Every Good Man Is Free

A Stoic paradox argued with stories of Essenes, Indian sages, a captive Spartan boy and a theatre crowd on its feet for a line of Euripides.

by Philo of Alexandria58 passages held

English, a translation held here, and your language

Original title: Quod omnis probus liber sit
Original language: Ancient Greek

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Overview

Once, in a theatre, Philo heard the actors reach some lines of Euripides praising the very name of freedom, and he watched the whole audience rise on tiptoe, shouting its approval of the sentiment and of the poet. He tells the story in this treatise to show that freedom is something every person recognises and wants, and then argues that almost everyone misplaces it. The claim he defends is a Stoic paradox, famous in the schools: only the wise and good person is free, and every fool is a slave, whatever the law says about either. A person with a master may be free, and a king may be a slave, because what enslaves is fear, greed and the passions, and no one can compel a soul that does not fear death. Philo addresses the work to one Theodotus and says it is a companion to an earlier treatise proving that every bad man is a slave; that treatise is lost, though Eusebius still listed both in the fourth century. The argument runs mostly on examples. The Essenes of Palestine and Syria, some four thousand strong, own no slaves and hold everything in common. Calanus, the Indian sage, refuses a summons from Alexander the Great. A Spartan boy taken captive kills himself rather than do a slave's work, and Diogenes the Cynic, captured by robbers and waiting to be sold, complains that sheep bound for market are fattened while he is starved. The treatise quotes the Bible only a handful of times and Greek poets and philosophers constantly, and since the mid-nineteenth century scholars have debated whether Philo wrote it; the standard editions print it as his.

Key concepts

What is the Stoic paradox in Every Good Man Is Free?

That only the wise and good person is free, and every fool is a slave, whatever the law says. The paradox moves freedom from legal status to the condition of the soul. A person with a master may be free, and a king may be a slave, because what really enslaves is fear, greed and the passions. Philo defends it as his own view, arguing in the manner of the Greek schools.

What makes a person a slave, according to this treatise?

Submitting to what the passions command against one's own judgement. The man who, from a lowly spirit, does base things he knows he should not is a slave in the full sense, whatever his legal position. Fear, greed and desire are the soul's unlawful masters, and a person who obeys them has sold the one freedom no law can grant or take away.

Why can a soul that does not fear death not be compelled?

Because every compulsion works through a threat, and the last threat is death. Someone who does not fear it has nothing left by which they can be forced to act against their judgement. That is why Philo's examples so often end at the edge of death: the captive who dies rather than serve, the sage who defies a king, the hero who defies torture.

Why does Philo call the good man a burden hard to bear?

Because wisdom has weight and folly has none. Philo takes up Antisthenes' saying that the virtuous man is a burden hard to be borne: folly is light and tossed about in every direction, while wisdom is settled and immovable. The saying turns the paradox into an image. The fool can be picked up and carried wherever a master or a passion wants him; the wise man cannot be moved, and that immovability is his freedom.

Themes of the book

What this book returns to, gathered into themes and ordered by how much of the text each one occupies.

Only the Wise Are Free, Whatever the Law Says

If a slave can be free and a king a slave, what is freedom? Philo defends the Stoic paradox that it lies in the soul's independence from fear and desire.

The claim is a paradox famous in the schools: only the wise and good person is free, and every fool is a slave, whatever the law says about either. What enslaves is fear, greed and the passions, and no one can compel a soul that does not fear death. The man who submits to base acts against his own judgement is truly a slave; the one who meets fortune willingly and bears it is free, even under a master. Philo borrows Euripides' Hercules for the stance: burn my flesh and drink my blood, the stars will leave their places before you wring a word of flattery from me.

freedom
slavery
self-mastery
passions
autonomy
coercion
right reason
virtue

Enter a dialogue

Essenes, an Indian Sage, a Spartan Boy and Diogenes

Does anyone actually live the paradox? Philo argues mostly by example, and the examples come from everywhere except the lecture room.

Freedom is something everyone recognises: Philo once watched a theatre audience rise on tiptoe to cheer a line of Euripides praising its very name. Then he shows who has it. The Essenes of Palestine and Syria, some four thousand strong, own no slaves and hold everything in common. Calanus, the Indian sage, refuses a summons from Alexander the Great. A Spartan boy taken captive kills himself rather than do a slave's work. Diogenes the Cynic, captured by robbers and waiting to be sold, complains that sheep bound for market are fattened while he is starved. None of them is free by law; each is free in fact.

courage
community
wealth
resilience
wit
poverty
labor

Enter a dialogue

Within this work

passages held: 58
distinct concepts: 103
by passages held, corpus-wide: #633

What this book thinks together

The wheel takes this book’s leading concepts and shows how often they come up together. The wider the band between two, the more of its passages speak of both. Among them, most often together: “freedom” and “virtue”.

Concept co-occurrence, strongest first 8 concepts, joined by 20 pairings. 56 pairings reach beyond these concepts and are not drawn.
Concept	Paired concept	Shared passages
freedom	virtue	26
freedom	slavery	10
courage	freedom	9
courage	virtue	7
freedom	self-mastery	7
self-mastery	virtue	7
slavery	virtue	6
virtue	wisdom	5
freedom	wisdom	4
self-mastery	slavery	4
courage	self-mastery	3
courage	slavery	3
fortune	freedom	3
education	freedom	2
education	virtue	2
fortune	slavery	2
courage	fortune	1
education	wisdom	1
fortune	self-mastery	1
fortune	virtue	1

Works held

The author's work in order, this book marked in place. Your-language title first, the original beneath it where the two differ; side chips show which full texts are held.

