Clement of Alexandria

Monday, 23 August 2010 Night Office

Clement of Alexandria's Reading this morning was a real depth charge of Scripture Theology, “Adoration of the Divine Word and God the Father.”

Reading: Titus 2: 1-3, 3: 2.  

From the writings of Saint Clement of Alexandria (Cohortatio ad Gentes l:PG 8, 59-63)

We should live reasonable, honest, and devout lives in this present age, as we wait for the manifestation of the glory of our great God

• The Lord has mercy on us, trains, exhorts and warns, preserves and guards us. He rewards us for our learning more than we could deserve with his promise of the kingdom of heaven, his sole return from us being our salvation. For while evil lives on the destruction of mankind: truth, like the bee, harms nothing in nature, and glories only in the salvation of men.
• So you have the Lord's promise and his love for man; it is yours to partake of that grace. And you need not imagine that my song k50f117 of salvation is something new, like a new piece of furniture or a new house, for as scripture says: He was before the morning star; and: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
• Our own existence dates before the foundation of the world; because of our future destiny our being began in God himself. It is .to the Word of God that we owe our creation as rational beings, and through him that we belong to eternity, because: In the beginning was the Word. So in respect of his eternal nature the Word was and is the divine beginning of all things; but because he has now taken the name of Christ, a name consecrated long ago and worthy of his kingly power, for that reason I call my song new.
• This Word then, the Christ, is he to whom we owe our life from of old, and the goodness of that life, by the fact that he appeared himself to men. This Word, who alone is both God and man, in teaching us to live rightly on earth conveys us to eternal life. For in the words of that holy apostle of the Lord: The saving grace of God has appeared to all, training us to renounce irreligion and worldly desires, and to live reasonable, honest, and devout-lives in this present age, as we wait for our blessed hope, the manifestation of the glory of our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ. (Titus 2: 11-13. NRSV)
• This is the new song of the Word, who was in the beginning, and who has now appeared on earth, our pre-existent Saviour. The Word who was with God, and by whom all things were made, has appeared as our Teacher. The Word, who, as creator, made us in the beginning and gave us life, taught us how to live rightly when he came as our teacher, so that later as God he might grant us immortal life.

The Writings of Clement of Alexandria. Wilson, Edinburgh 1867.

Exhortation to the Heathen (Exhortatio ad Gentes)

Chapter 1. pp.20-23. Exhortation to abandon the Impious Mysteries of Idolatry for the Adoration of the Divine Word and God the Father. 

Clement of Alexandria (c.150-215) Clement was born at Athens of pagan parents. Nothing is known of his early life nor of the reasons for his conversion. He was the pupil and the assistant of Pantaenus, the director of the catechetical school of Alexandria, whom he succeeded in about the year 200. In 202 Clement left Alexandria because of the persecution of Septimus Severus, and resided in Cappadocia with is pupil, Alexander, later bishop of Jerusalem. Clement may be considered the founder of speculative theology. He strove to protect and deepen faith by the use of Greek philosophy. Central in his teaching is his doctrine of the Logos, who as divine reason is the teacher of the world and its lawgiver. Clements’s chief work is the trilogy. Exhortation to the Greeks, The Teacher, and Miscellaneous Studies.