title: Origen

text: Origen was born in either 185 or 186 AD in Alexandria. Porphyry called him "a Greek, and educated in Greek literature". According to Eusebius, Origen's father was Leonides of Alexandria, a respected professor of literature and also a devout Christian who practised his religion openly. Joseph Wilson Trigg deems the details of this report unreliable, but admits that Origen's father was certainly at least "a prosperous and thoroughly Hellenized bourgeois". According to John Anthony McGuckin, Origen's mother, whose name is unknown, may have been a member of the lower class who did not have the right of citizenship. It is likely that, on account of his mother's status, Origen was not a Roman citizen. Origen's father taught him about literature and philosophy, and also about the Bible and Christian doctrine. Eusebius states that Origen's father made him memorize passages of scripture daily. Trigg accepts this tradition as possibly genuine, given Origen's ability as an adult to recite extended passages of scripture at will. Eusebius also reports that Origen became so learned about the holy scriptures at an early age that his father was unable to answer his questions.


title: Origen

text: In 202, when Origen was "not yet seventeen", the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus ordered Roman citizens who openly practised Christianity to be executed. Origen's father Leonides was arrested and thrown in prison. Eusebius reports that Origen wanted to turn himself in to the authorities so that they would execute him as well, but his mother hid all his clothes and he was unable to go to the authorities since he refused to leave the house naked. According to McGuckin, even if Origen had turned himself in, it is unlikely that he would have been punished, since the emperor was only intent on executing Roman citizens. Origen's father was beheaded, and the state confiscated the family's entire property, leaving them impoverished. Origen was the eldest of nine children, and as his father's heir, it became his responsibility to provide for the whole family.


title: Origen

text: When he was eighteen years old, Origen was appointed as a catechist at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Many scholars have assumed that Origen became the head of the school, but according to McGuckin, this is highly improbable and it is more likely that he was simply given a paid teaching position, perhaps as a "relief effort" for his destitute family. While employed at the school, he adopted the ascetic lifestyle of the Greek Sophists. He spent the whole day teaching and would stay up late at night writing treatises and commentaries. He went barefoot and only owned one cloak. He did not drink alcohol and ate a simple diet and he often fasted for long periods of time. Although Eusebius goes to great lengths to portray Origen as one of the Christian monastics of his own era, this portrayal is now generally recognized as anachronistic.


title: Origen

text: According to Eusebius, as a young man, Origen was taken in by a wealthy Gnostic woman, who was also the patron of a very influential Gnostic theologian from Antioch, who frequently lectured in her home. Eusebius goes to great lengths to insist that, although Origen studied while in her home, he never once "prayed in common" with her or the Gnostic theologian. Later, Origen succeeded in converting a wealthy man named Ambrose from Valentinian Gnosticism to orthodox Christianity. Ambrose was so impressed by the young scholar that he gave Origen a house, a secretary, seven stenographers, a crew of copyists and calligraphers, and paid for all of his writings to be published.


title: Origen

text: Sometime when he was in his early twenties, Origen sold the small library of Greek literary works which he had inherited from his father for a sum which netted him a daily income of four obols. He used this money to continue his study of the Bible and of philosophy. Origen studied at numerous schools throughout Alexandria, including the Platonic Academy of Alexandria, where he was a student of Ammonius Saccas. Eusebius claims that Origen studied under Clement of Alexandria, but according to McGuckin, this is almost certainly a retrospective assumption based on the similarity of their teachings. Origen rarely mentions Clement in his own writings, and when he does, it is usually to correct him.


title: Origen

text: Eusebius claims that, as a young man, following a literal misreading of Matthew 19:12, in which Jesus is presented as saying "there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuch for the sake of the kingdom of heaven", Origen either castrated himself or had someone else castrate him in order to ensure his reputation as a respectable tutor to young men and women. Eusebius further alleges that Origen privately told Demetrius, the bishop of Alexandria, about the castration and that Demetrius initially praised him for his devotion to God on account of it. Origen, however, never mentions anything about having castrated himself in any of his surviving writings, and in his exegesis of this verse in his "Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew", written near the end of life, he strongly condemns any literal interpretation of Matthew 19:12, asserting that only an idiot would interpret the passage as advocating literal castration.


title: Origen

text: Since the beginning of the twentieth century, some scholars have questioned the historicity of Origen's self-castration, with many seeing it as a wholesale fabrication. Trigg states that Eusebius's account of Origen's self-castration is certainly true, because Eusebius, who was an ardent admirer of Origen, yet clearly describes the castration as an act of pure folly, would have had no motive to pass on a piece of information that might tarnish Origen's reputation unless it was "notorious and beyond question." Trigg sees Origen's condemnation of the literal interpretation of Matthew 19:12 as him "tacitly repudiating the literalistic reading he had acted on in his youth."


title: Origen

text: In sharp contrast, McGuckin dismisses Eusebius's story of Origen's self-castration as "hardly credible", seeing it as a deliberate attempt by Eusebius to distract from more serious questions regarding the orthodoxy of Origen's teachings. McGuckin also states, "We have no indication that the motive of castration for respectability was ever regarded as standard by a teacher of mixed-gender classes". He adds that Origen's female students (whom Eusebius lists by name) would have been accompanied by attendants at all times, meaning that Origen would have had no good reason to think that anyone would suspect him of impropriety. Henry Chadwick argues that, while Eusebius's story may be true, it seems unlikely, given that Origen's exposition of Matthew 19:12 "strongly deplored any literal interpretation of the words". Instead, Chadwick suggests, "Perhaps Eusebius was uncritically reporting malicious gossip retailed by Origen's enemies, of whom there were many." However, many noted historians, such as Peter Brown and William Placher, continue to find no reason to conclude that the story is false. Placher theorizes that, if it is true, it may have followed an episode in which Origen received some raised eyebrows while privately tutoring a woman.


title: Origen

text: In his early twenties Origen became less interested in work as a grammarian and more interested in operating as a rhetor-philosopher. He gave his job as a catechist to his younger colleague Heraclas. Meanwhile, Origen began to style himself as a "master of philosophy". Origen's new position as a self-styled Christian philosopher brought him into conflict with Demetrius, the bishop of Alexandria. Demetrius, a charismatic leader who ruled the Christian congregation of Alexandria with an iron fist, became the most direct promoter of the elevation in status of the bishop of Alexandria; prior to Demetrius, the bishop of Alexandria had merely been a priest who was elected to represent his fellows, but after Demetrius, the bishop was seen as clearly a rank higher than his fellow priests. By styling himself as an independent philosopher, Origen was reviving a role that had been prominent in earlier Christianity but which challenged the authority of the now-powerful bishop.


title: Origen

text: Meanwhile, Origen began composing his massive theological treatise "On the First Principles", a landmark book which systematically laid out the foundations of Christian theology for centuries to come. Origen also began travelling abroad to visit schools across the Mediterranean. In 212 he travelled to Rome – a major center of philosophy at the time. In Rome, Origen attended lectures by Hippolytus of Rome and was influenced by his "logos" theology. In 213 or 214 the governor of Arabia sent a message to the prefect of Egypt requesting him to send Origen to meet with him so that he could interview him and learn more about Christianity from its leading intellectual. Origen, escorted by official bodyguards, spent a short time in Arabia with the governor before returning to Alexandria.


title: Origen

text: In the autumn of 215 the Roman Emperor Caracalla visited Alexandria. During the visit, the students at the schools there protested and made fun of him for having murdered his brother Geta (died 211). Caracalla, incensed, ordered his troops to ravage the city, execute the governor, and kill all the protesters. He also commanded them to expel all the teachers and intellectuals from the city. Origen fled Alexandria and traveled to the city of Caesarea Maritima in the Roman province of Palestine, where the bishops Theoctistus of Caesarea and Alexander of Jerusalem became his devoted admirers and asked him to deliver discourses on the scriptures in their respective churches. This effectively amounted to letting Origen deliver homilies, even though he was not formally ordained. While this was an unexpected phenomenon, especially given Origen's international fame as a teacher and philosopher, it infuriated Demetrius, who saw it as a direct undermining of his authority. Demetrius sent deacons from Alexandria to demand that the Palestinian hierarchs immediately return "his" catechist to Alexandria. He also issued a decree chastising the Palestinians for allowing a person who was not ordained to preach. The Palestinian bishops, in turn, issued their own condemnation, accusing Demetrius of being jealous of Origen's fame and prestige.


title: Origen

text: Origen obeyed Demetrius's order and returned to Alexandria, bringing with him an antique scroll he had purchased at Jericho containing the full text of the Hebrew Bible. The manuscript, which had purportedly been found "in a jar", became the source text for one of the two Hebrew columns in Origen's "Hexapla". Origen studied the Old Testament in great depth; Eusebius even claims that Origen learned Hebrew. Most modern scholars regard this claim as implausible, but they disagree over how much Origen actually knew about the language. H. Lietzmann concludes that Origen probably only knew the Hebrew alphabet and not much else, whereas R. P. C. Hanson and G. Bardy argue that Origen had a superficial understanding of the language but not enough to have composed the entire "Hexapla". A note in Origen's "On the First Principles" mentions an unknown "Hebrew master", but this was probably a consultant, not a teacher.


title: Origen

text: Origen also studied the entire New Testament, but especially the epistles of the apostle Paul and the Gospel of John, the writings which Origen regarded as the most important and authoritative. At Ambrose's request, Origen composed the first five books of his exhaustive "Commentary on the Gospel of John", He also wrote the first eight books of his "Commentary on Genesis", his "Commentary on Psalms 1–25", and his "Commentary on Lamentations". In addition to these commentaries, Origen also wrote two books on the resurrection of Jesus and ten books of "Stromata" (miscellanies). It is likely that these works contained much theological speculation, which brought Origen into even greater conflict with Demetrius.


title: Origen

text: Origen repeatedly asked Demetrius to ordain him as a priest, but Demetrius continually refused. In around 231, Demetrius sent Origen on a mission to Athens. Along the way, Origen stopped in Caesarea, where he was warmly greeted by the bishops Theoctistus of Caesarea and Alexander of Jerusalem, who had become his close friends during his previous stay. While he was visiting Caesarea, Origen asked Theoctistus to ordain him as a priest. Theoctistus gladly complied. Upon learning of Origen's ordination, Demetrius was outraged and issued a condemnation declaring that Origen's ordination by a foreign bishop was an act of insubordination.


title: Origen

text: Eusebius reports that as a result of Demetrius's condemnations, Origen decided not to return to Alexandria and instead to take up permanent residence in Caesarea. John Anthony McGuckin, however, argues that Origen had probably already been planning to stay in Caesarea. The Palestinian bishops declared Origen the chief theologian of Caesarea. Firmilian, the bishop of Caesarea Mazaca in Cappadocia, was such a devoted disciple of Origen that he begged him to come to Cappadocia and teach there.


