Women Cynics and Dinner Conversation

Crates & Hipparchia

It was a feature of ancient Cynicism that women were welcome as equals into the movement (along with slaves and others not given equal status in Greek society). The same cannot be said for any other philosophical movement nor, come to that, political or religious group — not only in ancient times but in most cases up to the present day, and in almost any culture. It is regretable then that Hipparchia is the only woman Cynic of whom we have a written account. Wife of the Cynic Crates (Diogenes’ favourite pupil) and sister of Metrocles (Crates’ pupil), it was with the abject but happy figure of Crates that the young, beautiful, and well born Hipparchia fell in love. They married in spite of her parent’s objections, and regardless of Crates’ warnings to her that they would live like dogs in the street. Both Crates and Hipparchia are remembered for their compassion to the poor and sick, living long and happy lives in the streets of Athens and Piraeus.

The Symposium

Table conversation has been identified as dialogic genre all of its own: the original definition of symposium describing a Greek banquet dialogue conducted by men. In the convivial and sometimes carnivalesque atmosphere stimulated by food and drink, the discourse of the symposium assumed special privileges of ease, familiarity, frankness, and eccentricity. The significance here being that, in antiquity, to discourse freely with men at supper was a privilege granted only to philosophical equals. In the case of Hipparchia, we are told how she accompanied Crates to a banquet where she challenged the atheist Theodorus to a duel. Any action Theodorus made that could not be considered wrong, would likewise not be considered wrong if undertaken by Hipparchia. When Theodorus strikes himself, Hipparchia strikes Theodorus, and so the game continues culminating with Theodorus trying to strip Hipparchia of her cloak. Here Hipparchia publicly demonstrates not only her willingness to challenge men at their own game, but also the practical side of Cynic philosophy such as parrhesia (freedom and boldness of speech), anaideia (shamelessness) and apatheia (disregard for feelings). And here we have a key to other probable women cynics in antiquity. 

Consistent with my view that myth is an instructor of philosophic wisdom equal to that provided by history, for the purposes of the discussion here I will consider women from the canonical and non-canonical gospels. Claims, for instance, that Mary Magdalene might have shared such a gospel meal with Jesus at the Last Supper, might be part of modern myth making prompted by those who seek to rescue Magdalene from her misrepresentation as a penitent whore by misogynistic redactors of the Bible. But it is entirely reasonable that Jesus (whom I charactarise as a Cynic philosopher in another post) would wish to include women among his close companions. It is clear that he responds positively to women who do not hesitate before him. As in the example of the Gospel of Mary, Jesus praises Mary’s composure in not flinching at his immortal appearance following his resurrection: "Blessed are you, that you did not waver at the sight of me." But, staying with the theme of food and drink, from the Gospel of Thomas we have Salome admonishing Jesus for eating at her table: “Who are you, man, that you . . . have come up on my couch and eaten from my table?” And from the Gospel of John, when Jesus requests that the Samaritan woman draws him water to drink, she responds: "How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?"

But the ultimate challenge to Jesus involving eating or drinking comes from the Syrophoenician woman in the gospels of Mark and Matthew. Having heard of Jesus’ reputation for healing the sick, the woman came to seek a cure for her daughter who, we are variously told, was possessed by an unclean spirit and tormented by a demon. In Matthew’s version the woman addresses Jesus first but was ignored by him, whereupon Jesus’ companions, irritated by her persistence, pleaded with their master to get rid of the troublesome woman, saying, "Send her away, for she is crying after us." According to Matthew, after first ignoring the woman, Jesus then says, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." A backhanded compliment to his disciples that, albeit sheep, their needs were of more importance than the needs of this woman who had come to beg Jesus to cure her dying daughter. But it is the following verses from Mark that provide evidence of the woman's Cynic credentials:

'And he [Jesus] said to her, “Let the children first be fed, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.” 

But she answered him, “Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs.” '

Having tried to dismiss the woman a second time, referring to the disciples as children and the woman as the dog* she is—being a gentile in a house of Jews—Jesus then finds himself out-maneuvered at his own game. Her response is that, a dog she might be but as such also a member of the household and deserving of whatever crumbs might fall her way. Mark uses the diminutive form of dog, kynaria (puppy) in place of kynos (dog) but being referred to as a ‘little bitch’ is no less an insult for that. The term Cynic itself is derived from the Greek kynicos, an adjectival form of the noun for dog. When challenged that she is a dog, the Syrophoenician woman embraces the term and the actions of a dog as a rhetorical device. She is not indignant in the face of insult but employs the aphoristic style of the chreia to deflect the insult back onto its originator.  

