"
Philo's ethics, like the rest of his philosophy, exhibits the
transfusion of Greek ideas with his Hebrew spirit. The Greek
philosophers had evolved a rational plan of life, while the Jewish
teachers were impregnated with burning ardor for the living God; and
Philo brings the two things together, making ethics dependent on
religion. The Stoics, who were the most powerful school of his day,
regarded as the ideal of goodness life according to unbending reason
and in complete independence of God or man. Philo understands God as a
personal power making for righteousness, and man's excellence,
accordingly, which is likeness to God, is piety and charity.[269]
Above all he insists upon Faith ([Greek: pistis]) and he defines
virtue as a condition of soul which fixes its hopes upon the truly
Existent God. The Stoics also professed to honor faith or confidence
above all things, but the virtue which they meant was reliance upon
man's own powers. Philo's virtue is almost the converse of this. Man
must feel completely dependent upon God, and his proper attitude is
humility and resignation. So only can he receive within his soul the
seed of goodness, and finally the Divine Logos.[270] Yet at the same
time Philo remains loyal to the Jewish ideal of conduct: faith without
works is empty, and, as he puts it, "The true-born goods are faith and
consistency of word and action.
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