title: Origen

text: Demetrius raised a storm of protests against the bishops of Palestine and the church synod in Rome. According to Eusebius, Demetrius published the allegation that Origen had secretly castrated himself, a capital offense under Roman law at the time and one which would have made Origen's ordination invalid, since eunuchs were forbidden from becoming priests. Demetrius also alleged that Origen had taught an extreme form of "apokatastasis", which held that all beings, including even Satan himself, would eventually attain salvation. This allegation probably arose from a misunderstanding of Origen's argument during a debate with the Valentinian Gnostic teacher Candidus. Candidus had argued in favor of predestination by declaring that the Devil was beyond salvation. Origen had responded by arguing that, if the Devil is destined for eternal damnation, it was on account of his actions, which were the result of his own free will. Therefore, Origen had declared that Satan was only morally reprobate, not absolutely reprobate.


title: Origen

text: Demetrius died in 232, less than a year after Origen's departure from Alexandria. The accusations against Origen faded with the death of Demetrius, but they did not disappear entirely and they continued to haunt him for the rest of his career. Origen defended himself in his "Letter to Friends in Alexandria", in which he vehemently denied that he had ever taught that the Devil would attain salvation and insisted that the very notion of the Devil attaining salvation was simply ludicrous.


title: Origen

text: During his early years in Caesarea, Origen's primary task was the establishment of a Christian School; Caesarea had long been seen as a center of learning for Jews and Hellenistic philosophers, but until Origen's arrival, it had lacked a Christian center of higher education. According to Eusebius, the school Origen founded was primarily targeted towards young pagans who had expressed interest in Christianity but were not yet ready to ask for baptism. The school therefore sought to explain Christian teachings through Middle Platonism. Origen started his curriculum by teaching his students classical Socratic reasoning. After they had mastered this, he taught them cosmology and natural history. Finally, once they had mastered all of these subjects, he taught them theology, which was the highest of all philosophies, the accumulation of everything they had previously learned.


title: Origen

text: With the establishment of the Caesarean school, Origen's reputation as a scholar and theologian reached its zenith and he became known throughout the Mediterranean world as a brilliant intellectual. The hierarchs of the Palestinian and Arabian church synods regarded Origen as the ultimate expert on all matters dealing with theology. While teaching in Caesarea, Origen resumed work on his "Commentary on John", composing at least books six through ten. In the first of these books, Origen compares himself to "an Israelite who has escaped the perverse persecution of the Egyptians." Origen also wrote the treatise "On Prayer" at the request of his friend Ambrose and Tatiana (referred to as the "sister" of Ambrose), in which he analyzes the different types of prayers described in the Bible and offers a detailed exegesis on the Lord's Prayer.


title: Origen

text: Pagans also took a fascination with Origen. The Neoplatonist philosopher Porphyry heard of Origen's fame and traveled to Caesarea to listen to his lectures. Porphyry recounts that Origen had extensively studied the teachings of Pythagoras, Plato, and Aristotle, but also those of important Middle Platonists, Neopythagoreans, and Stoics, including Numenius of Apamea, Chronius, Apollophanes, Longinus, Moderatus of Gades, Nicomachus, Chaeremon, and Cornutus. Nonetheless, Porphyry accused Origen of having betrayed true philosophy by subjugating its insights to the exegesis of the Christian scriptures. Eusebius reports that Origen was summoned from Caesarea to Antioch at the behest of Julia Avita Mamaea, the mother of Roman Emperor Severus Alexander, "to discuss Christian philosophy and doctrine with her."


title: Origen

text: In 235, approximately three years after Origen began teaching in Caesarea, Alexander Severus, who had been tolerant towards Christians, was murdered and Emperor Maximinus Thrax instigated a purge of all those who had supported his predecessor. His pogroms targeted Christian leaders and, in Rome, Pope Pontianus and Hippolytus of Rome were both sent into exile. Origen knew that he was in danger and went into hiding in the home of a faithful Christian woman named Juliana the Virgin, who had been a student of the Ebionite leader Symmachus. Origen's close friend and longtime patron Ambrose was arrested in Nicomedia, and Protoctetes, the leading priest in Caesarea, was also arrested. In their honor, Origen composed his treatise "Exhortation to Martyrdom", which is now regarded as one of the greatest classics of Christian resistance literature. After coming out of hiding following Maximinus's death, Origen founded a school of which Gregory Thaumaturgus, later bishop of Pontus, was one of the pupils. He preached regularly on Wednesdays and Fridays, and later daily.


title: Origen

text: Sometime between 238 and 244, Origen visited Athens, where he completed his "Commentary on the Book of Ezekiel" and began writing his "Commentary on the Song of Songs". After visiting Athens, he visited Ambrose in Nicomedia. According to Porphyry, Origen also travelled to Rome or Antioch, where he met Plotinus, the founder of Neoplatonism. The Christians of the eastern Mediterranean continued to revere Origen as the most orthodox of all theologians, and when the Palestinian hierarchs learned that Beryllus, the bishop of Bostra and one of the most energetic Christian leaders of the time, had been preaching adoptionism (the belief that Jesus was born human and only became divine after his baptism), they sent Origen to convert him to orthodoxy. Origen engaged Beryllus in a public disputation, which went so successfully that Beryllus promised only to teach Origen's theology from then on. On another occasion, a Christian leader in Arabia named Heracleides began teaching that the soul was mortal and that it perished with the body. Origen refuted these teachings, arguing that the soul is immortal and can never die.


title: Origen

text: In 249, the Plague of Cyprian broke out. In 250, Emperor Decius, believing that the plague was caused by Christians' failure to recognise him as divine, issued a decree for Christians to be persecuted. This time Origen did not escape. Eusebius recounts how Origen suffered "bodily tortures and torments under the iron collar and in the dungeon; and how for many days with his feet stretched four spaces in the stocks". The governor of Caesarea gave very specific orders that Origen was not to be killed until he had publicly renounced his faith in Christ. Origen endured two years of imprisonment and torture, but obstinately refused to renounce his faith. In June 251, Decius was killed fighting the Goths in the Battle of Abritus, and Origen was released from prison. Nonetheless, Origen's health was broken by the physical tortures enacted on him, and he died less than a year later at the age of sixty-nine. A later legend, recounted by Jerome and numerous itineraries, places his death and burial at Tyre, but little value can be attached to this.


title: Origen

text: Origen was an extremely prolific writer. According to Epiphanius, he wrote a grand total of roughly 6,000 works over the course of his lifetime. Most scholars agree that this estimate is probably somewhat exaggerated. According to Jerome, Eusebius listed the titles of just under 2,000 treatises written by Origen in his lost "Life of Pamphilus". Jerome compiled an abbreviated list of Origen's major treatises, itemizing 800 different titles.


title: Origen

text: By far the most important work of Origen on textual criticism was the "Hexapla" ("Sixfold"), a massive comparative study of various translations of the Old Testament in six columns: Hebrew, Hebrew in Greek characters, the Septuagint, and the Greek translations of Theodotion (a Jewish scholar from 180 AD), Aquila of Sinope (another Jewish scholar from 117–138), and Symmachus (an Ebionite scholar from 193–211). Origen was the first Christian scholar to introduce critical markers to a Biblical text. He marked the Septuagint column of the "Hexapla" using signs adapted from those used by the textual critics of the Great Library of Alexandria: a passage found in the Septuagint that was not found in the Hebrew text would be marked with an "asterisk" (*) and a passage that was found in other Greek translations, but not in the Septuagint, would be marked with an "obelus" (÷).


title: Origen

text: The "Hexapla" was the cornerstone of the Great Library of Caesarea, which Origen founded. It was still the centerpiece of the library's collection by the time of Jerome, who records having used it in his letters on multiple occasions. When Emperor Constantine the Great ordered fifty complete copies of the Bible to be transcribed and disseminated across the empire, Eusebius used the "Hexapla" as the master copy for the Old Testament. Although the original "Hexapla" has been lost, the text of it has survived in numerous fragments and a more-or-less complete Syriac translation of the Greek column, made by the seventh-century bishop Paul of Tella, has also survived. For some sections of the "Hexapla", Origen included additional columns containing other Greek translations; for the Book of Psalms, he included no less than eight Greek translations, making this section known as "Enneapla" ("Ninefold"). Origen also produced the "Tetrapla" ("Fourfold"), a smaller, abridged version of the "Hexapla" containing only the four Greek translations and not the original Hebrew text.


title: Origen

text: According to Jerome's "Epistle" 33, Origen wrote extensive "scholia" on the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Isaiah, Psalms 1–15, Ecclesiastes, and the Gospel of John. None of these "scholia" have survived intact, but parts of them were incorporated into the "Catenaea", a collection of excerpts from major works of Biblical commentary written by the Church Fathers. Other fragments of the "scholia" are preserved in Origen's "Philocalia" and in Pamphilus of Caesarea's apology for Origen. The "Stromateis" were of a similar character, and the margin of "Codex Athous Laura", 184, contains citations from this work on Romans 9:23; I Corinthians 6:14, 7:31, 34, 9:20–21, 10:9, besides a few other fragments. Origen composed homilies covering almost the entire Bible. There are 205, and possibly 279, homilies of Origen that are extant either in Greek or in Latin translations.


title: Origen

text: The homilies preserved are on Genesis (16), Exodus (13), Leviticus (16), Numbers (28), Joshua (26), Judges (9), I Sam. (2), Psalms 36–38 (9), Canticles (2), Isaiah (9), Jeremiah (7 Greek, 2 Latin, 12 Greek and Latin), Ezekiel (14), and Luke (39). The homilies were preached in the church at Caesarea, with the exception of the two on 1 Samuel which were delivered in Jerusalem. Nautin has argued that they were all preached in a three-year liturgical cycle some time between 238 and 244, preceding the "Commentary on the Song of Songs", where Origen refers to homilies on Judges, Exodus, Numbers, and a work on Leviticus. On June 11, 2012, the Bavarian State Library announced that the Italian philologist Marina Molin Pradel had discovered twenty-nine previously unknown homilies by Origen in a twelfth-century Byzantine manuscript from their collection. Prof. Lorenzo Perrone of Bologna University and other experts confirmed the authenticity of the homilies. The texts of these manuscripts can be found online.


title: Origen

text: Origen is the main source of information on the use of the texts that were later officially canonized as the New Testament. The information used to create the late-fourth-century Easter Letter, which declared accepted Christian writings, was probably based on the lists given in Eusebius's "Ecclesiastical History" HE 3:25 and 6:25, which were both primarily based on information provided by Origen. Origen accepted the authenticity of the epistles of 1 John, 1 Peter, and Jude without question and accepted the Epistle of James as authentic with only slight hesitation. He also refers to 2 John, 3 John, and 2 Peter but notes that all three were suspected to be forgeries. Origen may have also considered other writings to be "inspired" that were rejected by later authors, including the Epistle of Barnabas, Shepherd of Hermas, and 1 Clement. "Origen is not the originator of the idea of biblical canon, but he certainly gives the philosophical and literary–interpretative underpinnings for the whole notion."


