Body and Soul in Ancient Philosophy

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Tad Brennan
its function. Why, then, do the Stoics insist that something that is a good
for my body in this sense cannot be a good for me, i. e. contribute to my
happiness?
And how well does this picture of the body’s ethical status fit with
Stoic anthropology? The Stoics certainly did not have the metaphysical
picture of the Phaedo, in which bodies are of a completely different
order and nature from the immaterial, imperishable souls. The Stoics insisted
that souls, too, are corporeal, and that at least some souls are perishable.
5 And turning from metaphysics to anthropology, I think it is
hard to find evidence from the Early Stoa that a human being was identified
with the soul alone, rather than some combination of soul and
body. If, as seems possible from the evidence, they thought that a
human being is a compound of both soul and body, how could they
think that the good of one part of the human being, the good of the
body, is no part of the good of the whole human being?
The question I want to explore in this paper, then, is primarily a
question about Stoic anthropology in relation to Stoic ethics: what
did the Stoics think about the relation between the human body and
the human soul, and how does this fit with their views on the structure
and content of the human good?
II. Antiochus from the De finibus
The ancient text that seems to me to come closest to discussing this
question directly is book 4 of Cicero’s De finibus. In the third book
of the De finibus, Cicero had put a long exposition and defense of
Stoic ethics into the mouth of his friend Cato; now in the fourth
book, Cicero makes himself the mouthpiece for a corresponding critique
of Stoic ethics. The fourth book is commonly thought to derive
its content from Antiochus of Ascalon, Cicero’s Academic teacher. Although
Antiochus is not mentioned by name until the fifth book, the
similarities between the philosophical outlooks of the last two books
have persuaded many people, me among them, that in the fourth
book, Cicero is giving voice to the Antiochean critique of Stoicism.
5 Corporeality: Nemesius 81, 6 –10 = SVF 2.790 = LS 45. Perishability: Eusebius,
PE 15.20.6 = SVF 2.809 = LS 53W.