of good
conduct for all mankind. Each of them is a moral type of eternal
validity and represents one of the ways in which blessedness may be
attained.[137] Abraham represents the goodness which comes from
instruction; Isaac, the spontaneous goodness that is innate, and the
joy (or laughter) of the soul that is God's gift to his favored sons;
Jacob, the goodness that comes after long effort, through the life of
practice and severe discipline. Before this triad, the Bible presents
another group of three, who represent the virtues preparatory to the
acquisition of perfect goodness: Enosh, Enoch, and Noah.[138] They
typify respectively, as their names indicate, hope, repentance, and
justice. It is a pretty thought, helped by an error in the Septuagint
translation,[139] which sees in the name of the first (_i.e._, man,
[Hebrew: 'nosh]) the symbol of hope. Hope, the commentator suggests, is the
distinguishing characteristic of man[140] as compared with other
animals, and hope therefore is our first step towards the Divine
nature, the seed of which faith is the fruit. Next in order come
repentance and natural justice, and from these stepping-stones we can
rise to the higher self. Philo's interpretation of these Bible figures
would appear to have behind it an old Midrashic tradition. As far back
as the book of Ben Sira, in the passage on "the Praises of Famous Men"
(xliv), they are taken as typical of the different virtues, and Enoch
notably is the type of repentance. In the first century the world was
becoming incapable of understanding abstract ideas, and required
ethics to be concretely embodied in examples of life. Philo found
within the Jewish Scriptures what the Christian apostles later
transferred to other events.

Joseph, whose life followed that of the patriarchs, is the type of the
political life, the model of the man of action and ambition. Taken
alone, this is inferior to the life of the saint and philosopher, but
mixed with the other it produces the perfect man, for the truly good
man must take his part in public life. The story of Joseph, then,
illustrates the full humanity of Moses' scheme, and it marks also,
according to Philo, the great moral lesson, that if there be one spark
of nobility in a man's soul, God will find it and cause it to shine
forth.[141] For Joseph, until he comes down to Egypt, is not a
virtuous man, but full of conceit and unworthy aspiration for
supremacy; he shows his true worth when he i