that man cleared himself toward us with statements of faith [The text is damaged here.] that it was as toward God (1 Corinthians 6:9–10).

11Origen went on: We came down into the discussion; he gave a statement, as that man cleared himself toward us with statements of faith [The text is damaged here.] that it was as toward God.

Necessarily, then, beloved Dionysius inquires about this too. The texts by which they are pulled aside — lest any of them escape me — I will first set out, and to each, God granting, according to your prayer, we will answer.

What has pulled them aside is this: The soul of all flesh is blood. And this text has terribly stirred those who have not understood it. And You shall not eat the soul with the flesh; take strong care not to eat blood; you shall not eat the soul with the flesh. This is what has pulled them aside; for the other things that have pulled them aside are far less than the force of the sense in these.

I, for my part, praying to be helped in reading the divine things — for we need help so that we may not think something besides the truth — [The text is damaged here.]. I found that things not bodily are named with the same names as all the bodily things, so that the bodily things belong to the outer man, and the things with the same names as the bodily belong to the inner. Scripture says that the human being is two men: For if our outer man is being destroyed, yet our inner is being renewed day by day; and I delight in the law of God according to the inner man. These two men the apostle everywhere sets out, in each person (Leviticus 17:11) (Leviticus 17:14) (Deuteronomy 12:23) (2 Corinthians 4:16) (Romans 7:22) (Genesis 9:4).

16Origen went on: And God said, Let us make a human being according to our image and according to our likeness, and let them rule, and the rest. And God made the human being — not taking dust from the earth as in the case of the second, but according to the image of God he made him.

And that the 'according to the image of God' (Genesis 1:26–27) is known as immaterial, better than every bodily subsistence, not by Moses only but also by the apostle, his wording shows when he says: Having put off the old man with his deeds and having put on the new, the one being renewed unto knowledge according to the image of the one who created him.

There are, then, two men in each of us. How is it said, The soul of all flesh is blood? The problem is great. As, then, the outer man is named with the same name as the inner, so also his members, so that one may say that every member of the outer man is also named according to the inner man.

The outer man has eyes, and the inner is said to have eyes: Lighten my eyes, lest I sleep unto death. He is not speaking about these eyes, nor about perceptible sleep, nor about the common death. The commandment of the Lord is bright, lighting the eyes. It is not that by keeping the Lord's commandments we become sharper-sighted according to the body, but that by keeping the divine commandments we become sharper-sighted according to the mind. The eyes of the inner man see through more than ours: Uncover my eyes, and I will consider the wonders of your law (Genesis 2:7) (Colossians 3:9–10) (Leviticus 17:11) (Psalm 13:3) (Psalm 19:8) (Psalm 119:18).

18Origen went on from the psalm: Wrath is theirs according to the likeness of the serpent, as of a deaf asp that stops her ears, which will not listen to the voice of charmers, of a drug being mixed by a wise man.

And you, as many as know yourselves to be at fault, if you hear a word and a drug being mixed by a wise man, and you hear words of charmers, so that it may settle your wrath and your vice, and then you stop your ears, not opening them nor spreading them for the reception of what is said — the word will reach you: Wrath is theirs according to the likeness of the serpent, as of a deaf asp that stops her ears, which will not listen to the voice of charmers, of a drug being mixed by a wise man.

The outer man smells with nostrils, receiving fragrance and stench. And the inner man receives the fragrance of righteousness and the stench of sins with other nostrils — fragrance, as the apostle teaches, saying: We are the fragrance of Christ to God in every place, among those being saved and among those perishing: to the one a smell from death to death, to the other a smell from life to life. And Solomon too says in the Song of Songs, in the person of the young women, the daughters of Jerusalem: After you we will run to the smell of your ointments. As, then, with the nostrils we receive perceptible fragrance and perceptible stench, so according to the inner man there is a reception, in the one who is healthy according to the divine senses, of the fragrance of righteousness (Psalm 58:4–5) (2 Corinthians 2:15–16) (Song of Solomon 1:4).

19Origen went on: As with the nostrils we receive perceptible fragrance and perceptible stench, so according to the inner man there is a reception, in the one who is healthy according to the divine senses, of the fragrance of righteousness, which the apostle had, and of the stench of sins. What stench of sins? About which the prophet says thus: My bruises have grown rancid and rotten from the face of my folly.

The outer man has the tasting faculty, and the inner man has the spiritual tasting faculty, about which it is said: Taste and see that the Lord is kind.

