Introduction

The opponents of Epicureanism in antiquity successfully established a cliche that has remained to this day: the theoretical and practical disinterest of Epicurus and the Epicureans in political communities.

The purpose of this book is to shed light on how political reflection was integrated into Epicurean philosophy and how it influenced the actions and lifestyle of those who subscribed to it. As is well known, no treatise by the Hellenistic philosophers has come down to us. In the catalogues of their works in Diogenes Laertius' Lives of eminent philosophers, the magnitude and thematic heterogeneity of the lost works can be appreciated. These include several works by Epicurus related to the subject of this book: O n Choice and Avoidance, On Piety, On Ways of Life, On Justice and the Other Virtues, On Kingship (DL 10.28). Fortunately, research on Epicureanism in the last decades has considerably expanded the documentary base available for the twofold task at hand. Relevant texts have been recovered from the papyri of Herculaneum of particular significance to our understanding of Epicurean political theory and its doctrinal role in the lives and actions of the Epicureans. Furthermore, the remains of Greek epigraphy and the prosopography of the Roman Epicureans has provided interesting testimonies of the public activities of the Epicureans.

Epicurus' remarks on political theory are contained in the so-called Principal Doctrines. Almost a third of them refer to the Epicurean lifestyle and society. The gnomic and condensed style of Principal Doctrines combines elaborate accounts of the Epicurean view on different matters with an implicit dialogue with the philosophical tradition. Fortunately, in addition to the letters of Epicurus and the testimonies transmitted by Diogenes Laertius, we can count on the Vatican Sayings, discovered in 1888, and on two other texts from early Epicureanism.

This book is structured around two key questions: what, according to Epicureanism, are political communities; and what are the connections between the way of life that Epicureanism espouses and its understanding of the nature of political communities? Both questions are entirely in the tradition of Greek philosophy. Cicero excludes Epicureanism from ‘the true and elegant philosophy' [verae elegantisque philosophiae; Tusc. 4.6] which originated with Socrates and was preserved by the Peripatetics, the Stoics and the Academics. However, Epicurus and the Epicureans, despite their intemperate rhetorical references to the philosophers of the past and to their contemporary rivals, answer these questions through an ongoing dialogue with the Greek philosophical tradition.

In Laws 10 Plato presents the physicalist cosmogony and the contractual theory as two faces of the same disease (Laws 888b8) and condemns its harmful fusion as impious and subversive, perhaps with Archelaus the disciple of Anaxagoras in mind. The Epicureans understand philosophy as a study of nature [a ‘physiology': φυσιολογfα], from which they raise the question ‘what are political communities?' Epicurus may have been inspired by Archelaus, whom according to Diogenes Laertius he valued positively (DL 10.12).

We will now focus on the argumentative structure of the book (something we will revisit later in the summaries of the chapters). Contractualist theories include descriptions of the agents of the pact. Epicurean texts offer two, because they differentiate the covenants that establish justice from the later ones that required laws and sanctions to fulfil the purposes implied by the former. This purpose is expressed in the doctrinal formula ‘neither harming one another nor being harmed' ( PD 33) and its achievement is the security which, as Hermarchus and Lucretius stress, made possible the survival of human beings. In Epicureanism security means the satisfaction of natural desires and confidence regarding their future satisfaction and ‘the danger of violent death'. Thus, justice is for Epicureans a modality of the useful, as can be seen especially in the above-mentioned excerpt from Hermarchus. The typology of the actors in the two pacts differs.

