Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: Judges 2 and Origen's De Principiis: Book V (4-5)

Judges 2 – The angel of the Lord reminds the people to make covenants with the inhabitants of the land, but to “tear down their altars” (2:2).  But they do not obey.  For this reason it says, they will be forced to share the land.

At age 110, Joshua dies and is buried in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mt. Gaash.  Another generation comes along “who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel. Then the Israelites did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and worshiped the Baals; and they abandoned the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt; they followed other gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were all around them, and bowed down to them; and they provoked the Lord to anger” (2:10-12).

The Lord raises up Judges from among the people to help them, but they do not listen to them with any consistency.  During the time of the particular judge, things would be better; but when he died, things would degenerate again.  “So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel; and he said, ‘Because this people have transgressed my covenant that I commanded their ancestors, and have not obeyed my voice, I will no longer drive out before them any of the nations that Joshua left when he died” (2:20-21).

Origen (185-254 AD)

De Principiis (First Principles)

Chapter V

4 – Origen feels it is important to reason out the conclusions that he draws not just to rely on “inference alone” or getting his listeners to agree with him on assertions that are merely conjecture. He seems to be examining whether or not the structures of political power that men have always had around them are somehow there “by divine order” or if they actually came into being because of “reasons” that can be tracked.

He starts by examining the Scripture narrative – the story of the prince of Trye from the Book of Ezekiel. Here are my notes on this chapter of Ezekiel where he is prophesying over the kingdoms and powers that surround God’s people:

The prophecy against the kingdom of Tyre – great trading city and center of the region. Tyre is condemned for being proud enough to consider itself “a god.”  But foreigners will be brought against them.

Tyre was created perfect – full of natural riches and guarded by God’s ensigns. But Tyre’s “busy trading has filled you with violence and sin” (28:16). The dishonesty of their trade, however, and the pride they showed has brought them to ashes. They have become “an object of terror – gone forever” (28:19).

        

Sidon too (less important but involved in the political intrigue Ezekiel is condemning here) is addressed God will send the plague to demonstrate His anger. Men will “learn that I am the Lord Yahweh” by God’s bringing down the nations hostile to Judah around it. Similarly, God will replant his people “on the soil . . .I gave to my servant Jacob [and] they shall live there in confidence, build houses, plant vineyards” (28:26).

What Origen calls the “malignant powers” of the world “were not formed or created so by nature, but fell from a better to a worse position” and the “blessed” powers also were not created so but just never fell into negligence regarding their moral state.

5 – In this section, Origen examines a passage from Isaiah (14:12-14), which was understood to be the story of Satan or Lucifer’s origins. Lucifer (helel) is called the “brightness of morning” or the “day star”:

"How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit on the mount of assembly on the heights of Zaphon; I will ascend to the tops of the clouds, I will make myself like the Most High’" (Isaiah 14:12-14, NIV).

”[A]t one time he was light”; “he had been at one time in heaven, and had had a place among the saints, and had enjoyed a share in that light in which all the saints participate, by which they are made angels of light, and by which the apostles are termed by the Lord the light of the world. In this manner, then did that being once exist as light before he went astray, and fell to this place, and had his glory turned into dust, which is peculiarly the mark of the wicked, as the prophet also says; whence, too, he was called the prince of this world, i.e., of an earthly habitation: for he exercised power over those who were obedient to his wickedness.”

Job refers to this same power by the name “dragon.” He concludes that “it is evident from all this that no one is pure either by essence or nature, and that no one was by nature polluted. And the consequence of this is, that it lies within ourselves and in our own actions to possess either happiness or holiness; or by sloth and negligence to fall from happiness into wickedness and ruin, to such a degree that, through too great proficiency, so to speak, in wickedness . . . he may descend even to that state in which he will be changed into what is called an “opposing power.”

Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: Judges (Intro) through 1 and Origen's De Principiis: Book V (2-3)

Introduction to Judges: We learn in Judges that the ban upon the enemies of the Israelites during their wars of conquest were not so thorough as Joshua may have led us to believe.  It is the theme of Judges to show how a remnant of the native peoples remained and how this remnant persisted as a temptation for the Jews.  The point of these conquest stories seems to be to show that God’s people are a people set apart.  Their ways and the ways of the world around them are not to be the same, nor are they to accommodate themselves to other ways.

