On Sobriety

Noah wakes from his wine and curses the grandson who did nothing, and Philo sets out to explain why the verdict is just.

by Philo of Alexandria25 passages held

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Original title: De sobrietate
Original language: Ancient Greek

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Overview

A reader of Genesis meets an apparent injustice here. Ham sees his father Noah lying drunk and uncovered and tells his brothers; Noah wakes, learns what his younger son has done, and curses not Ham but Ham's son Canaan, who took no part in it. Philo finds the answer in the names: Ham means warm, like a fever lying dormant in the body, and Canaan means commotion, so Canaan is Ham's wickedness once it stirs into action. Cursing the grandson is cursing the sin at the moment it moves from inclination to deed, which is when it deserves punishment. Before he reaches that verdict Philo spends the opening of the treatise on a smaller word, younger, and shows that Scripture calls people young or old by the state of their souls rather than by their years, which is why Abraham, short-lived beside his ancestors, is the one it calls an elder. Among the shortest of Philo's treatises, the book begins at the moment Noah becomes sober again and ends on the blessings given to Shem and Japheth. Ambrose, the fourth-century bishop of Milan, whose Old Testament commentaries lean heavily on Philo, retold Noah's story in a book of his own.

Key concepts

What do the names Ham and Canaan mean in On Sobriety?

Ham means warm, and Canaan means commotion. Warmth in a body is fever, and in a soul it is wickedness, lying dormant like a disease not yet broken out. Canaan is the same wickedness once it stirs into motion. Philo uses the two names to show that father and son in the story are one evil at two stages, before and after it acts.

Why does Philo think wickedness deserves punishment only once it acts?

Because the moment it moves from inclination into deed is the moment it becomes a sin that can be judged. While wickedness lies dormant, it is a sickness in the soul; when it stirs, it becomes an act with a victim. Noah's curse falls on Canaan, the commotion, rather than Ham, the warmth, because justice strikes the evil at the point where it breaks out.

What does it mean to be an elder in Philo's sense?

An elder is someone whose soul has matured in wisdom, whatever their age in years. Scripture, Philo argues, calls people young or old by the state of their souls. That is why Abraham, who lived a shorter life than almost any of his ancestors, is the only one called an elder: the title names what he became, not how long he lived.

What does sobriety mean in this treatise?

Sobriety is the soul's return to itself after the befuddlement of folly, pictured as Noah waking from his wine. It is the state in which judgment becomes possible again: Noah, sober, sees clearly what his sons have done and pronounces blessing and curse. The Greek title names exactly this, what Noah prayed for and cursed once he was sober.

Themes of the book

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

Why the Curse Falls on Canaan

When does wickedness deserve punishment: while it lies dormant, or once it moves? Philo's answer turns an apparent injustice in Genesis into a theory of guilt.

Ham sees his father lying drunk and uncovered and tells his brothers; Noah wakes and curses not Ham but Ham's son Canaan, who took no part. Philo finds the answer in the names. Ham means warm, and warmth in a body means fever, in a soul wickedness: a disease lying dormant. Canaan means commotion, the same wickedness once it stirs. So the curse falls on the grandson because it falls on the sin at the moment it passes from inclination into deed, which is when it deserves punishment.

action
law and punishment
justice
moral psychology
vice
opportunity
passions
freedom

Enter a dialogue

Young and Old by the State of the Soul

Is a person old because of the years they have lived, or because of what they have become? Scripture, Philo argues, counts only the second.

Before he reaches the curse, Philo spends the opening of the treatise on a smaller word, younger, and shows that Scripture calls people young or old by the state of their souls rather than by their years. Abraham lived a shorter life than almost any of his ancestors, yet he alone is called an elder, because the name belongs to a mind grown mature in wisdom. A long life without that growth is still a youth, and the treatise, which begins as Noah becomes sober again, treats waking from folly as the start of true age.

moral development
moral education
wisdom
virtue
memory
recollection
happiness
praise

Enter a dialogue

Within this work

passages held: 25
distinct concepts: 56
by passages held, corpus-wide: #758

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: “scriptural interpretation” and “virtue”.

Concept co-occurrence, strongest first 4 concepts, joined by 3 pairings. 21 pairings reach beyond these concepts and are not drawn.
Concept	Paired concept	Shared passages
scriptural interpretation	virtue	4
action	allegory	3
allegory	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)
Written in the manner of the Greek schools rather than as commentary on Moses, it is, with On the Eternity of the World, one of Philo's philosophical treatises.
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.
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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.
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On Sobriety (De sobrietate) you are here 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