Seneca philosopher biography

The ancient Roman philosopher, poet, statesman and talented speaker. The biography of Seneca was born approx. His father, known as Seneca the Elder, was an outstanding rhetorician. His father was confident in the advantage of practical activity on philosophy and dreamed of a political career for his sons. For the sake of children, he moved to Rome, and the young years of the younger one passed here.

By philosophy, Seneca was carried away from his youth, his mentors belonged to the school of Roman Stoic Sextius. But the father managed to convince him to engage in state activities. Under the emperor, Caligula Seneca, an already famous writer and speaker, receives the first government position - the questor - and is part of the Senate. One of his speeches in the Senate caused such an envy of Caligula that he ordered to kill Seneca.

He survived only because the emperor assured that Seneca was sick and would not live long. Under Claudia, the philosopher was sent to exile to Corsica in 41. Seneca helped to return to the Empress Agrippina the youngest. In 50, he was chosen a praetor and married Pompey Paulin, a rich and influential woman. Agrippina entrusted him with raising her only son Nero, who was then twelve years old.

For five years, Seneca was one of his educators, he was the author of the inauguration speech of Nero and during his reign reached the heights of power and wealth. After the murder of Agrippina and the death of a friend, the commander of Burra in 62, Seneca departed and wanted to return Nero to Nero all the wealth received from him, but Nero refused to accept them back.

The departure from business could no longer save the philosopher. Nero felt that the very personality of Seneca, which always embodied the norm and ban for him, was a certain barrier in his way. And when the conspiracy of Pison was disclosed in 65, Nero, despite the almost proven non -involvement of Seneca, orders his mentor to die. Fulfilling the order of the emperor, Seneca committed suicide; His death reminded contemporaries the death of Socrates.

The works from philosophical works have reached us “dialogs” - 10 small treatises, “moral letters to Lucilia” - the last, final work of Seneca; The treatises “On Blessed Life”, “On Blessings”, “Studies of Nature” and nine tragedies “Medea”, “Fedra”, “Oedipus”, “Agamemnon”, “Frantic Hercules”, “FIEST”, and others. The main ideas of the worldview adhering to the doctrine of the Stoics, Seneca believes that everything consists of matter and God.

The basis of nature is the logos - the mind spilled in all existing and providing inanimate objects "stable state", plants - "growth", animals - "self -movement", and in people and gods, acting as a mind in the proper sense. The brotherhood of people as a creature is a rational person enters one category with the gods and the "community of gods and people" arises, whose monastery is the whole universe.

Everyone is equal in it, for everyone got the soul - a particle of the deity. Senece was close to the ideal of a human community: "We are only members of a huge body. Nature, who created us from the same and the same to the same thing, gave birth to us brothers." There is matter about the soul in man, as in the universe, the body and the soul involved in God: "Praise in a person that cannot be taken or give, which belongs to the person himself.

You will ask what this is? The soul, and in it - a perfect mind." The soul directs the moral development of a person, leads him to virtue, to good, fortunately. The goal of man is to come to virtue through the improvement of his nature, to become a "man of good", and then the sage. Only the sage is able to carry out the ideal norm of behavior about wisdom, but conscience, awareness of the moral norm, distinguishes a moral person, a philosopher, from the crowd: “I will teach you how to find out that you have not yet become wise.

The sage is full of joy, cheerful and unsolvedly serene, he lives on a par with the gods ... But if you strive to earn all kinds of pleasures, then Know that you are as far from wisdom as to joy. " About philosophy, man’s imperfection is overcome by philosophy, which is likened to treatment, healing from vices: "Medicines for the soul are found ancients, but our business is to find how to use them and when." A seeker of the truth should rely on the experience of "people who have investigated the coming path." These people are philosophers, whose teaching can give knowledge of the true good: "After all, a person is a rational being; it means for him the highest good - to fulfill what he is born for." About the friendship of the "man of good" - the one who has not yet become a sage, but is already "in the harbor", contemplates virtue.

He does not seek happiness in external things and does not need anything, even in friends. Not because he wants to live without friends, but because he can. Nevertheless, he knows what real friendship is and appreciates his friends. Friends are not afraid of separation, they can always be together: "A friend should be in our souls, and the soul is always with us." Friends cannot even be separated by death: "And perhaps - if the conversations of the sages are true, and we are waiting for a certain place for all, those whom we imagine disappeared, only went forward."About death as part of the divine will "a man of good" perceives death.

Death is preinstalled by world law and therefore cannot be an unconditional evil: "It is as stupid to be afraid of death as to be afraid of old age ... who does not want to die, he did not want to live. For life is given to us under the condition of death and there is only a path to it itself." But life is not an unconditional blessing: "Everyone cares not about whether they live right, but about how long they will live; meanwhile, living correctly - this is accessible for everyone, to live for a long time - nobody." Each step, each act of Seneca, somehow strives to comprehend, correlate with the chosen ideal, with the moral norm, he does not lose his sense of internal responsibility for the committed for a moment.

He says: "Read my books, seeing in them the search for truth, which I do not know, but I am stubbornly looking." Two states are voluntarily intertwined with the soul: one truly common, accommodating gods and people ... and another to which we are attributed to birth. In this height, he eludes the guard and gains strength in the open sky. She is not in order to have a good day and kill time without boredom, no, she paches and tempers the soul, subordinates life to order, controls actions, indicates what to do and what to refrain from.

There is only one chain that holds us on a leash - a love of life. No need to strive to get rid of this feeling, but it is necessary to reduce its strength. Roman Stoics: Seneca, Epictete, Mark Aurelius. Lucius Anney Seneca, moral letters to Lucilia.