The outer man has perceptible touch, and the inner man has touch — that touch by which the woman with the flow of blood touched the hem of Jesus. She touched. For the one who said, Who touched me? bore witness. And a little before, Peter was saying to him: The crowds are pressing you, and you say, Who touched me? He thinks that those who touch bodily are touching, not spiritually. So those pressing Jesus were not touching him; for they were not touching him by faith. But she alone, having a certain divine touch, touched Jesus and for this reason was healed. And since she touched with his divine touch, for this reason power of Jesus went out upon her divine touch (Psalm 38:5) (Psalm 34:8) (Luke 8:43–46) (Mark 5:30–31) (Matthew 9:20–22).

20Origen went on: And since she touched with his divine touch, for this reason power of Jesus went out upon her divine touch. He says then: Who touched me? For I knew power had gone out from me.

About this more divine touch John speaks: And our hands handled concerning the word of life. So we have other hands, about which it is said: The lifting of my hands is an evening sacrifice. For if I lift these hands, but the hands of my soul lie below, and I do not lift them through holy and good deeds, the lifting of my hands does not become an evening sacrifice.

I have other feet as well, about which Solomon promised me, saying: Your foot shall not stumble. Something strange is said in Ecclesiastes. To the one who does not understand it will seem senseless; but to the wise it has been said from Ecclesiastes: The eyes of the wise man are in his head. In what head? For of every human being, even of the senseless and the fool, the perceptible eyes are in a perceptible head; but the eyes of the wise man, the ones spoken of before, the ones lit by the Lord's commandment, are in his head — in Christ, since the head of a man is Christ, the apostle says. The thinking faculty is in Christ. My belly, my belly I ache, said Jeremiah (Luke 8:46) (1 John 1:1) (Psalm 141:2) (Proverbs 3:23) (Ecclesiastes 2:14) (1 Corinthians 11:3) (Jeremiah 4:19) (Psalm 91:12).

21Origen went on: My belly, my belly I ache, said Jeremiah. What belly does he ache with? The one we too ache with — the belly with which, since he was in labor for the people, I ache in my belly, and the senses, not these but of my heart.

If I come even to the fine parts of the body, I see them without flesh upon the soul. Lord, do not rebuke me in your wrath, nor discipline me in your anger. Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am weak; heal me, Lord, for my bones were troubled. What bones of the prophet were troubled? The harmony of his soul and the firmness of his mind were troubled, and he asks for the restoration of those bones.

Our bones were scattered beside Hades. What bones of the speaker were scattered beside Hades? If you see for me the one who has sinned, and you see his harmonies in the region of sin, in the region of the dead, in the region of vice, you will say of such a one that his bones were scattered. All my bones will say: Lord, who is like you? These bones speak, converse, say, perceive God — and these bodily bones are without sensation, as physicians' pupils show when they saw bones of one who does not perceive in the sawing. All my bones, then, will say: Lord, who is like you? Bones the inner man has, all of them (Jeremiah 4:19) (Psalm 6:1–2) (Psalm 141:7) (Psalm 35:10).

23Origen went on: So the heart of the fool is lost, and it is said, Hear me, you who have lost the heart, as the blood is poured out and the vital power of the soul.

If the soul has been understood, and understood according to the inner man, and it has been understood that in that one is the 'according to the image,' (Philippians 1:23) it is clear that Paul says well: For it is better to depart and to be with Christ. Before the resurrection the righteous man is with Christ, and in that very soul he lives with Christ. For this reason: For it is better to depart and to be with Christ.

But according to you who say that the soul lies in the tomb with the body, it has not gone out from the body, it does not rest, it has not come to be in the paradise of God, it does not rest in Abraham's bosom. And according to you who say such things, it is not better to depart and to be with Christ; for he is not with Christ at the moment of departing, if the soul is blood. If the soul lies in the tombs, how can it be with Christ?

But according to me and the word of God, the soul that has departed from the labors, that has departed from the sweats, that has been released from the body, that can say, Now you release your servant, Master, in peace, goes out in peace and rests with Christ. So Abraham's soul heard: And you shall go to your fathers in peace, nourished in a good old age. He goes away to the fathers. Which fathers? About whom Paul says: For this reason I bend my knees to the Father, from whom every family (Luke 16:22) (Luke 2:29) (Genesis 15:15) (Luke 23:43).

24Origen went on: He goes away to the fathers. Which fathers? About whom Paul says: For this reason I bend my knees to the Father, from whom every family. Thus according to us Aaron was released. For it is also written in Ecclesiastes about the righteous man who has contested well, who has gone out from the bodily bond, that He shall come out of the house of prisoners to reign.

