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The Lucan trilogy: 3 — Stoic politics from Zeno to Seneca
Should we be politically active or withdraw into our personal and family life? This is a fundamental question that we all face, implicitly or explicitly, throughout our lives. Stoicism is often accused of being a self-centered philosophy, with little regard for social and political activism. Which is somewhat bizarre, given that the Stoics were explicitly cosmopolitans, and given the many examples of politically involved Stoics, from Gaius Blossius to Cato the Younger, from Seneca to Marcus Aurelius.
In truth, the Stoics struggled from the beginning to define what should their attitude be toward socio-political involvement. Indeed, they disagreed significantly among themselves, evidence that Stoicism was not a monolithic philosophy but a vibrant set of ever evolving ideas.
A splendid example of such disagreements can be found in the very different attitudes that Seneca and his nephew, the poet Lucan, held toward the Civil War that led to the end of the Republic and the beginnings of the Empire. For those interested in digging deeper I highly recommend a paper by David B. George, entitled “Lucan’s Cato and Stoic attitudes to the Republic,” published in Classical Antiquity (volume 10, issue n. 2), and which I used as the basis for the current essay.
[The previous two parts of this trilogy can be found here and here.]
The early Stoa
George roots his scholarly treatment in the early Stoa of Zeno and his students. On the one hand, the exact constitution of a State is an “indifferent” for a Stoic, meaning that it does not affect her ability to exercise virtue. One can be virtuous in a democracy just as much under a fascist regime. On the other hand, the Stoics held to the concept of oikeiosis, or “natural affinity” for other people, which means that they had a duty to help others live just and flourishing lives — which is far more likely in a democracy than under fascism.
It is true, George says, that Zeno, Cleanthes, and Chrysippus — the first three heads of the Stoa — were teachers who did not get politically involved. But it is also the case that two of Zeno’s students, Persaeus of Citium and Sphaerus of Borysthenes, served two kings in explicitly political roles. Persaeus was sent by Zeno himself to aid…
