Origen and Eusebius Interpreting Psalm 77

The discovery of twenty-nine new Greek Homilies on the Psalms by Origen has consistently widened our knowledge on the Alexandrian’s interpretation of the Psalter. He dedicated nine sermons to Psalm 77, addressing several distinctive points of his exegesis, and especially stressing the spiritual meaning of the historical events recalled in the composition. His interpretation urges the audience to a moral edification and to avoid the perils of heresies, symbolised by the schism between the kingdom of Judah and the kingdom of Israel. Eusebius, who knew Origen’s works on the Psalter, also composed a Commentary on the Psalms which we can partly read from direct tradition (on Pss. 51-95:2a). His interpretation of Psalm 77 is in line with the methodology of the Alexandrian exegesis, inasmuch as it investigates the persona loquens of the psalm or gives importance to the other Greek translations from the Hexapla. However, even if Eusebius never refused the allegorical interpretation, or denied its moral value, he was more interested in explaining the text from a historical point of view, stressing the responsibilities of the Jews for their punishments and thus highlighting the apologetic stance of the events narrated in the psalm. The analysis compares some fundamental key-issues of the two fathers’ exegesis of Psalm 77, so as to highlight the peculiarity of their own interpretations. The account of the different perspectives lets us glimpse the motivations that led Eusebius to pursue a different interpretation from Origen’s, while maintaining the basis of his method.