¹ Paul's negative reaction to certain aspects of these Corinthians’ language and behavior enables us to reconstruct at least some of the Corinthians’ viewpoint. Thus it is possible, for example, to determine the self-designations of the Corinthians from 1 Cor 1:26–27, 2:6–3:4 and 4:8–10: wise, powerful, of noble birth, perfect (vs. babes), rich, kings, etc. For a complete and systematic analysis and reconstruction, see Hurd, J. D. Jr, The Origins of 1 Corinthians (London: S.P.C.K., 1965).Google Scholar

² Conzelmann, Hans, 1 Corinthians (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1975)Google Scholar says that the background of Paul's “opponents” in 1 Corinthians cannot be established on the basis of the material available. Like previous commentators on the letter, however, he does not deem it of primary importance to pursue more systematically the potential pertinence of the rich literature he cites

³ Wilckens, Ulrich, Weisheit und Torheit (BHTh 26; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1959) 89–90Google Scholar; Reitzenstein, Richard, Die hellenistischen Mysterienreligionen (3rd ed.; Stuttgart: Teubner, 1927Google Scholar; reprint Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1956) 342–45.

⁴ Sharp critique of Wilckens in Pearson, Birger, The Pneumatikospsychikos Terminology in 1 Corinthians (SBLDS 12; Missoula: University of Montana, 1973) 8–9.Google Scholar

⁵ Pearson, Pneumatikos, esp. 11–12, 17–21; Dupont, Dom Jacques, Gnosis: La connaissance religieuse dans les epitres de Saint Paul (Paris: Gabalda, 1949) 172–80;Google Scholar see also the important review by Bultmann, , JTS NS 3 (1952) 10–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 14–16.

⁶ The term pneumatikos occurs by itself a very few times in Philo, and then with little or no religious significance: “pneumatic sinews” or “nerves” in Her. 242; Praem. 48; Aet. 125; in Op. 67 nature provides a “pneumatic” substance for the soul's powers of sense-perception. Of greater interest here is Abr. 113: Sarah thinks the appearance of the visiting strangers is like “prophets or angels transferred from ‘spiritual’ and soul-like essence into human form” (note the parallel of “spiritual” and “soul”). It may be significant, however, that elsewhere Philo speaks of prophets and angels not as “spiritual” but as “ethereal” or “heavenly” beings. The term psychikos Philo uses dozens of times, almost always in a way that makes a metaphor or trope of the term it modifies. Thus food; death, light, house, wealth, passover, etc., are applied to the inner life of the soul—a meaning hardly helpful to Dupont's and Pearson's thesis. The usage is consistent and it is neutral in the sense that “psychic” never carries any pejorative connotations and there is no comparison with any higher aspect such as “spiritual” or “divine.” In other Greek-Jewish literature, the writings of the Septuagint in particular, pneumatikos and psychikos appear neither in paired contrast nor separately—with the one exception of the psychikos-somatikos pair in 4 Mace 1:32.

⁷ Pearson's method here is formally the same as that of Reitzenstein and Wilckens: attempting to explain the meaning of the pneumatikos-psychikos contrast on the basis of a contrast between the nouns pneuma and psychē, but he substitutes Hellenistic Judaism for Gnosticism.

