Sapiens and Sthitaprajna: A Comparative Study in Seneca’s Stoicism and the Bhagavadgita

By Ashwini Mokashi

About the Book
Sapiens and Sthitaprajna studies the concept of a wise person in the Stoic Seneca and in the Bhagavadgita. Although the Gita and Seneca’s writings were composed at least two centuries apart and a continent apart, they have much in common in recommending a well-lived life. This book describes how in both a wise person is endowed with both virtue and wisdom, is moral, makes right judgements and takes responsibility for actions. A wise and virtuous person always enjoys happiness, as happiness consists in knowing that one has done the right thing at the right time.
Both Seneca and the Gita demand intellectual rigour and wisdom for leading a virtuous and effective life. They provide guidelines for how to become and be wise. Both systems demand a sage to be emotionally sound and devoid of passions. This leads to mental peace and balance, and ultimately tranquillity and happiness. While surveying these similarities, this study also finds differences in their ways of application of these ideas. The metaphysics of the Gita obliges the sage to practise meditation, while the Stoics require a sage to be a rational person committed to analysing and intellectualizing any situation.
This comparative study will be of interest to students of both Ancient Western and Ancient Indian Philosophy. Practitioners of Stoicism and followers of the Gita should find the presence of closely-related ideas in a very different tradition of interest while perhaps finding somewhat different prescriptions a spur to action.

About the Author
Ashwini Mokashi was educated at the University of Pune and at King’s College, London. She taught Philosophy at Pune in Wadia and Ferguson colleges and as a guest lecturer at the University of Pune, she taught a comparative course in Ancient Greek and Sanskrit during 1993-95. She now lives in Princeton, New Jersey and works on her writings in philosophy as an independent research scholar. She has served two terms as President of the Princeton Research Forum. Her next project is a personal and philosophical account of a meditational community in Pune and Nimbal.

• Language: English
• Publisher: D.K. Printworld
• Release date: Apr 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9788124610558

Book preview

Front.jpg

Sapiens and Sthitaprajña

Sapiens and Sthitaprajña

A Comparative Study in Seneca’s Stoicism and the Bhagavadgītā

Ashwini Mokashi

Foreword

Sharad Deshpande

Prologue

Shivaji Sondhi

Cataloging in Publication Data — DK

[Courtesy: D.K. Agencies (P) Ltd. ]

Mokashi, Ashwini, 1968- author.

Sapiens and sthitaprajña : a comparative study in

Seneca’s stoicism and the Bhagavadgītā / Ashwini

Mokashi ; foreword, Sharad Deshpande ; prologue,

Shivaji Sondhi.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 9788124609637 (hbd.)

1. Seneca, Lucius Annaeus, approximately 4

bc

–

65

ad

— Criticism and interpretation. 2. Bhagavadgītā.

— Criticism, interpretation, etc. 3. Stoics. 4. Wisdom.

5. Philosophy, Ancient. 6. Hindu philosophy.

7. Philosophy, Comparative. I. Title.

LCC B528.M65 2019 | DDC 188 23

ISBN: 978-81-246-1055-8

First published in India in 2020

© Ashwini Mokashi

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, except brief quotations, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the copyright holder, indicated above, and the publishers.

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Regd. Office: "Vedaśrī", F-395, Sudarshan Park

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Dedicated to

My Spiritual Guru

Prof. R.D. Ranade

whose lifework and philosophical writings have provided

the torchlight and backbone for our existence,

even when I never got to meet him in person!

and

my late grandfather

Shankarrao B. Mokashi

who encouraged me and taught me philosophy

from as early as possible, and

left a deep impression on me of human values,

by following them himself and becoming my guru,

and an ideal of what a person can be.

Foreword

A

mongst

all living beings only humans have the concept of an ideal. An ideal is something which is to be looked up to, to aspire for and to pursue not for any reason, but for its intrinsic worth. What is that ideal the pursuit of which would make human life worth living and a human being an ideal human being? Is there any conceptual difference between the good and the ideal? Can there be an ideal human being ever, given his/her akratic nature, his/her tendency to act against reason, to succumb to temptation? How to survive and behave virtuously in the face of evil? Are the concepts of the good life and of an ideal human being culture-specific? Keeping these questions in mind Ashwini Mokashi initiates a rich cross-cultural probing of the notion of an ideal human or Sapiens as propounded by Seneca – one of the widely known Stoic philosophers of the fourth century

bce

– and the Sthitaprajña as propounded in the sacred text, the Bhagavadgītā, the authorship of which is attributed to Maharṣi Vyāsa, though in the epic text of Mahābhārata it is revealed by Lord Śrī Kr̥ṣṇa to Arjuna.

