json/Second Temple/Philo/On the Birth of Abel and the Sacrifices Offered by him and by his Brother Cain/English/Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1929.json

{
    "language": "en",
    "title": "On the Birth of Abel and the Sacrifices Offered by him and by his Brother Cain",
    "versionSource": "https://www.nli.org.il/en/books/NNL_ALEPH001216057/NLI",
    "versionTitle": "Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1929",
    "status": "locked",
    "license": "Public Domain",
    "versionNotes": "",
    "actualLanguage": "en",
    "languageFamilyName": "english",
    "isSource": false,
    "isPrimary": true,
    "direction": "ltr",
    "heTitle": "על קורבנות הבל וקין",
    "categories": [
        "Second Temple",
        "Philo"
    ],
    "text": {
        "Introduction": [
            "ON THE BIRTH OF ABEL AND THE SACRIFICES OFFERED BY HIM AND BY HIS BROTHER CAIN (DE SACRIFICIIS ABELIS ET CAINI) <br>ANALYTICAL INTRODUCTION",
            "The main theme of this treatise is the interpretation of Gen. 4:2–4.",
            "<i>v.</i> 2 I. (1–10). He added to this that she brought forth his brother Abel.",
            "II. (11–49). And Abel became a shepherd of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the land.",
            "<i>v.</i> 3 III. (50–87). And it came to pass after some days that Cain brought of the fruits of the earth as a sacrifice to the Lord.",
            "<i>v.</i> 4 IV. (88-end). And Abel brought also himself of the first-born of his sheep and of their fats.",
            "In I. Philo principally meditates on the word “added,” the subject of which he assumes to be God. He holds that addition always implies a removal of something and thus the birth of the Abel attitude of mind, which refers all things to God, implies the removal of the opposite Cain attitude. His thought then passes (5) to the phrase used of the patriarchs “he was added to his people.” He makes comparisons in this respect between Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, thought of as the three who learn respectively by teaching, nature, and practice, and finally contrasts them (8) with Moses, who is not “added” but translated to God’s presence.",
            "The treatment of II. opens (11) with a discussion as to why Abel the younger is mentioned in <i>v.</i> 2 before his elder brother, the answer being that vice is older in point of time, but virtue in point of worth. This is illustrated (15) from experience of life, for the philosophical calm comes later than the passions of youth, then (17) from the story of Jacob and Esau, and finally (19) by the law of Deut. 21:15–17, that the first-born who is the child of the hated wife (<i>i.e.</i> Virtue) is not to be disinherited in favour of the younger child of the beloved wife (<i>i.e.</i> Vice). This leads Philo on to the elaborate allegory (20–44) of the two, as courtesan and chaste woman, pressing their claims upon the mind. Virtue’s harangue, beginning 28, which contains what is probably the most formidable catalogue of bad qualities ever drawn up (32), includes an impassioned eulogy of toil (35–41) and ends with some loosely connected thoughts (43–44) on the inferior value of the secular learning. Her pleading prevails with the mind (45), which becomes what Abel was—a shepherd, and thus we resume the real consideration of the text. The true shepherd controls the unreasoning, but not vicious, faculties (46) and the greatness of the calling is illustrated from various verses in the Pentateuch (48–51). We should here expect some similar interpretation of Cain’s occupation, but Philo dismisses this with the remark that he has treated it in an earlier book (51).",
            "III. The charges brought against Cain in <i>v.</i> 3 are (<i>a</i>) that he offered only “after some days,” (<i>b</i>) that he offered of the fruits, but not of the first-fruits. The first naturally leads to a homily (53) on the duty of ready service. The causes of tardiness are discussed and rebuked by appropriate texts (54–57), and an example of ready thankfulness is found (59) in the story of Abraham, when he bids Sarah <i>hasten</i> to prepare a meal for the angelic visitors of Gen. 18. Two side thoughts are suggested by this story, (1) an interpretation of the three measures of meal (59), (2) of the phrase “buried cakes” (<i>i.e.</i>, cakes baked in the ashes (60) which Philo explains as the duty of reticence about sacred truths; and as this phrase is also used of the dough brought out of Egypt, we are led on to some thoughts about the symbolism of the passover (60–63). We return (64) to the duty of avoiding delay, and Philo dwells on the timelessness of God’s actions, which we should imitate in our worship (64–68). This is contrasted (69) with Pharaoh’s postponement of Moses’ prayers on his behalf, which again is compared with the human tendency to seek help in misfortune from earthly remedies rather than from God (70–71).",
            "The second charge brought against the Cain spirit necessitates an examination of what “first-fruits” are. They must be first in “value,” <i>i.e.</i> virtues (73), but the ἀπαρχή or “first offering” of these is rather an εὐχαριστητικὸς λόγος or body of pious meditation. At this point (74–75) Philo, remembering that in Lev. 2:14 the offering is to be “new, roasted, sliced, pounded,” passes on to an examination of these four, which are treated with much richness of thought. The substance of our meditation must be fresh inspired thoughts (76–79) which will supersede the old-world learning of the schools, dear as that is to Philo (78). It must be hardened by the fire of close reasoning (80–81). It must be “sliced” or divided by careful analysis and classification of the thoughts under their proper headings (82–85), and finally it must be “pounded,” <i>i.e.</i> made part of ourselves by the discipline of repeated meditation (85–87).",
            "IV. The introduction of the subject of Abel’s offering of the first-born of his sheep is immediately followed by a quotation of the directions with regard to the offering of the first-born in Exod. 13:11–13, and the sections 90–117 are almost entirely short homilies on the different parts of this passage. Thus (<i>a</i>) the time of the offering is put at the entrance to Canaan, the “wavering reasoning” from which God means us to escape (90); (<i>b</i>) we have then an apologetic discussion of the words “God sware,” showing that such expressions are a concession to the human tendency to anthropomorphism (91–96); (<i>c</i>) by reading an “if” into the words “and shall give thee,” he draws his favourite moral that we can only give what God has given (97); (<i>d</i>) dwelling on the words “thou shalt set apart” or “separate,” he argues that the ideas of God which we offer to Him must be kept apart from lower and profane conceptions of Him (98–101); (<i>e</i>) “the males to the Lord” means that while the male offspring of the soul are the virtues, those of the “beasts” or senses are such as are kept under control of the mind (102–106); (<i>f</i>) we have an illustrative digression on the similar command in Numb. 15:19–20, to make offering from the “mixture,” <i>i.e.</i> our compound being, and a contrast with the offerings of perfection, in which there is no setting apart (107–112); (<i>g</i>) on the last verse of Exod. 13:11–13, “all that openeth the womb of the ass, thou shalt exchange it for a sheep, but if thou dost not exchange it, thou shalt redeem it,” we are told that the ass is labour, the sheep progress, and that labour, at least in the case of things indifferent, is futile, unless it brings progress, and if futile must be “redeemed,” <i>i.e.</i> set free (112–116).",
            "At this point the word “redeemed” seems to lead Philo to a different line of thought. What is meant by the saying that the Levites were a ransom or redemption for the first-born? Levi—‘sanctified Reason,’ Israel’s first-born, is accepted by God before Reuben, Jacob’s first-born, ‘natural ability’ (118–121). But it means also that the wise are the ransom for the fools. This was shown in God’s willingness to spare Sodom for the sake of ten righteous, and we see it in the saving influence of good men in a commonwealth, and so in the commonwealth of the individual virtuous thoughts redeem the evil (121–126). This last explains the saying that the cities of the Levites are “ransomed for ever,” for this ransom of the soul is a perpetual process (127). This again leads on to a discussion why these cities were assigned as a refuge for the homicide. The Levite like the homicide is a fugitive—from natural ties (129). He too has slain—wicked doctrines as in Exod. 32. (130), and he represents the merciful side of God’s legislative power, as the homicide does the punitive, for he slew “whom the Lord delivered into his hand” (131–133). Finally, when the sanctification of the Levite is assigned to the day when God smote Egypt, we are taught that since that smiting is perpetual, the sanctification is also perpetual (134–135).",
            "We return for a moment to Abel and his offering of the fat, but pass at once to a comment on the fact that neither heart nor brain, the seat of the dominant principle, appear in the sacrificial ritual. Only when this mind of ours has been purged of its tendency to lapses will it be admitted as a proper part of the ὁλοκαύτωμα or “whole burnt offering” (136-end).",
            "There are two special points in connexion with the text which require mention.",
            "The first is that we have for this treatise and that of <i>Quis Rer. Div. Her.</i> the valuable help of a papyrus discovered in Upper Egypt in 1889. Not only is this papyrus considerably older than the other MSS. to which it is most akin, but the analysis given by Cohn goes far to justify his opinion that it presents on the whole a better text.",
            "The other is the history of the sections 21–32, which do not appear in this place in Mangey’s edition nor in Yonge’s translation. These sections containing the allegory of the two women had been incorporated in an otherwise spurious treatise, <i>De Mercede Meretricis.</i> In consequence the archetype of the MSS. from which Turnebus made his edition of 1552 omitted them here, and this was followed in subsequent editions. That their proper place is in this treatise is shown not only by their presence in other MSS., but also by the evidence that Ambrose, whose treatise on Cain and Abel draws largely from Philo, evidently had these sections before him."
        ],
        "": [
            [
                "[1] And He added to this that she brought forth Abel his brother (Gen. 4:2). The addition of one thing implies the removal of some other, as in the case of arithmetical quantities or of our successive inward thoughts.",
                "[2] If we must say that Abel was added we must suppose that Cain was taken away. In case these unfamiliar terms may cause perplexity to many, I will attempt to give as clear an account as I can of the underlying philosophical thought. It is a fact that there are two opposite and contending views of life, one which ascribes all things to the mind as our master, whether we are using our reason or our senses, in motion or at rest, the other which follows God, whose handiwork it believes itself to be. The first of these views is figured by Cain who is called Possession, because he thinks he possesses all things, the other by Abel, whose name means “one who refers (all things) to God.”",
                "[3] Now both these views or conceptions lie in the womb of the single soul. But when they are brought to the birth they must needs be separated, for enemies cannot live together for ever. Thus so long as the soul had not brought forth the God-loving principle in Abel, the self-loving principle in Cain made her his dwelling. But when she bore the principle which acknowledges the Cause, she abandoned that which looks to the mind with its fancied wisdom."
