Why Stoicism Is Having a Cultural Moment
https://dailystoic.com/stoicism-cultural-moment/
The rise of the New Atheism movement
Since the early 2000s, a number of outspoken critics of traditional religion have received a great deal of media attention. The rapid rise of these “New Atheists” reflects a broader trend of growing disenchantment with organized religion. Many people are sympathetic to New Atheist critiques of religion as dogmatic, outmoded, politicized, and violent; they’re also compelled by the efforts of New Atheists to use scientific inquiry as a means of debunking religious beliefs. Much ink has been spilled lately, for example, trying to disprove God’s existence through scientific methods and logical arguments (see the work of Richard Dawkins and Victor Stenger).
These efforts have inspired people at all points on the skepticism spectrum to search out systems of belief that lack the ideological baggage of the world’s dominant religions. And in their search for a new life stance, one place they quickly end up is secular humanism, which, according to the International Humanist and Ethical Union, “stands for the building of a more humane society through an ethics based on human and other natural values in a spirit of reason and free inquiry through human capabilities.” Those who dig deeper into the history of humanism soon find themselves standing on Stoicism’s stoop, since much of what humanism champions — rationality, freedom, virtue, naturalism — serves as the foundational principles of ancient Stoic philosophy as well.
To people who are leaving behind organized religion, Stoicism’s emphasis on reason as the law (or logos) that shapes and guides the universe is refreshingly simple. (It may also explain why you’re constantly hearing the phrase “Everything happens for a reason” uttered by everyone from your mom to Barack Obama.) Ancient Stoics believed that, as part and parcel of the universe, we humans have our share of reason within as well (see Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 7.9; Musonius Rufus, Frag. 38). And by using our reason to guide us, we can understand the nature of reality and perceive the truth. Amazingly, this is all that’s required to be a good person and live an ethically correct life. So Seneca says, “Virtue is nothing else than right reason” (Ep. 66.32). Right reason is the path to contentment: “If you accomplish the task before you, following right reason with diligence, energy and patience…if you can hold to this, without fear or expectation, and find fulfillment in what you’re doing now… you will live a happy life” (Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 3.12).
That being reasonable is all that’s required for a good and happy life is a very freeing concept for those who have attempted to live according to the arcane rules and odd prohibitions of Judaism, Christianity, or Islam — and for those who just aren’t sure what to believe. You don’t have to have all the answers; you just have to think rationally and do what’s right. That’s what Epictetus recommends: “Isn’t it enough to know the nature of good and evil, the limits of desire and aversion…and to use these as rules to administer the affairs of life, without troubling ourselves about things above us? For these things are perhaps incomprehensible to the human mind” (Frag. 7.175).
The Stoics’ acceptance of both our capacity to live rightly and our inability to understand all also underlies their theology, including their conception of God. As a philosophy that evolved over time, there is no fixed dogma or text that defines “Stoic belief” on this topic. (Of course, many Stoic beliefs, including that of a unitary god with multiple aspects, were absorbed into Christian doctrine. This makes them strangely familiar to us and may also, ironically, make them all the more appealing too.) However, for most ancient Stoics, God, or more appropriately, Zeus, certainly did exist. He was a singular entity, equivalent with Reason, which encompasses and directs all of Nature or the Universe for a purpose.
Some Stoics were devout worshippers of this god: see, for example, Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus or Epictetus’ famous declaration, “If I were a nightingale I should sing as a nightingale, if a swan, as a swan: but as I am a rational creature I must sing to God” (Discourses, 1.16). Others were less certain about the nature of the divine. The debate continues to this dayamong modern philosophers, but almost all Stoics seem to agree that in the end what you think you know about God doesn’t really matter — you still can and should pursue the good and live virtuously. As Marcus Aurelius puts it, “Things are either isolated units [atoms], or they form one inseparable whole. If that whole be God, then all is well; but if aimless chance, at least you need not be aimless also” (9.28).
This flexible agnosticism is another attractive feature of Stoicism for modern adherents. You can retain the spiritual elements of the philosophy while remaining outside the confines of proper religion, or you can adapt it to suit even the most die-hard non-believers, all while maintaining its integrity as a belief system. Pigliucci nicely sums up the allure of this “best-of-both-worlds” quality in his NYT essay: “There is something very appealing for me as a non-religious person in the idea of an ecumenical philosophy, one that can share goals and at the least some general attitudes with other major ethical traditions across the world.”
Stoicism offers its modern-day devotees a sort of New Atheism “lite”, seemingly untainted by the clashes that define contemporary religious (or anti-religious) thought. It doesn’t demand adherence to an all-or-nothing view of God, or project a sense of self-righteous certainty about matters that are beyond our control (or understanding), even as it champions goodness and reason. This calm yet confident focus on being our best selves, no matter who or what rules the cosmos, may be what’s drawing so many people toward the Stoic way of life.
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