Book Review: Origen. The Bible and Philosophy in the Third-Century Church. By Joseph W. Trigg, John Knox Press, Atlanta, 1983, 300 pages; SCM Press, London, 1985, 300 pages. £9.50
Abstract
Book ReviewOrigen. The Bible and Philosophy in the Third-Century Church. By Joseph W. Trigg, John Knox Press, Atlanta, 1983, 300 pages; SCM Press, London, 1985, 300 pages. £9.50 SAGE Publications, Inc.1986DOI: 10.1177/002114008605200112 ThomasMacCarthy O.P. On page one of his large-scale study, The Christian Tradition, Jaroslav Pelikan remarks that "The Church is always more than a school; ... But the Church cannot be less than a school." Origen was happy to be a part of this Academy . of God, teaching the faith with skill and generosity; teaching, but learning, too, learning above all from the Scriptures of Judaism and of the New Testament. More than a couple of recent patristic studies have contributed to a reexamina- tion of "accepted" conclusions about the early Church: our author has now opened up the treasures of Origen's thought to the general, English-reading public with this fine study. And the conclusions reached by Jerome and Justinian about Origen sound somehow less comfortable and convincing than before the publications of their work by Dani6lou, Nautin, Crouzel - and Trigg. Origen was, we said, primarily a teacher, both at Alexandria and later at Caesarea. Trigg comprehensively covers the path of his life, through the