APPENDIX TO ON THE GIANTS
§ 7. Fire-born. The fire-creatures are mentioned by Aristotle, Hist. An. v. 552 b, and by other writers. This supposed connexion with Macedonia, which recurs in De Plant. 12, does not appear elsewhere.
The stars are souls divine. Cf. De Op. 73. This belief was held not only by the Stoics but by Plato and Aristotle, see Zeller, Stoics (Eng. Trans.), p. 206.
§ 13. As though into a stream, etc. The idea is clearly derived from Plato, Tim. 43 A, while the thought of the fall of the soul is similar to that of Phaedrus 248 c.
§ 14. Study to die to the life in the body. From Plato, Phaedo 67 E οἱ ὀρθῶς φιλοσοφοῦντες ἀποθνήσκειν μελετῶσι, cf. ibid. 64 A οὐδὲν ἀλλὸ αὐτοὶ ἐπιτηδεύουσι ἢ ἀποθνήσκειν τε καὶ τεθνάναι. See on Quod Det. 34.
§ 16. Ambassadors backwards and forwards. Cf. Plato, Symp. 202 E καὶ γὰρ πᾶν τὸ δαιμόνιον μεταξύ ἐστι θεοῦ τε καὶ θνητοῦ· τίνα δʼ, ἦν δʼ ἐγώ, δύναμιν ἔχον; ἑρμηνεῦον καὶ διαπορθμεῦον θεοῖς τὰ παρʼ ἀνθρώπων καὶ ἀνθρώποις τὰ παρὰ θεῶν.
§ 22. The air which flows up from the land. This is explained in De Somn. i. 144, where Jacob’s ladder which reached from earth to heaven is interpreted as the air, τὰς γὰρ ἀναδιδομένας ἐκ γῆς ἀναθυμιάσεις (rising vapours) λεπτυνομένας ἐξαεροῦσθαι συμβέβηκεν ὤστε βάσιν μὲν και ῥίζαν ἀέρος εἶναι γῆν. κεφαλὴν δὲ οὔρανον. The similar statement about the water which follows here is meant to explain Gen. 1:2, not to exclude the fact that earth also is a βάσις.
§ 38. If they come to him, etc. In this sentence Philorecedes somewhat from the view that these things are μέγιστον κακόν. and takes the Stoic position in more or less Stoic language. Cf. Diog. Laert. vii. 104, 105, where wealth, glory, health, and strength are preferable indifferents (ἀδιάφορα προηγμένα): indifferent because καὶ χωρὶς τούτων εὐδαιμονεῖν ἐνδέχεται; preferable as having μέσην τινὰ δύναμιν ἢ χρείαν συμβαλλομένην πρὸς τὸν κατὰ φύσιν βίον. These last words suggest that by επανόρθωσις Philo means moral improvement, not supplying material deficiencies.
§ 41. ἐφάμιλλός γε κτλ. While the general sense of this passage is clear, the form even with the corrections of τε to γε and ἀσυγκρίτος to ἀσυγκρίτων is far from satisfactory. εἰ μὴ in this sense should follow on a negative statement (so and so cannot be true, unless something which is clearly impossible is true also), not on a statement which, though ironically negative in sense, is affirmative in form.
The translator suggests the following reconstruction: οὔκουν <εἰ> τὸ μὲν σαρκός ἐστιν ἅλογος ἡδονή, τὸ δὲ ψυχης καὶ τοῦ παντὸς ὁ νοῦς τῶν ὅλων, ὁ θεός, ἐφάμιλλος [τε] ἢ [ἀ]συγκρίτων ἡ σύγκρισις, εἰ μὴ κτλ., i.e. “then if the first is … and the second is … the comparison is not an evenly balanced one or between two really comparables, unless we are prepared to admit,” etc.
§ 52. Reason in the form of utterance. The Stoics laid great stress on the distinction between λόγος προφορικός (speech) and λόγος ἐνδιάθετος (thought). Aaron, who in Philo is regularly λόγος, stands sometimes for the one, sometimes for the other. But it is only as representing the ἐνδιάθετος that he is fitted to enter the most holy place, and so only through silent meditation can we obtain the ἡρεμία ἀκλινής of Moses.
§ 53. τὸ ἐσωτάτω καταπέτασμα καὶ προκάλυμμα τῆς δόξης ἀνειμένῃ καὶ γυμνῇ τῇ διανοίᾳ, “with the understanding open and divested of the last and inmost veil of opinion.” ἀνειμένῃ (‘loosened,’ ‘unfastened’) is a natural word to be used in connexion with καταπέτασμα and προκάλυμμα, and is probably Passive not Middle, as it is in agreement with διανοίᾳ, not like ἀπαμφιασάμενον with ὃ (εἷδος); cf. πύλαι ἀνειμέναι Dion. Hal. x. 14. The use of ἀνείμων in a literal sense with reference to the precept of Exod. 22:26 f. in De Somniis i. 99 goes very little way to make it a likely correction here. And the accusatives (καταπέτασμα and προκάλυμμα) almost require the participle (ἀνειμένῃ).—G. H. W.
§ 56. Knit in a twin existence. Considering the number of Platonic reminiscences in this treatise, it seems likely that we have an echo of Socrates’ fable of pain and pleasure definitely mentioned in De Ebr. 8 (ἐκ μιᾶς κορυφῆς συνημμένω δύʼ ὄντε), Phaedo 60 B.
§ 59. From his own commonwealth. Philo is probably suggesting a comparison between Moses’ πολιτεία and that of Plato, from which some forms of poetry were banished for a similar reason.