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The biographical information in Diogenes Laertius, though he frequently cites his sources by name, is not always reliable. At times he refers to contradictory accounts of the same events. Biography could also be a polemical tool, used to credit or discredit a philosopher and his way of life. A disciple of Aristotle, Aristoxenus of Tarentum, had already moved in this direction, accusing Socrates, Plato, and Theophrastus of unseemly sexual behavior of a homosexual nature in order to discredit them (as Diogenes reveals at 3.29 and 5.39). Stoic sources accused Arcesilaus of being a corruptor of youth and the author of obscene stories (4.40); Epicurus was taxed with licentiousness (10.4 and 6).
Diogenes’ biographies extensively document the competitive relationships between rival philosophers and their followers. Many types of philosophical lives were practiced in antiquity, and no single type predominated. The idea that philosophers, despite having different aims, would work together toward a common goal was completely foreign.
What they did share was a distance, whether greater or smaller, from ordinary ways of life. In this sense the ancient philosophers tended to emphasize the superiority of their way of life, and not its ability to be universalized. The Cynics showed the most radical indifference to conventional social and sexual customs, defying the judgments of others. They did not hesitate to masturbate or copulate in public, or to eat raw meat or vegetable remains at the markets.
Outsiders often perceived philosophy as an aberrant way of life. Even the simple fact of a small group gathering in a school to study, or to live a common life, could appear strange. The comic playwrights took pride in using philosophers as an object of laughter, and Diogenes Laertius did not shy away from quoting them.
But even more important are the accounts he quoted of the character and curriculum of the various schools. He sheds light not only on the economic basis of the respective schools but also on the types of collective life each one fostered among all the members of a school, including women and slaves. Though they operated largely inside their own schools, philosophers were public figures. Diogenes Laertius frequently attests to the public success of the teachings of various philosophers, such as Plato, Stilpo, Theophrastus, Zeno of Citium, and the Academics Arcesilaus and Carneades. Especially after the start of the Hellenistic age, philosophy grew increasingly central to the educational life of Athens and other cities. The rival schools became instruments for the formation of future citizens, not just of Athens but of Rome.
Even the Cynics were integrated into the urban fabric. The figure of the desert saint or the solitary philosopher is alien to the ways in which ancient philosophy was lived. The life was not conceived of as an exercise in introspection and isolation from others, unless for brief moments, as was the case with Democritus (9.38), the Academic Xenocrates (4.11), and Pyrrho (9.63). It was instead characterized by an interpersonal dimension, with interlocutors and auditors who were sometimes outside the school and not focused exclusively on adhering to its tenets. Diogenes Laertius documents the public aspect of the Socratic discussions, and the saying attributed to Socrates’ student Aristippus is particularly meaningful: interrogated as to what advantage can come from philosophy, he responded that it was the ability “to be able to consort confidently with everyone” (2.68). Freedom of speech (parrhesia), even in the face of powerful people, was a trait that the Cynics especially prized.
Of course, the philosophical way of life in antiquity was rarely devoid of an argumentative and doctrinal dimension. The ancient philosopher was a recognizable character not only for his way of life but also for his doctrines and the ways of reasoning he professed—not that theory and practice necessarily cohered. On the contrary, Diogenes Laertius often quotes critics who note contradictions—a damaging claim, since any philosopher trying to follow in the footsteps of Socrates was expected to be a model of consistency.
Within his biographies, Diogenes Laertius emphasizes the deaths of philosophers, which he comments on and judges with his own verses. Certainly at times the narration can be explained by a simple taste for the extraordinary, the banal, or the entertaining; this is the case for deaths resulting from accidents, as with Alexinus (2.109), Xenocrates, who tripped and broke his head (4.14–15), Demetrius of Phalerum who died of a snake bite (5.78–79), or Protagoras who drowned (9.55–56); or for deaths resulting from diseases, as with Polemon (4.20), Crantor (4.27), and Lyco (5.68); or for deaths resulting from an excessive consumption of wine, as with Arcesilaus (4.44) or Lacydes (4.61). Suicides abound, as with Speusippus (4.3–4), Dionysus (7.167), and Cleanthes (7.176). It is hard to say if suicide was understood as an act of courage, especially in painful conditions, or a sign of cowardice. The behavior of Socrates seems noble, as does that of Zeno of Elea, who either bit off his tongue and spat it in the face of a tyrant, or was beaten to death in a mortar (9.26–27), as also happened to Anaxarchus (9.58–59).
