Philo's guide to decoding the Hebrew Bible

[Ishtar]

That the organised brotherhoods of the Essenes and the Zadokites were already practising the new covenant and spiritual teachings similar to Christianity at least a century before Jesus would account for the extent of the spread of the churches, which, if you don't know the real story, seem to have mushroomed all over the region like magic in the 1st and 2nd centuries CE.

Within a handful of years of Jesus' supposed death, we find Christian communities all over the eastern Medterranean, their founders unknown ... Paul could not possibly account for all the Christian centres across the empire; many were in existence before he go there ... A form of Christian faith later declared heretical, Gnosticism, clearly preceded the establishment of orthodox beliefs and churches in whole areas like northern Syria and Egypt.

Indeed, the sheer variety of Christian expression and competitiveness in the first century, as revealed in documents both inside and outside the New Testament, is inexplicable if it all proceeded from a single missionary movement beginning from a single source ...

Paul meets rivals at every turn who are interfering with his work, whose views he is trying to combat. The "false apostles" he rails against in 2 Corinthians 10 and 11 are "proclaiming another Jesus" and they are certainly not from Peter's group. Where do they all come and where do they get their ideas? The answer seems inevitable: Christianity was born in a thousand places, in the broad fertile soil of Hellenistic Judaism. It sprang up in many independent communities and sects, expressing itself in a great variety of doctrines.

Earl Doherty, The Jesus Puzzle.

I believe that the Zadokites' beliefs constituted a part of this eventual Christian edifice, along with all the other too many to count Gnostic sects and brotherhoods at the time, such as the Essenes.

The Essenes seem to have had their teachings lifted in an out-and-out cut and paste job by the canonisers like Irananeus and put into the New Testament, as shown by my earlier table. There were also other branches of the Essenes referred to by Philo called the Eclectics and the Ascetics.

Philo also tells ua about the Thereputae, who had parishes, churches, bishops, priests and deacons long before the Christian era. The Theraputae were based in Alexandria, dubbed by some as the Crucible of Christianity, and so maybe we should look at these guys next.

[Ishtar]

Except Caesar actually existed. Someone conquered Gaul...and the Senate....and Cleopatra.

Caesar definitely existed but certain of Caesar's exploits and attributes were also exaggerated when he died

Like his resurrection and ascension to heaven in the arms of angels, possibly?

[Minimalist]

That the organised brotherhoods of the Essenes and the Zadokites were already practising the new covenant and spiritual teachings similar to Christianity at least a century before Jesus would account for the extent of the spread of the churches,

I don't know about that but it certainly would explain the comment of "Paul" in 2 Corinthians about escaping from Damascus when it was ruled by Aretas.

That happened c 80 BC which is the only time that Aretas of Nabatea ruled Damascus, which is far to the north of Nabatea. Someone gathering up these letters and later editing them explains a lot.

[seeker]

I think all of this points to the same conclusion we had a while back, a synthesis of the various independent messianic (christian to the greeks, christ=messiah) movements that presented the separate Gnostic movements as a single literalist movement. I still like Rome as the center of this because of the political situation but Alexandria was certainly influential

[Ishtar]

I still like Rome as the center of this because of the political situation but Alexandria was certainly influential

The Romans certainly propagated the Literalist story, but not until the 4th century. So what went on during the first two centuries, how the story moved from a mythological into a historical one, still needs to be unravelled a bit more, and I think the key may lay in Alexandria.

[seeker]

I still like Rome as the center of this because of the political situation but Alexandria was certainly influential

The Romans certainly propagated the Literalist story, but not until the 4th century. So what went on during the first two centuries, how the story moved from a mythological into a historical one, still needs to be unravelled a bit more, and I think the key may lay in Alexandria.

Could be. Do you think there were developments in Alexandria that were sgnificantly different from other developments that we've discussed?

[Minimalist]

There is one little interesting historical tidbit which plays into Alexandria and which made it unique in the Roman empire. Unlike all the other provinces, which were classified as either senatorial or imperial, Egypt was regarded as the personal domain of the emperor. He derived all the income from that province and appointed legates to administer it for him.

Particularly in the early days of the empire, when Augustus and Tiberius ruled for nearly 70 years, this would have provided a greater degree of stability than the appointments of governors to the other provinces. It also explains a bit why Caligula was so involved when the citizens of Alexandria rioted against the Jews. It was his province and income that was being threatened.

[Ishtar]

Yes, and Philo tried to stand up to him.

Speaking of whom, and as I said in the previous post, Philo also tells us about the Theraputae, the Egyptian Mystery Gnostics, who had parishes, churches, bishops, priests and deacons long before the Christian era.

