Stoicism

Marcus Aurelius was a stoic who had one of the worst human rights records when it came to persecuting early Christians. What did this pupil of Antonio Pius miss or what could he not see. Why were his eyes darkened?

Stoicism

Stoicism was founded by Zeno of Citium in Athens in the early 3rd century BC.

It is a philosophy of personal eudaemonic virtue ethics informed by its system of logic and its views on the natural world, asserting that the practice of virtue is both necessary and sufficient to achieve happiness and well being. They believe the individual and society will flourish by living an ethical life. The Stoics identified the path to eudaimonia with a life spent practicing the cardinal virtues and living in accordance with nature.

Zeno'e philosophy is not far from the philosophy of the Bible if we do not turn a blind eye to covetous practices of the Roman Emperial Cult like Marcus Aurelius. Not understanding that the use of force to provide welfare and the dainties of rulers was a violation of the Law of Nature was the foolishness of King Saul, the error of the Nicolaitan, Balaam and the masses as described by Polybius, and all the warnings of the prophets.

Some of the first principles of stoicism is:

• "To do no harm."
• "To contribute to the common good."
• "To act with kindness, benevolence, fairness, and goodwill toward all."

The Stoics elaborated a detailed taxonomy of virtue, dividing virtue into four main types: wisdom, justice, courage, and moderation.

Stoicism could be considered self-tyranny because it says that we should control those passions that can produce destructive emotions. They believed that this is done through rational thought or Right Reason. They saw a natural duty of all men written in the Natural Law.

The Greek term Kathēkonta is contrasted, in Stoic ethics, with katorthōma.

This Kathēkon is a Greek concept that was forged by Zeno of Citium, the founder of Stoicism. It has been translated as "appropriate behaviour", "befitting actions", or "convenient action for nature", or also "proper function". Kathekon was translated officium in Latin by Cicero and by Seneca as convenentia which we see in Romans 1:28.

The Stoics believed that to be followers of Stoicism they must do what a human being should do as a right action (katorthoma), which is obedient to nature which is the primary sense of kathēkon. To Christianize the Stoic katorthoma, which is a duty of everyman, we must fulfill that duty with fervent charity as opposed to legal charity which feeds not the humility of the soul through daily sacrifice and love but degenerates the soul of the masses and empowers the madness of their tyrants.

• "That is why charity, the prime virtue of the Christian, the legitimate hope of the socialist, the object of all the efforts of the economist, is a social vice the moment it is made a principle of constitution and a law; that is why certain economists have been able to say that legal charity had caused more evil in society than proprietary usurpation.”

Had Pierre-Joseph Proudhon understood the true nature of the early Church and the gospel of the Kingdom he may have turned in his copy of Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei for a Bible.

Polybius's notion of tyche is to be equated with the Stoic notion of divine providence or pronoia. But the legal charity by the State through public religion and the free bread of Rome had its own degenerating effect on the virtue and ethics of the masses. The nature of those civil institutions of the State, like those of Sodom, weakened the people and made leaders more and more drunk on, or at least blinded by, the power they were granted by the sloth and avarice of the people.

Virtue and ethics

The Stoics are especially known for teaching that "virtue is the only good" for human beings, and those external things—such as health, wealth, and pleasure—are not good nor bad in themselves (adiaphora) but have value as "material for virtue to act upon." Ethics are a part of this view.

Alongside Aristotelian ethics, the Stoic tradition forms one of the major founding approaches to virtue ethics. The Stoics also held that certain destructive emotions resulted from errors of judgment, and they believed people should aim to maintain a will (called prohairesis) that is "in accordance with nature".

Because of this, the Stoics thought the best indication of an individual's philosophy was not what a person said but how a person behaved. To live a good life, one had to understand the rules of the Natural Law. 

Whatever the sages of Stoicism would do is what a human being should do as a right action (katorthoma), which is obedient to the Law of Nature.

To Christianize the Stoic katorthoma, which is a duty of everyman, we must fulfill that duty with fervent charity as opposed to legal charity.

Confusion about stoicism

Stoicism is not supposed to be a religion but a Philosophy but then religion can can contain a philosophy.

Stoicism is meant to help people deal with adverse situations by raising our awareness of how we can lose things in life.

Stoics may have emotions but their emotions should not control them but should be guided by the reason of virtue.

