Humans Are Animals Too
After reading our excerpt of The Enchiridion, I was struck by how (despite a heavy internal focus) Stoicism ignores one of the biggest sources of wisdom in the human experience. Epictetus emphasizes that we must do away with emotions ranging from positive to negative for fear that they will cloud our judgement. However, I do not find emotion and reason to be antithetical to each other. Some of the most “irrational” emotions such as anger and jealousy often just require a gentle internal inquiry to understand and gain knowledge from. For example, if I can figure out the root of my jealousy of someone or something then I will have gained a stronger understanding of myself and I can now figure out other ways to fulfill whatever I was jealous of. I will readily admit there is wisdom to not responding to things reactively but I would argue stoicism goes beyond that with its rejection of emotions and personal connections.
Epictetus also advocates a very individualistic perspective. Again, I think there is value to the idea that we should focus on what we can control. But I don’t believe that requires keeping an emotional distance from those we love. If a person was truly rational, shouldn't they be able to both understand the grim reality of things like death and pain and still form deep attachments with the people around them? Yes we are rational animals but we must not forget that we are also social animals. Humans are literally programmed to be in community with each other, it is just as much in our nature as philosophical thought.
The other excerpt that caught my attention was…
“17. Remember that you are an actor in a play, which is as the playwright wants it to be short if he wants it short, long if he wants it long. If he wants you to play a beggar, play even this part skillfully or a cripple, or a public official, or a private citizen.”
At first glance this declaration seems harmless, noble even, to fulfill whatever purpose you think the gods have assigned you in the best possible way. However, I think this pillar is potentially the most dangerous of all because it relies on the idea of a divine will. Don’t get me wrong, there is definitely a place for accepting the reality of one’s situation in the world, but I think this could also be an easy way out for the ruling class to ignore the issues around them by accepting it as “divine will”. This combined with the disregard for emotion and the emphasis on individualism seems opposed to human nature. The roles we have in our current society are secondary (in my opinion obviously) to our status as humans. We are humans first and a good life should embrace that.