title: Origen

text: Origen's commentaries written on specific books of scripture are much more focused on systematic exegesis than his homilies. In these writings, Origen applies the precise critical methodology that had been developed by the scholars of the Mouseion in Alexandria to the Christian scriptures. The commentaries also display Origen's impressive encyclopedic knowledge of various subjects and his ability to cross-reference specific words, listing every place in which a word appears in the scriptures along with all the word's known meanings, a feat made all the more impressive by the fact that he did this in a time when Bible concordances had not yet been compiled. Origen's massive "Commentary on the Gospel of John", which spanned more than thirty-two volumes once it was completed, was written with the specific intention not only to expound the correct interpretation of the scriptures, but also to refute the interpretations of the Valentinian Gnostic teacher Heracleon, who had used the Gospel of John to support his argument that there were really two gods, not one. Of the original thirty-two books in the "Commentary on John", only nine have been preserved: Books I, II, VI, X, XIII, XX, XXVIII, XXXII, and a fragment of XIX.


title: Origen

text: Of the original twenty-five books in Origen's "Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew", only eight have survived in the original Greek (Books 10–17), covering Matthew 13.36–22.33. An anonymous Latin translation beginning at the point corresponding to Book 12, Chapter 9 of the Greek text and covering Matthew 16.13–27.66 has also survived. The translation contains parts that are not found in the original Greek and is missing parts that are found in it. Origen's "Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew" was universally regarded as a classic, even after his condemnation, and it ultimately became the work which established the Gospel of Matthew as the primary gospel. Origen's "Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans" was originally fifteen books long, but only tiny fragments of it have survived in the original Greek. An abbreviated Latin translation in ten books was produced by the monk Tyrannius Rufinus at the end of the fourth century. The historian Socrates Scholasticus records that Origen had included an extensive discussion of the application of the title "theotokos" to the Virgin Mary in his commentary, but this discussion is not found in Rufinus's translation, probably because Rufinus did not approve of Origen's position on the matter, whatever that might have been.


title: Origen

text: Origen also composed a "Commentary on the Song of Songs", in which he took explicit care to explain why the Song of Songs was relevant to a Christian audience. The "Commentary on the Song of Songs" was Origen's most celebrated commentary and Jerome famously writes in his preface to his translation of two of Origen's homilies over the Song of Songs that "In his other works, Origen habitually excels others. In this commentary, he excelled himself." Origen expanded on the exegesis of the Jewish Rabbi Akiva, interpreting the Song of Songs as a mystical allegory in which the bridegroom represents the Logos and the bride represents the soul of the believer. This was the first Christian commentary to expound such an interpretation and it became extremely influential on later interpretations of the Song of Songs. Despite this, the commentary now only survives in part through a Latin translation of it made by Tyrannius Rufinus in 410. Fragments of some other commentaries survive. Citations in Origen's "Philokalia" include fragments of the third book of the commentary on Genesis. There is also Ps. i, iv.1, the small commentary on Canticles, and the second book of the large commentary on the same, the twentieth book of the commentary on Ezekiel, and the commentary on Hosea. Of the non-extant commentaries, there is limited evidence of their arrangement.


title: Origen

text: Origen's "On the First Principles" was the first ever systematic exposition of Christian theology. He composed it as a young man between 220 and 230 while he was still living in Alexandria. Fragments from Books 3.1 and 4.1–3 of Origen's Greek original are preserved in Origen's "Philokalia". A few smaller quotations of the original Greek are preserved in Justinian's "Letter to Mennas". The vast majority of the text has only survived in a heavily abridged Latin translation produced by Tyrannius Rufinus in 397. "On the First Principles" begins with an essay explaining the nature of theology. Book One describes the heavenly world and includes descriptions of the oneness of God, the relationship between the three persons of the Trinity, the nature of the divine spirit, reason, and angels. Book Two describes the world of man, including the incarnation of the Logos, the soul, free will, and eschatology. Book Three deals with cosmology, sin, and redemption. Book Four deals with teleology and the interpretation of the scriptures.


title: Origen

text: "Against Celsus" (Greek: Κατὰ Κέλσου; Latin: "Contra Celsum"), preserved entirely in Greek, was Origen's last treatise, written about 248. It is an apologetic work defending orthodox Christianity against the attacks of the pagan philosopher Celsus, who was seen in the ancient world as early Christianity's foremost opponent. In 178, Celsus had written a polemic entitled "On the True Word", in which he had made numerous arguments against Christianity. The church had responded by ignoring Celsus's attacks, but Origen's patron Ambrose brought the matter to his attention. Origen initially wanted to ignore Celsus and let his attacks fade, but one of Celsus's major claims, which held that no self-respecting philosopher of the Platonic tradition would ever be so stupid as to become a Christian, provoked him to write a rebuttal.


title: Origen

text: In the book, Origen systematically refutes each of Celsus' arguments point-by-point and argues for a rational basis of Christian faith. Origen draws heavily on the teachings of Plato and argues that Christianity and Greek philosophy are not incompatible, and that philosophy contains much that is true and admirable, but that the Bible contains far greater wisdom than anything Greek philosophers could ever grasp. Origen responds to Celsus's accusation that Jesus had performed his miracles using magic rather than divine powers by asserting that, unlike magicians, Jesus had not performed his miracles for show, but rather to reform his audiences. "Contra Celsum" became the most influential of all early Christian apologetics works; before it was written, Christianity was seen by many as merely a folk religion for the illiterate and uneducated, but Origen raised it to a level of academic respectability. Eusebius admired "Against Celsus" so much that, in his "Against Hierocles" 1, he declared that "Against Celsus" provided an adequate rebuttal to all criticisms the church would ever face.


title: Origen

text: Between 232 and 235, while in Caesarea in Palestine, Origen wrote "On Prayer", of which the full text has been preserved in the original Greek. After an introduction on the object, necessity, and advantage of prayer, he ends with an exegesis of the Lord's Prayer, concluding with remarks on the position, place, and attitude to be assumed during prayer, as well as on the classes of prayer. "On Martyrdom", or the "Exhortation to Martyrdom", also preserved entire in Greek, was written some time after the beginning of the persecution of Maximinus in the first half of 235. In it, Origen warns against any trifling with idolatry and emphasises the duty of suffering martyrdom manfully, while in the second part he explains the meaning of martyrdom.


title: Origen

text: The papyri discovered at Tura in 1941 contained the Greek texts of two previously unknown works of Origen. Neither work can be dated precisely, though both were probably written after the persecution of Maximinus in 235. One is "On the Pascha". The other is "Dialogue with Heracleides", a record written by one of Origen's stenographers of a debate between Origen and the Arabian bishop Heracleides, a quasi-Monarchianist who taught that the Father and the Son were the same. In the dialogue, Origen uses Socratic questioning to persuade Heracleides to believe in the "Logos theology", in which the Son or Logos is a separate entity from God the Father. The debate between Origen and Heracleides, and Origen's responses in particular, has been noted for its unusually cordial and respectful nature in comparison to the much fiercer polemics of Tertullian or the fourth-century debates between Trinitarians and Arians.


title: Origen

text: Lost works include two books on the Resurrection, written before "On First Principles", and also two dialogues on the same theme dedicated to Ambrose. Eusebius had a collection of more than one hundred letters of Origen, and the list of Jerome speaks of several books of his epistles. Except for a few fragments, only three letters have been preserved. The first, partly preserved in the Latin translation of Rufinus, is addressed to friends in Alexandria. The second is a short letter to Gregory Thaumaturgus, preserved in the "Philocalia". The third is an epistle to Sextus Julius Africanus, extant in Greek, replying to a letter from Africanus (also extant), and defending the authenticity of the Greek additions to the book of Daniel. Forgeries of the writings of Origen made in his lifetime are discussed by Rufinus in "De adulteratione librorum Origenis". The "Dialogus de recta in Deum fide", the "Philosophumena" attributed to Hippolytus of Rome, and the "Commentary on Job" by Julian the Arian have also been ascribed to him.


title: Origen

text: Origen writes that Jesus was "the firstborn of all creation [who] assumed a body and a human soul." He firmly believed that Jesus had a human soul and abhorred docetism (the teaching which held that Jesus had come to Earth in spirit form rather than a physical human body). Origen envisioned Jesus' human nature as the one soul that stayed closest to God and remained perfectly faithful to Him, even when all other souls fell away. At Jesus's incarnation, his soul became fused with the Logos and they "intermingled" to become one. Thus, according to Origen, Christ was both human and divine, but like all human souls, Christ's human nature was existent from the beginning.


title: Origen

text: Origen was the first to propose the ransom theory of atonement in its fully developed form, although Irenaeus had previously proposed a prototypical form of it. According to this theory, Christ's death on the cross was a ransom to Satan in exchange for humanity's liberation. This theory holds that Satan was tricked by God because Christ was not only free of sin, but also the incarnate Deity, whom Satan lacked the ability to enslave. The theory was later expanded by theologians such as Gregory of Nyssa and Rufinus of Aquileia. In the eleventh century, Anselm of Canterbury criticized the ransom theory, along with the associated Christus Victor theory, resulting in the theory's decline in western Europe. The theory has nonetheless retained some of its popularity in the Eastern Orthodox Church.


title: Origen

text: One of Origen's main teachings was the doctrine of the preexistence of souls, which held that before God created the material world he created a vast number of incorporeal "spiritual intelligences" (ψυχαί). All of these souls were at first devoted to the contemplation and love of their Creator, but as the fervor of the divine fire cooled, almost all of these intelligences eventually grew bored of contemplating God, and their love for him "cooled off" (ψύχεσθαι). When God created the world, the souls which had previously existed without bodies became incarnate. Those whose love for God diminished the most became demons. Those whose love diminished moderately became human souls, eventually to be incarnated in fleshly bodies. Those whose love diminished the least became angels. One soul, however, who remained perfectly devoted to God became, through love, one with the Word (Logos) of God. The Logos eventually took flesh and was born of the Virgin Mary, becoming the God-man Jesus Christ.


title: Origen

text: In recent years it has been questioned whether Origen believed this, being in reality a belief of his disciples and a misrepresentation of Justinian, Epiphanius and others.


title: Origen

text: Origen may or may not have believed in the Platonic teaching of "metempsychosis" ("the transmigration of souls"; i.e. reincarnation). He explicitly rejects "the false doctrine of the transmigration of souls into bodies", but this may refer only to a specific kind of transmigration. Geddes MacGregor has argued that Origen must have believed in "metempsychosis" because it makes sense within his eschatology and is never explicitly denied in the Bible. Roger E. Olson, however, dismisses the view that Origen believed in reincarnation as a New Age misunderstanding of Origen's teachings. It is certain that Origen rejected the Stoic doctrine of eternal return, although he did posit the existence of a series of non-identical worlds.


