Posts by Don

I have a VERY clunky translation I did of 1005 from French w help from Google translate. Here's the section sans any editing or attempt to clean up:

[5] ... remembering what [you have been taught] and the happiness (that you experienced), take this into account again: [have high hopes] concerning the future and [believe that] the fourfold remedy is powerful precisely in all circumstances: "Nothing to fear from the divinity, nothing to apprehend from death! And it is easy to procure what is good, easy to bear what is dreadful!" As for the reasonings by analogy that he draws, he says, from books, you will know that these formulas are correspondences of twelve or fifteen... [6] ... [on] the questions to be explored, he has provided the most luminous explanations possible, and thinks the same thing [in] all [cases; and] it is in this way, that we can draw [from books] a very great wisdom.

Quote from Cassius

We don't even seem to have an agreed upon title, and I gather all it is referred to is P. Herc. 1005

There isn't one. The title at the end of the scroll is just fragmented: ΠΡΟΣ ΤΟΥΣ.... which is open to interpretation. Is it Against the ... Or For the... or Concerning the... No way to know. P. Herc. 1005 is the safest designation.

Quote from Joshua

Quote

With tagathon literally being a contraction of the definite article (the) with agathon (good), to deinon simply can't be contracted since there are two vowels together: to deinon.

Do you mean aren't two vowels here, Don? I don't know the rules in Greek. Latin often uses verbal elision when two vowels adjoin; genus omne animantum from Lucretius, for instance. Spoken as omnanimantum.

Thanks! Corrected!

Have NOT read yet. Posting for reference:

The Tetrapharmakos (Fourfold Cure) and the Sober Reasoning in Epicurus: A Critical Philosophical Paradigm against the Politicization of Medical Truth?

The Tetrapharmakos (Fourfold Cure) and the Sober Reasoning in Epicurus: A Critical Philosophical Paradigm against the Politicization of Medical Truth?

www.academia.edu

I need to find a better translation and change that WP article.

Quote from Eikadistes

in this case, "the terrible" or "bad", I think, is referring to the general feeling of Pain.

Agreed. I've always found it interesting that "to deinon" is used. With tagathon literally being a contraction of the definite article (the) with agathon (good), to deinon simply can't be contracted since there aren't two vowels together: to deinon. And note what the usual algos refers to "pain (of either mind or body), sorrow, trouble, grief, distress, woe." That's a pretty wide net!

Quote from Kalosyni

And wondering...for the 4th on the list, perhaps instead of "easy to endure" it should say "easy to avoid"?

The word in the fourth line is εὐεκκαρτέρητον.

https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?do…57%3Aentry%3Deu)ekkarte%2Frhtos

Based directly on ἐγκαρτερέω ,

A.persevere or persist in a thing, 2. c. acc., await stedfastly, 3. abs., hold out, remain firm under

The prefix ευ- (eu-) conveys the "easy to do ..."

I get the sense that "the terrible" is "easily endured" precisely in light of PD4: Pain does not last continuously in the flesh; instead, the sharpest pain lasts the shortest time, a pain that exceeds bodily pleasure lasts only a few days, and diseases that last a long time involve delights that exceed their pains.

PS. But I think I understand what you're saying; however, I would respond to that by saying pain isn't easy to avoid. We can avoid some pain by choosing certain paths. But there are some pains that happen by chance and some that just happen by virtue of our being mortal creatures. PD4 and the 4th line (τὸ δὲ δεινὸν εὐεκκαρτέρητον) provide encouragement to see "the terrible" in context. And it's not just "pain" or άλγος in line 4. It's literally "the terrible" τὸ δεινὸν (to deinon) the same word used in our word "dino-saur" terrible lizard. PD4 does use άλγος "pain (of either mind or body), sorrow, trouble, grief, distress, woe" The tetrapharmakos ups the ante with "the terrible".

All hail, Cassius , the Founder of the Feast! May you have the most pleasurable of birthdays!

FYI

File

Where was the Garden of Epicurus? The Evidence from the Ancient Sources and Archaeology

While we will probably never know the exact location of Epicurus’s Garden in ancient Athens, we can take a number of educated guesses.

Don

April 19, 2023 at 11:10 PM

Quote from Matteng

Another prejudice is that Epicureans friendship means to them to isolate with only some few friends from society.

See my article somewhere on this site on the location of the Garden. It was not a convent cut off from society. Supposedly, there was even a sign welcoming passers-by. There was no isolation.

Quote from Matteng

Epicureans would deny that humans are social beings

Oh, the Stoics...

