Philo of Alexandria

Origen's Allegorical Hermeneutic - Revised for Seminary Scholarship Symposium

by Landon Schnabel

Mosaic Torah as Encyclical Paideia: Reading Paul’s Allegory of Hagar and Sarah in Light of Philo of Alexandria’s

by Jason Zurawski

To be presented in the Wisdom and Apocalypticism session at the Society of Biblical Literature annual meeting in Chicago, IL, November 2012.

Philo’s allegorical reading of Genesis’ Hagar, Sarah, and Abraham narrative deals with the advantages, and possible... more Philo’s allegorical reading of Genesis’ Hagar, Sarah, and Abraham narrative deals with the advantages, and possible disadvantages, of a Greek education. In his reading, Hagar represents encyclical paideia, or what we might call liberal arts, subjects pertaining to a specifically Greek education such as grammar, rhetoric, or music. For Philo, this education (i.e. Hagar) was an absolutely essential step for Abraham in the attainment of his true desire, virtue or wisdom (i.e. Sarah), the former preparing him for the latter. While for Philo, Greek paideia was an often necessary means to attaining wisdom, there were dangers involved, namely becoming too devoted to the maidservant to the detriment of the mistress. Sarah banished Hagar because once Abraham obtained wisdom, he no longer had need for the encyclical studies.
Paul’s reading of the narrative, on the surface, seems completely unrelated, and scholars, not surprisingly, have almost universally rejected any connection between the two. While I do not suggest that Paul was necessarily reading Philo, I do believe there is good reason for attempting to understand Paul’s exegesis in light of Philo’s. Two popular topics of conversation among Jews in the Diaspora were, one, Mosaic Law as a means to obtaining wisdom, and two, Greek paideia as a more cautious means to wisdom. Paul’s reading, then, becomes part of this conversation, yet with some fairly drastic innovation due precisely to his new understanding of wisdom, fully available now only as or through Christ. Paul conflates the two paths to wisdom, Mosaic Torah and Greek paideia, the Torah itself becoming Hagar, Philo’s encyclical studies. It has a definite purpose, but once the goal of wisdom is reached, it is no longer needed. Paul, therefore, warns the Galatians of the dangers of returning to the Mosaic Law, as pedagogue and paideia, once having attained true wisdom via Christ. This reading of the allegory shows a consistency in Paul’s argumentation in the letter which has been lost due to the more typical interpretations of the allegory.

Philo and the Presence of the Therapeutrides at Lake Mareotis

by Holger Szesnat

Szesnat, Holger. "Philo and the Presence of the Therapeutrides at Lake Mareotis." Neotestamentica 32 (1998) 191-201.

Philo of Alexandria

by Holger Szesnat

Szesnat, Holger. 2000. "Philo of Alexandria." In Gay Histories and Cultures: An Encyclopedia, Vol. 1, edited by G. E. Haggerty, 685-686. New York: Garland.

Pretty Boys in Philo's De Vita Contemplativa

by Holger Szesnat

Szesnat, Holger. 1998. "'Pretty boys' in Philo's De Vita Contemplativa." Studia Philonica Annual 10:87-107.

Philo and Female Homoeroticism

by Holger Szesnat

Szesnat, Holger. "Philo and Female Homoeroticism: Philo's Use of Gunandros and Recent Work on Tribades." Journal for the Study of Judaism 30, no. 2 (1999): 140-147.

"El heredero de los bienes divinos" [Quis rerum divinarum heres sit]. Introducción, traducción y notas

by Marco Antonio Santamaría Álvarez

En: J. P. Martín (ed.), Filón de Alejandría. Obras Completas, III, Madrid, 2012, 133-221.

A.Destro - M.Pesce, “Le voyage céleste. Tradition d’un genre ou schéma culturel en contexte?”, in N.Belayche - J.-D. Dubois (eds.), L’Oiseau et le poisson. Cohabitations religieuses dans les mondes grec et romain, Paris : PUPS (coll. Religions dans l’histoire), 2011, 361-386.

by Mauro Pesce

Des Hauts-lieux, aux lieux du Temple et de Dieu : Itinéraire d’un symbole de l’Israël antique aux exégèses allégoriques de Philon d’Alexandrie

by Alexandre d'Helt

Co-authored with Baudouin Decharneux, in Bulletin de la Classe des Lettres de l’Académie Royale de Belgique, 21 (2010), pp. 17-38.

