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The Theodorians

The following is part of a book review of Cyreniacs Handbook: Handbook of Source Material for Cyrenaic Philosophy.

Theodorus the Atheist was discussed in a previous series of essays about the Cyrenaics. Like the other thinkers who were highlighted, he also founded a sect that bore his name. According to the Handbook,

Theodore was the founder of that branch of the Cyrenaic sect which was called after him “Theodorei”, “Theodoreans.” The general characteristics of the Cyrenaic philosophy are described elsewhere. The opinions of Theodore, as we gather them from the perplexed statement of Diogenes Laertius (ii. 98) partook of the lax character of the Cyrenaic school.

He taught that the great end of human life is to obtain joy and avoid grief, the one the fruit of prudence, the other of folly; that prudence and justice are good, their opposites evil; that pleasure and pain are indifferent. He made light of friendship and patriotism, and affirmed that the world was his country. He taught that there was nothing really disgraceful in theft, adultery, or sacrilege; but that they were branded only by public opinion, which had been formed in order to restrain fools … The wise man would indulge his passions openly without the least regard to circumstances.

But the great charge against him was atheism. “He did away with all opinions respecting the Gods,” says Laertius, but some critics doubt whether he was absolutely an atheist, or simply denied the existence of the deities of popular belief. The charge of atheism is sustained by the popular designation of Theodoras ”Atheus,” by the authority of Cicero (de Nat. Deor. i. 1), Laertius, Plutarch (De Placit. Philos. i. 7), Sextus Empiricus (Pyrrhon. Hypotyp. lib. iii.), and some of the Christian Fathers; while some other authorities speak of him as only rejecting the popular theology. Theodore wrote a book “Concerning God”, De Diis, which Laertius–who had seen it–says (ii. 97) was not to be disdained; and he adds that it was said to have been the source of many of the statements or arguments of Epicurus. According to Suidas he wrote many works both on the doctrines of his sect and on other subjects.

Elsewhere, it says:

Theodorus considered joy and grief to be the supreme good and evil, the one brought about by wisdom, the other by folly. Wisdom and justice he called goods, and their opposites evils, pleasure and pain being intermediate to good and evil. Friendship he rejected because it did not exist between the unwise nor between the wise; with the former, when the want is removed, the friendship disappears, whereas the wise are self-sufficient and have no need of friends.

Notice the statement on how Laertius held Theodorus’ book on divinity in high esteem, and considered it to be the source for “many of the arguments” we find in the Epicurean theories on theology and piety. Now, let’s consider this in light of what we know of Epicurean theology, as attested in Principal Doctrine 1 and Philodemus’ scroll On Piety. PD1 states:

A happy and eternal being has no trouble himself and brings no trouble upon any other being; hence he is exempt from movements of anger and partiality, for every such movement implies weakness.

The Monadnock translation says:

That which is blissful and immortal has no troubles itself, nor does it cause trouble for others, so that it is not affected by anger or gratitude (for all such things come about through weakness).

The pattern that immediately becomes evident here is that, just as Theodorus used to teach his philosophy in terms of pairs of opposites (joy/grief, prudence/folly, etc.), we see here a focus on “anger and partiality / gratitude“. Scholars have pointed out that this has to do with the gods’ autarchy (self-sufficiency): they do not need anything from anyone, ergo they are not of the constitution that would experience anger or gratitude, as no creature may harm or benefit them. We know from Lampe’s book that autarchy was one of the cardinal virtues of Theodorus, so this fits his profile, particularly if the gods are to be seen as ethical guides.

Also notice that these aspects of the theology do not touch on the physics. Unlike Epicurus, Theodorus was not of the lineage of Democritus and may not have come up with a physical theory of gods as super-evolved animals with bodies made of particles, as we see in Epicurean theology. This indicates that his ideas in the work On the Gods cited by Laertius (which seem to have influenced Epicurus) may have focused, instead, on the ethical aspects of the gods. Hence the two key attributes that Epicurus considers taboo to ascribe to deities in his Epistle to Menoeceus:

Do not ascribe to god anything that is inconsistent with immortality and blissfulness; instead, believe about god everything that can support immortality and blissfulness.