⁸ Indeed, no evidence is provided (Pearson, Pneumatikos, 11) for this contention on which the rest of the argument depends. Schweizer's, Eduard comments (“Pneuma,” TDNT 6 [1968] 396Google Scholar) hardly support this contention. As Pearson contends, the use of pneumatikos for the highest religious status or the highest part of the self would be more understandable if πνεμα were used for the highest part of a person, in contrast to ψυχή as a lower part. However: Philo uses πνεμα very rarely with respect to the higher soul (a dozen times, vs. hundreds for νος and διάνοια), and then it is not instead of, but in close connection with the other terms and usually as the essence of the rational soul. Wisdom uses πνεμα interchangeably with ψυχή. In Wis 15:11 this is in an allusion to Gen 2:7. But this usage of πνεμα is not necessarily related to interpretation of Gen 2:7. The translation of the Hebrew rûah surely provides one of the roots of this usage. Ps 77:3, 6 and Job 32:8,18 are two examples where the context is contemplation of God or the possession of wisdom. Philo's use of Stoic philosophical language accords with his usage in Jewish exegetical traditions. He closely associates and nearly identifies ψυχή, νος, and πνεμα: the spirit in the heart generates thoughts, Spec. leg. 1.6; the mind is the πνεμα ἔνθερμον,, Fug. 134; cf. Som. 1:30; cf. Diogenes Laertius 7.157; Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta (ed. J. von Arnim) 2, frg. 96 and frg. 838.

⁹ Like those from Wisdom cited in the previous paragraph, these are passages which Pearson (Pneumatikos, 18–20) uses to explain the origins of the pneumatikos-psychikos terminology.

¹⁰ Philo does use πνεμα once for “the dominant part of ourselves,” Spec. leg. 1.171, where the abbreviated form of this traditional exegetical distinction may account for the expression: τ ν μῖν λογικν πνεμα. Cf. Spec. leg. 1.277.

¹¹ Pearson, Pneumatikos, 18–20.

¹² Apparently rejected as not relevant by Pearson, Pneumatikos, 19, note 26.

¹³ The other pairs of contrasting terms in 1 Cor 15:44–54—i.e., heavenly-earthly, immortal-mortal, incorruptible-corruptible—represent further the language of the Corinthians whose views Paul is attempting to “correct” by insisting on the historical priority of the psychic or earthly human being to the pneumatic or heavenly human being.

¹⁴ It is evident that in Philo's writings we have to contend with a variety of different—and not necessarily related or consistent—interpretations of a given text or scriptural symbol. Philo's treatises display several standard interpretations or uses (a) of Gen 1:26–27 or parts thereof, (b) of Gen 2:7 or parts thereof, and (c) of combinations of parts of Gen 1:26–27 and 2:7. Jervell, Jacob, Imago Dei [FRLANT 58; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1960] 52–70Google Scholar) has attempted a simplified presentation of this complex Philonic material. Since he is concerned primarily with the imago dei, however, he does not distinguish all of the discrete exegetical traditions which Philo uses and combines, although he comments on some of them.

¹⁵ Conzelmann, 1 Corinthians, 286; Brandenburger, Egon, Adam and Christus (WMANT 7; Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag, 1962) 124–31Google Scholar, and others.

¹⁶ ‘Brandenburger, Adam, 117–31.

¹⁷ See Colpe, Carsten, Die religionsgeschichtliche Schule (FRLANT 78; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1961) 171–97Google Scholar; Conzelmann, 1 Corinthians, 284–85, agrees but continues to use the concept anyhow.

¹⁸ Rudolph, “Urmensch,” RGG ³ 6.1196.

¹⁹ That is, this is the most we can conclude once we recognize the Philonic distinctions which Brandenburger (Adam, 118–23) either overlooked or discounted. Brandenburger's claim to find the Primal Man in Philonic material will not stand up to a more careful examination of the Philonic passages on which he bases it. The weak link in the argument is on pp. 122–23. Eltester, F.-W. (Eikon im Neuen Testament [BZNW 23; Berlin: Töpelmann, 1958]Google Scholar) on whom Brandenburger relies, is not always accurate in his reading of Philo. See further the warning in Jervell, Imago Dei, 65–66.

²⁰ See Op. 134; Leg. all. 1.131, 53, 88–95, 2.4; Plant. 44; Q.G. 1.4, 8; 2.56; Q.E. 2.46; Her. 57. The “heavenly” vs. “earthly” human beings occur in Leg. all. 1.31 and 90–95, and the “two types of humankind” in Leg. all. 1.31 and 2.4.

