Therapeutae

The primary source concerning the Therapeutae is the De vita contemplativa ("The Contemplative Life"), traditionally ascribed to the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BCE – 50 CE).

I.2) and mentions a group that lived on a low hill by the Lake Mareotis close to Alexandria in circumstances resembling lavrite life (cf.

According to De Vita Contemplativa, the Therapeutae were widely distributed in the Ancient world, among the Greeks and beyond in the non-Greek world of the "barbarians", with one of their major gathering points being in Alexandria, in the area of the Lake Mareotis: Now this class of persons may be met with in many places, for it was fitting that both Greece and the country of the barbarians should partake of whatever is perfectly good; and there is the greatest number of such men in Egypt, in every one of the districts, or nomes, as they are called, and especially around Alexandria; and from all quarters those who are the best of these therapeutae proceed on their pilgrimage to some most suitable place as if it were their country, which is beyond the Maereotic lake.They lived chastely with utter simplicity; they "first of all laid down temperance as a sort of foundation for the soul to rest upon, proceed to build up other virtues on this foundation" (Philo).

They renounced property and followed severe discipline: These men abandon their property without being influenced by any predominant attraction, and flee without even turning their heads back again.They were dedicated to the contemplative life, and their activities for six days of the week consisted of ascetic practices, fasting, solitary prayers and the study of the scriptures in their isolated cells, each with its separate holy sanctuary, and enclosed courtyard: the entire interval from dawn to evening is given up by them to spiritual exercises.

For they read the holy scriptures and draw out in thought and allegory their ancestral philosophy, since they regard the literal meanings as symbols of an inner and hidden nature revealing itself in covert ideas.On the seventh day the Therapeutae met in a meeting house, the men on one side of an open partition, and the women on the other, to hear discourses.

[14][15] As described in the 1st century CE text Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, Egypt had intense trade and cultural contacts with India during the period which, combined with evidence in the Indian Edicts of Ashoka of Buddhist missionary activity to the Mediterranean around 250 BCE, has led to the hypothesis that Therapeutae might have been a Buddhist sect composed of descendants of Ashoka's emissaries.