            ],
            [
                "[4] This will be shown still more clearly by the oracle which was given to Rebecca or Patience (Gen. 25:21 ff.). She had conceived the two contending natures of good and evil and considered earnestly, as wisdom bade her, the character of both, when she perceived them leaping and as in a skirmish preluding the war that should be between them. And therefore she besought God to show her what had befallen her, and how it might be remedied. He answered her question thus: “two nations are in thy womb.” That was what had befallen her—to bear both good and evil. But again “two peoples shall be separated from thy womb.” This is the remedy, that good and evil be separated and set apart from each other and no longer have the same habitation.",
                "[5] So then when God added the good conviction Abel to the soul, he took away the foolish opinion Cain. So too, when Abraham left this mortal life, “he is added to the people of God” (Gen. 25:8), in that he inherited incorruption and became equal to the angels, for angels—those unbodied and blessed souls—are the host and people of God. In the same way again the Practiser Jacob, we read, is added to something better, when he left the worse (Gen. 49:33).",
                "[6] Once more there is Isaac to whom was granted the higher gift of self-learnt knowledge. He too abandoned all such bodily elements as had been interwoven with the soul, and is added and allotted to another company; but not this time, with the others, to a people, but to a ‘race’ or ‘genus,’ as Moses says (Gen. 35:29). For genus is one, that which is above all, but people is a name for many.",
                "[7] Those who have advanced to perfection as pupils under a teacher have their place among many others; for those who learn by hearing and instruction are no small number, and these he calls a people. But those who have dispensed with the instruction of men and have become apt pupils of God receive the free unlaboured knowledge and are translated into the genus of the imperishable and fully perfect. Theirs is a happier lot than the lot of the people, and in this sacred band Isaac stands confessed as a chorister."
            ],
            [
                "[8] A further thought of the same nature is revealed to us.… There are still others, whom God has advanced even higher, and has trained them to soar above species and genus alike and stationed them beside himself. Such is Moses to whom He says “stand here with Me” (Deut. 5:31). And so when Moses was about to die we do not hear of him “leaving” or “being added” like those others. No room in him for adding or taking away. But through the ‘Word’ of the Supreme Cause he is translated (Deut. 34:5),  even through that Word by which also the whole universe was formed. Thus you may learn that God prizes the Wise Man as the world, for that same Word, by which He made the universe, is that by which He draws the perfect man from things earthly to Himself.",
                "[9] And even when He sent him as a loan to the earthly sphere and suffered him to dwell therein, He gifted him with no ordinary excellence, such as that which kings and rulers have, wherewith to hold sway and sovereignty over the passions of the soul, but He appointed him as god, placing all the bodily region and the mind which rules it in subjection and slavery to him. “I give thee,” He says, “as god to Pharaoh” (Exod. 7:1); but God is not susceptible of addition or diminution, being fully and unchangeably himself.",
                "[10] And therefore we are told that no man knows his grave (Deut. 34:6). For who has powers such that he could perceive the passing of a perfect soul to Him that “IS”? Nay I judge that the soul itself which is passing thus does not know of its change to better things, for at that hour it is filled with the spirit of God. For God does not consult with those whom He blesses as to the gifts He means to bestow. His wont is to extend His loving-kindness unstinted to those who have no thought of them.",
                "Such is the meaning of the words that God added to the mind the birth of the perfect good. The good is holiness and the name of holiness is Abel."
            ],
            [
                "[11] “And Abel became a shepherd of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground” (Gen. 4:2). Why is it that while he showed us Cain as older than Abel, he has now changed the order and mentions the younger first, when he comes to speak of their choice of occupations? For the probability was that the elder proceeded to his husbandry first, and the younger at a later time to his charge of the flock.",
                "[12] But Moses sets no value on probabilities and plausibilities, but follows after truth in its purity. And when he comes alone to God apart from all, he frankly says that he has no gift of speech (by which he means that he has no desire for eloquence or persuasiveness), and this he says has been his condition from a few days ago when God first began to talk with him as His servant (Exod. 4:10).",
                "[13] Those who have fallen into the surge and stormy sea of life must needs float on, not holding firmly to any strong support which knowledge gives, but trailed along by the flotsam of the probable and the plausible. But for the servant of God it is meet to hold fast to truth and spurn the fabulous inventions of eloquence, which are but baseless guesswork.",
                "[14] What then is the special truth which here he brings before us? Surely that in point of time vice is senior to virtue, but that in point of value and honour the reverse is the case. And therefore when the birth of each is brought before us, Cain may have the precedence. When we make a comparison of the occupations of the two, Abel should take the lead.",
                "[15] For when the life of man begins, from the very cradle till the time when the age of maturity brings the great change and quenches the fiery furnace of the passions, folly, incontinence, injustice, fear, cowardice, and all the kindred maladies of soul are his inseparable companions, and each of them is fostered and increased by nurses and tutors and by the fact that the rules and customs which impress and exercise their authority upon him expel piety and set up in its stead that superstition which is the sister of impiety.",
                "[16] But when the prime is past, and the throbbing fever of the passions is abated, as though the storm winds had dropped, there begins in the man a late and hard-won calm. Virtue has lulled to rest the worst enemy of the soul, that commotion whose waves of passion follow each other in swift succession, and in that firm support of virtue he stands secure.",
                "Thus vice will carry off the honour of precedence in time, virtue the precedence in repute and honour and good name. And to this truth we have a faithful witness in the legislator himself.",
                "[17] For he shows us Esau, who is named after his folly, as elder in point of age, but it is to the younger brother named from his discipline and practice of things excellent, even Jacob, that he awards the prize of precedence. Yet Jacob will not judge himself worthy to accept this prize until, as in some contest of the arena, his adversary has surrendered in exhaustion and yielded up the victor’s crown to him who has waged war without parley or quarter against the passions. For Esau ‘sold,’ we read, the ‘birthright to Jacob’ (Gen. 25:33),",
                "[18] in full admission that as the flute and lyre and the other instruments of music belong only to the musician, so all that is supreme in value, and all to which virtue gives its place of honour, belong not to any of the wicked, but to the lover of wisdom only."
            ],
            [
                "[19] Again the same lesson is taught in a law which Moses enacts, a law both excellent and profitable. It runs thus. “If a man have two wives, one loved and the other hated, and each bear a son to him, and the son of her that is hated is the first-born, it shall be that on the day on which he allots his goods to his sons he shall not be able to give the right of the first-born to the son of her whom he loves, and set aside the first-born, the son of her whom he hates, but he shall acknowledge the first-born, the son of her whom he hates, to give him a double portion of all that he has gotten; for he is the beginning of his children, and to him belong the rights of the first-born” (Deut. 21:15–17).",
                "[20] Mark well then, my soul, and understand who is she that is hated, and who is her son, and thou wilt straightway perceive that to this last alone and to none other belong the honours of the elder. For each of us is mated with two wives, who hate and loathe each other, and they fill the house of the soul with their jealous contentions. And one of these we love, because we find her winning and gentle, and we think her our nearest and dearest. Her name is pleasure. The other we hate; we think her rough, ungentle, crabbed and our bitter enemy. Her name is virtue.",
                "[21] So Pleasure comes languishing in the guise of a harlot or courtesan. Her gait has the looseness which her extravagant wantonness and luxury has bred; the lascivious roll of her eyes is a bait to entice the souls of the young; her look speaks of boldness and shamelessness; her neck is held high; she assumes a stature which Nature has not given her; she grins and giggles; her hair is dressed in curious and elaborate plaits; under her eyes are pencil lines; her eyebrows are smothered in paint; she revels perpetually in the warmth of the bath; her flush is artificial; her costly raiment is broidered lavishly with flowers; bracelets and necklaces and every other feminine ornament wrought of gold and jewels hang round her; her breath is laden with fragrant scents; a strumpet of the streets, she takes the market-place for her home; devoid of true beauty, she pursues the false.",
                "[22] In her train come a sample of her closest friends, villainy, recklessness, faithlessness, flattery, imposture, deceit, falsehood, perjury, impiety, injustice, profligacy; and taking her stand in their midst, like the leader of a chorus, she speaks thus to the Mind. “See here,” she says, “I have coffers containing all human blessings—such as belong to the gods are in heaven—and outside these coffers you will find no good thing. These I will open,",
                "[23] if you will dwell with me, and give you unceasing and unstinted use and enjoyment of all that is therein. But first I wish to recount to you the multitude of joys within my store, so that if you assent it may be with willingness and gladness, and if you turn from them it will not be through ignorance that you refuse. With me you will find freedom from the sense of restraint, from the fear of punishment, from the stress of business, from the discipline of labour; you will find colours all and sundry, sweet modulations of melodious sounds, costly kinds of food and drink, abundant varieties of delicious perfumes, amours without ceasing, frolics unregulated, chamberings unrestricted, language unrepressed, deeds uncensored, life without care, sleep soft and sweet, satiety ever unfilled.",
                "[24] If then you are willing to pass your time with me, I will be your cateress and give you from them all what accords with your wishes. I will join you in considering what food and drink would charm your palate, what sight would please your eyes, what sound your ears, what perfume your nostrils. And of all that you desire nothing shall fail, for you shall find fresh sweets ever springing up to replace and more than replace those which are consumed.",
                "[25] For in the treasure-houses I have spoken of are evergreen plants, which bloom and bear fruit in constant succession, so that the fullness of the fresh fruit, each in their season, ever pursues and overtakes those that have already ripened. These plants never once have known the ravages of civil or foreign war, but from the day that earth took them to her bosom, she cherishes them like a kindly nurse. She makes their roots dive deep and fast below like foundations, she extends the growth above the ground till it soars to heaven. She brings forth branches, which imitate and answer to the hands and feet of living creatures. She causes leaves to bloom like hair, at once to shelter and adorn, and then at the last she gives the fruit, the crowning purpose of the whole process.”",
                "[26] When the other heard this, standing as she was, hidden from sight, yet within earshot, she feared lest the Mind should unawares be made captive and enslaved, and carried away by this wealth of gifts and promises. She feared too lest he should yield to the spell of that countenance so well and cunningly dressed to deceive, for by her talismans and witchcrafts the sorceress was pricking him, and working in him the itch of desire. So suddenly coming forward she appeared with all the marks of a free-born citizen, a firm tread, a serene countenance, her person and her modesty alike without false colouring, her moral nature free from guile, her conduct from stain, her will from craft, her speech from falsehood, reflecting faithfully the honesty of her thoughts. Her carriage was unaffected, her movements quiet, her clothing plain, her adornment that of good sense and virtue, which is more precious than gold.",
                "[27] And in her company came piety, holiness, truth, justice, religion, fidelity to oaths and bonds, righteousness, equity, fellow-feeling, self-control, temperance, orderliness, continence, meekness, frugality, contentment, modesty, a quiet temper, courage, nobility of spirit, good judgement, foresight, good sense, attentiveness, desire for amendment, cheerfulness, kindness, gentleness, mildness, humanity, high-mindedness, blessedness, goodness. The daylight will fail me while I recount the names of the specific virtues.",
                "[28] Ranged on each side with her in their midst they formed her body-guard. She assuming her wonted mien thus began.",
                "“I see yonder Pleasure, that lewd dealer in magic and inventor of fables, tricked out as for the stage, importunately seeking parley with you, and as it is my nature to hate evil, I feared lest being off your guard you should be deceived and consent to the worst of ills as though they were the highest good. Therefore, that you may not through sheer ignorance put from you aught that is to your advantage and purchase for yourself unwelcome misfortune, I judged it well to proclaim to you, before it was too late, the full truth of all that attaches to this woman.",