²¹ Leg. all. 1.31. In this and subsequent quotations from Philo, I have relied upon the translation by Colson and Whitaker (LCL), while adapting toward consistency of English terminology and contextual meaning.

²² Op. 134, however, appears to be a special case (so also Jervell, Imago Dei, 53) which does little more than make the usual Platonic distinction between the intelligible form or idea of man and sense-perception or empirical man. Focusing on Op. 134, a text frequently cited in references to 1 Cor 15:44–54, tends to divert us from Philo's usual understanding of the heavenly anthrōpos vs. the earthly anthrōpos, leading us either to false distinctions (such as “the idea man” vs. “the historical Adam”—Conzelmann, 1 Corinthians, 286) or to dismissing the distinction as merely Philo's Platonic form of thinking.

²³ The order in which the two creation accounts of humans are presented in the Biblical account just happens to correspond with Philo's more basic pattern of priority.

²⁴ The Greek words are εὐϕυϊα, εὐϕυϊα, πιμονή, μνήμη. εὐϕυϊα is an Aristotelian term used inclusively of natural and moral goodness. εὐϕυϊα,, is attested almost exclusively in Philo and in this context. It surely connotes more than “cleverness, tact” (so LSJ)! The Neoplatonic metaphorical use of θίξις in the sense of the apprehension of the mind probably leads us in the right direction. Ironically enough, Colson and Whitaker (LCL) do better on εὐθιξία (“facility in apprehending”) than on πιμονή and μνήμη in their paraphrase based on contextual usage.

²⁵ Can Wis 4:1–5 be understood as an independent witness to the particular Jewish theological tradition on which Philo is here drawing? There is immortality in the remembrance of virtue (μνήμη ρετς), but the impious (of the two kinds of anthrōpoi here in Wisdom) are unable to persist, even though they may blossom with virtue for a season.

²⁶ In this passage both Moses and the anthrōpos after the Image are juxtáposed with the symbolism of the Hebdomad, important in Philo and elsewhere in Hellenistic Judaism (cf. Aristobulus in Eusebius Praep. Ev. IX. 667a–668b). For Philo the perfect number, Seven, symbolizes Light-Logos-Sophia and thus the human mind insofar as the Holy Logos of the Hebdomad comes upon the soul and replaces the Six and its mortal things (cf., Leg. all. 1.15–18; Q.G. 2.41).

²⁷ Pearson, Pneumatikos, 27–28.

²⁸ See further, e.g., Quod. omn. prob. 160; Congr. 19; Agr. 157–62; Mig. 28–33; 36–40; Sob. 9–10; Som. 2.10–11, 234–36; Leg. all. 1.90–94. Cf., in NT writings, Heb 5:12–14.

²⁹ Abraham is a symbol of the nascent sophos who sojourns with Hagar or school studies as preparation for becoming teleios and possessed of Sarah or Sophia (Aretē), Jacob symbolizes the practicer who eventually attains the vision of God, symbolized by the name Israel (e.g., Leg. all. 3.244; Congr. 154; Q.G. 3.20). Erwin Goodenough has laid out these patterns of perfection clearly and sympathetically in By Light, Light (New Haven: Yale University, 1935), chs. VGoogle Scholar, VI, and VIII, and esp. pp. 136–52, on Abraham.

³⁰ Philo, of course, has appropriated this set of terminology from Hellenistic philosophy, where it was standard at least among the Stoics, e.g., Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta (ed. J. von Arnim) 3.85–89, 150–57. Jewish wisdom theology prior to Philo had long since expressed the relation between the wise man and Sophia in the same or similar terms: see, e.g., Prov 8–9; 8:18; Sir 4:11–13; 11:1; 15:5–6; Wis 5:16; 7:7–8; 8:3, 5, 10, 17–18.

³¹ In fact Philo devotes the last sub-section of the treatise De virtutibus (187–227) to the subject “Concerning Noble Birth,” the most striking passage of which (211–19) discusses Abraham, inspired by the divine Spirit, as a paradigm of perfection and kingship (although he was a commoner, ἰδιώτης,, cf. Paul's charge against the Corinthians, 1 Cor 1:26–27) as well as of noble birth. Pearson (Pneumatikos, 40) notices at least the “noble-birth” in this key passage and devotes an excursus to this spiritual quality.