Stoics are not Fatalistic but distinguish between things that are and are not within their control in hope of eliminating unnecessary stress.

The "Stoic Opposition" opposed the tyranny by certain emperors in the 1st-century like Nero and Domitian. The Stoic martyrs Roman Senator Thrasea Paetus, Rubellius Plautus and Barea Soranus were executed by Nero. Cato the Younger led an army against the tyranny of Julius Caesar.

Stoics are willing to encourage minimalism and do not want to fall prey to consumerism but choose to think about spiritual corruption that comes with an emphases on materialism seeing excessive spending never leading to spiritual fulfilment.

Diogenes the Cynic

Diogenes the Cynic or Diogenes of Sinope was the founders of Cynicism and the beginning of stoicism. Diogenes the Cynic or Diogenes of Sinope was born around 404 BC and died at Corinth in 323 BC. Diogenes was a controversial figure. He was allegedly banished, or fled from, Sinope for debasement of currency. He was the son of the mintmaster of Sinope. He would eventually be considered one of the founders of Cynicism. In Corinth he passed his philosophy of Cynicism to Crates, who taught it to Zeno of Citium, who fashioned it into the school of Stoicism.

"He with the most who is content with the least." Diogenes the Cynic

"The foundation of every state is the education of its youth." Diogenes the Cynic

"Blushing is the color of virtue." Diogenes the Cynic

"Dogs and philosophers do the greatest good and get the fewest rewards." Diogenes the Cynic

"I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world." Diogenes the Cynic

"The mob is the mother of tyrants." Diogenes the Cynic

"Poverty is a virtue which one can teach oneself." Diogenes the Cynic

Zeno

Zeno's Republic was opposed to the state-Utopia of Plato's Republic. Zeno as a stoic argued that his Republic could only exist among those who would be faithful to the natural moral law of the individual and "only the virtuous can be regarded as true citizens".

"All the good are friends of one another."

"No loss should be more regrettable to us than losing our time, for it’s irretrievable."

"Extravagance is its own destroyer."

"Man conquers the world by conquering himself."

"Steel your sensibilities, so that life shall hurt you as little as possible."

"Better to trip with the feet than with the tongue"

"A bad feeling is a commotion of the mind repugnant to reason, and against nature."

Marcus Aurelius

Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius (AD 121 to AD 180), cites Epictetus in his Meditations but had a terrible record of persecuting Christians. Bill Clinton is an avid reader of the Meditations of Aurelius

• “The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.”
• “If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.”
• “Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize?”
• “People are not disturbed by things, but by the views they take of them.”
• “Do not indulge in dreams of having what you have not, but reckon up the chief of the blessings you do possess, and then thankfully remember how you would crave for them if they were not yours.”
• “Don’t go on discussing what a good person should be. Just be one.”
• “Remember that very little is needed to make a happy life.”
• "Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth."
• "When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive - to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love."
• "Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking."
• "You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength."
• "The universe is change; our life is what our thoughts make it."
• "Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one."
• "The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts."
• "Death smiles at us all, but all a man can do is smile back."
• "It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live."
• "The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane."
• "Are you ready to do your duty for Rome?"
• "For 25 years, I have conquered, spilt blood, expanded the empire. Since I became Caesar, I have known four years without war, four years of peace in twenty. And for what? I brought the sword. Nothing more."
• "Concentrate on what you have to do. Fix your eyes on it. Remind yourself that your task is to be a good human being; remind yourself what nature demands of people. Then do it, without hesitation, and speak the truth as you see it. But with kindness. With humility. Without hypocrisy."
• "If a man is mistaken, instruct him kindly and show him his error. But if you are not able, blame yourself, or not even yourself."
• "What is your art? To be good."
• "No matter what anyone says or does, my task is to be good."
• "What is your vocation? To be a good person."
• "No longer talk at all about the kind of man that a good man ought to be, but be such."

Epictetus

Epictetus (AD 50—135) was born a slave and lived in Rome until his banishment in AD 93, when the Roman emperor Domitian banished all philosophers from the city.

“Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants.”

“Man is not worried by real problems so much as by his imagined anxieties about real problems.”

“First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.”

“Any person capable of angering you becomes your master; he can anger you only when you permit yourself to be disturbed by him.”

“He who laughs at himself never runs out of things to laugh at.”

