Origen's line-by-line exegesis of John 1:1-7, working out what it means that 'the Word was with God' and 'the Word was God.'
Book 2 of Origen's Commentary on John picks up where Book 1 left off, turning from the meaning of 'the beginning' and 'the Word' to the second clause of John's prologue: 'the Word was with God.' Origen, writing to his dedicatee Ambrose, first surveys Old Testament formulas like 'the Lord's word came to Hosea' or 'to Isaiah, son of Amoz' and asks whether the Word that 'comes to' the prophets is the same Word that is eternally 'with God.' He distinguishes the historical sense of these prophetic names from their mystical sense (Hosea as 'Saved,' son of 'Wells'), a hallmark of his allegorical method.
The bulk of the book is a sustained argument about the relationship of the Father to the Son as Word, image, and life. Origen works through the logic of John 1:3-4 -- 'all things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being' -- distinguishing carefully between what comes into being 'through' the Word, what comes into being 'by' the Word, and what has being only 'without' the Word (evil), a distinction he uses to avoid making God the cause of sin while still affirming the Word's universal causal role. He then turns to 'in him was life,' asking how life relates to reason and how both relate to the 'light of men,' anticipating objections from unnamed opponents (likely Gnostic or Valentinian readers) whom he imagines pressing him on these very points.
The book closes with an extended treatment of John the Baptist as a 'man sent from God' to bear witness to the light, including reflection on whether John and Elijah might return to testify again before Christ's second, fuller coming. Origen reads the exchange between John's disciples and Jesus ('Rabbi, where are you staying?') as a model of the soul's search for the Teacher. Throughout, the book is essential for understanding Origen's Trinitarian vocabulary -- Son as 'image of the image,' Father and Son as two 'springs' -- language later theologians both drew on and contested.
“How then did the Lord's word come upon Hosea, and is it the same word given to Isaiah, son of Amoz”
— Commentary on John, Book 2 · read this chapter →
“for since a spring wells up from a depth, the wisdom of God, each of those being saved becomes a son of it”
— Commentary on John, Book 2 · read this chapter →
“it is possible, while nothing has come into being without the Word, not only that all things came into being through the Word but also that some things came into being by the Word”
— Commentary on John, Book 2 · read this chapter →
“Let them tell us, then, how life, the consort of reason, came to be in reason, and how it is rather the life of reason, and not reason itself, that is the light of men”
— Commentary on John, Book 2 · read this chapter →
“This man arrived as a witness, so as to testify about the light”
— Commentary on John, Book 2 · read this chapter →
It is Origen's detailed exegesis of John 1:1-7, focusing especially on the phrase 'the Word was with God.' He examines the relationship between the Father and the Word, works through what it means that all things came into being 'through' the Word, and closes with a discussion of John the Baptist's role as witness to the light.
Origen compares the Father and Son to a spring: the Father is the spring of divinity and the Son is the spring of the word or reason each rational being possesses. He treats the Son as 'image of the image,' distinct from but derived from the Father, so that human beings are 'made according to the image' rather than being images outright.
Ambrose is the wealthy patron and former Valentinian convert to whom Origen addresses the whole Commentary on John, here called 'holy brother Ambrose, formed according to the gospel.' Origen writes the commentary partly to answer Gnostic readings of John that Ambrose would have encountered.
Origen argues that while nothing came into being 'without' the Word, this does not mean literally everything came into being 'through' the Word in the same sense; he distinguishes things caused through the Word from things merely not excluded by the Word, a move designed to keep God from being the direct cause of evil.
Origen reads John as 'a man sent from God... to testify about the light,' and considers whether John himself, or Elijah, might return again to testify before Christ's second, more fully revealed coming, tying John's mission to the broader theme of witness running through the prologue.
Commentary on John, Book 1 · Commentary on John, Book 10 · Commentary on John, Book 4 · Commentary on John, Book 5 · Commentary on John, Book 6 · Commentary on Matthew, Book 10 · Commentary on Matthew, Book 11 · Commentary on Matthew, Book 12 · Commentary on Matthew, Book 13 · Commentary on Matthew, Book 14 · Commentary on Matthew, Book 15 · Commentary on Matthew, Book 16