Understanding the Stoic Philosophy of Cleanthes “the Ass”….
Meet Stoic philosopher Cleanthes
Cleanthes of Assos was a Greek Stoic philosopher and successor to Zeno of Citium as the second scholarch of the Stoic school in Athena. Cleanthes started his career as a boxer. He was introduced to philosophy through the lectures of Crates followed by Zeno. With no visible means of support, he was summoned before the Areopagus where the judges, being impressed with his work on philosophy, voted him ten minae.
He originated new ideas in Stoic physics besides further developing it in accordance with materialism and pantheism. His power of patient endurance earned him the title of “the Ass” from his fellow students. He as rather rejoiced by it as it meant his back was strong enough to endure anything Zeno put upon it.
He became the leader of the Stoic school in 262 BCE after Zeno’s death and held the position for the next 32 years. Even after becoming the leader of the school, he continued to support himself by his own labour. His pupil, Chrysippus went on to become one of the most important stoic thinkers. The largest surviving writing of Cleanthes is “Hymn to Zeus”.
The Soul is a matter
Cleanthes revolutionised stoic physics by his theory of tension or tonos and developed pantheism applying his materialistic views to logic and ethics.
He considered the sun to be divine because it sustains all living thing on the earth resembling the divine fire.
Cleanthes claimed that the soul is a material substance and that it is proved by the correspondence of body and soul. He argued that just like physical qualities, mental capacity is also inherited by a child from his parents. Similarly, the soul feels pain when the body is injured while the body is affected correspondingly when the soul is tormented by anxiety or depression. So, the soul must be just as materialistic as the body.
Cleanthes also believed that the soul lives on after death and that it’s the intensity of existence depends on the strength of that particular soul. According to Cleanthes, one must live a life of reason in accord with the natural order to strengthen one’s soul.
The philosophy of Cleanthes
Cleanthes considered the passions, ie, love, fear and grief, to be “worthless” and “contrary to nature” contributing nothing towards strengthening the soul.
“to live consistently with nature”
As his teacher Zeno had said, the goal of life was to “live consistently” implying that only a passionless life of logic can lead towards being self-content. Cleanthes added the words “with nature” to it, completing the famous Stoic formula “to live consistently with nature”. For Cleanthes, this meant to live with reason one must live in consistency with the Universal order because the Universe is governed by reason.
According to him, true freedom is not acting without motive or set purpose, but humbly accepting the Universal order and what befalls one. This view of his can be found in his famous prayer from “Hymn to Zeus”:
“Lead me, Zeus, and you too, Destiny,
To wherever your decrees have assigned me.
I follow readily, but if I choose not,
Wretched though I am, I must follow still.
Fate guides the willing, but drags the unwilling.”
Watch the video essay for more: https://youtu.be/4B-4t6coeUQ