Though patristic writers interacted with and wrote about Jews with
varying degrees of affinity and hostility, contemporary scholarship has
frequently employed the term “supersessionism” as an umbrella concept
under which to understand early Christian views of Jews and Judaism.
Turning to Origen as a case study, this paper evaluates the heuristic
value of “supersessionism” as a means through which to analyze the
multivalent patristic relationship to Jews. Origen provides a fitting
source for such an examination, chiefly because of his distinct
understanding of Christ’s ongoing self-revelation in the Scriptures and
their interpretation and his gradational view of the soul’s encounter
with Christ, which is not fully realized until the eschaton.
Contemporary notions of supersession often are rigidly based on linear models of time, covenant, and revelation. Yet, for Origen, the Israelite prophets, who routinely serve as examples of advanced spiritual perception, are not linear predecessors to the apostles who merely looked forward to Christ, but those who looked at Christ and became physical recipients of the same Christ proclaimed by the apostles and perceived, in part, by advanced Christians. The divinity whom they encountered now lies enfleshed in their words—the words of the Old Testament—through which the soul encounters the very same divinity. Such an understanding of divine revelation and the soul’s encounter with Christ is not sufficiently explained through linear models, and, thus, one must look for ways beyond “supersessionism” to understand Origen’s distinct opposition toward the continuation of Jewish practice.
Contemporary notions of supersession often are rigidly based on linear models of time, covenant, and revelation. Yet, for Origen, the Israelite prophets, who routinely serve as examples of advanced spiritual perception, are not linear predecessors to the apostles who merely looked forward to Christ, but those who looked at Christ and became physical recipients of the same Christ proclaimed by the apostles and perceived, in part, by advanced Christians. The divinity whom they encountered now lies enfleshed in their words—the words of the Old Testament—through which the soul encounters the very same divinity. Such an understanding of divine revelation and the soul’s encounter with Christ is not sufficiently explained through linear models, and, thus, one must look for ways beyond “supersessionism” to understand Origen’s distinct opposition toward the continuation of Jewish practice.
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