FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66  
67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   >>   >|  
, is a moot point. But their general purport is clear: they were an apologetic presentation of Jewish life, written to show the falsity of anti-Semitic calumnies. The Jews are good citizens and their manner of life is humanitarian. The Essene sect is a living proof of Jewish practical socialism and practical philosophy, the Therapeutae show the Jewish zeal for the contemplative life. Next we come to Philo's philosophical monographs, which are not, as one might expect, the work of his mature thought, but rather the exercises of youth. Dissertations or declamations upon hackneyed subjects were part of the regular course of the university student at Alexandria, and Philo prepared himself for his Jewish philosophy by composing in the approved style essays upon "Providence," "The Liberty of the Good," and "The Slavery of the Wicked," etc. What chiefly distinguishes them above other collections of commonplaces is the appeal to the Bible for types of goodness, and here again the Essenes figure as the type of the philosophical life.[86] The writer, while still engaged in the studies of the Greek university, is feeling his way towards his system of universal Mosaism. This he expounds confidently and enthusiastically in his "Life of Moses." Philo in this book is not any longer the apt pupil of Greek philosophers, nor the eloquent defender of the Jewish-Alexandrian community against lying detractors. He preaches a mission to the whole world, and he lays before it his gospel of monotheism and humanity. Each Greek school has its ideal type, its Socrates, Diogenes, or Pythagoras; but Philo places above them all "the most perfect man that ever lived, Moses, the legislator of the Jews,[87] as some hold, but according to others the interpreter of the sacred laws, and the greatest of men in every way." And above all the ethical systems of the day he sets the law of life that God revealed to His greatest prophet: "The laws of the Greek legislators are continually subject to change; the laws of Moses alone remain steady, unmoved, unshaken, stamped as it were with the seal of nature herself, from the day when they were written to the present day, and will so remain for all time so long as the world endures. Not only the Jews but all other peoples who care for righteousness adopt them.... Let all men follow this code and the age of universal peace will come about, the kingdom of God on earth will be established."[88] Nor is the Greek to
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66  
67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Jewish
 

greatest

 

remain

 
university
 

philosophical

 
universal
 

written

 

philosophy

 

practical

 

preaches


detractors

 
mission
 

legislator

 

gospel

 

community

 

monotheism

 

interpreter

 

school

 

Socrates

 
Diogenes

humanity

 

perfect

 
defender
 

Pythagoras

 

Alexandrian

 

places

 

continually

 
righteousness
 

peoples

 
endures

follow

 

established

 

kingdom

 

present

 
revealed
 

prophet

 

legislators

 
eloquent
 

ethical

 

systems


subject

 
change
 

nature

 

stamped

 

steady

 

unmoved

 

unshaken

 

sacred

 

feeling

 

expect