Annotation CLXXXIX

”I sent you to reap that whereon you have not labored; others have labored, and you have entered into their labors.” — John 4:38

Whether the angels insert souls into bodies.

Origen, in the same thirteenth tome, expounding this passage, said that it is the ministry of the angels to insert into bodies the souls of the men over whose guardianship they preside, and to form the very bodies in the womb — and that this is “the labor of others,” into which the Apostles entered. And he speaks thus: “It must be considered whether, since the angels have been set over the sowing [scattering] of the seed of men, the Apostles — [as] helpers of the perfecting of those [things] which have been sown — enter into the labors of others, [and] reap. And if the matter stands thus, it must also be seen whether the ministry and office of the angels in inserting souls into bodies be not troublesome and full of labor — since they bind together two [things] contrary by nature into one tempering [blend], and at a certain and appointed time begin to apply the care which pertains to each [soul], and bring forth into the light, to bear fruit, him who was before fashioned.” But someone, wishing to oppose these [things], will say that God himself is said to form and fashion [man], in that passage,¹ “Thy hands

made me, and fashioned me”; and in that [other],² “Before I formed thee in the womb, I knew thee.” To which it must be answered, that it can be [the case] that, even [with] the angels [being] set over the birth of men, God says that he himself fashions him in the womb.