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from Philo's On the Account Of the World's Creation Given                           by Moses 

[Moses], that great master, holding the unoriginate to be of a different order from
that which is visible, since everything that is an object of sensible perception is subject
to becoming and to constant change, never abiding in the same state, assigned to that
which is invisible and an object of intellectual apprehension the infinite and undefinable
as united with it by closest tie; but on that which is an object of the senses he bestowed
"genesis," "becoming" as its appropriate name. 

Seeing then that this world is both visible and perceived by the senses, it follows that
it must also have had an origin. Whence it was entirely to the point that he put on record
that origin, setting forth in true grandeur the work of God. 

III. He says that in six days the world was created, not that its Maker required a
length of time for his work, for we must think of God as doing all things simultaneously,
remembering that "all" includes with the commands which He issues the thought behind
them. Six days are mentioned because for the things coming into existence there was
need of order. Order involves number, and among numbers by the laws of nature the most
suitable to productivity is 6, for if we start with 1 it is the first perfect number, being equal
to the product of its factors i. e., 1 x 2 x 3), as well as made up of the sum of them (i. e.,
1 + 2 + 3), its half being 3, its third part 2, its sixth part 1. We may say that it is in its
nature both male and female, and is a result of the distinctive power of either. For among
things that are, it is the odd that is male, and the even female. Now of odd numbers 3 is
the starting point, and of even numbers 2, and the product of these is two is 6. For it was
requisite that the world, being most perfect of all things that have come into existence,
should be constituted in accordance with a perfect number, namely six; and inasmuch as
it was to have in itself beings that sprang from a coupling together, should receive the
impress of a mixed number, namely the first in which odd and even were combined, one
that should contain the essential principle both of the male that sows and of the female
that receives the seed. 

. . . 

[T]he earth put forth plants and bore herbs before the heaven was furnished. But
the heaven was afterwards duly decked in a perfect number, namely four. This number
it would be no error to call the base and source of 10, the complete number; for what 10
is actually this, as is evident, 4 is potentially; that is to say that, if the numbers from 1
to 4 be added together, they will produce 10, and this is the limit set to the otherwise
unlimited succession of numbers; round this as a turning point, they wheel and retrace
their steps. 

4 also contains the ratios of the musical consonances, that produced by an interval of
four notes, and that produced by an interval of five, and the octave and double octave as
well. And it is out of these that the most perfect concord is produced. Of that produced
by an interval of four notes the ratio is 1 1/3, of that produced by an interval of five 1 1/2, of
the octave 2, of the double octave 4. All of these the number 4 embraces in itself, 1 1/3 in
the ratio 4:3; 1 1/2 in the ratio 6:4; 2 in the ratio 4:2; 4 in the ratio 4:l. 

XVI. There is also another property of the number 4 very marvelous to state and to
contemplate with the mind. For this number was the first to show the solid, the numbers
before it referring to things without actual substance. For under the head of 1 what is
called in geometry a point falls, under that of 2 a line. For if 1 extend itself, 2 is formed,
and if a point extend itself, a line is formed: and a line is length without breadth, if breadth
be added, there results a surface, which comes under the category of 3: to bring it to a
solid surface needs one thing, depth, and the addition of this to 3 produces 4. The result
of all this is that this number is a thing of vast importance. It was this number that led us
out of the realm of incorporeal existence patent only to the intellect, and has introduced
us to the conception of a body of three dimensions, which by its nature first comes within
the range of our senses. Anyone who does not understand what I am saying will catch
my meaning if he calls to mind a very familiar game. Players with nuts are in the habit
of setting forth three nuts all on one level and of adding one to these, thus forming a.
pyramidal figure. The figure of the triangle on the level only reaches the number 3; the
added nut produces, in numbers 4, but in figures a pyramid, a body rendered solid by
its accession. In addition we must remember also that first among numbers 4 is a square,
made up of equal factors multiplying into one another, a measure of rightness and equality,
and that alone among them it is such as to be produced from the same factors whether
added or multiplied together ... 

