Only Philo gave to the expression of their physical and
metaphysical speculation a religious warmth new to it, when he
associated it with the word uttered by the personal God. Philosophy,
theology, and religion were all joined and harmonized in his
conception.
If we have followed thus far the spirit of Philo aright, the Logos is
only the immanent manifestation of the One God, who is both
transcendental and immanent, metaphorically, not metaphysically,
separate. In other words, it is the complete aspect of God as He
reveals Himself to the world. Above it and including it is the being
or essence of God, seen in Himself, and not in relation to His outward
activity. But it is often suggested that the Logos appears to Philo as
a second God, subordinate, indeed, to the Supreme Being, but yet a
separate personality. It is said, with truth, that he speaks of it as
a person, now calling it king, priest, primal man, the first-born son
of God, even the second God, and identifying it at other times with
some personal being, Melchizedek or Moses, and apostrophizing it as
man's helper, guide, and advocate.[216] Now we have reason to think
that Gnostic sects of Jews, both in Alexandria and in Palestine, were
at this time tending towards the division of the Godhead into separate
powers. The heresy of "Minut," frequently mentioned in the Talmud,
consisted originally, in the opinion of modern scholars, of a Gnostic
ditheism;[217] and during the latter part of the first century and
thereafter we hear of sects in Egypt and Syria which supported similar
theories.
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