Wasn't Origen considered an early Father? Yet, he was excommunicated. In addition, many of the original Reformers, now considered heretics, were humanly inspired by Augustine. All I was saying is that there were lots of Fathers who went off the reservation, as compared to the majority, on at least one issue or other. I'm asserting that the reason for that must have been the accusation of private interpretation.
Pretty sure that was a local excommunication. You have me intrigued, I haven't spent that much time investigating all of the Fathers of the Church, there are quite a few. I'm not prepared to say that "lots" of the Church Fathers "went off the reservation" but will try to do more reading concerning the issue. Thanks.
Catholic Apologists and Protestant Apologists/Antagonists each cherrypick the writings of the Early Church Fathers when it suits their purposes.
Suffice to say that many of the Early Church Fathers might well have reached a toasty end for their "heretical" teachings.
“Pretty sure that was a local excommunication.”
There was a local excommunication, in fact there were several. Unfortunately for Origen, the 5th Ecumenical Council made his condemnation universal.
” IF anyone asserts the fabulous pre-existence of souls, and shall assert the monstrous restoration which follows from it: let him be anathema.
II.
IF anyone shall say that the creation (thu paragwghn) of all reasonable things includes only intelligences (noas) without bodies and altogether immaterial, having neither number nor name, so that there is unity between them all by identity of substance, force and energy, and by their union with and knowledge of God the Word; but that no longer desiring the sight of God, they gave themselves over to worse things, each one following his own inclinations, and that they have taken bodies more or less subtile, and have received names, for among the heavenly Powers there is a difference of names as there is also a difference of bodies; and thence some became and are called Cherubims, others Seraphims, and Principalities, and Powers, and Dominations, and Thrones, and Angels, and as many other heavenly orders as there may be: let him be anathema.
III.
IF anyone shall say that the sun, the moon and the stars are also reasonable beings, and that they have only become what they are because they turned towards evil: let him be anathema.
IV.
IF anyone shall say that the reasonable creatures in whom the divine love had grown cold have been hidden in gross bodies such as ours, and have been called men, while those who have attained the lowest degree of wickedness have shared cold and obscure bodies and are become and called demons and evil spirits: let him be anathema,.
V.
IF anyone shall say that a psychic (yukikhn) condition has come from an angelic or archangelic state, and moreover that a demoniac and a human condition has come from a psychic condition, and that from a human state they may become again angels and demons, and that each order of heavenly virtues is either all from those below or from those above, or from those above and below: let him be anathema.
VI.
IF anyone shall say that there is a twofold race of demons, of which the one includes the souls of men and the other the superior spirits who fell to this, and that of all the number of reasonable beings there is but one which has remained unshaken in the love and contemplation of God, and that that spirit is become Christ and the king of all reasonable beings, and that he has created(1) all the bodies which exist in heaven, on earth, and between heaven and earth; and that the world which has in itself elements more ancient than itself, and which exists by themselves, viz.: dryness, damp, heat and cold, and the image (idean) to which it was formed, was so formed, and that the most holy and consubstantial Trinity did not create the world, but that it was created by the working intelligence (Nous dhmiourgos) which is more ancient than the world, and which communicates to it its being: let him be anathema.
VII.
IF anyone shah say that Christ, of whom it is said that he appeared in the form of God, and that he was united before all time with God the Word, and humbled himself in these last days even to humanity, had (according to their expression) pity upon the divers falls which had appeared in the spirits united in the same unity (of which he himself is part), and that to
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restore them he passed through divers classes, had different bodies and different names, became all to all, an Angel among Angels, a Power among Powers, has clothed I himself in the different classes of reasonable beings with a form corresponding to that class, and finally has taken flesh and blood like ours and is become man for men; [if anyone says all this] and does not profess that God the Word humbled himself and became man: let him be anathema.
VIII.
IF anyone shall not acknowledge that God the Word, of the same substance with the Father and the Holy Ghost, and who was made flesh and became man, one of the Trinity, is Christ in every sense of the word, but [shall affirm] that he is so only in an inaccurate manner, and because of the abasement (kenwsanta), as they call it, of the intelligence (nous); if anyone shall affirm that this intelligence united (sunhmmenon) to God the Word, is the Christ in the true sense of the word, while the Logos is only called Christ because of this union with the intelligence, and e converse that the intelligence is only called God because of the Logos: let him be anathema.
IX.
IF anyone shall say that it was not the Divine Loges made man by taking an animated body with a yukh logikh and noera, that he descended into hell and ascended into heaven, but shall pretend that it is the Nous which has done this, that Nous of which they say (in an impious fashion) he is Christ properly so called, and that he is become so by the knowledge of the Monad: let him be anathema.
X
IF anyone shall say that after the resurrection the body of the Lord was ethereal, having the form of a sphere, and that such shall be the bodies of all after the resurrection; and that after the Lord himself shall have rejected his true body and after the others who rise shall have rejected theirs, the nature of their bodies shall be annihilated: let him be anathema.
XI.
IF anyone shall say that the future judgment signifies the destruction of the body and that the end of the story will be an immaterial yusis, and that thereafter there will no longer be any matter, but only spirit nous): let him be anathema.
XII.
IF anyone shall say that the heavenly Powers and all men and the Devil and evil spirits are united with the Word of God in all respects, as the Nous which is by them called Christ and which is in the form of God, and which humbled itself as they say; and [if anyone shall say] that the Kingdom of Christ shall have an end: let him be anathema.
XIII.
IF anyone shall say that Christ [i.e., the Nous is in no wise different from other reasonable beings, neither substantially nor by wisdom nor by his power and might over all things but that all will be placed at the right hand of God, as well as he that is called by them Christ [the Nous, as also they were in the reigned pre-existence of all things: let him be anathema.
XIV.
IF anyone shall say that all reasonable beings will one day be united in one, when the hypostases as well as the numbers and the bodies shall have disappeared, and that the knowledge of the world to come will carry with it the ruin of the worlds, and the rejection of bodies as also the abolition of [all] names, and that there shall be finally an identity of the gnpsis and of the hypostasis; moreover, that in this pretended apocatastasis, spirits only will continue to exist, as it was in the reigned pre-existence: let him be anathema.
XV.
IF anyone shall say that the life of the spirits (nopn) shall be like to the life which was in the beginning while as yet the spirits had not come down or fallen, so that the end and the beginning shall be alike, and that the end shall be the true measure of the beginning: let him be anathema.
Pretty clear, Diva. Origen made some very interesting observations early on and was often quite frank to say in some areas he was speculating. But before too long he went off the rails. Others did too. One of the prime examples is Tertullian.