The Enchiridion. Epictetus

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СКАЧАТЬ truth of subjective consciousness, which is to distinguish what is in our power from what is not in our power. Not in our power are all the elements which constitute our environment, such as wealth, health, reputation, social prestige, power, the lives of those we love, and death. In our power are our thinking, our intentions, our desires, our decisions. These make it possible for us to control ourselves and to make of ourselves elements and parts of the universe of nature. This knowledge of ourselves makes us free in a world of dependencies. This superiority of our powers enables us to live in conformity with nature. The rational philosophy of control of Self and of adjustment to the Whole implies an asceticism of the emotional and the sensitive life. The philosopher must examine and control his passions, his love, his tenderness at all times in order always to be ready for the inevitable moment of farewell. The Stoics practiced a Jesuitism avant la lettre. They were able to live in the world as if they did not live in it. To the Stoic, life is a military camp, a play on the stage, a banquet to which we are invited. The Enchiridion briefly indicated the techniques which the philosopher should apply in acting well the diverse roles which God might assign to those whom he loves, the Stoic philosophers. From the rules of social conduct to the recommendations of sexual asceticism before marriage, and the method of true thinking, the advanced Stoic will find all principles of perfection and all precepts for realizing philosophical principles in his conduct in this tiny volume.

      Thus the Enchiridion was liberating for all intellectuals who learned from it that there are philosophical ways of self-redemption. From its time, the secular thinker could feel jubilant because he was not in need of a divine grace. Epictetus had taught him that philosophical reason could make him free and that he was capable of redeeming himself by sound reasoning.

      In the Stoic distinctions of personality and world, of I and mine, of subjective consciousness and the world of objects, of freedom and dependence, we find implicit the basic elements of modern philosophies of rationalism and of objective idealism or pantheism. For this reason there is a continuous renascence of Stoicism from Descartes, Grotius, and Bishop Butler, to Montesquieu, Adam Smith, and Kant. In this long development in modern times, the tiny Enchiridion of Epictetus played a remarkable part.

      The translations of Epictetus and of all other Stoics had the widest effect on philosophers, theologians, and lay thinkers. They were studied by the clergy of the various Christian denominations, by the scientists who were striving for a natural religion, and by the independent philosophers who were eager to separate philosophy from religion. There were many outstanding bishops in the Catholic and Anglican Churches who were eager to transform the traditions of Roman Stoicism into Christian Stoicism. Among the Calvinistic denominations were many thinkers who were in sympathy with Stoic moral principles because of their praise of the austerity of life and of the control of passions. Likewise the adherents of natural religion were propagating Stoicism as the ideal pattern of universally valid and intelligible religion. Renascent Stoicism had three functions in the rise of the modern world. First, it reconciled Christian traditions to modern rationalistic philosophies; secondly, it established an ideal pattern of natural religion; and, thirdly, it opened the way for the autonomy of morals.

ALBERT SALOMON

      The New School

      for Social Research

      July, 1948

      SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Epictetus: Life and Work

      Arnim, Hans V., “Epictetos” in Pauli-Wissowa (ed), Real-Encyclopaedie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, VI, col. 126-131.

      Arnold, E. V., “Epictetus” in Hastings, Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, 1912. Vol. V, pp. 323, 324.

      Bonhoeffer, A., Epiktet und die Stoa. Stuttgart, 1890.

      – , Ethik des Stoikers Epiktet. Stuttgart, 1894.

      – , Epiktet und das Neue Testament. Giessen, 1911.

      Bruns, Ivo, De schola Epicteti. Kiel, 1897.

      Bultmann, Rudolf, “Das religiöse Moment in der ethischen Unterweisung des Epiktets und das Neue Testament,” Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde des Urchristentums, Vol. XIII, 1912; pp. 97-110; 177-191.

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