St. Jerome on reading erroneous authors

By Thomas V. Mirus ( bio - articles - email ) | Feb 20, 2026

A couple of weeks ago, I stayed up all night reading St. Jerome’s letters. While not speaking well of my self-discipline, it was profitable in further convicting me against the narrative of Jerome as a man of unjust anger.

One of the most famous controversies in which St. Jerome was involved was over the great 3rd-century theologian Origen, a brilliant and influential writer who unfortunately fell into some serious heresies, such as the pre-existence of souls and the eventual redemption of the damned (even the devil). Origen even influenced some saints in an erroneous direction.

But one thing I discovered in reading St. Jerome’s letters is how moderate his position on Origen actually was. There is a lot we can learn from him about how to approach non-heretical writings by authors who erred elsewhere.

Below I will quote at length from three of his letters, but to paraphrase his position: St. Jerome says, The only reason I am now criticizing Origen so sharply is that you won’t admit that he made errors. If you would just admit that, and we could all agree to reject the bad and take the good from Origen, I would be happy to go back to praising him as much as ever. I would indeed have preferred to pass over his errors in judicious silence, leaving those works untranslated, but since men now trumpet them throughout the Latin world, and even accuse me of agreeing with them, I must become his opponent.

St. Jerome writes: “But you may say, If error is common to many, why do you assail him alone? I answer, because he alone is praised by you as an apostle. Take away your exaggerated love for him, and I am ready to take away the greatness of my dislike.” How often can we say the same!

I relate strongly to this because I had the same experience. My initial attitude toward Origen was that he was a brilliant mind who made some innocent mistakes but is worth reading. But as I became aware of how many people today continue to promote his heresies, especially universalism, I became more hardened against Origen as a dangerous author who never should have been rehabilitated. (Also, I am now skeptical that even in the third century he could be excused for thinking those doctrines were compatible with the deposit of faith.) But if people were willing to limit themselves to reading Origen’s commentaries but not his speculative theology, it would be another matter.

Letter 61 to Vigilantius: “Origen is a heretic, true; but what does that take from me who do not deny that on very many points he is heretical? He has erred concerning the resurrection of the body, he has erred concerning the condition of souls, he has erred by supposing it possible that the devil may repent, and—an error more important than these—he has declared in his commentary upon Isaiah that the Seraphim mentioned by the prophet are the divine Son and the Holy Ghost. If I did not allow that he has erred or if I did not daily anathematize his errors I should be partaker of his fault. For while we receive what is good in his writings we must on no account bind ourselves to accept also what is evil. Still in many passages he has interpreted the scriptures well, has explained obscure places in the prophets, and has brought to light very great mysteries, both in the old and in the new testament. If then I have taken over what is good in him and have either cut away or altered or ignored what is evil, am I to be regarded as guilty on the score that through my agency those who read Latin receive the good in his writings without knowing anything of the bad? If this be a crime the confessor Hilary must be convicted; for he has rendered from Greek into Latin Origen’s Explanation of the Psalms and his Homilies on Job. Eusebius of Vercellæ, who witnessed a like confession, must also be held in fault; for he has translated into our tongue the Commentaries upon all the Psalms of his heretical namesake, omitting however the unsound portions and rendering only those parts which are profitable....I will come to your own case: Why do you keep copies of his treatises on Job? In these, while arguing against the devil and concerning the stars and heavens, he has said certain things which the Church does not receive. Is it for you alone, with that very wise head of yours, to pass sentence upon all writers Greek and Latin, with a wave of your censor’s wand to eject some from our libraries and to admit others, and as the whim takes you to pronounce me either a Catholic or a heretic? And am I to be forbidden to reject things which are wrong and to condemn what I have often condemned already?”

Letter 62 to Tranquillinus: “...you ask me, insignificant though I am, for an opinion as to the advisability of reading Origen’s works. Are we, you say, to reject him altogether with our brother Faustinus, or are we, as others tell us, to read him in part? My opinion is that we should sometimes read him for his learning just as we read Tertullian, Novatus, Arnobius, Apollinarius and some other church writers both Greek and Latin, and that we should select what is good and avoid what is bad in their writings according to the words of the Apostle, Prove all things: hold fast that which is good. Those, however, who are led by some perversity in their dispositions to conceive for him too much fondness or too much aversion seem to me to lie under the curse of the Prophet:—Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil; that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! For while the ability of his teaching must not lead us to embrace his wrong opinions, the wrongness of his opinions should not cause us altogether to reject the useful commentaries which he has published on the holy scriptures. But if his admirers and his detractors are bent on having a tug of war one against the other, and if, seeking no mean and observing no moderation, they must either approve or disapprove his works indiscriminately, I would choose rather to be a pious boor than a learned blasphemer.”