Like any other political model, the Epicurean paradigm has a compelling normative or regulative character. The Epicurean genealogical approach to justice and laws, we hold, is also the theoretical framework from which this normative component is derived. The normative or regulative function of the Epicurean political model is embodied in the preconception [πρoληψις] of the just. Cicero (ND 1.43-4) ascribes to Epicurus the achievement of having coined the term πρoληψις and his testimony is now widely accepted. At the risk of being repetitive, it is worth noting that although Epicurus' two most extensive Principal Doctrines (PD 37 and 38) deal precisely with the preconception of the just, the opponents of the Epicureans in antiquity do not even mention them. PD 37 and 38 discuss the dynamics arising from the relationship between the just and the legal in political communities. The prolepsis of the just operates as a canon of the usefulness of the laws; that is, of their suitability to the purpose of the pact (‘neither harming one another nor being harmed'). The Epicureans embedded the collective ownership of the preconception of the just in language and explains their acquisition and continuity through the world's conceptualization, involving the transmission and learning of language.

The documentary basis of the first three chapters consists mainly of Epicurean texts. The anti-Epicurean literature of antiquity provides neither testimonies nor considerations of the elements of Epicureanism's political reflection that we have indicated. Consequently, nor does it deal with their contribution to the treatment of the Epicurean way of life. This is undoubtedly a very significant fact that underlines the relevance of examining the interpretative procedures of the opponents of Epicureanism. For this reason, the purpose of chapter 4 is to examine the interpretative strategies followed by Cicero, Plutarch and Lactantius to disqualify Epicureanism. Above all, we are interested in pointing out the contributions of Cicero, Plutarch and Lactantius to the formation of a certain forma mentis, already present in antiquity, that has determined how Epicurus and his doctrines are read and understood. Our examination of them as readers of Epicureanism, we suggest, might eventually shed some light on how the philosophical diatribes of antiquity influenced the transmission of Greek philosophy (especially of Epicureanism) to posterity. The cliche of the theoretical and practical disinterest of Epicurus and the Epicureans in political communities stems from this kind of philosophical literature. If these anti-Epicurean diatribes, as we have indicated, omit the political reflections of Epicureanism, it is entirely reasonable to wonder about the apoliticism that they attribute to Epicurus and the Epicureans. We consider that this question can be answered on two complementary levels. On the one hand, by reconstructing the model of the Epicurean sage derived from the literature of antiquity and, on the other, through the collection of testimonies and documents about the social interaction of Epicurus and the Epicureans. We deal with these tasks in chapters 5 and 6, respectively. Both converge in a picture of Epicurus' and the Epicureans' interaction with their political communities that is far more complex, varied and interesting than the anti-Epicurean tradition has allowed.

The general approach outlined above is articulated as follows in the six chapters of the book. In the first chapter we consider the Epicurean genealogy of justice and the laws. First of all, we analyse what the conception of justice involves. We show that, contrary to what might be expected, such a genealogical pattern does not lead to conventionalist and relativistic views like those of the Sophists. The Epicureans examine the just as a modality of the useful, making use of the Hellenistic category of the relative [τo πρoς τι]. The just is not conventional, being constrained by conformity to the purpose established in the first pacts of human communities (pacts based on the basic agreement ‘neither harming one another nor being harmed'). This conformity is always determined by circumstances. In the Epicureans' view, the geographical diversity and temporal variability of justice pertains precisely to its unconventional character. Secondly, we explore the stages and actors of the Epicurean genealogy of justice and law. We emphasize its continuity with the rationalistic attempts to explain the origin of living beings and civilized life in society and stress that the traditional opposition between disordered and bestial primitive life and civilized human life receives an interesting reformulation in Epicureanism. This is so, we argue, because Epicureans did not view pre-social primitive life as ‘Hobbesian'; they rather contrasted this primitive state of human beings not only with the arrival of human groups and justice, but also with the subsequent stage in which it became necessary to establish laws and sanctions due to the complexity of societies, the weakening of the awareness of the usefulness of the pacts, and the dissolution of the bonds that had made pacts possible in the first place. According to Lucretius, the gradual ‘softening', or humanization, of human beings makes possible the birth of a pact amongst what he terms neighbours [finitimi], people immersed not in a state of ‘war of all against all' due to vain and irrational desires but in affective relations such as friendship and pity for the weak. The utility and the relations of friendship (established between individuals humanized by the use of fire, housing and family life) are the two causes through which Lucretius explained the origin of human associations capable of forming pacts of justice. Finally, against those who argue that it is incoherent to appeal to friendship as the essential cause of the origin of justice within a hedonistic theory, we maintain that such readings presuppose a too sharp distinction between altruism and selfishness, a view that does not seem applicable to the way in which interpersonal relations were conceived in the ancient world.

