If I were a nightingale, I would perform the work of a nightingale, and if I were a swan, that of a swan. But as it is, I am a rational being, and I must sing the praise of God. This is my work, and I accomplish it, and I will never abandon my post for as long as it is granted to me to remain in it; and I invite all of you to join me in this same song. (Discourses 1.16.20-21)
Epictetus is typically considered the most religious of the Roman Stoics. As such, some attempt to portray him as an outlier among the Stoics. However, as A.A. Long points out,
In his conception of divine providence, creativity, and rationality, Epictetus is completely in line with the general Stoic tradition. His distinctiveness, in what I have discussed so far, extends mainly to the enthusiasm with which he commends obedience to God and to the warmth he infuses in his expressions of God's concern for human beings.[1]
We find this same “notable religious sensibility” in the philosophy of Seneca, Musonius Rufus, and Marcus Aurelius,[2] and, as A.A. Long further notes, it is “broadly in line with traditional Stoicism.”[3] To a large degree, these religious sentiments result from the inherent “structural resemblance” between the rationality of humans and that of the divine logos, which allows for a “certain degree of personalistic theism in thinking and speaking about god”[4] in Stoicism. We see this language used frequently by Epictetus.
Likewise, over the history of the Stoa, God will “assume more and more spiritual and personal traits” and “religiousness will tend to permeate” Stoicism and move it toward theism without fully arriving there.[5] Nevertheless, it is essential to balance the religious sentiments of Epictetus with the realization that he never claimed nor adhered to any form of divine revelation; neither did he express a need for religious faith, in the forms those concepts are commonly understood today. For Epictetus, to follow God means “we should pay attention to the God in us, i.e. to our reason, in order to determine what is the right thing for us, namely how we are to live in accordance with nature.”[6] As Andrew Mason, Teaching Fellow at the University of Edinburgh, points out in the introduction of a beautiful little volume on The Philosophy of Epictetus:
Talk of God’s seeing, helping, guiding, speaking to and punishing us, and of God as our father, can be explained in terms either of God’s overall providence, or of our inner god or daemon, our reason, which is a fragment of the cosmic deity. Likewise prayer, for Epictetus, is not an appeal for intervention by an external God, but rather an admonition to oneself. Epictetus does differ from the early Stoics in the extent to which he uses personalistic language about God; this may be explained partly by his personal outlook, but also by the purpose of the Discourses, in the context of which God’s providence and his status as an ethical example are more important than the cosmological aspects of him which played an important part in early Stoicism.[7]
A.A. Long sums up the difference between Epictetus and his predecessors in the Stoa by arguing he “proceeds from rather than to God.”[8] He points out, “Epictetus’ favourite formula for the goal of human life is ‘to follow the gods’ (Discourses1.12.5; 1.30.4; 4.7.20).”[9] The earlier Stoics used oikeiosis as the starting point to explain Stoic ethical theory; they taught theology last. Epictetus reversed that approach and made theology the starting point of ethics. Epictetus builds his ethical theory and practice on what Long calls THEONOMIC FOUNDATIONS.[10]
Epictetus argues we are born with an innate moral sense (preconception) of the good and the divine.[11] Because each of us possesses a fragment of divine Reason (logos) as our guiding principle, we are innately capable of understanding and living according to the laws of God that are written in Nature. Thus, Epictetus’ instruction to ‘follow God’ is equivalent to ‘living according to nature’ (1.26.1). Nevertheless, Epictetus is not unique in this approach; as Plutarch noted, Chrysippus always put theology first when discussing ethical matters.[12] Here we see why the Stoic conception of Nature, derived from the study of physics and theology, is essential to understanding this holistic philosophical system. Both oikeiosis and theology fall under the topic of physics in Stoicism. Thus, whether the Stoics began with oikeiosis or theology, they grounded their ethical theory in physics—the study of nature.