Most of these accounts imply that the cause of death is an implicit judgment affixed on a certain way of life, whether positive or negative. The majority of philosophers cited lived to a ripe age, and this itself was considered evidence of the advantage of their way of life. At least two versions of the death of the Cynic Diogenes, stating that he died of a dog bite or from eating a live octopus, present a clear reference to his “canine” way of life—from which the moniker Cynic derives—as if death represented a sort of rebuke to it. In some cases it is possible to find a connection between the type of death and specific doctrines of a philosopher or a philosophic tendency he followed. Thales perished from a lack of water, which he considered the base of all things (1.39). For Heraclitus that principle was fire; he died from a lack of heat (9.3–4). Likewise the death of Zeno the Stoic is attributable to lack of breath (8.28–29), or pneuma—for the Stoics, the essential element of everything. Chrysippus also died in a manner appropriate to a Stoic, though more ridiculously—suffocating from laughter (7.185). And in one version, Pythagoras’s death is attributed to his refusal to cross a field of beans, which prevented him from escaping his pursuers, who killed him (8.39–40)—a reference to the Pythagorean taboo against eating certain kinds of beans.
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Diogenes Laertius informs us of the existence of a debate over how to classify Cynicism and Skepticism: should they be considered haireses—philosophical orientations? It depends. If a hairesis is used to mean a way of conducting life that followed a certain line of reasoning (logos), then Skepticism could reasonably be called a philosophical orientation. If instead a hairesis implies the upholding of a true doctrine, then we can no longer call Skepticism a hairesis, since it refused assent to all doctrines (1.20).
Cynicism presented a different sort of problem, since it was unclear if its adherents, with their outrageous behavior, followed any line of reasoning at all. Diogenes Laertius claims that the Cynics refuted sophisms (6.38–39) and often based their theories on deductions (6.72). Can we then say their way of life flowed from a certain line of reasoning (logos) expressed in a certain number of key doctrines? Diogenes Laertius thinks the answer is yes; and to confirm it, after having elaborated on the lives of various Cynics, he gives a summary of their key doctrines (6.103).
Diogenes thus considers the exposition of the content of the doctrines and the modes of philosophical reflection to be integral to the biographies. In the life of Plato, Diogenes directly addresses a lady “rightly fond of Plato,” and then offers a typology of the Platonic dialogues, along with a summary of key ideas, so that the biography “may not be found to omit his doctrines” (3.47). Similar summaries of doctrines occur in many other lives as well, both of philosophers who were not linked to specific schools—as with Thales, Anaxagoras, Heraclitus, Leucippus, and Democritus—and of philosophers who were founders of schools. In such cases, a doxography is sometimes presented in connection to the life of the school’s founder, as in the case of Zeno the Stoic. The idea is that the doctrines introduced and argued by the founder constitute the patrimony at the heart of an orient
ation and way of philosophic life, and this patrimony is followed in large part by the disciples and successive members.
But Zeno’s successors, like those of Plato, introduced variations and modifications to the doctrines of the founder, and thus an orthodox line can be distinguished from positions that progressively distance themselves from it. Diogenes Laertius justifies limiting himself to general doxographies of the different schools in order to protect the proportions of the different parts of his writing (7.160).
