No Wonder They Call Him Heretic

Origen was one of the greatest Christian theologians of the Early Church. Born in 185 A.D. in Alexandria, Origen was the son of Leonidas, who was martyred. At the ripe old age of 18, Origen succeeded Clement of Alexandria as the head of catechismal school in said city. Origen found increasing success as a teacher, and he is said to have worked day and night with the crowds that came to hear him, both "orthodox" Christians and Gnostics alike. In 215, he was asked to lecture on Scripture by bishops in Caesarea and Jerusalem, but as he was not yet ordained Demetrius, the patriarch of Alexandria, ordered him to return to Alexandria. Between 219 and 230, Origen wrote his great comprehensive study of Christian doctrine, On First Principles. Origen then was invited to Greece and on the way was ordained presbyter by the bishops of Jerusalem and Caesarea. This action caused the final break with Demetrius, who called a synod of Egyptian bishops. The decision was that Origen was forbidden to teach at Alexandria, and he was soon afterwards excommunicated. The sentence had little effect outside Egypt. Origen became an honored teacher of the church, working out of the city of Caesarea in Palestine from 231 through the rest of his life. From 231 to his death, Origen produced a vast body of works, including scriptural commentaries on both the Old and the New Testaments. In 250, when the persecution of the Emperor Decius broke out, Origen was imprisoned