A Larger Hope 1

by Ilaria L E Ramelli

  181. “While the reign of Christ will shine forth in the life of the world to come, humans, from absolutely all peoples, will enjoy it, once liberated from their ancient sins and made worthy of the promises of God.” Eusebius opposes the punishment of Moab (Isa 16; Jer 31) to beatitude, but Moab represents the powers of evil, and not humans: “Moab means the evil demon and the adverse power. . . . From this single example it leaves to us to understand all the rest that will happen to the powers of evil.” Eusebius stresses the final destruction of death and adverse powers; humans will be purified from evil and saved.

  182. The impious, that is, those who have not sinned against men but against God, or have sinned in a superhuman degree, will pay the penalty beneath the earth. It is not, however, said that this punishment will be eternal, all the more in that the reference to the existence of the earth itself seems to refer to intermediate eschatology.

  183. John 17 buttresses the idea of restoration as unity in Origen and Eusebius alike.

  184. “Making us all one thing, so that we are no longer many, but all of us are one, made one with his divinity . . . made perfect not in a confusion of substances reduced to one, but in the perfection of virtue brought to its apex, . . . all of us by imitation of God’s unity.”

  185. Arius had taught that the divine Son was not of one substance with God, but was rather the most preeminent of all God’s creatures. This view was rejected at the Council of Nicea in 325.

  186. See Scully, Physicalist Soteriology. On Hilary’s relation to Origen and Augustine: Image, The Human Condition in Hilary of Poitiers, and my review in Reading Religion: http://readingreligion.org/books/human-condition-hilary-poitiers.

  187. Si labitur quis et decidat, a diuina eius prouidentia nusquam prorsus abscedat, nec omnino aliquid sit quod illi penitus pereat. Et super omnia adhuc illud uidendum est, quod ad cunctam rationabilem naturam quanta et quam minima pars homo est, qui similiter ut ceterae omnes rationabiles naturae arbitrii uoluntate donatus est, qui tamen uelut ouis errans per ignorantiae montes et colles boni pastoris humeris reportatus est et restitutus est ad illas nonaginta et nouem oues quae non errauerunt. Quid ergo tibi uidetur, qui hoc ita sentis? Ne una erraret ouicula, nonaginta et nouem ouium profectus et gloria debuit impediri? Impeditum namque fuerat, si naturae rationabili libertas arbitrii, per quam illae nonaginta et nouem in summis excelsis profectibus permanserunt, non fuisset indulta, quandoquidem nec eorum qui quo modo oberrauerant salutem dispensatio diuina despexerit, sed stadium quoddam praesentem hunc et uisibilem mundum posuerit, in quo, concertantium et aduersantium agone moderato, certaminis praemia proposuerit regressum ad pristinum statum, dum per arbitrii libertatem quae illuc ducunt eligi et nihilominus et respui quae non sinunt possunt.

  188. Athetēsis (a setting aside, abolition) is the marking of a passage as spurious.

  189. See Ramelli, “The Dialogue of Adamantius.” An Oxford critical edition and a monograph are in the works.

  190. See Ramelli, “In Illud: Tunc et Ipse Filius . . . ,” 259–74.

  191. Ramelli, “In Illud: Tunc et Ipse Filius . . . ,” 13. If this work On the Incarnation and Against the Arians is Marcellus’ (which is not entirely certain), another close parallel would emerge with Origen’s interpretation of the eventual submission of the Son as the submission of humanity and its salvation.

  192. See Ramelli, “In Illud: Tunc et Ipse Filius . . .”

  193. See Ramelli, “Origen’s Anti-Subordinationism and Its Heritage in the Nicene and Cappadocian Line,” and further arguments will eventually appear in a monograph on Origen’s philosophical theology.

  194. In Photius, Library, 232.291b.

  195. See also, e.g., Against the Arians, PG 26.397.21. Cf. Maftei, L’incarnation du Verbe for the salvific value of Christ’s inhumanation according to Athanasius.

  196. See also Against the Arians 1.45, 48, 50; 3.25; 2.59, 69; Letter to Serapion, 3.6.

  197. As MacDonald, Evangelical Universalist, 20, notes, the view that salvation is by grace does not require in the least that anyone be damned.

