Apokatastasis. What a wonderful language Greek is. I wish I spoke it or at least was able to read it. I am left with just a smattering of words and their meanings, and then only in the Latin alphabet at that. Yet, from what I can see, Greek is a language of defined and specific words. Words that can only be taken in one meaning and carry a significance with just the use of the word.
It takes me back to Umberto Eco's work "The Search for the Perfect Language". Yet according to Eco and his research, the perfect language of the Western World was to have been Hebrew. For it was in Hebrew that God spoke to Adam, Jacob and Moses. Or so the scriptures say. An interesting idea, especially since I have been engaged in a book on St. Jerome and his work in translating from "Hebrew" to Latin the books of the bible. (I use quotes, because it seems a lot of the translations he has used are from Origen, though the commentaries on the scriptures are mostly the work of Jerome)
I also find that the idea or understanding that Jerome has of the scriptures is strongly based in the teaching and the skills of Origen. Yet to actually know what Origen taught is almost impossible. To borrow liberally from another source "One of the main difficulties in studying Origen [is] the necessity of examining all the works that we possess before asserting anything at all about him."[Crouzel, Henri. Origen. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, Ltd., 1985 (French), 1989 (Authorised English Translation by Worrall, A.S.)] This as you can see would be a major task, as few of the works of Origen are in English. When I left Christian Brothers High School in 1970, I had just completed Latin II, when I arrived at Marello Prep, they did not offer Latin, so I took Spanish. Alas, I lack the current skill.
What I have read about Origen has led me to think about him differently. Also the two books I have completed on how books were written in the early 3oo-400AD time period has also led me to see what is "written" is not always what was. Origen wrote ideas, not necessarily exactly what he believed. The fear of being called a heretic, or worse being excommunicated, was a real and major concern for many. From Augustine in his writings asserting that he is anything but a Manachian, to Jerome swearing he was not part of the Origenist Heresy are two examples.
I need to say that I have not abandoned my attempt to understand predestination, this is all part of the journey that I am on. You see, Origen had some ideas about God that would make all the ideas of predestination moot. I see some errors in his understanding of the pre-existence of souls, but if they pre-existed in the mind of God, does not mean they existed as individual realities. I know Aquinas says that "thoughts" in the mind of God are realities, but he also says that we can project onto the creator from the created, and we think, and we have ideas, but they are not realities. God may also have ideas that he does not intend to be created at a given moment in time.
Once I get past this hurdle I may be on to the next. I am glad this is not a sprint, but a long and arduous walk. I see how easily error and pitfalls could become one in this game of thinking. I do how ever have a soft spot in my heart for the idea of apokatastasis. This word, which I started with, means a coming to full circle in the end of time. God brings back all his creation to Himself. You see, predestination would be moot, but first again I need to see what Origen meant by this pre-existence of souls.
So, to whom do I turn, yet another man who was run from his Episcopate and was a follower of Origen and used his ideas in his sermons, St. John Chrysostom. Alas I must await for that book to arrive and be read, then I must mull those ideas and see how they all fit into this puzzle. I read some of the sermons of John years ago, but I want to know how he formed his ideas, then I can see how he looked at Origen and how he got around most of the Origenist Heresy. (If there was a heresy at all with Origen! I am beginning to question that. I mean, maybe "what we have here is a failure to communicate" to borrow from the line in Cool Hand Luke.)