The stories that make up judges are not all in chronological order.  They seem to come from widely different sources and times.  The last several chapters even seems to predate some of the earlier stories—involving as they do characters within two generations of the wilderness generation.

The Eerdman’s Handbook says the date of the conquest is at around 1240.  The period covered here is about 200 years, but some of the “periods of rest” recounted here might have been times running concurrently in different parts of the region

Judges 1 - In chapter 1, the people of the tribe of Judah (and Simeon, helping out) are the first to go to war with the Canaanites and Perizzites.  They defeat them and catch Adoni-bezek, cutting off his thumbs and big toes, presumably in retaliation for having done this to other kings (70 of them according to him) in the past (1:6-7). 

Then they attack and take the city of Jerusalem, “killing all its people and setting the city on fire” (1:8). Later, in verse 21, it says the Benjaminites did not succeed in driving out the Jebusites from Jerusalem but lived among them.

        

They go on to attack the Canaanite towns in the hill country, the Negeb and the lowlands. They take Hebron and go on to Debir (Kiriath-sepher). Caleb promises the victor there his daughter Achsah. Among the other cities taken are Zephath, Hormah, Gaza, Ashkelon, Ekron with territories around them.  The only people they had trouble defeating were the inhabitants of the plain because of the “chariots of iron” they had (1:19).

Tribes of Joseph (Benjaminites?) also take Bethel.  Men of Manasseh do not succeed in driving out the inhabitants of Beth-shean or Taanach, or Dor or Ibleam or Megiddo.  The Canaanites remained there with them. And Ephraim settled among the Canaanites of Gezer; as did Zebulun at Kitron and Nahalol.  Asher shared the towns of Acco, Sidon, Ahlab, Achzib, Helbah, Aphik and Rehob. Naphtali lived among Canaanites at Beth-shemesh and Beth-anath.

The Amorites pushed the Danites out of the lands they were given, back into the hill country of the north.  Amorites lived among the tribes of Joseph in Harheres, Aijalon, and Shaalbim, but “when the descendants of Joseph became stronger, they forced the Amorites to work as slaves” (1:35).

Origen (185-254 AD)

De Principiis (First Principles)

Chapter V

2 – “[E]very being which is endowed with reason, and transgresses its statutes and limitations, is undoubtedly involved in sin by swerving from rectitude and justice. Every rational creature, therefore, is capable of earning praise and censure: of praise, if, in conformity to that reason which he possesses, he advances to better things; of censure, if he fall away from the plan and course of rectitude, for which reason he is justly liable to pains and penalties.”

This same reasoning applied to those we call the devil and his companions or angels. Who are these characters named in Scripture? Origen goes into what he thinks is referred to by these words – Satan, principalities and powers - and also those beings referred to as “heavenly beings.”

And what exactly is meant when humans are designated as “rational” and then divided into different “orders”: the Lords’ people, the nations?

3 – He means to inquire into whether these various beings were created exactly as they appear or whether they were created with the ability to be “capable of either condition.”  Were the holy angels always holy?

And were the “principalities” and “powers” and “thrones” created to “hold sway over others” or if they were given their powers “on account of merit.”

Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: Joshua 22-24 and Origen's De Principiis: Books IV and V-1

Joshua 22 – Joshua releases the Gadites, Reubenites and half-tribe of Manasseh to go to their lands east of the Jordan, instructing them “to observe the commandment and instruction that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, to love the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to keep his commandments, and to hold fast to him, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul” (22:5).

When they get there, though, there is a serious misunderstanding.  They construct an altar by the Jordan, “an altar of great size” (22:10). When the other Israelite tribes learn of it, they “gathered at Shiloh, to make war against them” (22:12).

The Ephraimites were in possession of the ark and the sanctuary and opposed proliferation of altars, but each tribe had a sanctuary according to The Jerusalem Bible. They send out Phineas, Eleazar’s son, to talk to them along with ten chiefs.  When they get there they confront them by saying, “What is this treachery that you have committed against the God of Israel in turning away today from following the Lord, by building yourselves an altar today in rebellion against the Lord” (22:16). They compare the offense with the trouble they had at Peor [see Numbers 25] when a plague was attributed to Israelites having sexual relations with the women of Moab.  They tell them rather to come across the Jordan and take lands there if they are tempted to apostasy. 