title: Origen

text: Origen believed that, eventually, the whole world would be converted to Christianity, "since the world is continually gaining possession of more souls." He believed that the Kingdom of Heaven was not yet come, but that it was the duty of every Christian to make the eschatological reality of the kingdom present in their lives. Origen is often believed to be a Universalist, who suggested that all people might eventually attain salvation, but only after being purged of their sins through "divine fire". This, of course, in line of Origen's allegorical interpretation, was not "literal" fire, but rather the inner anguish of knowing one's own sins. Origen was also careful to maintain that universal salvation was merely a possibility and not a definitive doctrine. Jerome quotes Origen as having allegedly written that "after aeons and the one restoration of all things, the state of Gabriel will be the same as that of the Devil, Paul's as that of Caiaphas, that of virgins as that of prostitutes." Jerome, however, was not above deliberately altering quotations to make Origen seem more like a heretic, and Origen expressly states in his "Letter to Friends in Alexandria" that Satan and "those who are cast out of the kingdom of God" would be not included in the final salvation.


title: Origen

text: Origen was an ardent believer in free will, and he adamantly rejected the Valentinian idea of election. Instead, Origen believed that even disembodied souls have the power to make their own decisions. Furthermore, in his interpretation of the story of Jacob and Esau, Origen argues that the condition into which a person is born is actually dependent upon what their souls did in this pre-existent state. According to Origen, the superficial unfairness of a person's condition at birth—with some humans being poor, others rich, some being sick, and others healthy—is actually a by-product of what the person's soul had done in the pre-existent state. Origen defends free will in his interpretations of instances of divine foreknowledge in the scriptures, arguing that Jesus's knowledge of Judas's future betrayal in the gospels and God's knowledge of Israel's future disobedience in the Deuteronomistic history only show that God knew these events would happen in advance. Origen therefore concludes that the individuals involved in these incidents still made their decisions out of their own free will. Like Plato, Plotinus and Gregory of Nyssa, Origen understands that only the agent who chooses the Good is free; choosing evil is never free but slavery.


title: Origen

text: Origen was an ardent pacifist, and in his "Against Celsus", he argued that Christianity's inherent pacifism was one of the most outwardly noticeable aspects of the religion. While Origen did admit that some Christians served in the Roman army, he pointed out that most did not and insisted that engaging in earthly wars was against the way of Christ. Origen accepted that it was sometimes necessary for a non-Christian state to wage wars but insisted that it was impossible for a Christian to fight in such a war without compromising his or her faith, since Christ had absolutely forbidden violence of any kind. Origen explained the violence found in certain passages of the Old Testament as allegorical and pointed out Old Testament passages which he interpreted as supporting nonviolence, such as Psalm 7:4–6 and Lamentations 3:27–29. Origen maintained that, if everyone were peaceful and loving like Christians, then there would be no wars and the Empire would not need a military.


title: Origen

text: Origen bases his theology on the Christian scriptures and does not appeal to Platonic teachings without having first supported his argument with a scriptural basis. He saw the scriptures as divinely inspired and was cautious never to contradict his own interpretation of what was written in them. Nonetheless, Origen did have a penchant for speculating beyond what was explicitly stated in the Bible, and this habit frequently placed him in the hazy realm between strict orthodoxy and heresy.


title: Origen

text: According to Origen, there are two kinds of Biblical literature which are found in both the Old and New Testaments: "historia" ("history, or narrative") and "nomothesia" ("legislation or ethical prescription"). Origen expressly states that the Old and New Testaments should be read together and according to the same rules. Origen further taught that there were three different ways in which passages of scripture could be interpreted. The "flesh" was the literal, historical interpretation of the passage; the "soul" was the moral message behind the passage; and the "spirit" was the eternal, incorporeal reality that the passage conveyed. In Origen's exegesis, the Book of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs represent perfect examples of the bodily, soulful, and spiritual components of scripture respectively.


title: Origen

text: Origen saw the "spiritual" interpretation as the deepest and most important meaning of the text and taught that some passages held no literal meaning at all and that their meanings were purely allegorical. Nonetheless, he stressed that "the passages which are historically true are far more numerous than those which are composed with purely spiritual meanings" and often used examples from corporeal realities. Origen noticed that the accounts of Jesus's life in the four canonical gospels contain irreconcilable contradictions, but he argued that these contradictions did not undermine the spiritual meanings of the passages in question. Origen's idea of a twofold creation was based on an allegorical interpretation of the creation story found in the first two chapters of the Book of Genesis. The first creation, described in Genesis 1:26, was the creation of the primeval spirits, who are made "in the image of God" and are therefore incorporeal like Him; the second creation described in Genesis 2:7 is when the human souls are given ethereal, spiritual bodies and the description in Genesis 3:21 of God clothing Adam and Eve in "tunics of skin" refers to the transformation of these spiritual bodies into corporeal ones. Thus, each phase represents a degradation from the original state of incorporeal holiness.


title: Origen

text: Origen's conception of God the Father is apophatic—a perfect unity, invisible and incorporeal, transcending all things material, and therefore inconceivable and incomprehensible. He is likewise unchangeable and transcends space and time. But his power is limited by his goodness, justice, and wisdom; and, though entirely free from necessity, his goodness and omnipotence constrained him to reveal himself. This revelation, the external self-emanation of God, is expressed by Origen in various ways, the Logos being only one of many. The revelation was the first creation of God (cf. Proverbs 8:22), in order to afford creative mediation between God and the world, such mediation being necessary, because God, as changeless unity, could not be the source of a multitudinous creation.


title: Origen

text: The Logos is the rational creative principle that permeates the universe. The Logos acts on all human beings through their capacity for logic and rational thought, guiding them to the truth of God's revelation. As they progress in their rational thinking, all humans become more like Christ. Nonetheless, they retain their individuality and do not become subsumed into Christ. Creation came into existence only through the Logos, and God's nearest approach to the world is the command to create. While the Logos is substantially a unity, he comprehends a multiplicity of concepts, so that Origen terms him, in Platonic fashion, "essence of essences" and "idea of ideas".


title: Origen

text: Origen significantly contributed to the development of the idea of the Trinity. He declared the Holy Spirit to be a part of the Godhead and interpreted the Parable of the Lost Coin to mean that the Holy Spirit dwells within each and every person and that the inspiration of the Holy Spirit was necessary for any kind of speech dealing with God. Origen taught that the activity of all three parts of the Trinity was necessary for a person to attain salvation.


title: Origen

text: In one fragment preserved by Rufinus in his Latin translation of Pamphilus's "Defense of Origen", Origen seems to apply the phrase "homooúsios" (ὁμοούσιος; "of the same substance") to the relationship between the Father and the Son. But Williams states that it is impossible to verify whether the quote that uses the word "homoousios" really comes from Pamphilus at all, let alone Origen.


title: Origen

text: In other passages, Origen rejected the belief that the Son and the Father were one "hypostasis" as heretical. According to Rowan Williams, because the words "ousia" and "hypostasis" were used synonymously in Origen's time, Origen almost certainly would have rejected "homoousios," as a description for the relationship between the Father and the Son, as heretical.


title: Origen

text: Nonetheless, Origen was a subordinationist, meaning he believed that the Father was superior to the Son and the Son was superior to the Holy Spirit, a model based on Platonic proportions. Jerome records that Origen had written that God the Father is invisible to all beings, including even the Son and the Holy Spirit, and that the Son is invisible to the Holy Spirit as well. At one point Origen suggests that the Son was created by the Father and that the Holy Spirit was created by the Son, but, at another point, he writes that "Up to the present I have been able to find no passage in the Scriptures that the Holy Spirit is a created being." At the time when Origen was alive, orthodox views on the Trinity had not yet been formulated and subordinationism was not yet considered heretical. In fact, virtually all orthodox theologians prior to the Arian controversy in the latter half of the fourth century were subordinationists to some extent. Origen's subordinationism may have developed out of his efforts to defend the unity of God against the Gnostics.


title: Origen

text: Origen is often seen as the first major Christian theologian. Though his orthodoxy had been questioned in Alexandria while he was alive, after Origen's death Pope Dionysius of Alexandria became one of the foremost proponents of Origen's theology. Every Christian theologian who came after him was influenced by his theology, whether directly or indirectly. Origen's contributions to theology were so vast and complex, however, that his followers frequently emphasized drastically different parts of his teachings to the expense of other parts. Dionysius emphasized Origen's subordinationist views, which led him to deny the unity of the Trinity, causing controversy throughout North Africa. At the same time, Origen's other disciple Theognostus of Alexandria taught that the Father and the Son were "of one substance".


title: Origen

text: For centuries after his death, Origen was regarded as the bastion of orthodoxy, and his philosophy practically defined Eastern Christianity. Origen was revered as one of the greatest of all Christian teachers; he was especially beloved by monks, who saw themselves as continuing in Origen's ascetic legacy. As time progressed, however, Origen became criticized under the standard of orthodoxy in later eras, rather than the standards of his own lifetime. In the early fourth century, the Christian writer Methodius of Olympus criticized some of Origen's more speculative arguments but otherwise agreed with Origen on all other points of theology. Peter of Antioch and Eustathius of Antioch criticized Origen as heretical.


title: Origen

text: Both orthodox and heterodox theologians claimed to be following in the tradition Origen had established. Athanasius of Alexandria, the most prominent supporter of the Holy Trinity at the First Council of Nicaea, was deeply influenced by Origen, and so were Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus (the so-called "Cappadocian Fathers"). At the same time, Origen deeply influenced Arius of Alexandria and later followers of Arianism. Although the extent of the relationship between the two is debated, in antiquity, many orthodox Christians believed that Origen was the true and ultimate source of the Arian heresy.


title: Origen

text: The First Origenist Crisis began in the late fourth century, coinciding with the beginning of monasticism in Palestine. The first stirring of the controversy came from the Cyprian bishop Epiphanius of Salamis, who was determined to root out all heresies and refute them. Epiphanius attacked Origen in his anti-heretical treatises "Ancoratus" (375) and "Panarion" (376), compiling a list of teachings Origen had espoused that Epiphanius regarded as heretical. Epiphanius's treatises portray Origen as an originally orthodox Christian who had been corrupted and turned into a heretic by the evils of "Greek education". Epiphanius particularly objected to Origen's subordinationism, his "excessive" use of allegorical hermeneutic, and his habit of proposing ideas about the Bible "speculatively, as exercises" rather than "dogmatically".


