On Prayer 27.14
Summary: The feasts, sabbaths, and jubilees of the law may be shadows of the ordering of whole ages, known fully only to God.
Greek text · Koetschau 2:373
καὶ ἐξεταστέον εἰ ἐπὶ αἰῶνας ἀναφέρονται οἱ λόγοι τῶν κατὰ τὰς „ἡμέρας“ ἢ „μῆνας“ ἢ „καιροὺς“ ἢ „ἐνιαυτοὺς“ ἀναγεγραμμένων ἑορτῶν ἢ πανηγύρεων. εἰ γὰρ „σκιὰν“ ἔχει „ὁ νόμος τῶν μελλόντων, “ ἀνάγκη τὰ πολλὰ σάββατα πολλῶν τινων ἡμερῶν εἶναι „σκιὰν“ καὶ τὰς νουμηνίας διὰ χρονικῶν διαστημάτων ἐνίστασθαι. οὐκ οἶδα ὑπὸ ποίας σελήνης συνοδευούσης τινὶ ἡλίῳ ἐπιτελουμένας. εἰ δὲ καὶ „πρῶτος“ „μὴν“ καὶ δεκάτη ἡμέρα „ἕως τεσσαρεσκαιδεκάτης“ καὶ τῶν ἀζύμων ἑορτὴ ἀπὸ τεσσαρεσκαιδεκάτης „ἕως μιᾶς καὶ εἰκάδος“ „σκιὰν“ περιέχει „μελλόντων, “ „τίς σοφὸς καὶ“ ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον θεῷ „φίλος, “ ὡς πλειόνων μηνῶν τὸν πρῶτον ἰδεῖν καὶ τὴν δεκάτην αὐτοῦ ἡμέραν καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς; τί δέ με δεῖ λέγειν περὶ τῆς ἑορτῆς τῶν ἑπτὰ ἑβδομάδων ἡμερῶν καὶ περὶ τοῦ ἑβδόμου μηνὸς (οὗ ἡ νεομηνία ἡμέρα „σαλπίγγων“ ἐστὶ, „τῇ“ δὲ „δεκάτῃ“ „ἡμέρα ἱλασμοῦ“), τῷ μόνῳ νομοθετήσαντι αὐτὰ θεῷ ἐγνωσμένων; τίς δὲ ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον τὸν Χριστοῦ κεχώρηκε νοῦν. ὡς τοὺς ἑβδόμους ἐνιαυτοὺς τῆς ἐλευθερίας τῶν Ἑβραίων οἰκετῶν καὶ „τῆς ἀφέσεως“ τῶν χρεῶν ἀνέσεώς τε ἀπὸ γεωργίας τῆς ἁγίας γῆς ἐκλαβεῖν; ἔστι δέ τις καὶ ἀνωτέρω τῆς διὰ ἑπτὰ ἐτῶν ἑορτῆς ὁ καλούμενος Ἰωβηλαῖος, ὅντινα κἂν ἐπὶ ποσὸν φαντασθῆναι εἶναί τι τρανῶς ἢ τοὺς ἐν αὐτῷ νόμους πληρωθησομένους ἀληθινοὺς οὐδενός ἐστι (πλὴν) τοῦ τὴν πατρικὴν βουλὴν περὶ τῆς ἐν ἅπασι τοῖς αἰῶσι διατάξεως κατὰ „τὰ“ „ἀνεξερεύνητα“ „αὐτοῦ“ „κρίματα“ καὶ τὰς ἀνεξιχνιάστους αὐτοῦ ὁδοὺς τεθεωρηκότος.
English · Claude translation
And we must examine whether the principles of the feasts or festivals recorded according to “days” or “months” or “seasons” or “years” refer to ages. For if “the law has a shadow of the things to come,” the many sabbaths must be a “shadow” of many days, and the new moons must come round at intervals of time, accomplished by I know not what moon in conjunction with what sun. And if the “first” “month,” and the tenth day “until the fourteenth,” and the feast of unleavened bread from the fourteenth “until the twenty-first,” contain a “shadow” “of things to come,” “who is wise and” so much a “friend” of God as to see the first of many months, and its tenth day, and what follows? And why need I speak of the feast of seven weeks of days, and of the seventh month (whose new moon is a day “of trumpets,” and “on the tenth” “a day of atonement”), known only to God, who gave these laws? And who has so received the mind of Christ as to understand the seventh years of the release of Hebrew servants and of “the remission” of debts, and of rest from cultivating the holy land? And there is also something higher than the seven-year feast, the one called the Jubilee, of which no one can form even a slight clear idea, or of the true laws to be fulfilled in it, except the one who has contemplated the Father's counsel about the ordering of all the ages according to “his” “unsearchable” “judgments” and his untraceable ways.
About this passage
Notes
Translation notes
- The quotations and allusions are Gal 4:10, Heb 10:1 (Col 2:16–17), Exod 12:2–6 and 12:18 (Lev 23:5–6), Hos 14:9 (14:10 LXX), Lev 23:15–16, 23:24, 23:27, Exod 21:2, Deut 15:1–2, Lev 25:4 and 25:10, and Rom 11:33. The speculation on ages is offered by Origen as a question.
Cite this passage
Origen, Or. 27.14 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/origen-oratione/27/14/).
Plain text
Origen, Or. 27.14 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/origen-oratione/27/14/).
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