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As I am going to demonstrate a most philosophical proposition, namely, that religious reasoning is absolute master of the passions, I would willingly advise you to give the utmost heed to philosophy.
For reason is necessary to every one as a step to science: and more especially does it embrace the praise of prudence, the highest virtue.
If, then, reasoning appears to hold the mastery over the passions which stand in the way of temperance, such as gluttony and lust,
it surely also and manifestly has the rule over the affections which are contrary to justice, such as malice; and of those which are hindrances to manliness, as wrath, and pain, and fear.
How, then, is it, perhaps some may say, that reasoning, if it rule the affections, is not also master of forgetfulness and ignorance? They attempt a ridiculous argument.
For reasoning does not rule over its own affections, but over such as are contrary to justice, and manliness, and temperance, and prudence; and yet over these, so as to withstand, without destroying them.
I might prove to you, from many other considerations, that religious reasoning is sole master of the passions;
but I shall prove it with the greatest force from the fortitude of Eleazar, and seven brethren, and their mother, who suffered death in defence of virtue.
For all these, contemning pains even unto death, by this contempt, demonstrated that reasoning has command over the passions.
For their virtues, then, it is right that I should commend those men who died with their mother at this time in behalf of rectitude; and for their honours, I may count them happy.
For they, winning admiration not only from men in general, but even from their persecutors, for their manliness and endurance, became the means of the destruction of the tyranny against their nation, having conquered the tyrant by their endurance, so that by them their country was purified.
But we may now at once enter upon the question, having commenced, as is our wont, with laying down the doctrine, and so proceed to the account of these persons, giving glory to the all wise God.
The question, therefore, is, whether reasoning be absolute master of the passions.
Let us determine, then, What is reasoning? and what passion? and how many forms of the passions? and whether reasoning bears sway over all of these?
Reasoning is, then, intellect accompanied by a life of rectitude, putting foremost the consideration of wisdom.
And wisdom is a knowledge of divine and human things, and of their causes.
And this is contained in the education of the law; by means of which we learn divine things reverently, and human things profitably.
And the forms of wisdom are prudence, and justice, and manliness, and temperance.
The leading one of these is prudence; by whose means, indeed, it is that reasoning bears rule over the passions.
Of the passions, pleasure and pain are the two most comprehensive; and they also by nature refer to the soul.
And there are many attendant affections surrounding pleasure and pain.
Before pleasure is lust; and after pleasure, joy.
And before pain is fear; and after pain, sorrow.
Wrath is an affection, common to pleasure and to pain, if any one will pay attention when it comes upon him.
And there exists in pleasure a malicious disposition, which is the most multiform of all the affections.
In the soul it is arrogance, and love of money, and vaingloriousness, and contention, and faithlessness, and the evil eye.
In the body it is greediness and gormandizing, and solitary gluttony.
As pleasure and pain are, therefore, two growths of the body and the soul, so there are many offshoots of these passions.
And reasoning, the universal husbandman, purging, and pruning these severally, and binding round, and watering, and transplanting, in every way improves the materials of the morals and affections.
For reasoning is the leader of the virtues, but it is the sole ruler of the passions. Observe then first, through the very things which stand in the way of temperance, that reasoning is absolute ruler of the passions.
Now temperance consists of a command over the lusts.
But of the lusts, some belong to the soul, others to the body: and over each of these classes the reasoning appears to bear sway.
For whence is it, otherwise, that when urged on to forbidden meats, we reject the gratification which would ensue from them? Is it not because reasoning is able to command the appetites? I believe so.
Hence it is, then, that when lusting after water-animals and birds, and fourfooted beasts, and all kinds of food which are forbidden us by the law, we withhold ourselves through the mastery of reasoning.
For the affections of our appetites are resisted by the temperate understanding, and bent back again, and all the impulses of the body are reined in by reasoning.
And what wonder? if the lusts of the soul, after participation with what is beautiful, are frustrated,
on this ground, therefore, the temperate Joseph is praised in that by reasoning, he subdued, on reflection, the indulgence of sense.
For, although young, and ripe for sexual intercourse, he abrogated by reasoning the stimulus of his passions.
And it is not merely the stimulus of sensual indulgence, but that of every desire, that reasoning is able to master.
For instance, the law says, Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor anything that belongs to thy neighbour.
Now, then, since it is the law which has forbidden us to desire, I shall much the more easily persuade you, that reasoning is able to govern our lusts, just as it does the affections which are impediments to justice.
Since in what way is a solitary eater, and a glutton, and a drunkard reclaimed, unless it be clear that reasoning is lord of the passions?
A man, therefore, who regulates his course by the law, even if he be a lover of money, straightway puts force upon his own disposition; lending to the needy without interest, and cancelling the debt of the incoming sabbath.
And should a man be parsimonious, he is ruled by the law acting through reasoning; so that he does not glean his harvest crops, nor vintage: and in reference to other points we may perceive that it is reasoning that conquers his passions.
For the law conquers even affection toward parents, not surrendering virtue on their account.
And it prevails over marriage love, condemning it when transgressing law.
And it lords it over the love of parents toward their children, for they punish them for vice; and it domineers over the intimacy of friends, reproving them when wicked.
And think it not a strange assertion that reasoning can in behalf of the law conquer even enmity.
It alloweth not to cut down the cultivated herbage of an enemy, but preserveth it from the destroyers, and collecteth their fallen ruins.
