On Prayer 4.1 · Sophia Scriptura

Greek text · Koetschau 2:307

Οὐκ ἄλογον δή μοι ἐφάνη τὸ κατὰ τὰς γραφὰς σημαινόμενον πρῶτον διαστείλασθαι τῆς εὐχῆς δύο σημαινούσης, ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ τῆς προσευχῆς· καὶ γὰρ τοῦτο τὸ ὄνομα πρὸς τῷ κοινῷ καὶ συνήθει πολλαχοῦ κειμένῳ τέτακται καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς κατὰ τὸ σύνηθες ἡμῖν σημαινόμενον [τῆς] εὐχῆς ἐν τοῖς περὶ τῆς Ἄννης λεγομένοις ἐν τῇ πρώτῃ τῶν Βασιλειῶν· „καὶ Ἠλεὶ ὁ ἱερεὺς ἐκάθητο ἐπὶ θρόνου ἐπὶ φλιῶν ναοῦ κυρίου. καὶ αὐτὴ ψυχῇ πικρᾷ καὶ προσηύξατο πρὸς κύριον καὶ κλαυθμῷ ἔκλαυσε. καὶ ηὔξατο εὐχὴν καὶ εἶπε· κύριε τῶν δυνάμεων, ἐὰν ἐφοράσει ἐπίδῃς ἐπὶ τὴν ταπείνωσιν τῆς δούλης σου καὶ μνησθῇς μου καὶ μὴ ἐπιλάθῃ τῆς δούλης σου καὶ δῷς τῇ δούλῃ σου σπέρμα ἀνδρὸς, καὶ δώσω αὐτὸν τῷ κυρίῳ δοτὸν πάσας τὰς ἡμέρας τῆς ζωῆς αὐτοῦ, καὶ σίδηρος οὐκ ἀναβήσεται ἐπὶ τὴν κεφαλὴν αὐτοῦ.“

English · Claude translation

It seemed to me not unreasonable first to distinguish the meaning according to the Scriptures, since euchē has two meanings, and likewise proseuchē. For this word too, besides the common and customary sense in which it is used in many places, is also applied in the sense of euchē as we customarily understand it, in what is said about Hannah in the first book of Kingdoms: “And Eli the priest sat on a seat by the doorposts of the temple of the Lord. And she was bitter of soul, and she prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly. And she vowed a vow and said: O Lord of hosts, if you will indeed look upon the humiliation of your servant and remember me and not forget your servant, and give to your servant a male child, then I will give him to the Lord as one given all the days of his life, and no iron shall come upon his head.”

About this passage

Source

Koetschau 2:307 · Paul Koetschau, ed., Origenes Werke 2: Buch V–VIII gegen Celsus, Die Schrift vom Gebet, GCS 3 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1899), 297–403 · Greek text: P. Koetschau, Origenes Werke 2 (GCS 3, 1899), digitized by the Perseus Digital Library and published by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0

Text

As printed in Koetschau, GCS 3. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; the problem in this passage is discussed in the notes.

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Koetschau, GCS 3; made independently of existing English translations. No public-domain English translation exists; reviewed against the Greek.

Scripture

1 Sam 1:9 · quotation, high confidence
1 Sam 1:10 · quotation, high confidence
1 Sam 1:11 · quotation, high confidence

Topics

Prayer

Notes

Translation notes

The quotation is 1 Sam 1:9–11 (1 Kgdms LXX). The sentence about the two words is compressed in the Greek, and the precise contrast Origen draws is uncertain. The editor deletes a repeated τῆς (“the”) in this sentence.

Cite this passage

Origen, Or. 4.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/origen-oratione/4/1/).

Plain text

Origen, Or. 4.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/origen-oratione/4/1/).