That the wisest of the Greeks learnt to adopt these conceptions of God from principles with which Moses supplied them, I am not now concerned to urge; but they have borne abundant witness to the excellence of these doctrines, and to their consonance with the nature and majesty of God. In fact, Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, Plato, the Stoics who succeeded him, and indeed nearly all the philosophers appear to have held similar views concerning the nature of God. These, however, addressed their philosophy to the few, and did not venture to divulge the true doctrine[[398]] to the masses who were prepossessed by (other) opinions; whereas our lawgiver, by making practice square with precept, not only convinced his own contemporaries, but so firmly implanted this belief concerning God in their descendants to all future generations that it cannot be moved. The cause (of his success) was that he far surpassed (other legislators) in promoting the good of all men to all time by his scheme of legislation; for he did not make religion a department of virtue, but the various virtues—I mean, justice, temperance, fortitude, and mutual harmony in all things between the members of the community[[399]]—departments of religion. Religion governs all our actions and studies and speech; none of these things did our lawgiver leave unexamined[[400]] or indeterminate.
The Two Methods of Education Combined by Moses
All schemes of education and moral training fall into two categories; instruction is imparted in the one case by precept, in the other by practical exercising of the character. All other legislators, following their divergent opinions, selected the particular method which each preferred and neglected the other. Thus the Lacedæmonians and Cretans employed practical, not verbal, training; whereas the Athenians and nearly all the rest of the Greeks made laws enjoining what actions might or might not be performed, but neglected to familiarize the people with them by putting them into practice.
Our legislator, on the other hand, took great care to combine both systems. He did not leave practical training in morals without a written code;[[401]] nor did he permit the letter of the law to remain inoperative. Starting from the very beginning with the food of which we partake from infancy and the private life[[402]] of the home, he left nothing, however insignificant, to the discretion and caprice of the individual. What meats a man should abstain from, and what he may enjoy; with what persons he should associate; what period should be devoted respectively to strenuous labour and to rest;[[403]]—for all this our leader made the law the standard and rule, that we might live under it as under a father and master[[404]] and be guilty of no sin through wilfulness or ignorance.
All Jews Know their Law, which is Read Every Week
For ignorance he left no pretext. He proved[[405]] the Law to be the most excellent and necessary form of instruction, ordaining, not that it should be heard once for all or twice or on several occasions, but that every week men should desert their other occupations and assemble to listen to the Law and to obtain a thorough and accurate knowledge of it; a practice which all other legislators seem to have neglected.[[406]]
Indeed, most men, so far from living in accordance with their own laws, hardly know what they are. Only when they have done wrong do they learn from others that they have transgressed the law. Even those of them who hold the highest and most important offices admit their ignorance; for they employ professional legal experts as assessors and leave them in charge of the administration of affairs. But, should any one of our nation be questioned about the laws, he would repeat them all more readily than his own name. The result, then, of our thorough grounding in the laws from the time when we first had any sensations whatever, is that we have them as it were engraven on our souls. A transgressor is a rarity and to elude punishment by entreaty an impossibility.—c. Ap. II. 16-18 (164-178).
(62) A Future Life—for the Law-abiding
With us the death penalty is imposed for most offences, for instance, if a man commit adultery.... Even fraud in such matters as weights or measures, or injustice and deceit in trade, or purloining another man’s property or laying hands on what one did not deposit—all such crimes have punishments attached to them which are not on the same scale as with other nations, but more severe. For example, the mere intention of doing wrong to one’s parents or of impiety against God is followed by instant death.
For those, on the other hand, who live in accordance with our laws the prize is not silver or gold, no crown of wild olive[[407]] or of parsley[[408]] with any such public proclamation (as attends those awards). No; each individual, relying on the witness of his own conscience and the lawgiver’s prophecy, which is confirmed by the sure testimony of God, is firmly persuaded that to those who observe the laws and, if they must needs die for them, willingly meet death,[[409]] God has granted a renewed existence and in the revolution (of the ages)[[410]] the gift of a better life. I should have hesitated to write thus, had not the facts made all men aware that many of our countrymen have on many occasions ere now preferred to brave all manner of suffering rather than to utter a single word against the Law.[[411]]—c. Ap. II. 30 (215-219).