1. Septuagint, Ecclesiasticus (Siracides), 44 (2nd cent. BCE - 2nd cent. BCE)
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2. Septuagint, Wisdom of Solomon, 14, 13 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
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3. Philo of Alexandria, On The Creation of The World, 78 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 78. As then, those who make a feast do not invite their guests to the entertainment before they have provided everything for festivity, and as those who celebrate gymnastic or dramatic contests, before they assemble the spectators, provide themselves with an abundance of competitors and spectacles, and sweet sounds, with which to fill the theatres and the stadia; so in the same manner did the Ruler of all, as a man proposing games, or giving a banquet and being about to invite others to feast and to behold the spectacle, first provide everything for every kind of entertainment, in order that when man came into the world he might at once find a feast ready for him, and a most holy theatre; the one abounding with everything which the earth, or the rivers, or the sea, or air, brings forth for use and enjoyment, and the other being full of every description of light, which has either its essence or its qualities admirable, and its motions and revolutions worthy of notice, being arranged in perfect order, both as to the proportions of its numbers, and the harmony of its periods. And a man would not be far wrong who should say that in all these things there might be discovered that archetypal and real model music, the images of which the subsequent generations of mankind engraved in their own souls, and in this way handed down the art which is the most necessary and the most advantageous to human life. XXVI. |
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4. Strabo, Geography, 2.3.7, 16.4.27 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 2.3.7. Next he undertakes to find fault with those who gave to the continents their present division, instead of marking them out by lines drawn parallel to the equator, by which means the different animals, plants, and temperatures would have been distinguished, according as they approached the frigid or the torrid zones; so that each continent would have formed a kind of zone. Afterwards, however, he overturns and gives up altogether this view, bestowing every commendation on the existing system, and thus making his argument altogether worthless and of no avail. In fact, the various arrangements [of a country] are not the result of premeditation, any more than the diversities of nations or languages; they all depend on circumstances and chance. Arts, forms of government, and modes of life, arising from certain [internal] springs, flourish under whatever climate they may be situated; climate, however, has its influence, and therefore while some peculiarites are due to the nature of the country, others are the result of institutions and education. It is not owing to the nature of the country, but rather to their education, that the Athenians cultivate eloquence, while the Lacedemonians do not; nor yet the Thebans, who are nearer still. Neither are the Babylonians and Egyptians philosophers by nature, but by reason of their institutions and education. In like manner the excellence of horses, oxen, and other animals, results not alone from the places where they dwell, but also, from their breeding. Posidonius confounds all these distinctions. In praising the division of the continents as it now stands, he advances as an argument the difference between the Indians and the Ethiopians of Libya, the former being more robust, and less dried by the heat of the climate. It is on this account that Homer, who includes them all under the title of Ethiopians, describes them as being separated into two divisions, These eastward situate, those toward the west. [Od. i, 23. [Crates], to support his hypothesis, supposes another inhabited earth, of which Homer certainly knew nothing; and says that the passage ought to be read thus, towards the descending sun, viz. when having passed the meridian, it begins to decline. 16.4.27. When the poet says, I went to the country of the Ethiopians, Sidonians, and Erembi, it is doubtful, what people he means by Sidonians, whether those who lived near the Persian Gulf, a colony from which nation are the Sidonians in our quarter (in the same manner as historians relate, that some Tyrian islanders are found there, and Aradii, from whom the Aradii in our country derive their origin), or whether the poet means actually the Sidonians themselves.But there is more doubt about the Erembi, whether we are to suppose that he means the Troglodytae, according to the opinion of those who, by a forced etymology, derive the word Erembi from ἔραν ἐμβαίνειν, that is, 'entering into the earth,' or whether he means the Arabians. Zeno the philosopher of our sect alters the reading in this manner, And Sidoni, and Arabes; but Poseidonius alters it with a small variation, And Sidonii, and Arambi, as if the poet gave the name Arambi to the present Arabians, from their being so called by others in his time. He says also, that the situation of these three nations close to one another indicates a descent from some common stock, and that on this account they are called by names having a resemblance to one another, as Armenii, Aramaei, Arambi. For as we may suppose one nation to have been divided into three (according to the differences of latitude [in which they lived], which successively became more marked [in proceeding from one to the other]), so in like manner we may suppose that several names were adopted in place of one. The proposed change of reading to Eremni is not probable, for that name is more applicable to the Ethiopians. The poet mentions also the Arimi, whom Poseidonius says are meant here, and not a place in Syria or Cilicia, or any other country, but Syria itself. For the Aramaei lived there. Perhaps these are the people whom the Greeks called Arimaei or Arimi. But the alterations of names, especially of barbarous nations, are frequent, Thus Darius was called Darieces; Parysatis, Pharziris; Athara, Atargata, whom Ctesias again calls Derceto.Alexander might be adduced to bear witness to the wealth of the Arabians, for he intended, it is said, after his return from India, to make Arabia the seat of empire. All his enterprises terminated with his death, which happened suddenly; but certainly one of his projects was to try whether the Arabians would receive him voluntarily, or resist him by force of arms; for having found that they did not send ambassadors to him, either before or after his expedition to India, he was beginning to make preparations for war, as we have said in a former part of this work. |
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5. Vitruvius Pollio, On Architecture, 6.1.3-6.1.8 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
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6. Dio Chrysostom, Orations, 12.27, 12.33-12.34 (1st cent. CE
