Wisdom of Diogenes

At around 405 BC Diogenes was born in Sinope. Sometime during his life in Sinope, he went to Delphi’s oracle and the oracle said to him, to “debase the currency.” After that occasion, he got banished from Sinope. We should get this “debasement of currency” not literally, but symbolically. Symbolically, it meant to reject traditional values.

When asked what was the most beautiful thing, Diogenes answered, parrhesia. That is freedom of speech. Parrhesia was best expressed during Alexander the Great’s visit to Diogenes. All the great philosophers greeted Alexander after his return from the campaign. Diogenes didn’t even care. So, Alexander visited him. Alexander said, that he would give Diogenes whatever he wanted. Diogenes' answer was, “stand out of my light.” When the Dog was searching for something in the bones, Alexander asked what he was searching for. Diogenes answered, “your father’s bones, but I can’t differentiate them from slaves.”

Sometimes Diogenes would go to the theater when the play was over. On some occasions, he would walk backwards. One could say that he was insane, but it was the case. Epictetus in Discourses says, that Diogenes was a “spy” sent by Zeus to guide humans to a better life. Indeed, when Philip the Second’s guards captured him and asked what he was doing, Diogenes said that he was a spy. We see how he didn’t care to pay a court to a ruler, unlike other philosophers. On one occasion Diogenes was washing lettuces. Plato looked at this and said, “had you paid court to Dionysius, you wouldn’t now be washing lettuces,”. Diogenes replied, “If you had washed lettuces, you wouldn’t have paid court to Dionysius.” He had emphasized self-sufficiency and freedom over the lavish living. Being at court meant that he would not be able to practice either of them.

Epictetus in Discourses says that Diogenes had good health. That his body was shining. Indeed, the Cynic way of life requires one to be in a good shape. Crates the Cynic, student of Diogenes, would get mocked while running and exercising. He would reply that he was doing it for his lungs, liver, and heart. Unlike athletes who are training only for the sake of the body, Cynics were training for the sake of body and soul. Antisthenes advised walking barefoot. Cicero was praising Indian sages who got naked in the winter. Musonius Rufus in his lecture said, that we are not only the body or the soul, we are both. Hence exercise should aim to strengthen both at the same time. He advised sleeping on the floor and fasting.

Here you have the philosopher who was tough. He didn’t care what rulers thought of him and thought that he was sent by Zeus to teach humans a good way of life. What was Diogenes' philosophy all about? Diogenes' philosophy was about living in agreement with nature. Stoics later adopted the same doctrine in ethics. But whereas for the Stoics, there was a good thing (virtue), a bad thing (vice), and indifferences (either preferable indifferences or indifferences we would not prefer in natural circumstances), for the Cynics there was only virtue and vice. They didn’t care about fame, about reputation, about income, or anything similar. Acting in agreement with nature meant a primitive life, free of social conventions and constraints. For as we see, when Diogenes was called the Dog, he didn’t take it as an insult.

Dogs can eat in public, procreate in public, and for that matter do anything in public that they would do in private. Diogenes had the same attitude. If something is virtuous in private, then it would not be less virtuous in public. But people go astray. They diverge from nature’s laws. They become hedonistic, weak. They are not shameless and self-sufficient. Cynics aims to heal themselves from these weaknesses. By his virtue of philanthropy, he tries to spread his ideas as much as possible and aid other humans as well.