(no incipits from the various Ammonian pericopes but the material is a follow up from the previous section: i.e. same Ammonian Matthew 172)
| Comm. Matt. | Citation in (1) | Gospel | Ammonian section (containing the citation) | Ammonian boundary verse (true section start) | Does Origen cite the boundary? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12.36 | Mt 17:1–2 | Matthew | Ammonian 172 (Mt 16:28–17:9) | Mt 16:28 | No — citation begins inside the unit |
| 12.36 | Mk 9:2 | Mark | Ammonian 87 (Mk 9:1–9) | Mk 9:1 | No |
| 12.37 | Mt 17:1 | Matthew | Ammonian 172 (Mt 16:28–17:9) | Mt 16:28 | No |
| 12.37 | Mt 17:2 | Matthew | Ammonian 172 (Mt 16:28–17:9) | Mt 16:28 | No |
| 12.37 | Mk 9:2 | Mark | Ammonian 87 (Mk 9:1–9) | Mk 9:1 | No |
| 12.38 | Mt 17:1 | Matthew | Ammonian 172 (Mt 16:28–17:9) | Mt 16:28 | No |
| 12.38 | Mt 17:2 | Matthew | Ammonian 172 (Mt 16:28–17:9) | Mt 16:28 | No |
| 12.38 | Mt 17:3 | Matthew | Ammonian 172 (Mt 16:28–17:9) | Mt 16:28 | No |
| 12.38 | Lk 9:30–31 | Luke | Ammonian 98 (Lk 9:27–36) | Lk 9:27 | No |
| 12.39 | Mt 17:1 | Matthew | Ammonian 172 (Mt 16:28–17:9) | Mt 16:28 | No |
| 12.39 | Mk 9:2 | Mark | Ammonian 87 (Mk 9:1–9) | Mk 9:1 | No |
| 12.39 | Lk 9:29 | Luke | Ammonian 98 (Lk 9:27–36) | Lk 9:27 | No |
| 12.39 | Jn 17:1–3 | John | Ammonian 153 (Jn 16:33–17:24) | Jn 16:33 | No |
| 12.39 | Mk 9:3 | Mark | Ammonian 87 (Mk 9:1–9) | Mk 9:1 | No |
What this shows, narrowly and strictly, is that every Gospel-text Origen explicitly invokes in 12.36–39 falls within a single identifiable Ammonian unit in your lists—Matthew 172 for the Matthean transfiguration block, Mark 87 for the Markan transfiguration block, Luke 98 for the Lukan transfiguration block, and John 153 for the Johannine prayer block. In that minimal sense, yes: he is citing material that is Ammonian-pericope addressable across all four Gospels.
But if the question is stronger—whether these citations function as evidence that Origen is citing by Ammonian boundaries (i.e., habitually anchoring at pericope incipits/finis, or navigating by unit edges)—the evidence in 12.36–39 is weak, because the lemmata he foregrounds are systematically intra-pericope rather than boundary-marking.
The key phrase he makes programmatic, “Μετὰ δὲ ἡμέρας ἓξ (κατὰ τὸν Ματθαῖον καὶ τὸν Μᾶρκον),” is a classic synopsis-trigger: it is the conspicuous shared wording that lets him align Matthew with Mark immediately. Yet in your Ammonian segmentation the Matthean unit that contains this wording begins earlier (Mt 16:28), and the Markan unit begins earlier (Mk 9:1). Origen is therefore not behaving like someone “entering the unit at its Ammonian start,” but like someone selecting the rhetorically salient clause that initiates the scene of the transfiguration within a larger indexed section.
The one place where Origen’s Greek sounds apparatus-like is in 12.38 when he shifts to Luke with an explicit navigator: “κατὰ δὲ τὸν Λουκᾶν … ‘Μωσῆς καὶ Ἠλίας ὀφθέντες ἐν δόξῃ’ καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως τοῦ ‘ἐν Ἱερουσαλήμ’.” That is a genuine boundary-style instruction (“καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως…”), but even here the “ἕως” endpoint he specifies (“ἐν Ἱερουσαλήμ,” i.e. Luke 9:31 in your citation list) still lies within Luke’s Ammonian 98 (Lk 9:27–36). It reads as excerpt-navigation within a recognized block rather than movement from one Ammonian unit to another.
John is similar. In 12.39 Origen brings in Jn 17:1–3 (your list), but your Ammonian John-unit that contains this begins at Jn 16:33 (Ammonian 153). Again, he is not “citing the unit boundary”; he is selecting a conceptual apex (the high-priestly prayer opening) to interpret prayer/transfiguration motifs (“ὁμιλῇ… προσεύξηται τῷ πατρί”) across the Gospels.
So the best construal is this: Comm. Matt. 12.36–39 clearly exhibits a comparative, multi-Gospel reading practice signaled by Origen’s repeated framing “κατὰ τὸν Ματθαῖον καὶ τὸν Μᾶρκον,” “κατὰ δὲ τὸν Λουκᾶν,” and his ease in importing John; it also contains one explicit excerpting formula (“καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς ἕως…”). Yet the specific Gospel citations you list do not land on Ammonian pericope incipits, and they do not require an Ammonian boundary apparatus to explain them. They are, rather, the naturally prominent intra-pericope “synoptic alignment points” (μετὰ ἡμέρας ἓξ; μετεμορφώθη ἔμπροσθεν αὐτῶν; garments shining; Moses and Elijah in glory; prayer) that an exegete can correlate without invoking unit numbers—though they remain perfectly compatible with a world in which such units are available.
