On Prayer
Origen, tr. Oulton, 1954
A few words also must now be said about the direction towards which he who prays should …
The Superiority of Prayer towards the East (Chapter XXXII)
A few words also must now be said about the direction towards which he who prays should look. There are four cardinal points, north, south, west, and east. Who would not at once agree that the east clearly shows the direction we ought to face when praying,1 symbolically of the soul looking to the “rising”2 of “the true light”?3 But if someone should prefer to offer his intercessions towards the opening of his house, in whatever direction the doors of the dwelling face, on the plea that the heaven-ward aspect is more compelling than looking towards the wall, should it happen that the openings of the building are not towards the east, we may reply to him that it is by convention that the doors of men’s dwelling-places face in this or that direction, but that by nature4 the east has been given a preference over the other points of the compass, and nature ought to be placed before convention. Further, suppose that a man wishes to pray on a plain. Why on that reasoning should he pray towards the east rather than towards the west? But if reason dictates that the east is to be preferred in that case, why should this not be done everywhere? So much for this matter.
Notes
- XXXII. the east . . . the direction we ought to face when praying] Turning to the east when making supplication or offering sacrifice was a common custom in pre-Christian times. Cf. Sophocles O.C., 477 (with R. C. Jebb’s note); Vergil, Aeneid, XII, 172; Tacitus, Hist., III, 24; Philo, De V.C., 3. … Origen, In Num. hom., V (C.B., XXX, 26): “Sed et in ecclesiasticis observationibus sunt nonnulla huiusmodi, quae omnibus quidem facere necesse est, nec tamen ratio eorum omnibus patet. Nam quod, verbi gratia, genua flectimus orantes et quod ex omnibus coeli plagis ad solam orientis partem conversi orationem fundimus, non facile cuiquam puto ratione compertum.” Basil, De Spiritu Sancto, 66: “What writing taught us to turn to the east in prayer?” Other early references to the custom are Clement of Alexandria, Strom., VII, 7, 43; Tertullian, Adv. Valent., 3; Apol., 16 (where T. says that because they turned to the east in prayer Christians were suspected of worshipping the sun). … Thus, Origen, In Levit. hom., IX, 10 (C.B., XXIX, 438) says: “Ab oriente tibi propitiatio venit; inde est enim vir, cui ‘Oriens nomen’ est [Zech. 6:12] . . . Imitaris ergo per hoc, ut ad orientem semper adspicias, unde tibi oritur ‘sol iustitiae’” [Mal. 4:2]. Another text is adduced in support of the practice in Didascalia Apostolorum, ch. XII (ed. R. H. Connolly, 119, 120): “For it is required that you pray toward the east, as knowing that which is written ‘Give ye glory to God, who rideth upon the heaven of heavens towards the east’ [Ps. 67 (68):33].” Yet another passage of Scripture is laid hold of by Gregory of Nyssa, In Oratione Dominica, V (P.G., XLIV, 1184), where the argument is that since Paradise was in the east (Gen. 2:8), therefore when we turn to the east in prayer, we ask the second Adam to restore to us what the first Adam lost. At a much later date (? c. 743), John of Damascus, De Fide Orthodoxa, IV, 12 (P.G., XCIV, 1133–1136) repeats the texts from Zechariah, Malachi, and Genesis and adds other reasons for the custom, namely, that when Christ was on the Cross, his face was turned to the west, hence when we adore him we turn to the east; and that when he ascended into heaven, he was borne towards the east, and so will come in like manner: quoting Matt. 24:27.
Candidates for baptism faced west when they were renouncing Satan; in professing the Creed they faced east, “the region of light,” where God had planted Paradise. (Cyril, Hieros., Cat. Myst., I; P.G., XXXIII, 1068, 1073). Cf. also Ambrose, De Mysteriis, II; Jerome, Comment. in Amos, III, 6 (P.L., XXV, 1068). On the general subject of praying eastwards, see Bingham, Antiquities of the Christian Church, 517, 653; “Orientation,” in D.A.C.L., by H. Leclercq. - Luke 1:78.
- John 1:9.
- XXXII. by convention . . . by nature] θέσει . . . φύσει. A Stoic antithesis. Diogenes Laërtius, VII, 128 quotes Chrysippus as saying that τὸ δίκαιον is “by nature” and not “by convention”: see J. von Arnim, S.V.F., III, 76. Strabo, Geographica, II, 3:7, contrasts φύσις with “custom” and “training,” and in the same section speaks of a certain question as “a mere matter of argument” (θετικὴ).