*A derogatory term applied to Gentiles by Jews of the day because their consumption of meat was not prepared according to Jewish law. A term also applied specifically to Greek Cynics because of their doggish behaviour.


So impressed was Jesus at the woman’s boldness in his presence (parrhesia) that he said to her, “For this saying you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter." The woman employs cynical irony by accepting the appellative ‘dog’ and even the ‘dog’s act’ of licking up the crumbs that fall to the floor, to turn the table on her tormentor whom she continues to refer to as ‘Lord’ and ‘master’, all the while maintaining just the safe side of ridicule. The Syrophoenician woman has no concern at entering a house of men; that she is a gentile and they Jews; that she addresses them first; and then, when rebuffed, ignores insults and pleas to leave them in peace to assert her own authority. 
For a full analysis of this minor gospel parable see my essay A Tale of Two Cynics: The Philosophic Dual Between Jesus and the Woman from Syrophoenicia.  



Having identified some cursory aspects of Cynicism (in it's positive sense) employed by women, many other examples, both ancient and modern will no doubt come to mind. Of course, such a mindset is only appreciated by male Cynics and therefore, demonstrations of parrhesia by women (as with the recent jailing of members of the Russian band Pussy Riot for ranting against President Putin and Christian iconography) predictably put them at great personal risk. In this sense Cynicism can only ever be a strategy for maintaining one's personal integrity in the face of tyrannical forces, not a means of changing society — there is, in any case, little evidence that human nature in general, and patriarchy in particular, has ever changed as a result of individual protests or even large scale revolution. 

Why Nietzsche was a Cynic Philosopher

Nietzsche has been recruited to many causes, some of which directly contradict the other. If one wishes to read about Nietzsche the misogynist or Nietzsche the feminist icon, Nietzsche the antichrist or Nietzsche the admirer of Jesus, it is simply a matter of locating the appropriate text. As Georges Bataille says, the multi-layered irony in Nietzsche’s work allows one to use (or abuse) Nietzsche’s writings to support just about any position one wishes to take: ‘It is common to retain only one aspect of Nietzsche, suiting the one who assumes the right to choose.’ But I am not the first to claim Nietzsche as a Cynic, as his sister’s testimony suggests:

There is no doubt that . . . my brother tried a little bit to imitate Diogenes in the tub; he wanted to find out with how little could a philosopher do.   Elizabeth Forster-Nietzsche

We also have Nietzsche’s own testimony that he is a cynic. In his final work, Ecce Homo, in answer to his question ‘Why I Write Such Good Books,’ Nietzsche replies ‘There is altogether no prouder and at the same time more exquisite kind of book than my books—they attain here and there the highest thing that can be attained on earth, cynicism.’ And in a letter describing Ecce Homo to Georg Brandes, his first biographer and critic, Nietzsche says, ‘I have now written an account of myself with a cynicism that will become world-historical.’ For the most part then, when Nietzsche uses the term cynicism—either to describe himself or more generally—he uses it positively: ‘the highest thing that can be attained on earth’. The pejorative use of the term may well appear in Nietzsche’s text, but as with much of his writing, the reader needs to separate out for them self Nietzsche’s all-too-human comments from his more serious philosophical message. 

     All the evidence points to the fact that, like the Cynics, Nietzsche lived an ascetic lifestyle. He was preoccupied with self-discipline and testing himself against the elements (Cynic ponos and askesis) and for Nietzsche, self-perfection was the real goal of morality. Living on his meagre pension, his lifestyle outwardly exhibited itself as very simple and his total abstinence from alcohol was a denial which even Diogenes did not endure. Nietzsche then, like the Cynics, embraced the minimum necessary for life as a strategy for survival. The tiny room where he lived and worked, devoid of decoration or comfort, has parallels with Diogenes own choice of dwelling. Driven by his need to reach the limits of pain and endurance, one way in which Nietzsche practised askesis—despite his frail health—was to take long walks into the mountains. His typical day would start at five in the morning in his small rented room in the Swiss Alpine village of Sils-Maria. He would write until midday and then take long walks up the surrounding peaks, eventually retiring early to bed after a snack of bread and ham or egg alone in his room. An examination of Nietzsche’s work reveals many examples of his testing himself against the elements, raging against comfort in all its manifestations: physical, intellectual, and moral. Nietzsche was particularly mindful of the Cynic’s avoidance of suffering by affirming life itself. In his lectures on Greek literature, Nietzsche recalled an anecdote concerning Antisthenes. Plagued by pain and very ill, Antisthenes asked who will free him from his suffering. When Diogenes shows him a dagger, Antisthenes is said to have responded: 'I said from suffering, not from life.' Nietzsche concludes from this incident the following observation:

