Is Origen A Church Father?

[cmotherofpirl]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='24 April 2010 - 07:03 PM' timestamp='1272146615' post='2099382']
Neither Origen nor Tertullian are Church Fathers. A heretic cannot be a Father of the Church.
[/quote]
You can do good work, then become a heretic. You can't just discount the good stuff one did BEFORE one fell into error.

[Ephrem Augustine]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='24 April 2010 - 05:03 PM' timestamp='1272146615' post='2099382']
Neither Origen nor Tertullian are Church Fathers. A heretic cannot be a Father of the Church.
[/quote]

Not according to [url="http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/"]New Advent dot org[/url]

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='cmotherofpirl' date='24 April 2010 - 05:55 PM' timestamp='1272153302' post='2099416']
You can do good work, then become a heretic. You can't just discount the good stuff one did BEFORE one fell into error.
[/quote]
I never said that everything written by the two men is heretical. Nevertheless, a heretic cannot be a Church Father, because the Holy Fathers are commemorated in the liturgy, and no heretic is ever commemorated liturgically.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Ephrem Augustine' date='24 April 2010 - 06:08 PM' timestamp='1272154135' post='2099427']

Not according to [url="http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/"]New Advent dot org[/url]
[/quote]
Good thing no one has to agree with the New Advent website.

I do not consider Arios, Nestorios, Origen, Tertullian, Eutyches, Dioscorus, et al., to be Church Fathers. Heretics cannot be Fathers of the Church.

[N/A Gone]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='24 April 2010 - 06:03 PM' timestamp='1272146615' post='2099382']
Neither Origen nor Tertullian are Church Fathers. A heretic cannot be a Father of the Church.
[/quote]


[quote name='cmotherofpirl' date='24 April 2010 - 07:55 PM' timestamp='1272153302' post='2099416']
You can do good work, then become a heretic. You can't just discount the good stuff one did BEFORE one fell into error.
[/quote]


Does the title "Church father" really matter or change what we gain from their writings?

Reminds me of a quote...""You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." The intentions of Origin were honest, but he did not have the security or framework that we have now. Tertullian was very important, and still quoted today on various topics, but fell into heresy as an old man. I assume both are in heaven and can guide us in our faith today.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Revprodeji' date='24 April 2010 - 07:35 PM' timestamp='1272159311' post='2099467']
Does the title "Church father" really matter or change what we gain from their writings?

Reminds me of a quote...""You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." The intentions of Origin were honest, but he did not have the security or framework that we have now. Tertullian was very important, and still quoted today on various topics, but fell into heresy as an old man. I assume both are in heaven and can guide us in our faith today.
[/quote]
Church Fathers is a liturgical term. We commemorate them (i.e., the Church Fathers) within the liturgy, for the Church Catholic is by nature the Church of the Fathers. That said, there are only Holy Fathers within the Church, and not unholy Fathers (i.e., heretics).

Tertullian is important, but he is nevertheless a heretic, and so he cannot be commemorated with the Church Fathers.

If you can call Tertullian a Church Father, you might as well call Arios and Nestorios Church Fathers. By the way, the only people who call heretics Church Fathers are heretics (i.e., those who subscribe to the errors of the man in question).

Origen is condemned publicly in the liturgical prayers of the Churches of the Byzantine tradition, so I can never - as a matter of faith - subscribe to any position that would give Origen that sacred title.

Edited April 25, 2010 by Apotheoun

[Innocent]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='25 April 2010 - 08:14 AM' timestamp='1272159897' post='2099477']
Church Fathers is a liturgical term. We commemorate them (i.e., the Church Fathers) within the liturgy, for the Church Catholic is by nature the Church of the Fathers. That said, there are only Holy Fathers within the Church, and not unholy Fathers (i.e., heretics).

Tertullian is important, but he is nevertheless a heretic, and so he cannot be commemorated with the Church Fathers.

If you can call Tertullian a Church Father, you might as well call Arios and Nestorios Church Fathers. By the way, the only people who call heretics Church Fathers are heretics (i.e., those who subscribe to the errors of the man in question).

Origen is condemned publicly in the liturgical prayers of the Churches of the Byzantine tradition, so I can never - as a matter of faith - subscribe to any position that would give Origen that sacred title.
[/quote]

A blog I've read occasionally, titled "[url="http://witnesstolove.blogspot.com"]Witness to Love[/url]" has, I notice, the below shown icon in its sidebar, and the icon is labelled "Tertullian."

[center][img]http://i140.photobucket.com/albums/r30/prophet_o_peace/Phatmass/tertullian.jpg[/img][/center]

I have seen the same icon on [url="http://www.centropian.com/religion/academic/theologians/Tertullian.html"]this site[/url], too. But I haven't found that icon anywhere else on the net. Therefore perhaps it is possible that the icon has been mis-identified as one showing Tertullian.

If the person shown in the icon is indeed Tertullian, would it be considered wrong in the Orthodox tradition to write such an icon?