Apis, le veau d'or et la religion des égyptiens

by Daniel Barbu

in Ecriture et réécriture, edited by  C. Clivaz, C. Combet-Galland, J.-D. Macchi & C. Nihan (Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium 248), pp. 199-211.

In Memoriam Apostoli Pauli: Plato, Paul, and the Body Politic in Galatians

by Jeffrey Keiser

Presented at the Society of Biblical Literature Annual Meeting, joint Greco-Roman Religions/SAMR session, Sunday, November 20, 2011, San Francisco, California.

This paper challenges received wisdom concerning the Apostle Paul’s alleged rejection of the Platonic metaphor of the... more This paper challenges received wisdom concerning the Apostle Paul’s alleged rejection of the Platonic metaphor of the body as a tomb. Previous scholarship on the subject is surveyed and a new interpretation of the metaphor is proposed, based on a rereading of a key Platonic text, Cratylus 400c, in light of fifth-century B.C.E. Athenian funerary culture. The paper concludes with some remarks on the implications of this new interpretation both for our understanding of Plato’s anthropology and that of the subsequent Platonic tradition, as represented differently by Philo of Alexandria and Paul of Tarsus.

Pan-dôra / omnium munus. Philosophes et apologistes face au mythe de Pandore

by Aude Busine

co-authored with Sabrina Inowlocki, published in Delcomminette, Sylvain et al. (ed), « Mais raconte-moi en détail … »: Mélanges de philosophie offerts à Lambros Couloubaritsis, Ousia - Vrin, Bruxelles - Paris, page 167-178

Jucci - L’essenismo e l’ascesi terapeutica - ocr

by Elio Jucci

Elio Jucci - L’essenismo e l’ascesi terapeutica”, in Aa. Vv., Antiche Vie dell’Antichità. Colloquium internazionale sugli aspetti dell’ascesi nei primi secoli del cristianesimo, Udine 2006, 81-124. (Relazione tenuta ad Aquileia 23-24 Settembre 2005)

L'articolo esamina il tema dell'ascetismo, delineando inizialmente lo status della problematica nel mondo biblico ed... more L'articolo esamina il tema dell'ascetismo, delineando inizialmente lo status della problematica nel mondo biblico ed ebraico più in generale, quindi con un'analisi approfondita degli sviluppi presenti nel movimento dei Terapeuti descritti da Filone Alessandrino, degli Esseni, descritti nelle fonti antiche (principalmente in Filone e in Giuseppe Flavio), della/e comunità descritte nei Manoscritti di Qumran.

Philo’s Reading of the Phaedrus Myth: Breathing Genesis into the Platonic Text

by Jason Zurawski

Paper presented at the 2011 International Society for Neoplatonic Studies conference, "Neoplatonic Philosophy and the East: ex oriente lux," Haifa, Israel.

Throughout his corpus Philo of Alexandria reveals a great fondness for the winged chariot of the soul imagery found in... more Throughout his corpus Philo of Alexandria reveals a great fondness for the winged chariot of the soul imagery found in Plato’s Phaedrus.  Philo utilizes this imagery to, typically, three ends.  First, he regularly enjoys likening the nous as the charioteer of the rest of the soul.  This use serves primarily Philo’s ethical motivations.  Next, he makes use of the Phaedrus myth, particularly the great struggle the cars of the daimones face when trying to follow the gods upward, when treating the Genesis account of the fallen angels who take a fancy to the daughters of men.  Finally, and of chief importance here, when Philo decides to most strongly draw on the Phaedrus, he does so in order to describe the mystical ascent of the nous from the mundane to the noetic.  While these three motifs may seem disparate and unrelated, they all actually fit quite well together in greater service to Philo’s system of cyclic causation, specifically the ascent portion of the cycle.  It is interesting that when Philo most clearly and consciously utilizes the Phaedrus imagery he is concerned with ascent only, and he blatantly ignores the most obvious aspect of the Phaedrus imagery, namely, the descent of souls into bodies.  One would expect that Philo, given his strong Platonic leanings and fondness for the Phaedrus, would have used this imagery as an obvious opportunity to explain the presence of the soul in the body.  But it is exactly this aspect of the Phaedrus myth that Philo omits.  This is due to two factors.  First, Philo prefers to follow the Timaeus and Plato’s suggestion there that the implanting of the soul into the body was done out of necessity and the goodness of the demiurge (42a; 69d), over and against the idea found in the Phaedrus that the descent of the soul was due to some foulness or evil on the part of the soul (246e; 248b-c).  Second, and more fundamental, Philo ignores the descent motif in the Phaedrus because he must negotiate with Gen 2:7 and the divine inbreathing of pneuma into the face of the protoplast.  For Philo, this is the means by which humanity receives its nous, implanted graciously by God via the divine pneuma.  Philo envisions this inbreathing of pneuma as the starting point in a system of cyclic causation that ends with the return of the nous to the divine.

