Fragments on Lamentations · §66 · Origen of Alexandria

Whole day means each day; hand swapped from gifts to discipline

The “whole day” (Psalm 56:1) shows according to each day, as in David: “the whole day making war he afflicted me.” (Psalm 56:1) And “he turned his hand” would also signify that formerly supplying the good things to me, now he brings on the disciplines, as if having exchanged the hand.

Greek

Klagel. Jerem. 3, 3. Τὸ ὅλην τὴν ἡμέραν δηλοῖ καθ’ ἑκάστην ἡμέραν, ὡς παρὰ τῷ Δαβίδ· «ὅλην τὴν ἡμέραν πολεμῶν ἔθλιψέ με. σημαίνοι δ’ ἂν τὸ ἔστρεψε χεῖρα αὐτοῦ καὶ ὅτι πάλαι μοι τὰ ἀγαθὰ χορηγῶν, νῦν τὰς παιδείας ἐπάγει, καθάπερ ἀλλάξας τὴν χεῖρα.

Report a mistake in this passage

About this text

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.

Report a mistake