What is wisdom and who is a wise person are the two questions that lie at the heart of the notion of an ideal human being as it was conceived in the ancient Indian and Graeco-Roman traditions. The genesis of the concept of a wise person dates back to the Greek philosophers Socrates and Plato in the Western tradition and to the Upaniṣads in the Indian tradition. The Upaniṣads (like the Īśa and the Kaṭha) seek to establish the true nature of the indwelling Self. Thus, by implication one who knows the true nature of the indwelling Self (the Ātman) would be a wise person or an ideal human being in the Upaniṣadic context of the supreme ideal of self-realization. Unlike the metaphysical message of the Upaniṣads, the Bhagavadgītā contains practical advice given by Lord Śrī Kr̥ṣṇa to Arjuna who is facing a moral dilemma on the battlefield – whether to fight with kinsfolk who have now turned into enemies. So, in the Bhagavadgītā the question, who is a wise person or who is an ideal human being is raised in the context of knowing one’s duties, i.e. sva-dharma, especially in morally ambivalent situations. The resolution of conflicting duties requires a certain state of being. As an adjective the word sthitaprajña denotes this state of being as one of maintaining steady or unwavering (sthita) intelligence (prajñā) while resolving conflicting duties, and as a noun it refers to a person who possesses such unwavering intelligence which is reflected in his/her behaviour. But the sthitaprajña state of being cannot be episodic. It must be a stable disposition throughout all situations in one’s life. Such a state of being is cultivated through yoga, i.e. the practice of equanimity towards happiness and misery in life (samatvam), and non-attachment (anāsakti) towards the fruits of action. Equanimity (samatvam) and non-attachment (anāsakti) are at the core of two central notions of the Bhagavadgītā, viz. jñāna-yoga and karma-yoga. The Bhagavadgītā also characterizes sthitaprajña as samādhistha and yogastha, i.e. as one who pays equal attention to the positive and negative aspects of any course of action, remains equally detached from happiness and suffering, and as one who has internalized yoga, performs actions stemming from equanimity. Ashwini Mokashi’s elaboration of sthitaprajña, samādhistha and yogastha is useful for the general reader in understanding the Bhagavadgītā’s conception of an ideal human being.

The concept of Sapiens or ho Sophós first entered Graeco-Roman culture when the Delphic Oracle declared Socrates to be the wisest man amongst all because he lived a virtuous life. Latter-day Stoics codified Socratic values into an ethical system. This ethical system evolved round a cluster of ideas such as virtue (a̓reté) or excellence of any kind, the good life (eu̓daimonía) or human flourishing or prosperity, appropriate behaviour (kathēkonta), affinity, affiliation or endearment

(oi̓keiôsis) appetite or impulsive response (hormai), giving assent to the right judgement (katasýnthesis), a sense of detachment

(a̓pátheía) and purpose or goal (telos).

Ashwini Mokashi addresses these questions, namely, who is a Sapiens and how does one become a Sapiens in the framework of these extremely complex ideas. As per the most general and somewhat simplistic account a Sapiens is a virtuous person whose conduct is rational, who possesses the knowledge of good and bad and who does not suffer from the weakness of will (akrasia). She traces various formulations of the concept of Sapiens in the writings of early Stoics, Plato, Aristotle and Zeno, and compares them with Seneca’s formulation. A Sapiens, in all these formulations, is viewed under the threefold aspect of téchne (craft or art, or practice), epistēmē (knowledge) and phrónesis (wisdom). How these aspects are related to one another according to the ancient Greeks and what they meant by these terms are extremely important questions. In the history of Greek philosophy and ethical theory, one finds multiple answers with regards to the meanings of these terms and their relation with one another. Ashwini Mokashi builds on these multiple meanings of téchne, epistēmē and phrónesis, and how they are related to one another in the work of Plato, Aristotle and the early Stoics, while expounding Seneca’s views which are expressed as an informed commentary by an independent mind on the established Stoic ethical theory developed by Zeno, Aristo and Chrysippus. As Ashwini Mokashi observes, Stoic ethics in general and Seneca’s views in particular focus on virtue which is relevant to the three principal aspects of philosophy, viz. logic, physics and ethics. On this view a Sapiens is one who has achieved excellence in all these branches and has become an exemplar. However, a Sapiens as an exemplar has to emerge as a person who progressively tries to overcome residual tendencies to deviate from the Stoic ideals of virtue, endearment, impulsive response, detachment, etc. as mentioned above. This emphasis makes Seneca’s ethics action-oriented and his philosophy practice-oriented. Seneca’s focus is on training oneself in the cultivation of virtue in various situations rather than simply cogitating over what is virtue by trying to understand what a wise person would do. The process of becoming a Sapiens illustrates Seneca’s philosophical psychology involving a treatment of the emotions of anger and grief.

