On the Contemplative Life

Philo's portrait of a Jewish community of men and women living in prayer beside an Egyptian lake, which Christians later claimed as their own.

by Philo of Alexandria33 passages held

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Original title: De vita contemplativa
Original language: Ancient Greek

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Overview

Eusebius of Caesarea, the fourth-century historian of the church, read this treatise and decided that its subjects were Christians: converts made by the evangelist Mark in Alexandria, living by rules his own church still kept. Jerome followed him, and on the strength of this one book counted Philo among the church's writers. The people Philo describes were in fact Jews, a community of men and women called Therapeutae, worshippers or healers of the soul, who lived on a low rise beyond Lake Mareotis, outside Alexandria. They gave their property to relatives and lived apart in small houses, each with a room for solitary prayer that Philo calls a monasterion — the word Jerome later seized on as proof that these were monks. Six days of the week they spent alone, reading the scriptures as allegory. On the seventh they met, men and women divided by a wall high enough to keep them apart and low enough to let the women hear. Most of the women were elderly virgins by choice. Every seven weeks they held a feast, which Philo sets against the famous drinking parties of Greek literature — Xenophon's and above all Plato's Symposium, which he mocks for its talk of love. They ended it with an all-night vigil of hymns in two choirs, like Moses and Miriam after the crossing of the sea. In 1879 the German scholar P. E. Lucius argued that the whole work was a Christian forgery; F. C. Conybeare's Oxford edition of 1895 answered him, and Philo's authorship is now generally accepted, though scholars still debate how closely the portrait matches a real community.

Key concepts

Who are the Therapeutae in On the Contemplative Life?

A Jewish community of men and women devoted to contemplation, living beyond Lake Mareotis outside Alexandria. The name means worshippers, or healers of the soul. Philo presents them as the contemplative counterpart to the Essenes, whose active life he had described before: the Therapeutae give their property to relatives, live apart and spend their days in prayer and the allegorical study of scripture.

What is the contemplative life for Philo?

A life given wholly to the knowledge of God and nature, pursued in solitude and shared worship. Its members renounce property and the city, spend six days alone reading the scriptures as allegory and praying, and meet on the seventh. Its practitioners, Philo says, are citizens of heaven and of the world, loved by the Father of all for their virtue.

What is a monasterion?

The room in each Therapeutic house set aside for solitary prayer and study. A member brings into it no food or drink, only the laws, the oracles of the prophets, hymns and psalms, the things by which knowledge and piety grow. Jerome later seized on it as proof that these people were monks, which is how the word entered the history of Christian monasticism.

Why does Philo reject slavery at the Therapeutae's feast?

Because nature created all people free. Slavery, he says, is the work of injustice and greed in those who prefer inequality, the cause of all evil, and who have subjected the weaker to the stronger. So at the feast free members serve the others of their own will, as a service offered and not a duty imposed, in contrast to the slave boys who pour the wine at a Greek banquet.

Themes of the book

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

Leaving Everything to Live in Contemplation

What would it take to give a whole life to understanding God and the world? Philo's Therapeutae are his answer, drawn as a community of men and women who actually did it.

The Therapeutae, worshippers or healers of the soul, gave their property to relatives or friends, left families and cities behind, and settled on a low rise beyond Lake Mareotis outside Alexandria. Each lived apart in a small house with a room set aside for solitary prayer, which Philo calls a monasterion, and spent six days alone reading the scriptures as allegory. Every city, even the best governed, is full of tumult, Philo says, so leaving it is not a change of masters but a bid for freedom. He ends by calling them citizens of heaven and of the world, beloved by the Father of all for their virtue.

contemplative life
contemplation
solitude
prayer
allegory
scripture
wealth
divine love

Enter a dialogue

A Feast Without Wine-Soaked Talk or Slaves

What would a banquet look like if its purpose were wisdom rather than pleasure? Philo sets the Therapeutae's feast against the famous drinking parties of Greek literature.

On the seventh day the community met, men and women divided by a wall high enough to keep them apart and low enough to let the women hear. Every seven weeks they held a feast, and Philo stages it against the drinking parties of Greek literature, Xenophon's and above all Plato's Symposium, which he mocks for its talk of love. Here there are no slaves, since nature created all people free and only greed made some masters, and free members serve willingly. The feast ends in an all-night vigil of hymns in two choirs, like Moses and Miriam after the sea.

communal worship
music
temperance
luxury
drunkenness
equality
slavery
hospitality