(c) What, then, is the function of the powers? They are not intended, as is so often said, to act as personal agents who can take the place of God in all mundane affairs, but to present to our thought the mode in which we may conceive of the Eternal Mind as acting in time and space; or, in other words, they are not meant to separate God from the material world, but to bring Him into contact with it. It is through them that the self-existent Being (6 dv or 7d év) is omnipresent, having filled the universe with Himself. He ‘stretches’ them into every part, as we may stretch our mind to a speaker, or the energies of our souls to God. It is through the powers that God ‘touches’ the soul ; for we can receive only a broken and partial revelation. The passage which is thought to prove decisively the separate personality of the powers is the following: €& éxelyys [otclas] yap mdvra éyévynoev 6 Beds, ox épamrduevos avrds ob yap iv béms daelpou kal mepupuévns trkys padvew tov Wuova cal MaKdptov, ANG Tals dowudrors Suvdmerw, Gv ervov dvoua at idéac, Karexphoaro mpds 7d yévos Exacrov Thy dpudrrovoay Aapety pwoppyy (Sacrificant. 13 [ii. 261]). Yet even
PHILO
PHILO 905
so a a ey
here it is God, evidently used in the highest sense, who generated the universe, and the powers are really ‘ideas,’ which impart form to every genus. God did not touch matter Himself, for that would ay ae He communicated to it the totality of the Divine idea, and that the universe, instead of affording fragmentary glimpses of the Divine thoughts, was a complete revelation of His nature. Again, it is quite in conformity with Philo’s abundant use of figurative language when God and His powers are compared to a sovereign and his attendant bodyguard. Similarly, the human mind, as a king, has its bodyguard of attendant powers (de Migrat. Abr. 31 [i. 462], and several other passages); and the passages where the Divine powers figure most clearly as separate persons may all be explained as instances of this rhetorical style. It is impossible for us to survey these in detail. Some confusion arises also because expositors are not careful to separate Philo’s literal interpreta- tions from his allegorical. Thus the three visitors to Abraham might literally be angels, and yet allegorically might be designed to represent God under three aspects of His being. <A different order of reflexion arises in connexion with the creation of man. The words ‘Let us make man’ point to a plurality of persons. These words would have been quite intelligible if Philo had looked upon all the Divine powers as distinct persons; but in fact he feels their difficulty, and declares that the truest reason for them is known to God only. He treats of them in four passages of considerable length (de Mundi Op. 24 [i. 16f.]; Conf. Ling. 33-36 [i. 480-433]; de Fuga et Inv. 13 f. [i. 556]; and de Mut. Nom. 4 [i. 582f.]); and in these he professes to give only a plausible con- jecture. One distinction is made perfectly clear. Man, unlike the rest of the creation, has been partly formed by inferior agents, whereas the whole cosmos, heaven and earth and sea, was made by the architect Himself, without the co-operation of others. This proves conclusively that the sub- ordinate agents, to whom is assigned the partial creation of man, were not regarded as identical with the Divine powers which were exercised in every part of creation. Man occupies a unique place in that he is liable to sin ; and therefore God delegated the creation of man in part to others, in order that, if evil arose, it might not be ascribed to the Supreme Goodness. These others are angels, and angels are souls flying in the air, and ‘under-servants of God’s powers’ (rods brodiaxdvous avrod Tay Suvdpewy ayyédous, de Monarch. ii. 1 [ii. 2221), Nevertheless, they are themselves spoken of as God’s powers. This apparent inconsistency is easily explained. All objects which embodied a rational idea might be spoken of as powers; but these created and finite manifestations of Divine thought in the elements, in all the lovely sights of nature, and in pure angelic souls in- habiting the air, are not to be identified with the infinite and unbegotten powers which, in our modern language, must be described as attributes of God. While, however, they are distinct to our thought and perception, they participate in the same nature; for it is only through sharing in a Divine idea that matter can receive the impress of rational form, or souls concentrate in them- selves the characters of personality.
7. The doctrine of the Logos.—(a) At the head of the hierarchy of Divine powers was the Logos. This word occasions a good deal of difficulty to interpreters of Philo, owing to the want of any precise English equivalent. It denotes, in its Fichest sense, the mind itself, but more especially the rational faculty. Then it is applied to any rational thought or idea residing within the mind, and is extended to any relation which may be
rationally conceived, to an underlying principle or law, for instance, of numbers or harmony, and to the meaning of anything. From this it passes to any kind of outward expression of some thought or idea, particularly in spoken or written language. Probably its best representative in English is ‘Thought,’ a word which has some approach to the same variable application.