Athanasius of Alexandria - Biography

Biography

St Athanasius was born in the city of Alexandria or possibly the nearby Nile Delta town of Damanhur ca. 296-298. It is speculated that his parents were wealthy enough to afford giving him an esteemed secular learning. In his earliest work, Against the Heathen - On the Incarnation, written before 319, he repeatedly quoted Plato and used a definition from the Organon of Aristotle. He was also familiar with the theories of various philosophical schools, and in particular with the developments of Neo-Platonism. In later works, he quotes Homer more than once (Hist. Ar. 68, Orat. iv. 29). In his letter to Emperor Constantius, he presents a defense of himself bearing unmistakable traces of a study of Demosthenes de Corona (Fialon).

He came from a Christian family, despite accounts to the contrary, as in his writings he tells more than once of an aunt who taught him some principles of the Christian faith, and a father who did the same, as well as mentioning (once) his mother doing the same. He had a Christian brother, and later in his life, in one of his exiles, he hid in his father's tomb in what appears to be described as a Christian cemetery.

He knew Greek and he admits to not knowing Hebrew . The Old Testament passages he quotes frequently come from the Septuagint Greek translation. Ignorant of Hebrew, and only rarely appealing to other Greek versions (to Aquila once in the Ecthesis, to other versions once or twice on the Psalms), his knowledge of the Old Testament is limited to the Septuagint. He was able to write a letter in exile, with no access to a copy of the Scriptures, and quote from memory every verse in the Old Testament with reference to the Trinity without missing any. The combination of Scriptural study and of Greek learning was characteristic of the famous Alexandrian School, of Clement, Origen, Dionysius and Theognostus.

At the time he was a student, the influence of Origen was still felt in the traditions of the theological school of Alexandria. It was from St. Alexander of Alexandria, Bishop of Alexandria, 312–328, himself an Origenist, that St Athanasius received his main instruction. His earliest work,Against the Heathen - On the Incarnation, bears traces of Origenist Alexandrian thought but in an orthodox way. He later modified the philosophical thought of the School of Alexandria away from the Origenist principles such as the "entirely allegorical interpretation of the text" proposed by Origen.