Plato, Philo, and Jesus as "a God" by Paul Wernle 1904 [Professor Extraordinary of Modern Church History at the University of Basle]
From: The Beginnings of Christianity, Volume 2
Angels and demons were the connecting link between the remote God and the visible world for the popular belief. Philosophy substituted the 'Logoi' or the 'Logos' and the Holy Spirit for the angels.
Here Philo had paved the way for the Christians. He himself was a Platonist, feeling himself a stranger in this phenomenal world while his true home was in the world of ideas. He did not introduce the conception of Logos into Jewish thought. Stoic and Aristotelian philosophers had done that before him. But just as he appropriated the work of his Jewish predecessors to a very large extent, even where they followed other Greek philosophers, so he took up the conception of the Logos from this tradition, and adapted it to Platonic modes of thought by defining it more sharply, and by individualizing it both as regards God and as regards the world. Even in Philo we find the Logos called the "second God," and the Old Testament was interpreted with reference to him.
Nor was Philo the only forerunner in this direction.
In the Wisdom of Solomon the spirit of wisdom is described, in accordance with the Stoic doctrine, as an infinitely subtilized, universal reason that pervades everything and is yet distinct from God Himself.
Of Christian writers, St Paul was the first to look upon Christ as such an intermediary being, higher than all the angels, yet lower than God Himself, nor was the term Logos as yet applied to Him. It was no philosophical problem that had moved St Paul to take this view. He wished to find Christ in the whole of the Old Testament. This was only possible by depriving God and the angels of a great portion of the sphere of their activity. Jesus, however, thereby comes to be the God that actively works in the world.
Then the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews developed his Pauline theology by means of conceptions taken directly from Alexandrine sources. The world was created through the Son of God. He is the reflection of God's glory and the impress of His substance, upholding all things by the word of His power. In the 45th Psalm He is called God —of course as Son, i.e., as God in a secondary sense. The very word 'reflection' is used as an attribute of wisdom in the Wisdom of Solomon. But this disciple of Philo did not venture as yet to apply the word 'Logos' to Jesus.
In the prologue of the Fourth Gospel, however, this name appears clearly and unmistakably. "In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was a God." Dependence on Philo's writings is possible, yet it is not even absolutely necessary to presuppose it. The cosmological character of the opening sentences clearly points to a philosophical source. Between God and the world stands the Logos. On the one hand He is with God, on the other everything is created by Him. He is called 'a' God, but not 'the' God; in exactly the same way Philo distinguished between God with and God without the article, and supported this distinction by Old Testament proofs. The most suitable name is Son of God, or rather the only Son, in distinction from the 'children' of God, who only become children by His mediation. He is not only the creator of the world but its supporter, as in Him is all life.
Now the fact is of great importance that the man who introduced the Logos into the Gospel was not himself a philosopher, nor did the problem of the mediation between God and the world cause him any anxiety or difficulty. It is for apologetic and not philosophical ends that he makes use of the theory of the Logos. If, therefore, he ascribes a cosmological signification to the Logos, notwithstanding all this, then he must have been determined to do so by a firmly established tradition. It was an accepted theory — derived either from Philo or elsewhere — that the Logos had created and supported the world. The evangelist accepts this view in order to make it the basis for the transition to the apologetic, which is the sole aim of the whole of his prologue.
From: The Beginnings of Christianity, Volume 2
Angels and demons were the connecting link between the remote God and the visible world for the popular belief. Philosophy substituted the 'Logoi' or the 'Logos' and the Holy Spirit for the angels.
Here Philo had paved the way for the Christians. He himself was a Platonist, feeling himself a stranger in this phenomenal world while his true home was in the world of ideas. He did not introduce the conception of Logos into Jewish thought. Stoic and Aristotelian philosophers had done that before him. But just as he appropriated the work of his Jewish predecessors to a very large extent, even where they followed other Greek philosophers, so he took up the conception of the Logos from this tradition, and adapted it to Platonic modes of thought by defining it more sharply, and by individualizing it both as regards God and as regards the world. Even in Philo we find the Logos called the "second God," and the Old Testament was interpreted with reference to him.
Nor was Philo the only forerunner in this direction.
In the Wisdom of Solomon the spirit of wisdom is described, in accordance with the Stoic doctrine, as an infinitely subtilized, universal reason that pervades everything and is yet distinct from God Himself.
Of Christian writers, St Paul was the first to look upon Christ as such an intermediary being, higher than all the angels, yet lower than God Himself, nor was the term Logos as yet applied to Him. It was no philosophical problem that had moved St Paul to take this view. He wished to find Christ in the whole of the Old Testament. This was only possible by depriving God and the angels of a great portion of the sphere of their activity. Jesus, however, thereby comes to be the God that actively works in the world.
Then the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews developed his Pauline theology by means of conceptions taken directly from Alexandrine sources. The world was created through the Son of God. He is the reflection of God's glory and the impress of His substance, upholding all things by the word of His power. In the 45th Psalm He is called God —of course as Son, i.e., as God in a secondary sense. The very word 'reflection' is used as an attribute of wisdom in the Wisdom of Solomon. But this disciple of Philo did not venture as yet to apply the word 'Logos' to Jesus.
In the prologue of the Fourth Gospel, however, this name appears clearly and unmistakably. "In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was a God." Dependence on Philo's writings is possible, yet it is not even absolutely necessary to presuppose it. The cosmological character of the opening sentences clearly points to a philosophical source. Between God and the world stands the Logos. On the one hand He is with God, on the other everything is created by Him. He is called 'a' God, but not 'the' God; in exactly the same way Philo distinguished between God with and God without the article, and supported this distinction by Old Testament proofs. The most suitable name is Son of God, or rather the only Son, in distinction from the 'children' of God, who only become children by His mediation. He is not only the creator of the world but its supporter, as in Him is all life.
Now the fact is of great importance that the man who introduced the Logos into the Gospel was not himself a philosopher, nor did the problem of the mediation between God and the world cause him any anxiety or difficulty. It is for apologetic and not philosophical ends that he makes use of the theory of the Logos. If, therefore, he ascribes a cosmological signification to the Logos, notwithstanding all this, then he must have been determined to do so by a firmly established tradition. It was an accepted theory — derived either from Philo or elsewhere — that the Logos had created and supported the world. The evangelist accepts this view in order to make it the basis for the transition to the apologetic, which is the sole aim of the whole of his prologue.
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