But the eastern tribes had no intention of rebelling. They do not intend to “offer burnt offerings or grain offerings or offerings of well-being on it” (22:23). What they want is a physical reminder that will establish their connection to the tribes west of the Jordan. “We did it from fear that in time to come our children might say to our children, ‘What have you to do with the Lord, the God of Israel? For the Lord has made the Jordan a boundary between us and you, you Reubenites and Gadites; you have no portion in the Lord,’ So your children might make our children cease to worship the Lord.  Therefore we said, ‘Let us now build an altar, no for burnt offering, nor for sacrifice, but to be a witness between us and you, and between the generations after us, that we do perform the service of the Lord in his presence with our burnt offerings and sacrifices and offerings of well-being; so that your children may never say to our children in time to come, ‘You have no portion in the Lord”’  (22:24-28.) This is satisfactory to Phineas and the Israelites.

Joshua 23 – A long time later, when Joshua is old, he summons everyone to him and admonishes them to be steadfast as Moses did before his death.  He tells them to love the Lord and avoid intermarriage with the women of the region lest they “be a snare and a trap for you,” (23:13).  The blessing has been experienced, but the curse is always there for them to consider.  If they transgress the covenant “then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you, and you shall perish quickly from the good land that he has given to you” (23:16).

Joshua 24 – Joshua gathers the tribes at Shechem and goes over with them the whole narrative from Terah and his sons, Abraham (who built an altar at Shechem) and Nahor to the present.  And again he asks them to renew the covenant by choosing “this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served in the region beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord” (24:15).  The people choose likewise, not once but three times (24:16-18; 24:21 and 24:24). 

Joshua wrote their promise “in the book of the law of God; and he took a large stone, and set it up there under the oak in the sanctuary of the Lord. [And he said] ‘See, this stone shall be a witness against us; for it has heard all the words of the Lord that he spoke to us; therefore it shall be a witness against you, if you deal falsely with your God’” (24:27). 

Joshua was 110 when he died and he was buried in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mt Gaash. Joseph’s bones were buried at Shechem in the plot Jacob had bought from the children of Hamor [see Genesis 33:18].  And Eleazar dies too and is buried at Gibeah (his son Phineas’ town).

Origen (185-254 AD)

De Principiis (First Principles)

Chapter IV – On Defection or Falling Away

1 – Origen compares how some “fall away” from the faith with people like doctors or mathematicians who spend so much of their lives learning their crafts, their “art.” A person like this is not going to lose everything all at once. He still may “repair the losses” his negligence will bring and recover the knowledge.

2 – If we wish to examine the “divine benefits bestowed upon us by Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” we must start with considering three different natures we are dealing with.

Chapter V – On Rational Natures

1 – There are in Origen’s intellectual landscape different “species and orders” of “rational natures.” We find, he says, in the Holy Scriptures different “orders and offices, not only of holy beings, but also of those of an opposite description” and he intends to examine references to such “beings” in this section as best he can.

“There are certain holy angels of God whom Paul terms ‘ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation.’ In the writings also of St. Paul himself we find him designating them, from some unknown source, as thrones, and dominions, and principalities, and powers; and after this enumeration, as if knowing that there were still other rational offices and orders besides those which he had named, he says of the Savior: ‘Who is above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come.’

Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: Joshua 19-21 and Origen's De Principiis: Book Three 7-8

Joshua 19 – Then the lots of Simeon (within the inheritance of Judah—13 towns there including Beersheba, Hormah and Ziglag, near the Negev); Zebulun (the plain of Jezreel, west of Mt. Tabor); Issachar (the town of Jezreel up to Mt. Tabor and including the towns of Shunem and Endor); Asher (22 towns from Megiddo up the coast of the Mediterranean to north of Tyre); Naphtali (Arabah north of Mt. Tabor up to just north of the river that flows north of Tyre) and Dan—they get land west of Benjamin’s land but when they lose it, they go north and take land at the source of the Jordan River.

