The history of Diogenes of Sinope, peripatetic philosopher, rascal and hound, is now told in numerous tales which, we must state frankly, may or may not be true. Put bluntly, who knows? Who now, millennia later than a man claimed to have lived between roughly 412-323 BCE, can even hazard a guess? Yet we do know that he was remembered and that writers and biographers in the Hellenistic Roman world were interested in memorialising the man known as a dog and that he was someone famous in that world for the anecdotes told about him and the character revealed in them. This, in itself, is something noteworthy for it is not the fate of every, or even most, human beings to be remembered centuries, let alone millennia, after their death.
One person who took it upon himself to record a broad swathe of the history of Greek philosophers was Diogenes Laertius. He was likely active in the first half of the third century CE and so at least 500-550 years after Diogenes had lived. In his Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, which is now our major secondary source for Greek philosophy and philosophers, he recorded, in ways most experts think largely impartial and unexpanded, although certainly also largely uncritically, the details of the lives, opinions, sayings and deeds of Greek philosophers as much as he was aware of them. Often there would be differences of opinion - some said this happened, others said that, etc., - but Diogenes Laertius would then simply record the variants he was aware of and leave it to readers to decide what to do with the information. His book is not a philosophical book and neither does he himself set out to discover the truth of the matters he reports. Instead, he supplies a compendium of tales and leaves it largely at that. I have, so far, spoken about “his book”. But, in fact, Diogenes Laertius wrote 10 books in what was, in reality, a multi-volume work. Some philosophers, such as Plato or Epicurus, get a volume all to themselves [books 3 and 10 respectively] whereas others cover the notables from philosophical schools such as the Stoics or the Pythagoreans, etc. It is in book 6 that Diogenes Laertius turns his attention to The Cynics and the second philosopher he deals with under this rubric is Diogenes of Sinope. I want to survey this material now to present a picture of that philosopher whom, so it is said, even Alexander the Great wished to be if he could not be Alexander.
Diogenes was originally the son of a banker, Hicesias, on the southern coast of the Black Sea which is now northern Turkey but which was then colonised by Greeks. It is said that during his time in Sinope working with his father the currency that his father was in charge of, this being the coins that he was responsible for minting, became deliberately debased, making them worthless. For this his father, or Diogenes, or both of them, were imprisoned and banished respectively. Diogenes lost all his possessions and his citizenship as a result of this incident, for which he was exiled, and which has since been historically verified through archaeology in modern day Sinop which has revealed lots of coins which were deliberately debased in the mid 4th century BCE. This, as one powerful, and likely truthful, incident is extrapolated as an explanation of the later public character of Diogenes, a man who would debase and destroy the numismatic lifeblood of civilisation itself and attempt to make commerce impossible. Indeed, this very story of the currency being defaced was later metaphorically applied to Diogenes’ activity more generally and he was regarded as the debaser and defacer of civilisation itself.
After his exile from Sinope, and as a stateless individual, Diogenes next turned up in Athens where it is said he attached himself to the philosopher Antisthenes. Antisthenes had been a student of Socrates himself, a revered philosophical figure of the time and one in whose shadow many later philosophers would stand. Yet it seems that Antisthenes was not keen to accept Diogenes as his student and even took to beating him with a stick in order to dissuade him. Yet the tale told about this makes sure to tell us that Diogenes was steadfast and resolute in his desire to be taught by the words of such an eminent philosophical figure. This is presented as Diogenes being desirous of both virtue and wisdom when he says, “Strike, for you will not find any stick hard enough to drive me away as long as you continue to speak."