³² Perhaps it will suffice to quote only one of the many pertinent texts: For the wise person is a friend of God rather than a servant…. But he who has this allotment has passed beyond the bounds of human happiness. He alone is nobly born (εὐγενής)…, not only rich, but all rich (οὐ πλούσιος, λλ πάμπλουτος)…, not merely of high repute, but glorious (οὐκ ἔνδοξος, λλ᾽ εὐκλήης)…, sole king (μόνος βασιλεύς)…, sole freeman (μόνος λεύθερος)…, Sob. 56.

See further, e.g., Mig. 197; Som. 2.242–44; Virt. 8; Sac. 43–44; Sob. 55–57.

³³ Wilckens (Weisheit, 5–11) makes this quite clear.

³⁴ Koester's, Helmut review (Gnomon 33 [1961] 590–95)Google Scholar and Colpe's, Carsten review, (Monatsschrift für Pastoraltheologie 52 [1963] 487–93Google Scholar) must be used along with Wilckens' exegesis in order to make sense out of the polemical situation in 1 Corinthians. That Sophia, for the Corinthian “opponents,” is a personified divine figure is clear, likewise that Sophia is their salvation-content. This does not mean that they also identified Sophia with the exalted Christ (in the sense of the Gnostic redeemer, according to Wilckens), see Koester, 591–92. It is Paul who makes the identification: the true wisdom of God is the historical person, the crucified man, Jesus Christ. Conzelmann (I Corinthians, ad. loc.) does not really clarify the polemical situation with respect to sophia in 1 Cor 1–2.

³⁵ Wilckens, Weisheit, 139–59, following Pascher, J., H BAΣIΛIKH OδOΣ (Studien zur Geschichte und Kultur des Altertums 17; Paderborn: Schoeningh, 1931)Google Scholar; cf. Colpe's review of Wilckens.

³⁶ When he comes to direct discussion of sophia, Pearson (Pneumatikos, 30–32) moves away from the Philonic material, although he does base his interpretation of sophia as pneuma on Wis 7:22 and 9:17 and fragments of Aristobulus, as well as one Philonic phrase from Gig. 47.

³⁷ On the identity of Logos and Sophia generally in Philo, see Wolfson, , Philo (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University, 1962 ³) 1.253–61.Google Scholar

³⁸ The most notorious by now is the “by light, light” paragraph in Praem. 43–46, from which, of course, comes the title of Goodenough, By Light, Light, which gives an extensive discussion of the function of Sophia as divine light and enlightenment, esp. ch. VI. Cf. Wlosok, Antonie, Laktanz und die philosophische Gnosis (Abhandlungen der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, Phil.-hist. Klasse 1960, 2; Heidelberg: Winter, 1960) 77–114.Google Scholar Also Klein, Franz Norbert, Die Lichtterminologie bei Philon von Alexandrien und in den Hermetischen Schriften (Leiden: Brill, 1962) 11–79Google Scholar. It should be pointed out, however, that “light” is less, rather than more, prominent than some other imagery in Philo's writings.

³⁹ See also esp. Q.G. 4.46; note the similarity of the language in both texts to that of the Corinthians discerned through 1 Cor 15:44–45.

⁴⁰ It is difficult, on the basis of Paul's formulations in 1 Cor 2:10–16 and 12:4–11; 14:2, 12, etc., to determine whether the Corinthians were thinking in terms of the pneuma. Determination of this may not be very important for the purposes of this essay, however, since in our Hellenistic Jewish analogy the soteriological functions of the Spirit are always parallel to or identical with those of Sophia/Logos, as, e.g., in Wis 7:22–30; Her. 259–66; Gig. 27, 47; Quod Deus 1–3.