“Caretake this moment. Immerse yourself in its particulars. Respond to this person, this challenge, this deed. Quit evasions. Stop giving yourself needless trouble. It is time to really live; to fully inhabit the situation you happen to be in now.”

“A ship should not ride on a single anchor, nor life on a single hope.”

“It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.”

“You become what you give your attention to.”

“No person is free who is not master of himself.”

Seneca

Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger, or Seneca, was a Stoic philosopher of Ancient Rome, a statesman, dramatist, and, in one work, satirist, from the post-Augustan age. Born 4 BC at Córdoba, Spain and died in 65 AD at Rome before the exile in 93 AD. Thomas Jefferson had a copy of Seneca’s Letters on his nightstand when he died.

"If you wished to be loved, love." Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“It’s not because things are difficult that we dare not venture. It’s because we dare not venture that they are difficult.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“Associate with people who are likely to improve you.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“Hang on to your youthful enthusiasms – you’ll be able to use them better when you’re older.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“If a man knows not to which port he sails, no wind is favorable.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“He suffers more than necessary, who suffers before it is necessary.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“To wish to be well is a part of becoming well.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“He who is brave is free.” Lucius Annaeus Seneca

Musoniuis Rufus

Musoniuis Rufus was a stoic philosopher in Rome around the 1st century AD that was exiled from Rome by the Emperor Nero in 65 AD.

"We begin to lose our hesitation to do immoral things when we lose our hesitation to speak of them."

"Humanity must seek what is NOT simple and obvious using the simple and obvious."

"Since every man dies, it is better to die with distinction than to live long."

"Only by exhibiting actions in harmony with the sound words which he has received will anyone be helped by philosophy."

"Thus whoever destroys human marriage destroys the home, the city-the whole human race."

Diogenes Laertius

Diogenes Laertius (3rd century AD) was a biographer for some of the more famous philosophers. He had a controversial reputation among scholars for repeating things and perhaps focusing on the wrong part of certain teachings, but since he wasn't reinterpreting those teachings, his accounts are some of the most reliable we have.

“Now they say that the wise man is passionless [has apatheia], because he is not prone to fall into [passions]. But they add that in another sense the term apatheia is applied to the wretched man, when, that is, it means that he is hard and unrelenting.” Diogenes Laertius

“Again, the good are genuinely in earnest and vigilant for their own improvement, using a manner of life which banishes evil out of sight and makes what good there is in things appear.” Diogenes Laertius

“At the same time they are free from pretense; for they have stripped off all pretense or ‘make-up’ whether in voice or in look.” Diogenes Laertius

“Free too are they from all business cares, declining to do anything which conflicts with duty.” Diogenes Laertius

“They will take wine, but not get drunk. Nay more, they will not be liable to madness either; not but there will at times occur to the good man strange impressions due to melancholy or delirium, ideas not determined by the principle of what is choiceworthy [i.e., healthy] but contrary to nature.” Diogenes Laertius

“Nor indeed will the wise man ever feel emotional suffering; seeing that such suffering is irrational contraction of the soul, as Apollodorus says in his Ethics.” Diogenes Laertius

“They further maintain that parental affection for children is natural to the good, but not to the bad.” Diogenes Laertius

“Also, they maintain, he will marry, as Zeno says in his Republic, and beget children.” Diogenes Laertius

“Moreover, they say that the wise man will never form mere opinions, that is to say, he will never give assent to anything that is false…” Diogenes Laertius

“Moreover, according to them not only are the wise free, they are also kings; kingship being rule unaccountable to others, which none but the wise can maintain: so Chrysippus in his treatise vindicating Zeno’s use of terminology. For he holds that knowledge of good and evil is a necessary attribute of the ruler, and that no bad man is acquainted with this science.” Diogenes Laertius

“Similarly the wise and good alone are fit to be magistrates, judges, or orators, whereas among the bad there is not one so qualified.” Diogenes Laertius

“Furthermore, the wise are infallible, not being liable to error. They are also blameless; for they do no harm to others or to themselves.” Diogenes Laertius

“Further, the wise man is said to be free from arrogance for he is indifferent to the good or bad opinions [of others]. However, he is not alone in this, there being another who is also free from arrogance, he who is ranged among the rash, and that is the wretched man.” Diogenes Laertius

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