                "[29] Know then that the finery with which she is bedizened is all borrowed. For of such things as make for true beauty she brings nothing—nothing that comes from herself and is indeed her own. But she has habited herself with a false and spurious comeliness, which is mere nets and snares to take you as her prey, and these, if you are wise, you will see in time and thus make her hunting of none effect. The sight of her is sweetness to your eyes, her voice like music ringing in your ears, but to the soul, the most precious of possessions, her nature is to work mischief through these and all other avenues.",
                "Of what she has to give, she set before you in full such things as were bound to be pleasant hearing, but the innumerable others which do not make for ease and comfort, in malice prepense she hid from you, expecting that none would accept them lightly. But these too I will strip bare and set before you, and will not follow Pleasure’s way, to lay before you only what in me is attractive, and slur over and conceal what involves discomfort. Rather all such things as of themselves offer joy and delight I will pass in silence, for I know that they will speak for themselves in the language of facts, but all that spells pain and hardship I will set out in plain terms, without figure of speech, and show them openly, so that the nature of each may be clearly visible, even to those who see but dimly. For what of mine seems most to partake of ill shall be found by those who make trial thereof to be more beautiful and precious than the greatest goods which Pleasure has to give.",
                "[30] But before I begin to speak of me and mine, I will bring to your mind as much as I can of what she left unsaid.",
                "[31] For she told you of her treasured stores, of colours, sounds, scents, flavours, and all varieties, of the faculties born of touch and all forms of sense, and she heightened this sweetness with the seductiveness of her discourse. But there are other things which are part and parcel of her, the maladies and plagues which you must needs experience if you choose her gifts, and these she did not tell you, that carried off your feet by windy thoughts of some gain or other you might be caught in her net.",
                "[32] Know then, my friend, that if you become a pleasure-lover you will be all these things:",
                "unscrupulous, impudent, cross-tempered, unsociable, intractable, lawless, troublesome, passionate, headstrong, coarse, impatient of rebuke, reckless, evil-planning, ill to live with, unjust, inequitable, unfriendly, irreconcilable, implacable, covetous, amenable to no law, without friend, without home, without city, seditious, disorderly, impious, unholy, wavering, unstable, excommunicate, profane, accursed, a buffoon, unblest, murder-stained, low-minded, rude, beast-like, slavish, cowardly, incontinent, unseemly, shame-working, shame-enduring, unblushing, immoderate, insatiable, braggart, conceited, stubborn, mean, envious, censorious, quarrelsome, slanderous, vainglorious, deceitful, cheating, aimless, ignorant, stupid, dissident, [faithless], disobedient, unruly, a swindler, dissembling, mischievous, mistrustful, ill-reputed, skulking, unapproachable, abandoned, evil-minded, inconsistent, prating, garrulous, a babbler, windy-worded, a flatterer, dull-minded, unconsidering, unforeseeing, improvident, negligent, unpreparing, tasteless, erring, tripping, utterly failing, unregulated, unchampioned, lickerish, easily led, flaccid, pliable, full of cunning, double-minded, double-tongued, plot-hatching, treacherous, rascally, incorrigible, dependent, ever insecure, vagrant, agitated, a creature of impulse, an easy victim, frenzied, fickle, clinging to life, a glory-hunter, violent-tempered, ill-conditioned, sullen, disconsolate, quick to wrath, timorous, dilatory, dawdling, suspicious, faithless, stubborn, evil-thinking, a pessimist, lacrimose, malicious, maniacal, deranged, unformed, mischief-plotting, filthy-lucre-loving, selfish, servile, feud-loving, truckling to the mob, ill-managing, stiff-necked, womanish, decadent, dissolute, a scoffer, a glutton, a simpleton, a mass of misery and misfortune without relief.",
                "[33] “Such then is the true story of that grand pageant which Pleasure, the lovely, the much coveted reveals. This truth she purposely concealed for fear lest, if you knew it, you should eschew association with her. But the riches of goodness that I have stored in my treasuries are such in number and greatness that none can tell of them as is their due. They who have already had part in them know them, and they too whose nature is attuned to them shall in their time know them, when they are bidden to sit down at that banquet, where you shall not find the pleasures that only bring the crammed belly and the bloated body, but where the mind ranging amid the virtues and nourished therewith rejoices and is glad."
            ],
            [
                "[34] For this cause and because, as I said before, things holy in virtue of their essential goodness cannot but through their very nature have speech for us, though we pass them by in silence, I say no more about them. For neither do sun and moon need an interpreter, because their rising by day or night fills the whole world with light. Their shining is a proof that needs no further witness, established by the evidence of the eyes, an evidence clearer than the ears can give.",
                "[35]But in my store there is one thing which seems especially to involve hardship and discomfort, and this I will tell you frankly without concealment; for though at the first encounter it seems on the surface painful to the imagination, practice makes it sweet and reflection shows it to be profitable. This thing is toil, the first and greatest of blessings, the enemy of ease, waging war to the death against pleasure.",
                "[36] For in very truth, God has appointed toil as the beginning of all goodness and true worth to men, and without it you shall find that nothing excellent takes shape amongst mortal men. Toil is like light. Without light we cannot see, and neither the eye nor the colour is capable without the other of creating sight-perception; for before either, Nature created light to be a link between the two, a link which unites and connects the colour and the eye, while in the darkness each is powerless. And so the eye of the soul cannot grasp the practices of virtue, unless it take toil, like light, to co-operate with it. Toil stands midway between the mind and the excellence which the mind desires: with its right hand it draws to it the one, with its left the other, and of itself it creates that perfection of goodness, friendship and harmony between the two."
            ],
            [
                "[37] Choose any good thing whatsoever, and you will find that it results from and is established through toil. Piety and holiness are good, but we cannot attain to them save through the service of God, and service calls for earnest toil as its yoke-fellow. Prudence, courage, justice, all these are noble and excellent and perfectly good, yet we cannot acquire them by self-indulgent ease. It is much indeed if by constant care and practice there arise a kindliness between us and them. Service pleasing to God and to virtue is like an intense and severe harmony, and in no soul is there an instrument capable of sustaining it, without such frequent relaxation and unstringing of the chords that it descends from the higher forms of art to the lower.",
                "[38] Yet even these lower forms demand much toil. Consider all who practise the school-learning, the so-called preparatory culture. Consider the labourers on the soil and all who get their living by some trade or profession. Neither by day nor night do they cast their cares aside, but always and everywhere they cease not to bear affliction, as the saying goes, in hand and foot and every faculty, so that often they choose death in its stead."
            ],
            [
                "[39] But just as those who desire to have their soul attuned and favourable must needs cultivate the virtues of the soul, so those who purpose to gain the same qualities for their body must cultivate health and the powers that accompany health; and indeed all who take thought for the faculties within them, which combine to make them what they are, do so cultivate them with constant and unremitting toil.",
                "[40] “You see then how good things spring and grow from toil as from a single root. Never therefore suffer yourself to lose your hold of toil, for with it will be lost, though you little know it, a vast heap of blessings. The Ruler indeed of all heaven and the world possesses and provides to whom He wills good things in ease absolute. Without toil He made this vast universe long ages ago, and now without toil He holds it in perpetual existence, for to know no weariness is an attribute most fitting to God. But it is not so with mortals. To them Nature has given no good thing to be acquired without toil, that here too God may alone be accounted happy—the one and only blessed being."
            ],
            [
                "[41] Toil, it seems to me, assumes a function similar to that of food. As food has made itself a necessity to life and has joined in the same connexion with itself all the conditions active or passive that are involved in life, so toil has made all good things dependent on itself. And therefore just as those who seek to live must not neglect food, so those who desire the acquisition of the good must make provision for toil, for it bears to the noble and excellent the same relation as food does to life.",
                "“Never then despise toil, that from the one you may reap a multitude, even the harvest of every good thing.",
                "[42] And so though you be the younger in birth you shall be accounted the elder and judged worthy of the elder’s place. And if your life to the end be a progress to the better, the Father will give you not only the birthright of the elder, but the whole inheritance, even as He did to Jacob, who overthrew the seat and foundation of passion—Jacob who confessed his life’s story in the words ‘God has had mercy on me and all things are mine’ (Gen. 33:11), words of sound doctrine and instruction for life, for on God’s mercy, as a sure anchor, all things rest."
            ],
            [
                "[43] He had learnt this lesson under Abraham, who stood as grandfather to his early training, who gave to wise Isaac all his wealth (Gen. 25:5), leaving nothing for the false bastard thoughts bred of his concubines, save little gifts for those of little worth. For the real wealth, the perfect virtues, are the possessions of the perfect and true-born only. But the secondary things of the daily duties are fitting to the imperfect, who have risen only to the primary learning of the schools. These have Hagar and Keturah for their source, Hagar meaning ‘sojourning,’ and Keturah ‘incense-burning.’",
                "[44] For he who contents himself with the secular learning only does but sojourn and is not domiciled with wisdom. He sheds indeed over the soul, as it were, a sweet fragrance from the exquisite niceties of his studies, but yet it is food, not fragrance, that he needs for his health. The sense of smell is but the minister of the sense of taste; she is as the slave who tastes each dish before the monarch; we call her indeed a useful contrivance of nature, yet only an underling. And the sovereign forms of knowledge must ever be served above the subject, and the native-born above the alien sojourner.”",
                "[45] After hearing this the mind turns away from pleasure and cleaves to virtue, for it apprehends her loveliness, so pure, so simple, so holy to look upon. Then too it becomes a shepherd of the sheep, one who guides the chariot and controls the helm of the unreasoning faculties of the soul, who does not suffer them to be swept away in disorder and discord, without a master or a guide, lest their unbridled instincts come to perdition, when they lack the protection and control of a father’s hand, and help is far away."
            ],
            [
                "[46] Surely when the Practiser submitted to “shepherd the sheep of Laban” (Gen. 30:36), of him, that is, whose thoughts are fixed on colours and shapes and lifeless bodies of every kind, he felt that it was a task most congenial to virtue. And note that he does not tend all the sheep, “but those that were left” (<i>ibid.</i>). What does this mean? Unreasonableness is of two kinds. One is the unreasonableness that defies convincing reason, as when men call the foolish man unreasonable. The other is the state from which reason is eliminated, as with the unreasoning animals.",
                "[47] The first of these, the unreasoning movements of the mind, I mean the activities which defy convincing reason, are the charge of the sons of Laban, who were “three days’ journey away” (<i>ibid.</i>), a parable which tells us that they were severed for all time from a good life; for time has three divisions, compounded as it is of past, present and future. But the forces which are unreasonable in the other sense, not those which defy right reason, but merely lack reason (and in these the unreasoning animals participate), the Man of Practice will not disdain to tend. He feels that error has befallen them not so much through sinful wickedness, as through untutored ignorance.",
                "[48] Ignorance is an involuntary state, a light matter, and its treatment through teaching is not hopeless. But wickedness is a wilful malady of the soul, and its action is such that to remove it is hard, if indeed it is not hopeless.",
                "Thus Jacob’s sons, trained under an all-wise father, may go down into Egypt the passion-loving body, and meet with Pharaoh the disperser of the good, who deems himself the sovereign of the animal and the composite; yet they will not be dazzled by his lavish pomp and splendour, but will confess that they are shepherds of sheep, and not only they, but their fathers also (Gen. 47:3)."
