Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life, trans. by M. Chase, Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1999, x + 309 hlm. (PWL); Pierre Hadot, What is Ancient Philosophy?, trans. by M. Case, Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2004, xiv + 362 hlm. (WAP).

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 226-235
Author(s):  
Haryanto Cahyadi
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Pierre Hadot

Barthes and the Lessons of Ancient Philosophy

2020 ◽  
pp. 137-153
Author(s):  
Lucy O’Meara
Keyword(s):  
Academic Discipline ◽  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
Literary Canon ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Art Of Living ◽  
Late Work ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Collège De France ◽  
Pierre Hadot ◽  
Moral Perfectionism

Roland Barthes was a classicist by training; his work frequently alludes to the classical literary canon and the ancient art of rhetoric. This chapter argues that ancient Greco-Roman philosophy permits insights into Barthes’s very late work, particularly when we understand ancient philosophy not as an academic discipline, but as a mode of thought which prioritises an art of living. This chapter will focus on Barthes’s posthumously published Collège de France lecture notes (1977–80) and on other posthumous diary material, arguing that this work can be seen as part of a tradition of thought which has its roots in the ethics and care of the self proposed by ancient Greco-Roman philosophical thought. The chapter uses the work of the historian of ancient philosophy, Pierre Hadot, to set Barthes’s teaching in dialogue with Stoic and Epicurean thought, and subsequently refers to Stanley Cavell’s work on ‘moral perfectionism’ to demonstrate how Barthes’s final lecture courses, and the associated Vita Nova project, can be seen as efforts by Barthes to transform his ‘intelligibility’. Barthes’s late moral perfectionism, and the individualism of his teaching, corresponds to the ancient philosophical ethical imperative to think one’s way of life differently and thereby to transform one’s self.

scholarly journals The metamorphosis of the soul. an attempt to read ancient philosophy as a praxis of life – Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault.

KÜLÖNBSÉG ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emese Faragó
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
Spiritual Exercises ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Pierre Hadot

The metamorphosis of the soul. An attempt to read ancient philosophy as a praxis of life – Pierre Hadot: Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault. (Review) Hadot, Pierre: Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault. Trans. Ákos Cseke. Budapest, Kairosz, 2010.

Drafted into a Foreign War?

Rhizomata ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 183-217
Author(s):  
Matthew Sharpe
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
The Self ◽  
Spiritual Practices ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Technologies Of The Self ◽  
Analytic Tradition ◽  
Modern Conception ◽  
The Past ◽  
Rational Inquiry

Abstract This paper examines the central criticisms that come, broadly, from the modern, ‘analytic’ tradition, of Pierre Hadot’s idea of ancient philosophy as a way of life.: Firstly, ancient philosophy just did not or could not have involved anything like the ‘spiritual practices’ or ‘technologies of the self’, aiming at curing subjects’ unnecessary desires or bettering their lives, contra Hadot and Foucault et al. Secondly, any such metaphilosophical account of putative ‘philosophy’ must unacceptably downplay the role of ‘serious philosophical reasoning’ or ‘rigorous argument’ in philosophy. Thirdly, claims that ancient philosophy aimed at securing wisdom by a variety of means including but not restricted to rational inquiry are accordingly false also as historical claims about the ancient philosophers. Fourthly, to the extent that we must (despite (3)) admit that some ancient thinkers did engage in or recommend extra-cognitive forms of transformative practice, these thinkers were not true or ‘mainline’ philosophers. I contend that the historical claims (3) and (4) are highly contestable, risking erroneously projecting a later modern conception of philosophy back onto the past. Of the theoretical or metaphilosophical claims (1) and (2), I argue that the second claim, as framed here, points to real, hard questions that surround the conception(s) of philosophy as a way of life.

Pierre Hadot as a Reader of Wittgenstein

Paragraph ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 322-337 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Laugier
Keyword(s):  
Ralph Waldo Emerson ◽  
Henry David Thoreau ◽  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
Political Transformation ◽  
Ethical Reflection ◽  
Spiritual Exercise ◽  
Stanley Cavell ◽  
Collège De France ◽  
Pierre Hadot ◽  
Point Of Departure

Pierre Hadot (1922–2010), professor of ancient philosophy at the Collège de France, published, in the late 1950s and early 1960s, some of the earliest work on Wittgenstein to appear in French. Hadot conceived of philosophy as an activity rather than a body of doctrines and found in Wittgenstein a fruitful point of departure for ethical reflection. Hadot's understanding of philosophy as a spiritual exercise — articulated through his reading of ancient philosophy but also the American transcendentalists Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson — will find an echo in Wittgenstinian thinkers such as Stanley Cavell and Cora Diamond. Ultimately philosophy for Hadot is a call to personal and political transformation.

