Philo: On the Wages of a Harlot from the Ancient Writings of The Set-Apart Bible. Read free with the Sacred Names (Yahuah, Yahshua, Elohim) and audio narration.
1 This injunction also is very admirably and properly set down in the sacred tablets of the law, that the wages of a harlot are not to be received into the temple, and inasmuch as she has earned them by selling her beauty, having chosen a most infamous life for the sake of shameful gain ; but if the gifts which proceed from a woman who has lived as a concubine are unholy, how can those be different which proceed from a soul which is defiled in the same manner, which has voluntarily abandoned itself to shame and to the lowest infamy, to drunkenness and gluttony, and covetousness and ambition, and love of pleasure, and to innumerable other kinds of passions, and diseases, and wickednesses ? For what time can be long enough to efface those defilements, I indeed do not know. Very often in truth time has put an end to the occupation of a harlot, since, when women have outlived their beauty, no one any longer approaches them, their prime having withered away like that of some flowers ; and what length of time can ever transform the harlotry of the soul which from its youth has been trained in early and habitual incontinence, so as to bring it over to good order? No time could do this, but God alone, to whom all things are possible, even those which among us are impossible. Accordingly, the man who is about to offer a sacrifice ought to examine and see, not whether the victim is without blemish, butvwhether his mind is sound, andentire, and perfect. Let him likwise investigate the causes for which he is about to offer the sacrifice ; for it must be as an expression of thankfulness for kindnesses which have been shown to him, or else of supplication for the permanence of his present blessings, or for the acquisition of some future good, or else to avert some evil either present or expected ; for all which objects he should labour to bring his reason into a state of good health and Banity; for if he is giving thanks for benefits conferred upon him, he must take care not to behave like an ungrateful man, * Deuteronomy xxiii. 18. 250 PHILO JUD^EOS. becoming wicked, for the benefits are conferred on a virtuous man ; or if his object be to secure the permanence of his present prosperity and happiness, and to be enabled to look forward to such for the future, he must still show himself worthy of his good fortune, and behave virtuously ; or if he is asking to escape from evils, let him not commit actions deserving of correction and punishment.