As I was walking early one morning in the colonnades of the gymnasium, a certain man, together with others, met me and said, "Hail, philosopher." And having said this, he turned and walked along with me; his friends also turned with him. And I in turn greeted him and said, "What is it especially?"
And he said, "I was taught at Argos by Corinthus the Socratic that one ought not to despise nor neglect those who wear this garb, but in every way to treat them kindly and to converse with them, in case some benefit should come from the association either to that person himself or to me. And it is good for both, even if only one of the two is benefited. For this reason, then, whenever I see anyone in such a garb, I gladly approach him; and so now too I have addressed you with pleasure, and these men accompany me, expecting that they too will hear something useful from you."
"And who are you, most excellent of mortals?" Thus I said, jesting with him. And he told me both his name and his lineage plainly. "Trypho," he said, "is my name; I am a Hebrew of the circumcision, a refugee from the war that has now taken place, spending most of my time in Greece and in Corinth." "And what," said I, "could you gain so much from philosophy as from your own lawgiver and the prophets?" "Why," said he, "do not the philosophers make all their discourse about God, and are not their inquiries continually about monarchy and providence? Or is this not the task of philosophy, to inquire about the divine?"
"Yes," said I, "so we too have held. But most of them have not even given thought to this—whether there is one God or several, and whether he exercises providence over each one of us or not—as though this knowledge contributed nothing to happiness; nay, they even attempt to persuade us that God cares for the universe as a whole, and for the genera and species themselves, but no longer for me and you and the individual, since otherwise we would not pray to him through the whole night and day."
"But where this ends up for them is not hard to perceive: for license and freedom follow for those who hold these opinions, to say and do whatever they wish, fearing no punishment nor hoping for any good from God. For how could it be otherwise? They say that the same things will always be, and moreover that you and I will live again in like manner, having become neither better nor worse. And certain others, having postulated that the soul is immortal and incorporeal, think that they will pay no penalty even if they have done some evil (for the incorporeal is impassible), and that, since it is immortal, they have no further need of God."
And he, smiling pleasantly, said, "But you—how do you think about these things, and what opinion do you hold concerning God, and what is your philosophy? Tell us."