Folia Theologica 17. (2006)
László Perendy: A Christian Platonist
188 L. PERENDY There is also a female creative principle present in his thought, probably due to Pythagorian influences. In some contexts his Dyad is identified with the two powers45, in other contexts it is identified with Matter or Wisdom46. This female life-principle later appears in Plutarch's works. It is sometimes identified with the Logos. Sophia assists the supreme God in the creation and administration of the world. On the whole, Philo himself does not know exactly what to do with this Earth Mother, whose concept he may have taken over from contemporary Platonized Pythogoreanism.47 Philo's division of the universe is triadic. Each division has a causal principle: God is the cause of the intelligible world, his Creative Power is the cause of the aetherial world, and his Regal Power is the cause of the sublunary world, i.e. the realm of growth and decay. We can suspect Persian influences here, and the ruler of the sublunary world reminds us of the Demiurge of the Valentinians. This figure was not malevolent in Platonism proper, and Philo himself identifies him with one aspect of God. Nevertheless, in contemporary thought he often appears as an independent demon who rules the sublunary world and sometimes he appears to be a rival to the Supreme Deity.48 H. GUYOT, L’infinité divine depuis Philon le Juif jusqu'à Plotin, Paris, 1906. M. MINITTI COLONNA, Sul De aeternitate mundi di Filone Alessandrino, in Nicolaus 1 (1979) 61-89. J. L. MORENO MARTINEZ, El logos y la creación. La referencia al Logos en el "principio" de Gen. 1,1 segün Filon de Alejandria, in Scripta Theologica 15 (1983) 381-419. V. NIKIPROWETZKY, Problèmes du "récit de la création” chez Philon d’Alexandrie, in Revue des études juives 124 (1965) 271-306. G. REALE, Filone di Alessandria e la prima elaborazione filosofica della dottrina della creazione, in R. CANTALAMESSA - L. F. PIZZOLATO (eds.), Paradoxos politeia. Studi patristici in onore di G. Lazzati, Milano, 1979, 274-287. 45 Cf. E. SEGAL, Two Powers in Heaven. Early Rabbinic Reports about Christianity and Gnosticism, Leiden, 1977. 46 Cf. P. BEAUCHAMP, La cosmologie religieuse de Philon et la lecture de l'Exode par le Livre de la Sagesse. Le thème de la manne, in Philon d'Alexandrie (Colloques Nationaux du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Lyon 11-15 Septembre 1966), Paris, 1967, 207-219. 47 J. DILLON, o. c. 163-164.