Leucius Charinus wrote: ↑Sun Sep 04, 2022 10:52 pm
Who were the "therapeutae" in antiquity?
I will list below a number of paradoxes that I have run across in trying to answer this question (i.e. "Who were the therapeutae") in past discussions.
PARADOX 1: Dominance of Literary and archaeological evidence citations
...
Google says (I will edit and paraphrase for greater relevance here) that a 'paradox' is:
- a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory proposition which, on investigation and by explanation may proven true.
- a proposition which, despite sound reasoning from acceptable premises, leads to a conclusion that seems senseless, logically unacceptable, or contradictory.
- a situation, person, etc. which combines contradictory features or qualities.
Some synonyms include contradiction in terms, inconsistency, incongruity, anomaly, conflict, absurdity, oddity, enigma, puzzle, mystery, conundrum, oxymoron.
All of these definitions declare contradiction paired with some element of uncertainty which may not be resolved satisfactorily to all sane, well-intentioned observers. A "paradox" is NOT a legitimizing opportunity for the moral insane to question Truth; the illegitimacy of liars is not allowed by exception of some understandable confusion or missing data. An erroneous conclusion isn't a paradox, it's Error. Opinion (a debatable point) isn't a paradox either.
For me, a true paradox is an evident or known conundrum or enigma: a confounding mystery, not merely a gap in the data-set or an unknown, nor something that is merely debatable.
By design, your descriptions of paradoxes here are disinformative in almost every case. AND YET -- that notorious 'But...' -- the work
De Vita Contemplativa ascribed to one 'Philo Judaeus'
is deeply problematic itself: "a hot mess" as the kids of today would say. Legitimately, we may argue a) whether Philo wrote it (or not), b) whether the Therapeutae at Lake Mareotis were real or fiction, c) whether they were "Jews" , d) whether they were connected to other 'Jewish groups', and so on. This tedious path has been tread and re-tread many times before: why bother re-explaining to the wrong-headed or bad-intentioned for the umpteenth time? I reject outright the nihilist presumption of meaninglessness. Instead, I can grasp the Anonymous Authors identified this as a timeless mystery wrapped in a
cipher (after Edelstein's mentor, K. Jaspers). Their Program is German Existentialist, also.
"Paradox 3" isn't. I await AI to determine the statistical probability of any purported "genuine Philonean tract"; until then, DVC is assumed valid. I accept 'Philo is Author' with the caveat and distinct probability he had a dozen or more scribes in his employ. 'Philo' is therefore a theosophical publishing house, a "Deepak Chopra" of Antiquity. A ghostwriting former secretary or copyist is 'Philo' or 'Pseudo-Philo' -- that distinction is trivial. Is it even possible The Author is a Female? Hmmm! (Hat-tip to Emma Edelstein and the "womenfolk": Anonymous Author and modern
Therapeutide.)
"The author of "VC is virulently anti-Hellenic, Philo is not.
Philo is allied to Greek culture and philosophy, the author of "VC" is not.
Philo praises Pythagoras, Plato, etc while the author of "VC" repudiates them.
Philo has great respect for the symposium, while the author of "VC" presents a detestable, common drinking-bout.
Philo respects the Platonic Eros, the author of "VC" does not.
Your line is all wrong (patently false, deliberately skewed, misleading, etc.) -- e.g., the symposium vs. drinking-bout is misappropriated -- and generally if not intentionally disinformative.
"Paradox 1" isn't. Like so many terms in Philo's vocabulary, the word 'therapeutae' is pagan Greek. The 'therapeut' as an ascetic or devotional personality type existed throughout the then-known world (as he says). There's no archaeological evidence proving that, either. 'We don't have proof' isn't paradoxical, and literary inconsistency isn't either. 'Problematic' is not 'paradoxical' by definition.
"Paradox 2" is a red-herring, and wrong in so many ways.
"The author of {DVC} described a monastic community in the 1st century." No, Philo does not label the writers' colony such; the resemblance to some later Xian phenomenon is noteworthy but not necessarily consequential; Essenes were also communal,
monastic. Lack of evidence somewhere is not proof of non-existence: an evidentiary gap is wholly inconclusive and does not contradict Philo's claim. The characteristic 'monasterion' should be a divine space, relevant to the site's former military architecture (c.500 BC?) in barracks where Semitic relics were safely stored. For the Therapeutae, we may logically conclude the
monasterion/
semneion became a psycho-spiritual healing chamber and repository of holy books (i.e. religious valuables).
"The author states this group (monastic community) was all over the empire." Totally False. Ascetic holy men ('therepeuts') were found everywhere, Philo admits. However, a 'monasterion' (as described) was unique to adapted relic fortresses of their fore-bearers in Egypt. The odd word first appears at a
military boundary long protected and settled by 'Jewish' mercenaries. {I wonder if it is coded to a Semitic 'Monad' symbol: Agathodaimon/Ouroboros?} The 'monasterion' concept was later borrowed by derivative groups; the NT adopted the closet (ταμεῖόν) but forcefully repudiated the Ophite Serpent.