            ],
            [
                "[49] And indeed no one could in power and sovereignty find so lofty a cause for boasting as these can in their office as shepherds. Surely to those who can reason it is a prouder task than kingship to have the strength to rule, as a king in a city or country, over the body and the senses and the belly, and the pleasures whose seat is below the belly, and the other passions and the tongue and in general all our compound being—aye and to rule them with vigour and with a right strong yet ever-gentle hand. For like the charioteer he must sometimes give the rein to his team, sometimes pull them in and draw them back, when they rush too wildly in unreined career towards the world of external things.",
                "[50] How admirable again is the example of Moses the guardian of the laws, who, judging the business of a shepherd to be a great and glorious task, took it upon himself. For we find him ruling and leading the thoughts and counsels of the worldling Jethro and drawing them away from the absorbing crowd and tumult of the citizen’s life into the lonely land where injustice is not; for he “led his sheep down into the wilderness” (Exod. 3:1).",
                "[51] It is a natural consequence of what we have said, that “every shepherd of sheep is an abomination to the Egyptians” (Gen. 46:34). For the right reason which is our pilot and guide to things excellent is an abomination to all who love the passions, just as really foolish children hate their teachers and tutors and every form of reason which would warn them and bring them to wisdom. And we find Moses saying that “he will sacrifice to God the abominations of Egypt” (Exod. 8:26), meaning thereby the virtues, these offerings unblemished and most worthy, which are the abominations of every fool.",
                "With good reason then is Abel who refers all that is best to God called a shepherd, while Cain who refers them to himself and his own mind is called a tiller of the soil. But what is meant by a tiller of the soil (Gen. 4:2) I have shown in earlier books."
            ],
            [
                "[52] “And it came to pass after some days that Cain brought of the fruits of the earth as an offering to God” (Gen. 4:3). There are two charges against the self-lover: one that he made his thank-offering to God “after some days,” instead of at once; the other that he offered of the fruits and not of the earliest fruits, or in a single word the first-fruits. Let us examine each of the charges, taking first that which is first in order.",
                "[53] Our good deeds should be done in the spirit of eagerness to anticipate the call, and with slackness and hesitation put right away; and the best of deeds is to do without delay the pleasure of the Primal Good. And therefore it is commanded “if thou vowest a vow, delay not to pay it” (Deut. 23:21). Now the vow is a request of good things from God, and this commandment bids him, whose hopes have been fulfilled, to give the crown of honour to God and not to himself, and to give that crown, if it may be, without delay or loss of time.",
                "[54] Those who fail in this fall into three classes. The first are those who through forgetfulness of their blessings have lost that great treasure, the spirit of thankfulness. The second are those who through overweening pride think that they themselves have caused the good things which have fallen to them, and not He who is the true cause. But there is also a third class who are guilty of an error less blameworthy than these last, but more so than the first named. They accept the Ruling Mind as the cause of the good, yet they say that these good things are their natural inheritance. They claim that they are prudent, courageous, temperate, and just, and are therefore in the sight of God counted worthy of His favours."
            ],
            [
                "[55] To each of these the sacred pages have their counterword. To the first, with whom memory is dead and oblivion strong and living, the scripture says: “When thou hast eaten and art filled, and hast built fair houses and dwelt in them, and thy sheep and oxen are increased, and thy silver and gold and all that thou hast is multiplied, take heed lest thou be uplifted in thy heart and forget the Lord thy God” (Deut. 8:12–14). When then wilt thou not forget God? Only when thou dost not forget thyself. For if thou rememberest thine own nothingness in all things, thou wilt also remember the transscendence of God in all things.",
                "[56] But him that believes himself to be the cause of the good things which befall him the scripture recalls to wisdom thus: “Say not ‘my strength or the might of my hand hath gotten me all this power,’ but thou shalt keep ever in remembrance the Lord thy God who gave thee strength to get power” (Deut. 8:17 f.).",
                "[57] The third, he, that is, who thinks himself worthy of the possession and enjoyment of good, may learn a better lesson from the oracle which says “Not for thy righteousness nor for the holiness of thy heart dost thou go into the land to inhabit it,” but first “because of the iniquity of these nations,” since God visited their wickedness with destruction, and next “that he might establish the covenant which he sware to our fathers” (Deut. 9:5). Now the covenant of God is an allegory of His gifts of grace, and it may not be that any of His gifts should be imperfect. Thus, all the bounty of the Uncreated must be perfect and complete. But amongst all existing things the one that is complete is virtue and virtuous actions.",
                "[58] If then we destroy forgetfulness and ingratitude and self-love and their parent vice, vainglory, we shall no longer through backwardness fall short of true service, but passing over things created, and staying not to embrace aught that is mortal, we shall run and leap to meet our Master, having made ourselves ready to do His bidding."
            ],
            [
                "[59] For Abraham went with all zeal and speed and eagerness and bade Sarah (that is Virtue) hasten and knead three measures of meal and make “buried” cakes (Gen. 18:6), when God came attended by His two highest potencies, sovereignty and goodness, and He, the one between the two, called up before the eye of the soul, which has power to see, three separate visions or aspects. Each of these aspects, though not subject itself to measurement—for God and His potencies are alike uncircumscribed—is the measure of all things. His goodness is the measure of things good, His sovereignty of its subjects, and the Ruler Himself is the measure of all things corporeal and incorporeal, and it is to serve Him that these two potencies assume the functions of rules and standards, and measure what lies within their province.",
                "[60] It is well that these three measures should be as it were kneaded and blended in the soul, that she, convinced that God who is above all exists—God who overtops His potencies in that He is visible apart from them and yet is revealed in them—may receive the impression of His sovereignty and beneficence. Thus too, being admitted into the inmost mysteries, she will learn not to blab or babble them thoughtlessly, but to store them up and guard them in secrecy and silence. For it is written “make buried cakes,” because the sacred story that unveils to us the truth of the Uncreated and His potencies must be buried, since the knowledge of divine rites is a trust which not every comer can guard aright."
            ],
            [
                "[61] The stream that issues through the mouth and tongue of the ill-controlled soul floods in wherever there are ears to hear. Some of these have spacious cisterns which retain the influx. Others, because the passages are narrow, cannot imbibe the stream, and the overflow pouring forth unchecked is dispersed in all directions, while to its surface rise and float the secret truths, and thus like a mass of flotsam our most precious treasures are borne away in the current.",
                "[62] And therefore they, who became partakers in the lesser before the greater mysteries, judged wisely, as I think, for they “baked their dough which they brought out of Egypt into buried unleavened cakes” (Exod. 12:39), that is, they kneaded the savage untamed passion with aid of reason that softened it as though it were food. And the method by which they softened it and wrought it to something better was revealed to them by divine inspiration, and they did not utter it aloud, but treasured it in silence. Their hearts were not lifted up by the revelation; rather they were bowed in submission, and all proud thoughts were humbled."
            ],
            [
                "[63] Let us then say nay to all hesitation, and present ourselves ever up-girded and ready to give thanks and honour to the Almighty. For we are bidden to keep the Passover, which is the passage from the life of the passions to the practice of virtue, “with our loins girded” ready for service. We must grip the material body of flesh, that is the sandals, with “our feet,” that stand firm and sure. We must bear “in our hands the staff” of discipline, to the end that we may walk without stumbling through all the business of life. Last of all we must eat our meal “in haste” (Exod. 12:11). For it is no mortal passage, since it is called the passover of the Uncreate and Immortal one. And right fitly is it so called, for there is no good thing which is not divine and is not of God.",
                "[64] Be this then thy quest, my soul, and that quickly, even as it was with the Practiser Jacob. He, when his father asked him “What is this that thou hast found so quickly, my son?” replied (and the words convey an important truth), “It is what the Lord God set before me” (Gen. 27:20). Long experience had taught him that what the world of creation gives to the soul it makes secure only after long time, as it is with those who impart the arts and their rules to their pupils. They cannot at once fill to the brim the mind of the beginners, as one fills a vessel. But when the fountain of wisdom, God, imparts each form of knowledge to the mortal race, He needs not time for the work. Such persons become apt disciples of the only wise Being and discover quickly what they seek."
            ],
            [
                "[65] Now the first virtue of beginners is to desire that their imperfection may imitate as far as possible the perfection of the teacher. But the divine Teacher is swifter even than time, for not even when He created the Universe did time co-operate with Him, since time itself only came into being with the world. God spake and it was done—no interval between the two—or it might suggest a truer view to say that His word was deed. Now even amongst us mortals there is nothing swifter than word, for the outrush of the parts of speech leaves behind the hearer’s understanding of them.",
                "[66] As the perennial streams which pour through the outlets of their springs never cease their motion, and cannot rest, for the oncoming flow ever impels them, so the current of words, when it begins to move, keeps pace with that swiftest of things in us—swifter than the flight of birds—the understanding. Thus as the Uncreated anticipates all created being, so the word of the Uncreated outruns the word of the created, though that ride with all speed upon the clouds. Therefore it is that He does not hesitate to say, “now thou shalt see if my word shall overtake thee or not” (Numb. 11:23), implying that the divine word has outrun and overtaken all things.",
                "[67] But if the word has proved swifter than all, much more is it so with Him who speaks, as He testifies in another place. “Here I stand there before thou wast” (Exod. 17:6). He shows hereby that His subsistence is before all created being, and that He who is here exists also there and elsewhere and everywhere, for He has filled all wholly and entirely and left nothing where His presence is not.",
                "[68] For He does not say “I will stand here and there,” but even now, when I am present here, I stand at the same time there also. My motion is not one of transference in space, where the traveller leaves one place when he occupies another, but it is a motion of self-extension and self-expansion.",
                "Necessarily then do His loyal children imitate their Father’s nature and, with a forwardness that brooks no delay, do what is excellent, and the most excellent deed of all is before aught else to honour God."
