The Roots of Christian Mysticism Session 4
Summary of Reverend Professor
Andrew Louth's "Clement of Alexandria and Origen" talk,
The London Christian Meditation Centre, St Mark's, Clerkenwell,
04 October 2005
Clement of Alexandria
We know very little about Clement except that for the last decade
of the second century he was in Alexandria. We don’t know
whether he was a master of prayer. He probably was. He was probably
a philosopher and the distinction between a philosopher and a master
of prayer was not the distinction that it would be regarded as today.
His importance is really what others in the tradition have made
of him, particularly the Byzantine tradition which was essentially
a monastic tradition. This would not have taken the form it did
had it not been for Clement and Origen.
Alexandria was a very important place in late antiquity. It was
founded by Alexander the Great and in the centuries following his
death it became a great centre of intellectual activity (a bit like
Oxford and Cambridge put together). It was noted for its very large
library which was founded to contain all the wisdom mankind had
discovered. In the shadow of this library philosophers, astronomers
and scientists worked. Lots of traditions met in Alexandria, not
just the traditions of the Mediterranean world. Alexandria was at
the eastern end of the Mediterranean which was significant because
it was clear to those thinking people who lived there that there
was a world beyond the Roman Empire. Clement for example knew of
Buddha ( probably the only Christian who did) and he refers to him.
He didn’t know much about him but the fact that he was aware
there were other traditions of philosophical inquiry and other ways
of seeking the truth outside the Roman world is important. There
are signs of all this in his writings.
We don’t know where or when he was born but it was sometime
in the mid second century. We don’t think he came from Alexandria.
He probably spent his youth and early manhood traveling and seeking
for the truth. He probably spent time in Athens where there were
many philosophers. In Alexandria he found a teacher Pantaenus who
was nicknamed the “Sicilian Bee”. Pantaenus seems to
have been a fairly “orthodox” Christian of which there
would not have been many at that time in Alexandria.
After his time in Alexandria we hear nothing more about him except
that Eusebius tells us of a Clement who is a priest carrying a letter
from Alexander, bishop of Jerusalem, who was in prison to the Church
in Antioch. (The History of the Church bk. 6.11) It is often said
that Clement fled during persecution in the third century but there
is no evidence of this.
The mature Clement was the perfect example of a Christian Platonist.
See Charles Bigg The Christian Platonists of Alexandria (a very
old and very good book). Christian Platonism was a confluence of
Greek wisdom, of which Plato was the most important, and the Hebrew
Scriptures. For example Clement (following Justin Martyr) parallels
the creation account in Genesis with the account by Plato in Timaeus.
In Timaeus the creator forms the material of the world soul into
an X which Clement sees as the making explicit of Christ or the
cross at the heart of creation.
Clement’s longest book The Stromateis (lit. “Carpet
bags”) is a collection of sustained thoughts. It is not clear
what his sequence of thought is. Clement didn’t intend this
to be read cold. He intended it for his disciples. It is an esoteric
work written in such a way that it couldn’t be understood
by those it was not meant for! Every chapter ends with a quote from
scripture (he used the Septuagint, the Greek translation) and from
Greek philosophy.
One interesting idea in the Stromateis is a passage looking at
the various ways we can come to know God For example by analysis.
A sphere becomes a circle becomes a line becomes a point. You then
focus on the point and let yourself go casting yourself into the
depths of Christ. This seems to be the description of a meditative
experience.
Clement’s central insight which he derives from Platonism
and one which bears most closely on what he means by prayer is a
sense of human inwardness; a sense that what we really are is hidden
within us. It is not obvious but needs to be searched for. Therefore
the first step towards knowing anything is to know yourself. This
begins a voyage of self-discovery. The self is the soul though in
Plato and Clement a more specific word is used “psyche”
meaning “life-force.”
Plato also used the word “nous” to describe the most
inward part of our soul. In English if someone hasn’t got
much nous it means (in the north!) that they haven’t got much
sense of who they are and how things are. “Nous” is
not knowledge in the sense of information but in the sense of how
much understanding you have of the truth. Clement and Origen and
others take up this Platonic way of looking at who we are and see
that we are in touch with the truth of ourselves. It is also a way
of grasping the truth of things. For those Platonic philosophers
contemporary with Clement knowing the truth was knowing God.
