A Review of Origen's Treatise On Prayer

A Review of Origen’s Treatise On Prayer

                In the treatise On Prayer by the early Church Father, Origen, there are several ways in which he describes the dispositions and manner by which one is to pray to God.  In this work, Origen attempts to distinguish these ways of praying by providing strong evidence of his explanations mainly through scripture passages.  He makes some points when he writes about how one should pray and what one should pray (Origen, pg. 82). 

                When referring to how one ought to pray, he recommends letting go of all spite toward others before in order to be prepared for prayer.  As he wrote, “When we leave behind bearing malice in coming to pray, we keep the Savior’s commandment, ‘if you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against any one’" (Origen, pg. 100).  While writing about what is prayed, he mentions prayers of supplication, prayer, intercession and thanksgiving, providing many scriptural examples to show what he meant by each. 

                While taking more of a philosophical approach, he also deals with those who believe in God, but does not believe that praying is necessary.  This is because, “God not only foreknows what will happen but also foreordains it, and nothing can happen contrary to His foreordination” (Origen, pg. 91) as the argument goes, and therefore, “’prayer is in vain’” as written to him in a letter (Origen, pg. 92).  To refute this thought, Origen’s argument states that if this is true, no one has freedom and those who believe that this is the case “must admit something extremely foolish—first, that we are not living beings and, second, that we are not rational beings" (Origen, pg. 93). 

               While focusing on how to pray, he gives a beautiful description of when one prays they must seek “heavenly and great things” (Origen, pg. 115) rather than corporal things.  He says that this is because what is corporal is only a shadow of those heavenly things and will surely come to the one praying.  He then goes into several Old Testament examples to show that the needs of the flesh are met when one focuses on the spiritual, so that one does not need to worry about such things.

                It is quite obvious that Origen is very knowledgeable about the scriptures and the ways of Christianity, which is a testament to the great faith and enthusiasm of the early Christians.  However, there seems to be, in this writing, some influence and confusion from other sources that existed at that time.  For example, he does not seem to have the idea of the Holy Trinity being three Persons in one God.  This seems evident when he wrote, “I have spoken sufficiently in the preceding examination on the subject of prayer and…have been capable of receiving it according to the grace given by God through His Christ. (And my hope is that it has been given also in the Holy Spirit; if so, you who read this treatise will judge of its inspiration)” (Origen, pg. 117). This seems to look at the Father, Son and Holy Spirit as three different beings all together.  However, this can be a misjudgment on the part of this writer.            

There is so much more that could be writen about this ancient work, such as his in-depth examination of the Our Father and also when he writes about where would be the best place to pray.  Even though sometimes his words are a bit hard to follow because of the many directions he takes to explain his position on things, Origen seems mostly to have been a very devout, knowledgeable Christian man who truly believed what he wrote.   This piece On Prayer would be a good read for those who want to go deeper into how and what disposition one needs to pray.  It may be advised that it would be better if someone who was able to catch any misunderstandings that Origen may have had as he was from a time where not all doctrine was very well defined.  But other than that, it can be seen that this theological work is truly from a devoted writer. 

Work Cited:  Origen, Origen:  An Exhortation to Martyrdom, Prayer and Selected Works.  Trans:  Rowan A. Greer.  New York:  Paulist Press, 1979.  Print.