title: Origen

text: Epiphanius asked John, the bishop of Jerusalem, to condemn Origen as a heretic. John refused on the grounds that a person could not be retroactively condemned as a heretic after that person had already died. In 393, a monk named Atarbius advanced a petition to have Origen and his writings censured. Tyrannius Rufinus, a priest at the monastery on the Mount of Olives who had been ordained by John of Jerusalem and was a longtime admirer of Origen, rejected the petition outright. Rufinus's close friend and associate Jerome, who had also studied Origen, however, came to agree with the petition. Around the same time, John Cassian, an Eastern monk, introduced Origen's teachings to the West.


title: Origen

text: In 394, Epiphanius wrote to John of Jerusalem, again asking for Origen to be condemned, insisting that Origen's writings denigrated human sexual reproduction and accusing him of having been an Encratite. John once again denied this request. By 395, Jerome had allied himself with the anti-Origenists and begged John of Jerusalem to condemn Origen, a plea which John once again refused. Epiphanius launched a campaign against John, openly preaching that John was an Origenist deviant. He successfully persuaded Jerome to break communion with John and ordained Jerome's brother Paulinianus as a priest in defiance of John's authority.


title: Origen

text: In 397, Rufinus published a Latin translation of Origen's "On First Principles". Rufinus was convinced that Origen's original treatise had been interpolated by heretics and that these interpolations were the source of the heterodox teachings found in it. He therefore heavily modified Origen's text, omitting and altering any parts which disagreed with contemporary Christian orthodoxy. In the introduction to this translation, Rufinus mentioned that Jerome had studied under Origen's disciple Didymus the Blind, implying that Jerome was a follower of Origen. Jerome was so incensed by this that he resolved to produce his own Latin translation of "On the First Principles", in which he promised to translate every word exactly as it was written and lay bare Origen's heresies to the whole world. Jerome's translation has been lost in its entirety.


title: Origen

text: In 399, the Origenist crisis reached Egypt. Pope Theophilus I of Alexandria was sympathetic to the supporters of Origen and the church historian, Sozomen, records that he had openly preached the Origenist teaching that God was incorporeal. In his "Festal Letter" of 399, he denounced those who believed that God had a literal, human-like body, calling them illiterate "simple ones". A large mob of Alexandrian monks who regarded God as anthropomorphic rioted in the streets. According to the church historian Socrates Scholasticus, in order to prevent a riot, Theophilus made a sudden about-face and began denouncing Origen. In 400, Theophilus summoned a council in Alexandria, which condemned Origen and all his followers as heretics for having taught that God was incorporeal, which they decreed contradicted the only true and orthodox position, which was that God had a literal, physical body resembling that of a human.


title: Origen

text: Theophilus labeled Origen as the "hydra of all heresies" and persuaded Pope Anastasius I to sign the letter of the council, which primarily denounced the teachings of the Nitrian monks associated with Evagrius Ponticus. In 402, Theophilus expelled Origenist monks from Egyptian monasteries and banished the four monks known as the "Tall Brothers", who were leaders of the Nitrian community. John Chrysostom, the patriarch of Constantinople, granted the Tall Brothers asylum, a fact which Theophilus used to orchestrate John's condemnation and removal from his position at the Synod of the Oak in July 403. Once John Chrysostom had been deposed, Theophilus restored normal relations with the Origenist monks in Egypt and the first Origenist crisis came to an end.


title: Origen

text: The Second Origenist Crisis occurred in the sixth century, during the height of Byzantine monasticism. Although the Second Origenist Crisis is not nearly as well documented as the first, it seems to have primarily concerned the teachings of Origen's later followers, rather than what Origen had written. Origen's disciple Evagrius Ponticus had advocated contemplative, noetic prayer, but other monastic communities prioritized asceticism in prayer, emphasizing fasting, labors, and vigils. Some Origenist monks in Palestine, referred to by their enemies as "Isochristoi" (meaning "those who would assume equality with Christ"), emphasized Origen's teaching of the pre-existence of souls and held that all souls were originally equal to Christ's and would become equal again at the end of time. Another faction of Origenists in the same region instead insisted that Christ was the "leader of many brethren", as the first-created being. This faction was more moderate, and they were referred to by their opponents as "Protoktistoi" ("first createds"). Both factions accused the other of heresy, and other Christians accused both of them of heresy.


title: Origen

text: The Protoktistoi appealed to the Emperor Justinian I to condemn the Isochristoi of heresy through Pelagius, the papal "apocrisarius". In 543, Pelagius presented Justinian with documents, including a letter denouncing Origen written by Patriarch Mennas of Constantinople, along with excerpts from Origen's "On First Principles" and several anathemata against Origen. A domestic synod convened to address the issue concluded that the Isochristoi's teachings were heretical and, seeing Origen as the ultimate culprit behind the heresy, denounced Origen as a heretic as well. Emperor Justinian ordered for all of Origen's writings to be burned. In the west, the "Decretum Gelasianum", which was written sometime between 519 and 553, listed Origen as an author whose writings were to be categorically banned.


title: Origen

text: In 553, during the early days of the Second Council of Constantinople (the Fifth Ecumenical Council), when Pope Vigilius was still refusing to take part in it despite Justinian holding him hostage, the bishops at the council ratified an open letter which condemned Origen as the leader of the Isochristoi. The letter was not part of the official acts of the council, and it more or less repeated the edict issued by the Synod of Constantinople in 543. It cites objectionable writings attributed to Origen, but all the writings referred to in it were actually written by Evagrius Ponticus. After the council officially opened, but while Pope Vigillius was still refusing to take part, Justinian presented the bishops with the problem of a text known as "The Three Chapters", which attacked the Antiochene Christology.


title: Origen

text: The bishops drew up a list of anathemata against the heretical teachings contained within "The Three Chapters" and those associated with them. In the official text of the eleventh anathema, Origen is condemned as a Christological heretic, but Origen's name does not appear at all in the "Homonoia", the first draft of the anathemata issued by the imperial chancery, nor does it appear in the version of the conciliar proceedings that was eventually signed by Pope Vigillius, a long time afterwards. These discrepancies may indicate that Origen's name may have been retrospectively inserted into the text after the council. Some authorities believe these anathemata belong to an earlier local synod. Even if Origen's name did appear in the original text of the anathema, the teachings attributed to Origen that are condemned in the anathema were actually the ideas of later Origenists, which had very little grounding in anything Origen had actually written. In fact, Popes Vigilius, Pelagius I, Pelagius II, and Gregory the Great were only aware that the Fifth Council specifically dealt with "The Three Chapters" and make no mention of Origenism or universalism, nor spoke as if they knew of its condemnation—even though Gregory the Great was opposed to universalism.


title: Origen

text: As a direct result of the numerous condemnations of his work, only a tiny fraction of Origen's voluminous writings have survived. Nonetheless, these writings still amount to a massive number of Greek and Latin texts, very few of which have yet been translated into English. Many more writings have survived in fragments through quotations from later Church Fathers. Even in the late 14th Century, Francesc Eiximenis in his Llibre de les dones, produced otherwise unknown quotations from Origen, which may be evidence of other works surviving into the Late Medieval period. It is likely that the writings containing Origen's most unusual and speculative ideas have been lost to time, making it nearly impossible to determine whether Origen actually held the heretical views which the anathemas against him ascribed to him. Nonetheless, in spite of the decrees against Origen, the church remained enamored of him and he remained a central figure of Christian theology throughout the first millennium. He continued to be revered as the founder of Biblical exegesis, and anyone in the first millennium who took the interpretation of the scriptures seriously would have had knowledge of Origen's teachings.


title: Origen

text: Jerome's Latin translations of Origen's homilies were widely read in western Europe throughout the Middle Ages, and Origen's teachings greatly influenced those of the Byzantine monk Maximus the Confessor and the Irish theologian John Scotus Eriugena. Since the Renaissance, the debate over Origen's orthodoxy has continued to rage. Basilios Bessarion, a Greek refugee who fled to Italy after the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, produced a Latin translation of Origen's "Contra Celsum", which was printed in 1481. Major controversy erupted in 1487, after the Italian humanist scholar Giovanni Pico della Mirandola issued a thesis arguing that "it is more reasonable to believe that Origen was saved than he was damned." A papal commission condemned Pico's position on account of the anathemas against Origen, but not until after the debate had received considerable attention.


title: Origen

text: The most prominent advocate of Origen during the Renaissance was the Dutch humanist scholar Desiderius Erasmus, who regarded Origen as the greatest of all Christian authors and wrote in a letter to John Eck that he learned more about Christian philosophy from a single page of Origen than from ten pages of Augustine. Erasmus especially admired Origen for his lack of rhetorical flourishes, which were so common in the writings of other Patristic authors. Erasmus borrowed heavily from Origen's defense of free will in "On First Principles" in his 1524 treatise "On Free Will", now considered his most important theological work. In 1527, Erasmus translated and published the portion of Origen's "Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew" that survived only in Greek and in 1536, he published the most complete edition of Origen's writings that had ever been published at that time. While Origen's emphasis on the human effort in attaining salvation appealed to the Renaissance humanists, it made him far less appealing to the proponents of the Reformation. Martin Luther deplored Origen's understanding of salvation as irredeemably defective and declared "in all of Origen there is not one word about Christ." Consequently, he ordered for Origen's writings to be banned. Nonetheless, the earlier Czech reformer Jan Hus had taken inspiration from Origen for his view that the church is a spiritual reality rather than an official hierarchy, and Luther's contemporary, the Swiss reformer Huldrych Zwingli, took inspiration from Origen for his interpretation of the Eucharist as symbolic.


title: Origen

text: In the seventeenth century, the English Cambridge Platonist Henry More was a devoted Origenist, and although he did reject the notion of universal salvation, he accepted most of Origen's other teachings. Pope Benedict XVI expressed admiration for Origen, describing him in a sermon as part of a series on the Church Fathers as "a figure crucial to the whole development of Christian thought", "a true 'maestro'", and "not only a brilliant theologian but also an exemplary witness of the doctrine he passed on". He concludes the sermon by inviting his audience to "welcome into your hearts the teaching of this great master of the faith". Modern Protestant evangelicals admire Origen for his passionate devotion to the scriptures but are frequently baffled or even appalled by his allegorical interpretation of them, which many believe ignores the literal, historical truth behind them.


title: Origen

text: Origen is often noted for being one of the few Church Fathers who is not generally regarded as a saint. Nevertheless, there are notable individuals who referred to Origen as St. Origen. This includes Anglicans such as Edward Welchman, John Howson; and Sir Winston Churchill.; Calvinists such as Pierre Bayle, Georges-Louis Liomin and Heinrich Bullinger; Oriental Orthodox such as Pope Shenouda III of Alexandria, Fr. Tadros Yakoup Malaty and the Coptic Orthodox Diocese of the Southern United States. The Evangelical Church in Germany celebrates April 27 as Origen's feast day.