In some traditions knowledge implies that you are in a sense what
you know. In Greek idiom “like knows like”. For the
Greeks genuine knowledge entails a sort of assimilation to what
you know. If two people know each other they have formed some sort
of common ground and in that they begin to know one another. For
Plato if we are going to know the truth we have to be assimilated
to the truth. Clement who, as we have seen, sees any point he wants
to make as a confluence of two traditions associated this idea of
assimilation in the Platonic tradition with the idea in the Hebrew
tradition of creation in the image of God. This idea appears in
Genesis though not much more is made of it in the Hebrew Scriptures.
However it is taken up by the Christian tradition and becomes very
important. God created us in his image and likeness so that we can
know him.
In Greek the word for “likeness” is “homooisis”.
Becoming like God was the destiny of the soul. (CF. Plato Theaetetus
176B) Clement quotes this passage many times in his works as it
forms the basis of his doctrine of prayer:
O truly sacred mysteries! O pure light! In the blaze of the torches
I have a vision of heaven and of God. I became holy by initiation.
The Lord reveals his mysteries; He marks the worshipper with His
seal, gives light to guide his way, and commends him, when he has
believed, to the Father’s care, where he is guarded for ages
to come. These are the revels of my mysteries! If you will, be yourself
also initiated, and you shall dance with angels around the unbegotten
and imperishable and only true God, the Word of God joining with
us in our hymn of praise. This Jesus being eternal, one great high
priest of one God who is also Father, prays for men and encourages
men: “Give ear, myriad peoples,” or rather, so many
of human kind as are governed by reason, both barbarians and Greeks;
the whole race of men I call, I who was their Creator by the Father’s
will…O you who of old were images, but do not at all resemble
your model, I desire to conform you to the archetype, that you may
become even as I am. I will anoint you with the ointment of faith,
whereby you ascend to God. “Come to Me, all you that labour
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon
you and learn to me; for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall
find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is
light.” Let us hasten, let us run; let us take up His yoke;
let us take upon ourselves incorruption; let us love Christ, the
noble charioteer of human kind. (Exhortation to the Greeks, xii)
The doctrine of prayer is the doctrine of how we come to know God-by
discovering what we truly are and we do that by discovering the
image within. Athanasius uses the idea of a mirror (see Contra Gentes).
We look into ourselves and in the mirror we have the image of who
we are. Normally the mirror is mucky and we can’t see. If
we clean it then we will see the true image of what we truly are
which is the image of God. The ancients didn’t think of the
mirror in the way we do. We think that it works by reflection. The
Greeks thought that we sent out rays from our eyes which encountered
the rays from an object and what they saw in the mirror was actually
there. Of course it goes without saying that mirrors were not made
of glass. Clare of Assissi and others also made great use of the
analogy of the mirror. But now that a mirror is made of glass and
almost always works the mirror analogy is not such a meaningful
one.
Origen
He was also from Alexandria and was probably born there. His parents
may not have been Christian when he was born as they gave him the
name Origen which means Son of Horus. His father was a leading member
of the Christian community and died in the Severan persecution in
202. Eusebius tells us that the young Origen was anxious to share
his father’s fate but his mother hid his clothes to prevent
him from leaving the house! He was put in charge of the Catechetical
School while still young. It is difficult to say how formalised
this school was particularly as these were times of persecution.
Being a catechumen in the early Church was a serious business. You
had to find a Christian to present you and then were enrolled for
three years after which you would be baptised.
Origen was a serious person and led an ascetic life. He went to
Caesarea and there he set up an academy with the help of a wealthy
patron. The roll call of those who studied there is really quite
amazing! He turned out all the great bishops of the later third
century. Gregory the Wonderworker has left an interesting oration
in which he tells us how Origen taught. This is a rare glimpse of
teaching in the third century.
In the mid third century there was mass persecution of the Christians
under Decius. Everyone was required to obtain a certificate saying
that they had sacrificed to the gods. Many Christians apostasized.
Those who refused to obtain a certificate were killed. Origen was
one who refused but because he was so important he wasn’t
killed. He was tortured for up to a year but remained firm. However
he lived after the persecution in a broken state and died shortly
afterwards.