Joshua 20 – The cities of refuge are appointed.  In these cities, men who kill without intent or by mistake can take refuge, explain their case to the elders there and remain until “there is a trial before the congregation, [and] until the death of the one who is high priest at the time: then the slayer may return home, to the town in which the deed was done” (20:6). The cities of refuge are Kedesh (Naphtali); Shechem (Ephraim); Hebron (Judah); Bezer (Reuben); Ramoth (Gad); and Golan (Manasseh).

Joshua 21 – The Levitical towns and pasturelands are also set aside: the Kohathites (descended from Aaron) get 13 towns from the tribes of Judah, Simeon [Hebron—excepting the fields given to Caleb, Libnah, Jattir, Eshtemoa, Holon, Debir, Ain, Juttah, and Beth-shemesh], and Benjamin [Gibeon, Geba, Anathoth, and Almon]and ten towns from the tribes of Ephraim [Shechem, Gezer, Kibzaim, and Beth-horon], Dan [Elteke, Gibbethon, Aijalon, and Gath-rimmon].and the half-tribe of Manasseh [Taanach, and Gath-rimmon]; the Gershonites got 13 towns from the tribes of Issachar [Kishion, Daberath, Jarmuth, and En-gannim], Asher [Mishal, Abdon, Helkath, and Rehob], Naphtali [Kedesh, Hammoth-dor, and Kartan]and the half-tribe of Manasseh in Bashan [Golan, and Beeshterah]; and the Merarites get 12 towns from the tribes of Reuben [Bezer, Jahzah, Kedemoth, and Mephaath], Gad [Ramoth, Mahanaim, Heshbon, and Jazer] and Zebulun [Jokneam, Kartah, Dimnah, and Nahalal].

So they had peace. “Not one of all the good promises that the Lord had made to the house of Israel had failed; all came to pass” (21:45).

Origen (185-254 AD)

De Principiis (First Principles)

Chapter III – On the Holy Spirit

7 – But the words of Genesis, where it says “He breathed into [Adam’s] face the breath of life, and man became a living soul.’ . . . if this be understood as applying generally to all men, then all men have a share in God.”

But if we understand that reference as a reference to the Holy Spirit, because “Adam also is found to have prophesied of some things,” and prophesy is understood by Origen as emanating from the Holy Spirit, then “it may be taken [NOT] as of general application, but as confined to those who are saints.”

“In the Psalms also it is written: ‘Thou wilt renew the face of the earth;’ “ and this refers in Origen’s view to the Holy Spirit “because He will take up His dwelling, not in all men, nor in those who are flesh, but in those whose land has been renewed.”

In the New Testament, when Christ comes to the apostles after His resurrection, “when old things had . . . passed away, and all things had become new, . . . [He says] ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’ This is doubtless what the Lord . . . meant to convey in the Gospel, when He said that new wine cannot be put into old bottles, but commanded that the bottles should be made new, i.e., that men should walk in newness of life, that they might receive the new wine, i.e., the newness of grace of the Holy Spirit.

And it is for the above line of reasoning that Origen thinks the words of the Gospel that set sins against the Holy Spirit in a separate category seem understandable: “[H]e who has committed a sin against the Son of Man is deserving of forgiveness; because if he who is a participator of the Word or reason of God cease to live agreeably to reason, he seems to have fallen into a state of ignorance or folly, and therefore to deserve forgiveness; whereas he who has been deemed worthy to have a portion of the Holy Spirit, and who has relapsed, is, by this very act and work, said to be guilty of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.”

Interesting “take” on the Trinity here – understood philosophically rather than narratively:

“There is . . . a special working of God the Father, besides that by which He bestowed upon all things the gift of natural life. There is also a special ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ to those upon whom he confers by nature the gift of reason, by means of which they are enabled to be rightly what they are. There is also another grace of the Holy Spirit, which is bestowed upon the deserving, through the ministry of Christ and the working of the Father, in proportion to the merits of those who are rendered capable of receiving it. This is most clearly pointed out by the Apostle Paul, when demonstrating that the power of the Trinity is one and the same, in the words, ‘There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit; there are diversities of administrations, but the same Lord; and there are diversities of operation, but it is the same God who worketh all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.’”

