Rhetoric and philosophy in the age of the Second Sophistic : real conflict or fight for controversy?

Vol.20,No.1(2015)

Natália Gachallová

Stable URL (handle):
http://hdl.handle.net/11222.digilib/133963

PDF
Abstract
The tension between the two dominant educational disciplines, rhetoric and philosophy, has been a phenomenon of much relevancy in ancient literature ever since the time of Plato. The question of the problematic relationship between the two professions in the era of the so-called Second Sophistic has received much scholarly attention recently, nevertheless, some questions still remain unanswered. This article discusses to what extent, if at all, any strict boundaries exist between rhetoric and philosophy of this era. The evidence material includes mainly the works of Roman representatives of the Second Sophistic movement ‒ Apuleius, Aulus Gellius and Marcus Cornelius Fronto; the Platonic corpus and works of Greek authors are used, as well, to complete the image. These suggest that if there actually is any sign of antagonism between the two disciplines, it has to be perceived as highly artificial and under the influence of the contemporary requirements. The need to provoke a reaction could be another strong motivation of these texts, since any kind of controversy was crucial to the self-presentation of anyone who pursued a career in rhetoric or philosophy. Eventually, there are aspects indicating that rhetoric and philosophy cooperated to anchor the position of the privileged elite as opposed to the new threat of democratization of educational institutions.

Keywords:
rhetoric; philosophy; Second Sophistic; grammatici

Pages:
19–32
References

Behr, C. A. (Ed.) (1973). Aristides, I: Panathenaic oration and In defence of oratory. London: Heinemann.

Behr, C. A. (Ed.) (1986). P. Aelius Aristides: The complete works. Volume I: Orations I‒XVI. Leiden: Brill.

Benner, A. R. & Fobes, F. H., (Eds.) (1950). Letters of Alciphron, Aelian, Philostratus. London ‒ Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Burnet, J. (Ed.) (1903). Platonis Opera. Oxford: University Press.

Bury, R. G. (Ed.) (1949 [2000]). Sextus Empiricus IV: Against the Professors. London – Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Gill, Ch. (Ed.) (2013). Marcus Aurelius: Meditations, Books 1–6. Oxford: University Press.

Haines, C. R. (Ed.) (1919). The Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto (2 volumes). London: Heinemann.

Hout, M. P. J. van den. (1988). M. Cornelius Fronto: Epistulae. Leipzig: Teubner.

Hout, M. P. J. van den (Ed.) (1999). A Commentary on the Letters of M. Cornelius Fronto. Leiden: Brill.

Hunink, V. (Ed.) (1997). Apuleius of Madauros: Pro Se De Magia. (2 volumes). Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben.

Lee, B. T. (Ed.) (2005). Apuleius' Florida: A Commentary. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.

Roberts, W. R. (Ed.) (1910). Dionysius of Halicarnassus: On literary composition. London: Macmillan and Co.

Rolfe, J. C. (Ed.) (1999‒2002). The Attic Nights of Aulus Gellius. (2 volumes; repr.). Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Wright, W. C. (Ed.) (1922). The Lives of the Sophists: Philostratus and Eunapius. London: Heinemann.

Anderson, G. (2003). The Second Sophistic: A Cultural Phenomenon in the Roman Empire. Abingdon: Routledge.

Beall, S. M. (1999). Aulus Gellius 17.8: Composition and the Gentleman Scholar. Classical Philology, 94, 55‒64. | DOI 10.1086/449416

Bourdieu, P. (1984). Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste. Harvard: University Press.

Bowersock, W. G. (1969). Greek Sophists in the Roman Empire. Oxford: University Press.

Bowersock, W. G. (2002). Philosophy in the Second Sophistic. In G. Clark ‒ T. Rajak, (Eds.), Philosophy and Power in the Graeco-Roman World: Essays in Honour of Miriam Griffin. (157‒170). Oxford: University Press.

Champlin, E. (1980). Fronto and Antonine Rome. London – Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Corbeill, A. (2001). Education in the Roman Republic: Creating Traditions. In Y. L. Too, Education in Greek and Roman Antiquity. (261‒287). Leiden: Brill.

Eshleman, K. (2008). Defining the circle of Sophists: Philostratus and the construction of the Second Sophistic. Classical Philology, 103, 395‒413. | DOI 10.1086/597183

Flinterman, J.-J. (2000‒2001). "… largely fictions …": Aelius Aristides on Plato's dialogues. In M. Zimmerman ‒ G. Schmeling ‒ H. Hofmann ‒ S. Harrison ‒ C. Panayotakis, (Eds.), Ancient Narrative. (volume I, 32‒54). Eelde: Barkhuis.

Flinterman, J.-J. (2002). The self-portrait of an Antonine orator: Aristides, Or. 2.429 ff. In E. N. Ostenfeld ‒ K. Blomqvist ‒ L. C. Nevett, (Eds.), Greek Romans and Roman Greeks. (198‒211). Aarhus: University Press.

Griswold, Ch. L. (2012). Plato on Rhetoric and Poetry. In E. N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2015.01.27. Retrieved from http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/ spr2012/entries/platorhetoric/.

Jonge, C. C. de (2008). Between Grammar and Rhetoric: Dionysius of Halicarnassus on Language, Linguistics and Literature. Leiden: Brill.

Karadimas, D. (1996). Sextus Empiricus against Aelius Aristides: the Conflict between Philosophy and Rhetoric in the Second Century A. D. Lund: University Press.

Kasulke, C. (2005). Fronto, Marc Aurel und kein Konflikt zwischen Rhetorik und Philosophie im 2. Jh. n. Chr. (Diss.) München: Saur.

Ker, J. (2004). Nocturnal Writers in Imperial Rome: The Culture of Lucubratio. Classical Philology, 99, 209–242.

Sidebottom, H. (2009). Philostratus and the Symbolic Roles of the Sophist and Philosopher. In E. Bowie ‒ J. Elsner, (Eds.), Philostratus. (69‒99). Cambridge: University Press.

Stanton, G. R. (1973). Sophists and Philosophers: Problems of Classification. The American Journal of Philology, 94.4, 351‒364. | DOI 10.2307/293614

Stevenson, A. J. (1993). Aulus Gellius and Roman Antiquarian Writing. (Diss.) London: King's College, 282‒326.

Swain, S. (1996). Hellenism and Empire. Language, Classicism and Power in the Greek World AD 50−250. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Thesarus Linguae Latinae (2004), München: K. G. Saur. TLL, 2015.01.27. Retrieved from http://litterae.phil.muni.cz/.

Vardi, A. (2004). Genre, Conventions and Cultural Programme in Gellius' Noctes Atticae. In L. Holford-Strevens ‒ A. Vardi, (Eds.), The Worlds of Aulus Gellius. (159‒186). Oxford: University Press.

Vardi, A. (2001). Gellius against the Professors. Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, 137, 41‒54.

Veblen, T. (1899 [2007]). The Theory of the Leisure Class. Oxford: University Press.

Zetzel, J. E. G. (1974). Statilius Maximus and Ciceronian Studies in the Antonine Age. Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, 21, 107‒23. | DOI 10.1111/j.2041-5370.1974.tb00146.x

Metrics

14

Views

0

PDF views

PDF