Volume: Volume 3, Issue 1

The article illustrates the importance of the discovery in 2012 of Codex Monacensis Graecus 314, containing 29 homilies on the Psalms by Origen. It is not only one of the most important finds of early Christian literature in Greek in the last decades, but it is also a major contribution to the study of the Alexandrian teacher and to the history of biblical interpretation in Late Antiquity. The 29 homilies represent nowadays the largest body of sermons among the writings of Origen, which are poorly preserved in their original language. They also provide interesting clues for assigning the homilies to the final period in the life of Origen.

Heraclitus begins his allegorical interpretation of Homer with the admonishment: “If he meant nothing allegorically, he was impious through and through, and sacrilegious fables, loaded with blasphemous folly, run riot through both epics.” Modern criticism roundly rejects Heraclitus’ defense of Homer’s integrity, preferring to treat his poems as straightforward narratives of the actions of gods and mortals. But there is ample evidence of Homer’s sophisticated use of divinities as symbols rather than agents, and reason to suppose that Homeric epic emerged in dialogue with attacks on the anthropomorphic representation of gods, like that of Xenophanes. I propose to raise the question of Homer’s method through discussion of a few representative passages, beginning with Athena’s intervention to prevent Achilles from slaying Agamemnon in Book I of the Iliad and concluding with the battle among the gods in Books XX-XXI. Particular reference will be made to Paul Radin, Primitive Man as Philosopher.