A very profound statement. One cannot get the better of the love of life than by means of a dagger. Yet that is the real suffering. It is obvious that the Cynic clings to life more than the other philosophers: ‘the shortest way to happiness’ is nothing but the love of life in itself and complete needlessness with reference to all other goods.

Like the Cynics then, Nietzsche lived his philosophy, but he also shared the Cynics objection to scientific and religious dogmatism and an antipathy towards pre-existing truths. The myth of progressive enlightenment is also dismissed by both the Cynics and Nietzsche, who believed instead in cycles of return. Moreover, although it is by no means conclusive evidence of a cynical stance, we have Nietzsche and the Cynics mutual dislike of Plato. Next, we can point to the contempt by both for pretentiousness: a hatred of narrow provincialism, and hostility towards political and other social institutions. Nietzsche and the Cynics saw themselves outside of such narrow preoccupations; they were cosmopolites: ‘citizens of the world’. Nationalism was dangerous to the species, which is why Nietzsche made a plea for intermarriage between nations. It seemed to Nietzsche a selfish and unreasonable influence that tied people down to the same companions and circumstances, and to the daily round of toil. Nietzsche expressed the same citizen of the world sentiments as Diogenes: ‘Why cling to your bit of earth, or your little business, or listen to what your neighbour says? It is so provincial to bind oneself to views which are no longer binding a couple of hundred miles away.’

     We can also turn to Nietzsche’s linguistic style for evidence of a cynical mode of discourse. His use of aphorisms and epigrams to stimulate the reader’s senses has strong links with Cynic genres such as the chreia. Compare for example Diogenes’ response when asked why he was walking around in broad daylight with a lighted lamp; “I’m looking for an honest man,” with Nietzsche’s aphorism, 'I looked for great human beings, but all I ever found were the apes of their ideals.' Like the Cynic Menippus, Nietzsche also mixed his literary style. Polemic, satire, irony, parody and his preference for the aphorism, mark him out as a true inheritor of the Cynic writing tradition: ‘What? Is humanity just God’s mistake? Or God just a mistake of humanity?’ But in whichever genre Nietzsche chose to present his writing, it is his biting sarcasm and cynical tone that most marks him out from other modern writers. 

     Nietzsche is not for the feint hearted, and like Diogenes, he appears, in his commentary at least, to be conceited, intolerant, and annihilating. This external arrogance and nastiness—in Nietzsche’s case belying a kind and sensitive nature—provides for the daring honesty and unrestraint that makes a cynic a great cynic. The targets of Nietzsche’s attacks, whether history, the law, religion, science, or philosophy, all have one particular element in common, one that shields truth more effectively than any other—the suffocating glue of morality. Nietzsche, like all cynics, questioned too much and was too inquisitive to be content with crude answers like religion, which he saw as a prohibition against people thinking for themselves. He despised even more the concomitant moral smugness of such belief systems and the way in which moral superiority was equated with goodness and righteousness, and thus became morality itself.

     Nietzsche also provides a powerful connecting philosophical thread linking the Cynics with the postmodernists: a classical scholar who was discussing postmodernist ideas even before the arrival of ‘modernism’. Michel Foucault, in The Order of Things was the first to acknowledge Nietzsche as the founder of postmodernism, and, as Nietzsche often referred to himself posthumously, we may wonder whether those of us reading his work today are in fact Nietzsche’s intended audience: ‘I want to be right not for today or tomorrow but for the millennia.’ His contempt for totalizing theories and scientific certitude, and his hostility towards progress and modern ideas at the end of a different century, uncannily echo both the themes of 200 BC and those we are presented with today. We can see the influence of Nietzsche’s philosophy in the work of many postmodernists: the antipathy to any system; the rejection of the Hegelian view of history-as-progress; an awareness of, and criticism of, the increasing pressure for conformity; and an obsession with the subjective and the small story. Nietzsche railed against established views of history, science and knowledge that prevailed during preceding centuries and set the scene for many of the philosophical and cultural genres that appeared and were superseded in relatively quick succession during the following century.

