And very appropriately do we see that Adam adds this assertion, " She gave me of the tree;" but he gives an habi- tation made of wood and perceptible by the outward senses to the mind except that outward sense itself. For what gave to the mind to be able to distinguish body, or whiteness? Was it not the sight? And what enabled it to distinguish sounds? Was it not the hearing? What, again, endowed it with the faculty of judging of smells? Was it not the sense of smell? What enabled it to decide upon flavours? Was it not the taste? What invested it with the power of distinguishing between rough and smooth? Was it not the touch? Cor- ON THE ALLEGORIES OF THE SACRED LAWS. 123 rectly, therefore, and with complete truth was it said by the mind, that it was the outward sense alone which gave me the power to comprehend the corporeal substance.
XIX. And God said to the woman, " What is this that thou hast done?" And she said, " The serpent beguiled me and I did eat." God asks one question of the outward sense, and she replies to a different one. For he is putting a question which has reference to the man; but she in her reply speaks not of the man but of herself, saying, " I ate," not I gave. May we then by the use of allegory solve the question which was here put, and show that the woman gave a felicitous and correct answer to the question? For it follows of necessity that when she had eaten, her husband did also eat, for when the outward sense striking upon its object is filled with its appearance, then immediately the mind joins it and takes its share of it, and is in a manner made perfect by the nourish- ment which it receives from it. This therefore is what she says, I unintentionally gave it to my husband, for while I was applying myself to what was presented to me, he, being very easily and quickly moved, impressed its appearance and image upon himself.
XX. But take notice that the man says that the woman gave it to him; but that the woman does not say that the serpent gave it to her, but that he beguiled her; for it is the especial property of the outward sense to give, but it is the attribute of pleasure which is of a diversified and serpent-like nature to deceive and to beguile. For instance, the outward sense presents to the mind the image of what is white by nature, or black, or hot, or cold, not deceiving it, but acting truly; for the subjects of the outward sense are of such a character, as also is the imagination which presents itself to man from them, in the case of the great majority of men who do not carry their knowledge of natural philosophy to any accurate extent. But pleasure does not present to the mind that the subject is such as it is in reality, but deceives it by its artifice, thrusting that, in which there is no advantage, into the class of things profitable.
For as we may at times see ill-looking courtezans dyeing and painting their faces in order to conceal the plainness of their countenances, so also may we see the intemperate man acting who is inclined to the pleasures of the belly. He looks 124 PHILO JUD^EUS.
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upon great abundance of wine and a luxurious store of food as a good thing, though he is injured by them both in his body and in his soul. Again, we may often see lovers madly eager to be loved by the ugliest of women, because pleasure deceives them and all but affirms positively to them that beauty of form, and delicacy of complexion, and healthiness of flesh, and symmetry of limb, exists in those who have the exact contraries to all these qualifications. Accordingly, they over- look those who are truly possessed of perfectly irreproachable beauty, and waste away with love for such creatures as I have mentioned. Every kind of deceit therefore is closely con- nected with pleasure; and every kind of gift with the outward sense: for the one bewilders the mind with sophistry and misleads it, representing to it anything that comes before it, not in the character which really belongs to it, but in one that does not. But the outward sense presents bodies, plainly as they are according to their real nature, without any device or artifice.
XXI. " And the Lord God said to the serpent, Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed above all cattle and every beast of the field; upon thy breast and upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. And I will put enmity in the midst between thee and between the woman, and in the midst between thy seed and between her seed, He shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."* What is the reason why he curses the serpent without allowing him to make any defence, when in another place he commands that " both the parties between whom there is any dispute shall be heard,"t and that one shall not be believed till the other has been heard? And indeed in this case you see that he did not give a prejudged belief to Adam's statement against his wife; but he gave her also an oppor- tunity of defending herself, when he asked her, " Why hast thou done this?" But she confessed that she had erred through the deceitfulness of serpent-like and diversified plea- sure. Why, therefore, when the woman had said, " The serpent deceived me, "J did he forbid the putting of the question to the serpent whether it was he who had thus deceived her; and why did he thus appoint him to be condemned without trial and without defence?
* Genesis iii. 14. + Deuteronomy xix. 17. J Genesis iiL 13.
