On Mating with the Preliminary Studies

Abraham takes the servant Hagar before Sarah bears him a son; Philo makes the story a curriculum, and Christian teachers adopted it.

by Philo of Alexandria62 passages held

English, a translation held here, and your language

Original title: De congressu eruditionis gratia
Original language: Ancient Greek

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Overview

Around 200 CE Clement of Alexandria, the Christian teacher working in Philo's own city, set out to justify his church's use of Greek learning. His argument ran through Abraham's household: Sarah, the true wife, was barren, so Abraham first had a child by her Egyptian servant Hagar. Clement named Philo as he went, and took from this treatise both its reading of the story and, almost word for word, its definition: general learning serves philosophy as philosophy serves wisdom, the knowledge of things divine and human. For Philo, Sarah is virtue, or wisdom, and Hagar is the round of preliminary studies an educated Greek passed through: grammar, geometry, astronomy, rhetoric, music and logic. A mind not yet able to bear children by virtue must first go in to the servant and learn from her, then return to the mistress. Hagar is Egyptian, bound up with the body and the senses, and her name, Philo says, means sojourning, since these studies are visitors in the soul rather than citizens. He offers himself as an example. As a young man he took up grammar, then geometry, then music, and handed every child of those unions to philosophy, his lawful wife. The danger, he warns, is the man who never goes back: many have grown old in poetry or painting and forgotten the mistress they meant to serve. Medieval Christian writers would recast the arrangement: philosophy as the handmaid of theology.

Key concepts

What are the preliminary studies in Philo's treatise?

They are the round of general education an educated Greek passed through before philosophy: grammar, geometry, astronomy, rhetoric, music and logic. Philo calls them encyclical, meaning the circle of ordinary schooling, and treats them as a necessary preparation. They train the mind, but they are not the goal, and he warns that they can become a trap for someone who never moves beyond them.

Who are Sarah and Hagar in On the Preliminary Studies?

Sarah is virtue, or wisdom, the true wife; Hagar is general learning, her Egyptian servant. A mind that cannot yet bear the children of virtue must first go in to the servant, as Abraham did, and learn from her, then return to the mistress. Hagar is Egyptian because these studies are bound up with the body and the senses.

What does Hagar's name, sojourning, mean for education?

It means the preliminary studies are visitors in the soul, not citizens. They are meant to stay for a time and prepare the way, not to settle and take over. A person who makes a home in grammar or music, instead of passing through them to philosophy, has mistaken a stopping place for a destination.

How does general learning relate to philosophy and wisdom?

As a servant relates to a mistress, twice over. General learning serves philosophy, and philosophy in turn serves wisdom, which is the knowledge of things divine and human. Clement of Alexandria took this ladder, nearly in Philo's words, to justify Christian use of Greek learning, and medieval writers later recast it as philosophy the handmaid of theology.

Themes of the book

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

Learning as the Handmaid, Wisdom as the Wife

What is all that schooling for? Philo's answer through Abraham, Sarah and Hagar gives the arts and sciences a real place, and a strict limit.

Sarah, the true wife, is virtue, and she has not yet borne Abraham a child; so she sends him to her Egyptian servant Hagar. For Philo, Hagar is the round of preliminary studies an educated Greek passed through: grammar, geometry, astronomy, rhetoric, music and logic. A mind not yet able to bear the children of virtue must first learn from the servant, then return to the mistress. General learning serves philosophy as philosophy serves wisdom. Hagar's name means sojourning, because these studies are visitors in the soul, not citizens, and the danger is the man who never goes back.

education
liberal arts
learning
philosophy
knowledge
wisdom
virtue
moral development
biblical allegory
grammar
logic

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Within this work

passages held: 62
distinct concepts: 124
by passages held, corpus-wide: #617

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: “education” and “virtue”.

Concept co-occurrence, strongest first 8 concepts, joined by 20 pairings. 58 pairings reach beyond these concepts and are not drawn.
Concept	Paired concept	Shared passages
education	virtue	12
allegory	virtue	6
moral development	virtue	6
allegory	education	5
education	moral development	4
education	philosophy	4
passions	virtue	4
reason	virtue	4
passions	reason	3
education	knowledge	2
education	reason	2
knowledge	philosophy	2
knowledge	virtue	2
moral development	passions	2
allegory	knowledge	1
allegory	passions	1
knowledge	reason	1
moral development	reason	1
philosophy	reason	1
philosophy	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) you are here 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.
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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

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