     One criticism that has been levelled at both Nietzsche and the Cynics is that of nihilism; precisely because their uncompromising attacks on popular doctrines and values are mistaken for a belief in nothing at all. But the reverse is the case. Nietzsche had a passionate belief in the validity of a search for the real; a search obscured to most of us by the lie of idealism. Cynicism merely seeks to expose the triteness, the mythology, and the hidden agendas that have corrupted such systems, inviting one to rediscover their fundamental meaning and purpose: the simple creed that made them possible in the first place. What cynicism does not claim to do is offer an alternative system. However, having exposed the lie, the question still remains whether most of us are prepared to accept the truth. 

Was Jesus a Cynic Philosopher (and a feminist)?

Jesus and the Woman from Syrophoenicia

Before I take a two week break from the blog, I wanted to pen something with a seasonal theme. In my essay, A Tale of Two Cynics (The Philosophical Forum, Dec 2010) I explore the possibility of Jesus as a Cynic through a 22 page deconstruction of the minor gospel parable of the woman from Syrophoenicia. I should point out straight away that when I talk of Jesus, I am not referring here to the messianic Christ character created by Paul in his letters and further elaborated by Matthew and Mark in their gospels—written at the earliest 30 years after Jesus was allegedly crucified. I am more concerned here with the semi-mythological Jesus, glimpses and clues of whom can be found in the gospels (both canonical and non-canonical) and from contemporary historians of the time such as Flavius Josephus. This historical Jesus (man or myth is not the issue here) represents everything that modern Christianity does not—images of fat bishops in their cathedral palaces clad in purple robes and gold chains, just does not sit comfortably with Jesus the ascetic sage entreating his followers to abandon money, possessions and a roof over their head for a life of hardship and prayer. In some respects the asceticism of Jesus went even further than that of the ancient Cynics, who at least were permitted to beg for food, wear sandals and enjoy the comfort and security of a street corner or tub.

     But I do not want to focus here on Jesus’ asceticism, nor do I want to dwell too much on the societal and historical influences that the Cynics must have had on Jesus. The main trade route between the Mediterranean coastal town of Ptolemais and Gadara (birthplace of Cynics Menippus, Meleager and Oenomaus) near the south-eastern end of the Sea of Galilee, passed just 8 miles north of Nazareth, and the Hellenized city of Sepphoris was only five miles away; so it is unlikely that Jesus would not have come into contact and been influenced in some way by Cynics. Indeed, the second century anti-Christian writer Celsus even made disparaging comparisons about Christians’ Cynic-like behaviour of preaching to the rabble in the market place. And first century historian Josephus (a contemporary of Jesus, whose personal agenda did not include promoting either Cynics or Christians) told in unflattering terms of a ‘Fourth Philosophy’ among the Jews founded by one, ‘Judas of Galilee’, notable for what can only be described as typical features of Cynicism: advocating hardship (ponos), the freedom to express one’s views without fear of human censorship (parrhesia) and world citizenship under ‘God’ (cosmopolitanism).

     But it is Jesus’ use of cynical irony and the Syrophonician woman’s parrhesia (see post dated 3 Dec 2011 under 'Freedom of Speech') that I want to draw attention too here, and specifically the use of a particular literary genre credited to the Cynics and known as the chreia. Regardless of the actual message: be it the glory of God or the stupidity of people who worship gods, the style and delivery of both early Christian and Cynic public speaking was based on the same modes of discourse. The Cynic diatribe was the prototype for the Christian sermon and the aphoristic sayings credited to pre-Biblical Christian texts—but reproduced and dotted throughout sections of the gospels—are indistinguishable from the Cynic chreia. The chreia (literal meaning of which is ‘something useful’) accounts for most of the Diogenes stories. It is a brief statement of an incident or situation followed by a pungent remark. When asked if he believed in the gods, Diogenes replied, “How can I help believing in them when I see a god-forsaken wretch like you?” On being reproached for eating in the market place (convention at the time forbade eating in public) Diogenes responds, “Well, it was in the market-place that I felt hungry”. And in a chreia credited to Antisthenes on it being confirmed to him by a priest that initiates into the Orphic Mysteries enjoyed certain advantages in Hades, Antisthenes replied, “Why then, don’t you die!”

