Studies in Philo of Alexandria – serie

The topic tackled in this book is Philo’s account of the complex, double-sided nature of God’s acting – the two-sided coin of God as transcendent yet immanent, unknowable yet revealed, immobile yet creating – and also the two sides of acting in humans – who, in an attempt to imitate God, both contemplate and produce.In both contexts, divine and human, Philo considers that it would not be proper to give precedence to either side – the result would be barren. God’s acting and man’s acting are at the same time both speculative and practical, and it is precisely out of this co-presence that the order of the world unfolds. Philo considers this two-sided condition as a source of complexity and fertility. Francesca Calabi argues that, far from being an irresolvable contradiction, Philo’s two-fold vision is the key to understanding his works. It constitutes a richness that rejects reduction to apparently incompatible forms and aspects.

The essays collected in this volume focus on the role played by the philosophy of the Hellenistic, or post-Aristotelian age (from the school of the successors of Aristotle, Theophrastus and other Peripatetics, Epicurus, Sceptical Academy and Stoicism, to neo-Pythagorenism and the schools of Antiochus and Eudorus) in Philo of Alexandria’s works.Despite many authoritative studies on Philo's vision of Greek philosophy as an exegetical tool in allegorizing the Scripture, there is not such a comprehensive overview in Philo’s treatises that takes in account both the progress achieved in the recent interpretation of Hellenistic philosophy and analysis of ancient doxographical literature.Contributors: Prof. Dr. David T. Runia, Master of Queen's College, Univ. of Melbourne; Prof. Dr. Robert W. Sharples, University College of London; Dr. Graziano Ranocchia, Fellow-researcher at the University of Würzburg; Prof. Dr. Carlos Lévy, Université Paris IV-Sorbonne; Prof. Dr. Anthony A. Long, University of Berkeley; Prof. Dr. Roberto Radice, Università Sacro Cuore, Milan; Prof. Dr. Gretchen Reydams-Schils, University of Notre Dame, USA; Prof. Dr. Margaret Graver, University of Dartmouth, USA; Prof. Dr. John Dillon, Trinity College, Dublin; Dr. Mauro Bonazzi, Università degli Studi, Milan