Origen, Exhortation to Martyrdom
Greek source: Origen, Exhortation to Martyrdom (Εἰς μαρτύριον προτρεπτικός), from the public-domain critical text of Paul Koetschau, GCS 2 = Origenes Werke I (Leipzig, 1899); digital text accessed via the First1KGreek project. This English translation is released into the public domain.
[§1] You who have been weaned from milk, you who have been drawn away from the breast, expect affliction upon affliction, expect hope upon hope, yet a little, yet a little, through the contempt of lips, through another tongue.
And you too, therefore, according to Isaiah, since you are no longer fleshly nor infants in Christ, having advanced in your spiritual stature, most God-fearing Ambrose and most pious Protoctetus, and no longer having need of milk but of solid food, listen — as those weaned from milk and drawn away from the breast — in what manner it is prophesied that for athletes, for the weaned, there is not a simple affliction but a kind of affliction upon affliction. But he who does not thrust away the affliction upon affliction, but like a noble athlete welcomes it, straightway welcomes also hope upon hope, which not long after the affliction upon affliction he will enjoy; for such is the meaning of yet a little, yet a little.
[§2] But even if they revile us and treat us with contempt, calling us either impious or fools — those who are strangers to the diction of the holy Scriptures — let us remember that the hope upon hope, which yet a little will be rendered to us, will be rendered through the contempt of lips, through another tongue. And who would not welcome affliction upon affliction, that he might straightway welcome also hope upon hope, reckoning with Paul that the sufferings of the present time, by which as it were we purchase blessedness, are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us from God — and especially since the momentary lightness of our affliction, light both in being and in being so called to those who are not weighed down by the things that beset them, the more it exceeds beyond measure, so much the greater and more abundant an eternal weight of glory it works for us, if, during the time of those who afflict us and who wish as it were to press hard upon our souls, we turn our governing faculty (hēgemonikon) away from the painful things and look not at the present painful things but at those things laid up by the grace of God for those who have lawfully contended in Christ, in return for their endurance in these — since God multiplies his benefactions and, beyond the worth of the toils of the one who has struggled, bestows as much as befits the God who gives magnificently, not sparingly, and who knowingly magnifies his own graces upon those who have displayed, to the utmost of their power, their love for him with the whole soul, through their having despised the earthen vessel.
[§3] Now I hold that God is loved with the whole soul by those who, out of their great eagerness to have fellowship with God, draw their soul away and separate it not only from the earthly body but also from every body; for such men it comes to pass, without distraction or any dragging away, to lay aside the body of their lowliness, whenever the time grants, through what is reckoned to be death, to strip off the body of death and to be heard when they have prayed in apostolic fashion and said: Wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? For who among those who groan in the tabernacle because of being weighed down by the corruptible body will not also give thanks, having first said: who shall deliver me from the body of this death? — seeing that, delivered through his passing away from the body of death, he will in holiness cry aloud: Thanks be to God through Christ Jesus our Lord. But if to anyone such a thing seems hard, he has not thirsted for God, the mighty one, the living one, nor yearned for God in the manner that the deer yearns for the springs of the waters, nor said: when shall I come and appear before the face of God? nor reckoned within himself the things which the prophet reckoned when it was said to him, Where is your God? — who every day poured out upon himself his own soul, rebuking it while it was still, through weakness, becoming exceedingly sorrowful and troubled, and saying: for I shall pass through into the place of the wondrous tabernacle, even to the house of God, with a voice of exultation and thanksgiving, the sound of one keeping festival.