Every culture is unique in terms of its Weltanschauung. By bringing together the two ideals, the Sapiens and the Sthitaprajña, Ashwini Mokashi shows how they are embedded in their respective cultures having distinct world views, and to what extent these ideals are analogous. It is often said that Indian ethical theory is a type of virtue ethics which is akin to the virtue-oriented ethical theories of the ancient Greeks and Stoics as opposed to the rule-oriented obligation theories of the modern West. But beneath this surface similarity, there is a profound difference between the two ethical systems, since they are anchored in fundamentally different world views. The Indian world view takes mokṣa or nirvāṇa, i.e. liberation from bondage, as the ultimate goal of life; whereas for the Greeks it is eu̓daimonía, i.e. a life of happiness lived in accordance with virtue. Now, if Greek ethics is termed as virtue ethics because it seeks to answer questions like what is the good life? and how should I live? keeping virtue as the ultimate goal, then as suggested by some scholars, Indian ethics ought to be called liberation ethics since it takes liberation from bondage as the ultimate goal. Given this fundamental difference in the conception of the ultimate goal, how to justify the claim that Indian liberation ethics has affinities with the virtue ethics of the Greeks? The liberated state of existence (mokṣa or nirvāṇa) would ipso facto manifest virtue, and thereby be a value for Indian ethical theorists. But from the point of view of the Greeks, it would not. Hence the seeming similarities are to be seen in the context of this fundamental difference. Ashwini Mokashi traces these similarities in terms of three sets of connected concepts and issues. The first set consists of virtue, the choice of being virtuous, the choice of action, detachment and equanimity. The second set consists of wisdom, judgement and the schooling of a wise person. The third set of notions falls within the domain of psychology dealing with anger, passions and peace of mind, leading to happiness. Likewise, the differences between the Gītā’s ideal of Sthitaprajña and Seneca’s Sapiens are to be understood in terms of mokṣa, dharma, sva-dharma and the process of becoming a wise person. In this context knowing how these terms are understood within the Vedic and the Upaniṣadic tradition in general and in the text of Bhagavadgītā in particular becomes pertinent.

Considerations of mokṣa, dharma and the process of becoming a wise person or an ideal human being lead to a deeper inquiry into the complex relationship between mokṣa and dharma in the Vedic and the Upaniṣadic tradition. Historically speaking, the idea of mokṣa appears in the later Upaniṣads. In the Vedic literature dharma is understood as the cosmic rule of maintenance and the well-being of the world order or, in the human context, the highest goal of life. As far as mokṣa is concerned, though the epic texts consider it as beyond the discipline of dharma, yet the attainment of mokṣa is possible through similar means which are "needed to conform to dharma". As Daniel H.H. Ingalls puts it, the Bhagavadgītā is the culminating instance of this trend.

Many Western scholars have argued that mokṣa and dharma are incompatible since the former has intrinsic value while the latter has only the instrumental value insofar as it is conducive to the attainment of mokṣa. This incompatibility is explained historically by pointing out that the idea of mokṣa (release from bondage) is later than the idea of dharma in the Vedic and early Indian literature. But apart from chronological considerations and apart from the fact that in due course mokṣa became the highest goal of life in the later literature; mokṣa and dharma are considered incompatible because whereas dharma is life affirming, mokṣa entails renunciation of life experiences in the empirical world. This incompatibility cannot be resolved unless it is recognized that dharma and mokṣa are different level concepts. From the mokṣa-centric point of view, dharma may have less value or no value. But dharma in itself is valuable in the empirical world because as such, no distinction can be made between what is valuable and what is not. But if this distinction was to be made, it is not by any other agency like the liberated soul like the Buddha or exemplars like Socrates, but the individual himself or herself has to make this distinction, he/she has to realize what the highest good is. The role of dharma in the process of becoming a wise person is precisely this, not to give moral precepts but to give ethical guidance to people, by making them see what is good according to their make-up and inclinations. This aspect of the process of becoming a wise person and the role of dharma in it is different from the Greek way of becoming a wise person. Whether the practice of dharma is a moral pursuit or whether it is prudence is a matter of further reflection.

By giving a rich descriptive account of two ancient traditions of theorizing on the summum bonum of life and the concept of the ideal human being, Ashwini Mokashi invites the reader to engage with philosophical issues involved in this cross-cultural exploration. This makes the book worth reading.

