Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Where'd the Stoics Go?

Source: David Sedley, "Introduction," The Cambridge Companion to Greek and Roman Philosophy, ed. David Sedley (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) 12.

"The pattern of post-classical survival largely represents the intellectual fashions that already prevailed in later antiquity, fashions which led to widespread circulation and study of both Plato and Aristotle, along with their most recent interpreters, while for example the writings of the early Stoics, just as easily reconcilable with Christianity, had largely vanished from view."

But weren't the later Stoics also reconcilable with Christianity? In Stoic Religion, I noted similarities between Stoicism and Colossians. Why weren't they used? And why were Plato and Aristotle preserved, while the early Stoics were not?