Discourses and Selected Writings (Penguin Classics)

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When faced with an obstacle in life, ask yourself: 'Is this something that is in my control? Or it is something external to myself?' If the former, you can choose how it affects you. If the latter, it is none of your concern. Needless suffering plagues people who think those externals are their responsibility. By clinging too much to all outside of one's self, the loss of such externals only causes unnecessary pain to the individual. That alone is in our power, which is our own work; and in this class are our opinions, impulses, desires, and aversions. On the contrary, what is not in our power, are our bodies, possessions, glory, and power. Any delusion on this point leads to the greatest errors, misfortunes, and troubles, and to the slavery of the soul. [38]

Heinrich Ritter, Alexander James William Morrison, (1846), The History of Ancient Philosophy, Volume 4, p. 212 Kiyozawa Manshi, a controversial reformer within the Higashi Honganji branch of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism, cited Epictetus as one of the three major influences on his spiritual development and thought. [83] See also [ edit ] Epictetus obtained his freedom sometime after the death of Nero in AD 68, [17] and he began to teach philosophy in Rome. Around AD 93, when the Roman emperor Domitian banished all philosophers from the city, [18] Epictetus moved to Nicopolis in Epirus, Greece, where he founded a school of philosophy. [19] Robin Waterfield, (2022), The Complete Works: Handbook, Discourses, and Fragments. (The University of Chicago Press) ISBN 9780226769332

Hendrik Selle: Dichtung oder Wahrheit– Der Autor der Epiktetischen Predigten. Philologus 145 [2001] 269–290 But isn't Stoicism open to a similar rejection? If you retreat from the world into your own soul, and don't care what others do with your body because you know they can't reach you - the real you (your will) anyway - you are in effect rolling out the red carpet for immoral people to abduct, abuse and ultimately kill others, including yourself. What is the good of an ethics of self-annihilation? Can an ethical system even be said to be coherent and consistent if it leads inevitably to self-annihilation? I guess only on the condition that you believe in the existence of an immortal soul - cut this metaphysical notion from the system and becomes self-contradictory. And as far as I can tell almost all ancient Stoics rejected the notion of an afterlife. It is easy to see how Stoicism could inspire Christian monks, though, since they could simply become ascetics in the believe that in suffering and even dying on purpose they approached Jesus Christ in his sufferings (the 'Imitatio Christi') - but this option is not open to the ethics of Seneca, Epictetus and Aurelius, making their ethics kind of unreasonable... the secret to invincibility. But it's not what most people at first thought would expect or even for that matter want. Out the window go the traditional definitions of evil. Suffering is thought very little of here; it's not even given a consolation in any sort of afterlife. There is an overwhelming faith here in the abilities of the mind not to eliminate but to stand above and resist to the waves of misery inevitably found in human life. His Teaching is pithy and Practical---"Now a Carpenter does not come to you and say, I have come to philosophize on carpentry, he hands you a contract and builds a House-so do you likewise in life , eat like a man, sleep like a man, endure insults, rear children, and love your Wife...." And as opposed to many of the then current ethics (like Aristotelean, Skeptic and Epicurean ethics), and in line with Socratic conceptions of virtue as knowledge, the Stoic ethics consists in practice, not theory. Only through acting like a Stoic is one a philosopher; all contemplation and theorizing about ethics is futile, since as soon as the class closes, one has to practice what he's learned. And thus we end up with a sort of self-help book avant la lettre. As a matter of fact, in the introduction to the Penguin Classics edition of Epictetus' Discourses, Robbert Dobbin writes that Stoicism (and Epictetus especially) inspired many a twentieth century psychologist in developing some version of rational cognitive theory.

That also brings me to another part of Epictetus' philosophy that I love--that we should treat moral deficiency and ignorance the way we treat physical disability. Abusing a blind person just because they're blind is obviously terrible, and so is abusing an ignorant person because they're ignorant, or an immoral person because they're immoral. Act well and provide an example, help them overcome their disability if they're open to it, and otherwise don't worry about it because, well, see above about Internals vs. Externals.Thomas Wentworth Higginson, (1865), The Works of Epictetus. Consisting of His Discourses, in Four Books, The Enchiridion, and Fragments. (Little, Brown, and Co.) Everyday acquire something that will fortify you against old-age, death, loss, and other ills as well; Epictetus was born around AD 50, [6] [7] presumably at Hierapolis, Phrygia. [8] The name his parents gave him is unknown. The word epíktētos (ἐπίκτητος) in Greek simply means "gained" or "acquired"; [9] the Greek philosopher Plato, in his Laws, used the term to mean property that is "added to one's hereditary property." [10] He spent his youth in Rome as a slave to Epaphroditus, a wealthy freedman and secretary to Nero. [11] His social position was thus complicated, combining the low status of a slave with the high status of one with a personal connection to Imperial power. [12]

Millar, Fergus (2004), "Epictetus and the Imperial Court", Rome, the Greek World, and the East, vol.2, University of North Carolina Press, ISBN 0-807-85520-0 But to begin with, keep well away of what is stronger than you. If a pretty girl is set against a young man who is just making a start on philosophy, that is no fair contest.Arrian recorded and published Epictetus’ informal lectures and conversations on ethics, in eight books, of which four books and some fragments survive. These are the Discourses; Arrian also wrote a summary of main themes, the Manual Heinrich Ritter, Alexander James William Morrison, (1846), The History of Ancient Philosophy, Volume 4, p. 210 So choose: either regain the love of your old friends by reverting to your former self or remain better than you once were and forfeit their affection

A surviving second- or third-century work, Altercatio Hadriani Et Epicteti gives a fictitious account of a conversation between Hadrian and Epictetus.

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Whenever externals are more important to you than your own integrity, then be prepared to serve them the remainder of your life Goal of education is to bring our preconception of what is reasonable and unreasonable in alignment with nature