Православная Богословская энциклопедия или Богословский энциклопедический словарь. Том I

Alpha and Omega are the names of the first and last letters in the Greek alphabet. The Lord says three times in the Apocalypse (Rev. 1:8,21:6,22:13) that He is Alpha and Omega, that is, as He Himself explains, the beginning and the end or the first and the last (Rev. 21:13); He who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty (Rev. 1:8). This name is a feature of the Apocalypse; but the same thought is also found in the Old Testament, where the Lord God says in the book of the prophet Isaiah: I am the first, and I am the last (Is. 44:6). Jesus Christ, calling Himself Alpha and Omega, thereby testifies to His Divinity, attributing to Himself the properties attributed by the prophets to the true God, from Whom all life comes and to Whom it returns. In both testaments, this expression primarily contains the idea of ​​eternity as an endless continuation, in which the end is inextricably linked with the beginning, and at the same time the idea of ​​​​divine causality: Alpha turns the thought to the beginning, creation, and Omega to the end, the completion of the kingdom of God on earth. This apocalyptic symbol of eternity is also found in ancient Christian writers, for example, in Prudentius and Tertullian (in Prudentius: “A and Ω mean: The very source and completion of everything that is, was and will be,” see Min in Patr. Latin vol. LIX, 863; also in Tertullian, ibid. II, 935). Borrowing this symbol from the Apocalypse, the first Christians, as a testimony to their faith in the Divinity of their Teacher, placed the letters A and Ω on their tombs and in churches with a cross in the middle; they even engraved them on their rings and rings, seals, mosaics and paintings. One of the oldest images of this symbol was found in the catacombs on the island of Melos and dates back to the end of the first or beginning of the second century. It is also found on coins, but not before the reigns of Constance and Constantius, sons of Constantine the Great. In the title we reproduce one of the most remarkable Christian rings of this kind, found in an ancient cemetery in Rome. Ancient Christian ring with the image of Alpha and Omega For a short theological discussion on the topic of Alpha and Omega, see “The Wanderer,” Jan. book for 1867, vol. I pp. 21–22 prot. G. Debolsky; extensive study in Duke's Encyclopedia, 3rd ed. Vol. I p. 1 et seq.