     One of the best examples of Jesus’ use of the chreia comes from Matthew 15.1-11. When Jesus was challenged by the Pharisees and scribes for breaking with Jewish purification laws by eating without washing their hands, Jesus retorted, “Hypocrites, it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a man but what comes out.” And in a typical example of the chreia in the non-canonical gospel of Thomas, we have the following response from Jesus when asked by his disciples if circumcision was beneficial or not: “If it were beneficial, their father would beget them already circumcised from their mother.” But in the case of the parable of the Syrophonician woman (Mark 7.27-28), having gone to the house in which Jesus and his disciples were holidaying in Lebanon to seek a cure for her dying daughter, it is she that uses the chreia in response to a taunt from Jesus:

 

And he [Jesus] said to her, “Let the children first be fed, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.”

But she answered him, “Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs.”

 

Having tried to dismiss the woman a second time, referring to the disciples as children and the woman as the dog she is—being a gentile in a house of Jews—Jesus then finds himself out-maneuvered at his own game. Her response is that, a dog she might be but as such also a member of the household and deserving of whatever crumbs might fall her way. So impressed was Jesus at the woman’s parrhesia that he said to her, “For this saying you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter.” No matter who the author, or whatever their underlying motive for recounting this story, all ultimately arrive at the same conclusion: whether or not Jesus was aware of the woman’s skills at parrhesia before he engaged her in a duel of words, the clear outcome of the contest is that the woman wins the argument. Even Saint John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople (347-407 CE)—not known as an advocate of women's’ rights!—has to acknowledge just in what way she wins the argument. He refers to it as ‘wisdom’ and ‘humility’ (feigned or otherwise). The woman employs cynical irony by accepting the appellative ‘dog’ and even the ‘dog’s act’ of licking up the crumbs that fall to the floor, to turn the table on her tormentor whom she continues to refer to as ‘Lord’ and ‘master’, all the while maintaining just the safe side of ridicule—safe, that is, from ridiculing Jesus in front of the disciples. Jesus would have accepted the woman’s ridicule for what it was, a coded fraternalism that bound the two of them into a mutually understood intercourse while the disciples could only wonder at the woman’s audacity (it is only with the Cynics that women are acknowledged as philosophical equals and that we find examples of women philosophising in public). And for her trouble, we are told by F. Gerald Downing (priest, and writer on Cynic origins of Christianity), the Syrophoenician woman wins from Jesus her ‘crown’.

     Only small clues can be drawn from his encounter with the woman from Syrophoenicia that Jesus may have been some kind of Cynic sage. Like the Cynics' mentor, Socrates, Jesus wrote nothing down, and so in the same way his own philosophy has been left open to interpretation and abuse from followers in the same way that Socrates’ was. But there are certain clues among all the Christian rhetoric and dogma—in the story of the Syrophoenician woman alone—that provide a key to Jesus’ much overlooked philosophy. First are the dog references. The term Cynic itself is derived from the Greek kynicos, an adjectival form of the noun for dog. When challenged that she is a dog, the Syrophoenician woman embraces the term and the actions of a dog as a rhetorical device. As with Cynics, the Syrophoenician woman is not indignant in the face of insult but employs the aphoristic style of the chreia to deflect the insult back onto its originator. Interestingly, Mark  (7:27) uses the diminutive form of dog, kynaria (puppy) in place of kynos (dog) but being referred to as a ‘little bitch’ is no less an insult for that. Then we have references to the woman’s shamelessness (anaideia). As with another Cynic slogan, apatheia, meaning disregard for feelings, the Syrophoenician woman has no concern at entering a house of men, that she is a gentile and they Jews, that she addresses them first, and then when rebuffed ignores insults and pleas to leave them in peace to assert her own authority. "What is this, O woman?" Jesus remarks, "Hast thou then greater confidence than the apostles? More abundant strength?" The woman’s boldness and disregard for the attitudes of others demonstrates all the hallmarks of the parrhesiast. Significantly, the content of the woman’s discourse with Jesus is deeply philosophical. Unlike the disciples, she does not have to ask Jesus to explain his meaning, she understands perfectly the allegory of his words and is able to engage with him on his own terms—she gives as well as receives. As with certain other celebrities, although constantly surrounded by admirers, Jesus strikes me as a lonely individual. In his encounter with the Syrophonician woman, each recognised in a fleeting moment the cynical spirit of the other but then sadly went their separate ways, their integrity intact but without the consolation of each other's company.