title: Cumans

text: The Cumans (or Kumans), also known as Polovtsians or Polovtsy (plural only, from the Russian exonym ), were a Turkic nomadic people comprising the western branch of the Cuman–Kipchak confederation. After the Mongol invasion (1237), many sought asylum in the Kingdom of Hungary, as many Cumans had settled in Hungary, the Second Bulgarian Empire playing an important role in the development of the state. Cumans played also an important role in (The Byzantine Empire, the Latin Empire, and the Nicaea Empire) Anatolia .


title: Cumans

text: Related to the Pecheneg, they inhabited a shifting area north of the Black Sea and along the Volga River known as Cumania, from which the Cuman–Kipchaks meddled in the politics of the Caucasus and the Khwarazmian Empire. The Cumans were fierce and formidable nomadic warriors of the Eurasian Steppe who exerted an enduring influence on the medieval Balkans. They were numerous, culturally sophisticated, and militarily powerful.


title: Cumans

text: Many eventually settled west of the Black Sea, influencing the politics of Kievan Rus', the Galicia–Volhynia Principality, the Golden Horde Khanate, the Second Bulgarian Empire, the Kingdom of Serbia, the Kingdom of Hungary, Moldavia, the Kingdom of Georgia, the Byzantine Empire, the Empire of Nicaea, the Latin Empire and Wallachia, with Cuman immigrants becoming integrated into each country's elite. The Cumans also played a prominent role in the Fourth Crusade and in the creation of the Second Bulgarian Empire. Cuman and Kipchak tribes joined politically to create the Cuman–Kipchak confederation.


title: Cumans

text: The Cuman language is attested in some medieval documents and is the best-known of the early Turkic languages. The "Codex Cumanicus" was a linguistic manual written to help Catholic missionaries communicate with the Cuman people.


title: Cumans

text: "Cuman" appears in ancient Roman texts as the name of a fortress or gate. The Roman natural philosopher Pliny the Elder (who lived in the 1st century AD), mentions "a fortress, the name of which is Cumania, erected for the purpose of preventing the passage of the innumerable tribes that lay beyond" while describing the "Gates of Caucasus" (Derbent, or Darial Gorge). The Greek philosopher Strabo (died 24 AD) refers to the Darial Gorge (also known as the Iberian Gates or the Caucasian Gates) as "Porta Caucasica" and "Porta Cumana".


title: Cumans

text: The original meaning of the endonym Cuman is unknown. It is also often unclear whether a particular name refers to the Cumans alone, or to both the Cumans and the Kipchaks, as the two tribes often lived side by side.


title: Cumans

text: Most other Turkish-speaking people (as well as most Muslim sources) called the Cumans some variant of "Qipchaqs", while Armenians called them "Xartesk'ns". Qumans were primarily used by Byzantine authors (and a few Arab sources), while the name used in Rus' tended to be "Polovtsian".


title: Cumans

text: In Turkic languages "qu", "qun", "qūn", "quman" or "qoman" means "pale, sallow, cream coloured", "pale yellow", or "yellowish grey". While it is normally assumed that the name referred to the Cumans' hair, Imre Baski – a prominent Turkologist – has suggested that it may have other origins, including:


title: Cumans

text: Observing that the Hungarian exonym for Cumans – i.e. "Kun", "Kunok" – appeared as "Cunus", "Cuni" in the chronicles and was applied to earlier nomads such as Pechenegs or Oghuzes, György Györffy derived Kun from Huns, instead of "Qun", which he kept separate from "Kun". However, István Vásáry rejected Györffy's hypothesis and contended that "the Hungarian name of the Cumans must go back to one of their self-appellations, i.e. to "Qun".


title: Cumans

text: Even after the Cumans were no longer the dominant power in their territory, people still referred to the area as Cumania. The Moroccan traveler, Ibn Battuta said of Cumania: "This wilderness is green and grassy with no trees, nor hills, high or low ... there is no means of travelling in this desert except in wagons." The Persian historian, Hamdallah Mustawfi (1281–1349), wrote that Cumania has a cold climate and that it has excellent pasturage and numerous cattle and horses. The 14th-century "Travels" of Sir John Mandeville, note that Cumania


title: Cumans

text: In East Slavic languages and Polish, they are known as the , derived from the Slavic root "*polvъ" "pale; light yellow; blonde". "Polovtsy" or "Polovec" is often said to be derived from the Old East Slavic "polovŭ" (половъ) "yellow; pale" by the Russians – all meaning "blond". The old Ukrainian word "polovtsy" (Пóловці), derived from "polovo" "straw" – means "blond, pale yellow". The western Cumans, or Polovtsy, were also called "Sorochinetses" by the Rus', – apparently derived from the Turkic "sary chechle" "yellow-haired". A similar etymology may have been at work in the name of the "Śārī", who also migrated westward ahead of the Qun. However, according to O. Suleymenov "polovtsy" may come from a Slavic word for "blue-eyed", i.e. the Serbo-Croatian "plȃv" (пла̑в) means "blue", but this word also means "fair, blonde" and is in fact a cognate of the above; cf. Eastern Slavic "polovŭ", Russian "polóvyj" (поло́вый), Ukrainian "polovýj" (полови́й). Blonde individuals likely existed among the Kipchaks, yet anthropologically speaking the majority of Turkic peoples had East Asian admixture and generally Kimeks–Kipchaks were dark-haired and brown-eyed. An alternative etymology of is also possible: the Slavic root "*pȍlje" "field" (cf. Russian "póle"), which would therefore imply that were "men of the field" or "men of the steppe" in contrast to the Lipovtsi.


title: Cumans

text: In Germanic languages, the Cumans were called "Folban", "Vallani" or "Valwe" – all derivatives of Proto-Germanic root *"falwa-" meaning "pale" (> English "fallow"). In the German account by Adam of Bremen, and in Matthaios of Edessa, the Cumans were referred to as the "Blond Ones".


title: Cumans

text: As stated above, it is unknown whether the name Kipchak referred only to the Kipchaks proper, or to the Cumans as well. The two tribes eventually fused, lived together and probably exchanged weaponry, culture and languages; the Cumans encompassed the western half of the confederation, while the Kipchaks and (presumably) the Kangli/Kankalis (possibly connected to three Pecheneg tribes known collectively as Kangars) encompassed the eastern half. This confederation and their living together may have made it difficult for historians to write exclusively about either nation.


title: Cumans

text: The Kipchaks' folk-etymology posited that their name meant 'hollow tree'; according to them, inside a hollow tree, their original human ancestress gave birth to her son. Németh points to the Siberian "qıpčaq" "angry, quick-tempered" attested only in the Siberian Sağay dialect. Klyashtorny links Kipchak to "qovï", "qovuq" "unfortunate, unlucky"; yet Golden sees a better match in "qïv" "good fortune" and adjectival suffix "-čāq". Regardless, Golden notes that the ethnonym's original form and etymology "remain a matter of contention and speculation".


title: Cumans

text: Kievan Rus', Mamluk, Hungarian, and Chinese sources preserved the names of many Cuman-Kupchak tribal groupings: Altun-oba, Arslan-opa, Ay-opa, Badač, Barat ~ Beret ~ Baraq, Baya(w)ut, Burčoğli (R. Burchebichi; Hg. Borcsol), B.zângî ~ B.zânrî (< ? *Buranlï "stormy"), Čağraq ~ Čoğraq ~ Čağraq, Čenegrepa (< Mong. "čengkir" "light blue, bluish"), Čitey(oğlï) (R. Chitѣyebichi), Čirtan ~ (*Ozur) Čortan (Hg. Csertan), Dorut ~ Dörüt ~ Dört, Enčoğlï ~ İlančuglï (Hg. Iloncsuk), İt-oba, Qitan-opa, Knn (?) (either corrupted from Köten, R. Kotianъ, Hg. Kötöny; or from Turkic tribal name Keyit, meaning "to irritate, to annoy"), Küčeba ~ Küčcöba (R. Kouchebichi), Küčet, Kor ~ Qor (H. Kór), Qara Börklü, Qay-opa (R. Kaepiči), Qol-oba ~ Qul-oba (R. Kolobichi ~ Kulobichi), Qmngû/Qumanlu, Qonğuroğlı (H. Kongur), Mekrüti ~ Bekrüti ~ Bekürte, Mingüzoğlı, Orunqu(t) (from Mong. oroŋğu "small, brown-colored gazelle"), Ölberli(ğ) ~ Ölperli(ğ) (Ar. al-b.rlū ~ al-b.rlī, R. Olperliu(ie)ve, Olbѣry, Olьbery, Ch. Yuliboli (玉里伯里), Lt. reges Uilperitorum, from Mg. ölöbür "ill, infirm" or Tk. *alp-erlü), Ören ~ Uran, Pečeneg, Shanmie gumali (苫滅古麻里), Tarğïl (R. Targolove), Tarew (R. Tarьevskyi), Terter ~ Teriter-oba (R. Terьterobichi), Toqsoba (R. Toksobichi), Tğ Yšqût (*Tağ Bašqurt?), Ulašoğlï (R. Ulashebichi; Hg. Olás), Urus-oba (R. Ourusoba; from endonym *"Aoruša" of Turkicized Alans, compare Greek: Αορσοι), Yimek ~ Yemek (R. Polovtsi Yemiakove), Yete-oba (R. Yetebichi), Yuğur, Moguty, Tatrany, Revugy, Shelьbiry, Topchaki (whom, Baskakov thought, belonged to the Chorni Klobuky), Elьborili, Kotan, etc.


title: Cumans

text: Seven of these – Toqsoba (meaning either "plump leather bottle" or "nine clans", compare Toquz Oghuz "nine tribes"), Borcsol ("Pepper Sons"), Csertan ("pike"), Olás ("union, federation"), Kór ~ Kól ("little, few"), Iloncsuk ("little snake"), and Koncsog ("leather trouser") – eventually settled in Hungary.


title: Cumans

text: The original homeland of the Cumans is unknown before their eventual settlement in the Eurasian steppe's western part.


