Finally, I have been able to write something regarding Origen. Origen was born in 185 Ad and wrote in the third century. I want to examine part of his writing de Principiis aka The Fundamental Doctrines. In Book II, one can find a treasure of the early Church’s insight on the concept of purgatory. I will show the passages and the reader can decide for themselves.
5. And that the understanding of this matter may not
appear very difficult, we may draw some considerations
from the evil effects of those passions which are wont to
befall some souls, as when a soul is consumed by the
fire of love, or wasted away by zeal or envy, or when the
passion of anger is kindled, or one is consumed by the
greatness of his madness or his sorrow; on which
occasions some, finding the excess of these evils
unbearable, have deemed it more tolerable to submit to
death than to endure perpetually torture of such a kind.
You will ask indeed whether, in the case of those who
have been entangled in the evils arising from those
vices above enumerated, and who, while existing in this
life, have been unable to procure any amelioration for
themselves, and have in this condition departed from
the world, it be sufficient in the way of punishment that
they be tortured by the remaining in them of these
hurtful affections, i.e., of the anger, or of the fury, or of
the madness, or of the sorrow, whose fatal poison was
in this life lessened by no healing medicine; or whether,
these affections being changed, they will be subjected to the pains of a general
punishment. Now I am of opinion that another species
of punishment may be understood to exist; because, as
we feel that when the limbs of the body are loosened
and torn away from their mutual supports, there is
produced pain of a most excruciating kind, so, when the
soul shall be found to be beyond the order, and
connection, and harmony in which it was created by
God for the purposes of good and useful action and
observation, and not to harmonize with itself in the
connection of its rational movements, it must be
deemed to bear the chastisement and torture of its own
dissension, and to feel the punishments of its own
disordered condition. And when this dissolution and
rending asunder of soul shall have been tested by the
application of fire, a solidification undoubtedly into a
firmer structure will take place, and a restoration be
effected.
6. There are also many other things which escape our
notice, and are known to Him alone who is the physician
of our souls. For if, on account of those bad effects
which we bring upon ourselves by eating and drinking,
we deem it necessary for the health of the body to make
use of some unpleasant and painful drug, sometimes
even, if the nature of the disease demand, requiring the
severe process of the amputating knife; and if the
virulence of the disease shall transcend even these
remedies, the evil has at last to be burned out by fire;
how much more is it to be understood that God our
Physician, desiring to remove the defects of our souls,
which they had contracted from their different sins and
crimes, should employ penal measures of this sort, and
should apply even, in addition, the punishment of fire to
those who have lost their soundness of mind! Pictures
of this method of procedure are found also in the holy
Scriptures. In the book of Deuteronomy, the divine word
threatens sinners with the punishments of fevers, and
colds, and jaundice, and with the pains of feebleness of
vision, and alienation of mind and paralysis, and
blindness, and weakness of the reins. If any one, then,
at his leisure gather together out of the whole of
Scripture all the enumerations of diseases which in the
threatenings addressed to sinners are called by the
names of bodily maladies, he will find that either the
vices of souls, or their punishments, are figuratively
indicated by them. To understand now, that in the same
way in which physicians apply remedies to the sick, in
order that by careful treatment they may recover their
health, God so deals towards those who have lapsed
and fallen into sin, is proved by this, that the cup of
God’s fury is ordered, through the agency of the prophet
Jeremiah, to be offered to all nations, that they may
drink it, and be in a state of madness, and vomit it forth.
In doing which, He threatens them, saying, That if any
one refuse to drink, he shall not be cleansed. By which
certainly it is understood that the fury of God’s
vengeance is profitable for the purgation of souls.
That the punishment, also, which is said to be applied
by fire, is understood to be applied with the object of
healing, is taught by Isaiah, who speaks thus of Israel:
“The Lord will wash away the filth of the sons or
daughters of Zion, and shall purge away the blood from
the midst of them by the spirit of judgment, and the spirit
of burning.” Of the Chaldeans he thus speaks: “Thou
hast the coals of fire; sit upon them: they will be to thee
a help.” And in other passages he says, “The Lord will
sanctify in a burning fire” and in the prophecies of
Malachi he says, “The Lord sitting will blow, and purify,
and will pour forth the cleansed sons of Judah.”
7. But that fate also which is mentioned in the Gospels
as overtaking unfaithful stewards who, it is said, are to
be divided, and a portion of them placed along with
unbelievers, as if that portion which is not their own
were to be sent elsewhere, undoubtedly indicates some
kind of punishment on those whose spirit, as it seems to
me, is shown to be separated from the soul. For if this
Spirit is of divine nature, i.e., is understood to be a Holy
Spirit, we shall understand this to be said of the gift of
the Holy Spirit: that when, whether by baptism, or by the
grace of the Spirit, the word of wisdom, or the word of
knowledge, or of any other gift, has been bestowed
upon a man, and not rightly administered, i.e., either
buried in the earth or tied up in a napkin, the gift of the
Spirit will certainly be withdrawn from his soul, and the
other portion which remains, that is, the substance of
the soul, will be assigned its place with unbelievers,
being divided and separated from that Spirit with whom,
by joining itself to the Lord, it ought to have been one
spirit. Now, if this is not to be understood of the Spirit of
God, but of the nature of the soul itself, that will be
called its better part which was made in the image and
likeness of God; whereas the other part, that which
afterwards, through its fall by the exercise of free-will,
was assumed contrary to the nature of its original
condition of purity,–this part, as being the friend and
beloved of matter, is punished with the fate of
unbelievers. There is also a third sense in which that
separation may be understood, this viz., that as each
believer, although the humblest in the Church, is said to
be attended by an angel, who is declared by the Saviour
always to behold the face of God the Father, and as this
angel was certainly one with the object of his
guardianship; so, if the latter is rendered unworthy by
his want of obedience, the angel of God is said to be
taken from him, and then that part of him–the part, viz.,
which belongs to his human nature–being rent away
from the divine part, is assigned a place along with
unbelievers, because it has not faithfully observed the
admonitions of the angel allotted it by God.
There you have it. Now you can decide for yourself.
Origen shows that the concept of purification after death was taught in the early Church, before Constantine. Origen, likewise, did not invent the concept or doctrine. The concept comes from the Bible. Purgatory is just a word that describes the concept. If anyone can show me the passage that says that a word has to be found in the Bible to be true, I will convert tomorrow to their denomination or sect.