There are several other powers of which 4 has the command ... 4 was made the
starting-point of the creation of heaven and the world, for the four elements, out of which
this universe was fashioned, issued, as it were from a fountain, from the numeral 4; and,
besides this, so also did the four seasons of the year, which are responsible for the coming
into being of animals and plants, the year having a fourfold division into winter and spring
and summer and autumn. 

XVII. The aforesaid numeral, then, having been deemed worthy of such high privilege
in nature, it was a matter of course that its Maker arrayed the heaven on the fourth day
with a most divine adornment of perfect beauty, namely the light-giving heavenly bodies;
and, knowing that of all things, light is best, He made it the indispensable means of sight,
the best of the senses; for what the intellect is in the soul, this the eye is in the body; for
each of them sees, one the things of the mind, the other the things of sense; and they have
need, the mind of knowledge, that it may become cognisant of incorporeal objects, the eye
of light, for the apprehending of bodily forms. 

Light has proved itself the source of many other boons to mankind, but pre-eminently
of philosophy, the greatest boon of all. For man's faculty of vision, led upwards by light,
discerned the nature of the heavenly bodies and their harmonious movement. He saw the
well-ordered circuits of fixed stars and planets, how the former moved in unchanging orbit
and all alike, while the latter sped round in two revolutions out of harmony with each other.
He marked the rhythmic dances of all these, how they were marshalled by the laws of a
perfect music, and the sight produced in his soul an ineffable delight and pleasure.... And
then, as usually happens, it went on to busy itself with questionings, asking What is the
essence of these visible objects? Are they in nature unoriginate, or had they a beginning
of existence? What is the method of their movement? And what are the principles by
which each is governed? It was out of the investigation of these problems that philosophy
grew, than which no more perfect good has come into the life of mankind.... 

XX. Earth and heaven having been equipped with the array appropriate to either--
earth on the third day, heaven, as has been recounted, on the fourth--the Creator took in
hand to form the races of mortal creatures, beginning with aquatic creatures on the fifth
day, deeming that there is no kinship so close as that between animals and the number
5. For living creatures differ from those without life in nothing more than in ability to
apprehend by the senses; and sense has a fivefold division, into sight, hearing, taste, smell,
and touch... 

After the fishes, He made the birds and land creatures; for when we come to these,
we find them with keener senses and manifesting by their structure far more clearly all the
qualities proper to beings endowed with the life-principle. 

To crown all ...He made man, and bestowed on him mind that excellence, life-principle
of the life-principle itself, like the pupil in the eye: for of this too those who investigate
more closely than others the nature of things say that it is the eye of the eye. . . . 

XXIII. After all the rest, as I have said, Moses tells us that man was created after the
image of God and after His likeness (Gen. i. 26). Right well does he say this, for nothing
earth-born is more like God than man. Let no one represent the likeness as one to a bodily
form; for neither is God in human form, nor is the human body God-like. No, it is in
respect of the Mind, the sovereign element of the soul, that the word "image" is used; for
after the pattern of a single Mind, even the Mind of the Universe as an archetype, the mind
in each of those who successively came into being was moulded. It is in a fashion a god to
him who carries and enshrines it as an object of reverence; for the human mind evidently
occupies a position in men precisely answering to that which the great Ruler occupies in
all the world. It is invisible while itself seeing all things, and while comprehending the
substance of others, it is as to his own substance unperceived; and while it opens by arts
and sciences roads branching in many directions, all of them great highways, it comes
through land and sea investigating what either element contains.... 

And, since images do not always correspond to their archetype and pattern, but are
in many instances unlike it, the writer further brought out in his meaning by adding "after
the likeness" to the words "after the image," thus showing that an accurate cast, bearing
a clear impression, was intended. 