The Stoics did not conceive of God as a transcendent being; the Stoic divinity is immanent. As such, a fragment of the same logos that providentially orders the cosmos resides in us as our guiding principle (hegemonikon). A.A. Long suggests,
The Stoics’ deepest religious intuitions are founded on their doctrine that the human mind, in all its functions – reflecting, sensing, desiring, and initiating action – is part and partner of God.[13]
In his book dedicated to the application of Epictetus’ teachings to a philosophical life, A.A. Long writes,
Whether [Epictetus] speaks of Zeus or God or Nature or the gods, he is completely committed to the belief that the world is providentially organized by a divine power whose creative agency reaches its highest manifestation in human beings.
That was orthodox Stoicism, and much else that Epictetus attributes to divinity is quite traditional. However, no theology is simply a matter of doctrine. Conceptions of the divine are indicated in numerous ways that go beyond such epithets as eternal, creative, providential, and beneficent, on all of which the Stoics were agreed. Awe, reverence, gratitude, joy, prayer, obedience-these are a sample of attitudes that a serious belief in a supreme divinity typically involves. Stoic philosophers, just like other believers, vary considerably over which of these attitudes they express and with what degree of emotional engagement.
When we review Epictetus from this perspective, his theology emerges as most distinctive in two respects: first, its serving as the explicit foundation for his moral psychology, and, secondly, its warmly and urgently personalist tone. More emphatically than any other Stoic in our record, Epictetus speaks of Zeus or God in terms that treat the world's divine principle as a person to whom one is actually present and who is equally present to oneself as an integral aspect of one's mind.[14]
A word of caution is appropriate here. We must use due caution when approaching Stoicism with our modern conceptions of God, religion, and piety. If we fail to check our preconceived notions and biases, we are likely to misinterpret and misunderstand the Stoics by “falling victim to either over-assimilation or excessive differentiation.”[15] We moderns commit a serious error when we attempt to position the Stoics at either end of the modern metaphysical spectrum. The Stoics were neither theists nor atheists in the modern sense. Stoicism is a rational form of spirituality that arrived at a conception of divinity through reason rather than revelation. Therefore, the Stoic concept of a divine, providentially ordered cosmos resides in the open space between theism and atheism. Many scholars apply the label of pantheism to Stoic theology. However, it is clear a thread of theism was present from the founding of the Stoa, and this blend of pantheism and theism is expressed differently by various ancient Stoics.
Nevertheless, as we will see, the Stoics, in general, and Epictetus, in particular, considered their worldview essential to their philosophical system. The difference in worldview—the nature of the cosmos and the nature of human beings—was one of the primary differentiators among the Stoics, Epicureans, Cynics, and Sceptics during the Hellenistic period. They all agreed that eudaimonia (a good flow) was the summum bonum of human life. Likewise, they all agreed an excellent character (virtue) was essential. The Cynics even agreed with the Stoics that virtue is both necessary and sufficient for eudaimonia. It was primarily their divergent worldviews, which subsequently affected their other doctrines and differentiated these philosophical schools. A.A. Long argues,
The choice of Stoicism over Epicureanism, its principal rival, was decisive not only for one's ethical values and priorities but also for one's understanding of the world's general structure, one's theology, and the importance to be attached to systematic reasoning and the study of language. Yet, however much these and other schools disagreed over their accounts of such things, they all shared the view that philosophy should provide its adepts with the foundation for the best possible human life-that is to say, a happiness that would be lasting and serene. At Epictetus' date (and in fact, from long before) philosophy in general was taken to be a medicine for alleviating the errors and passions that stem from purely reactive and conventional attitudes. To put it another way, the choice of Stoicism over another philosophy depended not on its promise to deliver an admirable and thoroughly satisfying life (that project would not distinguish it from rival schools) but on its detailed specification of that life and on the appeal of its claims about the nature of the world and human beings.[16]
Modern Stoic popularizers are simply wrong when they argue that physics and theology are not essential to the Stoic philosophical system. There is no support for such an assertion in the surviving texts or credible scholarship. One can abandon those aspects of Stoicism in modern times, as Lawrence Becker did, and attempt to create something entirely new for atheists and agnostics who reject the Stoic worldview.[17] Becker understood he was creating an entirely new synthesis of Stoicism; that’s why he called it “A New Stoicism.”
Nevertheless,
