Appropriations of Stoicism; or, the Place(s) of Ethics in Philosophy

Recent discussions in real life, and in several corners of the internet, have got me thinking about the seemingly quite widespread appeal of Stoic philosophy as a “plug and play” system: the way in which the ethical or practical bits of the ancient Stoics are so often taken as if they can stand alone, apart from wider systematic concerns. As one blogger recently relates, this sort of modular Stoicism is something you can learn in a weekend.

On the one hand, this is certainly true, nor is it an entirely new phenomenon. Roughly 1,500 years ago, the Platonist philosopher Simplicius was using Epictetus’ Handbook as an introductory text for his students. The subsequent centuries have seen elements of Stoic ethics taken up enthusiastically by Christians and other atheists who by would no means be willing to adopt traditional Stoic views in physics and theology.

Stoic Piety

In book XII of his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius writes:

People ask, ‘Have you ever seen the Gods you worship? How can you be sure they exist?’

Answers:
i. Just look around you.
ii. I’ve never seen my soul either. And yet I revere it.

That’s how I know the Gods exist and why I revere them — from having felt their power, over and over.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 12.28 (trans. Hays)

There are at least two noteworthy things here. First, and most apparently, we see the deep and genuine piety of this Stoic thinker and ruler of the known world, expressed eloquently and movingly. Put this passage alongside others from the Meditations, including the beautiful words of thanks in book I, and we see beyond a shadow of a doubt that for Marcus, the Gods are real, powerful, active presences in his life.

Second, and more subtly, in the analogy to the human soul, we see the Stoic doctrine of the subtle fire which animates all of the more gross matter in the cosmos. On this view, the human soul is supposed to be sure a fire, permeating the body, giving it vitality and motion. When that fire goes out, the body is dead, meaning that it is no longer self-maintaining, no longer an organic unity. Likewise, at the level of the cosmos as a whole, it is the creative fire of divine intellect—so frequently identified by the Stoic philosophers with Zeus himself—which animates and brings to perfection the entire order of the universe, which is likewise a perfect unity. Marcus’ answers, then, are not mere arbitrary comparisons, for which others might just as well be substituted, but are rooted in a core doctrine of Stoic metaphysics.

It’s not my preferred mode of doing metaphysics. I tend toward a bit more transcendence, and I’m less eager to shoehorn all of what’s real into what’s material. Nonetheless, I can appreciate both the general Stoic approach, and the way in which that approach can ground a deep and genuine piety.