  198. See Ramelli, “The Universal and Eternal Validity,” 210–21.

  199. Trans. Jeremy Schott and Mark Edwards with slight variations.

  200. Even though he does not expand on apokatastasis in Macarius, Volp, “The Fashion of this World,” too thinks that Macarius was a supporter of this doctrine and that in general he had an Origenian eschatology: Even if without any reference to Macarius’ texts, Volp states that for him “there only ever will be one ἀποκατάστασις at the end of all times” (889), as Origen already postulated.

  201. Jerome C. Ruf. 1:6. According to Jerome (in his preface to his translation of Origen’s Homilies on Ezekiel), Didymus defined Origen “the second teacher of the churches after the Apostle(s).” According to Rufinus, in his preface to his translation of Origen’s On First Principles, Jerome himself described Origen “the second teacher of the churches after the apostles.” Jerome, indeed, in his preface to the treatise on the Hebrew names, calls Origen “teacher of the churches after the apostles.” The Origenian Palladius visited Didymus four times. St. Anthony praised Didymus as endowed with spiritual sight (Socr. HE 4:25). Three of Didymus’ disciples were Origenians: Rufinus, the early Jerome, and Gregory Nazianzen.

  202. See my “Commentaries” in The Cambridge History of Later Latin Literature, ed. Gavin Kelly and Aaron Pelttari, forthcoming; Origen of Alexandria’s Philosophical Theology, in preparation.

  203. Cf. Ramelli and Konstan, Terms for Eternity, new ed., 135–42; “Time and Eternity,” in Routledge Companion to Early Christian Philosophy, ed. Mark Edwards, forthcoming.

  204. He writes: “It must be noted that αἰώνιος is said in several ways: in the expression, ‘αἰώνιος God,’ it means beginningless and endless; for the divinity is called αἰώνιος by virtue of having neither a beginning nor an end of its existence. But αἰώνιος is something different when used in the expression, ‘things unseen are αἰώνια’: for these things are not αἰώνια in the way God is, but rather because they do not perish but remain forever in the same condition. And αἰώνιος is meant differently again when it is measured against the present time, as when it is said: ‘the sons of this αἰών are wiser in their generation’; for the time that extends over the life of a human being is also called an αἰών. Indeed, it is laid down concerning the Hebrew who did not wish to be freed in the seventh year, that ‘he will be your slave unto the αἰών’: for no slave of a human being remains one forever, even after his death. It is in this sense that Paul too writes [1 Cor 8:13]: ‘if flesh causes my brother to stumble, I will not eat flesh through the αἰών,’ using this term in place of ‘throughout my life.’”

  205. See my volume of Novum Testamentum Patristicum devoted to John 13–17, and my “Harmony.”

  206. In Comm. in Iob col. 2:14 katastasis indicates the original condition of rectitude from which a rational creature has fallen; in Comm. in Eccl. col. 232:22 the noun indicates the original unity of all rational creatures; this unity is conceived by Didymus as a unity of concord and will, as it is in Origen. In Comm. in Eccl. col. 15:11 katastasis refers again to the original condition, the dwelling place of all rational creatures, which is also the place of virtue; this is also the condition to which they have to return. The original condition of the human being coincides with being in the image and likeness of God; when it goes far from this condition (katastasis), it loses its own identity (Comm. in Ps. 29–34 col. 221:6).

  207. Didymus, like Origen, supports the notion of the ontological non-subsistence of evil. Evil emerges from a wrong choice of rational creatures’ free will (Comm. in Iob 114–5); “when the agent ceases to want evil, the latter has no more ontolog
ical subsistence, . . . for evil is not a substance [ousia], but it arises and receives its existence in the moral choice: when the deception ceases, evil too disappears.” In Didymus’ ethical intellectualism, evil is the consequence of a bad choice, which results from a deception, of a lack of clear knowledge.

  208. See below in the section on Evagrius.

  209. This principle of commensurability is still emphasized by some contemporary theologians, such as Gregory MacDonald. MacDonald, The Evangelical Universalist, 11.

