`These are the generations of heaven and earth when they were created, in the day when Jahveh Elohim
made earth and heavens.' It was argued, that the expression implied, they were developed from the day
in which they had been created. Others seem to have held, that the three principal things that were
created - earth, heaven, and water - remained, each for three days, at the end of which they respectively
developed what is connected with them (Ber. R. 12).
57. Ber. R. i.
Like Plato and the Stoics, Philo regarded matter as devoid of all quality, and even form. Matter
in itself was dead - more than that, it was evil. This matter, which was already existing, God
formed (not made), like an architect who uses his materials according to a pre-existing plan -
which in this case was the archetypal world.
This was creation, or rather formation, brought about not by God Himself, but by the Potencies,
especially by the Logos, Who was the connecting bond of all. As for God, His only direct work
was the soul, and that only of the good, not of the evil. Man's immaterial part had a twofold
aspect: earthwards, as Sensuousness (αισθησις); and heavenwards, as Reason (νους). The
sensuous part of the soul was connected with the body. It had no heavenly past, and would
have no future. But `Reason' (νους) was that breath of true life which God had breathed into
man (πνευµα ) whereby the earthy became the higher, living spirit, with its various faculties.
Before time began the soul was without body, an archetype, the `heavenly man,' pure spirit in
Paradise (virtue), yet even so longing after its ultimate archetype, God. Some of these pure
spirits descended into bodies and so lost their purity. Or else, the union was brought about by
God and by powers lower than God (dĉmons, δηµιουργοι). To the latter is due our earthly
part. God breathed on the formation, and the `earthly Reason' became `intelligent' `spiritual'
soul (ψυχη νοερα ). Our earthly part alone is the seat of sin.58
58. For further notices on the Cosmology and Anthropology of Philo, see Appendix II.: `Philo and
Rabbinic Theology.'
This leads us to the great question of Original Sin. Here the views of Philo are those of the
Eastern Rabbis. But both are entirely different from those on which the argument in the Epistle
to the Romans turns. It was neither at the feet of Gamaliel, nor yet from Jewish Hellenism, that
Saul of Tarsus learned the doctrine of original sin. The statement that as in Adam all spiritually
died, so in Messiah all should be made alive,59 finds absolutely no parallel in Jewish writings.60
What may be called the starting point of Christian theology, the doctrine of hereditary guilt and
sin, through the fall of Adam, and of the consequent entire and helpless corruption of our nature,
is entirely unknown to Rabbinical Judaism. The reign of physical death was indeed traced to the
sin of our first parents.61 But the Talmud expressly teaches,62 that God originally created man
with two propensities,63 one to good and one to evil (Yetser tobh, and Yetser hara64). The evil
impulse began immediately after birth.65 66 But it was within the power of man to vanquish sin,
and to attain perfect righteousness; in fact, this stage had actually been attained.67
59. We cannot help quoting t he beautiful Haggadic explanation of the name Adam, according to its
three letters, A, D, M - as including these three names, Adam, David, Messiah.
60. Raymundus Martini, in his `Pugio Fidei' (orig. ed. p. 675; ed. Voisin et Carpzov, pp. 866, 867),