At this point we learn of Diogenes’ “simple mode of life”, something explained as one consequence of his loss of possessions, citizenship and exile but also as a result of his observance, and learning from, nature. So we are told that Diogenes learns to wander about without worrying where he will sleep from a mouse and that he utilised his cloak, his only garment, as a bed. He carried a wallet, a bag over his shoulder, to carry scraps of food and used the natural environment as his dining room, his meeting room and his bedroom. Also related here is that, being unable to secure permanent accommodations, he made use of a discarded cask or barrel for such purposes and without any hint of shame or disgrace in his homeless state. Seeing a child drinking water out of its hands, Diogenes learns to do without a cup and, in similar wise, he learns to use a hunk of bread as a spoon, dispensing with the latter utensil as well. Here “simplicity” was an express aim of the virtue of Diogenes. Being constantly outside in such circumstances, it is related that Diogenes took to purposely innuring himself to environmental conditions, rolling in hot sands in summer and embracing snow covered statues in winter, the better to deal with extremes of temperature. He also wore no shoes. In matters of sustenance he was said to content himself with plain food and drinking only water. In matters of bodily functions, including masturbation, he carried them out in the open air and where he might be seen, such as in the marketplace, again without shame or disgrace as any other innocent creature might do. It seems Diogenes did not favour marriage as is expressed in the anecdote in which he replied to a questioner asking when a man should marry, "Young men ought not to marry yet, and old men never ought to marry at all." He did not practice a pride in appearance or the flattering of others by such means and is reported to have said to a youth smartening himself up very carefully, ''If you are doing that for men, you are miserable; and if for women, you are profligate." Diogenes in his habitual appearance and practices, then, disdained common yet artificial standards in favour of an uncivilised life.
What Diogenes is not presented as is a man shy of expressing opinions or as one who hides himself away from the business or discourse of others. As one old English translation of the account of Diogenes Laertius puts it, “He was very violent in expressing his haughty disdain of others.” Diogenes, in fact, is presented as someone very clever with words and a master of the put down. On numerous occasions he is depicted bandying words with others, from slavers to people who are hosting him to notables such as Plato, and on each occasion he showcases a caustic wit which is often deeply critical of some thought or idea or current practice whilst utilising clever wordplay at the same time. For example, he calls the “discussions” Plato has [which is to say his philosophy, in Greek his ‘diatribe’] “disguises” [in Greek ‘katatribe’] intending to suggest that what Plato and his hearers regard as the greatest of philosophies, philosophies which are revealing the order of things are, in fact, shrouds thrown over reality which turn it into something it is not. Diogenes is also notable for numerous broadly political observations which are critical of the “civilised” context of a Greek city such as Athens. He criticises the Dionysian festivals which were at the heart of Greek cultural life, the Olympic games which were of similar stature in Greek cultural life and denounces demagogues as “ministers of the multitude”. Sometimes he is dismissive of human beings in general as when he is reported to have thought of them as the most stupid beings of all or as in when, asked where in Greece he saw human beings, he answers “Nowhere”. In general terms it can be said that there are many examples of sayings where Diogenes bewails the fact that human beings do not attend to their virtue, which is a matter of asking what is really valuable for human beings in who they are and how they live, or to its pursuit and that he denigrates human beings generally for that fact.
We can see examples of this type of thinking in examples such as the following:
He used also to say, "That the musicians fitted the strings to the lyre properly, but left all the habits of their soul ill-arranged." And, "That mathematicians kept their eyes fixed on the sun and moon, and overlooked what was under their feet." “That orators were anxious to speak justly, but not at all about acting so." Also, "That misers blamed money, but were preposterously fond of it." He often condemned those who praise the just for being superior to money, but who at the same time are eager themselves for great riches. He was also very indignant at seeing men sacrifice to the Gods to procure good health, and yet at the sacrifice eating in a manner injurious to health.”
