Fragments on Lamentations · §15 · Origen of Alexandria

Zion lives in bitterness, not as a form of anger

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Zion, having nothing sweet at all, lives through bitterness by herself; for one must not take “being embittered” (Lamentations 1:4) now of some form of anger.

Greek

Klagel. Jerem. 1, 4. Ἡ Σιὼν γλυκὺ μηδαμῶς ἔχουσά τι, ἐν πικρίᾳ διάγει καθ᾿ ἑαντήν οὐ ληπτέον γὰρ τὸ πικραινομένη νῦν ἐπί τινος εἴδους ὀργῆς.

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Origen on Lamentations: Jeremiah's grief for captive Jerusalem, read also as the soul taken captive by sin and set free by Christ.

Origen of Alexandria (c. 185–c. 254) was a Christian teacher in Alexandria and head of the catechetical school. This English is his fragments on Lamentations.

The full commentary is lost. What survives are short passages kept in later chains of quotations. He sets out the literal sense, the Hebrew form of the book, and its historical setting, and he compares the Greek translations.

A reader meets Jeremiah lamenting the fall of Jerusalem, and Jerusalem read both as the city and as the soul. Origen quotes Symmachus, Aquila, and Theodotion. He also cites Paul, David, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Habakkuk, Zechariah, and Daniel. He uses Septuagint book names and Psalm numbering.

EditionKlostermann, Origenes Werke III (GCS 6, 1901)

We have not yet re-checked this work against its source. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Greek on any section to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.

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