Thus I am persuaded to die for the truth; thus I despise the so-called death, ready; thus — bring beasts, bring crosses, bring fire, bring tortures. I know that at the moment of being released I go out of the body; I rest with Christ. For this reason let us contest, for this reason let us wrestle, let us groan being in the body — not as about to be in the tombs again at once, in the body, but as about to be released, and as changing the body toward the more spiritual. And being about to depart and be with Christ, how do we groan, we who are in the body?

When bishop Philip had entered, Demetrius, another bishop, said: Brother Origen teaches that the soul is immortal.

Origen said: Bishop Demetrius's word has given us the beginning of another problem. He said we had said that the soul is immortal. To this word I will say that the soul is both immortal and the soul is not immortal (Ephesians 3:14–15) (Ecclesiastes 4:14) (Romans 8:23) (Philippians 1:23) (Numbers 20:26–28) (2 Corinthians 5:4) (1 Corinthians 15:44).

25Origen said: To this word I will say that the soul is both immortal and the soul is not immortal. Let us first distinguish the name of death and how many things are signified from the utterance 'death.' I will try to set out how many things are signified, not according to the Greeks, but how many are signified according to the divine scripture. Perhaps someone wiser than I will also set out other significations; I, at any rate, for the present know three deaths. What are these three deaths?

Someone lives to God and has died to sin, according to the apostle. This death is blessed: someone dies to sin. This death my Lord died. For that which he died, he died to sin.

I know another death as well, according to which someone dies to God, about which it is said: The soul that sins, it shall die.

I know also a third death, according to which we commonly think those released from the body have died. For Adam lived thirty and nine hundred years, and he died.

There being, then, three deaths, let us see whether the human soul is immortal according to the three deaths, or not according to the three deaths, but immortal according to some of them. According to the middle death we all die, which we take to be dissolution. This death no human soul dies. For if it died, it would not be punished after death (Romans 6:10–11) (Romans 6:2) (Ezekiel 18:4) (Ezekiel 18:20) (Genesis 5:5).

26Origen went on: This death no human soul dies. For if it died, it would not be punished after death. Human beings, he says, will seek death and will not find it. For the souls being punished will seek death; they will want rather not to be than to be and be punished. For this reason human beings will seek death and will not find it. According to this signification every human soul is immortal.

But according to the remaining significations, according to the one the soul is mortal, and blessed if it dies to sin. About this death Balaam, prophesying, spoke, praying in a divine spirit: May my soul die in the souls of the righteous. About this death Balaam prophesied in a strange way, and he prayed the finest things for himself in the word of God. For he prayed to die to sin in order to live to God. And for this reason he said: May my soul die in the souls of the righteous, and may my seed be as the seed of these.

And there is another death, according to which we are not immortal, but we are able, from keeping watch, not to die. And perhaps the mortal of the soul is not always mortal. For so long as it admits of sinning such a sin that it becomes the soul that sins, it shall die, the soul is mortal of the real death. But if it comes to be in firmness of blessedness so as to be incapable of death, the one that has the eternal life is no longer mortal, but has become immortal according to this signification too (Revelation 9:6) (Numbers 23:10) (Romans 6:11) (Ezekiel 18:4).

27Origen went on: But if the soul comes to be in firmness of blessedness so as to be incapable of death, the one that has the eternal life is no longer mortal, but has become immortal according to this signification too.

How has it been said by the apostle, He who alone has immortality, of God? I am searching in order to find that Christ Jesus died for all apart from God. You have how God alone has immortality.

Let us take up the eternal life, then; let us take it up from what is in our power. God does not give it to us, but sets it before us: See, I have given life before your face. It is in our power to stretch out the hand, to act with good deeds, and to take the life and store it in the soul.

This life is Christ, who said, I am the life. This life which now is present to the righteous in a shadow, but then face to face. For the spirit before our face is Christ the Lord, of whom we said: In his shadow we shall live among the nations. If your shadow of the life grants such goods — such as Moses had when prophesying, such as Isaiah had when seeing the Lord Sabaoth sitting on a throne high and lifted up, such as Jeremiah had when hearing, Before I formed you in the belly I know you, and before I formed you in the belly I know you, and before you came out of the womb I consecrated you — such as Ezekiel had when seeing the cherubim, seeing the wheels, the unspeakable mysteries — how shall we live when we no longer live under the shadow of the life, but come to be in the life itself (1 Timothy 6:16) (Hebrews 2:9) (Deuteronomy 30:15) (Deuteronomy 30:19) (John 14:6) (1 Corinthians 13:12) (Lamentations 4:20) (Isaiah 6:1) (Jeremiah 1:5) (John 11:25)?