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Philo quotes Exodus 7 to argue that God appointed Moses to a divine status over Pharaoh. Philo depends on the Greek Septuagint translation, which interprets the Hebrew word for divine with the Greek "theos" which is also used for God.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
LXX Exodus 7:1
Septuagint
1 The Lord responded to Moses, saying, “Look, I have made you like a god to Pharaoh, and Aaron, your brother, will be your prophet. 2 And you yourself will tell him all the things I have commanded you. And Aaron, your brother, will talk to Pharaoh, so that he sends the sons of Israel out of his land. 3 I myself will harden the heart of Pharaoh and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.
Philo On the Birth of Abel 1:9
De sacrificiis Abelis et Caini
Classical
8 There is also another proof that the mind is immortal, which is of this nature:--There are some persons whom God, advancing to higher degrees of improvement, has enabled to soar above all species and genera, having placed them near himself; as he says to Moses, 'But stand thou here with Me.' He departs to another abode, that you may understand from this that God accounts a wise man as entitled to equal honour with the world itself, having both created the universe, and raised the perfect man from the things of earth up to himself by the same word. 9 Not but what, when he gave him the use of all earthly things and suffered him to dwell among them, he assigned to him not such a power as he might exercise in common with an earthly governor or monarch, by which he should forcibly rule over the passions of the soul, but he appointed him to be a sort of god, making the whole of the body, and the mind, which is the ruler of the body, subjects and slaves to him; 'For I give thee,' says he, 'as a god to Pharaoh.' But God is not susceptible of any subtraction or addition, inasmuch as he is complete and entirely equal to himself. 10 In reference to which it is said of Moses, 'That no one is said to know of his Tomb;' for who could be competent to perceive the migration of a perfect soul to the living God? Nor do I even believe that the soul itself while awaiting this event was conscious of its own improvement, inasmuch as it was at that time becoming gradually divine; for God, in the case of those persons whom he is about to benefit, does not take him who is to receive the advantage into his counsels, but is accustomed rather to pour his benefits ungrudgingly upon him without his having any previous anticipation of them. This is something like the meaning of God's adding the creation of what is good to the perfect mind. But the good is holiness, the name of which is Abel.
Date: 20-50 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
“... The persistence of the unwelcome opinion is particularly clear in the case of Exodus 7:1, whence the giving of the name ‘god’ to Moses was taken up in Sirach (45:2, where ‘god’ is indicated by the fragmentary Genizah Hebrew), and again in the Herodian age by Philo (Vita Mosis 1.158, ‘he was named god and king of the whole people’). It was also probably taken up in 4Q374, a Hebrew fragment on the exodus and conquest (line 6, ‘he set him for a god over mighty ones, and a cause of reeling to Pharaoh’). In the ancient versions, the sense ‘a god for Pharaoh’ or ‘a god of Pharaoh’ remains not only in the Septuagint and the Peshitta but also in later Jewish or Jewish-influenced versions and interpretations, including Aquila, Symmachus, and the Vulgate ...”
Horbury, William
"Jewish and Christian Monotheism in the Herodian Age" in Stuckenbruck, Loren T., and Wendy E. S. North (eds.) Early Jewish and Christian Monotheism
(p. 37) T&T Clark, 2004
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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