Greece & Rome · c. 50–135
Epictetus
Freed slave who taught Stoicism at Nicopolis
Taught that some things are up to us, namely our judgements, desires and choices, and everything else is not; we are disturbed not by events but by our opinions about them. He wrote nothing himself; his student Arrian recorded his lectures.
Life and thought
Epictetus was born a slave in Hierapolis in Phrygia around 50 CE and served in Rome under Epaphroditus, a freedman of Nero’s household, who let him study with the Stoic Musonius Rufus. Once freed, he taught in Rome until Domitian expelled the philosophers around 93, then opened a school at Nicopolis in western Greece, where he taught until his death. He was lame, perhaps from mistreatment. He wrote nothing; his student Arrian took notes that became the Discourses and the short handbook, the Enchiridion.
His teaching starts from one distinction: some things are up to us, namely our judgements, desires and choices, and everything else is not, including body, property, reputation and office. Unhappiness comes from treating what is not up to us as if it were. “It is not things that disturb us, but our judgements about things”: if you are insulted, the harm lies in your own judgement. For a former slave, freedom was therefore inner. The Enchiridion was adapted for Christian monks, admired in the Renaissance and drawn on by modern cognitive therapy.