Some translations use the word happiness (that is: always abiding in pleasure, which fits the ethical ideal of hedonism), and indestructible (which fits the definition of a god). In the case of the gods’ immortality, Epicurus may have developed this theory by linking it to his atomist physics.

Like Epicurus, Theodorus seems to not have been a real atheist (in spite of his epithet “Theodorus the Atheist”). He seems to have rejected the vulgar and popular beliefs about the gods, as Epicurus did, and for that reason they were both misbranded atheists. Diogenes Laertius, in Life of Aristippus (2.97-104), says:

The Theodoreans derived their name from Theodorus, who has already been mentioned, and adopted his doctrines. Theodorus was a man who utterly rejected the current belief in the gods. And I have come across a book of his entitled Of the Gods which is not contemptible. From that book, they say, Epicurus borrowed most of what he wrote on the subject.

Here, we see that Anniceris is not the only proto-Epicurean in the Cyrenaic lineage. The Handbook has this to say of Theodorus, which could have easily been attributed to Epicurus, as it is consistent with his instruction that one should philosophize not for Greece, but for oneself:

It was reasonable, as he thought, for the good man not to risk his life in the defense of his country, for he would never throw wisdom away to benefit the unwise.

Elsewhere, the Handbook says of Theodorus:

He said the world was his country.

These teachings are identical to the Epicurean conception of cosmopolitanism, which is sustained by an anarchic spirit that choose nature over culture, true friends over imaginary or Platonic communities.

Further Reading:
Cyreniacs Handbook: Handbook of Source Material for Cyrenaic Philosophy

Dialogues on the Epicurean Gods

The Annicerians

The following is part of a book review of Cyreniacs Handbook: Handbook of Source Material for Cyrenaic Philosophy.

In my most recent Twentieth message, I argue for the possibility of an Afro-Greek intellectual ferment happening around Cyrene, which may have influenced pleasure philosophy. While studying Lampe’s book on the Cyrenaics, we learned that the philosophical lineage and tradition that Aristippus began there was very diverse, and that many of his disciples branched off into their own sects. However, since much of the philosophizing that took place there involved the celebration of Pleasure as our guide, Cyrene has been often neglected among students of philosophy, and for this reason Michel Onfray calls the city of Cyrene a philosophical Atlantis whose buried treasures we should rediscover.

Anniceris was a disciple of Aristippus, who is credited with inventing pleasure ethics, and he and his sect are considered Cyrenaic, but he was not an acritical follower. He was a reformer of Cyrenaic doctrine who established his own sect. He invented the idea of the hedonic calculus (which Epicurus appropriated and developed further by adding the hierarchy of desires). Anniceris has been called a proto-Epicurean. More on his doctrine can be found here.

Anniceris is supposed to have reformed the Cyrenaic sect, and to have introduced in its stead the Annicerian sect. – Strabo

One passage in the Cyrenaic Handbook says that Anniceris “became an Epicurean despite being an acquaintance of Paraebatus, the student of Aristippus“. According to his biography, he lived at the same time as Alexander the Great, which means that it is chronologically possible that he may have met Epicurus or some of the early Epicureans and converted to the new doctrine. However, since Anniceris is not mentioned as a prominent disciple in any of the extant Epicurean sources, this may be speculation, and we may treat the Annicerians as a pre-Epicurean sect. The Handbook says:

Anniceris had a brother by the name of Nicoteles, also a philosopher, and his student was the famous Posidonius. The sect called Annicerean originates from him. He lived at the time of Alexander the Great, he believed that friendship and patriotism were good in themselves and so seems to have created a sect that was halfway between Epicurean and Cyrenaic.

Among his sayings and teachings, we find many ideas that would later be elaborated on by the Epicureans, including the importance of cultivating healthy habits and dispositions, and the importance of friendship:

Instruction is not sufficient in itself to inspire us with confidence and to make us rise superior to the opinion of the multitude. Habits must be formed because of the bad disposition which has grown up in us from the first.

