On the Giants and On the Unchangeableness of God

Two linked treatises on the flood story's most awkward verses: angels who take human wives, and a God who regrets making humankind.

by Philo of Alexandria84 passages held

English, a translation held here, and your language

Original title: De gigantibus; Quod Deus sit immutabilis
Original language: Ancient Greek

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Overview

Printed editions divide this commentary into two treatises, On the Giants and On the Unchangeableness of God, and the Loeb Classical Library puts them in different volumes; this page covers both. Yet the second opens by asking what Genesis means by the words and after this, and the verse it quotes follows straight on from the passage the first had just reached. They read best as one argument about the opening verses of Genesis 6, the prelude to the flood. The first half takes on the strangest, where the angels of God see that the daughters of men are beautiful and take them as wives, and giants walk the earth. Philo insists Moses tells no fable here, whatever the Greek poets say of giants. Angels, he argues, are what other philosophers call daemons: souls that live in the air, some of which sink into bodies. The giants become people born of the earth, devoted to the body, set against people born of heaven and people born of God. The second half confronts a verse that seems to make God fickle: God repented that he had made humankind. That cannot be literal, Philo argues, because God does not change. Scripture holds two principles side by side, that God is not like a man and that God is like a man, and it uses the second as a teacher uses simple language, for readers not yet able to bear the first.

Key concepts

Who are the angels and giants of Genesis 6 in Philo's reading?

The angels are what other philosophers call daemons: souls that live in the air, some of which descend into bodies. The giants are people born of the earth, whose lives are given over to the body and its pleasures. Philo sets them beside two higher kinds, people born of heaven and people born of God, so the verse becomes a classification of human lives rather than a tale of monsters.

What are the two principles Philo finds in Scripture about God?

That God is not like a man, and that God is like a man. The first states the truth: God has no body, no passions and no change of mind. The second is a concession to readers who cannot yet grasp that truth, and Scripture uses it as a teacher uses simple language, to guide them towards the better principle rather than to describe God as he is.

What is divine immutability in On the Unchangeableness of God?

It is the doctrine that God does not change, in mind, will or being. Change belongs to created things, which come to be and pass away; God, who is their cause, stands outside that process. For Philo this rules out any literal reading of verses in which God regrets, grows angry or changes his plans, and it is why the treatise exists at all.

Why does the human being alone deserve praise or blame, according to Philo?

Because the human soul alone received from God a voluntary mind, able to act by deliberate purpose. Plants and animals move without design, so neither their good nor their harm can be praised or blamed. The human being, freed as far as possible from necessity, resembles God in that freedom, and for that reason is answerable for what it chooses.

Themes of the book

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

Giants of the Earth and People of Heaven

What does it mean to be born of the earth rather than of heaven? For Philo the giants of Genesis are not a fable but a kind of person everyone has met.

Genesis 6 says the angels of God took the daughters of men as wives, and giants walked the earth. Philo insists Moses tells no myth here, whatever the Greek poets say of giants. Angels are what other philosophers call daemons, souls that live in the air, some of which sink into bodies. The giants are people born of the earth, devoted to the body, set against people born of heaven and people born of God. The divine spirit, the verse says, cannot abide in them, because they are flesh: it may visit many, but it stays only with a few.

soul
embodiment
pleasure
desire
wealth
human nature
virtue
wisdom
vice

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Why Scripture Says God Repented

If God does not change, what is a reader to do with a verse that says he regretted making humankind? Philo's answer is a theory of how Scripture teaches.

God repented that he had made humankind: Philo will not take the verse literally, because God does not change. Scripture, he argues, holds two principles side by side, that God is not like a man and that God is like a man. The first is the truth; the second is how a teacher speaks to readers not yet able to bear it, as a doctor may tell a frightened patient less than the whole. Against this unchanging God stands the human being, the one creature given a voluntary mind, and so the one open to praise and blame.

divine immutability
anthropomorphism
repentance
biblical interpretation
scriptural interpretation
conscience
moral responsibility
intellect
impermanence

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Within this work

passages held: 84
distinct concepts: 186
by passages held, corpus-wide: #545

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: “moral psychology” and “virtue”.

Concept co-occurrence, strongest first 8 concepts, joined by 15 pairings. 71 pairings reach beyond these concepts and are not drawn.
Concept	Paired concept	Shared passages
moral psychology	virtue	7
allegory	virtue	5
allegory	soul	4
reason	virtue	4
creation	virtue	3
soul	virtue	3
virtue	wisdom	3
allegory	moral psychology	2
allegory	wisdom	1
anthropomorphism	creation	1
creation	moral psychology	1
creation	reason	1
creation	wisdom	1
moral psychology	reason	1
moral psychology	soul	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.
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.
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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) you are here 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.
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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.
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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

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