            ],
            [
                "[69] But Pharaoh the “Disperser of the excellent” cannot receive the vision of timeless values, for the eyes of the soul, whereby alone incorporeal natures are apprehended, are blinded in him, nor will he bring himself to get help through what is timeless. When he is plagued by the frogs, those soulless opinions and conjectures, which produce noise and sound destitute and devoid of all reality, Moses said to him, “Appoint with me a time, when I shall pray for thee and thy servants, to take away the frogs” (Exod. 8:9). Though in that dire strait he should have said “Pray for me at once,” he puts it off with the word “to-morrow.” He must needs maintain to the end the unchanging level of his godlessness.",
                "[70] This is the case with almost all the Facing-both-ways, even though they do not admit it in so many words. When anything befalls them which they would not, since they have never had any firm faith in God their Saviour, they first flee to the help which things created give, to physicians, herbs, drug-mixtures, strict rules of diet, and all the other aids that mortals use. And if one say to them, “Flee, ye fools, to the one and only physician of soul-sickness and cast away the help, miscalled as such, of the created and the mutable,” they laugh and mock, and all their answer is “tomorrow for that,” as though, whatever may befall, they would never supplicate God to save them from the ills that beset them.",
                "[71] But when no human help avails, and all things, even healing remedies, prove to be but mischievous, then out of the depths of their helplessness, despairing of all other aid, still even in their misery reluctant, at this late hour they betake themselves to the only saviour, God. He, for He knows that what is done under stress of necessity has no sure foundation, does not in all cases follow His law (of mercy), but only when it may be followed for good and with profit.",
                "So then every imagination which counts that all things are its own possession and honours itself before God—and such a mind is shown by the words “to sacrifice after some days”—may know that it stands in danger to be brought to the judgement-bar for impiety."
            ],
            [
                "[72] We have now sufficiently considered the first charge against Cain. The second was as follows. Why does he make his offering of firstlings from the fruits instead of from the first-fruits? Surely for the same reason, namely to give the first honour to created being and render only the second to God. For as there are some who prefer the body to the soul, the slave to the mistress, so there are those who have honoured the created rather than God. And yet the Lawgiver laid down that we should bring “the firstlings of the first-fruits of the land into the house of the Lord God” (Exod. 23:19), and not ascribe them to ourselves. For it is right that we should acknowledge as belonging to God all the movements of the soul that come first either in order or in value.",
                "[73] The first in order are those in which we became at once participators, when we came into existence, taking nourishment, growth, sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch, reason, mind, the parts of the soul, the parts of the body, their activities, in general their natural movements and states. The first in worth and value are righteous conduct, virtues, and virtuous actions.",
                "[74] Of these then it is right to offer the firstlings, and the firstlings are the word of thanksgiving, sent up out of a true and sincere mind. This thank-offering we should divide into its proper sections, just as the lyre and other musical instruments have their parts. There each of the notes has music in itself and also is fully adapted to make harmony with another. Or again in the alphabet the vocals or vowels are each sounded by themselves and also with the consonants form entire and single sounds.",
                "[75] So with ourselves, for nature has framed in us manifold powers of sense-perception and reason and intelligence, each attuned to some function of its own, and also she has so adjusted them all in due proportion, that they work in unity and harmony with each other. Whether we consider each severally or all together, we may justly say that nature has indeed been happy in her work."
            ],
            [
                "[76] Wherefore, “if you bring an offering of first-fruits,” make such division as Holy Writ prescribes (Lev. 2:14). First the new, then the roasted, then the sliced, and last the ground.",
                "The new is for the following reason. To those who cling to the old-world days with their fabled past and have not realized the instantaneous and timeless power of God, it is a lesson bidding them accept ideas that are new and fresh and in the vigour of youth. It bids them feed no more on effete fables, which the long course of the ages has handed down for the deception of mortal kind, and thus be filled with false opinions, but rather receive in full and generous measure new, fresh, blessed thoughts from the ever ageless God. So shall they be schooled to understand that with Him nothing is ancient, nothing at all past, but all is in its birth and existence timeless."
            ],
            [
                "[77] And therefore in another place we find, “thou shalt rise up away from the head of the hoary and thou shalt honour the head of the elder” (Lev. 19:32). He suggests a vast contrast between the two words. For by “hoary” is meant time which has no activity, from whose presence we must hurry to depart and shun the illusion which deceives the multitude, that time is capable of effecting anything. By “elder” is meant he that is worthy of honour and privilege and high place, and to approve such was the task entrusted to Moses, the friend of God. For “whom thou knowest,” it runs, “these are the elders” (Numb. 11:16), meaning that he would welcome no mere innovation, but his wont is to love the truths that come from older days and are worthy of the highest reverence.",
                "[78] No doubt it is profitable, if not for the acquisition of perfect virtue, at any rate for the life of civic virtue, to feed the mind on ancient and timehonoured thoughts, to trace the venerable tradition of noble deeds, which historians and all the family of poets have handed down to the memory of their own and future generations. But when, unforeseen and unhoped for, the sudden beam of self-inspired wisdom has shone upon us, when that wisdom has opened the closed eye of the soul and made us spectators rather than hearers of knowledge, and substituted in our minds sight, the swiftest of senses, for the slower sense of hearing, then it is idle any longer to exercise the ear with words."
            ],
            [
                "[79] And so we read “ye shall eat the old and older yet, but also bear out the old from the face of the new” (Lev. 26:10). The meaning is this. We must not indeed reject any learning that has grown grey through time, nay, we should make it our aim to read the writings of the sages and listen to proverbs and old-world stories from the lips of those who know antiquity, and ever seek for knowledge about the men and deeds of old. For truly it is sweet to leave nothing unknown. Yet when God causes the young shoots of self-inspired wisdom to spring up within the soul, the knowledge that comes from teaching must straightway be abolished and swept off. Ay, even of itself it will subside and ebb away. God’s scholar, God’s pupil, God’s disciple, call him by whatever name you will, cannot any more suffer the guidance of men."
            ],
            [
                "[80] Again, let the fresh ripeness of the soul be “roasted,” that is tested by the might of reason, as gold is tested by the furnace. The sign that it has been tested and approved is its solidity. For as the grain in the full-grown ears is roasted, that it may no longer be soft and flaccid, and this result can only be attained by fire, so too young aspirations to the ripeness of virtue must be made solid and steadfast by the invincible power of reason. Reason indeed not only can harden within the soul the principles it has acquired and save them from looseness and dissolution, but it also has the vigour to reduce to weakness the impulses of unreasoning passion.",
                "[81] Behold the Practiser Jacob “seething” these impulses, and then the next moment we find Esau “fainting” (Gen. 25:29). For the bad man is based on vice and passion and, when he sees the props on which he rests conquered and robbed of strength by the reason which convicts them, he must in natural consequence find the bonds loosened which knit his strength together.",
                "[82] But again this reason must not be a confused mass, but divided into its proper sections. This is the meaning of “slicing” the offering. Order is better than disorder everywhere, but especially in that nature of swiftest outflow, reason."
            ],
            [
                "It must therefore be divided into main or leading thoughts, the so-called ‘relevant topics,’ and each of these must be provided with its properly constructed development. In this way we shall imitate the skilled archers, who set up a target and aim all their arrows at it. For the main thought is like the target and the developments like the arrows.",
                "[83] In this way we weave into a harmonious whole that noblest of garments, reason; for the lawgiver cuts the plate of gold into threads, to weave them each in its fitting place into a lasting whole (Exod. 36:10). And so reason, which is more precious than gold, the rich and manifold union of myriad forms, is brought to its excellent perfection, if first it be shredded into the utmost nicety of leading thoughts and points, and then through these the arguments and demonstrations which they need are passed like woof through the warp.",
                "[84] Further, there is the command that, when the victim destined to be burnt whole has been flayed, it shall be divided into its limbs (Lev. 1:6), in order that first the soul should be seen in its nakedness without the covering with which false and idle conjectures invest it, and then be divided as the limbs demand. It is virtue which is the whole and is seen as a genus, and it is then divided into its primary species, prudence, temperance, courage, and justice, so that observing the distinctions between each of these we may undertake willing service to them both severally and together.",
                "[85] Let us see to it that we exercise our soul stripped of its encumbrances, that it be not confused and deceived by vague, wholesale, indiscriminate ideas of things, but may divide and classify such things as come before it, and look closely into each, so that it may make its scrutiny with strictest care. And so too we must train our reason, which so long as it flows in disordered current can only create obscurity, but when divided into its proper heads, with the arguments and demonstrations suited to each, will like a living animal be compacted of parts complete in themselves, and made into a harmonious whole.",
                "Once more, if these things are to be our lasting possession we must continually exercise and discipline ourselves therein. For contact with knowledge without abiding in it is as if we should taste food or drink, and then be barred from receiving its nourishment to the full."
            ],
            [
                "[86] So after the “slicing” must come the “pounding,” that is, after division and classification we must continually dwell in and linger over the thoughts presented to our minds. Continued exercise makes solid knowledge, as its absence makes ignorance. We see how great is the multitude of those who, through shirking bodily training, have enfeebled their natural strength. Not such an example did those follow who fed their soul with the heavenly food called manna. They ground and chafed it and made of it “buried” cakes (Numb. 11:8), judging it right to crush and grind virtue’s heaven-sent discourse, that its impress on their understanding might be the firmer.",
                "[87] When then you acknowledge as God wills these four things, the new,’ that is the blossom or vigour; the ‘roasted,’ that is the fire-tested and invincible reason; the ‘sliced,’ that is the division of things into their classes; the ‘pounded,’ that is the persistent practice and exercise in what the mind has grasped, you will bring an offering of the first-fruits, even the first and best offspring of the soul. Yet even if we are slow to do this, He Himself is not slow to take to Himself those who are fit for His service. “I will take you,” He says, “to be My people and I will be your God (Exod. 6:7), and ye shall be to Me a people. I am the Lord” (Lev. 26:12)."
            ],
            [
                "[88] Such were the charges brought against Cain who made his offering after many days. But Abel brought other offerings and in other manner. His offering was living, Cain’s was lifeless. His was first in age and value, Cain’s but second. His had strength and superior fatness, Cain’s had but weakness. For we are told that Abel offered of the firstlings of the sheep and of their fat (Gen. 4:4).",
                "[89] And thus he fulfilled the sacred ordinance, “It shall be when the Lord thy God has brought thee into the land of the Canaanites, as He sware to thy fathers, and shall give it unto thee, thou shalt separate everything that opens the womb that is male unto the Lord; everything that opens the womb from thy herds among thy cattle, all that are born to thee, the males to the Lord. All that opens the womb of an ass, thou shalt exchange for a sheep; but if thou dost not exchange it, thou shalt redeem it”(Exod. 13:11–13). That which opens the womb is the first-born, that is Abel’s gift, and the time and method of this offering is a matter for thy search.",
                "[90] The fittest time indeed is when God has brought thee where reason is tossed to and fro, that is to the land of the Canaanites. He brought thee there in no random manner, but according to His own oath. And He brought thee there not to be carried hither and thither, ever passive amid the surge and eddy and swirl, but that quit of the wild sea thou shouldst spend thy days under clear sky and in calm water, and reaching virtue as an anchorage or roadstead, or haven of most sure shelter, mightest there find a stable resting-place."