8 – So Origen sees the Trinity as the source of everything that brings “salvation” to mankind: “God the Father bestows upon all, existence; and participation in Christ, in respect of His being the word of reason, renders them rational beings. From which it follows that they are deserving either of praise or blame, because capable of virtue and vice. On this account, therefore, is the grace of the Holy Ghost present, that those beings which are not holy in their essence may be rendered holy by participating in it.”

And the progress one makes in the Spirit, though occasionally we slip back, can be restored through repentance.

Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: Joshua 16-18 and Origen's De Principiis: Book Three 6

Joshua 16 – The other Josephite tribe, Ephraim, receives land around Bethel, Beth-horon and out to Gezer.  “They did not drive the Canaanites out of Gezer, however, so the people of Gezer live as slaves among the people of Ephraim to this day” (16:10).

 

Joshua 17 – Another allotment is made to a son of Joseph, Manasseh—other than the one to his son Machir, on the east side of the Jordan.

One of the sons of Manasseh had no male heirs, so the girls come to Joshua to claim a share they say was promised by Moses (17:4). They get an additional ten portions.  Some of the towns given to Manasseh are in the portions given to Issachar, and Asher but some of these were really in the control of the Canaanites (17:12) whom they could not drive out. The tribes of Joseph get more than one allotment because they are numerous (17:17), but they have the Canaanites to deal with and their chariots of iron.

Joshua 18 – The people of Israel gather at Shiloh; as the conquest progressed, the center of worship shifted from Gilgal to Shiloh, and set up the Tent of Meeting.

Seven tribes have still not received their inheritance. Joshua sends three men from each tribe out to describe the land and return.  They do this and set down their observations in a book: so the portion of Benjamin is described in great detail, around Jericho and Ai, squeezed between Judah and Ephraim.

Origen (185-254 AD)

De Principiis (First Principles)

Chapter III – On the Holy Spirit

6 – “That the working of the Father and the Son operates both in saints and in sinners, is manifest from this, that all who are rational beings are partakers of the Word, i.e., of reason, and by this means bear certain seeds, implanted within them, of wisdom and justice, which is Christ. Now, in Him who truly exists, and who said by Moses, ‘I Am Who I Am,’ all things, whatever they are, participate; which participation in God the Father is shared both by just men and sinners, by rational and irrational beings, and by all things universally which exist.”

He cites Paul’s words concerning not having to ascend to heaven or descend into the deep to access Christ. “Christ is in the heart of all, in respect of His being the Word or reason, by participating in which they are rational beings.”

When man begins through use of his reason to understand the difference between good and evil, and therefore become liable for the wrong decisions they make, “they ought to avoid and guard against that which is wicked: ‘For to him who knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.’”

Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: Joshua 13-14 and Origen's De Principiis: Book Three 4-5

Joshua 13 – Joshua is now old.  And contradicting the chapters that we just finished, the Lord says to Joshua that “much of the land still remains to be possessed” (12:1) – the lands of the Philistines (the Jerusalem Bible note says they originated in Crete or Asia Minor.  They established a settlement in Palestine around 1200, on the maritime plain—a district they always kept control of), the Geshurites (east of Egypt), the Canaanites, the Sidonians, the Gebalites and all of Lebanon. 

Still they go ahead with the division of the land among the tribes of Israel. See the map for how this was done:http://www.bible-history.com/maps/palestine_joshua.html

In going over the division, the writer mentions in passing that Balaam, “who practiced divination” is killed.  The lands covered in this chapter include those given to the tribes east of the Jordan: Reubenites, Gadites and half-tribe of Manasseh (people of Machir, son of Manasseh).
 
Joshua 14 – The lands west of the Jordan are distributed by lot at Gilgal (near Jericho) where the stones were set up. Caleb (now 85) claims the hill country where the Anakim dwelled (near Hebron), and Joshua grants it to him “because he whole-heartedly followed the Lord. Caleb was a Kenizzite, not an Israelite.  His clan came from the south, the Negev.  The land had previously been called Kiriath-arba (Arba being the greatest of the Anakim (14:15).

