Herein we conclude, from part 1, part 2, part 3, providing quotations and citations on Serpent and Dragon (within a Satanic context) from Philo of Alexandria (20 BC-50 AD). The fuller complete result consists of quotations of those sections within the text that refer to Angels, Cherubim, Seraphim, Devil, Satan, demons, serpent and dragon. The point is not to elucidate these references but to provide relevant partial quotations and citations. See my section on Angels here, Cherubim and Seraphim here, Satan here and Demons here.
Serpent and Dragon in Philo of Alexandria’s On Husbandry, On the Life of Moses and On the Migration of Abraham.
On Husbandry
XXI But we must explain what is the enigmatical meaning which he conceals under this prayer, the name of Dan, being interpreted, means “judgment;” therefore he here likens that power of the soul which investigates, and accurately examines, and distinguishes between, and, in some degree, decides on each part of the soul, to a dragon (and the dragon is an animal various in its movements, and exceedingly cunning, and ready to display its courage, and very powerful to repel those who begin acts of violence), but not to that friendly serpent, the counsellor of life, which is wont to be called Eve in his national language, but to the one made by Moses, of the material of brass, which, when those who had been bitten by the poisonous serpents, and who were at the point of death beheld, they are said to have lived and not to have died.
XXII The serpent, then, which appeared to the woman, that is to life depending on the outward senses and on the flesh, we pronounce to have been pleasure…And these things thus expressed resemble visions and prodigies; I mean the account of one dragon uttering the voice of a man and pouring his sophistries into most innocent dispositions, and deceiving the woman with plausible arguments of persuasion; and of another becoming a cause of complete safety to those who looked upon it.
XXIV Moses, therefore, represents the serpent that appeared to Eve as planning the death of man, for he records, that God says in his curses, “He shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” But he represents the serpent of Dan, which is the one which we are now discussing, as biting the heel of the horse and not of the man, (108) for the serpent of Eve, being the symbol of pleasure, as has been already shown, attacks man.
On the Life of Moses, I
VIII But whenever their distress abated, then again their taskmasters returned and oppressed them with increased severity, always after the respite adding some new evil which should be even more intolerable than their previous sufferings; for some of their overseers were very savage and furious men, being, as to their cruelty, not at all different from poisonous serpents or carnivorous beasts–wild beasts in human form–being clothed with the form of a human body so as to give an appearance of gentleness in order to deceive and catch their victim, but in reality being harder than iron or adamant.
On the Migration of Abraham
XII For what has been said in words, indeed, is applicable to the serpent, but in reality it is meant to apply to every man who is irrational and a slave to his passions, being truly a divine oracle, “Upon thy breast and upon thy belly shalt thou Go;” for anger has its abode about the breast, and the seat of desire is in the belly.
In the next segment, we will consider Angels in Flavius Josephus.
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