            ],
            [
                "[91] But, when he tells us that God sware an oath, we must consider whether he lays down that such a thing can with truth be ascribed to God, since to thousands it seems unworthy of Him. For our conception of an oath is an appeal to God as a witness on some disputed matter. But nothing is uncertain or open to dispute with God.",
                "[92] He it is who has shown to all others plainly the signs whereby they may know the truth. Truly He needs no witness, for there is no other god to be His peer. I need not argue that he who bears witness, in so far as he is a witness, is superior to him for whom the witness is given. For the one craves help, the other renders it, and the latter condition is always more excellent than the former. But there is nothing better than the Cause—even to think the thought were blasphemy—since there is nothing equal to Him, or even but a little below. The gulf that separates God from what comes next to Him is one of kind and nature.",
                "[93] Now men have recourse to oaths to win belief, when others deem them untrustworthy; but God is trustworthy in His speech as elsewhere, so that His words in certitude and assurance differ not a whit from oaths. And so it is that while with us the oath gives warrant for our sincerity, it is itself guaranteed by God. For the oath does not make God trustworthy; it is God that assures the oath."
            ],
            [
                "[94] Why then did it seem well to the prophet and revealer to represent God as binding Himself by an oath? It was to convince created man of his weakness and to accompany conviction with help and comfort. We are not able to cherish continually in our souls the thought which sums so worthily the nature of the Cause, that “God is not as man” (Numb. 23:19), and thus rise superior to all the human conceptions of Him.",
                "[95] In us the mortal is the chief ingredient. We cannot get outside ourselves in forming our ideas; we cannot escape our inborn infirmities. We creep within our covering of mortality, like snails into their shells, or like the hedgehog we roll ourselves into a ball, and we think of the blessed and the immortal in terms of our own natures. We shun indeed in words the monstrosity of saying that God is of human form, but in actual fact we accept the impious thought that He is of human passions.",
                "[96] And therefore we invent for Him hands and feet, incomings and outgoings, enmities, aversions, estrangements, anger, in fact such parts and passions as can never belong to the Cause. And of such is the oath—a mere crutch for our weakness.",
                "[97] So to resume, “if God gives such and such to thee, thou shalt separate them” (Exod. 13:11). Thus does Moses condition his command. Yes, for unless He gives, thou shalt not have, since all things are His possessions, all things outside thee, and the body, the senses, the reason, the mind, and the functions of them all; and not thyself only, but this world also. And whatsoever thou severest or dividest from it for thy use, thou shalt find to be not thine but Another’s. Earth and water, air, sky, stars, all forms of living creatures and plants, things that perish and things that perish not, thou dost not hold in ownership. Therefore whatsoever thou bringest as an offering, thou wilt offer God’s possession and not thine own."
            ],
            [
                "[98] Again note the true sense of holiness shown in the command to separate from what has been given us, not to bring all. For numberless are the gifts assigned by nature to mankind as their portion, in none of which does she herself participate. She is unborn yet gives birth, needs no nourishment yet gives it, changes not yet gives growth, admits neither of diminishment nor increase yet gives the ages of life in succession; she gives that bodily organization which has the power to take and give, advance, see, hear, absorb food, cast it forth when digested, distinguish flavours, utter speech, and do the many other things which belong to those offices which are at once useful and necessary.",
                "[99] Perhaps it may be said that, while these are but indifferent things, nature must have taken for her own undoubted forms of good. Let us test then, among these truly named “good” things, those which in our judgement are most admired, all of which we pray to attain at their proper seasons, and whose attainment is counted our greatest happiness.",
                "[100] Such are a happy old age and a happy death. We all know that they are the greatest blessings that can befall mankind, and yet in neither has nature any share, for she knows neither old age nor death. And why should we count it strange that the uncreated does not deign to use the good which belongs to the created, when even the created itself lays claim to virtues varying according to the different species into which it is divided? Men could not contest with women, nor women with men, the functions which fitly belong only to the other sex.",
                "[101] If women should affect the practices of men, or men attempt those of women, they will in each case be held to belie their sex and win an ill name thereby. And some virtues and excellences nature has so discriminated, that not even long practice could make them common property. To sow and beget belongs to the man and is his peculiar excellence, and no woman could attain to it. Again welfare in child-bearing is a good thing belonging to women, but the nature of man admits not of it. Thus even the phrase “as a man” (cherisheth his son) (Deut. 1:31) is not used of God in its literal sense, but is a term used in figure, a word of help to our feeble apprehension. Separate, therefore, my soul, all that is created, mortal, mutable, profane, from thy conception of God the uncreated, the unchangeable, the immortal, the holy and solely blessed."
            ],
            [
                "[102] The words “of all that openeth the womb, the males to the Lord,” are indeed true to nature. For as nature has given the womb to women as the proper part for generation of living offspring, so she has set in the soul for the generation of things a power by which the understanding conceives and travails and is the mother of many children.",
                "[103] Of the thoughts thus brought to the birth some are male and some female, just as in the case of living beings. The female offspring of the soul is vice and passion, that emasculating influence which affects us in each of our pursuits. The male offspring is health of soul and virtue, by which we are stimulated and strengthened. Of these the men’s quarters must be dedicated wholly to God, the women’s quarters must be set to our own account, and therefore we have the command “all that openeth the womb, the males to the Lord.”"
            ],
            [
                "[104] But we also find “everything which openeth the womb from thy herds amongst thy cattle, all that are born to thee, the males to the Lord” (Exod. 13:12). Having spoken of the offspring of the ruling element he proceeds to instruct us as to the offspring of the unreasoning element, the element allotted to the senses, which he likens to cattle. Now the younglings that are reared among the herd are tame and docile, because they are guided by the care of the herdsman who rules them. For those that roam at large and in liberty become wild for want of one to tame them, but those who are led by goatherd, neat-herd, shepherd, and the like, the herdsman, that is, who tends whatever kind of animal it may be, must needs be tame and gentle. So then, the senses also as a kind may be either wild or tame.",
                "[105] They are wild when, throwing off the control of their herdsman the mind, they are carried away in their unreason into the outer sphere of things perceptible by them. They are tame when they respond submissively to reflection, the ruling element in our compound nature, and accept its guidance and control. Whatsoever then sense sees or hears or in general perceives under the direction of the mind is male and perfect, for each perception is made under good conditions.",
                "[106] But whatsoever lacks that guide works destruction in our body, as anarchy does in a city. So then here, as in the former case, we must admit that the motions of the senses, which obey the mind and necessarily are of the better kind, come to pass through God’s will, but those which reject control must be held to belong to ourselves, when propelled by the external objects of sense we are carried away in unreasoning course."
            ],
            [
                "[107] Again we are bidden to set apart not only from these but from the “whole mixture.” The words of the commandment are as follows, “and it shall be that when ye eat of the bread of the land, ye shall set apart a portion marked out for the Lord: a loaf as the first offering of your mixture, ye shall set it apart as a portion. As ye do with a portion from the threshing-floor, so shall ye set it apart” (Numb. 15:19–20).",
                "[108] The “mixture” then is ourselves, and indeed in a literal sense, so many substances are brought together and compounded in us, to make our complete selves. Cold and heat, wet and dry, such opposite forces as these were blended and combined by the moulder of living creatures to produce that single congeries the individual, and it is from this that it is here called a “mixture.”",
                "Of this congeries, in which soul and body hold the place of primary divisions, we must dedicate the firstlings.",
                "[109] These firstlings are the sacred impulses which accord with the excellence of either, and therefore also we have the comparison with the threshing-floor. For as on the threshing-floor the wheat, barley, and other grain are gathered apart, while the chaff and husk and any other refuse are scattered elsewhither, so too in us there are the best, the profitable elements which provide that true nourishment, whereby right living is brought to its fullness. These it is which must be dedicated to God, while the rest which has nothing of the divine must be left as refuse to mortality. It is from the former then that we must take for our offering.",
                "[110] But there are some powers which are pure from evil through and through, and these we must not mutilate by severing into their parts. These are like the undivided sacrifices, the whole burnt-offerings of which Isaac is a clear example, whom God commanded to be offered in victim’s fashion, because he had no part or lot in any passion which breeds corruption.",
                "[111] And the same truth is taught in another passage, “my gifts, my offerings, my fruits ye shall observe to offer me at my feasts” (Numb. 28:2). No word here of setting apart or dividing: they are to be brought full, perfect, and complete. For the soul’s feast is the joy and gladness which the perfect virtues bring, and by perfect is meant virtues unspotted by all the tainting evils to which the human race is liable. Such a feast the wise man only can keep and save him none other. For hardly ever shall you find a soul which has never tasted of passions or vices."
            ],
            [
                "[112] Having given us the doctrine of the parts of the soul, of the ruling part and the subject part, and having shown also in each of these what is the masculine and what the feminine element, Moses proceeds to teach us the lesson that follows next. He knows well that without toil and care it is not possible for male offspring to fall to our lot. Thus his next words are “all that openeth the womb of an ass, thou shalt exchange for a sheep” (Exod. 13:13). It is as much as to say exchange all toil for progress. For the ass is the symbol of toil—he is a patient beast—and the sheep of progress, as the very name shows.",
                "[113] Come then to the study of the arts, or the trades, or whatever else can be taught and learnt, not with disdain or slackness, but with all care and attention, with your mind braced to endure patiently all manner of drudgery, and at the same time be at pains not to be held in bondage by fruitless toil, but to bring your labour to the most honourable conclusion and win progress and betterment. For toil is to be borne for the sake of progress.",
                "[114] But if it should chance that with all your acceptance of labour and its drudgery your nature gains nothing, but refuses the improvement which progress should bring, turn from it and desist. It is a weary task to oppose nature. And therefore it is that he adds “if thou dost not exchange it, thou shalt redeem it” (Exod. 13:13): that is, if you cannot gain progress in exchange for your labour, let the labour go as well, for the word “redeem” suggests such a meaning, namely that you shall free your soul from the care that has no end and accomplishes nothing."
            ],
            [
                "[115] But these words do not apply to the virtues, but only to the secondary arts and any necessary trades which men practise to provide for the needs of the body, or to procure additional and material comforts. Labour undertaken for the perfectly good and excellent in any form, even though it fail to attain its end, is of itself strong to benefit the labourer from the first. It is those things which lie outside virtue which are all profitless, unless the result crown the work. It is just as it is with animals. If you take from them the head, all else goes with it. And the head of actions is their end or object. While it is in its place they live in some sort. If you choose to cut it off or amputate it, they die.",
                "[116] So athletes who cannot win a victory, but are always defeated, will do well to retire. Merchants or shipmen who meet with perpetual disasters at sea should desist and change their occupation. Those who have studied the lower subjects, but have been unable through dullness of nature to imbibe any knowledge, will deserve praise if they abandon them. For exertion in such matters is not engaged in for the sake of the exercise, but for the sake of the object at which they aim.",
                "[117] If then our nature opposes our efforts for progress in them, let us not fruitlessly resist her. If she forwards those efforts, let us do homage to God with those firstlings and honours which are the ransom of our souls, for they rescue it from cruel task-masters and redeem it into liberty."