And reasoning appears to be master of the more violent passions, as love of empire and empty boasting, and arrogance, and loud boasting, and slander.
For the temperate understanding repels all these malignant passions, as it does wrath: for it masters even this.
Thus Moses, when angered against Dathan and Abiram, did nothing to them in wrath, but regulated his anger by reasoning.
For the temperate mind is able, as I said, to be superior to the passions, and to transfer some, and destroy others.
For why, else, does our most wise father Jacob blame Simeon and Levi for having irrationally slain the whole race of the Shechemites, saying, Cursed be their anger.
For if reasoning did not possess the power of subduing angry affections, he would not have spoken thus.
For at the time when God created man, He implanted within him his passions and moral nature.
And at that time He enthroned above all the holy leader mind, through the medium of the senses.
And He gave a law to this [mind], by living according to which it will maintain a temperate, and just, and good, and manly reign.
How, then, a man may say, if reasoning be master of the passions, has it no control over forgetfulness and ignorance?
The argument is exceedingly ridiculous: for reasoning does not appear to bear sway over its own affections, but over those of the body,
in such a way as that any one of you may not be able to root out desire, but reasoning will enable you to avoid being enslaved to it.
One may not be able to root out anger from the soul, but it is possible to withstand anger.
Any one of you may not be able to eradicate malice, but reasoning has force to work with you to prevent your yielding to malice.
For reasoning is not an eradicator, but an antagonist of the passions.
And this may be more clearly comprehended from the thirst of King David.
For after David had been attacking the Philistines the whole day, he with the soldiers of his nation slew many of them;
then when evening came, sweating and very weary, he came to the royal tent, about which the entire host of our ancestors was encamped.
Now all the rest of them were at supper;
but the king, being very much athirst, although he had numerous springs, could not by their means quench his thirst;
but a certain irrational longing for the water in the enemy's camp grew stronger and fiercer upon him, and consumed him with languish.
Wherefore his body-guards being troubled at this longing of the king, two valiant young soldiers, reverencing the desire of the king, put on their panoplies, and taking a pitcher, got over the ramparts of the enemies:
and unperceived by the guardians of the gate, they went throughout the whole camp of the enemy in quest.
And having boldly discovered the fountain, they filled out of it the draught for the king.
But he, though parched up with thirst, reasoned that a draught reputed of equal value to blood, would be terribly dangerous to his soul.
Wherefore, setting up reasoning in opposition to his desire, he poured out the draught to God.
For the temperate mind has power to conquer the pressure of the passions, and to quench the fires of excitement,
and to wrestle down the pains of the body, however excessive; and, through the excellency of reasoning, to abominate all the assaults of the passions.
But the occasion now invites us to give an illustration of temperate reasoning from history.
For at a time when our fathers were in possession of undisturbed peace through obedience to the law, and were prosperous, so that Seleucus Nicanor, the king of Asia, both assigned them money for divine service, and accepted their form of government,
then certain persons, bringing in new things contrary to the general unanimity, in various ways fell into calamities.
For a certain man named Simon, who was in opposition to Onias, who once held the high priesthood for life, and was an honourable and good man, after that by slandering him in every way, he could not injure him with the people, went away as an exile, with the intention of betraying his country.
Whence coming to Apollonius, the military governor of Syria, and Phœnicia, and Cilicia, he said,
Having good will to the king's affairs, I am come to inform thee that infinite private wealth is laid up in the treasuries of Jerusalem which do not belong to the temple, but pertain to king Seleucus.
Apollonius, acquainting himself with the particulars of this, praised Simon for his care of the king's interests, and going up to Seleucus informed him of the treasure;
and getting authority about it, and quickly advancing into our country with the accursed Simon and a very heavy force,
he said that he came with the commands of the king that he should take the private money of the treasury.
And the nation, indignant at this proclamation, and replying to the effect that it was extremely unfair that those who had committed deposits to the sacred treasury should be deprived of them, resisted as well as they could.
But Apollonius went away with threats into the temple.
And the priests, with the women and children, having supplicated God to throw his shield over the holy, despised place,
and Apollonius going up with his armed force to the seizure of the treasure,—there appeared from heaven angels riding on horseback, all radiant in armour, filling them with much fear and trembling.
And Apollonius fell down half dead upon the court which is open to all nations, and extended his hands to heaven, and implored the Hebrews, with tears, to pray for him, and propitiate the heavenly host.
For he said that he had sinned, so as to be consequently worthy of death; and that if he were saved, he would celebrate to all men the blessedness of the holy place.
Onias the high priest, induced by these words, although for other reasons anxious that king Seleucus should not suppose that Apollonius was slain by human device and not by Divine punishment, prayed for him;
and he being thus unexpectedly saved, departed to manifest to the king what had happened to him.
But on the death of Seleucus the king, his son Antiochus Epiphanes succeeds to the kingdom: a man of haughty pride and terrible.
Who having deposed Onias from the high priesthood, appointed his brother Jason to be high priest:
who had made a covenant, if he would give him this authority, to pay yearly three thousand six hundred and sixty talents.
And he committed to him the high priesthood and rulership over the nation.
And he both changed the manner of living of the people, and perverted their civil customs into all lawlessness.
So that he not only erected a gymnasium on the very citadel of our country, [but neglected] the guardianship of the temple.