Influence
The legacy of the work is to be sought in early Christian rather than Jewish
exegesis. Its contents were used by church fathers such as Origen,
Didymus, Ambrose, and Augustine. Christians also took over the form of
the question and answer, but they did not use it for running commentar-
ies. Because of the poor transmission of the text, theQuestions and An-
swershave been studied less intensively than other Philonic works. Much
further research needs to be carried out on both form and content.Allegorical Commentary
In modern scholarship the titleAllegorical Commentaryis applied to all the
exegetical treatises of Philo that are included neither in hisExposition of
the Lawnor in hisQuestions and Answers on Genesis and Exodus.Accord-
ing to Eusebius, Philo himself gave to these treatises the titleAllegory of the
Sacred Laws(Hist. Eccl.2.18.1). The treatises in theAllegorical Commentary
numbered thirty-one; of these, nineteen survive in Greek but are usually
referred to by their Latin titles (see the table on pp. 256-57). TheAllegorical
Commentaryconstitutes the most voluminous part of Philo’s oeuvre. The
treatises within the series cover important passages in Genesis 2–41 in a
verse-by-verse commentary. In them Philo adapts the question-and-
answer format. The questions, however, emerge from the exegesis of the
passage, and the answers are lengthier and more complex than in hisQues-
tions and Answers on Genesis and Exodus.This series is of particular im-
portance because it constitutes the first extant systematic inquiry into the
book of Genesis, providing an in-depth analysis of each verse in light of its
allegorical dimension as well as scholarly questions on the literal meaning.
Philo addresses here a highly educated Jewish audience able to follow com-
plicated discussions of minute details.Exegetical Approach
The style of theAllegorical Commentaryoften strikes the modern reader as
difficult and convoluted. It does not make for a fluent reading but de-
mands the same kind of attention as rabbinic midrash, which similarly
disregards the flow of the biblical stories and creatively engages each verse263PhiloEERDMANS -- Early Judaism (Collins and Harlow) final text
Tuesday, October 09, 2012 12:04:07 PM