Their heresy is recognized as similar to the heresy of Epiphanes, of which I have spoken above, in the exposition of the Gnostic heresies. They accept the various writings of the New and Old Testaments, reject marriage, and know no bounds in voluptuousness. Some said that this heresy was born in Rome and in Africa. They defile their body, mind, and soul with debauchery. Some of them look like monastics, and the women who live with them look like nuns. Their body is emaciated: satisfying their lust, they, I will express myself more modestly, do the work of the son of Judah, whose name is Abnanas (Gen. 38:9). For just as he, when his body touched Tamar and satisfied his lusts, did not do what was proper for procreation, according to the way of child-making given by God, but committed a sin against himself in the very way of evil action: so they also make use of imaginary wives, committing this unlawful deed. For them, the object of competition is not innocence, but hypocritical purity, which bears one name. They take care that a woman does not become pregnant through corruption, or that children do not multiply in the world, or that they are not caught by people; they want to be honored for this feat of chastity, which is revered among them, and yet this is what they do. Others prefer to do this most shameful deed not through the mediation of a woman, but in other ways, defiling themselves with their own hands. And in this they imitate the aforesaid son of Judah, defiling the earth with their transgressions and abominable drops, and with their feet grinding their effluents upon the earth, lest their seed should be taken away by unclean flies, to be conceived and begotten by demons.

Hl. 2. They, as I have already said, make use of various writings of the Old and New Testaments, and some apocryphal books, especially those which are called the Acts of Andrew and others. They have even often boasted that they do this openly, while they accuse those who belong to the Church who have lovers, so called cohabiting wives (τὰς συνεισὰκτους), — they accuse that they also do this secretly, being ashamed of people, so that they associate with iniquity, and outwardly, in order to avoid people's rumors, adorn themselves with an honorable name. Some have told us about some of the dead, and so have they, who have heard it from the raped women themselves. Among these, the name of a certain Bishop, who had held the office of bishop in a small city of Palestine for quite a few years, was exposed, as if he had such women in his service, i.e. cohabiting; and we also know that he was one of the confessors. However, we did not believe those who told this and said that they had heard about it from the women themselves, although the extreme cunning of the people who said this prompted us to believe, and sometimes not to believe the bad rumor about the previously mentioned Elder Bishop, which was spread after his death. And the guilt brought against him was this: when one of them was caught in the act of sin with a woman, and when we caught him, he presented as his justification that the woman who had committed fornication with him, although already old in years and outdated, showed him this obscene way of acting and taught him how to do and scatter his filthy effluents over the earth.

Hl. 3. Such are their abominable actions, which deceive their minds, because of the blindness of the devil. I do not consider it necessary to present the testimonies on the basis of which they are subjected to fall, lest, wishing to tell a detailed account in order to turn away from the lawless action of each heresy, I should not rather direct the thought of people who are not strengthened and are always capable of relaxation, inclined to catch evil instead of good. But in order to turn away from this terrible heresy peculiar to reptiles, I will offer only a few of the many.

Whence did you, dear ones, get the thought of such a lawless act of yours? And first of all, to whom is all this not obvious, namely, that your teaching is demonic, that it is a trick invented by people who are deceived in their minds and corrupted? For if conception (in your opinion) is a completely evil deed, it is certainly not because of childbearing, but because of carnal copulation; Why, then, being overcome by voluptuousness, do you copulate with your body? But if carnal copulation is not a bad deed, then it is not a bad deed that that which is conceived by means of copulation should be made begotten. By refusing this, a person does not need to cultivate the land. Abel, for example, was a shepherd of sheep, and Cain tilled the land. Some till the earth like Noah, who was a man who made the land, and plant vineyards (Gen. 9:20); And he planted grapes, but not that there might be no grapes on them; but plant and drink of this fruit, and drink, as it is written (Gen. 9:21). The elder can be forgiven for this. Being pleasing to God, he fell into intoxication not because of intemperance, but perhaps out of sorrow he fell into a state of unconsciousness, and unable to endure the effect of both causes, through weakness and old age he fell into infirmity, but did not deserve the ridicule of his son. And he who laughs has acquired a curse for himself, as an example that those who insult their parents will be punished, as well as the thoughts that rise up in you against the mind of God and against the well-ordered order.