title: Cumans

text: Chinese authors mentioned a Tiele tribe named 渾 (Mand. "Hún" (< MC *"ɦuon"), possibly a transcription of underlying *"Qun") located north of the Tuul River. The writings of al-Marwazi (c. 1120) state that a Turkic "Qun" people came from the northern Chinese borders – "the land of Qitay" (possibly during a part of a migration from further east). After leaving the lands of the Khitans (possibly due to the Khitans' expansion), the Qun entered the territory of the Šari people, whom the Quns expelled. Marwazi wrote that the Qun were Nestorian Christians. Golden surmised that these Quns might have sprung "from that same conglomeration of Mongolic peoples from which the Qitañ sprang"; however, Golden later suggested that the Quns were Turkic. Despite this, it is possible that certain tribes forming a part of the Cuman-Kipchak conglomerate were of Mongolic origin. Golden considers the Ölberli to have originally been Mongolic-speaking and argues that they were pushed westwards as a result of socio-political changes among the Khitans. The Syrian historian Yaqut (1179–1229) also mentions the Qun in "The Dictionary of Countries", where he notes that "(the sixth iqlim) begins where the meridian shadow of the equinox is seven, six-tenths, and one-sixth of one-tenth of a foot. Its end exceeds its beginning by only one foot. It begins in the homeland of the Qayi, Qun, Khirkhiz, Kimak, at-Tagazgaz, the lands of the Turkomans, Fārāb, and the country of the Khazars." The Armenian historian, Matthew of Edessa (died 1144), also mentioned the Cumans, using the name "χarteš", meaning "blond", "pale", "fair".


title: Cumans

text: It cannot be established whether the Cumans conquered the Kipchaks, if the Śari whom the Quns had defeated were to be identified as Kipchaks, or whether they simply represent the western mass of largely Kipchak-Turkic speaking tribes. The Quns and Śari (whom Czeglédy (1949:47-48,50) identifies with Yellow Uyghurs) were possibly induced into the Kimek union or took over said union and absorbed the Kimek. As a result, the Kipchaks presumably replaced the Kimeks as the union's dominant group, while the Quns gained ascendancy over the westernmost tribes and became Quman (though difficulties remain with the Qun-Cuman link and how Qun became Cuman, e.g. "qun" + "man" "the real Quns"? > *"qumman" > "quman"?). Kimeks were still represented amongst the Cuman–Kipchaks as Yimek ~ Yemek.


title: Cumans

text: The Cumans entered the grasslands of the present-day southern Russian steppe in the 11th century AD and went on to assault the Byzantine Empire, the Kingdom of Hungary, the Principality of Pereyaslavl and Kievan Rus'. The Cumans' entry into the area pressed the Oghuz Turks to shift west, which in turn caused the Pechenegs to move to the west of the Dnieper River. Cuman and Rus' attacks contributed to the departure of the Oghuz from the steppes north of the Black Sea. Mahmud al-Kashgari, writing in 1076, says that in the east Cuman territory bordered a town near Talas. The Cumans first entered the Bugeac (Bessarabia) at some point around 1068–1078. They launched a joint expedition with the Pechenegs against Adrianople in 1078. During that same year the Cumans were also fighting the Rus'. The Russian "Primary Chronicle" mentions Yemek Cumans who were active in the region of Volga Bulgaria.


title: Cumans

text: The vast territory of the Cuman–Kipchak realm consisted of loosely connected tribal units that represented a dominant military force but were never politically united by a strong central power; the khans acted on their own initiative. The Cuman–Kipchaks never established a state, instead forming a Cuman–Kipchak confederation (Cumania/Desht-i Qipchaq/Zemlja Poloveckaja (Polovcian Land)/Pole Poloveckoe (Polovcian Plain)), which stretched from the Danube in the west to Taraz, Kazakhstan in the east. This was possibly due to their facing no prolonged threat before the Mongol invasion, and it may have either prolonged their existence or quickened their destruction. Robert Wolff states that it was discipline and cohesion that permitted the Cuman–Kipchaks to conquer such a vast territory. Al-Idrīsī states that Cumania got its name from the city of Cumania; he wrote, "From the city of Khazaria to the city of Kirait is 25 miles. From there to Cumanie, which has given its name to the Cumans, it is 25 miles; this city is called Black Cumania. From the city of Black Cumania to the city of Tmutorakan (MaTlUqa), which is called White Cumania, it is 50 miles. White Cumania is a large inhabited city ... Indeed, in this fifth part of the seventh section there is the northern part of the land of Russia and the northern part of the land of Cumania ... In this sixth part there is a description of the land of Inner Cumania and parts of the land of Bulgaria."


title: Cumans

text: According to the 12th-century Jewish traveler Petachiah of Regensburg "they have no king, only princes and royal families".


title: Cumans

text: Cumans interacted with the Rus' principalities, Bulgaria, the Byzantine Empire, and the Wallachian states in the Balkans; with Armenia and the Kingdom of Georgia (see Kipchaks in Georgia) in the Caucasus; and with the Khwarezm Empire in Central Asia. The Cumans-Kipchaks constituted an important element and were closely associated with the Khwarazmian royal house via marital alliances. The Cumans were also active in commerce with traders from Central Asia to Venice. The Cumans had a commercial interest in Crimea, where they also took tribute from Crimean cities. A major area of commerce was the ancient city of Sudak, which Ibn al-Air viewed as the "city of the Qifjaq from which (flow) their material possessions. It is on the Khazar Sea. Ships come to it bearing clothes. The Qifjiqs buy from them and sell them slaves. Burtas furs, beaver, squirrels..." Due to their political dominance, the Cuman language became Crimea's "lingua franca". Thus the language was adopted by the Karaite Jewish and Crimean Armenian communities (who produced many documents written in Kipchak with the Armenian alphabet), where it was preserved for centuries up to the modern day.


title: Cumans

text: The Cumans first encountered the Rus' in 1055, when they advanced towards the Rus' Pereyaslavl principality, but Prince Vsevolod reached an agreement with them thus avoiding a military confrontation. In 1061, however, the Cumans, under the chieftain Sokal, invaded and devastated the Pereyaslavl principality; this began a war that would go on for 175 years. In 1068 at the Battle of the Alta River, the Cumans defeated the armies of the three sons of Yaroslav the Wise, Grand Prince Iziaslav I of Kiev, Prince Sviatoslav of Chernigov, and Prince Vsevolod of Pereyaslavl. After the Cuman victory, they repeatedly invaded Kievan Rus', devastating the land and taking captives, who became either their slaves or were sold at markets in the south. The most vulnerable regions were the Principality of Pereyaslavl, the Principality of Novgorod-Seversk and the Principality of Chernigov.


title: Cumans

text: The Cumans initially managed to defeat the Grand Prince Vladimir II Monomakh of Kievan Rus' in 1093 at the Battle of the Stugna River, but they were defeated later by the combined forces of Rus principalities led by Monomakh and were forced out of the Rus' borders to the Caucasus. In these battles some Pecheneg and Oghuz groups were liberated from the Cumans and incorporated into the Rus' border-guard system. Khan Boniak launched invasions on Kiev in 1096, 1097, 1105, and 1107. In 1096, Boniak attacked Kiev and burned down the princely palace in Berestove; he also plundered the Kievan Cave Monastery. Boniak was defeated near Lubny in 1107 by the forces of the Kievan Rus' princes. The Cumans led by Boniak crushed the Hungarian army led by Coloman in 1099 and seized the royal treasury. In 1109, Monomakh launched another raid against the Cumans and captured "1000 tents". In 1111, 1113, and 1116, further raids were launched against the Cumans and resulted in the liberation and incorporation of more Pecheneg and Oghuz tribes.


title: Cumans

text: During this time, the Cumans raided the Byzantine Empire and Volga Bulgaria. Volga Bulgaria was attacked again at a later stage, by Khan Ayepa, father-in-law of Grand Prince of Kiev Yuri Dolgorukiy, perhaps at his instigation. The Volga Bulgars in turn poisoned Ayepa "and the other princes; all of them died." In 1089, Ladislaus I of Hungary defeated the Cumans after they attacked the Kingdom of Hungary. In 1091, the Pechenegs, a semi-nomadic Turkic people of the prairies of southwestern Eurasia, were decisively defeated as an independent force at the Battle of Levounion by the combined forces of a Byzantine army under Emperor Alexios I Komnenos and a Cuman army under Togortok/Tugorkan and Boniak. Attacked again in 1094 by the Cumans, many Pechenegs were again slain. Some of the Pechenegs fled to Hungary, as the Cumans themselves would do a few decades later. In 1091/1092 the Cumans, under Kopulch, raided Transylvania and Hungary, moving to Bihor and getting as far as the Tisza and Timiș rivers. Loaded with goods and prisoners they then split into three groups, after which they were attacked and defeated by King Ladislaus I.


title: Cumans

text: In 1092, the Cumans resumed their raids against the Rus' and also attacked the Kingdom of Poland: and reportedly reached northern cities located in Lithuania. In 1094-1095 the Cumans, led by Tugorkan, in support of the exiled Byzantine pretender Constantine Diogenes (as a pretext to plundering), invaded the Balkans and conquered the Byzantine province of Paristrion. The Cumans then advanced all the way to Adrianople and Anchialos but could not conquer them. In the following years, when knights of the First Crusade were passing through the empire, Byzantium offered the Cumans prestige titles and gifts in order to appease them; subsequently good relations ensued. From 1097-1099, Sviatopolk II of Kiev requested help from the Cumans against Coloman, King of Hungary, who was involved in a feud with Volodar of Peremyshl, Prince of Przemyśl. King Coloman and his army crossed the Carpathian Mountains and laid siege on Przemyśl, which prompted David Igorevich, an ally of Volodar Rostislavich, to persuade the Cumans, under Khan Boniak and Altunopa, to attack the Hungarians. The Hungarian army was soundly crushed by the Cumans; the "Illuminated Chronicle" mentions that "rarely did Hungarians suffer such slaughter as in this battle." In 1104 the Cumans were allied with Prince Volodar. In 1106, the Cumans advanced into the Principality of Volhynia, but were repelled by Sviatopolk II. In 1114, the Cumans launched an invasion, from the western Romanian Plain, into the Byzantine Balkans once more. This was followed up by another incursion in 1123/1124. In 1135, the Cumans again invaded the Kingdom of Poland. During the second and third crusades, in 1147 and 1189, crusaders were attacked by Cumans, who were allied to the Asen dynasty of the Second Bulgarian Empire, or who were in Byzantine service. Cumans at that time also resettled in the Kingdom of Georgia and were Christianized. There they achieved prominent positions, helped Georgians to stop the advance of Seljuk Turks, and helped make Georgia the most powerful kingdom of the region (they were referred to as naqivchaqari). After the death of the warlike Monomakh in 1125, Cumans returned to the steppe along the Rus' borders. Fighting resumed in 1128; Rus' sources mention that Sevinch, son of Khan Boniak, expressed the desire to plant his sword "in the Golden gate of Kiev", as his father had done before him.


title: Cumans

text: On 20 March 1155, Prince Gleb Yuryevich took Kiev with the help of a Cuman army under the Cuman prince Chemgura. By 1160 Cuman raids into Rus' had become an annual event. These attacks put pressure on Rus' and affected trade routes to the Black Sea and Constantinople, in turn leading Rus' to again attempt action. Offenses were halted during 1166–1169, when Grand prince Andrey Bogolyubsky, son of Khan Ayepa's daughter, took control of Kiev in 1169 and installed Gleb as his puppet. Gleb brought in "wild" Cumans as well as Oghuz and Berendei units. Later, the princes of the Principality of Chernigov attempted to use Khan Konchek's army against Kievan Rus' and Suzdal. This Chernigov-Cuman alliance suffered a disastrous defeat in 1180; Elrut, Konchek's brother died in battle. In 1177, a Cuman army that was allied with Ryazan sacked six cities that belonged to the Berendei and Torkil. In 1183, the Rus' defeated a large Cuman army and captured Khan Kobiak (Kobek) as well as his sons and other notables.