            ],
            [
                "[118] We have it indeed on the authority of Moses that the Levites, who in place of the first-born were appointed to the service of Him who alone is worthy of service, were a ransom for all the others. “And behold I have taken,” he says, “the Levites from the midst of the sons of Israel, in place of every first-born that opens the womb from among the sons of Israel. They shall be their ransom and the Levites shall be mine, for every first-born is mine. On the day when I smote every first-born in the land of Egypt, I hallowed to myself every first-born in Israel” (Numb. 3:12, 13).",
                "[119] It is Reason, who has taken refuge with God and become His suppliant, that is here given the name of Levite. This Reason God took from the midmost and most sovereign part of the soul, that is He drew it and allotted it to Himself and adjudged to it the portion of the eldest son. And thus it is clear from this that, while Reuben is the first-born of Jacob, Levi is the first-born of Israel. The former has the precedence in years, the latter in honour and value.",
                "[120] For labour and progress of which Jacob is the symbol have their source in natural ability which gives Reuben his name, but the fountain of that devout contemplation of the only wise being, on which Israel’s rank is based, is the habit of service to God, and this service is symbolized by Levi. So then, just as Jacob appears as inheritor of the birthright of Esau, when labour striving for the good was victorious over the craving that pursues evil, so too Reuben the man of natural gifts must yield the rights of the elder to Levi, whose life is one of perfect virtue. And this perfection is shown most clearly in that he makes God his refuge and forsakes all dealing with the world of created things."
            ],
            [
                "[121] This is the primary meaning of the price which the soul that craves liberty pays for its deliverance and ransom. But it may be that the prophet also means to show another truth and one that we could ill spare, namely that every wise man is a ransom for the fool, whose existence could not endure for an hour, did not the wise provide for his preservation by compassion and forethought. The wise are as physicians who fight against the infirmities of the sick, alleviate them or altogether remove them, unless the violence of the malady’s impetuous course overpower the careful treatment of the physician.",
                "[122] It was such overpowering evil that destroyed Sodom, when no good could balance the vast sum of evil that weighed down the scale. If there had been found in Sodom the number fifty, the number which brings the message of redemption from slavery and full liberty to the soul (Lev. 25:10 ), or any of the numbers which wise Abraham named in succession from fifty downwards till he reached the lower limit of ten, the number sacred to education, the mind would not have perished in such shameful downfall (Gen. 18:24 ff.).",
                "[123] Yet we should try, as well as we may, to save even those whom the evil within them is bringing to certain ruin, and follow the example of the good physicians, who, though they see that there is no hope for the patient, yet render their services gladly, lest others should think, in the event of some disaster which they did not expect, that it is due to the physician’s neglect. And if some seed of recovery should appear in him, however little, it should be cherished as we fan an ember with every care. For we may hope that the germ may grow and spread, and that thus the man may lead a better and more stable life.",
                "[124] For my own part, when I see a good man living in a house or city, I hold that house or city happy and believe that their enjoyment of their present blessings will endure, and that their hopes for those as yet lacking will be realized. For God for the sake of the worthy dispenses to the unworthy also His boundless and illimitable wealth. I know indeed that they cannot escape old age, but I pray that their years may be prolonged to the utmost.",
                "[125] For I believe that, as long as they may live, it will be well with the community. So when I see or hear that any of them are dead, my heart is sad and heavy. Not for them. They have reached in the due course of nature the end we all must reach. They have lived in happiness and died in honour. It is for the survivors that I mourn. Deprived of the strong protecting arm, which brought them safety, they are abandoned to the woes which are their proper portion, and which they soon will feel, unless indeed nature should raise up some new protectors to replace the old, as in the tree which sheds its now ripened fruit, her agency makes other fruits grow up to give sustenance and pleasure to those who can pluck them.",
                "[126] As then in a city good men are the surest warrant of permanence, so in the commonwealth of the individual composed of soul and body, the strongest force to ensure stability belongs to those aspirations of the reason to wisdom and knowledge, which the lawgiver in his parable calls on grounds already stated “ransom” and “firstborn.”",
                "[127] And thus too he speaks of the cities of the Levites as “ransomed for ever” (Lev. 25:32), because the worshipper of God has reaped eternal freedom, and, while in the continuous flux of the soul change succeeds change, healing also succeeds healing in him. For the saying that the cities may be redeemed not once for all, but for ever, suggests the thought that for the worshipper with perpetual change goes perpetual liberation. The one is incidental to mortal nature, the other stands firm through the grace of the Benefactor, who is that worshipper’s portion and possession."
            ],
            [
                "[128] And here we may turn to another matter, which deserves more than a passing consideration. Why did he throw open the cities of the Levites to the fugitives from vengeance and deem fit that there the holiest should live side by side with men reckoned unholy, namely those who had committed involuntary homicide? The first answer is one that follows from what has been already said. We showed that the good are a ransom for the bad, and therefore it is with good reason that the sinners come to the consecrated to get purification.",
                "Secondly, as they whom the Levites receive are exiles, so too the Levites themselves are virtually exiles.",
                "[129] For as the homicides are expelled from the home of their nativity, so too the Levites have left children, parents, brothers, their nearest and dearest, to win an undying portion in place of that which perishes. The two differ in that the flight of these is not of their own desire, but for an involuntary deed, while those have fled of their own free will in loving quest of the highest. Again, the homicides find their refuge in the Levites, the Levites in Him who is ruler of all. The former in their imperfection think to have for their allotted province the holy word, the latter to have the God to whom they have been consecrated.",
                "[130] And, once more, they who slew involuntarily were granted the right of living in the same cities as the Levites, because these too were privileged as a reward for slaying in a righteous cause. We find that when the soul fell and honoured the god of Egypt, the body, as gold, with an honour which was not its due, the holy thoughts with one accord of their own motion rushed to the defence in arms. These arms were the proofs and arguments which knowledge gives. And they set before them as their captain and leader the high priest and prophet and friend of God, Moses. They waged war to the death for true religion, and held not their hands till they had made an end of all the false doctrines of their enemies (Exod. 32:26–28). And thus it is natural that Levite and homicide should dwell together, for their deeds though not the same are alike."
            ],
            [
                "[131] There is another interpretation current of this matter, though not for vulgar knowledge. It may be entrusted to the hearing of the elders: younger ears may well be sealed against it. It is this. Amongst all the highest powers that attach to God, there is one excelled by none, the legislative. For He Himself is the lawgiver and the fountain of laws, and on Him depend all particular lawgivers. This legislative power is such as to be divided into two parts, one for rewarding those who do well, the other for the punishment of evil-doers.",
                "[132] Of the first of these divisions the Levite is the minister. For he undertakes all the rites that belong to that perfect priesthood, by which mortality is commended to and recognized by God, whether it be through burnt-offering or peace-offering or repentance of sins. But of the second division, whose function is to punish, they who shed blood involuntarily have thereby become the ministers.",
                "[133] To this Moses testifies in the words “he did it not of intention, but God delivered him into his hands” (Exod. 21:13). The slayer’s hands we see were used as instruments, but He who worked invisibly by these was another, even the Invisible One. It is well then that the two should dwell together who are the ministers of the two forms of law-giving, the Levite serving that which bestows reward, the involuntary slayer that which executes vengeance.",
                "[134] When we read “on the day that I smote all the first-born in Egypt, I sanctified to myself all the first-born in Israel” (Numb. 3:13), we must not suppose that at that time only when Egypt was dealt that mighty blow by the destruction of her first-born did the first-born of Israel become holy.",
                "[135] No, the lesson is that in the past, in the present, in the future, that hallowing may be for ever repeated in the soul. When the most dominant elements of blind passion are destroyed then comes the sanctification of the elder and precious offspring of Israel who has the clear vision of God. For the exodus of evil works the entrance of virtue, and the opposite is true also. When good withdraws, the evil that is biding its time takes its place. Hardly has Jacob gone out (Gen. 27:30) when Esau is with our mind, which is open to all that come. He thinks to efface the image of virtue and impress in its stead, if he can, the stamp of vice. Yet he shall not be able to accomplish his purpose. The wise man will ward off the blow before it fall, and Esau shall wake to find himself tripped, supplanted, and his inheritance passed to the other."
            ],
            [
                "[136] But Abel offers the firstlings not only from the first-born, but from the fat, showing that the gladness and richness of the soul, all that protects and gives joy, should be set apart for God.",
                "I note that also in the ordering of the sacrifices the worshipper is bidden to bring from the victims these three first, the fat, the kidneys, and the lobe of the liver (Lev. 3:3 ff.). Of these I will speak separately. But nowhere is there a word of the brain or the heart, which we should have supposed would be offered before all, seeing that also in the Lawgiver’s words it is acknowledged that the ruling principle resides in one or other of these.",
                "[137] Yet perhaps it was in true piety and after careful thought that he excluded them from the altar of God, because this ruling principle from moment to moment is subject to many changes either way, to good and bad. And thus it is ever assuming different impressions: sometimes that of a coin pure and approved by the test, sometimes of one that is base and adulterated.",
                "[138] This region then which admits both contending elements, the noble and the shameful, which is familiar with both, and honours both alike, seemed no less unholy than holy to the lawgiver, and therefore he dismissed it from the altar of God. For the shameful is profane, and the profane is surely unholy.",
                "[139] It is this profaneness which has excluded the ruling principle. But if that should undergo purgation, then, when all the parts have been cleansed, there shall be given to the sacrificial fire a whole offering free from stain and pollution. For this is the law of burnt-offerings, that nothing save the excrement and hide which are the tokens of bodily weakness, not of wickedness, should be left to created being, but the rest, which show a soul wholly complete in all its parts, should be given in their entirety as a burnt-offering to God."