  6

  Fourth Century Origenians II

  The Cappadocians and Evagrius

  Basil of Caesarea

  As we have already seen, Gregory Thaumaturgus (Wonderworker) brought not only Christianity but specifically Origen’s thought to Cappadocia. This, by means of Macrina the Elder, and her granddaughter Macrina the Younger, entered the family of the latter’s brothers, Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nyssa. Basil thus inherited Origenist sympathies from his godly sister and grandmother. He ordained Evagrius—an Origenian—a lector; a letter of Evagrius was even ascribed to him in which the final chapter expounds the doctrine of apokatastasis as a return to the initial unity (Evagrius, Ep. fidei = [Bas.] Ep. 8; cf. Evagrius, Ep. ad Mel. 5). Also, Chapter 6 of Book 2 of Origen’s On First Principles was even ascribed to Basil under the name Sermo de incarnatione Domini, Homily on the Incarnation of the Lord! And so it happened that Origen’s chapter, under the name of Basil, was used by Leo the Great to confirm the dogmas of Chalcedon.

  Basil also collected many passages from Origen’s works in his Philocalia together with Gregory Nazianzen—the attribution is traditional and probable—and he highly praised Gregory the Wonderworker, a direct disciple of Origen (Letter 28), as well as other disciples or estimators of Origen, such as Dionysius of Alexandria, Eusebius, Firmilian of Caesarea, and Africanus, all of whom he includes among the champions of orthodoxy. Basil exalts Gregory the Wonderworker elsewhere also (e.g., Letter 204; De Spir. S. 29:74). Even Basil’s criticism of extreme allegoresis in his Hexaëmeron must not be understood as directed against Origen, but against “gnostics” or Manichaeans, all the more so in that Basil is deeply influenced by Origen. Toward the end of his life, Basil in his tract On the Holy Spirit, which is full of Origenian themes, at § 73 shows high respect of Origen. And Basil in turn was highly esteemed by Gregory Nyssen, his brother, a strong supporter of the doctrine of universal salvation, who speaks of him in sublime terms at the beginning of The Creation of the Human Being, and at the beginning of his On the Soul and the Resurrection. Indeed, Gregory devotes this important dialogue, which very clearly supports the doctrine of apokatastasis, to the memory of his venerated brother Basil.

  Basil shared with Origen the conviction that otherworldly sufferings will not be physical, and that this world is a school for acquiring the knowledge of God. What is more, Basil’s Commentary on Isaiah210 is full of Origenian themes relevant to the doctrine of universal salvation. In Comm. in Is. 2:85, Basil, like Origen in his Homilies on Jeremiah, interprets God’s declarations that he will not forgive his people as pedagogical threats. Commenting on Chapter 9 of Isaiah, Basil claims that if one recognizes one’s sins then the punishment for it becomes temporal, and not eternal, and the fire is purifying. Basil reads Isaiah 9:1–6 as an expression of “the dogma of salvation.” The Logos-Angel (i.e., Announcer) knows the great plan of God, that is, God’s salvific plan, which had remained hidden for centuries, but now is clear. The power which is on the Logos’ shoulders is referred by Basil to the cross: “since when he was lifted up on the cross he has drawn all people to himself.” This reference to John 12:31–32 is overtly universalistic and is connected by Basil with the equally universalistic 1 Corinthians 15:24–28:

  The peace given by the Lord extends for all eternity; it knows neither boundaries nor limits. Indeed, all beings will submit to him, and all will recognize his authority. And when God will be all in all, once those who created confusion with apostasies will be restored to peace, they will sing praises to God in a symphony of peace.

  Rebels are not destroyed or excluded or forcibly submitted, but they are reintegrated in the universal peace. The Logos descended “out of mercy, especially for the weakest.” And again, Basil insists on the preventive, therapeutic, and educative value of the punishments decided by God for those who abstain from evil out of fear and not yet out of love.211 Basil reflects that, until one finally converts, one sin generates another, like darnel, but this will be burnt in the otherworldly purifying fire:

  God’s threat manifests God’s beneficial action: Iniquity will be burnt away as by fire. Indeed, our good Master, as a benefit to human beings, providentially established that the matter provided by iniquity should be consigned to annihilation. It will be devoured by fire like dry darnel and burnt away. . . . If we unmask sin by means of its admission, we shall reduce it to dry darnel, deserving of being devoured by the purifying fire.