Epicurus stressed the importance of friendship (φίλιας) throughout the extant texts and the history of Epicureasnism. It seems to me that Stoics emphasized duty to the state as a virtue, whereas the Epicureans stressed interpersonal relationships as a virtue.

For example:

VS23. Every friendship is an excellence* in itself, even though it begins in mutual advantage.

* The word used is ἀρετή aretē usually translated as "virtue" in other contexts.

Quote from Kalosyni

Of course in the real world, we need to work and do household upkeep so that we can have suffiency and a certain level of comfort...so there is the necessity of procuring the necessities for the continuation of life.

This made me think of...

VS41 One must laugh and seek wisdom and tend to one's home life and use one's other goods, and always recount the pronouncements of true philosophy.

γελᾶν ἅμα δεῖ καὶ φιλοσοφεῖν καὶ οἰκονομεῖν καὶ τοῖς λοιποῖς οἰκειώμασι χρῆσθαι καὶ μηδαμῇ λήγειν τὰς ἐκ τῆς ὀρθῆς φιλοσοφίας φωνὰς ἀφιέντας.

I would offer a version of the hypothetical.

Riffing on Cassius 's "Epicureans don't live in a cave" and in light of the book I've just started listening to:

What happens to your life if there is no one to remember you? If your memories are solely your own with no one who experienced them with you? Do you need someone to remember you when you die? Do you need someone to mourn you?

I think I know my answer, but I'm going to tag team on this thread with that little question.

Hmm... I'm still struggling with the hypothetical, even in light of your revision.

The **big** difference in taking a year vacation and not remembering and dying and having no memory is that we don't get to interact with the people that do remember after the we die. There's a finality to death that gets lost in the hypothetical. I think I can appreciate what you're trying to do.

To me, that finality has more to do with being content with the idea of dying right now. Have you treated people so you don't regret anything you've done? Have you lived your life as you wished? It's not a YOLO (You Only Live Once) or FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), and we can't - or most likely can't - quit our jobs and run off to live on the beach in Tahiti (or whatever scenario one prefers)... but thinking about dying right now certainly puts things in perspective: relationship, career choices, recreation, etc. Meditare mortem "Meditate on death."

Hmmm....I would think do as little a possible. Memories work both ways: as personal experiences to rerun in one's mind, and shared experiences to be retold with others. If half of that equation is gone, what's the point?

Your scenario sounds a little like dementia. Everyone around the person remembers, but not the person "taking the vacation." How do we deal with friends or family that have dementia?

I would concur with Martin.

The word used there is εὐσυνκρίτοις and seems to possibly be word coined by Epicurus. I've seen it described as referring to men who have to help others and has the meaning of “well constituted, well composed.” (remite a los hombres que han de ayudar a otros y tiene el significado de "bien
constituido, bien compuesto"). And well-compounded, well-constituted, or discriminating, Diog.Oen.1,2.

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, ε , εὔσπολον: , εὐσύγ-κρι^τος

The word also occurs in fragment 3 in the inscription, too:

And so, having described the second reason for the inscription, I now go on to mention my mission and to explain its character and nature.

Having already reached the sunset of my life (being almost on the verge of departure from the world on account of old age), I wanted, before being overtaken by death, to compose a [fine] anthem [to celebrate the] fullness [of pleasure] and so to help now those who are well-constituted. Now, if only one person or two or three or four or five or six or any larger number you choose, sir, provided that it is not very large, were in a bad predicament, I should address them individually and do all in my power to give them the best advice. But, as I have said before, the majority of people suffer from a common disease, as in a plague, with their false notions about things, and their number is increasing

**Excellent** episode, gentlemen!!

I found the last segment talking about the need for gods' bodies to experience pleasure especially insightful. I don't know whether I've ever heard it read that before.

Thanks for the shout-out. We'll get that episode scheduled. I continue to hold an idealist position (not strongly, but that's the way I lean), but I'll look forward to exploring the topic.

You are DEDICATED, Cassius !! Editing on battery power!

These defaced statues bring to mind the countless individual humans and their communities - including but not limited at all to Epicureans - who were persecuted, killed, marginalized, beaten into submission, by the "triumph" of Christianity. Bart Ehrman had reminded us that a "triumph" is not a metaphor in ancient Rome. It is a celebration of the subjugation of your enemy, a parade of their enslaved men, women, and children through the streets of the city. Displaying your power that has hammered an enemy into submission.

The Triumph of Christianity - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Roman triumph - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

How are you doing? Are you directly impacted by the path?

Anyone else want to check in?