[§4] I would pray, then, that throughout the whole present contest you, mindful of the great reward laid up in the heavens for those persecuted and reproached for the sake of righteousness and for the sake of the Son of Man, may rejoice and exult and leap for joy, just as the apostles once rejoiced when they were counted worthy to be dishonored for his name's sake. And if ever you should feel a shrinking in your soul, let the mind of Christ that is in us say to that soul, when it wishes, so far as in it lies, to confound Christ himself as well: Why are you sorrowful, O soul? and why do you trouble me? Hope in God, for I shall give thanks to him — and again. Would that the soul might in no way be troubled, but that even before the very tribunals and before the bare swords brought against the neck it might be guarded by the peace of God which surpasses all understanding, and be calm, reckoning that those who depart from the body are at home with the very Lord of all things. But if we are not of such stature as always to preserve our freedom from disturbance, still let not the soul's disturbance be poured out or made manifest to those outside, that we may have room for a defense before God, saying to him: O my God, my soul was troubled within myself. And the word exhorts us to be mindful also of that which is said in this manner in Isaiah: Fear not the reproach of men, and by their contempt be not overcome. For indeed it is absurd, when God plainly presides over the motion of heaven and the things in it, and over the things accomplished on earth and sea by his divine art in the generations and constitutions and nourishings and increases of all manner of animals and plants, to close our eyes and not look upon God, but to turn our eyes toward the fear of those who a little later will die and be handed over to the judgment that is according to their desert.
[§5] To Abraham, then, it was once said by God: Go forth from your land ; and to us perhaps a little later it will be said: Go forth from the whole earth. It is good to obey him, that he may quickly show us the heavens, in which is what is called the kingdom of the heavens. Now concerning many virtues one may see life filled with contests and those who contend. For it will seem that, concerning temperance, many others also, even of those not of God's portion, have contended, and that some have died bravely while keeping their resolve on behalf of the common master, and that men clever in the matters examined by argument have cultivated prudence, and that those who have set before themselves to live justly have given themselves to righteousness. And indeed against each virtue there wars either the mind of the flesh or also most of the external things; but concerning piety alone it is the chosen race that contends, the royal priesthood, the holy nation, the people for God's own possession — while the rest of mankind do not even, up to appearance, show that, if there are things that contend against the pious, they resolve to die for piety, preferring death with piety to life with impiety. And each of those who wish to be among the chosen race is persuaded to hear God speaking at every season — even when they plot against him who under the pretext of being polytheists are godless — the words: You shall have no other gods besides me, and: The name of other gods you shall not call to remembrance in your hearts, nor shall it be named from your mouth. Wherefore by such men God is believed with the heart unto righteousness, and confessed with the mouth unto salvation, since they apprehend that they will neither be justified unless they so believe in God with their heart thus disposed, nor be in salvation unless the word be such as the disposition is. For those deceive themselves who suppose that, for attaining the end in Christ, it suffices that with the heart it is believed unto righteousness, even if there be not added and with the mouth it is confessed unto salvation. And indeed one may say that it is rather to honor with the lips while keeping the heart far from God, than to honor him with the heart while the mouth does not confess unto salvation.
[§6] But if the one who says, You shall not make for yourself an idol, nor any likeness and what follows, says these things as though You shall not bow down to them and Neither shall you serve them differ from one another, then perhaps the person who is disposed toward the idols serves them, whereas the person who is not so disposed but who, out of cowardice—which he names conformity —dissembles with them so as to seem to be pious like the many, does not indeed serve, but does bow down to the idols. And I would say that those who abjure Christianity before a tribunal, or before coming to the tribunal, do not indeed serve, but do bow down to the idols, taking up the name God of the Lord God upon vain and lifeless matter. In this way, too, the people who were profaned unto the daughters of Moab bowed down and did not serve idols. For it is written in these very words that they called them to the sacrifices of their idols, and the people ate of their sacrifices, and they bowed down to their idols, and they were initiated to Beelphegor. And observe that it is not said, and they served their idols ; for it was not even possible, after so many signs and wonders, in a single moment of time to be persuaded by the women with whom they committed fornication to reckon the idols to be gods. And perhaps in this way, too, at the calf-making in Exodus, they bowed down, without serving the calf which they saw coming into being.
We ought, then, to consider the trial that has come upon us to be a testing and an examining of our love toward the divine. For the Lord tests you, as it is written in Deuteronomy, to know whether you love the Lord your God with your whole heart and with your whole soul. But you, being tested, shall go after the Lord your God, and him shall you fear, and his commandments shall you keep, and above all this one: There shall be for you no other gods besides me, and his voice shall you hear, and to him shall you be joined —to him who takes you up from the regions here and adds you to himself unto the, as the apostle named it, increase of God in him.