Edited April 25, 2010 by Innocent

[Laudate_Dominum]

Origen is my Church Father.

[N/A Gone]

Apo,

I understand what you mean in the liturgy, but I think there is a middle ground. Clearly we believe there are people in heaven that the Church does not declare as Saints. I think with tertullian we can learn a lot of positive in his life, and then later on we can see how he stumbled and hopefully prevent it ourselves. Augustine almost fell into heresy later in his life (retractions-Pelgian issue) but we understand him as human and trying to understand the divine.

Just my thoughts. I tend to use the term "Church father" simply for someone who contributed to the formation of the early Church and her understanding of the apostolic faith. Clearly Tertullian had an important role here.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Revprodeji' date='25 April 2010 - 11:17 AM' timestamp='1272215829' post='2099751']
Apo,

I understand what you mean in the liturgy, but I think there is a middle ground. Clearly we believe there are people in heaven that the Church does not declare as Saints. I think with tertullian we can learn a lot of positive in his life, and then later on we can see how he stumbled and hopefully prevent it ourselves. Augustine almost fell into heresy later in his life (retractions-Pelgian issue) but we understand him as human and trying to understand the divine.

Just my thoughts. I tend to use the term "Church father" simply for someone who contributed to the formation of the early Church and her understanding of the apostolic faith. Clearly Tertullian had an important role here.
[/quote]
The judgment about whether or not a man is a Church Father is made by looking at the man's earthly life, and not by trying to determine his final fate, which is unknown to us. Is Arios a Church Father? I say no, and not because I know for a fact that he is in hell, but I say "no" because during his lifetime he was a heretic, and the same holds for Nestorios, Dioscorus, Tertullian, Eutyches, Origen, Pyrrhus, Sabellios, and all the other arch-heretics of the Church's existence. There are no heretical Church Fathers corresponding to the God-bearing Fathers commemorated in the Church as pillars of the faith.

Edited April 25, 2010 by Apotheoun

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='25 April 2010 - 12:57 PM' timestamp='1272218247' post='2099762']
The judgment about whether or not a man is a Church Father is made by looking at the man's earthly life, and not by trying to determine his final fate, which is unknown to us. Is Arios a Church Father? I say no, and not because I know for a fact that he is in hell, but I say "no" because during his lifetime he was a heretic, and the same holds for Nestorios, Dioscorus, Tertullian, Eutyches, Origen, Pyrrhus, Sabellios, and all the other arch-heretics of the Church's existence. There are no heretical Church Fathers corresponding to the God-bearing Fathers commemorated in the Church as pillars of the faith.
[/quote]
For what reasons do you call Origen a heretic?

[N/A Gone]

Apo, I know that Tertullian fell into heresy later in his life, but I am honestly not an expert on the exact situation. The way it was explained to me is that in his personal understanding he fell into heresy, but he did not teach or promote heresy. Does this later decision to fall into heresy discredit all the work he did previously? Those other men you cite promoted their heresy against Church teaching. Did Tertullian do this?

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' date='25 April 2010 - 12:01 PM' timestamp='1272218493' post='2099765']
For what reasons do you call Origen a heretic?
[/quote]
For many reasons: (1) his subordinationist Triadology; (2) his belief in the pre-existence of human souls; (3) his belief that the fall is a cycle that recurs eternally; (4) his disdain for the human body, which was evidenced by the self-mutilation of his own body; (5) his view that existence in the body is a punishment of the soul for committing a pre-earthly sin; (6) his doctrine that the damned will be released from hell and be saved; (7) his belief that demons are both angels and the souls of evil men; (8) his view that Christ's resurrected body was not the same body that He took from the Theotokos, but an ethereal body composed of a spiritual form (i.e., a type of Docetism); (9) his belief that the body of Christ, which He used only as a shell during His earthly ministry, has been destroyed, and that the bodies of the saints will also be destroyed at the final judgment, is - like all of the other propositions listed here - condemned as heretical.

Edited April 25, 2010 by Apotheoun

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Revprodeji' date='25 April 2010 - 12:03 PM' timestamp='1272218620' post='2099767']
Apo, I know that Tertullian fell into heresy later in his life, but I am honestly not an expert on the exact situation. The way it was explained to me is that in his personal understanding he fell into heresy, but he did not teach or promote heresy. Does this later decision to fall into heresy discredit all the work he did previously? Those other men you cite promoted their heresy against Church teaching. Did Tertullian do this?
[/quote]
You are confusing the man with his writings. His writings have historical relevance certainly, but they are not the writings of a Church Father, nor of a Christian in the final analysis, which is why great caution is called for when reading anything written by Tertullian.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Revprodeji' date='25 April 2010 - 12:03 PM' timestamp='1272218620' post='2099767']
. . . Those other men you cite promoted their heresy against Church teaching. Did Tertullian do this?
[/quote]
Yes, Tertullian in many of his writings promoted the Montanist heresy (i.e., the new prophecies of the Spirit), and he attacked the bishop of Rome and other bishops who remained faithful to apostolic teaching.