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On Prayer

Origen, tr. Oulton, 1954

The word “prayer” (euche) occurs for the first time, so far as my observation goes, when …

Discussion on Prayer in General
Chapters III to XVII
The words “Euche” and “Proseuche” (Chapters III and IV)

The word “prayer” (euche) occurs for the first time, so far as my observation goes,1 when “Jacob,” flying from the wrath of his “brother Esau, departed into Mesopotamia” in accordance with the counsel of Isaac and Rebecca.2 The passage runs as follows: “And Jacob prayed a prayer, saying, if God the Lord will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, and will bring me back again in safety to my father’s house, then shall the Lord be unto me for God. And this stone, which I have set up for a pillar, shall be unto me God’s house: and of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely give the tenth unto thee.”3 . . .4

Here we should note that the word “prayer” (euche), which often has a different meaning from proseuche, is used of a person who promises in prayer to do this or that, if so be that he obtains these things from God. But the term is also employed in its customary usage:5 as, for example, we find it so used after the plague of frogs, the second in order of the ten.6 . . . “Pharaoh called for Moses and Aaron, and said, Pray the Lord for me, and let him take away the frogs from me and my people; and I will let the people go, that they may sacrifice to the Lord.”7 And if anyone finds it hard to believe, because the expression “pray” is Pharaoh’s, that it has the usual sense, as derived from “prayer,” in addition to the sense previously mentioned,8 he should note the passage which follows: “And Moses said unto Pharaoh, Appoint unto me when I shall pray for thee and for thy servants and for thy people, that the frogs be destroyed from thee and from thy people and out of thy houses, and remain in the river only.”9

Observe that in the case of “the lice,” the third plague, neither does Pharaoh request a prayer to be made, nor does Moses pray.10 But in the case of “the swarm of flies,”11 the fourth, he says, “Pray therefore for me to the Lord”; on which occasion “Moses said, I will go out from thee12 and I will pray unto God, and the swarm of flies will depart from Pharaoh and his servants and his people, tomorrow.”13 And a little further down, “And Moses went out from Pharaoh, and prayed unto God.”14 And again, while at the fifth and sixth plagues15 neither did Pharaoh request a prayer to be made nor did Moses pray, at the seventh “Pharaoh sent, and called for Moses and Aaron, and said unto them, I have sinned this time: the Lord is righteous, and I and my people are wicked. Pray therefore unto the Lord, and let there be an end to voices of God and hail and fire.”16 And a little lower down, “Moses went out of the city from Pharaoh, and spread abroad his hands unto the Lord: and the voices ended.”17 Why it is not said, “And he prayed,” as on the former occasions, but “he spread abroad his hands unto the Lord,” must be considered more suitably at another time. Also, at the eighth plague Pharaoh says, “And pray unto the Lord your God, and let him take away from me this death. And Moses went out from Pharaoh and prayed unto God.”18

We have said that the word euche is often used not in the accustomed manner,19 as for example with reference to Jacob.20 Also, in Leviticus, “The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say unto them, Whosoever shall vow a vow, as being an estimation of his soul to the Lord, the estimation of the male, from twenty years old to sixty years old, even his estimation shall be fifty shekels of silver by holy weight.”21 And in Numbers, “And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say unto them, When either man or woman shall vow solemnly22 a vow to make a separation for himself to the Lord, he shall be separated from wine and strong drink,”23 and so forth, with reference to him who is called a Nazirite. Then, a little lower down, “And he shall sanctify his head on that day in which he was sanctified to the Lord for the days of his vow.”24 And again, a little lower down, “This is the law of him who hath vowed, in whatsoever day he shall fulfil the days of his vow.”25 And again, a little lower down, “And after that he who hath vowed shall drink wine. This is the law of him who hath vowed, whosoever shall vow to the Lord his gift as concerning his vow, apart from whatsoever his hand shall find according to the power of his vow, which he shall vow according to the law of separation.”26 And at the end of Numbers, “And Moses spake unto the heads of the tribes of Israel, saying, This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded. When a man voweth a vow unto the Lord, or sweareth an oath by a bond, or shall make a bond concerning his soul, he shall not cause his word to become void; he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth. And if a woman voweth a vow unto the Lord, or bindeth herself by a bond, being in her father’s house, in her youth; and if her father heareth her vows, and her bonds wherewith she hath bound her soul, and if her father holdeth his peace, all her vows shall stand, and every bond wherewith she hath bound her soul shall remain with her.”27 And subsequently he lays down certain laws concerning such a woman. The same meaning is to be found in Proverbs: . . . [“It is a snare] to a man rashly to sanctify anything of his own; for after he hath vowed cometh repentance”28; and in Ecclesiastes: “Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay”29; and in the Acts of the Apostles: “There are with us four men which are under a vow of their own act.”3031

