Refutation of All Heresies 6.32.8
Authorship disputed: The work names no author. Book 1 was long printed among Origen's works as the Philosophumena; after books 4–10 were found in a manuscript from Mount Athos (published 1851), it was assigned to Hippolytus, the usual view today, though some scholars ascribe it to another Roman writer of the same circle. Books 2 and 3 are lost, and book 4 lacks its beginning.
Summary: The Demiurge is the “consuming fire” of Deuteronomy; the soul is a middle realm, the Hebdomad.
Textual problem in this passage: the printed text is uncertain or disputed here. See the notes.
Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 280
Λέγει, φησί, καὶ Μωϋσῆς· Κύριος ὁ θεός σου πῦρ ἐστι φλέγον καὶ καταναλίσκον. Καὶ γὰρ τοῦτο οὕτως γεγράφθαι θέλει. Διπλῆ δέ τις ἐστί, φησίν, ἡ δύναμις τοῦ πυρός· ἔστι γὰρ πῦρ παμφάγον, κατασβεσθῆναι μὴ δυνάμενον... Κατὰ τοῦτο τοίνυν τὸ μέρος θνητή τις ἐστὶν ἡ ψυχή, μεσότης τις οὖσα· ἔστι γὰρ ἑβδομὰς καὶ κατάπαυσις.
English · Claude translation
“Moses too,” he says, “says: ‘The Lord your God is a burning and consuming fire’”; for he wants this to be written so. “The power of fire,” he says, “is twofold; for there is an all-devouring fire that cannot be quenched … In this respect, then, the soul is something mortal, being a kind of middle; for it is Hebdomad and rest.”
About this passage
Notes
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Cite this passage
Hippolytus, Haer. 6.32.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/6/32/8/).
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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 6.32.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/6/32/8/).
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