Origen's Commentary on the Gospel of John

Origen’s Commentary on the Gospel of John

At first, as I was reading Origen, I was thinking to myself, “How differently Origen reads than I do.” Of course, what springs to mind is his focus on spiritual and mystagogical readings of John, his ability to write expansively on just one verse of Scripture, his desire to harmonize disparate passages of Scripture, and his desire to explain the “peculiar” meaning of some texts. Origen is prone to see John’s gospel as a lively symbolic world where nothing means what it says in its plain sense, but must be read closely and spiritually to discern its higher meaning.
Yet, to say that Origen reads differently than I is somewhat facile. Of course he does, given our differences in native languages, his education and social