Origen like Clement was a Christian Platoninst but the focus of
his teaching was Scripture. Almost everything he wrote, and he wrote
prolifically, was concerned with the interpretation of Scripture-
commentaries, sermons and even his work On First Principles which
contains a systematic account of how to read the Scriptures. He
also wrote the Hexapla, a work consisting of six columns each being
a different translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. Origen was able
to use whichever translation seemed most appropriate. Sadly this
no longer exists together with a lot of what he wrote because he
was accused of heresy after his lifetime.
A lot of modern biblical scholarship is about the critical analysis
of words. Origen did indulge in this but it was never the point.
The point of reading the scriptures for Origen was to bring us to
an encounter with Christ. With regard to the Old Testament Origen
saw this as fulfilled in Christianity. Glimpses of the truth seen
through Moses and the prophets were actually made flesh in Christ.
Not many of the Fathers thought Christian truth was something that
could be deduced from the bible. Christ was the truth and the Old
Testament was the history of God’s dealings with his people.
For Origen reading the scriptures is a spiritual experience and
therefore the tradition of lectio divina may be traced back to him.
However the liturgical context is never far away for Scripture would
mainly have been heard in Church and most of Origen’s work
was sermons.
In the 4th century Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nazianzus made
a selection of the writings from Origen and began with this quotation:
“Listening to the Scriptures is like trying to listen to
a symphony you won’t be able to understand it if you haven’t
become attuned to it. How do you become attuned? By our life as
Christians and by the Rule of Faith. Within this framework we can
hear the harmony.
On Prayer
Origen wrote a book On Prayer (or it may have been entitled “On
the Prayer meaning the Lord‘s Prayer).
We are apt to treat prayer as a spiritual exercise which ignores
the body. Quite a lot of modern writing assumes that prayer is a
purely mental activity. Drawing the body into prayer is a valuable
exercise. The Christian tradition generally seems to have very little
to say about it but the Fathers of the Early Church did speak about
it. The following is an extract from On Prayer:
Disposition is a matter of the soul, and posture of the body. Now
Paul, as we said above, was describing disposition when he says
that we should pray without anger and without dissent, but posture
in “lifting up holy hands” (1 Tim. 2:8)…Accordingly
it seems to me that anyone who intends to embark on prayer should
lay a foundation for himself by preparing himself a while so that
he will be the more attentive and alert throughout his prayer…He
will put aside all alien thoughts, so coming to prayer, extending
his soul, as it were, before extending his hands, his mind intent
on God before his eyes and, before standing, raising his intellect
from the earth and setting it before the Lord of all. All remembrance
of wrongs against anyone who is supposed to have done him injustice
should be put away…Nor can there be any doubt that, of the
numerous dispositions of the body, standing with hands extended
and eyes upraised is much to be preferred, in that one thereby wears
on the body the image of the characteristics which are becoming
to the soul in prayer…Yet we should know that kneeling, because
it is a symbol of humility and submission, is essential when one
intends to confess one’s own sins against God and to beseech
healing from them, and remission…A few words may be said on
the direction that one should face whilst at prayer. Since there
are four directions, towards the north and the south, towards the
rising of the sun and its setting, who would not immediately agree
that the direction of sunrise obviously indicates that we should
make our prayer facing in that direction, as having the symbolic
implication that the soul is facing the rising of the true light?
(On Prayer 31.2).
The disposition of the soul for Origen is “attention.”
A play can be made on the similarity of two Greek words “prosoche”
meaning “attention” and “proseuche” meaning
“prayer.” The whole history of mankind can be seen as
a failure to pay attention. In Origen’s doctrine of the pre-existence
of souls (for which he was later condemned) all souls were originally
paying attention to God. They got bored and their attention wandered.
The extent to which their attention wandered is the place where
they fell to. Origen suggested that the world of bodies was God’s
providential scheme for finding our way back. The whole of Origen’s
understanding of the spiritual life was the paying of attention,
what is sapping it and how you preserve it. This is developed fully
by Evagrius, a disciple of Origen.
Origen says we face East because of the rising of the true light
which is Christ. A more common reason given is that in the Septuagint
Eden is placed over in the East so that we are looking towards our
ancient Fatherland. Prayer is not an individual or corporate activity
but a cosmic activity. We align ourselves with the direction of
the cosmos. Christians were always buried facing East until recently.
Margaret Lane
|