[§7] But moreover, if every evil word is an abomination to the Lord your God, how great an abomination must we reckon to be the evil word of denial, and the evil utterance of the proclamation of another god, and the evil oath by the fortune (tyche) of men—a thing without real subsistence? When this is put before us, we must remember him who taught, But I say to you, do not swear at all. For if the one who swears by heaven transgresses against the throne of God, and the one who swears by earth acts impiously in deifying what is called the footstool of the feet of God, and the one who swears by Jerusalem sins, and yet it is the city of the great King, and the one who swears by his own head offends—how great a sin must we reckon it to be to swear by anyone's fortune? And we must then also remember this: Concerning every idle word you shall give an account in the day of judgment. For what other word is so idle as the oath sworn in denial?
But it is likely that the enemy will wish to outwit us by whatever means he can, so as to make us bow down to the sun or to the moon or to all the host of heaven. But we will say that the word of God did not command these things. For the created things are by no means to be worshiped when the Creator is present, who suffices and reaches out to meet the prayer of all. And not even the sun itself would wish to be worshiped by those who belong to God's portion, and likely not by anyone else either; but imitating him who said, Why do you call me good? No one is good except one, God the Father, it would say, as it were, to the one who wishes to worship it: Why do you call me God? There is one true God; and why do you worship me? For the Lord your God shall you worship, and him only shall you serve. I too am a created being; why do you wish to worship one who himself worships? For I too worship and serve the God and Father, and, obeying his commands, I am subjected to vanity because of him who subjected it in hope, and I shall be set free from the bondage of corruption —being now myself also bound to a corruptible body— unto the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
[§8] It is to be expected that there will be some prophet of impiety too, perhaps not one but several, who will speak to us as though it were the Lord's word, which the Lord did not command, or as a word of wisdom that which is alien to wisdom, in order to slay us by the word of his mouth. But then, too, when the sinner rises up against us, let us say: But I, like a deaf man, did not hear, and like a mute man who does not open his mouth; and I became like a man who does not hear. For deafness toward impious words is a fine thing, whenever we despair of the correction of those who say the worse things.
[§9] It is useful for us to consider, in the seasons of those who summon us to the opposite courses, what God, wishing to teach, means when he says, I am the Lord your God, a jealous one. And I think indeed that, just as a bridegroom, turning his bride toward living reverently—gathering her whole self toward the bridegroom, and in every way guarding her against being poured out toward any other besides the bridegroom—would, even if he were wise, display jealousy, using such a display toward the bride as a remedy; so he who gives the oracle, and especially if he appears to be the firstborn of all creation, says to the bride-soul that he is a jealous God, drawing away those who hear from all fornication toward the demons and toward those reckoned to be gods. And as a God thus jealous he says concerning those who in whatever manner have gone whoring after other gods: They provoked me to jealousy with what is no god, they angered me with their idols; and I will provoke them to jealousy with what is no nation, with a nation without understanding I will anger them; for a fire has been kindled from my wrath, it shall burn to the lowest Hades.
[§10] And even if the bridegroom, being wise and free from passion, turns his betrothed away from every defilement not for his own sake, yet at least for her sake, seeing her defilement and abomination, he will do all the things able to heal and to turn her back, applying to her, as to a self-determining nature, words that turn her away from committing fornication. What defilement, then, could you conceive to come upon a soul worse than proclaiming some other god and not confessing the one who is truly the one and only Lord? And I think indeed that, just as the one who cleaves to the harlot is one body with her, so the one who confesses someone—and especially in the season of torture and examination of the faith—is mingled together and united with the one confessed; whereas the one who denies, by the very denial, in the manner of a knife cutting away, suffers separation from that one whom he denies, being severed from him whom he has denied. Therefore attend, lest it be as something consequent and necessary—that confession befalls the one who confesses and denial the one who denies—that this was said: Whoever confesses in me before men, I too will confess in him before my Father who is in heaven. And the Word himself and the Truth itself would say to both the one who confessed and the one who denied: With what measure you measure, it shall be measured back to you. You, then, who have measured with the measure of confession toward me and have filled up the measure of confession, shall receive a measure of the confession from me shaken together, pressed down, running over, which shall be given into your bosom ; and you, on the other hand, who have measured with the measure of denial and have denied me, shall receive, in proportion to the measure of denial, a measure of the denial from me concerning you.
