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Indiana University Studies 



which no one would put up with if once he were influenced by 

 (M. 475) wisdom. But they make settlements for themselves outside 

 the walls, in gardens^^ or in solitary places, seeking solitude not because 

 of any harsh misanthropy which they have cultivated, but because 

 they know that association with people totally dissimilar to them- 

 selves in character will be unprofitable and injurious to them.^^ 



Ill 



Now this sect is to be found in many parts of the civilized world, 

 /or it is right that both Greece and the land of the barbarians should 

 share in the perfect good. But it is numerous in Egypt thruout each 

 of the districts called Nomes, and particularly around Alexandria. 

 And the best of people from every place, as if going to the native 

 country of the Therapeutae, emigrate to a certain spot that is most 

 convenient, which is situated above Lake Marea, upon a low-lying 

 hill, being very well adapted to the purpose because of its safe 

 position and its mild climate. For the homesteads and villages 



12 Compare John 18, 12 for a garden beyond the brook Kedron where Jesus 

 went to be alone, and where certain traditions said that he was buried. 



In Philo's Life of Abraham the evils of city life are pictured in a most 

 vivid way, for he says: "Wickedness is everywhere and is therefore known 

 to many; but goodness is rare, so that it is not noticed even by a few. 

 Aimlessly doth the bad man hurry to the market-place and theaters and 

 law-courts, to council-chambers and assemblies, to every kind of concourse 

 and club. For he has given up his life to meddlesomeness, wagging his tongue 

 in immoderate and endless and indiscriminate gossip, confounding and 

 mixing up everything, truth with falsehood, and things which may be said 

 with those which may not, private matters with public, and sacred with 

 profane, and serious with ridiculous; all because he has never been taught that 

 which in season is best, namely silence" (Conybeare's translation). 



1'* Solitude and not asceticism is what is sought. Philo in his De Profugis 

 ch. 4 (I, 549) holds out a nobler ideal for a young man of wealth than mere 

 giving of it all away. He says: "See here, how thou canst act to escape from 

 these struggles. Adapt thyself to live with the same things — I mean, not 

 with the evil types of character, but with those things that engender them 

 with honours, magistracies, silver, gold, possessions, colours (i.e. paintings), 

 forms (i.e. statuary), diverse beautiful things. And when thou hast foregathered 

 with them, then like a good artist stamp on these material things the 

 noblest ideal and produce a perfect result worthy of praise" (Conybeare's 

 translation). 



Similar societies, offshoots, no doubt, of the mother society of 

 Alexandria, were found in Cyprus, Corinth, Tarsus, Colossae, Antioch, 

 Rome, Smyrna, and in other places of the Mediterranean Basin. 



Since the Jewish quarter was in the northeastern part of the city, 

 it wo'uld seem that the place of retreat would lie in that direction from 

 Alexandria. Conybeare gives the probable location as on the low limestone 