The Theraputae were based in Alexandria, although their ‘brotherhood of monks’ spread all over including into China. But they didn’t just have the infrastructure. They had the writings.

Eusebius says, after reading Philo:

They (the Therapeuts] possess short works by early writers, the founders of their sect, who left many specimens of the allegorical method, which they take as their models, following the system on which their predecessors worked.

So these writings of the allegorical method mean that they were Gnostic.

But then Esebius goes on to say:

It seems likely that Philo wrote this after listening to their exposition of the Holy Scriptures, and it is very probable that what he calls short works by their early writers were the gospels, the apostolic writings, and in all probability passages interpreting the old prophets, such as are contained in the Epistle to the Hebrews and several others of Paul’s epistles.

Of the Therapeutan Church, Eusebius says: “These statements of Philo seem to me to refer plainly and unquestionably to members of our Church.”

Concerning this, frankly uncharacteristic, admissions from Eusebius,
Taylor says:

...Eusebius has attested that the Therapeutan monks were Christians, many ages before the period assigned to the birth of Christ; and that the Diegesis and Gnomologue, from which the Evangelists compiled their gospels, were writings which for ages constituted the sacred scriptures of these Egyptian visionaries.”

It’s worth noting that Marcion was a Samaritan member of the Therapeutan brotherhood. And the Therapeutic network also included the Nazerenes – which is why Jesus is referred to as a Nazerene and not because he came from a place that did not yet exist.

Interestingly, in Acts 24:5, Paul is described as a “ringleader for the sect of the Nazerenes.”

"We have found this man to be a troublemaker, stirring up riots among the Jews all over the world. He is a ringleader of the Nazarene sect.”

So it’s clear from the New Testament that the Nazerenes are a sect, and that people thought Paul was one of them – that would make Paul a Therapeut.

[Minimalist]

I've seen discussions concerning the theraputae and the popular cult of Aesculapius... who, coincidentally or not, was also considered to be the son of a god...in this case Apollo. A lot of this stuff starts to run together.

[Minimalist]

Yes, and Philo tried to stand up to him.

Unsuccessfully...but that's not the point. The point is that Philo (and others) would have had far more freedom to write in Alexandria where there was no deadening hand of orthodox religion to shout "blasphemy" every two minutes (as they are prone to do.) Moreover, Alexandria had enjoyed a long period of peace. The last significant fighting had been while Julius Caesar was there in 48-47 and the city was barely touched. Octavian's "conquest" was even milder. Egypt had been beaten at Actium and never recovered. Thus from 31 BC to 40 AD, Alexandria was rich, calm, literate, and carefully cultivated by the emperors. Really an ideal place to allow the mind to contemplate things.

[seeker]

The only religion to yell about blasphemy was literalist Christian. Even Jews were never as eager to call each other blasphemers as Christians were. Its always been difficult for me to see this as perhaps an insertion to represent the notion of Christian persecution by the Jews.

[Minimalist]

Maybe, but we don't seem to get the variety of thought out of Jerusalem that we do out of Alexandria and Babylon.

Perhaps the threat was sufficient enough to maintain order?

[Ishtar]

Maybe, but we don't seem to get the variety of thought out of Jerusalem that we do out of Alexandria and Babylon.

Perhaps the threat was sufficient enough to maintain order?

It was a more cosmopolitan atmosphere - it's been described as a melting pot of different nationalities and beliefs.

At that time, there were more Jews living in Alexandria than anywhere else in the world. Apion says that the Alexandrian Jews were "from Syria" i.e. Antiochans, Galileans, Samaritans and Zadokites.

However, Josephus says that the Samaritan Jews in Alexandria fought with the Alexandrian Judaean Jews over whose temple was the kosher one - the one in Jerusalem or the Samaritan one at Mount Gerizim. Josephus says that Ptolemy (63-47 BCE) found for the Jerusalem Jews and had the Samaritan Jews executed.

As the Samaritans were aligned with the Theraputae, this would have put the Jerusalem Jews in opposition to the Theraputea and the Nazerenes.

[Minimalist]

Josephus says that Ptolemy (63-47 BCE) found for the Jerusalem Jews and had the Samaritan Jews executed.

Josephus says a lot of things.

[seeker]

I always wondered about the whole Jews in Alexandria bit. The Maccabees forcibly converted Judah but outside of Judah there were supposedly colonies of Jews all over the place and they seem to have been there since the Persian period. Not only that but with those Persians around there were seemingly very few Zoroastrians left over in Egypt.

The likely answer to this dilemma is that the majority of people being called Jews were Zoroastrian but the religions are so similar and given the danger of being Persian in the Greek Empire it probably was much easier for people to just say they were Jewish.