Joshua 15 – Judah receives land to the south bordering on Edom and the Wilderness of Zin, east along the Dead Sea, north from the mouth of the Jordan along a boundary that is hard to trace but is shown on the map roughly.  It is a very large territory.  Caleb’s portion compromises Judah’s.  Many towns and cities are listed that are found in the land of Judah.  The Jebusites, however, of Jerusalem are not driven out.

Origen (185-254 AD)

De Principiis (First Principles)

Chapter III – On the Holy Spirit

4 – Origen points out that references to the Holy Spirit – the SAME Holy Spirit – can be found in both the New and Old Testaments. “For all knowledge of the Father is obtained by revelation of the Son through the Holy Spirit, so that both of these beings ‘lives,’ exist as the ground of the knowledge of God the Father. For as it is said of the Son, that ‘no one knoweth the Father but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal Him,’ the same also is said by the apostle of the Holy Spirit, when He declares, ‘God hath revealed them to us by His Holy Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, even the deep things of God;’ and again in the Gospel, when the Savor, speaking of the divine and profounder parts of His teaching, which His disciples were not yet able to receive, thus addresses them: ‘I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now; but when the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, is come, He will teach you all things, and will bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.’”

The Holy Spirit “searches the deep things of God” and “reveals God to whom He will.” And these words on the “disconnect” that always exists between the spiritual realm and the world of time in which we live are so good: “When we use . . . such terms as ‘always’ or ‘was,’ or any other designation of time, they are not to be taken absolutely, but with due allowance; for while the significations of these words relate to time, and those subjects of which we speak are spoken of by a stretch of language as existing in time, they nevertheless surpass in their real nature all conception of the finite understanding.”

5 – So why is the “Trinity” as a whole necessary for those “regenerated by God unto salvation”?

“I am of [the] opinion, . . . that the working of the Father and of the Son takes place as well in saints as in sinners, in rational beings and in dumb animals; nay, even in those things which are without life, and in all things universally which exist; but that the operation of the Holy Spirit does not take place at all in those things which are without life, or in those which, although living, are yet dumb; nay, is not found even in those who are endured . . . with reason, but are engaged in evil courses, and not at all converted to a better life. In those persons alone do I think that the operation of the Holy Spirit takes place, who are already turning to a better life, and walking along the way which leads to Jesus Christ, i.e., who are engaged in the performance of good actions, and who abide in God.”

Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: Joshua 11-12 and Origen's De Principiis: Book Three 3

Joshua 11 – The kings of the northern hill country combine with the kings along the rift valley called the Arabah (from the sea of Galilee to the Gulf of Aqaba) to fight the Israelites, but they are defeated. 

The King of Hazor is killed and his large city destroyed (11:11).  None of the other towns are, and all the spoil is taken. 

The following disturbing passage concludes the conquest passages: “. . .all were taken in battle.  For it was the Lord’s doing to harden their hearts so that they would come against Israel in battle, in order that they might be utterly destroyed, and might receive no mercy, but be exterminated, just as the Lord had commanded Moses” (11:20).

The Anakim (legendary giants of the region) were defeated too, except those in Gaza, Gath and Ashdod).  Then “the land had rest from war” (11:23).

Joshua 12 – A list of the defeated kings and towns east and west of the Jordan River follows—31 in all.

Origen (185-254 AD)

De Principiis (First Principles)

Chapter III – On the Holy Spirit

3 – “That all things were created by God, and that there is no creature which exists but has derived from Him its being, is established from many declarations of Scripture . . .”

Origen refers to a popular early Christian piece called The Pastor of Angel of Repentance; we know it by the name The Shepherd of Hermas. The treatise was considered “canonical” by many in the Church. It is an allegorical work. In it, the author writes, “First of all, believe that there is one God who created and arranged all things; who, when nothing formerly existed, caused all things to be; who Himself contains all things, but Himself is contained by none.”

But there is no specific Scriptural passage that says that the Holy Spirit was ever “made or created” not even in the way Wisdom is said to have been “made.” “The Spirit of God, therefore, which was borne upon the waters, as is written in the beginning of the creation of the world, is, I am of [the] opinion, no other than the Holy Spirit, so far as I can understand; as indeed we have shown in our exposition of the passages themselves, not according to the historical, but according to the spiritual method of interpretation.”