Become Like the Angels

3. Two Souls

[60] Chapter 3 Two Souls The more conventional debates that have been addressed thus far—soul composition and the soul-body relationship—coexisted at all times with a potentially more radical doctrine of the soul, that of two distinct souls. At first it might seem odd even to raise this doctrine in connection with Origen, since the doctrine of two distinct souls is generally associated with Gnosticism, a religious system that Origen spent his life opposing. Our first task, however, shall be to distinguish between two variations of the two souls doctrine, which may be called the “conflict” and “hierarchical” models. It will become clear that Origen rejects the former, “conflict” model because of its incompatibility with Christian doctrine. Origen accepts the latter, “hierarchical” version of the two souls doctrine, however, and for reasons that carry a good deal of doctrinal and spiritual significance . This chapter will begin by presenting both forms of the two souls doctrine, as mentioned above. Subsequently, in addressing Origen’s views, the central focus will again be on On First Principles 3, 4, where Origen addresses the two souls doctrine directly, although it is not easy to determine which model of the doctrine— “conflict” or “hierarchical”—he is there considering. Finally, Origen’s other writings will be scoured for evidence of one or the other form of two souls doctrine. [61] Two Souls Two Souls Theory: “Conflict” Model The origins of the “conflict” version of the two souls doctrine will delay us only briefly, since the idea seems to have fermented first on Iranian-Persian soil and is more or less foreign to the Greek mind. The curious blend of Mithraism, Zervanism, and Zoroastrianism, merged into a state religion under the Babylonian king Shápur in the third century ad, created a religious atmosphere favorable to the rigid, earth-denying dualism of the conflict model. Here the cosmos becomes a battleground, with every inch of territory claimed by the competing Kingdoms of Light and Darkness. In this view the lower soul is of matter and is for that reason an evil soul, opposed to the good soul as darkness is to light.1 The two souls are forever in conflict, giving rise to a vocabulary of militarism and apocalypticism . From the Near East this “conflict” version of the two souls doctrine would seep into other religious systems—first into those Greek thinkers predisposed to Eastern influence, and finally into three religious movements closely linked to the Iranian world: Judaism , Gnosticism, and Christianity. Although Plato himself had typically avoided depicting the world along the lines of “conflict” dualism, there are suggestions in the Laws that, since all motion derives from the soul, pre-cosmic matter must necessarily be moved by some kind of irrational soul.2 This notion would be exploited and developed substantially by some Middle Platonic thinkers. Though some more “mainstream” Middle Platonists show hints of this model, it is Numenius who is best known for it. The unrestrained metaphysical dualism of Numenius posits a preexistent soul, both immaterial and immortal, which descends into the body through delusion with earthly pleasures.3 In 1. Cf. Hans Jonas, The Gnostic Religion: The Message of the Alien God and the Beginnings of Christianity, 3rd ed. (Boston: Beacon Press, 2001), 28–29. 2. See Laws 896e, 897c–d. 3. “[There are] two world souls—the one being very beneficent, and the other malevolent , namely, matter.” Treatise on the Good 1, 16. Elsewhere Numenius refers to them as the “rational and irrational souls.” Ibid. 4, 53. [62] Inner Moral Conflict the course of its descent through the Milky Way it gathers influences and accretions, which form its “accreted soul” (prosphyēs psychē) or “irrational soul” (alogos psychē).4 Numenius’s concept of a second soul builds upon the Middle Platonic notion of the ochēma, or the soul’s passionate “envelope” or vehicle (also from Aristotle’s doctrine of the pneuma as the seat of the sensible soul), and serves to resolve the problem of the incorporeal soul’s communication with the body.5 The notion of two warring souls, while it may have some roots in Plato, is at the very least a radicalization of Plato’s ideas, and more than likely has connections with magical-astrological themes, perhaps drawn from Hermetic notions. Here, without a doubt, we have a “conflict” version of the two souls doctrine akin to that of PersianIranian Zoroastrianism. It was...