We argue that the Epicurean programme of philosophy includes a remarkable naturalistic genealogy that attributes the survival of human beings to the security derived from the creation of justice and laws. Chapter 2 aims to show how Epicureanism develops the category of security to conceptualize the philosophical life it proposes. We emphasize the continuity between the recognition that Epicureans give to the security provided by political communities and the discussions that ancient literature dedicates to security [ασφαλεια], safety or preservation [σωτηρfα], and freedom from fear [αδεια, αφοβfα] in texts concerned with the genealogy of civilized life, the ‘civil strife' [στασις] and the good order [ευνομfα]. As we have indicated, in Epicureanism security means satisfaction of natural desires, but also confidence regarding their future satisfaction and the danger of violent death. Security, both physical and psychological, is recognized in ancient literature as a constituent element of the polis. Epicurus extends this approach and presents security as the good of nature [τo της φυσεως αγαθoν] and as an end according to what is naturally congenial (κατα τo της φυσεως οiκειον ; PD 7), which establishes an interesting consistency between our nature and the purpose of pacts, justice and laws. Epicureanism bases this consistency on the natural desires which are limited and have generic objects that are easy to satisfy. We then consider some of the approaches that Epicureanism has to understanding the genealogy of false beliefs that give rise to irrational fears of gods and death. This genealogy seems to have been of special interest to the Epicureans due to the doctrinal contrast that they establish between the true piety, based on the preconception [πρoληψις] of the gods, and common or popular assumptions about the gods. One of the most interesting contributions of Epicureanism, the link between the fear of death and ambition for power, is also framed in this genealogy. Finally, we examine the Epicurean idea of security, that is, ‘the purest security' [εiλικρινεστατη ασφαλεια; PD 14] that Epicureanism advocates. To be sure, the Epicureans assume the positive attributes that recognize contractual security. Thus, unlike the Cynics, they claim that care without anguish for one's property is a legitimate means of strengthening tranquillity and minimizing fear. The limitation of natural desires, friendship and philanthropy are, in the Epicureans' view, the main factors that give the purest security to the Epicurean way of life. Their fusion reinforces the liberation from irrational fears and desires and establishes an attitude of gratitude towards the past, satisfaction towards the present and confidence in the future, which gives unity and stability to Epicurean life, properties that are highlighted in the two most representative figures of the Greek political imagery: the ship and the body.

In chapter 3 we deal with the preconception of the just. The term πρoληψις (‘preconception', ‘prolepsis') was coined by Epicurus and, as we have indicated, the two most extensive Principal Doctrines ( PD 37 and 38) treat the preconception of the just. Firstly, we provide some general clarifications regarding what Epicurus calls ‘the just of nature' (PD 31) to explain the connections between justice and usefulness. Next, we set out to clarify our claim that, within the domain of the Epicurean contractual model, justice can be considered a ‘modality of utility' and the prolepsis of the just a canon which validates the just. Secondly, we examine how the criteria of truth work in Epicurean epistemology and show that in the practical domain confirmation has specific features that PD 37 and 38 underline. Opinions are not properly contrasted with bodies or properties of bodies, but by an examination of their practical consequences, that is, the advantageousness or disadvantageousness of the actions that are based on determined opinions. In our view, the preconception of the just possesses a functional or ‘operative' nature, as it were, which makes it a criterion to evaluate empirically the ‘truth' of certain convictions about justice, embodied in the laws, out of their adequacy for the sake of not harming one another nor being harmed (PD 31 to 33; 35). Due to the variation in the circumstances, the validation itself is temporary: what has been confirmed or counter-witnessed in the present as just, may not have been confirmed or counter-witnessed in the same terms in the past or may not be confirmed or counter-witnessed in the future. Finally, we explore where Epicureanism locates the ownership of the preconception of the just. We reject interpretations that locate the prolepsis of the just in the constitution that rules over the life of a community or which distinguish a hierarchical and historical plurality of preconceptions of the just; in this way we attempt to show that the Epicureans embedded the collective ownership of the preconception of the just in language. We underline the relevance of an ingredient of experience that is not usually considered when dealing with Epicurean preconception's empirical genesis: the transmission and acquisition of language.