  Therefore, soon after, again in his commentary on Isaiah 9, commenting on the verse “The whole earth has been burnt by the impetus of the Lord,” Basil interprets this fire, which is punitive, as purifying: “He shows that earthly things are handed to the punishing fire for the sake of the soul. . . . He does not threaten destruction, but shows the purification, according to what the Apostle says: ‘If one’s work is burnt, one will suffer loss, but will be saved; only, as through fire’ [1 Cor 3:14–15].” Basil, like Paul, does not contemplate the case of people who pass through fire and are never purified.

  According to Basil, sins “unto death” can be cured (Comm. in Is. 4.4). Referring to 1 Corinthians 15:28, Origen’s locus classicus in support of apokatastasis, Basil offers an exegesis that is in full continuity with that of Origen: “All beings will be subject to Christ . . . when God is ‘all in all’, even those who now excite discord by revolt, having been pacified, will praise God in peaceful concord” (Comm. in Is. 9.6). Likewise, “All beings will be made subject to Christ’s rule . . . ; those made subject to his rule will obtain restoration” (Comm. in Is. 16.4–5). The same equation between submission and restoration-salvation that is clear in the last two passages, was posited by Origen, whom Basil is patently following.

  The interpretation of the destruction brought about by God as beneficial to sinners is also entirely Origenian: “I shall burn . . . that I may purify. . . . This is how God is angry: that he may bestow benefits on sinners” (Comm. in Is. 1.24); sinners will be destroyed qua sinners, that they may cease to be disobedient and become holy. This is what Origen said about Paul: God destroyed Paul the traitor and persecutor, to make him Paul the apostle of Jesus Christ.

  Moreover, Basil admits of the intercession of the saints for the sinners, which liberates the latter from their suffering (Or. 10, PG 31,624).212 And his linguistic use is consistent with that of Origen and Gregory of Nyssa: he calls “eternal” (ἀΐδιος/aïdios) only life in the other world; punishment, fire, death, etc., are never called so by him, but are only styled αἰώνια/aiōnia.213

  Further evidence that points to Basil’s penchant for the theory of universal restoration is found in a text by a friend of Augustine, who had no sympathy at all for that theory.214 It is Paulus Orosius’ Warning about the Error of the Priscillianists and the Origenists (Commonitorium de errore Priscillianistarum et Origenistarum), which was prepared for Augustine around the year 414. In section 3, pp. 160–62, Orosius reports that two men, both named Avitus, travelled one to Jerusalem and the other to Rome, and brought back from there “one Origen, and the other Marius Victorinus.” Both, however, concentrated more on Origen and “began to propose many ideas from Origen as wonderful.” At this point Orosius expounds these Origenian doctrines, first those which he deems orthodox, and then those which he regards critically. The good Origenian doctrines spread by the two Aviti, according to Orosius, concern the Trinity, the creation of everything by God de nihilo, the goodness of all creatures, and the exegesis
of Scriptures.

  Next comes the most interesting part of Orosius’ exposition, and the most relevant to Basil’s theology and its relation to Origen’s doctrine of universal restoration. For Orosius states that not only the two aforementioned Aviti, but also Basil taught some Origenian doctrines that Orosius deems debatable, among which is universal restoration (pp. 161–62). Orosius probably means Basil of Caesarea, the Cappadocian, since he describes him as “St. Basil the Greek,” and since Basil’s good knowledge of Origen’s ideas is beyond doubt. Basil taught such doctrines “in the most holy way,” but Orosius later realized that they were in fact problematic.

  The first of the doctrines that Orosius deems incorrect, but that Basil taught on the basis of Origen, is the eternal preexistence of creatures in God’s Wisdom, which would make them coeternal with God. Basil said that “God never began to create all that he has created.” Of course, this is a misunderstanding of Origen’s doctrine of the eternal preexistence of the ideas or logoi or paradigmatic models of all creatures in God, before their creation as substances (Princ. 1.4.4–5). Orosius passed on this misunderstanding to Augustine (Against the Priscillianists and the Origenists, 8.9).