Sharad Deshpande

Former Tagore Fellow

Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla

Prologue

I c

ame

across the thesis of this book over two decades back when I first met the author and was immediately taken with it. The Indian half of it was mostly familiar. The Bhagavadgītā was the central Hindu text in the family in which I grew up. Its second chapter was the subject of a large number of scholarly expositions by the late and learned Swami Budhananda of the Ramakrishna Mission in Delhi to which we had all gone during my youth. The dramatic setting of the Gītā – on the very battlefield of Kurukṣetra which appeared to stand metaphorically for the theatre of all life – made Kr̥ṣṇa’s teaching to Arjuna unforgettable. Indeed it is surely no accident that modern Indians starting with the supremely distinguished Mahatma Gandhi and Lokmanya Tilak have found in the Gītā a better starting point for confronting the challenges of modern life than many other Hindu texts. Modern life demands a constant readjustment of focus – more on which below.

However the second half of the thesis – the concept of the Wise Person (Sapiens) in Seneca was entirely new to me. Listening to the author and like the author herself, I was struck by the strong parallels between the ideal of the sthitaprajña and the ideal of the Sapiens and marvelled that two geographically and temporally distant schools of thought had commended the same life of wisdom to their contemporaries. I was further struck by Seneca’s formulation of the path to wisdom as learning to separate emotions from giving assent to them which complemented the Hindu wisdom I was familiar with. In fact, that is the sort of language, I suspect, that appeals to physicists, it certainly appealed to this one.

Given my own enthusiastic response to the ideas discussed in this book, I am therefore delighted that they are seeing the light of day in published form and I hope that you, the reader, will find them just as interesting and worthy of incorporating into your Weltanschauung on matters historical, philosophical and perhaps personal. The book itself is a broad sketch of the connections and I am sure others will find it interesting to take a more detailed look at the comparison and will deepen, improve and correct it as needed. I am personally curious whether it is possible to trace any actual and relevant transfer of knowledge between India and the Greco-Roman world which were, after all, connected during this period.

On the last front it is perhaps worth noting that the period between the formulation of the ideas in this book and its appearance has been characterized by a massive intrusion of information technology into human affairs. We are now truly living in the information age but it is equally an age of mass distraction wherein untold bits compete constantly for our scarce attention and push our minds in competing directions. The public intellectual who has, in my judgement and that of many others, has perhaps showed the most insight into the unique challenges it brings to humans alive today is Yuval Noah Harari. Harari himself recommends meditation – he has been a practitioner of the Hindu–Buddhistic (perhaps Indic would be a better term) vipassanā technique for decades – which is discussed in the present book as the Hindu route to actually becoming a sthitaprajña. By contrast one might identify practitioners of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy as Seneca’s heirs – they are engaged in learning to give assent to their emotions. So these most ancient of schools of thought are urgently relevant today. At least as sources of technique but perhaps also as sources of aspiration – which generally makes technique easier to assimilate.

In any event, I should no longer stand between you and the book. I commend it most highly. Indeed, I was impressed enough with the ideas that I married the author.

8 March 2019 Professor Shivaji Sondhi

Department of Physics

Princeton University

Princeton, NJ (USA)

Preface

T

his

work began in the fall of 1992, when I envisioned comparing the Stoics with the Gītā given what I saw as their apparent similarities in thinking, their ways of addressing the social and societal challenges, and their goals of raising a morally sound community despite all the wars and chaos surrounding them. I worked on these ideas for many years, finally concluding the thesis in 2002. Then I took a long break from the academic studies, went to work in the corporate world, in other words went to the school of life – experienced various ups and downs of life – and realized how important these ideas and ideals are and yet how difficult it is to practice them, to implement them in our lives and to appreciate detachment (vairāgya).

Pursuit of wisdom, virtue and happiness is a lifelong goal and the process of attaining it is a worthwhile experience. This realization helped me become an improved person at each step of life, with each new challenge teaching me to return to the principles I had already learnt. The themes in the ancient texts continue to dominate the conversation, while the quest for happiness is pursued anew with each new generation. Nevertheless, the ancient wisdom has stood the test of time and it behooves us to apply these principles to modern situations.

When I revisited my old writings after a decade or more, I realized the academic work of the comparison between the Stoics and the Gītā is not just for the scholars of philosophy, but it has major implications for all. One can evaluate the current challenges in our global community in a cohesive way using these lenses.

A mere hundred years ago, people referred to philosophical and spiritual wisdom for answers to their daily dilemmas. Now in 2018, we are less clear about the purpose of life, about philosophizing an issue and rising over our challenges. Rather we are more into psycho-analysing issues with the modern tools of analytical psychology and as a result even our daily rhetoric is about whether our stress levels are within normal range or abnormal range, what mental disorders people may have and how to treat those, how to control the epidemic of emotional disorders in our schools, workplaces or families. There is a serious lack of in-person communication, a lack of parental authority and a lack of available grandparents or extended family members, who are interested in passing on the ancient wisdom to the new generation. Not to mention a lack of ideal seers, who can guide us in