Seminar report on René Bloch's presentation, “Who was Philo of Alexandria? Tracing Autobiographic Passages in Philo”

by Justin A. Mihoc

Published on RBECS.

Prof Bloch presented a very interesting and engaging paper on a difficult topic, the identity of Philo, an important... more Prof Bloch presented a very interesting and engaging paper on a difficult topic, the identity of Philo, an important author for Philosophy, New Testament, Classical and Jewish studies. Following Gregory Sterling, Bloch proposed a study of ‘Philo for Philo’.
He also highlighted the parallels between Philo’s and Moses’ lives as presented by De Vita Mosis. The attraction and great admiration that Philo nurtured for his great biblical hero subsequently required him not to remain indifferent to the suffering of his people and to involve himself in politics as his role model did.

Rezension/Review: M. Böhm, Rezeption und Funktion der Vätererzählungen bei Philo von Alexandria

by Daniel Lanzinger

Rezension zu: Martina Böhm, Rezeption und Funktion der Vätererzählungen bei Philo von Alexandria. Zum Zusammenhang von Kontext, Hermeneutik und Exegese im frühen Judentum (BZNW 128), Berlin/New York 2005; in: Biblische Zeitschrift 53/2 (2009) 296f.

Rezension/Review: S.N. Svendsen, Allegory Transformed

by Daniel Lanzinger

Rezension zu: Stefan Nordgaard Svendsen, Allegory Transformed. The Appropriation of Philonic Hermeneutics in the Letter to the Hebrews (WUNT II/269), Tübingen 2009, in: Biblische Zeitschrift 55 (2011) 151f.

“Seeing God in Philo of Alexandria: The Logos, the Powers, or the Existent One?” The Studia Philonica Annual 21 (2009): 25–47

by Scott D. Mackie

This essay surveys selected Philonic visio Dei passages and demonstrates the presence of four recurring elements in... more This essay surveys selected Philonic visio Dei passages and demonstrates the presence of four recurring elements in all three of the commentary series. (1) The identity of the object of sight varies, not only from passage to passage in a treatise, but even within the same passage. Nevertheless, in all three commentary series there are clear statements of the visibility of the “Existent One” (τὸ ὄν). (2) A hierarchy of visionary accomplishment, based on the spiritual advancement of the noetic philosopher, often determines who is seen, and quite often it is τὸ ὄν who is seen by the highest category of mystic philosopher. (3) The intermediaries operate as autonomous agents, conceptually distinct from τὸ ὄν, both in passages promoting a hierarchy of visionary accomplishment, as well as those depicting the Logos as the ἀναγωγός, the “means and guide” of the noetic ascent. (4) Philo occasionally allows his allegiance to divine transcendence to direct the discussion, and τὸ ὄν is then said to be absolutely “non-visible.” It is also apparent that “intermediary-free” visio Dei passages are not as commonly encountered as those populated by intermediaries, and are most prevalent in the Exposition.

« The Use of Greek and Roman Stereotypes about the Egyptians by Hellenistic Jewish Apologists, with Special Reference to Josephus’ Against Apion », dans Internationales Josephus-Kolloquium Aarhus 1999, éd. par J. U. Kalms, Münster, Lit, 2000, p. 185-221.

by Katell Berthelot

« La mise en cause et la défense de la ‘philanthropie’ des lois juives au Ier et au XVIIIe siècles de n. è. », Revue des Etudes Juives 161/1-2, 2002, p. 41-82

by Katell Berthelot