--- title: "Allegorical Interpretation — Books I–III" author: "Philo of Alexandria" translator: "C. D. Yonge" languages: [en] shelf: "Second Temple" section: 17 of 37 url: https://scriptura.si/works/philo-tlg002-yonge-ogl/17/ cite: "Philo of Alexandria, tr. C. D. Yonge, Allegorical Interpretation — Books I–III, section 17. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/philo-tlg002-yonge-ogl/17/" --- # Allegorical Interpretation — Books I–III *Philo of Alexandria, tr. C. D. Yonge* ## 17. Section 2.97 Source: https://scriptura.si/works/philo-tlg002-yonge-ogl/17/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/philo-tlg002-yonge-ogl/17/#p-N [¶0] Therefore let Dan, says he, be a serpent in the path.—One path is the soul. For as in the roads one may behold a great variety of living beings, inanimate and animate, irrational and rational, good and bad, slaves and free, young and old, male and female, strangers and natural citizens, sick and healthy, mutilated and perfect; so also in the soul there are motions inanimate, and imperfect, and diseased, and slavish, and female, and innumerable others of the class of evils; and on the other hand, there are motions which are living, and perfect, and masculine, and free, and healthy, and ripe, and virtuous, and genuine, and really legitimate. ### Section 2.98 [¶2] Let then the principle of temperance be a serpent in the soul, which makes its advance through all the circumstances of life, and let it sit in the path. But what is the meaning of this expression?—The field of virtue is not trodden down; for they are few who walk along it, but that of vice is trodden and worn? And he recommends him here to occupy and to fill, with ambush and stratagem, the well-trodden path of passion and vice, in which the thoughts which are deserters from virtue pass their life. ### Section 2.99 [¶4] Biting the heel of the horse,—Very consistently the disposition which shakes the stability of the created and perishable being is called the supplanter, and the passions are compared to a horse; for passion has four legs as a horse has, and is an impetuous beast, and full of insolence, and by nature a most restive animal. But the reasoning of temperance is wont to bite, and to wound, and to destroy passion. Therefore passion having been tripped up, and having fallen, the horseman will fall backwards. We must comprehend that the horseman who has mounted upon the passions is the mind, who falls from the passions when they are reasoned upon closely, and so are supplanted; ### Section 2.100 [¶6] and it is well figured, that the soul does not fall forward, for it must not go before the passions, but rather advance behind them, and behave with moderation. And there is sound learning in what he says here. If the mind, though desirous to act unjustly, comes too late and falls backward, it will not act unjustly; but if, when it is moved onwards to some irrational passion it does not run forward but remains behind, it will then receive freedom from the dominion of the passions, which is a most excellent thing. ### Section 2.101 [¶8] On which account Moses, approving of this backward fall from off the vices, adds further, waiting for the salvation of the Lord, for, in good truth, he who falls from the passions is saved by God, and remains safe after their operation. May my soul meet with such a fall as this, and may it never afterwards remount upon that horselike and restive passion, in order that it may await the salvation of God, and attain to happiness! ### Section 2.102 [¶10] On this account also it was that Moses praised God in his hymn, because the horse and his rider has he thrown into the sea,Exodus xv. 1. meaning that he has thrown the four passions, and the miserable mind which is mounted on them, down into ruin as to its affairs, and into the bottomless pit, and this is almost the burden of the whole hymn, to which every other part of it is referred, and indeed that is the truth; for if once a freedom from the passions occupies the soul, it will become perfectly happy. ### Section 2.103 [¶12] And we must also inquire, what is the reason why Jacob says, that the rider will fall backward,Genesis xlix. 17. and Moses says, that the horse and his rider have been thrown into the sea. We must say, therefore, that that which is thrown into the sea is the Egyptian disposition, which indeed flies and escapes under the water, that is to say, under the advance of the passions. But the rider who falls backwards is not one of the persons who loves to yield to the passions; and the proof is, that Moses calls the one the horseman (ἱππεὺς), and the other the rider (ἀναβάτης). ### Section 2.104 [¶14] Now it is the business of the horseman to subdue the horse, and when he resists the rein to make him tractable; but it is the part of the rider to be conveyed wherever the animal carries him, and in the sea it is the office of the pilot to guide the ship, and to keep it straight, and to preserve it in the right course; but it is the part of the sailor to endure all that happens to the ship. And in reference to this the horseman who subdues the passions is not drowned in the sea, but dismounting from them awaits the salvation of the master. ### Section 2.105 [¶16] Accordingly, the word of God in Leviticus recommends men to feed on those creeping things which go on four feet, and which have legs above their feet, so that they are able to leap with them;Leviticus xi. 22. among which are the locust, and the attacus, and the acris,These are different kinds of locusts. and in the fourth place the serpent-fighter; and very properly; for if pleasure, like a serpent, is an unprofitable and pernicious thing, then the nature which contends against pleasure must be a most profitable and saving thing, and this is temperance. ### Section 2.106 [¶18] Fight thou then, O my mind, against every passion, and especially against pleasure, for the serpent is the most subtle of all the beasts that are upon the earth, which the Lord God has made. ### Section 2.107 [¶20] And of all the passions the most mischievous is pleasure. Why so? Because all things are the slaves of pleasure; and because the life of the wicked is governed by pleasure as by a master. Accordingly, the things which are the efficient causes of pleasure are found to be full of all wickedness: gold and silver, and glory and honours, and powers and the objects of the outward senses, and the mechanical arts, and all other things which cause pleasure, being very various, and all injurious to the soul; and there are no sins without extreme wickedness; ### Section 2.108 [¶22] therefore do thou array against it the wisdom which contends with serpents; and struggle in this most glorious struggle, and labour to win the crown in the contest against pleasure, which subdues every one else; winning a noble and glorious crown, such as no assembly of men can confer. ### Section 3 [¶24] THE THIRD BOOK OF THE TREATISE ON THE ALLEGORIES OF THE SACRED LAWS, AFTER THE WORK OF THE SIX DAYS OF THE CREATION.