Very little is known of the life of Epictetus. It is said that he was a
native of Hierapolis in Phrygia, a town between the Maeander and a
branch of the Maeander named the Lycus. Hierapolis is mentioned in the
epistle of Paul to the people of Colossae (Coloss. iv., 13); from which
it has been concluded that there was a Christian church in Hierapolis
in the time of the apostle. The date of the birth of Epictetus is
unknown. The only recorded fact of his early life is that he was a
slave in Rome, and his master was Epaphroditus, a profligate freedman
of the Emperor Nero. There is a story that the master broke his slave’s
leg by torturing him; but it is better to trust to the evidence of
Simplicius, the commentator on the Encheiridion, or Manual, who says
that Epictetus was weak in body and lame from an early age. It is not
said how he became a slave; but it has been asserted in modern times
that the parents sold the child. I have not, however, found any
authority for this statement.
It may be supposed that the young slave showed intelligence, for his
master sent or permitted him to attend the lectures of C. Musonius
Rufus, an eminent Stoic philosopher. It may seem strange that such a
master should have wished to have his slave made into a philosopher;
but Garnier, the author of a “Mémoire sur les Ouvrages d’Epictète,”
explains this matter very well in a communication to Schweighaeuser.
Garnier says: “Epictetus, born at Hierapolis of Phrygia of poor
parents, was indebted apparently for the advantages of a good education
to the whim, which was common at the end of the Republic and under the
first emperors, among the great of Rome to reckon among their numerous
slaves grammarians, poets, rhetoricians, and philosophers, in the same
way as rich financiers in these later ages have been led to form at a
great cost rich and numerous libraries. This supposition is the only
one which can explain to us how a wretched child, born as poor as Irus,
had received a good education, and how a rigid Stoic was the slave of
Epaphroditus, one of the officers of the imperial guard. For we cannot
suspect that it was through predilection for the Stoic doctrine, and
for his own use, that the confidant and the minister of the
debaucheries of Nero would have desired to possess such a slave.”
Some writers assume that Epictetus was manumitted by his master, but I
can find no evidence for this statement. Epaphroditus accompanied Nero
when he fled from Rome before his enemies, and he aided the miserable
tyrant in killing himself. Domitian (Sueton., Domit. 14), afterwards
put Epaphroditus to death for this service to Nero. We may conclude
that Epictetus in some way obtained his freedom, and that he began to
teach at Rome; but after the expulsion of the philosophers from Rome by
Domitian, A.D. 89, he retired to Nicopolis in Epirus, a city built by
Augustus to commemorate the victory at Actium. Epictetus opened a
school or lecture room at Nicopolis, where he taught till he was an old
man. The time of his death is unknown. Epictetus was never married, as
we learn from Lucian (Demonax, c. 55, torn, ii., ed. Hemsterh., p.
393). When Epictetus was finding fault with Demonax, and advising him
to take a wife and beget children, for this also, as Epictetus said,
was a philosopher’s duty, to leave in place of himself another in the
universe, Demonax refuted the doctrine by answering: Give me then,
Epictetus, one of your own daughters. Simplicius says (Comment., c. 46,
p. 432, ed. Schweigh.) that Epictetus lived alone a long time. At last
he took a woman into his house as a nurse for a child, which one of
Epictetus’ friends was going to expose on account of his poverty, but
Epictetus took the child and brought it up.
Epictetus wrote nothing; and all that we have under his name was
written
Photius (Biblioth., 58) mentions among Arrian’s works “Conversations
with Epictetus,” [Greek: Homiliai Epichtaeton], in twelve books. Upton
thinks that this work is only another name for the Discourses, and that
Photius has made the mistake of taking the Conversations to be a
different work from the Discourses. Yet Photius has enumerated eight
books of the Discourses and twelve books of the Conversations.
Schweighaeuser observes that Photius had not seen these works of Arrian
on Epictetus, for so he concludes from the brief notice of these works
by Photius. The fact is that Photius does not say that he had read
these books, as he generally does when he is speaking of the books
which he enumerates in his Bibliotheca. The conclusion is that we are
not certain that there was a work of Arrian entitled “The Conversations
of Epictetus.”
Upton remarks in a note on iii., 23 (p. 184, Trans.), that “there are
many passages in these dissertations which are ambiguous or rather
confused on account of the small questions, and because the matter is
not expanded by oratorical copiousness, not to mention other causes.”
The discourses of Epictetus, it is supposed, were spoken extempore, and
so one thing after another would come into the thoughts of the speaker
(Wolf). Schweighaeuser also observes in a note (ii., 336 of his
edition) that the connection of the discourse is sometimes obscure
through the omission of some words which are necessary to indicate the
connection of the thoughts. The reader then will find that he cannot
always understand Epictetus, if he does not read him very carefully,
and some passages more than once. He must also think and reflect, or he
will miss the meaning. I do not say that the book is worth all this
trouble. Every man must judge for himself. But I should not have
translated the book, if I had not thought it worth study; and I think
that all books of this kind require careful reading, if they are worth
reading at all.