Hl. 4. Though marriage is not so praiseworthy as virginity, though virginity is higher than it, and true and undefiled virginity is called glorious and virtuous: nevertheless marriage is honorable if it has the purpose of childbearing, and does not turn the beautifully created from God to a shameful end, but properly observes the order of marital communion established by God. True virginity is such as the Holy Apostle praises it: a virgin and an unintruder cares for the things of the Lord, that she may please the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit (1 Corinthians 7:34); By this he showed that loneliness does not give any reason even for the suspicion of misdeeds. But we know that Abraham also begat children, and yet he was a friend of God, and Isaac, and Jacob, and so forth. They did not defile themselves with lawless deeds, for they did not touch abominations, nor were they hostile to procreation, which was beautifully arranged by God, and those who labored among them in chastity and virginity did not violate the laws of podvig, and did not distort the laudable image of asceticism, putting on it as if in jest. Elijah hardly entered into the cities at all, nor was he a companion with women, but was constantly in the wilderness; and Elisha, and John, and all who, having in mind this great image of following the angels, according to the Gospel commandment of the Lord, distorted for themselves the Kingdom of Heaven (Matt. 19:12).

We would have much to say about this, and in many passages of the Divine Scriptures we could expose their thoughts, to the ridicule of which the devil put into them, but we are not satisfied with much. For it is quite evident that such a deed is not from their understanding, nor from God, but by the work of the demons this mockery and their fall into lawless deed. Having repelled this heresy, as it were, a terrible serpent, called viper, which is small in stature, but emits a breath terrible in its venom and brings destruction to those who approach it, — having crushed it, let us pass on to the following heresies, calling upon God for help in the accomplishment of all our work in God.

Against Origen Adamant, the Forty-Fourth and Sixty-Fourth Heresies

1. These are followed in order by Origen, who is called Adamantine. He was the son of Leonidas, a holy and blessed martyr. Origen himself, having endured much persecution in his youth, and in his manhood having well assimilated the Hellenic education and having been brought up in the Church, became famous in Alexandria during the time of King Decius. He was an Egyptian by birth, had a residence and education in Alexandria, and, perhaps, for some time attended the schools of Athena. They say that he suffered much for the holy teaching of the faith and for the name of Christ. In the city he was many times insulted, vilified and subjected to cruel tortures. Once, they say, the Greeks cut his hair, made him sit at the entrance to the so-called Sarapium, that is, in the pagan temple of their idol, and ordered him to distribute palm branches to those who came for impious service and worship of the idol, for such is the custom of the priests of their idols. Taking the branches, Origen, without any timidity or hesitation, cried out in a loud voice and boldly: "Go, receive not the branch of idols, but the branch of Christ." And much more, according to legend, the ancients tell about his excellent deeds.

2. But the reward for the feat did not remain with him to the end. He was subjected to great envy because he surpassed others in his education and learning. This especially irritated those who had government power at that time. Through the devil's wickedness, the evildoers devised to inflict shame on this man and determined for him such a punishment – they gave him to the Ethiopian to defile his body. Unable to endure such an action invented by the devil, Origen cried out that of the two deeds offered to him, he was more ready to offer sacrifice. Though he did not do this voluntarily, as many say, yet since he himself fully confessed that he had done it, namely, the Gentiles, having put incense on his hand, threw it from his hand on the hearth of the altar; by the judgment of confessors and martyrs, he was then deprived of the glory of martyrdom and expelled from the Church. Having undergone this in Alexandria, and not having the strength to endure the ridicule of scoffers, he withdrew from there and chose Palestine, that is, the land of Judea, as his residence. When he arrived in Jerusalem, the priests urged him, as a well-known and learned interpreter, to preach in the Church, for they say that before offering sacrifice he was also vouchsafed the presbytery. When the then priests of the holy Church of Jerusalem urged him, as I have said, to preach in the Church, and much urged him to do so, he stood up and pronounced only the following saying of Psalm forty-nine, omitting all that preceded it: "But God saith unto the sinner, That thou preach my statutes, and take my covenant in thy mouth" (Psalm 49:16). Then, bending the book, he gave it away and sat down weeping and tears. Everyone cried with him.