A friend should be cherished not merely for his utility – for, if that fails, we should then no longer associate with him – but for the good feeling for the sake of which we shall even endure hardships.

Clement of Alexandria had this to say of the Annicerians:

And those called Annicereans, of the Cyrenaic succession, laid down no definite end for the whole of life; but said that to each action belonged, as its proper end, the pleasure accruing from the action. These Cyrenaics reject Epicurus’ definition of pleasure, that is the removal of pain, calling that the condition of a dead man; because we rejoice not only on account of pleasures, but companionships and distinctions; while Epicurus thinks that all joy of the soul arises from previous sensations of the flesh.

It seems from this passage that the Annicerians focused on “the pleasures” rather than Pleasure. I have noted before that the use of plurals rather than singular nouns to refer to things is one technique that may be used by materialist philosophers to speak in clear and concrete language, rather than in abstract language. In A Few Days in Athens, this technique is used in the passage: “Zeno has his eyes on man; Epicurus has his eyes on men“–the idea here being that “man” is a Platonized, idealized abstraction while “men” are real, physical people. Ergo, Epicurus is more personal, and his philosophy is more humanized and reality-based.

Further Reading:

Cyreniacs Handbook: Handbook of Source Material for Cyrenaic Philosophy

The Birth of Hedonism: The Cyrenaic Philosophers and Pleasure as a Way of Life, by Kurt Lampe

Hegesias and Anniceris

Making Sense of Epicurean Friendship: An Intended Audience Approach

The Cyrenaics

The following is a book review of Cyreniacs Handbook: Handbook of Source Material for Cyrenaic Philosophy.

The Cyreniacs Handbook is a compilation of all that can be found in the available ancient sources about the Cyrenaics. The ideas are not explained or systematically explored. For that, I would enthusiastically recommend The Birth of Hedonism: The Cyrenaic Philosophers and Pleasure as a Way of Life, by Kurt Lampe (book review here). Since the ideas of the Cyrenaic School have been explored in my review of Lampe’s book, I will revisit some of the additional ideas I found of interest here.

The Cyrenaic School was founded by Aristippus of Cyrene. Lucian’s Sale of Creeds summarizes Aristippus’ doctrine this way: “Think the worst of things, make the most of things, get all possible pleasure out of things“.

Adaptability

He was able to adapt himself in both time and place. He enjoyed pleasure, but did not toil after more than what he had. His sayings were the best. Diogenes called him “the King’s Dog”. – Suda

In a previous discussion of the Cyrenaics, and again in the recent exploration of Philodemus’ method of studying and cultivating the virtues, I mentioned that Aristippus was known for the virtue of adaptability, and that he took pride in exacting enjoyment from all circumstances and being in control in adversity and prosperity. The Handbook explores this a bit further, saying (in page 16) that Aristippus could always turn a situation favorable, and that he got pleasure from what was present and didn’t toil to procure something not present. While many other philosophers (even in his own tradition) have a history of turning cynical and misanthropic, Aristippus said that his philosophy gave him the ability to feel at ease in any society (page 19), which is part of how this virtue of adaptability served him to live pleasantly.

Many of the Epicureans of later generations drew inspiration from Aristippus and were proud to see him as their precursor. This passage from Lucretius paraphrases Aristippus’ adaptability doctrine:

You yearned for what was not,
scorned what is.
Life slipped through your fingers shapeless and unlovely.

In Horace’s Epistle 1.1.1-19 we read:

I slip back privately to Aristippus precepts, trying to bend world to self and not self to world.

Here, we find that Horace (and Aristippus) flip the Stoic paradigm of control upside-down, inviting us to bend the world to ourselves, to use our freedom and creativity to creatively shape our environment and our reality in our favor, rather than allowing externals to control us and force us to change ourselves.

Is There a Neutral State of Sentience?