XXIV. One may not unfitly raise the question what reason there could be for his
ascribing the creation in the case of man only not to one Creator as in the case of the rest
but, as the words would suggest, to several. For he represents the Father of the universe
as speaking thus, "Let us make man after our image and likeness." 'Can it be,' I would
ask, 'that He to whom all things are subject is in need of anyone whatever? . . . The full
truth about the cause of this it must needs be that God alone knows, but the cause which
by probable conjecture seems plausible and reasonable we must not conceal. It is this.
Among existences some partake neither of virtue nor of vice, like plants and animals devoid
of reason; the one sort because they are without animal life and furnished with a nature
incapable of consciously receiving impressions; the other sort because from them mind and
reason have been eliminated: for mind and reason are as it were the dwelling-place of vice
and virtue, which are by nature constituted to make their abode in them. Others again have
partnership with virtue only, and have no part or lot in vice. Such are the heavenly bodies;
for these are said to be not only living creatures, but living creatures endowed with mind,
or rather each of them a mind in itself, excellent through and through and unsusceptible
of any evil. Others are of mixed nature, as man, who is liable to contraries, wisdom and
folly, self-mastery and licentiousness, courage and cowardice, justice and injustice, and (in
a word) to things good and evil, fair and foul, to virtue and vice. Now it was most proper
to God the universal Father to make those excellent things by Himself alone, because of
their kinship to Him. To make those which are neither good nor bad was not alien to
Him, since those too are free from vice which is hateful to Him. To make those of mixed
nature was in one respect proper to Him, in another not so; proper, so far as the better
principle which forms an ingredient in them is concerned; alien, in virtue of the contrary
and worse principle. So we see it is only in the instance of man's creation that we are told
by Moses that God said, "Let us make man," an expression which plainly shows the taking
with Him of others as fellow-workers. It is to the end that, when man orders his course
aright, when his thoughts and deeds are blameless, God the universal Ruler may be owned
as their Source; while others from the number of His subordinates are held responsible for
thoughts and deeds of a contrary sort: for it could not be that the Father should be the
cause of an evil thing to His offspring: and vice and vicious activities are an evil thing. . . . 

. . . 

XXX. Now when the whole world had been brought to completion in accordance with
the properties of six, a perfect number, the Father invested with dignity the seventh day
which comes next, extolling it and pronouncing it holy; for it is the festival, not of a single
city or country, but of the universe, and it alone strictly deserves to be called "public"
as belonging to all people and the birthday of the world. I doubt whether anyone could
celebrate the properties of the number 7, for they are beyond all words.... Now 7 or 7th
is a term used in two different senses. There is the 7 inside the number 10. This consists
of 7 units and is determined by the sevenfold repetition of the unit. There is the 7 outside
the number 10. This is a number starting throughout from the number 1 and formed
by doubling it and going on doubling (7 times) or trebling, or multiplying by any other
number in regular progression; as, for example, the number 64 is the product of doubling
from 1 onwards, and the number 729 that of trebling. Each of these forms claims more
than casual notice. The second form clearly has a very manifest superiority. For invariably
the 7th term of any regular progression, starting with unity and with a ratio of 2,3, or any
other number, is both a cube and a square, embracing both forms, that of the incorporeal
and that of the corporeal substance, the form of the incorporeal answering to the surface
which is formed by squares, that of the corporeal answering to the solid which is formed
by cubes. [For example 

1 2 4 8 16 32 64; 64 = 8², 64 = 4³ 

1 3 9 27 81 243 729; 729 = 27², 729 = 9³ 

1 5 25 125 625 3125 15625; 15625 = 125², 15625 = 25³ ] 

[There follow over twelve more pages on the properties and qualities of 7. Some of the
highlights: 

· 7 consists of 1, 2, and 4, which have two relations making specially for harmony, the
twofold and the fourfold, the one producing the diapason harmony, while the fourfold
relation produces double diapason. 

· 6:1, 5:2, 4:3 are also musically significant. 