ON THE ALLEGORIES OF THE SACRED LAWS. Ii5 We must say, therefore, that the external senses are not a a peculiar property of either bad or good men, but that they are of an intermediate nature, and common to both the wise man and the fool, and when they are found in the fool, thev are bad; but when they are found in the wise man, they are good. Very naturally therefore, since it has a nature whicli is not necessarily and intrinsically evil, but one which being capable of either character, inclines at different times anu under different circumstances towards either extremity, it is not condemned till it has itself confessed that it followed the worse inclination. But the serpent, that is pleasure, is of itself evil. On this account it is absolutely not found at all in the virtuous man; but the wicked man alone enjoys it. Very properly therefore does God curse it before it has time to make any defence, inasmuch as it has no seed of virtue within it, but is at all times and in all places blameable and polluting.
XXII. On this account also, God " saw that Er was wicked,"* without any apparent cause for this judgment of his character, and he slew him. For God is not unaware that that leathern mass which covers us, namely, the body; for Er being interpreted means leather, is an evil thing, and one whicli plots against the soul, and which is at all times lifeless and dead. For what else does he compel any one of us to do but to carry about a dead body, our soul raising up the body which as far as its own nature goes is dead, and bearing it almost without difficulty? And just consider, if you will, the great energy of the soul, for the most vigorous athlete would not be able to carry about a statue of himself for even a short time; but the soul, without any exertion and without any fatigue, carries about the statue of a man occa- sionally even for as long a time as a hundred years; for even at the end of that period it does not kill it, but only gets rid of a body which was dead from the beginning. And it is evil by nature, as I have said before, and a thing which plots against the soul, but which is not visible (to all men, but only to God, and to such men as are friends to God. " For the wicked Er," says Moses, " was an enemy of the Lord."
For when the mind busies itself with sublime contem- plations, and becomes initiated into the mysteries of the Lord, * Genesis xxxviiL 7.
126 PHILO JUDJ2US.
it judges the body to be a wicked and hostile thing; but when it abandons its investigations of divine things, it then looks upon the body as something friendly, and belonging to and nearly akin to itself; and accordingly it flies to the things which are dear to it. On this account the soul of the athlete and the soul of the philosopher differ; for the athlete attri butes all his importance to the good conditiou of his body, and would throw away his soul itself in the cause of his body, as being a man devoted to his body; but the philosopher, being a lover of what is ' virtuous, cares for that which is alive within him, namely his soul, and disregards his body which is dead, having no other object but to prevent the most excellent portion of him, namely his soul, from being injured by the evil and dead thing which is connected with it.
XXIII. You see that it is not the Lord who is here spoken of as slaying Er, but God. For he does not kill the body in respect of the absolute and irresponsible power which he possesses, and by which he rules and governs the universe, but in respect of that authority which he possesses in consequence of his goodness and excellence, for God is the name of goodness, the cause of all things; that you may understand that he also created all inanimate things, not by his authority, but by his goodness, by which also he created all living things; for it was requisite for the manifestation of the better things, that there should also be a subordinate creation of the inferior things, through the power of the same goodness which was the cause of all, which is God. When, then, 0 Soul! shall you most especially consider that you have gained a victory? Will it not be when you are made perfect, and when you have been thought worthy of decisions in your favour and of crowns? For then you will be a lover of God, not of the body, and you will receive prizes, inasmuch as your wife shall be Thamar the bride of Judah, and Thamar being interpreted means the palm-tree, the symbol of victory. And a proof of this is, that when Er married her, he was at once discovered to be a wicked man, and was slain; for Moses says, "And Judah took a wife for Er, his first-born son, whose name was Thamar; " and immediately afterwards he adds, " And Er was a wicked man before the Lord, and God slew him;" for when the miud has carried off the prize of virtue, it condemns the dead body to death.
ON THE ALLEGORIES OF THE SACRED LAWS. 127 You see that God also curses the serpent without allowing it to make any defence, for it is pleasure: and so also he slays Er without any visible cause being alleged, for Er is the body. And if you consider, O good friend, you will fiud that God has created in the soul some natural qualities which are in themselves faulty and blameless, and also in every soul some which are virtuous and praiseworthy, as is the case likewise with plants and animals. Do you not see that the Creator has made some plants capable of cultivation and useful and salutary, and others incapable of cultivation, wild, pernicious, the causes of diseases and destruction; and ani- mals too of similar variety of character, as beyond all question is the serpent, of which we are now speaking; for he is a destructive and deadly animal by his intrinsic nature. And as the serpent affects man, so does pleasure too affect the soul; in reference to which fact the serpent has been compared to pleasure.