            ]
        ],
        "Appendix": [
            "APPENDIX TO THE SACRIFICES OF ABEL AND CAIN",
            "§§ 5–7. In these sections we have a suggestion of the idea, to which Philo frequently recurs, of the “educational trinity,” stated by Aristotle in the form παιδείᾳ δεῖν τριῶν, φύσεως, διδασκαλίας, ἀσκήσεως. Philo takes as the typical examples of these three, Isaac, Abraham and Jacob, see particularly <i>De Abr.</i> 52 ff., where Isaac is ὁ αὐτομαθοῦς ἐπιστήμης ἀξιωθείς, Abraham represents οἱ μαθήσει καὶ διδασκαλίᾳ προκόψαντες (in <i>De Abr.</i> he is called the σύμβολον διδασκαλικῆς ἀρετῆς), while Jacob as usual is the ἀσκητής.",
            "§ 9. Ex. 7:1. Philo’s treatment of this text here is worth comparing with his other explanations. In <i>Leg. All.</i> i. 40 the mind is the god of the unreasoning element, <i>cf.</i> <i>De Mut. Nom.</i> 19. In <i>De Migr. Abr.</i> 84, the inspired mind is addressed as god, while in <i>Quod Det.</i> 161 the fact that the wise man is called the “god” of the fool is used as an illustration of the difference between reality and “opinion”; for even the wise man cannot be God in reality. To argue, therefore, as he does here, that an attribute which is inconsistent with God must also be inconsistent with Moses is to give the text a meaning which he shrinks from elsewhere.",
            "§ 10. <i>Such is the meaning</i>, etc. The translation assumes that Philo here sums up the general result of the first ten sections which have been a homily on Gen. 4:2. It would be possible, however, to take it in closer connexion with the immediately preceding sentences, “even so it is when God adds,” etc.",
            "§ 12. Ex. 4:10. The LXX. has οὐκ ἱκανός (some MSS. εὔλογός) εἰμι πρὸ τῆς χθές, οὐδὲ πρὸ τῆς τρίτης ἡμέρας, οὐδὲ ἀφʼ οὗ ἤρξω λαλεῖν τῷ θεράποντί σου. Our R.V. has “neither heretofore nor since thou hast spoken,” <i>i.e.</i> neither at the earlier nor the later date, and presumably this was the meaning of the LXX. Philo, however, by ignoring the second οὐδέ takes it to convey the idea that Moses’ contempt of τὸ εὔλογον only begins with his converse with God.",
            "His use of εὔλογος here and in other quotations of the text shows clearly that he actually had that reading.",
            "§ 13. <i>The fabulous inventions</i>, etc. Lit. “the conjectural and insecure myth-making of eloquence (or ‘the eloquent’)”, or, taking εὐλόγων εἰκαστικήν together, “which guesses at probabilities” (ὁ ψευδῶν εἰκαστικός, <i>De Cher.</i> 116, is in favour of this). Philo often uses εὔλογος in the ordinary sense of “reasonably probable,” but at other times, influenced perhaps by Ex. 4:10, in the double sense of (<i>a</i>) fine language, (<i>b</i>) merely probable as opposed to certain. It is impossible in translation to reproduce this double sense. The best modern equivalent would be “rhetorical,” were it not for the risk of confusion with the ancient technical use of “rhetoric” which is so common in Philo. There is a very similar phrasing in <i>Quod Det.</i> 38.",
            "§§ 15–16. The thought of these sections is developed more fully in <i>Quis Rer. Div. Her.</i> 293–299, where four periods are indicated: (1) early childhood; (2) boyhood, the dangers of which are described in words very similar to our passage; (3) the stage in which the healing influences of philosophy are brought to bear upon the passions; (4) when the soul definitely turns away from sin to wisdom. He does not mean here that passion ordinarily ceases with youth, but that, in the case of the converted, conversion does not usually come till youth is past.",
            "§ 17. <i>Named after his folly.</i> This is very far-fetched even for Philo. He interpreted the name of Esau from the Hebrew as (1) a thing made (ποίημα); (2) an oak or tree. In <i>De Cong.</i> 61 he says that the first signifies a fiction (πλάσμα) and the life of folly is of the nature of fiction, and that the second signifies a stubborn nature which takes folly for its counsellor.",
            "§§ 21–33. On the reasons why these sections were omitted in earlier editions of the treatise see Anal. Introd. p. 93. This curious parable, which particularly in the list of nearly 150 vices goes far beyond anything else to be found in Philo, is obviously based on the famous fable of Xenophon, <i>Mem.</i> ii. I, there ascribed to Prodicus, in which Vice and Virtue plead with Hercules when he stands at the crossways of life. There are several definite reminiscences of this. It is also no doubt directly aimed at the doctrines of Epicurus.",
            "§ 21. <i>Her eyebrows are smothered in paint.</i> Greek ladies sometimes painted their eyebrows with a preparation of soot (ἄσβολος) or of antimony (στίμμι), see <i>Dict, of Ant. s.v.</i>“fucus.”",
            "[ἐγκεκαλυμμένη τὰς ὀφρῦς. Philo perhaps wrote ἐγκεκολαμμένη. There is ground for the belief that ὀφρυκολάπτης may have been as familiar to Philo as δρυκολάπτης to Aristophanes (<i>Birds</i> 480, 979) or δρυοκολάπτης to Aristotle. A pair of tweezers is the ordinary implement for “eyebrowshaping” (as it is called in Bond Street), but a razor is sometimes used, at all events in Germany. ‘Carve’ or ‘chisel’ is the <i>secondary</i> meaning of κολάπτω, ‘I peck.’—G. H. W.]",
            "§§ 35–41. This eulogy of πόνος is based on the similar one put into the mouth of Virtue in the Prodicean fable.",
            "§ 37. <i>Severe harmony.</i> An adaptation of the Platonic idea of virtue as a harmony of the soul together with the Stoic view that moral evil is a relaxation of its τόνος (tension, muscular vigour).",
            "<i>Higher forms of art.</i> The Stoics said (<i>e.g.</i> Stob. <i>Eel.</i> ii. 6. 4) that virtue was a τέχνη περὶ ὅλον τὸν βίον and also (<i>ibid.</i>) that the chief virtues were both ἐπιστῆμαι and τέχναι. To judge from <i>De Cong.</i> 142 Philo would hardly have admitted the latter statement.",
            "§ 45. <i>After hearing this.</i> These words show that the literary device of making Virtue discourse has been maintained up to this point, though not very skilfully in the last three sections. To put these O.T. illustrations into the mouth of the woman described in 26 is hardly appropriate.",
            "§ 50. <i>Worldling.</i> Lit. “man of superfluity.” Philo explains the epithet in several places. Jethro is the vanity which deals with the varying customs, unsanctioned by nature, and thus serves to deceive the true life (<i>De Agr.</i> 43); or the seeming wise who perpetually changes according to the groundless opinions of men (<i>De Ebr.</i> 37); or jeers at things equal and necessary to life and glorifies the inequalities of superfluous wealth (<i>De Mut. Nom.</i> 103). “Worldling” seems to the translator to combine these ideas better than any other word.",
            "§ 51. <i>Earlier books.</i> No such passage in the earlier books survives. But in <i>De Agr.</i> 21 ff. a “tiller of the soil” is explained as one who lives to satisfy the wants of the body.",
            "§ 57. <i>Now the covenant</i>, etc. The argument seems to be: The covenant means God’s gifts, God’s gifts are perfect; virtue is perfect; therefore virtue is God’s gift, and not man’s merit.",
            "§ 62. <i>Lesser mysteries.</i> See on <i>De Cher.</i> 49. The Passover represents the first stage of initiation in which the soul is escaping from the Egypt of passion and entering upon its life of practice. This is a lower stage than the “mysteries” described in 59–60. where the soul gains a perception of God.",
            "§ 63. <i>She must grip … sandals.</i> The idea perhaps is that as the soul and body are bound together, the former must keep a tight hold of the latter. It thus corresponds to a foot which fits tightly into the sandal and does not allow it to slip.",
            "§ 68. <i>Self-extension.</i> For the Stoic conception of “tension” (τόνος) including both expansion and condensation see Zeller, <i>Stoics</i> (Eng. trans.), p. 140.",
            "§ 80. <i>It has the vigour.</i> In εὐτόνως we have again an allusion to the favourite Stoic idea of “tension” (see on 37). Here, however, the πάθη are conceived of as having their own τόνος, which is relaxed or weakened by the τόνος of reason. The same idea is no doubt present in the ἐκλύεται of 81.",
            "§ 82. <i>Reason.</i> To preserve the continuity of the argument, this word has been retained in this and the following sections. But clearly Philo drifts away from the faculty of reason to its expression in definite thoughts and words.",
            "§ 120. <i>Natural ability.</i> Reuben is several times taken as the type of εὐφυΐα. But it is strange to find this quality, which is elsewhere associated with φύσις and τὸ αὐτομαθές (Isaac) rather than with ἄσκησις (Jacob), taken here as the source of labour and progress of Jacob, and contrasted with the “inspired contemplation” of Israel.",
            "§ 122. <i>The number sacred to education.</i> Philo seems to associate the “perfect” number ten (1 + 2 + 3 + 4) with education, partly at least because he found in Lev. 27:32 that “every tenth which comes under the rod shall be holy” and he was convinced that the rod was παιδεία (<i>De Cong.</i> 94). Also he seems to have argued that the μέση παιδεία was the minimum which God would accept, and that therefore the “ten” of Gen. 18:32, must refer to that. This view is developed in <i>De Mut.</i> 226 ff.",
            "§ 123. <i>Due to the physician’s neglect.</i> This translation involves giving a very unnatural meaning to παρά with the acc. So far as the use of παρά goes, it would be better to take it “through the indifference (of the relatives) caused by them” (<i>i.e.</i> the physicians whose non-attendance leads the relatives to think that things are going well). But this rendering is very harsh and unnatural. The Papyrus has for παρʼ αὐτούς the unintelligible ανη ουτως which may perhaps conceal some illegible phrase = “apparent,” which the MSS. tried to patch up.",
            "§ 136. <i>The brain or the heart.</i> The Stoics for the most part decided on the heart. For Chrysippus’s arguments see Arnim, <i>Stoic. Vet. Frag.</i> ii. 885 ff.; Zeller, <i>Stoics</i> (Eng. Trans.), p. 214. The opponents could appeal to Plato, who located τὸ λογιστικόν in the head.",
            "<i>Also in the lawgiver’s words.</i> Philo could find plenty of examples of “heart” <i>e.g.</i> Deut. 5:29. For “brain” or “head” he may have relied on Gen. 3:15 LXX.",
            "§ 137. <i>Nothing save the excrement and hide.</i> Philo’s memory has played him false. There is no such exception ordered with regard to the ὁλοκαύτωμα. He is perhaps thinking of the directions about the “sin offering” in Lev. 4:11, where, however, the hide and excrement are only mentioned with the head, legs, etc., to show that the whole animal must be burnt."
        ]
    },
    "schema": {
        "heTitle": "על קורבנות הבל וקין",
        "enTitle": "On the Birth of Abel and the Sacrifices Offered by him and by his Brother Cain",
        "key": "On the Birth of Abel and the Sacrifices Offered by him and by his Brother Cain",
        "nodes": [
            {
                "heTitle": "הקדמה",
                "enTitle": "Introduction"
            },
            {
                "heTitle": "",
                "enTitle": ""
            },
            {
                "heTitle": "הערות",
                "enTitle": "Appendix"
            }
        ]
    }
}