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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 September 2020
Henry Chadwick proposed in the 1960s that Philo's Questions and Answers in Genesis 4.69 is important for understanding Paul's mission strategy in 1 Cor 9. In 2011 David J. Rudolph revisited that ‘missionary-apologetic’ reading of QG 4.69 in a discussion of Paul's observance of the Torah but refrained from drawing firm conclusions. This article subjects the missionary-apologetic hypothesis to closer scrutiny, especially regarding its plausibility as a reading of Philo. It argues that Chadwick's hypothesis lacks both evidence and explanatory power. QG 4.69, therefore, contributes little to our understanding of 1 Cor 9 and of Paul's missionary strategy and Torah observance.
1 Chadwick, H., ‘St. Paul and Philo of Alexandria’, BJRL 48 (1965) 286–307Google Scholar, at 297–8 and The Enigma of St Paul (London: Athlone, 1969) 13–14.
2 Chadwick, ‘St. Paul and Philo’, 298; The Enigma, 13.
3 D. J. Rudolph, A Jew to the Jews: Jewish Contours of Pauline Flexibility in 1 Corinthians 9:19–23 (WUNT ii/304; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011) 131–5.
4 Rudolph, A Jew to the Jews, 135.
5 QG 4.69, Chadwick's hypothesis and Rudolph's discussion have featured occasionally in recent scholarship. Citing Rudolph, Nanos claims that QG 4.69 concerns ‘rhetorical’ (rather than behavioural) adaptability: see M. D. Nanos, ‘Paul's Relationship to Torah in Light of his Strategy “to Become Everything to Everyone” (1 Corinthians 9.19–23)’, Paul and Judaism: Crosscurrents in Pauline Exegesis and the Study of Jewish-Christian Relations (ed. R. Bieringer and D. Pollefeyt; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 2012) 106–40, at 122 n. 21. Elsewhere Nanos describes rhetorical adaptability as ‘varying one's speech to different audiences by reasoning from their premises’, and cites QG 4.69 – an odd choice of example, since it describes people whose speech is inconsistent with their conduct rather than people who argue from their interlocutors’ premises. See Nanos, M. D., ‘Was Paula “Liar” for the Gospel? The Case for a New Interpretation of Paul's “Becoming Everything to Everyone” in 1 Cor 9:19–23’, Review and Expositor 110.4 (2013) 591–608Google Scholar, at 598. Olson follows Nanos’ reading of 1 Cor 9.19–23, claiming (somewhat inaccurately, given Rudolph's non-committal stance) that ‘[Rudolph] notes that Philo (QG 4.69) and Paul reflect a continuing discussion … about the use of tact by a missionary and apologist’: see Olson, J. C., ‘Pauline Gentiles Praying among Jews’, ProEccl 20 (2011) 411–31Google Scholar, at 416 n. 19. Elsewhere (‘The Jerusalem Decree, Paul, and the Gentile Analogy to Homosexual Persons’, JRE 40 (2012) 359–400, at 367–8 n. 20) Olson again refers to QG 4.69 as evidence for that debate, but acknowledges that Rudolph draws this notion from Chadwick.
6 The Armenian text is probably quite reliable. For a brief discussion, see Marcus, R., Questions and Answers on Genesis (LCL Philo Supplement i; London: Heinemann, 1953) vii–viiiGoogle Scholar.
7 Translation from Marcus, Questions on Genesis, 348–9.
8 Chadwick, The Enigma, 14.
9 E.g. 1 Cor 9.19–23; 2 Cor 1.17–2.4; 10.1–11; Gal 1.10; 2.11–14.
10 Petit, F., Quaestiones in Genesim et in Exodim: fragmenta Graeca (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1978) 165–6Google Scholar. Translation mine.
11 Marcus (Questions on Genesis, 348 n. i) says the Greek text features ἑκατέρῳ, a scribal error for θεάτρῳ. This is not quite correct. As Petit notes (Quaestiones, 166 n. b), the Greek source (Vat.gr. 1553 251v) has θεάτρῳ, and the error originates at Mai, A., Scriptorum veterum nova collection e Vaticanis codicibus, vol. vii (Rome: Typis Vaticanis, 1833) 106Google Scholar.
