Philosophie in Rom - Römische Philosophie?

Kultur-, literatur- und philosophiegeschichtliche Perspektiven

Gernot Michael Müller, Fosca Mariani Zini, Gernot Michael Müller, Fosca Mariani Zini

• Verlag: De Gruyter
• Jahr: 2017
• ISBN:
  9783110491425
• Auflage: 1
• Thema: Literatura
• Thema: Crítica literaria antigua y clásica

Lange als rein rezipierende und damit zu vernachlässigende Vertreter der antiken Philosophie angesehen, werden die philosophischen Werke von Römern inzwischen als ernstzunehmende Stimmen der von ihnen gepflegten hellenistischen Lehren wahrgenommen. Aus kultur- und bildungsgeschichtlicher Perspektive wird zudem vermehrt nach den Eigenheiten philosophischer Betätigung in Rom gefragt. Prägt diese Fragestellung inzwischen auch die Auseinandersetzung mit den einzelnen Autoren, sind Initiativen weiterhin rar, die solche autor- und werkbezogene Ansätze vergleichend aufeinander beziehen und zu einem Gesamtbild der Philosophie in Rom zusammenführen. Ausgehend von dem inzwischen akzeptierten Befund, dass die aus Griechenland importierte Philosophie in Rom signifikante Veränderungen und Weiterentwicklungen erfahren hat, nähert sich der Sammelband den zentralen römischen Autoren und Trägergruppen in komparatistischer Perspektive und fragt danach, welche Konsequenzen die spezifischen kulturellen Verständnisbedingungen in Rom für deren Auseinandersetzung mit der Philosophie hatten. Auf diese Weise entwirft er philosophie- und kulturgeschichtliche Kriterien, die die philosophischen Bemühungen von Römern als dezidiert römisch erkennbar machen.

III.Griechische Philosophen und ihr römisches Umfeld im 1. Jh. v. Chr.

The ‘Academy’ in Rome: Antiochus and his vetus Academia

Georgia Tsouni

Following what David Sedley has called a period of ‘decentralisation’ after Sulla’s siege of Athens and the subsequent closure of the Athenian philosophical schools in the First century BCE,323 Greek-speaking intellectuals who were active in the philosophical scene of Athens sought a new role. A great many emigrated to Rome and took themselves to the education of the Roman elite.324 In this essay, I would like to focus on one of them, Antiochus of Ascalon. The case of Antiochus gives as a prime example to understand the mechanisms of transmission of Greek philosophy within the context of Roman political power, and illuminates the way the new context within which Greek philosophy operated, triggered important developments both in the social role of philosophers, but also, most importantly, in the philosophical orientation of the time.

1The Defense of philosophical paideia in the First Century BCE and Antiochus

When Antiochus made a name for himself with the movement of the ‘Old Academy’, activity in the physical space of the Platonic Academy at Athens had seized as a consequence of Sulla’s siege. It is suggestive that at the beginning of Cicero’s De finibus 5 (which takes place at the dramatic date of 79 BCE, almost seven years after Sulla’s siege of Athens), Antiochus is depicted lecturing at the Ptolemaeum, a gymnasium built under the reign of Ptolemaus Philadelphos, and not in Plato’s Academy.325 This is where Cicero attends the lectures of Antiochus. The different location indicates a major shift in Academic identity that took place in the first half of the First century BCE. The continuity of Plato’s school is, from Antiochus onwards, not based anymore on uninterrupted institutional succession, but is constructed on the basis of a new interpretation of the Academic tradition. According to Antiochus’ understanding, the ‘Old Academy’’s identity consists in a set of doctrines, which were endorsed by all the members of the tradition.326

The visit to the Academy that Cicero depicts at the prologue to the last book of De finibus has all the characteristics of a nostalgic tour to a place known more for its past rather than its present. In what is one of the most evocative introductions to his dialogues, Cicero describes how he and his interlocutors, his brother Quintus, Marcus Piso, T. Pomponius Atticus and Cicero’s cousin Lucius visit the spot of Plato’s Academy, while on a grand educational tour to the Greek world in 79 BC; 327 in stark contrast to the gloomy reality resulting from the Roman siege of the city some seven years before, Athens appears there as an idealised space, the birthplace of the greatest politicians, poets, rhetoricians and philosophers, whose scenes of action (although deserted) offer a reminiscence of glory and inspiration for the Roman youth: Phalerum brings to mind the great rhetorician Demosthenes, whereas the, by that time, deserted Academy, makes one remember Cicero’s favourite, Carneades, and the legendary debates he held on that spot many decades before.328 As Cicero puts it at De finibus 5,5:

Multa in omni parte Athenarum sunt in ipsis locis indicia summorum virorum.

In every quarter of Athens the mere sites contain many mementoes of the most illustrious men.

Athens thus appears at the beginning of the first century BCE to be on the map as an educational destination, but it is valued more as a landscape of memory, rather than of original intellectual production. In another striking passage from De oratore 3,43, the city of Athens, due to the symbolic value of education that it carries, is invested with auctoritas, a notion which unites uniquely the concepts of ‘authorship’ and ‘authority’. This makes the city, according to Cicero, into ‘a lodging for studies’ from which the citizens are entirely aloof, and which are enjoyed only by foreign visitors.329 In the eyes of Cicero, Athens is the birth-place of the most important philosophers of the past, and this legitimizes its value, irrespective of its decadence in the Roman period.