[§11] How the measure of confession is filled up, or is not filled but falls short, we might consider in the following way. If throughout the whole time of the examination and the trial we give no place to the devil in our hearts — the devil who wishes to defile us with wicked thoughts of denial, or of double-mindedness, or with some plausible enticement luring us toward what is hostile to martyrdom and to perfection — and if besides this we do not defile ourselves with even a word foreign to confession, and if we bear all the reproach that comes from our adversaries, and the mockery, and the laughter, and the abuse, and the pity with which they seem to pity us, supposing us to be deluded and foolish and calling us deceived; and further, if we are not dragged this way and that, distracted and pulled by our affection for our children, or their mother, or any of those things reckoned in this life to be most dear, toward the possession of this life or toward continuing to live it — but rather, turning away from all these things, we become wholly God's and wholly given to the life with him and beside him, as those who will share in his Only-begotten and in those who partake of him — then we might say that we have filled up the measure of confession. But if we fall short even in some one thing, we have not filled up but have defiled the measure of confession and have mixed into it something foreign. Therefore we shall have need of the things that those need who have built upon the foundation wood or hay or stubble.
[§12] And this too we must know: that we received what are called God's covenants upon the agreements which we made with him when we undertook to live according to Christianity. And in our agreements with God was the whole way of life according to the gospel, which says: If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross, and let him follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for my sake, this one will save it. And often we have become more inspired hearing also this: For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world but forfeits his life? Or what will a man give in exchange for his life? For the Son of Man is about to come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and then he will repay each one according to his deed.
That one must deny himself and take up his own cross and follow Jesus was recorded not by Matthew alone, whose wording we have set down, but also by Luke and Mark. For hear Luke saying: And he said to all: If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for my sake, this one will save it. For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world but loses or forfeits himself? And Mark: And having summoned the crowd together with his disciples he said to them: If anyone wishes to follow after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses it for the sake of the gospel will save it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his life? For what will a man give in exchange for his life?
Long ago, therefore, we ought to have denied ourselves and to have said, It is no longer I who live ; and now too let it be shown whether, having taken up our cross, we have followed Jesus — which has come to pass if Christ lives in us. If we wish to save our life, then, that we may receive it back better than the life we had, let us lose it also by martyrdom. For if we lose it for the sake of Christ, casting it upon him in the death we die for his sake, we shall procure for it true salvation; but if the contrary, we shall hear that the man gains nothing who has gained the whole perceptible world through his own ruin or through forfeiting himself. And once a man has lost his life or forfeited it, even if he gains the whole world, he will not be able to give it in exchange for the perishing life. For the soul created according to the image of God is more precious than all bodies. One alone has been able to give a thing in exchange for our life that was formerly perishing — he who bought us with his own precious blood.