12 Rudolph, A Jew to the Jews, 133.
13 Marcus’ policy was to translate the Armenian but not the Greek, using the footnotes to identify differences between Greek and Armenian or suggest what the original Greek terminology may have been. See Marcus, R., Questions and Answers on Exodus (LCL Philo Supplement ii; London: Heinemann, 1953) 179–80Google Scholar.
14 Though the Armenian is generally trustworthy, Marcus notes some points of inaccuracy here. Marcus, Questions on Genesis, 348.
15 This has been much debated, but see Paget, J. Carleton, ‘Hellenistic and Early Roman Period Jewish Missionary Efforts in the Diaspora’, The Rise an Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries of the Common Era (ed. C. K. Rothschild and J. Schröter; WUNT 301; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013) 11–49Google Scholar.
16 Rudolph, A Jew to the Jews, 134.
17 E.g. Mos. 2.23; Spec. 1.334; 3.80; Det. 165.
18 E.g. Migr. 125; Abr. 46; Mos. 2.255; Hypoth. 356; Legat. 60.
19 E.g. Spec. 3.115; Agr. 13.
20 Deus 129; Leg. 3.137; 2.101; Spec. 1.239, 253.
21 Spec. 4.79; Leg. 1.73.
22 Virt. 48; cf. Cher. 130.
23 Virt. 201 says Noah and his family were saved due to his ‘high excellence’, but there Philo makes no universalising comment. There is no link to mission.
24 Reading allegorically, Philo expounds that salvation of the mind benefits also the soul and body.
25 Mai, Scriptorum veterum, 107; Harris, J. R., Fragments of Philo Judaeus (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1886) 8Google Scholar.
26 QG 4.206.
27 QG 4.204.
28 As translated by Marcus, Questions on Genesis, 525.
29 It may be that the Philonic corpus contains other passages relevant to the concept of noble deceit; this article does not claim to provide and discuss an exhaustive catalogue.
30 For more on this, see J. S. Zembaty, ‘Plato's Republic and Greek Morality on Lying’, JHP 517–45. Our concern here is to outline Philo's relationship to Greco-Roman discourse on noble deceit. It should be noted, however, that noble deceit was known also in Jewish tradition – perhaps most famously in Exod 1.17–21 where Hebrew midwives lie to the Pharaoh.
31 Rep. 331c.
32 Rep. 382c–d.
33 Rep. 389b–d.
34 Rep. 414–17, 459b–d.
35 Diss. log. 3.2–4.
36 Mem. 4.2.14–18.
37 Stoic. rep. 1057 B.
38 Inst. 12.1.38–9.
39 Math. 7.42.
40 Ecl. 2.7.
41 QG 4.206 does not directly invoke the medical illustration, but it does follow very closely after QG 4.204, continuing the theme of deceit in connection with Jacob's deception of Isaac. If these passages are taken as distinct and separate passages (QG 4.204 and QG 4.206) rather than one passage (QG 4.204–6), despite their proximity and common discursive context, the statement above must be revised to say that at least four of the seven passages in question invoke the medical illustration. It nonetheless remains clear that Philo associates deceit with doctors more often and more directly than he associates it with missionaries.
42 If the actors are missionaries, it does not follow that the man who imitates them (in their deceitfulness) is also a missionary. Chadwick nonetheless takes them to be so without explanation.
43 Chadwick, The Enigma, 13.
44 Petit, Quaestiones, 166; Rudolph, A Jew to the Jews, 135.
45 No Greek survives for QG 4.45, but Philo probably used a salvation verb for doctors saving patients.
46 Deus 65–6. Note also Cher. 15, with medical deception and the noun σωτηρία.
47 Rudolph, A Jew to the Jews, 133.
48 See, for example, Mitchell, M. M., ‘Peter's “Hypocrisy” and Paul's: Two “Hypocrites” at the Foundation of Earliest Christianity?’, NTS 58 (2012) 213–34CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 219. Mitchell cites QG 4.69 as a Jewish example of the ‘Ubiquitous Hellenistic topoi … about saying one thing and doing another’ within the ‘cultural cocktail of concerns’ to consider in discussing early Christian ‘hypocrisy’. This perspective is more moderate than the perspectives of those (like Olson, n. 5 above) who follow Chadwick's hypothesis.