As aforementioned, chapters 4, 5 and 6 are more ‘informative' and ‘doxographical' in character, although, as will be seen, they provide historical and doctrinal data that help reinforce our view that the Epicureans were not indeed averse to political life. Chapter 4 faces a well-known subject: how Epicurus and Epicureanism were received already in antiquity. There we dispute the reading that three prominent ancient writers made of Epicurus and his followers. Our struggle is against the interpretive procedures employed by Cicero, Plutarch and Lactantius - who were very hostile to Epicureanism - while examining Epicurean views. Our purpose is to show how decisive these ancient writers were in forging the traditional negative image of Epicureanism, as well as how their version of Epicureanism contributed to demoting Epicurean political reflection. These writers share several characteristics that demonstrate clearly their destructive intentions as well as the harmfulness of their account of Epicurus: (i) the reconstruction of Epicurean views drawing from the absolutization of decontextualized or mutilated slogans, or through the omission of certain views;

(ii) the consideration of Epicurean assertions based on the supposed ‘germs of danger' they contain and their repercussions at the level of social practice; and

(iii) the banalization of Epicurus' hedonism. Indeed, these are the three interpretive resources most frequently used by Cicero, Plutarch and Lactantius when disparaging Epicureanism. At any rate, the important point in chapter 4 is that if our knowledge of Epicurean philosophy depended exclusively on people like Cicero or Plutarch, we would practically be unaware of the political component of the Epicurean study of nature, and of its contribution t o the grounds of the Epicurean way of life.

Both the philosophers of the classical Greek period (Plato and Aristotle) and those of the Hellenistic era (Stoics, Epicureans and Sceptics) put forward their own version of a proverbial motif from ancient culture: the image of the sage. In chapter 5 we present the model of the Epicurean wise man and we investigate how it delineates the social interaction of the sage. We contrast Epicurean and Stoic sages and suggest that, contrary to what is claimed in several indirect sources, the Epicurean sage was interested in having a link with his polis. An Epicurean sage lives in and contributes to the development and well-being of the political community in which he lives as a citizen. In this characterization of the Epicurean sage, respect for laws and institutions, as well as a friendly attitude towards his homeland, play an important role. In order to deepen this characterization, we analyse an issue that Epicurus raised in his Puzzles [Aιαπορ(αι]: whether the wise Epicurean, knowing that he will not be discovered, will carry out actions contrary to the laws. In our view, this passage evokes the story of the Ring of Gyges in Plato's Republic, but yet the figure of Gyges represents neither a challenge nor a fascination for the Epicureans. We stress the biased reading of Cicero in On Duty (Off. 3.38-39) of the Epicurean view regarding the story of Gyges and Plutarch's mischievous interpretation of Epicurus' reply to the above-mentioned passage from the Puzzles. We note that both omit the role of the study of nature [ φυσιολογfα] and prudence [ φρoνησις] in the motivations and decisions of the Epicurean sage when analysing the topics mentioned. Both suggest that the reason Epicureans refrain from crime is the fear of being discovered and punished. The Epicurean sage, we argue, does not act out of fear of punishment, but, on the contrary, disregards behaviours authorized by the law and goes beyond what is required by law in social relations, cultivating friendship, philanthropy and gratitude. We also note the importance of self-sufficiency for the Epicurean sage and state that, far from being an egoistic property of the sage, self-sufficiency involves a social dimension and thereby an engagement with the law. Finally, we show how two communal ingredients of life, friendship and justice, occupy a central place in two fundamental doctrinal resources of the picture of Epicurean sage: the biographical tradition of the ‘imitation of Epicurus' [imitatio Epicurei] and ‘becoming like god' [δμοfωσις θεω].