[§13] And according to certain deeper meanings Isaiah says: I gave Egypt as thy ransom, and Ethiopia and Syene in thy stead; from the time that thou becamest precious in my sight. But the exact account concerning this and the rest — if, being lovers of learning in Christ and now at length willing to pass beyond learning through a mirror and in a riddle, you press on toward him who has called you — very soon you shall know face to face as friends of the Father and Teacher who is in the heavens. For friends learn in the very form and not through riddles, or by the bare wisdom of sounds and words and symbols and figures, but attaining to the nature of things intelligible and to the beauty of truth. If indeed you believe that Paul was caught up to the third heaven and was caught up into paradise and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter, you will consequently know that of the unspeakable words then revealed to Paul — after which he came down from the third heaven — you will immediately come to know more and greater, and after that knowledge you will not come down, if, taking up the cross, you follow behind Jesus, whom we have as a great high priest who has passed through the heavens. And you yourselves, not departing from following behind him, will pass through the heavens, surpassing not only the earth and the mysteries concerning the earth but also the heavens and the things concerning them. For there are stored up in God spectacles far greater than these, which no nature of those in a body can contain unless it has first been released from every body. For I am persuaded that of the things which the sun and moon and the choir of stars have seen — but also the holy angels, whom God made spirit and a flame of fire — God treasures up and keeps beside himself things far greater, that he may reveal them when all creation is set free from the bondage of the enemy into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
[§14] And so, beyond even this, one who is among the foremost of martyrs, having more than many martyrs — namely the love of learning in Christ — will ascend more quickly. But to you, holy Ambrose, who have looked with careful scrutiny into the gospel utterance, it is possible to see that perhaps either no one who has ever lived, or very few, will attain a certain outpouring of blessedness that is exceptional and abundant; and among such will you also be, if you swim through the contest without wavering. The words are as follows: Peter once said to the Savior, Behold, we have left all and followed thee; what then shall there be for us? And Jesus said to them (clearly to the apostles), Amen I say to you that you who have followed me, in the regeneration, when God sits upon the throne of his glory, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left brothers or sisters or parents or children or fields or houses for the sake of my name shall receive many times as much and shall inherit eternal life. And for the sake of these sayings I would pray, though I possessed on earth as much as you have, or even more than this, to become a martyr in Christ God, that I might receive many times as much, or, as Mark says, a hundredfold — which are much more than the few things we shall leave behind, if we are called to martyrdom, since they are multiplied a hundredfold.
And for this reason, if I am martyred, I would wish to leave behind children too, along with fields and houses, that in the presence of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom every fatherhood in heaven and on earth is named, I might be called father of children many times more numerous and holier, or, to speak with precision, a hundredfold more. But if there are fathers concerning whom it was said to Abraham, But thou shalt go to thy fathers, nourished in a good old age, in peace, someone might say (I do not know whether he speaks truly): perhaps those are fathers who at some time bore witness and left children, and in return for this have become fathers of the fathers of the patriarch Abraham and of other such patriarchs; for it is likely that those who leave children and bear witness become fathers not of infants but of fathers.
[§15] But if someone, as it were zealously desiring the greater gifts and counting blessed the rich martyrs and the father-martyrs who will beget children a hundredfold and will receive fields and houses a hundredfold, should inquire whether with good reason those men, over and above the martyrs who were poor in life, will have their possession among things intelligible multiplied — it must be said to him that, just as those who have endured tortures and pains displayed a more brilliant virtue in their martyrdom than those not tested in these things, so those who, being lovers of the body and lovers of life, have nonetheless cut through and torn apart these so many worldly bonds, using a great love toward God and having truly taken up the living Word of God, which is effective and sharper than any two-edged sword, have been able, by cutting through these so many bonds and fashioning wings for themselves like an eagle, to turn back to the house of him who is set over them. It is fitting, then, that just as one must yield the first places to those not tested in tortures and pains in favor of those who displayed their endurance in the joint-racks and the various instruments of torment and in fire, so also for us who are poor, even if we are martyred, the word suggests that we yield the first places to you who, for the sake of the love toward God in Christ, trample upon the deceitful glory that also reaches to the many, and upon so great a possession, and upon affection toward children.
[§16] But at the same time observe also the solemnity of Scripture, which promises a manifold and a hundredfold return of brothers and children and parents and fields and houses; yet a wife is not counted among these. For it is not said: Everyone who has left brothers or sisters or parents or children or fields or houses or a wife for the sake of my name shall receive many times as much; for in the resurrection of the dead they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels in heaven.
[§17] That, then, which Joshua said to the people when he was settling them upon the holy land, this Scripture might now say to us as well. The passage runs thus: Now fear the Lord and serve him in uprightness and in righteousness. And to us, when we are being persuaded to commit idolatry, it will say what follows next, which runs thus: Put away the foreign gods, whom your fathers served beyond the river and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.