It is not an accident that he includes lists of the writings of single philosophers, at times even taking care to distinguish between authentic and inauthentic works. Diogenes Laertius states the connection between the catalogue and the incompleteness of the doxography with regard to Aristotle: “it would take too long to enumerate” Aristotle’s many other doctrines, he says, as is clear from the catalogue of his writings (5.34). The catalogues not only were a more or less genuine display of scholarship—a typical practice in the second and third centuries AD—but may have proved useful for those who wanted to read certain philosophical texts. Diogenes’ quoting of the first lines of certain philosophical writings, especially of the Pre-Socratic authors, perhaps served the same function; the technique was one used in libraries to enable books to be identified.
The need to connect the biography, doxography, and writings of philosophers culminates in Book 10, about Epicurus. Letters by Epicurus and his students are quoted that demonstrate the tone of his way of life and of facing difficulties such as disease or economic hardships; they defend Epicurus against his detractors. We discover more about his excellent qualities, Diogenes Laertius says, in his doctrines and sayings (10.12). This is the only case in the Lives in which three letters are reproduced in their entirety, and the objective is clear: to show what kind of man Epicurus was (10.28–29). The writings are thus an essential way to understand the man and his way of life. In particular the Chief Maxims of Epicurus crown not only his biography but Diogenes’ own work, in that they contain an ethical conclusion regarding how to reach happiness.
In antiquity, the philosopher was not only characterized by his fidelity to doctrines but by the appropriateness of the arguments in support of these doctrines. Cleanthes the Stoic would have told master Zeno that the teaching of the doctrines was sufficient because he would find the proof himself (7.179). Although Diogenes Laertius does not generally include such supporting arguments, he does specifically mention the arguments of some philosophers—for example, the construction of paradoxical arguments in Chrysippus (7.186–87).
Confirmation of this interest in forms of argument as a sign of the philosophic life and practice seems to me to come from the ample use Diogenes Laertius makes of the theme of the “first inventor.” Many times this theme is introduced in order to attribute the invention of objects useful to philosophers, like the gnomon to Anaximander (2.1). Sometimes the inventions deal with practices like doubling a cloak and using a staff and knapsack—external signs of Cynic life, first introduced by Antisthenes (6.13) or by Diogenes the Cynic, depending on the source (6.22–23). Still other inventions involve philosophic terms or the application of common terms in a new philosophical way, as in the cases of Pythagoras, Plato, and the Stoic Zeno (8.48, 3.24, and 7.25, respectively). Sometimes the inventions deal with doctrines such as the transmigration of souls in Pythagoras (8.14) or the roundness of the earth, attributed variously to Pythagoras or Parmenides (9.21).
Aristotle had attributed the discovery of rhetoric to Empedocles and dialectic to Zeno (8.57). But Diogenes Laertius credits the Sophist Protagoras with more innovations than anyone else (9.51–53): the assertion of the existence of two opposing discourses for everything, the impossibility of contradiction, the division of tenses, and the distinction of the four parts of discourse: wish, question, answer, and command. Diogenes claims that Arcesilaus was the first to practice the suspension of judgment because of the existence of opposing arguments, and the first to argue for and against something (4.28). All of this is a sign that inventions and the use of argumentative techniques were an important aspect of the life of most philosophers. Diogenes Laertius in effect shows us how in antiquity philosophical doctrines, arguments, and a distinctive way of life all intertwined in one unitary fabric.
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Tensions would remain, however, between the modes of ancient philosophic life and other areas of knowledge that were not exclusively under the jurisdiction of the philosophers, such as medicine, mathematics, and astronomy. Different philosophical schools cultivated to varying degrees an interest in logic, physics, and ethics. Though Diogenes Laertius recognized that Socrates’ discussions were largely based around ethical questions, he reports that Socrates was interested in natural philosophy as well (2.45)—an interest some of his students did not share. Aristippus compared those who dedicated themselves to the scientific disciplines, rather than to philosophy, to the suitors who courted Penelope’s handmaids instead of their mistress (2.79). The Stoic Ariston of Chios affirmed something similar, as he intentionally eliminated physical and logical inquiry from the realm of his philosophic activity; physics, he said, was beyond human capacities, and logic was as useless as spiderwebs (7.160–61). Ariston at times came close to the Cynics, who, from Antisthenes to Diogenes, had neglected mathematical studies, music, geometry, and astronomy, which they considered useless for philosophic life (6.73 and 103). Antisthenes affirmed that virtue was sufficient for happiness; and virtue, being typical of actions, does not need many lines of reasoning or scientific knowledge (6.11).