In chapter 6 we endeavour to answer the question as to how apolitical Epicurus and the Epicureans actually were. We use the term ‘apolitical' in a broad sense to refer to political participation and social interaction. Our purpose in this chapter is twofold: on the one hand, we are concerned with examining the various tenets by which the adversaries of the Epicureans ascribe to them a kind of apoliticism and hostility to political communities. On the other hand, the chapter attempts to highlight various aspects of the interaction between Epicurus and the Epicureans and the societies in which they developed their philosophy. We first show how Cicero, Epictetus and Plutarch ground the apoliticism of the Epicureans on their refusal of the premise that human beings are naturally sociable. Their argumentation is highly rhetorical, as is usual in the philosophical diatribes of antiquity and they ignore the political approaches of the Epicureans and downgrade the Epicurean assessment of motivations and ambitions in politics which, at least since Socrates, had been inherent to the process of philosophical self-definition in Greece. The polemical strategy of these adversaries to Epicureanism, we state, involves historical levity since they were not interested in scrupulously reporting details of their lifestyle but rather in discounting their philosophical status. In sections 3, 4 and 5 of this chapter we are concerned precisely with presenting heterogeneous testimonies of the lifestyle of Epicurus and of numerous Epicureans that refute the apoliticism that has traditionally been attributed to them. We show how the testimonies about Epicurus' life and his testament do not paint a picture of a person shut away in Epicurus' school (the Garden) and isolated from the life of Athens, but of someone who, while refusing to participate actively in politics, respected the laws and institutions of the city, participated in its worship and piety, integrated family relationships into the exercise of philosophy, and cultivated numerous and heterogeneous friendships, including with influential politicians. Furthermore, on the basis of Epicurean texts and epigraphic documents from various Greek cities, we show how numerous Epicureans belonging to the upper classes served as advisers to kings, distinguished diplomats, ambassadors, priests of the imperial and local cult, and even as prophets, without their status as Epicureans being perceived as a problem. Finally, we present several examples of illustrious Roman Epicureans who were involved in the most important political events in Rome in the first century âñ; we highlight that Philodemus in On the Good King According to Homer is concerned with showing how the Epicurean philosopher can be useful and advise the ruler. In sum, the testimonies analysed paint a much more complex and fascinating picture of the theoretical and practical relationship between Epicurus (and the Epicureans) and their political communities than is present in the writings of the anti-Epicurean tradition.

To conclude: all Epicurean scholars know that Epicurus has been venerated and reviled as a philosopher since ancient times. A significant example of veneration is the philosopher-poet Lucretius (one of the main protagonists of this book) who holds that it was Athens, with its illustrious name, that gave the wheat-producing seed to wretched mortals that restored life and fixed the laws. It was also Athens that gave them ‘the sweet relief of life' when she gave birth to ‘that man of such great talent, from whose true lips everything was spread, and from whom, even after his death, his divine discoveries have carried his glory, which has been revealed since ancient times' (Lucretius, RN 6.1-8). Epicurus also received very bad press in antiquity: Cicero disapproves of his physics because he maintains that it is only a kind of deformation of Democritus's ideas (Fin. 1.17). Later in the same work, Cicero complains that Epicurus' doctrines are attractive because the crowd thinks that he maintains that actions correct and honest in themselves produce joy [ laetitia ], that is, pleasure ( voluptas; Fin. 1.25). But as already indicated above, likely the most illustrative example of this approach is the Christian apologist Lactantius: he states disparagingly that, although Epicurus' doctrine was always more famous than that of others, this was not because it revealed some truth, but because the word pleasure, ‘which is so popular', attracts many. Besides, as Lactantius continues, no one is immune to vices. The apologist says that all Epicurus cared about was attracting a large number of people to his cause and making them all happy: the lazy person is forbidden to learn the letters, the greedy man is allowed not to give alms, the indolent person is forbidden to hold public office, the obese one to exercise, the fearful man is forbidden to join the army, and the irreligious are satisfied when they hear Epicurus say that the gods do not care about anything. This is so, Lactantius concludes, because the wise man does everything in his own interest (Div. Inst. 3.17, 2-5).

