(printed p. 266 — Book III)
In Bellarmine, book 2 On Monks, and elsewhere, I read that certain people denied that these two great authors speak about the same Essenes. But whose opinion this is, I do not remember reading, although the most reverend and learned Baronius and others seem to incline toward it in volume 1 of the Annals. Bellarmine indicates that they had these two arguments.
The first: Josephus, book 18, chapter 2, asserts that the sect of the Essenes was ancient among the Jews, but Philo indicates that he is speaking of a discipline which arose in his own time.
The second: many things are handed down by Josephus concerning the Essenes which are manifestly erroneous and superstitious, none of which Philo attributes to his Therapeutae. Hence Saint Nilus, at the beginning of his Asceticus, asserts that the Essenes, namely those about whom Josephus speaks, had customs similar
[margin: Eusebius’s three Philo sources. Chapter XIII begins; two arguments for distinguishing Philo’s Essenes from Josephus’s are introduced.]
(printed p. 267)
to the customs of monks, but because they lacked faith in Christ, their holy customs profited them nothing.
The most reverend Baronius adds a third argument. Josephus, as we saw above, described a twofold form of Essenes who lived in Judea. For some were milder and occupied themselves with marriages; others were stricter. Yet even these stricter ones were in many matters more relaxed than those who lived in Egypt, whose history Philo wove. For Josephus testifies that his Essenes were accustomed to live in cities; those described by Philo, however, were accustomed to live outside, in gardens and country houses. Furthermore, Josephus writes that the former took lunch and supper every day; Philo, however, hands down that the latter were accustomed to take food only once a day, after sunset, and that some of them continued fasting as far as the third day, while others remained so for six days. Again, among the former a dish was set before each by the cook; for the latter, although they feasted together, salt with bread and hyssop was sufficient as relish. There are also many other differences between them in rites, so that it is plainly clear that even if they agreed in name, they were distinct from each other in very many institutions. Therefore the Alexandrian Essenes were different from those whom Josephus affirms were accustomed to live in Judea.
Others, however, and their number is much greater, judge that Josephus and Philo speak about the same Essenes. Among these Bellarmine counts Matthew Galenus in the book On the Origin of Monasticism, which has not yet come before my eyes. Each
[margin: Baronius’s third argument distinguishes Judean Essenes from Alexandrian contemplatives. The opposing view is introduced.]
(printed p. 268)
opinion seems probable to the already named Bellarmine, but each seems rather to me something that must be weighed.
For this matter it is not a little useful to have ready to hand that Philo and Josephus indeed lived in the same first century of Christ the Lord, but that Philo was older than Josephus. For when Caius succeeded the emperor Tiberius, Philo was already mature in age, powerful in wisdom and authority. In the very serious business of all the Jews who lived at Alexandria, of whom there were many thousands, an embassy was sent by them to Caius himself in the fourth year of his reign, and Philo was its leader. Both he himself in his book about that embassy and Josephus, book 18, chapter 10, testify to this.
But Josephus was then a little child, indeed an infant of three years, born in the first year of the same Caius, as he himself narrates at the beginning of his Life. He completed his books of the Jewish War and the Antiquities in the thirteenth year of Domitian, the fifty-sixth of his own age, as he writes at the end of the Antiquities. Again, afterward, in the first or second year of Claudius, who was Caius’s successor, Philo traveled from Alexandria to Rome. Remaining there for business, he conversed with Saint Peter, who had himself arrived at Rome at about the same time, as Eusebius writes in book 2 of the History, chapter 16, and Saint Jerome in the Catalogue.
These two writers also have this in common, that both were at Rome, but Josephus spent the greater part of his life in the parts of Judea,
[margin: Philo is older than Josephus; Serarius summarizes chronology and the embassy to Caius.]
(printed p. 269)
the other in Egypt. But whether this one ever saw Judea, or the other Egypt, is not clear. From these things it is further gathered that Philo could not have been an imitator of Josephus, but Josephus rather could have been an imitator of Philo.
Each establishes two kinds of Essenes. Josephus, in book 2, chapter 12, gives one kind as those who marry, and the other as the unmarried. Philo, at the beginning of the book On the Contemplative Life, gives one kind as the practical philosophers, who are also called cenobites by him, and another as the theoretic or contemplative philosophers, who are also called solitaries and those who live alone. These latter live separate from others, each leading a solitary life in small dwellings, which they called sacred houses or monasteries, as the same author says in the same book. Therefore I now establish two things.
First: Josephus treats only the practical and cenobitic Essenes, so that his two kinds are two parts of the same cenobites. This is understood, first, from what was said about the greatest community of goods among them, explained above in numbers 11, 12, 13, 17, 18, 19, and 20; then from their daily labors and crafts for several hours before and after noon, about which see numbers 23 and 29. Third, because Josephus never mentions contemplation, but only indicates that some of them diligently turned over the ancient physical and divine books, in numbers 38 and 50; and this,
[margin: Philo and Josephus both distinguish two kinds, but not in the same way. Serarius begins his reconciliation.]
(printed p. 270)
in a great multitude, almost never happens without some who do it. And they all did this also for the whole time that could be free from work for them, night and day. Hence, in comparison with the common people, all could be called theoretics, as is signified before Philo’s words by Eusebius in book 8 of the Preparation.
Fourth, because Josephus asserted that the Essenes who married differed from the unmarried only in that one opinion concerning marriage, number 51. Fifth, because Laertius and Aulus Gellius, book 1, chapter 9, teach that this kind of cenobitic life was Pythagorean, as we saw above. But Josephus has already sung to us that his Essenes were similar to the Pythagoreans.
Second: Philo deals in two places with these same practical Essenes, followers of the common life, and yet only those of them who were celibate: namely in the Apology and in the book On the Freedom of the Good Man. But with others, who were in a more excellent way theoretics and cultivators of the solitary life, he deals in the book On the Contemplative Life. Both parts of this statement are seen clearly at the very threshold of the first part of the last-named book, where he says: “After I have discussed the Essees, who love and practice the active life, excelling in all or, to speak less invidiously, in very many parts, now also, following the order of this treatment, I shall say what is fitting about those who have embraced theory or contemplation.” What things are in the Apology agree in matter and almost
[margin: Philo’s practical/cenobitic Essenes are distinguished from his contemplatives. Source page 295 ends mid-sentence.]
(printed p. 271)
word for word with those things which are handed down in that book On the Freedom of the Good Man. This will become clear, both this and each part of the statement I have just established, from Philo’s own words, which I now bring here, so that they may be compared with Josephus and with one another as conveniently as possible. Certainly one of the two can be illustrated from the other.