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Tuesday, January 30, 2018

6/75: Personal Progress, East And West

     In his sixth letter to Lucilius, Seneca mentions the Stoic notion of progress to his friend:
          "You cannot imagine how much progress I see myself making every day. 'What remedies are these that have done so much for you?' you say. 'Send them to me too!' Indeed, I am longing to shower you with all of them. What gives me pleasure in learning something is that I can teach it. Nothing will ever please me, not even what is remarkably beneficial, if I have learned it for myself only. If wisdom were given to me with this proviso, that I should keep it shut up in myself and never express it to anyone else, I should refuse it: no good is enjoyable to possess without a companion. So I will send you the books themselves; and I will annotate them too, so that you need not expend much effort hunting through them for the profitable bits, but can get right away to the things that I endorse and am impressed with."
     Seneca discusses progress toward wisdom further in Letter 75, noting that there are three categories of persons making progress. Some Stoics say that the first group of progressors have eliminated their mental infirmities but not their emotions. The second type have put aside the worst of the emotions, but have not yet achieved tranquility and are liable to backsliding. The third kind of progressors has gone beyond many serious faults (like greed, lust, and desire) but not all faults (like anger, ambition, and fear). Seneca tells Lucilius that he believes they both have made it, or will make it, into the third species. The Stoic goal is to become a wise person, or sage; such people are not troubled by anxiety, not defiled by pleasure, and fear neither the gods nor death. However, few humans have ever achieved this status (a notable example of a sage, for the ancient Stoics, was the Athenian philosopher Socrates).
   An interesting parallel (at least to me) can be drawn with the Theravada Buddhism of the Pali Canon. According to Bhikkhu Bodhi, the Buddha's disciples can be divided into four classes. The "stream-enterer" has eliminated doubt and certain other fetters. The "once-returner" has not eliminated additional fetters, but has weakened hatred and delusion and lust. The "non-returner" has eliminated lust and ill will. The goal of the Theravada Buddhist is to become an "arahant" who has eliminated the desire for existence -- along with conceit, restlessness, and ignorance -- and will not undergo any future rebirths in any realms.
     Whether or not Seneca believed in reincarnation or immortality is a subject for a future post.
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     Bhikkhu Bodhi, In the Buddha's Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon (Boston,Wisdom Publications, 2005), pages 373-384.
     Seneca, Letters on Ethics to Lucilius, Translated with an Introduction and Commentary by Margaret Graver and A.A. Long (University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 2015), Letter 6, 3-5 , pages 33-34; see also Letter 75, 8-18, pages 237-239. 

Friday, January 19, 2018

4/5: Living According To Nature

     As noted in my 12/30/17 post, in his fourth letter to Lucilius, Seneca quotes Epicurus' maxim that "Poverty is great wealth when it adjusts to nature's law". In Letter 5, Seneca goes on to flesh out his view of the Stoic concept of nature for Lucilius in good-humored (or perhaps sarcastic) fashion:
          "Our aim is to live in accordance with nature, is it not? This is contrary to nature: tormenting one's body, swearing off simple matters of grooming, affecting a squalid appearance, partaking of foods that are not merely inexpensive but rancid and coarse. A hankering after delicacies is a sign of self-indulgence; by the same token, avoidance of those comforts that are quite ordinary and easy to obtain is an indication of insanity. Philosophy demands self-restraint, not self-abnegation -- and even self-restraint can comb its hair. The limit I suggest is this: our habits should mingle the ideal with the ordinary in due proportion, our way of life should be one that everyone can admire without finding it unrecognizable."
     Here Seneca seems to be making an argument in favor of moderation ("... our habits should mingle the ideal with the ordinary in due proportion ...") which is the founding principle of this blog. The passage also brings to mind Aristotle's doctrine of the mean, discussed in my post of  10/19/17. As readers may recall, in Book II of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle defined virtues as the mean between excess and deficiency. Regarding temperance, for example, he said it was destroyed by excess (licentiousness) and deficiency (insensibility) but preserved by the mean.
     In closing, it is worth noting that Seneca authored a separate treatise called "Natural Questions" -- also included in the University of Chicago's recent series of translations of his complete works into English -- which I hope to read some day.
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     Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics (Penguin Classics, London, 2004; original translation by Thomson, revised by Tredennick, introduction by Barnes), Book II, page 34, pages 40-49; see also Appendix 1.
     Seneca, Letters on Ethics to Lucilius, Translated with an Introduction and Commentary by Margaret Graver and A.A. Long (University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 2015), Letter 5, 4-5, page 32. 





Monday, January 8, 2018

3: Seneca Was SO Judgmental

     Many of Seneca's letters to Lucilius discuss friendship. For instance, in Letter 3, Seneca expresses his concern to Lucilius that the latter has made friends with a person who he did not trust completely. However, according to Seneca:
          "Consider every question with a friend; but first, consider the friend. After you make a friend, you should trust him -- but before you make a friend, you should make a judgment. People who love someone and then judge that person are mixing up their responsibilities: they should judge first, then love, as Theophrastus advised. Take time to consider whether or not to receive a person into your friendship; but once you have decided to do so, receive him with all your heart, and speak with him as candidly as with yourself."
     Rightly or wrongly, judging another person -- the quality of being judgmental -- is no longer favored in the modern West. To cite but one example, consider the North American fitness chain that advertises itself as a "judgement-free zone" and informs potential members that "the world judges; we don't." However, I think there may be a mean between Seneca's "judge first" policy and the "never judge" motto of the fitness chain. 
     The Stoic thinker Epictetus was born about 10 years before Seneca's death in 65 AD/CE. Epictetus, who was a slave before he became a teacher of philosophy, expressed a more flexible view of the faculty of judgment in his Discourses:
          "The raw material of the good man is his mind -- his goal being to respond to impressions the way nature intended. As a general rule, nature designed the mind to assent to what is true, dissent from what is false[,] and suspend judgement in doubtful cases."
     Following Epictetus, I would argue that the better course is to give a potential friend the benefit of the doubt -- that is, to suspend judgment -- until all the evidence is in, before admitting him or her into your friendship, rather than making what might be a hasty decision about such an important matter.
     In closing, and before I forget, Happy New Year!
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References:  
     Epictetus, Discourses and Selected Writings, translated and edited by Robert Dobbin (Penguin Classics, London, 2008), Discourses, Book III, 1-2, page 146.
     Seneca, Letters on Ethics to Lucilius, Translated with an Introduction and Commentary by Margaret Graver and A.A. Long (University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 2015), Letter 3, 2, page 28. 

Procrastination

     I want to begin by apologizing for the time that has elapsed since my last post; sadly, I have been guilty of procrastination. Like mos...