Cleanthes

Cleanthes ( ancient Greek Κλεάνθης, * ca 331 BC or later in Assos in the Troad, today western Turkey; † ca 232 BC) was a Greek philosopher of Stoicism.

Cleanthes should have sued as the successor of Zeno in the office of school board astronomers Aristarchus of Samos because of his wickedness, because it was looking for an astronomical explanation for natural phenomena. For the Stoics, the attempt to replace the geocentric world view by the heliocentric was an outrage.

The restriction of the nature of knowledge by the perceived notion of natural law as meant retaining the familiar notions. Although world events was considered as destiny, to Cleanthes decided, Providence nachzuhelfen when he saw the familiar fail worldview. Among his writings, work on Heraclitus, a font " against Democritus ," and another " against Aristarchus " were.

Cleanthes was originally pugilist. When he went to study with Zenon, he earned his living by night work. For a gardener, he watered the garden by drawing water. In a flour seller he kneaded the bread dough. He raised the advantage of his life to the rich produced by Diogenes Laertius after he said: " While those playing ball, I work digging the hard and barren ground ." The Council of Elders of Athens granted him recognition as 10 mines, Zenon forbade him to accept. From Antigonus of Carystus he received, as reported 3000 mines paid.

In the views about the gods, he taught views that differed from each other. According to opinions that got along with the cult, he said nothing for so divine than reason. Cicero Velleius noted therefore that " this deity, which we recognize with the understanding, and of whose existence we seek out the ideas in the depths of our souls want, nowhere to be found is " ( in: Cicero, De nat deor I, 14. . ).

Cicero writes:

Cleanthes is considered one of the most important philosophers of the older Stoics. According to him virtuous action is possible only through knowledge of reality. Moral knowledge is inseparable from the spirit and strength of character. In addition to fortitude, temperance and justice, therefore, is the persistence of Cleanthes, the most important virtue of man. He wrote a Zeushymnus in which he glorified Zeus as a world soul and the world of reason and thus founded the Stoic theology. Of his prose writings only fragments are known.

He should be divorced by refusal to eat from the life.