One thing exampled primarily in these anecdotes is Diogenes’ preference for practice over discussion. Diogenes was not a man who extemporised at great length about theoretical ideas regarding virtue or philosophy or politics. In fact, one of his criticisms of Plato, and one of his caricatures of him, was as a talker. In another story we learn that Diogenes, being read out huge passages at length, exclaimed to those about him, “Be of good cheer, my friends, I see land!” when the reading stopped. He, in distinction, was a man who concentrated very much on the practical, the living, the doing. The virtuous life for Diogenes, and he is presented as one who sought it, for all his antagonistic activities in dialogue with Greek civilisation, was one you lived and not one you wrote books about or gave lectures about. We can, then, imagine Diogenes wanting to observe how someone lived to judge their virtue rather than being told to read a book someone had written about it or to attend one of their lectures. We may also see his manner of living as the substance of his philosophy and his practice of virtue. He extended this practical cast of mind even to himself, of course, and seems to have seen his own, often arrogant pronouncements or put downs as teaching for the masses he regarded as unenlightened in matters of virtue. For example, a story is told of Diogenes becoming a prisoner and being sold as a slave. When asked what he can do as a potential slave he answers “Govern men.” He then goes on to tell the master of the sale to announce him to potential buyers as “a master” that a buyer may purchase for himself.
Diogenes’ virtue was very anti-civilisation and anti-customary. He seems to have argued that all things belong to the wise and the following argument is provided:
“Everything belongs to the gods; and wise men are the friends of the gods. All things are in common among friends; therefore everything belongs to wise men."
Here, although Diogenes acknowledged the gods, which were ubiquitously recognised throughout the world of his day, he was no fan of superstition. An example here is a tale told about a woman who bent down to honour the gods and exposed herself at which point Diogenes made a pithy comment about the god standing behind her and seeing her so exposed. His point, of course, was that such a thing was mere superstition and, as such, a nonsense. In the same way, in another anecdote, he disdained the notion of purificatory ablutions. Diogenes likewise despised logic which was logic for the sake of upholding the principle of logic, logic being a human theory and not the practice of nature. So it being argued logically that Diogenes had horns, in one anecdote, he puts his hand on his forehead in an attempt to find them and exclaims that he cannot see them.
But although Diogenes opposed many customs and theoretical aspects of civilisation, examples here might be money which he opposed with poverty, law which he opposed with the workings of nature and superstition which he opposed with everyday experience, he was a man who did use reason and his virtue was not presented as unreasonable. Indeed, we may argue that all Diogenes actually did was argue for the folly of the things people had come to believe, as exampled in the way that they lived, and the sense or reason of the things he showed them instead. The whole point of Diogenes’ attitude and approach to virtue was that it was not found in codes and laws and customary practices which were entirely artificial in their basis and origin. What is there in front of you in nature, so he thought, is virtue enough. It is this which is our teacher. It is this which makes us human. Consider, for example, the anecdote in which Diogenes is asked what the proper time for supper is. He replies, “If you are a rich man, whenever you please; and if you are a poor man, whenever you can.” The point is that there is no “proper time for supper”. There never was, regardless of what civilised customs and practices now say. You can eat when you are hungry, or when you obtain food, whatever time it is.
It is at the heart of Diogenes’ conception of virtue that he regards the human beings of his experience as those who value the wrong things. So, for example, they value what happens in dreams as portentous for them - but they do not so value their waking thoughts and neither do they examine them nearly so seriously. Likewise, they complain to the gods regarding their luck and yet they value the wrong things in life and would not know good fortune from bad in the things that occurred to them anyway. In this, Diogenes makes the point that if you use the wrong measure your whole system of valuation is askew. Thus Diogenes’ thinking that “an easy life had been given to man by the gods, but that it had been overlaid by their seeking for honey, cheesecakes, and unguents, and things of that sort.” Diogenes’ point is that by building artificiality as an edifice on top of man as an animal in nature they had transformed and diverted the course of their lives into unnatural things. In a real sense, his claim is that human beings have replaced nature with the artificial. But, of course, in doing so, and as habitual creatures who manufacture “the normal”, they take the artificial then as exactly that which is “normal”, natural itself. This is why Diogenes repeatedly states throughout the anecdotes about him that he sees no human beings wherever he goes and why he is reported to have gone around in the daylight with a lantern claiming to be looking for one. That which is artificial, that which has been recreated on the basis of its own error-strewn imaginings, cannot be that which is natural. It has now transformed itself and lives opposed to that which it formerly was. Diogenes is only called a dog because human beings have so changed themselves that they no longer recognise themselves in him. They recognise him as closer to a feral beast that lives in nature - in distinction to their artificial selves.