The idea that Greek philosophy and its representatives carry important symbolic capital (which could have political importance as well) was shared by many in Cicero’s time. A plausible explanation for Antiochus’ quick adjustment to the new political reality is not only his personal charisma as a ‘convincing and able speaker’330 but crucially the association of his teaching with the ‘ancient tradition’, which had gained value in Rome. Roman generals such as Lucius Licinius Lucullus, who became famous as the conqueror of Mithridates, were particularly keen to ‘invest’ on the venerable name of the Greek tradition and people like Antiochus were keenly sought to play the role of a ‘friend and companion’ to the political elite.331 Antiochus followed Lucullus, as a philosophical advisor and perhaps also as mediator for the contacts of his Roman patron with the Greek-speaking local communities in the East, to Alexandria332 and died while at his service.333 It is from Alexandria in 87 BCE, following Lucullus, that Antiochus responds to Philo’s so-called Roman books334 and, through a treatise entitled Sosus,335 for the first time openly challenges the Academic identity as represented by its institutional head. That Antiochus’ teaching had an impact on other powerful Romans as well, is shown by the association of Varro and Brutus with Antiochus and his circle of students.336 Leaving aside the political role that philosophers played next to members of the Roman ruling elite, intellectual claims played a role as well: According to the testimony of Plutarch, Lucullus by associating himself with Antiochus opposed Cicero, who was Philo’s student and held opposing views on key philosophical issues, such as the possibility of secure knowledge.337 The testimony of Plutarch suggests that holding pretensions to Greek wisdom by showing an interest for current philosophical debates was in the late republic a mark of distinguished rank to those who held high political offices.338

The interest in representatives of ancient wisdom, such as Antiochus, in the first half of the First century BCE is connected in Cicero with the defense of the importance of the educational role of philosophy for the young Roman elite. The didactic context of De finibus 5 (where Antiochean, i.e. ‘Old Academic’ ethics, is presented) is suggestive: At De finibus 5,7 Antiochus’ school is advertised as the most suitable school for Lucius, the young cousin of Cicero, to follow. The relevant passage reads as follows:

Ex eorum enim scriptis et institutis cum omnis doctrina liberalis, omnis historia, omnis sermo elegans sumi potest, tum varietas est tanta artium, ut nemo sine eo instrumento ad ullam rem illustriorem satis ornatus possit accedere. Ab his oratores, ab his imperatores ac rerum publicarum principes extiterunt.

Not only may you derive from their writings and teachings (sc. of ‘the Peripatetics’) all liberal learning, all history, every choice form of style, but accomplishments in such variety that no one without such equipment can be properly prepared to approach any task of any distinction. From this school sprang the orators, from this school the generals and the governors of states.

Lucius, is meant to hear Antiochus’ account of ‘Old Academic’ ethics and change his allegiance to him, since such a schooling would guarantee the greatest success in the Roman political arena. Accordingly, the importance assigned to political and rhetorical studies in the ‘ancient tradition’ that Antiochus represents (and more specifically, the Peripatos) is highlighted in the account of Piso, who acts as the mouthpiece of Antiochus at De finibus 5.339

The association of the old philosophical tradition and, more specifically the Peripatos (of which Antiochus was the major representative in the first half of the First century BCE), with political theory and rhetoric testifies to the value that Roman elites placed on philosophical paideia as a supplement to rhetorical and legal forms of education during the late Republic. In Plutarch, the educational role of Greek philosophy is connected to the emerging ideal of ‘liberal education’, or humanitas, of which Cicero appears to be the greatest proponent.340 Cicero himself (and before him Scipio), belonged to a generation of Roman statesmen who embraced Greek paideia and assigned to it symbolic value, contrary to the voices who were critical of the influence of Greek (philosophical) ideas on Roman society.341 Again, the important position given to the Antiochean voice in dialogues such as the De finibus forms part of the larger Ciceronian attempt to legitimise philosophical discourse for his Roman audience.

The cultivation of Greek philosophical views and its defense acquired a new meaning after the ascent of Caesar to power and Cicero’s exclusion from political participation.342 During this period, exercise in philosophical thinking came to substitute the loss of the free res publica and its deliberative and judicial functions. This becomes obvious especially in the prefaces to Cicero’s dialogues. There, while commenting on his own activity, Cicero goes on to compare directly the labor of the political arena with the intellectual labor, the latter being the only means of public engagement and of ‘honourable leisure’ (otium cum dignitate) in the hands of those who have been deprived of participation into politics.343 There is, furthermore, a sense in which the philosophical dialogue functions in Cicero’s hands as a mouthpiece for the defenders of the republican order; all the speakers belong to the previous generations of optimates who held political office and who were associated with the glorious past of the res publica.344 Their interest in Greek philosophical ideas aims at highlighting the association of ‘liberal’ education of Greek provenance with the political order of the res publica and at offering a model of the ideal citizen of the republic. It is against this background, that Antiochus formula...

Inhaltsverzeichnis

• Cover
• Titelseite
• Impressum
• Inhaltsverzeichnis
• Einleitung
• I. Kultur- und mentalitätsgeschichtliche Grundlagen der Philosophie in Rom
• II. Gesellschaftliche und literarische Rollenkonzepte für eine Selbstdefinition des Philosophen in Rom
• III. Griechische Philosophen und ihr römisches Umfeld im 1. Jh. v. Chr.
• IV. Zum Verhältnis von Philosophie und Rhetorik in philosophischer Literatur und rhetorischer Theorie
• V. Ciceros politische Philosophie und die Krise der römischen Republik
• VI. Skeptizismus und Erkenntnistheorie bei Cicero und Augustin
• VII. Argumentationstechniken für eine Philosophie als Therapie: Cicero und Seneca im Vergleich
• VIII. Elemente einer stoischen Anthropologie für die römische Gesellschaft des 1. Jh.s n. Chr. im Œuvre Senecas
• IX. Philosophie und Naturkunde im 1. Jh. n. Chr.
• X. Zu Rezeption und Überlieferung römischer Philosophie am Ausgang der Spätantike
• Index
• Index locorum