XXIV. As, therefore, God hates pleasure and the body without any especial cause, so also does he give pre-eminent honour to virtuous natures without any visible cause; not alleging any action of theirs before the praises of them which he utters. For if any one were to ask why Moses says that "Noah found grace before the Lord God,"* without having previously done any good thing, as far at least as we know, we shall be very properly answered, that he was proved to be a praiseworthy character and order of creation; for the name Noah, being interpreted, means rest, or just: and it follows of necessity that one who is resting from acts of injustice and from sins, and who, so resting, lives with virtue and justice, must find grace before God; and to find grace, is not only, as some call it, equivalent to the expression " pleasing God," but it has some such meaning as this.
The just man seeking to understand the nature of all exist- ing things, makes this one most excellent discovery, that everything which exists, does so according to the grace of God, and that there is nothing ever given by, just as there is nothing possessed by, the things of creation. On which account also it is proper to acknowledge gratitude to the Crea- tor alone. Accordingly, to those persons who seek to investi- gate what is the origin of creation, we may most correctly • Genesis vi. 8.
]28 PHILO JUD.EUS.
make answer, that it is the goodness and the grace of God, which he has bestowed on the human race; for all the things which are in the world, and the world itself, are the gift and benefaction and free grace of God.
XXV. Moreover, God made Melchisedek, the king of peace, that is of Salem, for that is the interpretation of this name, "his own high priest,'* without having previously mentioned any particular action of his, but merely because he had made him a king, and a lover of peace, and especially worthy of his priesthood. For he is called a just king, and a king is the opposite of a tyrant, because the one is the interpreter of law, and the other of lawlessness. Therefore the tyrannical mind imposes violent and mischievous commands on both soul and body, and such as have a tendency to cause violent suffering, being commands to act according to vice, and to indulge the passions with enjoyment. But the other, the kingly mind, in the first place, does not command, but rather persuades, since it gives recommendations of such a character, that if guided by them, life, like a vessel, -will enjoy a fair voyage through life, being directed in its course by a good governor and pilot; and this good pilot is right reason. We may therefore call the tyrannical mind the ruler of war, and the kingly mind the guide to peace, that is Salem.
And this kingly mind shall bring forth food full of cheerful- ness and joy; for " he brought forth bread and wine," which the Ammonites and Moabites were not willing to give to the beholder, that is Israel; by reason of such unwillingness they are shut out from the companionship and assembly of God. For the Ammonites being they who are sprung from the out- ward sense of the mother, and the Moabites, who originate in the mind of the father, are two different dispositions, which look upon the mind and the outward sense as the efficient causes of all existing things, but take no notice of God. Therefore " they shall not come," says Moses, " into the assembly of the Lord, because they did not come to meet you with bread and water when you came out of Egypt,"f that is, out of the passions.
XXVI. But Melchisedek shall bring forward wine instead of water, and shall give your souls to drink, and shall cheer them with unmixed wine, in order that they may be wholly * Genesis xiv. 18. f Deuteronomy xxiii. 4.
ON THE ALLEGORIES OF THE SACRED LAWS. ] 29 oc;upied with a divine intoxication, more sober than sobriety itself. For reason is a priest, having, as its inheritance the true God, and entertaining lofty and sublime and magnificent ideas about him, " for he is the priest of the most high God." * Not that there is any other God who is not the most high; for God being one, is in the heaven above, and in the earth beneath, and there is no other besides hira."f But he sets in motion the notion of the Most High, from his conceiving of God not in a low and grovelling spirit, but in one of ex- ceeding greatness, and exceeding sublimity, apart from any conceptions of matter.