It should be pointed out that although it may not be the case Diogenes chose his poverty or his lifestyle, considering the story we have of him originally as the son of what we must assume was a relatively wealthy banker, once he found himself an exile and a stateless person without wealth or property he certainly embraced these as a means to true virtue, actively glorying in being a “cosmopolites” or citizen of the world as he referred to himself. We have ample evidence in the anecdotes collected by Diogenes Laertius for his contempt for civilisation, and often for specific examples of the civilised, people and things, to maintain that, thereafter, his poverty was a choice and one he saw as beneficial both to his living and promotion of virtue. We may even suggest, not quite scurrilously, that the poverty came first and the story about defacing the currency was tacked on later to provide a concrete example of Diogenes’ disdain for both wealth and commerce from the point of view of virtue. This was something that came to be a solid Cynic trait as others, such as the wealthy Cynic, Crates, would later be said to give their vast wealth away for the sake of their Cynic practice. Certainly the story about defacing the currency gives Diogenes’ Cynic practice nothing but plaudits in its retelling and provides him with solid credentials as a seeker after Cynic virtue.
Diogenes was a man of zero wealth or financial means in his wanderings around Greece and that which he stood for was an entirely non-economic way of life, a natural way of life in which there simply is no currency and so no commerce. This, in fact, is why the coin defacing story is so important for it sets Diogenes up as one who wishes to negate the very basis of civilisation: the obligation of buying and selling and the amassing of wealth through this means. Diogenes himself begged out of necessity and what undermines or defeats the purpose of commerce more than the notion that you should just give something to someone because you can or because you want to and not because you are required to by some artificial, and artificially instigated, obligation? Here we should note it is reported that Diogenes called covetousness “the metropolis of all evils” and that he simply stood for things like simplicity, frugality and subsistence in its stead. We might observe here that you do not find any other beings hoarding huge amounts of stuff beyond their abilities to utilise. Yet those who call themselves human beings will often collect any number of things they even forget they possess. This is but empty, pointless greed which does not lead to any form of virtue.
Ways of living we learn from Diogenes:
Cosmopolites. He claimed allegiance to a world community.
No money. He defaced currency, physically and metaphorically, and claimed wealth and virtue were incompatible.
Askesis. He claimed philosophy and virtue were found in practice not theorizing. What matters is how you live.
Poverty. He welcomed it as a teacher that would lead the individual into virtue and as one that encouraged the individual to take up virtuous forms of life.
Shamelessness. He saw the conventions of the civilised as artificial, empty, pointless and corrupting of humanity.
Self-sufficiency. He thought one should be responsible for leading oneself into virtuous and philosophical ways and that one could do so on one’s own initiative.
Lamp. He taught that one should shine a light on others, both in their unnatural leanings and in the giving of examples for their virtuous prosperity.
Diogenes was not one that taught there was something to stick to. In Greek terms he opposed nomos, law, with physis, nature. If anything, he taught that you should be what you are rather than creating yourself as something that you are not. He was, thus, a naturalist in this sense and in the sense that he promoted a virtue that was anti-artificiality. He took his existence as it came and lived simply, at a subsistence level, from day to day. He was one who thought that what was important was not simply living but living well where this means living simply in accordance with nature, something which, in practice, means taking off the clothes of artificiality rather than putting something on. Thus, his near nakedness, having only a cloak, is also symbolic of the nature he valued and found meaningful. And he did find it meaningful as this final anecdote explains:
When a man said to him, “I am not calculated for philosophy," he said, “Why then do you live, if you have no desire to live properly?"