3. Some time later, by the persuasion and compellation of many, he became acquainted with a certain Ambrose, one of the noble courtiers, whom some called a follower of Marcion, and others a follower of Sabellius, and persuaded him to depart from heresy, to curse it, and to accept the faith of the holy Church of God. For Origen then adhered to the correct and universal faith. And the said Ambrose, since he held a different opinion and was a learned man and zealous for the divine reading of the Holy Scriptures, he besought Origen, since the meaning of the sayings in the Divine books is profound, to give him an explanation. Inclined to his legitimate desire and conviction, Origen decided to become an interpreter, so to speak, of all Scripture and to explain it. In Tyre of Phoenicia he is said to have led an excellent life for twenty-eight years, in occupation and work. Ambrosius provided sufficient food for him, scribes, and acolytes, as well as a charter and other expenses. Meanwhile, Origen, spending his time without sleep and in strong studies, was doing his work on the Scriptures. First of all, he took care. to carefully collect six translations: Aquila, Symmachus, seventy-two, Theodotion, and the so-called fifth and sixth editions; To this he added a Hebrew text written in Hebrew letters, and on another page he made another comparison against it — he wrote the same Hebrew text, but in Greek letters. Thus arose the work called the Hexapla (Ἑξαπλᾶ), in which two appendices were made to the Greek translations, the Hebrew text written in Hebrew letters, and the Hebrew text written in Greek; so that the whole Old Testament consists of the so-called hexael and of two copies of the Hebrew text.

All this work this man was engaged in with special love. But he did not retain his fame to the end, for his extensive information served as a pretext for him to a great fall. Wishing, in accordance with his purpose, not to leave anything in the Divine Scriptures unexplained, he was subjected to the charm of sin and uttered deadly words. From him came the so-called Origenists. However, not the previous ones who were engaged in shameful deeds. As for these, as I have said before, I cannot say whether they originated from this Origen (who is also Adamantine), or whether they had as their head someone else, who was called Origen. However, it is also said of this Origen that he plotted something against his body. Some say that he castrated himself so as not to be agitated by voluptuousness, not to be inflamed and inflamed by carnal movements. Others do not say so, but that he has devised to apply some medicine to certain members and to dry them up. Others dare to raise something else against him, for example, that he has found some herb that has a healing effect on memory. We do not quite believe the extraordinary stories about him, but we have not omitted to convey these stories.

4. The heresy that originated from him was first revealed in the land of Egypt, and now it is found among excellent people who have apparently adopted a monastic way of life, among people who, by the attraction of nature, have withdrawn to the deserts and chosen non-acquisitiveness. Likewise, this heresy is terrible and worse than all the ancient heresies, with which it philosophizes in the same way. Although it does not dispose its followers to do shameful things, it inspires a terrible doubt about the Divinity itself. From her Arius received the first reason and after him anomie and others...

5–10. […] considerations concerning the blood that has been released from our bodies many times, and the flesh that has been transformed into some other matter, say that our body will be resurrected as it was at the end of life."

11. Such are the words of the above-mentioned pretended sage, expressing doubt about the truth: I have of necessity cited them as a proof to those who wish to know the whole essence of his disbelief in the resurrection. There is, by the way, much more in the commentary on this psalm. He says: "For this reason the wicked will not rise to judgment." On this basis, as simple people, he attacks those who recognize the resurrection as indubitable and believe with firm hope in the resurrection of the dead; In doing so, he said many harmful things and made a certain sophistic assumption, taken not from faith, but from reason, so that they would believe him in everything to their misfortune, and on the basis of what happens to us by nature, he attempted to distort the confession of our very resurrection, awaited with true hope. I, however, as an insignificant man, not wishing to venture to be better than those who had already worked successfully and very correctly overthrew all his invented rhetorical malice, considered it sufficient to be content with what was said by Blessed Methodius in the sermon "On the Resurrection" against the same Origen, and I will propose it here literally, as he himself expounded.