Philo On Torah

Philo
These laws of Moses, like the laws of the philosophers, are to be sure enacted laws and not natural laws, but, being enacted by God who is the creator of nature, they are, more than the laws of the philosophers, in accordance with nature, not only in the sense that they are in harmony with human impulses or capacities or that they are best fitted to the attainment of the gifts of nature, but also in the sense of their being universal, eternal, and immutable. With Philo, therefore, the philosophic maxims that happiness is life in accordance with virtue or in accordance with reason or in accordance with nature come to mean life in accordance with the Law (Torah/Nomos). All the philosophic maxims about man’s duty to follow God or to imitate God or to be like God come to mean with him that man must act in accordance with the Law. All the philosophic discussions as to whether virtue come to man by learning or habit or nature or divine dispensation comes to mean with him that virtue comes to man by God through nature as a divine grace, or through learning the truths taught in the book of His Law and through training in the performance of the precepts of this Law.

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