These three descriptions of Epicurus are surely overemphasized and probably inaccurate: the ‘sweet reliefs of human life' did not appear with Epicurus nor were his physics so trivial as to be a mere paraphrase of that of Democritus. Additionally, Epicurus was not interested in gaining adherents to his cause by justifying any action at any cost. If one reads his texts and tries to understand them, one quickly notices that, no matter how objectionable the Epicurean project may have seemed to various ancient writers, no one remained indifferent to his theses and arguments. Although in the popular imagination Epicurus is generally remembered for his ethical doctrines, we know he tried to formulate an explanation of reality that covered all of its aspects. He built up a philosophical system in which the different parts of philosophy (canonical, physical and ethical; DL 10.29-30) were interrelated, and in which all of them had a raison d’etre. Political reflection also occupied an important place in this system. It is distressing to recognize the pitiful state in which Epicurus' work came down to us and the fragmentary material through which we must reconstruct the theories and arguments of Epicureanism about human society and the Epicurean way of life. Nevertheless, as can be seen, the few surviving texts of Epicurus and the Epicureans offer enough material to justify this study of their political reflections. One of its main attractions is that it constitutes the best evidence we have of the naturalistic approach of the ancients to the treatment of polis, justice and laws, a perspective that the great works of political reflection written by Plato and Aristotle overshadowed. The naturalistic approaches of Epicureanism do not entail primitivism or crude relativism. Nor do they imply ‘presentism' (i.e. the philosophical view that only present things exist). The Epicureans recognize in the political community a reality which, to paraphrase Aristotle's words, is not restricted to the vicissitudes of the day (Pol. 1252b16), nor to what is convenient in the present. The political community looks at life as a whole (EN 1160a21-22; Porphyry, Abst. 1.7 2) and provides human beings with security, one of whose elements, as the Epicureans repeatedly emphasize, is confidence regarding the future satisfaction of natural desires and the danger of violent death.

In her magisterial 1994 book The Therapy of Desire, M. C. Nussbaum observes that when one discusses the issue of politics regarding the Epicureans, ‘things are already more complicated. Epicurus himself strongly discourages active involvement in the political community and treats justice as merely instrumental to one's freedom from disturbance'. According to Nussbaum, Epicurus is ‘very much concerned with the body and its needs,... with structures of community, and the ways in which these can help human beings meet their needs.'³ We do not think, though, that Epicurus was concerned with ‘structures of community' solely because they help humans meet their needs. Indeed, the satisfaction of human needs was an important part of Epicurus' worries, but he did not reduce such needs to their physico-biological aspects. Even though a body with its soul is a body, human beings have interests that go beyond the bodily needs associated with their desire and the satisfaction of those desires. The interaction of Epicurus and the Epicureans with their political communities was not restricted to the space of satisfying needs. As indicated above, the testimonies about Epicurus paint a picture of someone who was involved in the laws and institutions of his city. According to Epicurus, pleasant living not only implies living prudently and justly [φρον(μως καi δικα(ως], but also honourably (καλως ; LM 132; PD 5). Nonetheless, Epicurus' interaction with Athens, and that of the Epicureans with their political communities more generally, was not restricted to actions dictated by living prudently and justly but was also related to the desire to live honourably, a way of life that their doctrine advocated through friendship and philanthropy.

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