Title

Hierocles: Theory and Argument in the Second Century AD

Authors

Brad Inwood, University of TorontoFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

12-1983

Abstract

I propose a consideration of two important questions concerning the traditional Stoic doctrine of oikeiosis, in an attempt to see the sort of position Hierocles takes on these central questions, to determine something about the intellectual milieu in which he operated and about his philosophical style. The larger goal will be to present a partial picture of Stoic philosophical activity in this later period which, I hope, will justify the belief that phllosophically interesting Stoicism did not die out with Poseidonius. The two questions are these: why does Hierocles devote so much of what survives of the Stoicheiosis to the problem of self-perception? and second, what is the relationship between the egoistic oikeiosis with which all animals are said to begin life and the fundamental oikeiosis to other human beings which supports the Stoic conviction that other-regarding behaviour is essential to living the rational life?

Notes

Brad Inwood presented “Hierocles: Theory and Argument in the Second Century A.D.” to the Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy at its meeting with the American Philological Association in Cincinnati, 1983. A later version was published in Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 2 (1984) 151-183.

For information about the author, see http://classics.yale.edu/people/brad-inwood

Recommended Citation

Inwood, Brad, "Hierocles: Theory and Argument in the Second Century AD" (1983). The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter. 115.
https://orb.binghamton.edu/sagp/115