minus, and Christ. Those who first corrupted within themselves the seeds of piety conceived him. But we prophets, considering the spirit of our face to be no other [than him], no longer having any place among them after our own conception, are overshadowed under the grace of Christ, no longer among the Jews, but among all the nations, when the kingdom of God, having been taken away from them because of their daring deed against Christ, was given to the nations. For behold, the prophets live among us, speaking of him and preaching, but no longer among those who up to this very day surround him with their own corruptions, blaspheming him daily. Aquila rendered it, "the spirit of our nostrils"; Symmachus, "the breath of our nostrils." For those who love God breathe Christ at all times, having him before their eyes. It should be known that just as Christ, being spirit, spoke in the prophets, so also did the Father. For Paul says in the Epistle to the Hebrews: "God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son." Likewise also the Holy Spirit; for the Savior says: "Well did the Holy Spirit speak by Esaias: By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand." And in the Epistle to the Corinthians, Paul, having enumerated the gifts, among which is prophecy, says: "But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will," that is, authoritatively, not as a servant. You might also call the spirit of the face Christ, who has bestowed upon us the spirit of prophecy. For this is the face of the prophets, while the spirit is the gift, and the law is the shadow; "for the law having a shadow of good things to come." The prophets therefore lived in us, and in the shadow of the law. The prophetic gift, therefore, toward which the outcome of all prophecy tends, is Christ—that is, it is from Christ. For Christ is the end of the law and the prophets. It may also be said from the person of the apostles and the faithful: "For in him we live, and move, and have our being"; to whom we have said, "In his shadow we shall live," that is, by imitation of him; for the divine Apostle says: "Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ." C Vers. 21. "Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Idumea." This word is addressed to those who are from Edom and Esau, the brother of Jacob, announcing to them a superfluity of evils; for this is what "thou shalt be drunken and shalt pour out" means; concerning whom David also says: "Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof." For though they were brothers and neighbors, they preserved an ancestral hatred. After having spoken of Christ, he made mention of this one also in due time. For Christ was about to overthrow that which is called earthly, making it heavenly. For virtue and knowledge possess the force of a threat toward those who through the love of pleasure are led astray by errors and drunkenness, of which the [preceding] death of the flesh is the drunkenness, and the pouring out, the mortality of its carnal way of thinking. D
FROM THE COMMENTARIES OF ORIGEN ON EZEKIEL
A From the 20th tome of the Commentaries on Ezekiel. Thus says the Lord God: Shall you judge between sheep and sheep, and rams and he-goats? Is it not enough for you that you were grazing upon good pasture? And you trampled the remaining pasture with your feet, and drank the clearest water, and muddied the rest with your feet; and my sheep were pastured on what had been trampled by your feet, and drank what had been muddied by your feet.
(After setting forth the matter of the sheep and the rams and the sheep of the goats, as Scripture is wont to do, he adds:)
What is intended by these things, let us examine as best we can. The good pasture, I suppose, and all the water collected, are entirely the Holy Scriptures. Then, because some people, while selecting from the Scriptures what is useful, reject some things as if they were not salutary, these are they who, after having fed on their pleasant pasture and drunk the collected water, which they judged to be the best, trample the rest of the pasture with their feet, and B muddy the remaining water with their feet. Such are those who choose the New Testament and reject the Old, and who say that the Scriptures proceed from two different divine powers, some from a higher and others from a lower one. But the true pastor declares them to be his own, he who does not despise what has been trampled by their feet, nor reject the muddy water, which has been perturbed by the feet of the sheep, the rams, and the goats. For he did not wish these sheep of his to refrain from the rams that are on the right hand. We, therefore, who desire to be the sheep of the Pastor, must never shrink from being fed even by those things which, though they seem to disagree in the letter of the Scriptures, yet, because of the discrepancy of the expression, can be used for the whole of the pasture by those who are able to use it. But even if there is some water which has been muddied by their feet, and horrendous doubts are suggested, let us turn away from drinking that which has been muddied by their feet and from mingling it with the purest word of Scripture, lest, on account of these things, we bring disturbances upon the divine words. And observe diligently that he says to those who have muddied the water and trampled the pasture, as if speaking to the better ones: *And my sheep were pastured on what had been trampled by your feet, and drank what had been muddied by your feet.* But let us never trample the prophetic pasture, nor muddy the water...