The great Origen

Had the Christians learnt from and not rejected him, the world might have been a kinder, gentler, less neurotic place. Too late to start?

This is Who made our minds?, my Thursday essay probing the greatest, cruellest and most beautiful minds of the past 5,000 years, inspired by my book, The Soul: A History of the Human Mind (Penguin 2024). Share my journey!

Next Thursday: The man who invented Catholic guilt (last of 7 essays on Christianity)

A DEVOTED SON, a brilliant scholar, a transformative teacher, a theologian of genius and a model of humility: all have been said in praise of Origen Adamantius (c. 185-253 CE), the burning spirit from Alexandria whose prodigious mind illuminated early Christianity.

Origen teaching his students, in a Dutch illustration by Jan Luyken (1700). ‘It was like a spark falling in our deepest soul,’ said one (public domain).

His allegorical interpretation of the Bible is recognised today as equal to or greater than Saint Augustine’s, a stark reminder to today’s Christian creationists that few people took their bibles literally in the third century.

Aged seventeen, Origen lost his father, Leonidas,…