XXVII. And what good thing had Abraham done as yet when God called him and bade him become a stranger to his country and to this " generation," and to dwell in the land which the Lord should give him?J And that is a good and populous city, and one of great happiness. For the gifts of God are great and honourable. But he made this position of Abraham also to be typical, containing an emblem worthy of attentive consideration. For Abraham, being interpreted, means " Lofty Father;"§ a title of admiration in both its divi- sions. For when the mind does not, like a master, threaten the soul, but rather guides it, like a father, not indulging it in the pleasant things, but giving it what is expedient for it, even against its will, and also turning it away from all lowly things and such as lead it to mortal paths, it leads it to sublime con- templations and makes it dwell amid speculations on the world and its constituent parts. And, moreover, mounting up higher, it investigates the Deity itself, and his nature, through an un- speakable lore of knowledge, in consequence of which it cannot be content to abide in the original decrees, but, being improved itself, becomes also desirous of removing to a better habitation.
XXVIII. But there are some persons whom, even before their creation, God creates and disposes excellently; respecting whom he determines beforehand that they shall have a most excellent inheritance. Do you not see what he says about Isaac to Abraham, when he had no hope of any such thing, namely, that he should become the father of such an offspring, but did rather laugh at the promise, and asked, " Shall a son § Or, "Father of a great multitude," according to the marginal translation in the bible.
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be bom to me, who am a hundred years old; and shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bring forth a child?"* But God asserts it positively, and ratifies his promise saying, " Yea, behold Sarah, thy wife, shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name Isaac, and I will establish my covenant towards him for an everlasting covenant."
What then is the reason which caused this man, also, to be praised before his birth? There are some good things which are an advantage to a man both when they are past, and when they are present, such as good health, a sound condition of the outward senses, riches, if he be endowed with them, a good reputation; for all these things may, by a slight perver- sion of words, be called good things. But some are so not merely when they have been given to us, but even when it is predicted that they shall be so given, as joy is a good affection of the soul; for this does not cheer a man only when it is present and energises actively in him, but it delights him also by anticipations when it is hoped for — for it has this especial quality; all other good qualities have their own separate opera- tion and effect, but joy is both a separate good and a common good, for it comes as a crowning one after all the rest — for we feel joy at good health, and we feel joy at liberty and at honour, and at all other such things, so that one may say with propriety that there is not one single good thing which has not the addi- tional good of joy. But not only do we rejoice at other good things which are already previously past and also at those which are present, but we rejoice also at good things when about to happen to us and expected; as for instance, when we hope that we shall become rich, or that we shall obtain power, or that we shall receive praise, or that we shall find a means to get rid of an illness, or that we shall acquire vigour and strength, or that we shall become learned instead of ignorant, in all these cases we are rejoiced in no slight degree.
Since, then, joy diffuses itself over and cheers the soul, not only while it is present but also even when it is expected, it was very consistent and natural for God to think Isaac worthy of a good name and of a great gift before he was born, lor the name, of Isaac, being interpreted, means laughter of soul, and delight, and joy.
XXIX. Again, they say that Jacob and Esau, the former * Genesis xvii. 17.
ON THE ALLEGORIES OF THE SACRED LAWS. 131 being the ruler, and governor, and master, and Esau being the subject and the slave, had their several estates appointed to them while they were still in the world. For God, the creator of all living things, is thoroughly acquainted with all his works, and before he has completely finished them he comprehends the faculties with which they will hereafter be endowed, and altogether he foreknows all their actions and passions. For when Rebecca, that is the patient soul, proceeds to ask an oracle from God. the answers are, " Two nations are in thy womb, and two people shall come forth from thy bowels, and one people shall be stronger than the other people, and the elder shall save the younger."* For that which is wicked and void of reason is, by its own nature, a slave in the eye of God; but that which is good and endowed with reason and better, is looked upon as powerful and free by him. And this is the case not only when each of these two different characters is per feet in the soul, but when there is a doubt on the subject; for, altogether, a slight breeze of virtue shows power and supre- macy, and not freedom only, and on the other hand, the existence of even an ordinary degree of vice enslaves the reason, even though not by any means as yet come to maturity.