title: Cumans

text: Subsequently, Khan Konchek concluded negotiations. Like his son Khan Köten, preceding the Mongol invasion, Khan Konchek was successful in creating a more cohesive force out of the many Cuman groups – he united the western and eastern Cuman–Kipchak tribes. Khan Konchek also changed the old Cuman system of government whereby rulership went to the most senior tribal leader; he instead passed it on to his son Koten. Igor Svyatoslavich, prince of the Principality of Novgorod-Seversk, attacked the Cumans in the vicinity of the Kayala river in 1185 but was defeated; this battle was immortalized in the Rus' epic poem The Tale of Igor's Campaign, and Alexander Borodin's opera, "Prince Igor". The dynamic pattern of attacks and counterattacks between the Rus' and the Cumans indicates that both rarely, if ever, were able to attain the unity needed to deal a fatal blow. The Cuman attacks on the Rus' often had Caucasian and Danubian European implications.


title: Cumans

text: In the Balkans, the Cumans were in contact with all the statal entities. They fought with the Kingdom of Hungary, allied with the Bulgarians of the Second Bulgarian Empire (they were the empire's most effective military component) and with the Vlachs against the Byzantine Empire. A variant of the oldest Turkic chronicle, Oghuzname (The Oghuz Khan's Tale), mentions the Cumans fighting the Magyars, Rus', Romanians (Ulak), and Bashkirs, who had refused to submit to their authority.


title: Cumans

text: In alliance with the Bulgarians and Vlachs, the Cumans are believed to have played a significant role in the uprising led by brothers Asen and Peter of Tarnovo, resulting in victory over Byzantium and the restoration of Bulgaria's independence in 1185. István Vásáry states that without the active participation of the Cumans, the Vlakho-Bulgarian rebels could never have gained the upper hand over the Byzantines, and ultimately without the military support of the Cumans, the process of Bulgarian restoration could never have been realised. The Cuman participation in the creation of the Second Bulgarian Empire in 1185 and thereafter brought about basic changes in the political and ethnic sphere of Bulgaria and the Balkans. The Cumans were allies in the Bulgarian–Latin Wars with emperor Kaloyan of Bulgaria. In 1205, at the Battle of Adrianople (1205), 14,000 Cuman light cavalry contributed to Kaloyan's crushing victory over the Latin Crusaders. Cuman troops continued to be hired throughout the 13th and 14th century by both the Bulgarians and Byzantines.


title: Cumans

text: The Cumans who remained east and south of the Carpathian Mountains established a county named Cumania, which was a strong military base in an area consisting of parts of Moldavia and Wallachia. The Hungarian kings claimed supremacy over Cumania – among the nine titles of the Hungarian kings of the Árpád and Anjou dynasties were "rex Cumaniae" – but few, if any, Cuman leaders recognized their overlordship, pointing to the fact that "rex Cumaniae" was an allegory title since the kings never fulfilled that role.


title: Cumans

text: Like most other peoples of medieval Eastern Europe, the Cumans put up a resistance against the relentlessly advancing Mongols led by Jebe and Subutai. The Mongols crossed the Caucasus mountains in pursuit of Muhammad II, the shah of the Khwarezmid Empire, and met and defeated the Cumans in Subcaucasia in 1220. The Cuman khans Danylo Kobiakovych and Yurii Konchakovych died in battle, while the other Cumans, commanded by Khan Köten, managed to get aid from the Rus' princes.


title: Cumans

text: As the Mongols were approaching Russia, Khan Köten fled to the court of his son-in-law, Prince Mstislav the Bold of Galich, where he gave "numerous presents: horses, camels, buffaloes and girls. And he presented these gifts to them, and said the following, 'Today the Mongols took away our land and tomorrow they will come and take away yours'." The Cumans were ignored for almost a year, however, as the Rus' had suffered from their raids for decades. But when news reached Kiev that the Mongols were marching along the Dniester River, the Rus' responded. Mstislav of Galich then arranged a council of war in Kiev, which was attended by Mstislav Romanovich, Prince Yuri II of Vladimir-Suzdal and Mstislav Svyatoslavich of Chernigov. The princes promised support to Khan Koten's Cumans and an alliance between the Rus' and Cumans was formed. It was decided that the Rus' and Cumans would move east to seek and destroy any Mongols they found. The Rus' princes then began mustering their armies and moved towards the rendezvous point. The army of the alliance of the Rus' and Cumans numbered around 80,000. When the alliance reached Pereyaslavl, they were met by a Mongol envoy that tried to persuade them not to fight. This as well as a second attempt by the Mongols failed; the alliance then crossed the Dnieper River and marched eastward for nine days pursuing a small Mongol contingent, unknowingly being led by a false retreat. The battle took place near the Kalka River in 1223. Due to confusion and mistakes, and the superb military tactics and fighting-qualities of the Mongols, the Rus' and Cumans were defeated. In the chaos the Cumans managed to retreat, but the Rus' failed to regroup and were crushed. The Cumans were allied at Kalka River with Wallach warriors named Brodnics, led by Ploscanea. Brodnics' territory was in the lower parts of the Prut river in modern Romania and Moldova. During the second Mongol invasion of Eastern Europe in 1237–1240 the Cumans were defeated again; at this time groups of Cumans went to live with the Volga Bulgars, who had not been attacked yet.


title: Cumans

text: Istvan Vassary states that after the Mongol conquest, "A large-scale westward migration of the Cumans began." Certain Cumans also moved to Anatolia, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. In the summer of 1237 the first wave of this Cuman exodus appeared in Bulgaria. The Cumans crossed the Danube, and this time Tsar Ivan Asen II could not tame them, as he had often been able to do earlier; the only possibility left for him was to let them march through Bulgaria in a southerly direction. They proceeded through Thrace as far as Hadrianoupolis and Didymotoichon, plundering and pillaging the towns and the countryside, just as before. The whole of Thrace became, as Akropolites put it, a "Scythian desert."


title: Cumans

text: A direct attack on Cumania came only in 1238–1239, and encountered serious resistance by various Cuman khans. The final blow came in 1241, when Cuman control over the Pontic steppes ended and the Cuman–Kipchak confederation ceased to exist as a political entity, with the remaining Cuman tribes being dispersed, either becoming subjects and mixing with their Mongol conquerors, as part of what was to be known as the Golden Horde (Kipchak Khanate) and Nogai Horde, or fleeing to the west, to the Byzantine Empire, the Second Bulgarian Empire, and the Kingdom of Hungary, where they integrated into the elite and became kings and nobles with many privileges. Other Cuman captives were sold as slaves, who would go on to become Mamluks in Egypt, who would attain the rank of Sultan or hold regional power as emirs or beys. Some of these Mamluks led by Sultan Baibars would fight the Mongols again, defeating them at the Battle of Ain Jalut and the Battle of Elbistan.


title: Cumans

text: A group of Cumans under two leaders named and Saronius, the former of whom was higher in rank, entered the Latin Empire of Constantinople as allies about 1240, probably fleeing the Mongols. The name Saronius (found in Alberic of Trois-Fontaines, who calls the leaders kings) is probably a corruption of the Cuman name Sïčgan, meaning "mouse". They assisted the Emperor Baldwin II in the capture of Tzurullon from the Nicaeans in that year. The following year the Christian daughters of Saronius married two of the leading noblemen of the empire, Baldwin of Hainaut and William of Meri, while Jonas's daughter married Narjot III de Toucy, who had once served as regent of the empire in Baldwin's absence. When Narjot died in 1241, his wife became a nun. Jonas died that same year and was buried in a tumulus outside Constantinople in a pagan ceremony. According to Aubrey, eight volunteer warriors and twenty-six horses were sacrificed at the funeral.


title: Cumans

text: King Andrew II of Hungary granted the Burzenland region to the Teutonic Knights in 1211, with the purpose of ensuring security of the southeastern borders of his kingdom against the Cumans. The Teutonic Knights campaigned against the Cumans, on behalf of King Andrew, during the years of 1221–1225. However, the Teutonic Knights failed to defeat the Cumans and began to establish a country independent of the King of Hungary. In 1238, after Mongol attacks on Cumania, King Béla IV of Hungary offered refuge to the remainder of the Cuman people under their leader Khan Köten, who in turn vowed to convert his 40,000 families to Christianity. King Béla hoped to use the new subjects as auxiliary troops against the Mongols, who were already threatening Hungary. The Cumans were joined by the Iranian Jasz people, who had been living with the Cumans. Batu Khan of the Mongols then ordered Bela to stop giving refuge to the Cumans and made a particular point that if attacked the Cumans could easily run away, for they were skilled horseman, but not so for the Hungarians, who were a sedentary nation and had no such luxury. Bela rejected this ultimatum.


title: Cumans

text: Around December 1240, news came that the Mongols were advancing towards Hungary. King Bela then installed front line defenses at the Carpathian Mountains, after which he returned to Buda and called a council of war and ordered unity against the Mongols. The opposite happened, however, as many of the barons were hostile towards the Cumans. The Hungarian barons noted that there were Cumans in the Mongol armies, but they didn't realize that this was because they were conscripted into it and had no say in the matter. In particular the barons didn't trust Köten, despite the fact that the Mongols had attacked his people for nearly 20 years. This chaos pushed Bela into a corner; feeling he needed to show his strength and keep the rebellious barons on his side, he ordered Köten to be placed under house arrest. This did not placate the barons and had an opposite effect of erroneously seeming to admit that the King harboured doubts about Köten, too. This angered the Cumans, who were far from happy about the actions taken against them, and who had done nothing to invite such actions and hated the Mongols. News arrived on 10 March that the Mongols had attacked the Hungarian defenses at the Carpathian passes. This prompted Bela to send a letter to Duke Frederick of Austria asking for help. Frederick had previously wanted Bela's throne, but Bela responded by amassing a vast army and marching to the gates of Vienna, which forced Frederick to step back. On 14 March, news had arrived that the Carpathian defense forces were defeated by the Mongols. Ironically, given the suspicion of the Cumans, they were the only ones who seemed willing to fight the Mongols, the memory of the fate that had befallen them on the steppes still being fresh in their minds. By this time Bela had lost control of his army and many towns were destroyed. Soon thereafter Frederick arrived, and, wishing to harm the country's defense (in revenge to Bela), he stirred up further feelings against the Cumans.