Origen saw this as both necessary and natural. The one great lesson Origen learned from his Neoplatonist teachers was that every human being was made in the image of God, in the same way Plato described all material objects as made in the image of the Forms.31 Of course, the most perfect of God’s images was Jesus Christ himself, His only begotten son. However, everyone of every race, sex, age, or creed, from the lowest slave to the emperor himself, carried that same reflection of perfection.
