Psychological Interpretation of Psalm 1

The religious life, explained in detail throughout the Bible, is summarized in a single, short passage, namely Psalm 1. Further, the essential message is conveyed in just the first two or three verses. Noting this and studying the psalm will therefore greatly assist ones spiritual progress, in a very direct way, and with comparatively little [...]

Philo – the Rivers of Eden in On the Posterity of Cain

ON THE POSTERITY OF CAIN AND HIS EXILE 32.127
XXXVII. (127) On which account it is said in Genesis, “And a fountain went up from the earth, and watered all the face of the Earth.”{55}{#ge 2:6.} For since nature has allotted the most excellent portion of the whole body, namely the face, to the outward senses, [...]

Philo on the temptation of Adam and Eve

ALLEGORICAL INTERPRETATION, II{*}
II. (4) …”For I will make him,” says God, “a help-meet for him.” And, in the second place, is younger than the object to be helped; for, first of all, God created the mind [i.e., Adam], and subsequently he prepares to make its helper [Eve, as we shall see]. But all this [...]

Exegesis of the Fall of Adam and Eve in Lombard’s Sentences

Exegesis of the Fall Adam and Eve in Lombard’s Sentences
Book 2, Distinction 24
Chapter IV.
On (man’s) sensuality.
For the sensuality is a certain inferior force of the soul, out of which there is a movement, which is intended for [intenditur in] the senses of the7 body and the appetite for things pertaining to the body; but the [...]

Origen on the ‘eyes of the soul’

Origen on the ‘eyes of the soul’
Contra Celsum 7.39
Chapter XXXIX.
He [i.e., Celsus, the critic of Christianity whose work Origen refutes] also applies to us that epithet “carnal” or “flesh-indulging,” “although,” as we are wont to say, “we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth we know Him no more,”91 and although we [...]

On Philo’s Allegorical Exigesis of Genesis

On Philo’s Allegorical Exigesis of Genesis
While this shorter explanation in a catechetical form [Questions and Answers on Genesis] was intended for more extensive circles, Philo’s special and chief scientific work is his large allegorical commentary on Genesis [Allegorical Interpretation I-III]…
These two works frequently approximate each other as to their contents. For in the Quaestiones et [...]

Philo – Waters of Life (1)

Philo – Waters of Life (1)
Philo of Alexandria (Philo Judaeus; c. 20 BC – c. 50 AD)
Allegorical Interpretation 1.11.28
XI. (28) But a fountain went up upon the earth, and watered all the face of the earth.  [Genesis 2:6; LXX]
He here calls the mind the fountain of the earth, and the sensations he calls the face [...]

Philo – Tree of Life (3)

Philo – Tree of Life (3)
Philo of Alexandria (Philo Judaeus; c. 20 BC – c. 50 AD)
Allegorical Interpretation 1.17.56-1.18.62
XVII. (56) And God caused to rise out of the earth every tree which is pleasant to the sight and good for food, and the tree of life he raised in the middle of the Paradise, and [...]

Philo – Tree of Life (2)

Philo – Tree of Life (2)

Philo of Alexandria (Philo Judaeus; c. 20 BC – c. 50 AD)

On The Migration Of Abraham 8.36-42
VIII. (36) That then which is shown is that thing so worthy of being beheld, so worthy of being contemplated, so worthy of being beloved, the perfect good, the nature of which is to [...]

Philo – Tree of Life (1)

Philo – Tree of Life (1)

Philo of Alexandria (Philo Judaeus; c. 20 BC – c. 50 AD)
Questions and Answers on Genesis 1.10
Question: What is meant by the tree of life, and why it was placed in the middle of the Paradise? (Genesis 2:9).
Some people have believed that, if there were really plants of a corporeal [...]