| 12.27. Now concerning the nature of the gods in general, and especially that of the ruler of the universe, first and foremost an idea regarding him and a conception of him common to the whole human race, to the Greeks and to the barbarians alike, a conception that is inevitable and innate in every creature endowed with reason, arising in the course of nature without the aid of human teacher and free from the deceit of any expounding priest, has made its way, and it rendered manifest God's kinship with man and furnished many evidences of the truth, which did not suffer the earliest and most ancient men to doze and grow indifferent to them; 12.33. So it is very much the same as if anyone were to place a man, a Greek or a barbarian, in some mystic shrine of extraordinary beauty and size to be initiated, where he would see many mystic sights and hear many mystic voices, where light and darkness would appear to him alternately, and a thousand other things would occur; and further, if it should be just as in the rite called enthronement, where the inducting priests are wont to seat the novices and then dance round and round them â pray, is it likely that the man in this situation would be no whit moved in his mind and would not suspect that all which was taking place was the result of a more than wise intention and preparation, even if he belonged to the most remote and nameless barbarians and had no guide and interpreter at his side â provided, of course, that he had the mind of a human being? |
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7. New Testament, Acts, 17.16-17.31 (1st cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
| 17.16. Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw the city full of idols. 17.17. So he reasoned in the synagogue with Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace every day with those who met him. 17.18. Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also encountered him. Some said, "What does this babbler want to say?"Others said, "He seems to be advocating foreign demons," because he preached Jesus and the resurrection. 17.19. They took hold of him, and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new teaching is, which is spoken by you? 17.20. For you bring certain strange things to our ears. We want to know therefore what these things mean. 17.21. Now all the Athenians and the strangers living there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell or to hear some new thing. 17.22. Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus, and said, "You men of Athens, I perceive that you are very religious in all things. 17.23. For as I passed along, and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: 'TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.' What therefore you worship in ignorance, this I announce to you. 17.24. The God who made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, dwells not in temples made with hands 17.25. neither is he served by men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things. 17.26. He made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the surface of the earth, having determined appointed seasons, and the bounds of their habitation 17.27. that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 17.28. 'For in him we live, and move, and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also his offspring.' 17.29. Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold, or silver, or stone, engraved by art and device of man. 17.30. The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked. But now he commands that all men everywhere should repent 17.31. because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained; whereof he has given assurance to all men, in that he has raised him from the dead. |
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8. New Testament, Romans, 1.2, 1.16, 1.18-1.19, 1.23-1.26, 1.28, 2.1, 3.9 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
| 1.2. which he promised before through his prophets in the holy Scriptures 1.16. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes; for the Jew first, and also for the Greek. 1.18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness 1.19. because that which is known of God is revealed in them, for God revealed it to them. 1.23. and traded the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed animals, and creeping things. 1.24. Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves 1.25. who exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. 1.26. For this reason, God gave them up to vile passions. For their women changed the natural function into that which is against nature. 1.28. Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting; 2.1. Therefore you are without excuse, O man, whoever you are who judge. For in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself. For you who judge practice the same things. 3.9. What then? Are we better than they? No, in no way. For we previously charged both Jews and Greeks, that they are all under sin. |
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9. Plutarch, On Tranquility of Mind, None (1st cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
| 477c. and he comes to despise those who bewail and abuse life as a land of calamities or a place of exile appointed here for our souls? And Iam delighted with Diogenes, who, when he saw his host in Sparta preparing which much ado for a certain festival, said, "Does not a good man consider every day a festival?" and a very splendid one, to be sure, if we are sound of mind. For the universe is a most holy temple and most worthy of a god; into it man is introduced through birth as a spectator, not of hand-made or immovable images, but of those sensible representations of knowable things that the divine mind, says Plato, has revealed, representations which have innate within themselves the beginnings of life and motion |
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10. Seneca The Younger, Letters, 41.1, 90.4, 90.36, 90.44, 90.46 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
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11. Diogenes Laertius, Lives of The Philosophers, 6.104 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 6.104. So they get rid of geometry and music and all such studies. Anyhow, when somebody showed Diogenes a clock, he pronounced it a serviceable instrument to save one from being late for dinner. Again, to a man who gave a musical recital before him he said:By men's minds states are ordered well, and households,Not by the lyre's twanged strings or flute's trilled notes.They hold further that Life according to Virtue is the End to be sought, as Antisthenes says in his Heracles: exactly like the Stoics. For indeed there is a certain close relationship between the two schools. Hence it has been said that Cynicism is a short cut to virtue; and after the same pattern did Zeno of Citium live his life. |
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