Against Flaccus (In Flaccum)
Written as a demonstration of divine justice, this account of the Alexandrian riots of 38 CE and of the prefect Philo blamed for them stands with his historical and apologetic works.
EN
Allegorical Interpretation (Legum allegoriae I–III)
The first surviving treatise of the Allegorical Commentary, Philo's long verse-by-verse reading of Genesis, covering its second and third chapters in three books.
EN
Every Good Man Is Free (Quod omnis probus liber sit) you are here EN
On Abraham (De Abrahamo)
The first of Philo's lives of the patriarchs in the Exposition of the Law, following On the Creation of the World; its companions on Isaac and Jacob are lost, and On Joseph continues the set.
EN
On Cultivation (De agricultura)
Noah the farmer is a subject Philo splits across two treatises; this first one is built on the difference between near-synonyms, and On Planting continues it.
EN
On Dreams (De somniis I–II)
A treatise of the Allegorical Commentary, in two surviving books on the dreams of Jacob, Joseph and Pharaoh's court.
EN
On Drunkenness (De ebrietate)
Of the two books on drunkenness known in antiquity, this is the one that survives; it sits between On Planting and On Sobriety in the Allegorical Commentary's run on Noah and the vine.
EN
On Flight and Finding (De fuga et inventione)
Hagar's flight and the angel who finds her, Genesis 16:6–14, read within the Allegorical Commentary.
EN
On Joseph (De Josepho)
The life of the statesman in Philo's series of patriarch lives within the Exposition of the Law. It follows On Abraham; lives of Isaac and Jacob, now lost, once stood between them.
EN
On Mating with the Preliminary Studies (De congressu eruditionis gratia)
Philo's reading of Genesis 16 as a theory of education, set within the Allegorical Commentary; On Flight and Finding continues Hagar's story.
EN
On Planting (De plantatione)
The second of Philo's two treatises on Noah as farmer, turning from farming in general to the planting of the vineyard.
EN
On Rewards and Punishments (De praemiis et poenis et de exsecrationibus)
The closing treatise of the Exposition of the Law, on the rewards, punishments, blessings and curses the Law sets before its hearers.
EN
On Sobriety (De sobrietate)
A short sequel to On Drunkenness in the Allegorical Commentary, on Noah waking and pronouncing his blessings and curse. Its Greek title names exactly that: what Noah prayed for and cursed once sober.
EN
On the Change of Names (De mutatione nominum)
Genesis 17 and its renamings, from Abram and Sarai to Jacob and Joshua, read in the Allegorical Commentary; it also carries Philo's clearest statement that God has no proper name.
EN
On the Cherubim (De Cherubim)
Two short commentaries joined under one title: the cherubim at Eden's gate, then the birth of Cain. Within the Allegorical Commentary it picks up where the three books of Allegorical Interpretation stop.
EN
On the Confusion of Tongues (De confusione linguarum)
The Tower of Babel in the Allegorical Commentary, opening with a defence of Genesis against critics who likened it to Greek myth.
EN
On the Contemplative Life (De vita contemplativa)
A portrait of the Therapeutae, classed with Philo's historical and apologetic writings; it opens by referring back to his account of the Essenes, the active life to this contemplative one.
EN
On the Creation of the World (De opificio mundi)
The overture to Philo's Exposition of the Law, the series that goes on to lives of the patriarchs and a code of laws. It stands apart as his reading of the creation story in its literal order.
EN
On the Decalogue (De decalogo)
The hinge of the Exposition of the Law, turning from the lives of the patriarchs to the written law.
EN
On the Embassy to Gaius (Legatio ad Gaium)
The companion of Against Flaccus: an eyewitness history of the embassy Philo led to Gaius, and the fullest account he left of his own public life.
EN
On the Eternity of the World (De aeternitate mundi)
Among Philo's philosophical treatises, the one that names the Greek schools and their arguments most openly.
EN
On the Giants and On the Unchangeableness of God (De gigantibus; Quod Deus sit immutabilis)
Two treatises that editions usually separate but that read as one commentary, in the Allegorical Commentary, on the verses of Genesis leading up to the flood.
EN
On the Life of Moses (De vita Mosis I–II)
Philo's biography of Moses in two books, usually counted with the Exposition of the Law though it stands on its own.
EN
On the Migration of Abraham (De migratione Abrahami)
Abraham's call in Genesis 12, read as the soul's migration toward God; in the Allegorical Commentary it follows On the Confusion of Tongues in the order of Genesis.
EN
On the Posterity of Cain (De posteritate Caini)
The last of the Cain treatises in the Allegorical Commentary, following Cain from his exile through his descendants.
EN
On the Sacrifices of Abel and Cain (De sacrificiis Abelis et Caini)
One of the run of treatises on Cain and Abel in the Allegorical Commentary, taking up the brothers' offerings in Genesis 4.
EN
On the Special Laws (De specialibus legibus I–IV)
The largest work in the Exposition of the Law, in four books; it follows On the Decalogue and is followed by On the Virtues.
EN
On the Virtues (De virtutibus)
A pendant to On the Special Laws in the Exposition of the Law, gathering laws under the virtues they train rather than under the Ten Commandments.
EN
The Worse Attacks the Better (Quod deterius potiori insidiari soleat)
It follows On the Sacrifices of Abel and Cain in the Allegorical Commentary and carries the brothers' story on to the murder itself.
EN
Who Is the Heir of Divine Things? (Quis rerum divinarum heres sit)
Best known for its long passage on the Logos dividing the world into opposites, this reading of God's covenant with Abraham in Genesis 15 belongs to the Allegorical Commentary.
EN

— or open another of their works