| Origen locus | Gospel | Greek boundary marker in Origen | Start (biblical) | End (biblical) | Start Ammonian (Canon; Range) | End Ammonian (Canon; Range) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MAT.COM 12,24 | Matthew | “εἴ τις θέλει … καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς (16, 24–27)” | Mt 16:24 | Mt 16:27 | Matthew Ammonian 170 (Canon 2; “Matthew 16:24–26”) | Matthew Ammonian 171 (Canon 10; “Matthew 16:27”) |
| MAT.COM 12,24 | John | “παρὰ τῷ Ἰωάννῃ … καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως τοῦ ‘ὅπου αὐτὸν ἐσταύρωσαν’” | Jn 19:16 | Jn 19:18 | John Ammonian 196 (Canon 1; “Jn 19:16”) | John Ammonian 198 (Canon 1; “Jn 19:18b”) |
In MAT.COM 12.24–27 Origen’s Greek supplies the kind of internal “apparatus-language” that is most naturally explained by work within a pericope-indexing system of the Ammonian type. The signal is not the explicit mention of Ammonius, still less the citation of section-numbers, but a repeated reliance on formulae that presuppose (i) stable unit-boundaries and (ii) routine, mechanically assisted relocation across evangelists. The opening lemma already frames the unit as a detachable block: “Τότε ὁ Ἰησοῦς εἶπε … εἴ τις θέλει … καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς (16, 24–27).” The phrase “καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς” is not merely a stylistic shorthand for “and so on.” It is a delimiting device that treats Mt 16:24–27 as a recognized segment with a known extent. In other words, Origen can cite an incipit and invoke the remainder as an already-charted continuation. This is exactly the sort of citation-economy that pericope numeration exists to support: the text can be “called up” by a boundary phrase, without needing to reproduce the intervening material.
That same economy becomes more pointed when Origen traverses into John. After elaborating “ἀρνησάσθω ἑαυτόν” and “ἄρας τὸν σταυρόν,” he introduces Johannine passion diction with the same apparatus-style hinge: “κατὰ τὸ εἰρημένον οὕτω παρὰ τῷ Ἰωάννῃ ‘παραλαβόντες οὖν αὐτὸν ἐπέθηκαν αὐτῷ’ καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως τοῦ ‘ὅπου αὐτὸν ἐσταύρωσαν’.” Two features matter. First, “καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως τοῦ …” is an explicit incipit–terminus construction: it marks the beginning by an opening clause, and then fixes the endpoint by another clause, thereby delimiting a contiguous stretch. Second, Origen can move from Matthew’s discipleship saying to John’s crucifixion narrative and then back to Matthew/Mark/Luke (“ὁ δὲ κατὰ τὸν Ματθαῖον καὶ Μᾶρκον καὶ Λουκᾶν … Σίμων γὰρ ὁ Κυρηναῖος …”) without any rhetorical struggle to “find” the place. The movement reads as if the parallels are already laid out—precisely the practical effect of a canon-table culture, whether in full Eusebian form or in an earlier Ammonian environment.
Nor is Origen’s use of “καθεξῆς” incidental. In the ethical illustration “ὁ πάλαι ἀκόλαστος … σωφρονήσας καὶ καθεξῆς,” “καθεξῆς” functions as ordinary Greek (“and the rest”), but its co-presence with “καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς” in the surrounding exegetical scaffolding draws attention to a broader habit: Origen is comfortable eliding text by invoking sequential continuation as a known, navigable thing. In commentary practice, that habit is not merely linguistic; it is infrastructural. It presumes a reader (and author) operating with a textual map.
Against this, the Clementine Letter to Theodore (the excerpt earlier) deploys a more overtly topographical Greek, but its topography is narrowly intratextual. Clement’s “Ἀμέλει μετὰ τὸ … καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως … Ὧδε ἐπιφέρει κατὰ λέξιν … Ἐπὶ μὲν τούτοις ἕπεται … καὶ πᾶσα ἡ περικοπή” is explicit seam-language: “μετὰ τὸ” anchors location, “τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως” delimits range, “ἐπιφέρει” marks insertion, and “πᾶσα ἡ περικοπή” names the unit as such. Clement is policing sequence in Mark by describing what follows what. What is largely absent (in the cited lines) is the cross-Gospel correlational labor that an Ammonian apparatus is designed to facilitate. Clement’s method can be executed with a single Gospel roll and a strong sense of narrative adjacency. Origen’s method, in the passage at hand, is structurally comparative: Matthew is read through John, and John is then set in tension with Matthew/Mark/Luke via the Simon of Cyrene divergence. That comparative routine is exactly where a section-and-canon culture earns its keep.
Accordingly, the two texts witness to “apparatus-thinking” in different registers. Clement’s Greek is the stronger witness for the existence of pericope-conscious reading as an explicit discourse practice—he names “περικοπή” and narrates the Gospel as a sequence of addressable seams (“μετὰ τὸ … ἕπεται”). Origen’s Greek is the stronger witness for the specifically Ammonian function—the systematic coordination of parallels across evangelists—because it repeatedly enacts the logic that an Ammonian apparatus formalizes: lemma-plus-elision (“καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς”), bounded-range citation (“ἕως τοῦ …”), and rapid, confident cross-evangelist relocation in the service of exegetical comparison. On evidentiary grounds, therefore, Clement supplies a vivid demonstration of unit-language; Origen supplies the more probative demonstration of a parallelizing infrastructure.
