Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-5wvtr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-16T18:38:39.581Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 7 - The Stoa

from Part 1 - GREEK PHILOSOPHY FROM PLATO TO PLOTINUS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

Edited by
A. H. Armstrong
Get access

Summary

General

The significance of some doctrines of Posidonius and of Seneca for the development of Neoplatonism has been indicated. But these doctrines concern only details, and the problem remains to what extent Stoicism at large contributed to Neoplatonism.

The Stoic system can be interpreted in two ways. We see in it either a ‘mundanization’ and a materialization of the divine, or, on the contrary, a divinization and spiritualization of matter. Nothing exhibits this ambiguity better than the relation between determinism (heimarmenê) and providence (pronoia) in the Stoic system. Strict determinism seems to leave no place for providence in any genuine sense of the word. But the Stoa tried to identify the two. The same ambiguity is exhibited in one of the central concepts of the Stoa, the spermatic ratio (pattern). The adjective has materialistic connotations, the noun spiritualistic ones. The strict immanentism of the Stoa can be taken to assert either the divine character of the cosmos or the strictly mundane character of the divine.

Like all monistic and deterministic systems which at the same time profess some kind of prescriptive ethics, Stoicism must try to find some place for freedom of the will (mostly, the formula will be accepted that we are free, because we can do whatever we want, but determined, because we must want what we want), some meaningful discrimination between good and evil, some possibility of distinguishing between ‘is’ and ‘ought’. Whether any of this can be done is doubtful..

Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy , pp. 124 - 132
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1967

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Albinus, ed. Hermann, C. F. in Platonis Dialogi, 6 vols. Leipzig, 1921–36; vol. VI.Google Scholar
Albinus, Épitomé, ed. Louis, P.. Paris, 1945.Google Scholar
,Alexander of Aphrodisias Commentaries on Aristotle, in Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca, I–III. Berlin, 1891–9. Minor Works, ed. Bruns, I., in Supplementum Aristotelicum, II, 1–2. Berlin, 1887, 1892.
Anonymous Commentary on the Theaetetus ed. Diels, H. and Schubart, W.. Berlin, 1905.Google Scholar
Antiochus, Fragments, ed. Luck, G. in Der Akademiker Antiochus. Bern, 1953.
Apuleius, De Philosophia libri, ed. Thomas, P.. Leipzig, 1908.Google Scholar
,AristoclesFragments, ed. Heiland, H., Aristoclis Messenii reliquiae.Giessen, 1925.
Armstrong, A. H., The Architecture of the Intelligible Universe in the Philosophy of Plotinus [1940], p. 105.
Atticus, Fragments, in Eusebius, Praeparatio evangelica XI 1–2; XV 4–12; ed. Baudry, J.. Paris, 1931.Google Scholar
Baeumker, C.Das Problem der Materie in der griechischen Philosophie.Munich, 1890 (reprinted Frankfurt, 1963).Google Scholar
Becker, O., Plotin und das Problem der geistigen Aneignung [1940], p. 93;
Jaeger, W., Nemesius of Emesa (1914)
Jaeger, W.Nemesios von Emesa.Berlin, 1914.Google Scholar
Krämer, H. J.Der Ursprung der Geistmetaphysik.Amsterdam, 1964.Google Scholar
Merlan, P.From Platonism to Neoplatonism, 2nd edn. The Hague, 1960.Google Scholar
Merlan, P.Monopsychism, Mysticism, Metaconsciousness.The Hague, 1963.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nicomachus, Introductio arithmetica, ed. Hoche, R.. Leipzig, 1866.Google Scholar
Numenius, Fragments, ed. Leemans, E. A.. Brussels, 1937.Google Scholar
,PanaetiusFragments, ed. Straaten, M., 3rd edn. Leyden, 1962.Google Scholar
,PeripateticsFragments, ed. Wehrli, F. (Die Schule des Aristoteles), 10 vols. Basel, 1944–59.
Plutarch, Moralia, ed. Hubert, C., Pohlenz, M., etc.: in progress. Leipzig, 1952–.Google Scholar
Plutarch, Moralia, ed. Bernardakis, G. N., 7 vols. Leipzig, 1888–96.Google Scholar
Plutarch, Moralia, ed. and tr. Babbitt, F. C., etc. (Loeb Classical Library): in progress. London, 1927–.Google Scholar
Pohlenz, M.Die Stoa, 2 vols., 3rd edn. Göttingen, 1964.Google Scholar
,PosidoniusFragments, ed. Bake, I.. Posidonii Rhodii reliquiae.Leyden, 1820.
,Pseudo-Aristotlede mundo ed. and tr. Furley, D. J. (Loeb Classical Library). London, 1955.Google Scholar
Reinhardt, K. ‘Poseidonios’, in Paulys Realencyclopädie, 22.1 (1953).Google Scholar
Robin, L.La théorie platonicienne des idées et des nombres d'après Aristote.Paris, 1908 (reprinted Hildesheim, 1963).Google Scholar
Sambursky, S., Physics of the Stoics (1959), p. 7.
Schmekel, A.Philosophic der mittleren Stoa.Berlin, 1892.Google Scholar
Speusippus, Fragments, ed. Lang, P. in De Speusippi Academici scriptis. Bonn, 1911 (reprinted Frankfurt, 1964).
Strohm, H., ‘Studien zur Schrift von der Welt’, Museum Helveticum, IX (1952) –75 (strongly stressing the Platonic elements);Google Scholar
,the older stoaStoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, ed. Arnim, J., 4 vols. Leipzig, 1903–24.Google Scholar
Theiler, W. ‘Plotin und die an tike Philosophie’, in Museum Helveticum, 1 (1944).Google Scholar
Theiler, W.Die Vorbereitung des Neuplatonismus.Berlin, 1930.Google Scholar
Theophrastus, Metaphysics, ed. and tr. Ross, W. D. and Fobes, F. H.. Oxford, 1929.Google Scholar
Waszink, J. H., Timaeus a Calcidio translatus (1962);
Xenocrates, Fragments, ed. Heinze, R.. Leipzig, 1892.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • The Stoa
  • Edited by A. H. Armstrong
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy
  • Online publication: 28 March 2008
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521040549.008
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • The Stoa
  • Edited by A. H. Armstrong
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy
  • Online publication: 28 March 2008
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521040549.008
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • The Stoa
  • Edited by A. H. Armstrong
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy
  • Online publication: 28 March 2008
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521040549.008
Available formats
×