On the other hand, PhUo is a typical Jew of the Diaspora. He feels as a Greek. To him Greek is his mother tongue ; his Bible is the Greek transla- tion of the Pentateuch. We do not know whether he knew Hebrew, or, if so, how much. His Judaism is weakened and enlarged ; it has lost its strictness and national narrowness. In the former respect it is notable how little attention Philo pays to the Temple at Jerusalem (he never mentions the temple at Leontopolis in Egypt) ; he is concerned Avitli the cultus only in so far as it is prescribed in the Law ; the true sacrifice is prayer. Still more surprising is his neglect of the national hope. The Messiah is mentioned only occasionally (de PrcBiniis et Pcenis, xvi. 95 [ed. Mangey, ii. 423] ; cf. de Exsccr. viii. 164 [ed. Mangey, ii. 435]). His religion has lost its national limitation : it has become a universal reasonable religion.
But Philo's religion has borrowed new features from Hellenism, as, e.g., the notion of mystery (i.e. a hidden wisdom to be revealed only to the initiated [or, with Philo, the susceptible]), and the mystical ecstatic visions. True, there are examples of this in Palestinian Judaism [e.g., the Merkaba, God's chariot in Ezekiel ; for visions of Paradise cf. 2 Co 12^- ■* and Baba Hagiga, xiv. 6), but these are exceptions ; with Philo such things are the rule : all religion comes to perfection in the vision of God (Quis rer. div. her. sit, ed. Mangey, i. 508).
In de Vita Contemplativa Philo describes his own ideal ; and it is of no consequence whether the ascetic circles there described really existed in Egypt or whether he is drawing an ideal picture. It is unnecessary and incorrect to think that Christian monks are in view, as the Fathers did, who praised Philo as the oldest authority for Christian monasticism ; modern critics do the same even when they deny Philo's authorship of the treatise. From the existence of Essenes in Eastern Palestine known to Philo himself {Quod omnis probus liber and Apologia pro Judceis [ap. Eus. Prcep. Evang. viii. 11]) we may infer liow many possibilities there were in Judaism at this period.
4. Philosophy. — Philo was no prophet ; he is interested not so much in religion as in philosophy. Philo the Jew has a place among the Greek philo- sophers. To be sure, he is not an original tinnker. He belongs to the eclectics, deriving his notions from all the different schools and combining them. Sometimes, indeed, hp does not go direct to the
f)rimitive sources but to selections.* The way, lowever, in which he combines Platonic, Pytha- gorean, Stoic, Aristotelian, and Sceptic elements is very significant — significant also for contemporary philosophy. Some elements Philo probably found already combined by Posidonius of Apamea, the leader of later Stoicism, in whose philosophy the religious element is very prominent. The char- acteristic feature with Philo is the combination with Jewish religion : as this rests on revelation, a certain character of authority alien to ancient philosophy is impressed upon Philo's specula- tions.
From Plato, whom he mentions next to Moses and with nearly equal reverence, Philo borrows the doctrine of the Ideas, combining them, how- ever, with the Stoic doctrine of the Logos and the logoi, and clothing it in the form of the biblical doctrines of Wisdom and of angels (it is still dis- puted whether in this late Jewish theory, as well as in the Stoic theory, there is a reminiscence of polytheism, ancient gods being turned into divine attributes, or only a poetical mode of personilica- tionj.t Platonic is the dualistic view of the world : spirit being strictly opposed to matter. With Philo, besides the one transcendental God, who rules over all without mixing in it, there stands a second Divine Being, the Logos, sometimes viewed as God's plan of the world, but more frequently as a personal creative being : he calls it a second God, God's firstborn son, or archangel, begotten, pro- duced, created by God. This Logos is the maker of the world (Demiurge) and at the same time its preserver : He forms the cosmos by dividing, and sustains it by keeping it together. He is the mediator between God and man : revealing God to man, and protecting man against God through priestly intercession — a true paraclete. He guards and governs man, being the norm of his ethical behaviour. In this way the Logos is pre-eminent in all departments of philosophy and human life. From the Logos come the individual logoi, or Ideas or Angels. Entering the material world and forming it, they produce the visible cosmos. Matter is not created : it is eternal in the shape of an unformed substance (chaos). Creation means form-giving (cosmos).
From the Pythagoreans comes the symbolism of numbers, which finds ample support in the Penta- teuch : God has ordered everything according to measure, number, and weight, as already in Wis IV. The monas (one) is the divine number, the dyas (two) the number of creature and of sin ; the trias (three) is the number of the body ; tetras (four) and dekas (ten) mean perfection, possible and real (I0 = I-f2 + 3-^4); five signifies senses, sensuality ;' there is no end of speculation on seven.