Is philosophy helpful when tragedy strikes?

Recently, a friend of a close friend of mine committed suicide. His partner is, understandably, distraught. My friend called me up asking if I had written anything philosophical that could be of consolation. I replied that yes, I had, but it would only help if the person in question had adopted a philosophical outlook on life. She had not.

This episode disturbed me, at two levels. At an immediate one, I would have liked to be helpful to my friend’s friend, a fellow human being in distress. At a broader level, I like to think that philosophy is useful in life, both when good things happen, and when tragedy strikes. In this case, it clearly wasn’t.

But I should not have been surprised. Imagine you are suddenly attacked in the street. Knowledge of martial arts may help, but the moment of the attack is not the time to begin studying Judo. In fact, Marcus Aurelius said that life is more like wrestling than dancing (Meditation VII.61), because we always need to be on guard, as if we had a constant sparring partner who can attack and test us at any moment. If we are not prepared for our opponent to strike, he will easily get the better of us. Seneca is even more explicit:

“Everyone approaches courageously a danger which he has prepared himself to meet long before, and withstands even hardships if he has previously practiced how to meet them. But, contrariwise, the unprepared are panic-stricken even at the most trifling things. We must see to it that nothing shall come upon us unforeseen.” (Letters to Lucilius, CVII.3)

That is why Stoicism, Buddhism, and every other philosophy of life or religion need to be not just understood at a theoretical level, but practiced on a daily basis. Even then, philosophy can only soften the blows, unless one is a sage, or has achieved enlightenment. But softening the blows it does, in a variety of ways.

Perhaps the most famous example is Boetius’ The Consolation of Philosophy. Boetius was a successful statesman at the court of the Ostrogothic King Theodoric the Great. Until things went south…