Letter 84 to Pammachius and Oceanus: “We must not detract from the virtues of our opponents—if they have any praiseworthy qualities—but neither must we praise the defects of our friends. Each several case must be judged on its own merits and not by a reference to the persons concerned. While Lucilius is rightly assailed by Horace for the unevenness of his verses, he is equally rightly praised for his wit and his charming style.

…

But it will be said, If you knew these things, why did you praise him in your works? I should praise him today but that you and men like you praise his errors. I should still find his talent attractive, but that some people have been attracted by his impiety. Read all things, says the apostle, hold fast that which is good. Lactantius in his books and particularly in his letters to Demetrian altogether denies the subsistence of the Holy Spirit, and following the error of the Jews says that the passages in which he is spoken of refer to the Father or to the Son and that the words ‘holy spirit’ merely prove the holiness of these two persons in the Godhead. But who can forbid me to read his Institutes—in which he has written against the Gentiles with much ability—simply because this opinion of his is to be abhorred? Apollinaris has written excellent treatises against Porphyry, and I approve of his labours, although I despise his doctrine in many points because of its foolishness. If you too for your parts will but admit that Origen errs in certain things I will not say another syllable.…When once you have rejected these misstatements and have parted them with your censor’s wand from the faith of the Church, I may read what is left with safety, and having first taken the antidote need no longer dread the poison. For instance it will do me no harm to say as I have said, Whereas in his other books Origen has surpassed all other writers, in commenting on the Song of Songs he has surpassed himself; nor will I fear to face the words with which formerly in my younger days I spoke of him as a doctor of the churches.

Will it be pretended, that I was bound to accuse a man whose works I was translating by special request? That I was bound to say in my preface, This writer whose books I translate is a heretic: beware of him, reader, read him not, flee from the viper: or, if you are bent on reading him, know that the treatises which I have translated have been garbled by heretics and wicked men; yet you need not fear, for I have corrected all the places which they have corrupted, that in other words I ought to have said: the writer that I translate is a heretic, but I, his translator, am a Catholic.

The fact is that you and your party in your anxiety to be straightforward, ingenuous, and honest, have paid too little regard to the precepts of rhetoric and to the devices of oratory. For in admitting that his books On First Principles are heretical and in trying to lay the blame of this upon others, you raise difficulties for your readers; you induce them to examine the whole life of the author and to form a judgment on the question from the remainder of his writings. I on the other hand have been wise enough to emend silently what I wished to emend: thus by ignoring the crime I have averted prejudice from the criminal. Doctors tell us that serious maladies ought not to be subjected to treatment, but should be left to nature, lest the remedies applied should intensify the disease. It is now almost one hundred and fifty years since Origen died at Tyre. Yet what Latin writer has ever ventured to translate his books On the Resurrection and On First Principles, his Miscellanies and his Commentaries or as he himself calls them his Tomes? Who has ever cared by so infamous a work to cover himself with infamy?

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Well, had I been ill-disposed towards Origen, I might have translated these very books so as to make his worst writings known to Latin readers; but this I have never done; and, though many have asked me, I have always refused. For it has never been my habit to crow over the mistakes of men whose talents I admire. Origen himself, were he still alive, would soon fall out with you his would-be patrons and would say with Jacob: You have troubled me to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land.

Does any one wish to praise Origen? Let him praise him as I do. From his childhood he was a great man, and truly a martyr’s son. At Alexandria he presided over the school of the church, succeeding a man of great learning the presbyter Clement. So greatly did he abhor sensuality that, out of a zeal for God but yet one not according to knowledge, he castrated himself with a knife. Covetousness he trampled under foot. He knew the scriptures by heart and laboured hard day and night to explain their meaning. He delivered in church more than a thousand sermons, and published innumerable commentaries which he called tomes. These I now pass over, for it is not my purpose to catalogue his writings. Which of us can read all that he has written? And who can fail to admire his enthusiasm for the scriptures? If some one in the spirit of Judas the Zealot brings up to me his mistakes, he shall have his answer in the words of Horace:

‘Tis true that sometimes Homer sleeps, but then

He’s not without excuse:

The fault is venial, for his work is long.

Let us not imitate the faults of one whose virtues we cannot equal. Other men have erred concerning the faith, both Greeks and Latins, but I must not mention their names lest I should be supposed to defend Origen not by his own merits but by the errors of others. This, you will say, is to accuse them and not to excuse him. You would be right, if I had declared him not to have erred, or if I had professed a belief that the apostle Paul or an angel from heaven ought to be listened to in a depravation of the faith. But as it is seeing I frankly admit him to be wrong, I may read him on the same terms as I read others, because if he is wrong so also are they. But you may say, If error is common to many, why do you assail him alone? I answer, because he alone is praised by you as an apostle. Take away your exaggerated love for him, and I am ready to take away the greatness of my dislike.“