Ethics is the only thing of interest to all ancient philosophers, and it is no accident that ethics is the area most directly implicated in modes of conduct.
Still, most of the ancient philosophers, including the Pythagoreans, Plato, and Aristotle, maintained that it was necessary to inquire into logic and physics, as well as ethics. In Protagoras, Plato showed that, just as there was a diet for the body based on the ingestion of food, there also existed a diet for the soul, and its food was appropriate studies. In the Republic, he stressed the need for future philosophers to undertake a long preliminary study of the mathematical disciplines. Diogenes Laertius attributes the invention of inquiry based on analysis to Plato (3.24), and to Aristotle he attributes the thesis that scientific disciplines are useful for achieving virtue (5.31).
But even for the philosophers who maintain that philosophic life is constituted in part by the mathematical disciplines, these do not represent the apex. For the ancient philosopher the ultimate goal was searching for types of knowledge capable not only of guiding, but of constructing and permeating a superior form of life—the life of the philosopher.
—Translated from the Italian by Julia Hein
‘A la Recherche du Texte Perdu’: The Manuscript Tradition of Diogenes Laertius’ Lives of the Eminent Philosophers
Tiziano Dorandi
The Greek text of the Lives of the Eminent Philosophers by Diogenes Laertius has been transmitted (in its entirety or, most often, in the form of extracts) in some one hundred different manuscripts. The oldest examples of this tradition are three continuous manuscripts (B, P, and F) datable between the end of the eleventh century and the thirteenth century, and three collections of extracts: two (Φ, Φh) preserved in a Vatican manuscript from the twelfth century, and the third (Vi)—the oldest of all—written and dated 925, and preserved in Vienna. All the other manuscripts are more recent and are dated between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries (though some manuscripts with extracts appear as late as the eighteenth century).
B Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale, III B 29, twelfth century
P Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, gr. 1759, eleventh/twelfth centuries
F Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, plut. 69.13, thirteenth century
Φ, Φ h Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vaticanus gr. 96, twelfth century. This manuscript contains two summarized texts from Lives: the so-called Magnum Excerptum (ff. 29v-88r = Φ) and the
opuscule falsely attributed to Hesychius of Miletus (ff. 19r-29v = Φh).
Vi Vienna, Österreichische National-Bibliothek, phil. gr. 314, dated July 28, 925: only brief extracts from Book 3
These are the oldest Greek manuscripts and represent what is usually referred to as the “direct tradition.”
There is an “indirect tradition,” which consists of numerous Greek passages from the Lives that are quoted in works compiled in Byzantium (most notably, the Greek Anthology and the Suda).
Before recounting the efforts of modern scholars to establish a reliable Greek text, it will be useful to start with a few words on the principal manuscripts, their characteristics, and their apparent relationship to a common textual ancestor.
There is a large amount of material missing from the end of Book 7. The missing material included not only the end of the catalogue of writings by Chrysippus (cut off at 7.202), but also biographies of twenty or so Stoic philosophers following Chrysippus—from Zeno of Tarsus to Cornutus (they are listed in the so-called index locupletior copied in f. 1r–v of P). The missing material is confirmed by the presence of a (rather large) space left white at the end of Book 7—a white space common to the oldest manuscripts (B, P, and F). The fact that B, P, and F are all missing the material from Book 7 proves decisively that they derive from a common textual source, Ω, now lost, which also was missing that material.
Manuscript B (twelfth century) was copied directly from Ω by a scribe with little knowledge of Greek. Given the quality of the transcription, it is clear he had difficulty, and limited himself to reproducing it in a mechanical way, exactly as it appeared to him.
Lives of the Eminent Philosophers Page 74