Allegorizations of the Active and Contemplative Lives in Philo, Origen,

Allegorizations of the Active and Contemplative Lives in Philo, Origen, Augustine, and Gregory This paper examines the allegorical interpretations given to several Scriptural pairs as they relate to the idea of the active and contemplative lives in Philo, Origen, Augustine, and Gregory. As will be shown, Augustine combines elements found in the two previous writers to form his allegory of the two wives of Jacob as representative of the active and contemplative lives. In Philo, most of the essential elements of later Christian thought on the active and contemplative lives are already present. The superiority of the contemplative life is given at the beginning of his treatise on it: "I have discussed the Essenes, who persistently pursued the active life and excelled in all or, to put it more moderately, in most of its departments. I will now proceed at once in accordance with the sequence required by the subject to say what is needed about those who embraced the life of contemplation" (De Vita Cont. 1 [471]). The idea that the contemplative life follows upon the active is also present here, and is elaborated elsewhere: "... infants have one place and full grown men another. The one is named ascetic training and the other is called wisdom... For what life is better than a contemplative life, or more appropriate to a rational being?" (De Migr. Abr. 9 [443]). Both the active and contemplative lives are virtuous, but the contemplative is the more matur e and fuller expression of the life of wisdom; it should, however, only be practiced once the former has been used as a training ground. Philo allegorizes Leah and Rachel in several related ways in his works (cf. Sly, 163-74). At one point he identifies Rachel with bodily beauty, ... ... moves away. She loves to contemplate her lovely eyes; I love to use my hands to adorn myself: her joy is in reflection, mine in act." (Purgatorio xxvii, 101-08, [Musa trans.]) What has been called "the breadth of [Augustine's] vision and the lyrical exaltation of his language" (Mason, 45) has cast a long shadow indeed. Works Cited * Butler, D. C. Western Mysticism: The Teaching of Augustine, Gregory and Bernard on Contemplation and the Contemplative Life. 2nd ed. New York: Harper & Row, 1966. * Mason, M. E. Active Life and Contemplative Life: A Study of the Concepts from Plato to the Present. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1961. * Runia, D. T. Philo in Early Christian Literature: A Survey. Assen: Van Gorcum/Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993. * Sly, D. Philo's Perception of Women. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990.