THE
DISCOURSES OF EPICTETUS
R.P. Bazemore
Introduction 3
Map 5
Greek text 7
Notes on the text and commentary 44
Translation 71
Appendix 112
Philosophical terms 126
Footnotes 129
Bibliography 130
This translation and commentary on the first half of
Book I of the Discourses of Epictetus is
the second installment in a project in the Samford Department of Classics to
make the works of Epictetus more accessible to undergraduate students of Greek
and owes its existence to the scholarship, support
and generosity of the Chairman, Professor S.R. Todd, and to the wisdom and
vision of Professor and Dean J. Roderick
Davis.
Introduction
The
reader of Epictetus may find himself beset by several problems. The first is the form in which Arrian has
recorded his teaching, a mix of exposition in which Epictetus teaches his
subject to his students and of conversational question and answer sessions in
which it is frequently unclear who the interlocutor is and what part of an
exchange he is speaking. A speaker who is
clearly a student asks a question.
Epictetus answers, a conversation develops and it becomes impossible to
tell who is speaking. Visitors,
characters from mythology, public figures, Socrates and other philosophers make
their appearances in these conversations and often enough Epictetus talks to
himself and presents several positions.
In this translation I have followed the punctuation of Schenkl’s Greek
text in most places but, as can be seen, Schenkl was generally quite sparing, leaving
the reader to decide for himself who is speaking in most places and that
certainly seems to be the best course.
A second consideration is the highly
idiomatic, informal character of Epictetus’ Greek. Occasionally one has the feeling of being at
sea with no compass. A sentence will not
seem to make sense no matter how you read it.
This can be due to vocabulary, some of which is philosophical and
specialized and has to be found in the Liddell-Scott-Jones Greek-English Lexicon where the definition is sometimes clearly
tailor-made to the passage; and some vocabulary
is colloquial or perhaps slang. In addition, unusual word order and grammar
may make translation difficult.
When a passage seems to be a jumble,
you will likely notice a wide variation among the translators. I have referred to four as listed in the
bibliography: George Long who was appointed by Thomas Jefferson as the first
professor of classics at his new University of Virginia, Thomas Wentworth
Higginson who was an editor of The Atlantic Monthly and Emily Dickinson’s
friend and editor, W.A. Oldfather who taught classics at the University of
Illinois from 1909 to 1945 and did the Loeb Epictetus,
and Robert Dobbin who is a contemporary classicist living in
California. Of these my own clear
favorite is Long whose English is unusually lucid and true to the text and who
is much more likely than the others to point out difficulties in the Greek.
Reading Epictetus requires
considerable effort and you may well ask, Is It Worth It? My own opinion is very definitely Yes. But let me quote from Long’s introduction to
his translation:
“Upton remarks that 'there are many passages in these
dissertations which are ambiguous or rather confused on account of the small
questions, and because the matter is not expanded by oratorical copiousness,
not to mention other causes.' The discourses of Epictetus, it is supposed, were
spoken extempore, and so one thing after another would come into the thoughts
of the speaker (Wolf). Schweighaeuser also observes in a note (ii., 336 of his
edition) that the connection of the discourse is sometimes obscure through the
omission of some words which are necessary to indicate the connection of the
thoughts. The reader then will find that he cannot always understand Epictetus,
if he does not read him very carefully, and some passages more than once. He
must also think and reflect, or he will miss the meaning. I do not say that the
book is worth all this trouble. Every man must judge for himself. But I should
not have translated the book, if I had not thought it worth study; and I think
that all books of this kind require careful reading, if they are worth reading
at all.”
A more florid recommendation by Walt
Whitman is quoted by Traubel in his biography.
Whitman was familiar with Epictetus from his teenage years on and very
fond of reading him in his old age. He
told Traubel, “Epictetus is the one of all my old cronies who has lasted to
this day without cutting a diminished figure in my perspective. He belongs with the best of the great
teachers – a universe in himself. He sets me free in a flood of light – of
life, of vista.”
An 18th century drawing of Epictetus with an
inscription, an elegiac couplet from the Greek Anthology, Book VII, epigram
676. This is printed opposite the title
page of John Adams’ copy of the Enchiridion published in London in 1715 which
is now in the Boston Public Library.
Δοῦλος Επίκτητος γενόμην καὶ σῶμ’ανάπηρος
καὶ πενίην Ἶρος καὶ φίλος ἀθανάτοις.
A slave, I was Epictetus, crippled in body and poor as
Irus and I was a friend to the gods.
(Irus is the beggar in Odyssey XVIII)
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