Notes

  1. III, 1. occurs for the first time, so far as my observation goes] For another statement, involving a similar, but even greater amount of, search, see XXII, 1. Such investigation must, under the literary conditions of the time, have been very laborious. But we now know that Christians of Origen’s day had several books of the Bible combined in codex or book form, as for example in the Chester Beatty Biblical Papyri. And this must have made the task of such an examination of the Scriptures much lighter than if separate rolls had to be handled.
  2. Cf. Gen. 27:41–45.
  3. Gen. 28:20–22.
  4. A lacuna of two lines occurs here in T, which perhaps contained another example from the Scriptures of “prayer.”
  5. III, 2. is also employed in its customary usage] i.e., simply as “prayer,” with no suggestion of “vow.”
  6. A lacuna of two lines occurs here in T, which Koetschau supplies after this manner: “when Pharaoh commanded Moses and Aaron to pray to the Lord for him, that he should take away from him and his people the frogs which covered everything. The passage is as follows:”
  7. Ex. 8:8.
  8. III, 2. in addition to the sense previously mentioned] i.e., the sense of “vow” (as at the beginning of this section).
  9. Ex. 8:9.
  10. Ex. 8:16–19.
  11. Ex. 8:20–32.
  12. III, 3. “I will go out from thee,” etc.] In this quotation two similar verses of the LXX (Ex. 8:25, 28) are combined in a manner that suggests that Origen was relying on his memory.
  13. Ex. 8:25, 28 (LXX).
  14. Ex. 8:30.
  15. Ex. 9:1–12.
  16. Ex. 9:27, 28.
  17. Ex. 9:33.
  18. Ex. 10:17, 18.
  19. III, 4. is often used not in the accustomed manner] i.e., it is used in the sense of “vow” (as in Gen. 28:20–22), and not simply as “prayer.”
  20. See III, 2, above: in this section euche and the corresponding verb are translated “vow.”
  21. Lev. 27:1–3.
  22. Lit. “greatly.”
  23. Num. 6:1–3.
  24. Num. 6:11, 12 (LXX).
  25. Num. 6:13.
  26. Num. 6:20, 21.
  27. Num. 30:1–4.
  28. Prov. 20:25. Before this quotation there is a lacuna of one and three-fifths lines in T, which Koetschau conjecturally fills with two other quotations from Proverbs, as follows: “A sacrifice of a peace offering is with me; this day do I pay my vows” (7:14); and “A foolish son is the shame of his father; unholy are the vows of a hired mistress” (19:13 (LXX)); and “It is a snare,” etc:
  29. Eccl. 5:5.
  30. Acts 21:23: see note for text.
  31. III, 4. “There are with us four men which are under a vow of their own act”] The reading followed by the Revised Version in Acts 21:23 is: “We have four men which have a vow on them.” The reading “of their own act” (lit. “by themselves”) appears to be “Alexandrian,” being read by Codices ℵ and B and by the two Egyptian versions, as well as by Origen. It makes good sense, showing that the men in question had taken upon them their vow independently of Paul’s intervention.

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