CHAPTER II
POLITICS IN CODE
I
N the early part of the preceding chapter an extraordinary state
ment of Philo was quoted in which he urged caution upon any Jew
who had dealings with Roman governors.^1 The passage is itself only
a part of an extended allegorization of the character of Joseph, who
typified to Philo the politician. It is my conviction that the entire alle
gory of Joseph is a clever piece of double entendre, a fierce denunciation
of the Roman character and oppression, done in a way, and in a docu
ment, which would give it fairly wide currency among Jews, but would
seem quite innocuous if, as was unlikely, it fell into Roman hands.
For Philo wrote several sorts of treatises, some of which were de
signed exclusively for a circle of educated Jews, to all appearances for
Jews who lived by the "Mystery." The greatest series of treatises of this
sort was the Allegory of the Sacred Laws, a series of discussions which
would have been intelligible only to people thoroughly conversant with
the text of the Old Testament, and of interest only to Jews who under
stood the method and objective of mystic allegory. While this series is
Philo's greatest work, philosophically, for the general reader it has al
ways proved so dull that Philo could have been confident that Roman
officials would not sit up nights to read it. He could then speak in it
about as he pleased so long as he veiled his attack in allegory, and, when
he brought his remarks near to Alexandria, appear to "give way to the
Romans in honor."
De Somniis is that treatise of the great Allegory in which Philo dis
cusses the nature of dreams on the basis of the dreams recorded in Gene
sis. There were originally three books, each devoted to a particular kind
of dream, but of these we now have only the second and third. Joseph
appears in the second book only briefly, in a connection that will be dis
cussed later.^2
In the third book (our second book) Joseph is at the outset contrasted
with Isaac. There are two types of men, Philo says, those who apply the
nature of the good to many things, and those who ascribe it only to the
Best; or those who regard the good as a mixed thing in contrast with
i. See above, pp. 5 f. 2. See below, p. 32.