XXX. Again, why did the same Jacob when Joseph brought him his two sons, the elder being Manasses and the younger Ephraim, change his hands, and put his right hand upon the younger brother Ephraim, and his left hand upon the elder brother Manasses? And when Joseph thought this a grievous thing, and thought that his father had unintentionally made a mistake in the matter of the imposition of hands, Jacob said, " I did not make a mistake, but I knew, my son, I knew that this one should be a father of a nation, and should be exalted; but, nevertheless, his younger brother shall be greater than he."t What, then, must we say but this? That two natures, both utterly necessary, were created in the soul by God, one memory and the other recollection, of which memory is the best and recollection the worst. For the one has its perceptions fresh and harmonious and clear, so that it never errs through ignorance. But forgetfulness does, in every ease, precede re- collection, which is but a mutilated and blind thing. And, although recollection is worse, it is nevertheless older than memory, which is better than it, and is also conjoined with and * Genesis xxv. 23. t Genesis xlviii. 1.
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inseparable from it; for when we are first introduced to any art we are unable at once to make ourselves masters of all the speculations which bear upon it. Being, therefore, affected with forgetful ness at first, we subsequently recollect, until from a frequent recurrence of forgetfulness and a frequent recurrence of recollection, memory at last prevails in us in a lasting manner. On which account it is younger than recollection, for it is later in its existence.
And Ephraim is a symbolical name, being, to be interpreted, memory. For, being interpreted, it means the fertility of the soul of the man fond of learning, which brings forth its appro- priate fruit when it has confirmed its speculations, and preserves them in its memory. But Manasses, being interpreted, means recollection, for he is spoken of as one who has been translated from forgetfulness, and he who escapes from forgetfulness does unquestionably recollect. Most correctly, therefore, does that supplanter of the passions and practiser of virtue, Jacob, give his right hand to that prolific memory, Ephraim, while he places Manasses, or recollection, in the second rank. And, Moses, also, of all those who sacrificed the passover, praised those who sacrificed first most, because they having crossed over from the passions, that is to say, from Egypt, remained by the passage, and did not hasten any more to the passions which they had quitted; and the others he also thinks worthy to be placed in the second rank, for, having turned back, they retraced their steps, and, as if they had forgotten what it became them to do, they again hastened to do the same things; but the former men continued in their course without turning back. Therefore, Manasses, who is born of forgetfulness, resembles those who were the second party to sacrifice the passover; but the fertile Ephraim is like those who had sacrificed previously.
XXXI. On which account God also calls Bezaleel by name, and says that " He will give him wisdom and knowledge, and that He will make him the builder and the architect of all the things which are in his tabernacle;"* that is to say, of all the works of the soul, when he had up to this time done no work which any one could praise —we must say, therefore, that God impressed this figure also on the soul, after the fashion of an approved coin. And we shall know what the impression is if we previously examine the interpretation of the name. Now, * Exodus xxxi. 2.
ON THE ALLEGORIES OF THE SACRED LAWS. 133 Bezaleel, being interpreted, means God in his shadow. But the shadow of God is his word, which he used like an in- strument when he was making the world. And this shadow, and, as it were, model, is the archetype of other things. For, as God is himself the model of that image which he has now called a shadow, so also that image is the model of other things, as he showed when he commenced giving the law to the Israelites, and said, " And God made man according to the image of God,"* as the image was modelled according to God, and as man was modelled according to the image, which thus received the power and character of the model.
XXXII. Let us now, then, examine what the character which is impressed upon man is. The ancient philosophers used to inquire how we obtained our conceptions of the Deity? Men who, those who seemed to philosophise in the most excel- lent manner, said that from the world and from its several parts, and from the powers which existed in those parts, we formed our notions of the Creator and cause of the world. For as, if a man were to see a house carefully built and well provided with outer courts and porticoes, and men's chambers and women's chambers, and all other necessary apartments, he would form a notion of the architect; for he would never suppose that the house had been completed without, skill and without a builder; and, as he would argue in the same manner respecting any city, or any ship, or anything whatever that is made, whether it be great or small, so likewise any one entering this world, as an exceedingly large house or large city, and seeing the heaven revolving round it in a circle and comprehending everything within it, and all the planets and fixed stars moving onwards in the same manner and on the same principles, all in regular order and in due harmony and in such a manner as is most advantageous for the whole created universe, and the earth stationed in the central situation, and the effusions of air and water fixed on the boundaries, and, moreover, all the animals, both mortal and immortal, and the different kinds of plants and fruits, he will surely consider that undoubtedly all these things were not made without skill, but that God both was and is the creator of this whole universe. They, then, who draw their conclusions in this manner perceive God in his shadow, arriving at a due comprehension of the artist through his works. * Genesis i. 26.