The idea of the Stoic God is I think one of the hardest Stoic concepts to grasp and understand. It is something that I have been working on for a few years now and there are still times when I am left perplexed. I can understand why some would choose to forgo understanding what the Stoics meant by God, but in my experience, it has been worthwhile, and I do not think I would have stuck with Stoicism otherwise.
I love this. No convincing needed for me. Thank you for this clear exposition. This Stoic God is what I have come to embrace and influences everything I think and DO.
Great thoughts Ryan. Stoicism has become a game-changing perspective for me and I like to combine it with quirky themes like pop culture and drinks over at drinktothat.substac.com
Thank you for your post. You may know that I am a strong supporter of the need to encompass all of the Stoic system and not just some aspects. One aspect that many a writing on the subject miss is that of simple faith. For myself, I believe that much of the Stoic reasoning about God is not to present a new and distinctive God, but is to try to explain the means by which God fits into the reality of existence. I believe that Stoicism accepts God as a reality simply on the basis of the commonality of beliefs in God across cultures and religions - the common perceptions of mankind.
Stoicism says that if one strips away all of the myths and looked at the common beliefs, that there is a general belief in a God that is the manager and organiser of all matters. And this is sufficient reason to believe in God. If one is lucky enough to have experiences similar to Socrates. daemon, all the better in that one goes from belief to knowing. All of the physics and theories that follow are simply an attempt to rationalise why this belief in the one God is a reasonable belief to hold and how such fits in with guiding us as to how to live.
I believe that all the theorising was not an attempt to prove the existence of God. That was a given. What they were doing was to try to strip away the irrational to provide something people could believe in, in that some of the then current beliefs in the mythical gods were being seen as irrational.
The battle back then was defending rational belief from irrational belief, whereas today the battle is mostly between rational belief and irrational non-belief.
God is - so the question has to be 'How do we live with this knowledge'.
If you, or anyone else, are interested in following up on the God/Logos/Nature idea I am open to doing so by email - my email address being thestoa@hotmail.co.uk.
Good article, Ryan. But I am think it's problematic to describe Stoic thinking about God as theology. They themselves saw it as physics (as you know): a theory about the natural world.
I love this. No convincing needed for me. Thank you for this clear exposition. This Stoic God is what I have come to embrace and influences everything I think and DO.
Great thoughts Ryan. Stoicism has become a game-changing perspective for me and I like to combine it with quirky themes like pop culture and drinks over at drinktothat.substac.com
Sounds great. Game-changing for me likewise
Thank you for sharing your views Ryan, it’s a topic I’m wrestling with and this summary has been very helpful
Pandeism is also some to consider.
Thank you for your post. You may know that I am a strong supporter of the need to encompass all of the Stoic system and not just some aspects. One aspect that many a writing on the subject miss is that of simple faith. For myself, I believe that much of the Stoic reasoning about God is not to present a new and distinctive God, but is to try to explain the means by which God fits into the reality of existence. I believe that Stoicism accepts God as a reality simply on the basis of the commonality of beliefs in God across cultures and religions - the common perceptions of mankind.
Stoicism says that if one strips away all of the myths and looked at the common beliefs, that there is a general belief in a God that is the manager and organiser of all matters. And this is sufficient reason to believe in God. If one is lucky enough to have experiences similar to Socrates. daemon, all the better in that one goes from belief to knowing. All of the physics and theories that follow are simply an attempt to rationalise why this belief in the one God is a reasonable belief to hold and how such fits in with guiding us as to how to live.
I believe that all the theorising was not an attempt to prove the existence of God. That was a given. What they were doing was to try to strip away the irrational to provide something people could believe in, in that some of the then current beliefs in the mythical gods were being seen as irrational.
The battle back then was defending rational belief from irrational belief, whereas today the battle is mostly between rational belief and irrational non-belief.
God is - so the question has to be 'How do we live with this knowledge'.
If you, or anyone else, are interested in following up on the God/Logos/Nature idea I am open to doing so by email - my email address being thestoa@hotmail.co.uk.
Nigel Glassborow
Thank you Nigel, this has given me a lot to think about and I may take you up on the email offer.
Good article, Ryan. But I am think it's problematic to describe Stoic thinking about God as theology. They themselves saw it as physics (as you know): a theory about the natural world.
Also, the titles given to Seneca's letters are invented by later editors. Not by Seneca :-)