· Being made up of 3 and 4, 7 represents all that is naturally steadfast and upright in
the universe. The right-angled triangle is made up of sides of 3,4,5. Sides 3 and 4
produce the right angle; the obtuse and acute angle are manifestations of irregularity
and disorder and inequality: one such angle can be more acute or obtuse than another,
whereas the "right" angle is invariable. Thus 7 is the fountain-head of every figure
and every definite shape. 

· 7 is the starting point of all plane and solid geometry (3 points constitute a plane, 4
a solid), and thus all incorporeal and corporeal things. 

· Some numbers from 1 to 10 beget without being begotten; some are begotten but do
not beget; some both beget and are begotten. 7 alone does not fit in any of these
categories. (1 begets all subsequent numbers, but is begotten by none. 8 is begotten
by 2 x 4, but begets no number within 110; 4 is both begotten 12 x 2] and begets [2 x 4].
"It is in the nature of 7 alone, as I have said, neither to beget nor to be begotten. For
this reason other philosophers liken this number to the motherless and virgin Nike, who is said 
to have appeared out of the head of Zeus, while the Pythagoreans liken
it to the chief of all things: for that which neither begets nor is begotten remains
motionless ...There is only one thing that neither causes motion nor experiences it,
the original Ruler and Sovereign. Of Him 7 may be fitly said to be a symbol." 

· 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 ~ 6 + 7 = 28 (the time of the complete lunar cycle). 

· Every body has 3 dimensions: length, width, and depth and 4 limits: point, line,
surface, and solid. 

· Hippocrates claims a person's development goes through 7 stages (the so-called Seven
Ages of Man). 

· Alternatively Solon organizes human development into 10 stages of 7 years each (10
'weeks' of years). 

· The heavens are divided into 7 zones, the planets are marshalled in 7 ranks, the Great
Bear [the Big Dipper] contains 7 stars. 

· Apart from understanding (reason), our souls are divided into 7 parts: the 5 senses,
speech, and the generative faculty. All are controlled by the understanding (or reason)
like puppets. 

· The outward form of the human body is composed of seven main parts: head, breast,
belly, two arms, and two legs; its inner parts are also 7: stomach, heart, lung, spleen,
liver, 2 kidneys. The head also has 7 parts: 2 eyes, 2 ears, 2 nostrils, and a mouth. 

· The classes of visible objects are seven: body, extension [spatiality ?], shape, size,
colour, movement, and quiescence. 

· The varieties of the voice (vowels) are also 7: the acute, the grave, the circumflex, the
rough (aspirated), the thin (unaspirated), the long, and the short. 

· There are 7 movements: upward, downward, to the right, to the left, forward, backward, 
in a circle. 

· In grammar, there are seven vowels. 

· In music, the 7-stringed lyre, which corresponds to the choir of the 7 planets, provides
the rule to which the making of all musical instruments conforms. ] 

XLIV. In his concluding summary of the story of creation [Moses] says: "This is the
book of the genesis of heaven and earth, when they came into being, in the day in which
God made heaven and the earth and every herb of the field before it sprang up" (Gen. ii.
4-5). Is he not manifestly describing the incorporeal ideas present only to the mind, by
which, as by seals, the finished objects that meet our senses were moulded? For before the
earth put its young green shoots, young verdure was present, he tells us, in the nature of
things without material shape, and before the grass sprang up in the fields, there was in
existence an invisible grass. We must suppose that in the case of all other objects also,
on which the senses pronounce judgment, the original forms and measures, to which all
things that come into being owe shape and size, subsisted before them; for even if he has
not dealt with everything in detail but in the mass, aiming as he does at brevity in a high
degree, nevertheless what he does say gives us a few indications of universal Nature, which
brings forth no finished product in the world of sense without using an incorporeal pattern. 

Trans. F. Il. Colson and Rev. G. H. Whitaker, Loeb Classical Library [Philo, I, 13-102
passim] 

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