VIRTUE AND PHILOSOPHY IN 4 MACCABEES

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 307-325
Author(s):  
Paul B Decock
Keyword(s):  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Spiritual Exercises ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Philosophical Work ◽  
Fourth Section ◽  
The Third ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Pierre Hadot ◽  
Practical Question ◽  
Jewish Religion

The first section of this article focuses on the use of the term and theme of ἀρετή in the argument that the Jewish religion can be seen as a most worthy philosophy. The second section shows how 4 Maccabees can be seen as a Jewish version of a philosophical work in the ancient Greco-Roman tradition: it raises the practical question of the noble way of life and shows us inspiring examples of persons who embodied this way by the manner in which they faced their death. The third section explores how a reading of 4 Maccabees can be seen as one of the “spiritual exercises” in the philosophical tradition (Pierre Hadot). The fourth section touches briefly on the issue of the Hellenization of the Jewish religion, of which 4 Maccabees is a strong example.

Epistrophe and Metanoia in the History of Philosophy

2021 ◽  
Vol 65 (1) ◽  
pp. 201-210
Author(s):  
Pierre Hadot ◽  
Andrew Irvine ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Living Organism ◽  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
The Self ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
The West ◽  
History Of

Crucial in Pierre Hadot’s account of ancient philosophy as a way of life is the phenomenon of conversion. Well before he encountered some of the decisive influences upon his understanding of philosophy, Hadot already understood ancient philosophy and its long legacy in later thinkers of the West as much more than a formal discourse. Philosophy is an experience, or at least the exploration and articulation of a potential for experience. The energy of this potential originates in a polar tension between epistrophe (return) and metanoia (rebirth). The two poles, which are grounded in primal experiences of the living organism, motivate and model the conversion which must be lived by the philosopher. The genius of Western philosophical experience lies in the effort to synthesize return and rebirth, and thereby recover the self as an ontological point of identification with and origin of the cosmos.

Philosophie als performative Lebensform – als textuelle Praxis und mehr als textuelle Praxis

2017 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Shusterman
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
Discursive Practices ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Art Of Living ◽  
Self Knowledge ◽  
Philosophical Task ◽  
Linguistic Means

AbstractAlthough typically identified with discursive practices of writing and oral dialog that have long dominated its practice, philosophy has also asserted itself as something other and more than words; it claimed to be an entire way of life, an art of living dedicated to the pursuit of wisdom (as the word “philosophia” implies). After showing how discursive and non-discursive dimensions of ancient philosophy were designed to complement each other, this paper explains the reasons why even the basic philosophical task of self-knowledge requires discursive communicative tools. It then explores to what extent and in what ways philosophy can be practiced through non-linguistic means, by considering both Western and Asian sources.

A New Look at Spirituality

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 185-209
Author(s):  
Matteo Soranzo
Keyword(s):  
Michel Foucault ◽  
Religious Pluralism ◽  
Spiritual Transformation ◽  
Experiential Knowledge ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Linguistic Features ◽  
Discursive Strategy ◽  
Pierre Hadot ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Western Esotericism

The article examines the theme of spiritual transformation in three poets (Lazzarelli, Augurelli, Mantuanus) writing in the context of hermeticism, alchemy and monastic spirituality. Building on current scholarship on Western Esotericism and religious pluralism, the article argues that: 1) whether it occurs in hermetic, alchemical, or hagiographical contexts, spiritual transformation is characterized by recurring linguistic features and motifs consistent with Antoine Faivre’s definition of esotericism; 2) the presence of spiritual transformation and its corresponding language outside of proper esoteric contexts, suggests approaching this theme as a discursive strategy, whose features correspond to von Stuckrad’s definition of ‘language of experiential knowledge’. In a dialogue with Michel Foucault and Pierre Hadot, the article suggests taking this phenomenon as part of the Renaissance rediscovery of philosophy as a way of life, and an instance of a broader notion of spirituality.

A Philosophical Mode of Life

2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-30
Author(s):  
Max H. Sotak ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Philosophical Discourse ◽  
The World ◽  
Mode Of Life ◽  
Choice Of Life

This article presents Pierre Hadot’s treatment of a philosophical mode of life as it originated in ancient philosophy and fared down through the centuries. Hadot contends that philosophical discourse begins with a choice of life—an existential option from which philosophical discourse arises. The concept of philosophy as a purely theoretical attitude developed after the ancient period and reflects the domestication of philosophy within the context of the medieval and modern universities. The ancient schools of philosophy were concerned with a way of life that demanded the conversion of one’s being, a change of life­style, and a specific view of the world. Philosophical discourse, on this view, was designed to reveal, justify, and represent the existential option to the world.

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