"That makes them the first monastic community in the empire." Faulty logic, simply Wrong.
"The Egyptian monastic community movement belongs to the 4th not the 1st century." Irrelevant, and since the first such communities were consecrated Christian virgins
in the 2nd C. AD, we cannot conclude that cenobitic Christian monastics the 'first Egyptian monastics'. We simply don't know who was and where the first monastic community appeared.
"How could the author of {DVC} have portrayed a monastic community in Egypt ...from the 1st century?" Circular illogic.
"Paradox 4" is another red-herring, of the semantic variety. Is a secular American Jew or JuBu likewise 'Not Jewish'? On the contrary, Judaic sectarians and their proselytes are still "Jewish" here. Scholars have long debated First C. Jewish identity, inconclusively; opinions vary. Painted by the broad brush, Egyptian "Samaritans" (as, and/or Sethians, Melchizedekians, Cainites, etc.) were arguably Jewish in this period also.
"Paradox 5" is misleading. Philo is defending a controversial sectarian group to whom he has some affinity. We may read into his defense of his former teachers and current neighbors. But who was attacking the Mareotic colony? Other Jews (i.e. religious authorities), Greeks rabble-rousing against 'those itinerant Jews at the border, occupying the old fortresses' and perhaps certain Roman authorities concerned about
weird Judaic cults appearing in Rome. There's no need to presume the sectarians were "like Philo" in all religious particulars, either.
"Paradox 6" is a straw-man. A persecuted Jew might have found protection in a (pagan) temple's sanctuary; Jews may have sent their children to (pagan) temple schools (e.g. as I've known Jews who attended Catholic schools); some Jews may have been mantic specialists at pagan healing
sites; and so on. We don't know what categories of religious healers existed in different Jewish communities of Egypt and the Diaspora.
Who were the therapeutae of the medical profession and Asclepius for example? They were the dominant worshipers. They had the largest sector of the temple market. And the archaeology tells us that there were plenty of temples in Egypt. It also tells us that the therapeutae of Asclepius were all over the empire
The Edelsteins literally wrote the book on Asclepius; archival evidence proves they had been studying that cult since at least 1934. Yet their work,
Asclepius: Collection and Interpretation of the Testimonies [
1945] has NO WORD INDEX for "Therapeutae" -- Ding! Ding! Ding! --
they have assiduously avoided any reference to the word which appears several dozen times in the Greek of their text. Why, o why, indeed (telling by omission). "Who were the Therapeutae?" is the winning Jeopardy answer to the question, "Who were the First A. A.?" Our divine Edelsteins -- as writers of that best-selling Hermetic-Philonic synthesis and Neo-
Rechabite bible for Sobriety -- investigated the likewise "
pagani" Jewish Therapeutae for the abruptly requested
1938 Rockefeller project but kept that secret.
"Paradox 7" isn't; modern science evolved from superstition. What was Dr. Carl Jung's "Analytic Psychology," ultimately, but a modern gnostical reply to pseudo-scientific Freudian Psychoanalysis? Genius or drivel: take your pick.
The term therapeutic is obviously related to the therapeutae (worshipers) of the healing god Asclepius. Asclepius was the healing god from deep BCE until the Nicene council. His worshipers include Hippocrates and especially Galen. These people are regarded as the fathers of modern medicine. The word therapeutic appears to belong to the therapeutae of Asclepius.
Again, Ludwig Edelstein was considered the definitive expert on
Hippocrates, as the Summary to Roe v. Wade proved. His close colleague at Hopkins, Dr. Owsei Tempkin, was researching
Galen in England during the Summer of 1938. Reportedly, Mrs. Rupert Norton donated an Asclepius marble statue (2nd C. AD) to the William Welch Library in 1929; it was prominently displayed in the foyer when Edelstein worked there daily 1934-9.
"Paradox 8: How are the essenes related to the therapeutae?" is a trick question. How about: "Circles, a Venn Diagram of Dr. Bob's Akron rubber-workers below Dr. Sigerist's Baltimore Ph.Ds." Or is that heresy too painful to ever admit?
"Paradox 9: Why Does Clement of Alexandria Call Philo 'The Pythagorean'?" [/b]
Why is Bill's grandfather Fayette Griffith cryptically identified as a
Pythagorean? By Greek philosophical lineage, the grandson should be a
μαθηματικός, or an ἀκουσματικός ("worldly indeed") perhaps. The Four-Step Schemata for Jewish Metempsychosis/Anagogy is fundamentally
Pythagorean, as Clement would have recognized.
I suppose "this
chip of a book" consciously evokes Chester Beatty IV (EA 10684, verso) and "The Immortalization of the
Writer."