One of the sources mentioned in the Hand book discusses one of the controversies between the Cyrenaics and the Epicureans.

Among his other hearers was his own daughter Arete, who having borne a son named him Aristippus, and he from having been introduced by her to philosophical studies was called his mother’s pupil. He quite plainly defined the end to be the life of pleasure, ranking as pleasure that which lies in motion. For he said that there are three states affecting our temperament: one, in which we feel pain, like a storm at sea; another, in which we feel pleasure, that may be likened to a gentle undulation, for pleasure is a gentle movement, comparable to a favourable breeze; and the third is an intermediate state, in which we feel neither pain nor pleasure, which is similar to a calm. So of the feelings only, he said, we have the sensation. – Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 14.18

The first Epicureans argued against the existence of this third, intermediate state, and argued that all the experiences of the sentient being are either pleasant or painful.

Thinking about the past and the future

Tsouna argues (page 82 of The Ethics of Philodemus)  that we should think rightly concerning past and future, rather than not think of them at all. In our discussion of Philodemus’ critique of maximalism, we learned that

people who look to a long life or to the future in order to pursue new goods constantly are never able to achieve and enjoy the greatest pleasure because they are never content or satisfied. Furthermore, they think that happiness means a greater number of accumulated pleasures.

These teachings also go back to Aristippus, who recommended the practice of “presentism” to his disciples in order to help them squeeze pleasure out of their immediacy. He taught that never being anxious about the past or future is a sign of a constant, clear spirit. He also posited a type of dichotomy of control based on the present moment, and said that we should “care for only the present, for only that is in our power“. He judged of all good by the present alone, saying that the past is no longer, and the future is uncertain.

This is an interesting way of thinking about pleasure as it relates to time. In seeking to contrast this to what the Epicurean founders would have to say, I found PD 9:

If every pleasure were condensed and were present at the same time and in the whole of one’s nature or its primary parts, then the pleasures would never differ from one another. – Epicurean Principal Doctrine 9

Another translation says:

If all pleasure had been capable of accumulation … not only in recurrences in time, but all over the frame or, at any rate, over the principal parts of human nature, there would never have been any difference between one pleasure and another, as in fact there is.

The Epicurean focus (as usual) seems to be on the limits that nature places on our pleasures, and is (as in Aristippus) empirical: we SEE and FEEL that the pleasures are experienced as diverse, and we SEE and FEEL that they vary and have their limits in time, bodily or mental location, and intensity. Once available, there no need to intensify these pleasures, only to enjoy them. The anxiety that leads to constant intensification of pleasures and to seeking thrills, reflects ungratefulness of the creature towards nature, and is also based on a flawed understanding of nature.

Principal Doctrine 20 ties this to Aristippus’ presentism by reminding us that the flesh is not able to apprehend these natural limits, but the mind is. It is therefore up to the mind to clearly understand the natural limits of pleasure, and to secure the pleasant life by remaining in a contented disposition.

Further Reading:

Cyreniacs Handbook: Handbook of Source Material for Cyrenaic Philosophy

The Birth of Hedonism: The Cyrenaic Philosophers and Pleasure as a Way of Life

Cyrenaic Reasonings

Two great intellectual currents converged to create the great river of Epicurean philosophy. The first one is the atomist school founded by Leucippus and Democritus, the laughing philosopher, which concerned itself with the need for scientific and empirical certainly about the nature of things. This evolved into Epicurean physics. The second one was the Cyrenaic school of hedonism, which is the first Greek philosophy that posited that pleasure was the aim of life. This evolved into Epicurean ethics.

This blog series explores the threads that run through the Cyrenaic Schools and that make their way into the Epicurean one based on the highly-recommended book The Birth of Hedonism: The Cyrenaic Philosophers and Pleasure as a Way of Life, by Kurt Lampe.

I: Aristippus the Older and Aristippus the Younger
II: Hegesias and Anniceris
III: Theodorus the Godless
IV: Walter Pater’s Neo-Cyrenaic Philosophy
V: an Aesthetic Education

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