All the earth as his fatherland

Musonius Rufus on exile

since what do mortals need except two things only, 

Demeter’s grain and Aquarius’ drink, 

things which are at hand and which exist to nourish us?

-Euripides, Fragment 892, cited in Rufus, 46.

I. Introduction

As of late, upon reading of people’s experiences of exile and social isolation, I was reminded of a text. This text is a fragment of Stobaeus laying down Musonius Rufus’ thoughts on exile. Musonius Rufus was a Roman Stoic philosopher who lived from c. AD 30 - 100. Rufus is lesser known than Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, or Epictetus, but his words are just as powerful. Called the “Roman Socrates”, Rufus roamed the streets of Rome preaching his highly practical philosophy. Just like Epictetus or Marcus Aurelius, Rufus saw metaphysics or logic as secondary to the true activity of philosophy: ethics. His goal was to lead the human soul to freedom through the practice of reason and good judgement, through doing so the soul could be freed from the corruption the unexamined life bathes in. The goal of life for Rufus is a virtuous life, and philosophy is the practice that leads to this. Central to this doctrine is the belief that one should follow nature, and one does so by following reason which grants insight into the natural way of living. What gets in the way of this are the opinions and prejudices that are given to the soul through society. By freeing the soul from opinion and prejudice through the exercise of reason, one is able to live a more virtuous and free life. Free, that is, unconcerned for that which is outside the control of one’s reason. These basic Stoic tenets are very rationalistic, that is, by practicing thought one can reach a life of virtue. But Rufus believes that this is not as simple as it sounds. The prejudices and unnatural ways of living have such a grip on us that mere thinking is not enough, what is needed is practice. “Could someone acquire instant self-control by merely knowing that he must not be conquered by pleasures but without training to resist them?”(Rufus 36). It is not enough to know how one should act, when habit and the search for pleasure drive us to act differently. One must practice. Reason shows us the virtuous life, but only practice leads us there. It is not enough to know truth, one must also want truth, and only practice can make it so. 

Today I want to read with you a text of Rufus on the experience of exile, and how this seemingly bad experience is in fact a good when brought about for the right reasons. Rufus himself was no stranger to the experience of exile. As part of the Stoic Opposition, a group of Stoic philosophers that opposed the tyrannical rulership of emperors in the first century, Rufus was exiled twice. The second time to the island of Gyaros, a small and uninhabited Greek island. Here Rufus lived a harsh life far from the luxury of human culture. When states become rigid and tyrannical, philosophy opposes it by essence and sides with the voice of freedom. Rufus knew and experienced this. For him, philosophy serves no state or higher power, but is the activity that seeks to strengthen the lives of individual men and women, so that they might live free from whatever inside or outside forces that suffocate this freedom. The philosopher serves no interest but life and its strengthening . The philosopher serves no rule, but the rule of nature. In this sense, Stoicism is very far from being a-political. It is the practice of violence against that inner weakness, in yourself and others, that allows tyranny to take hold of life. It is a violence against that inner weakness that prevents life from being strong enough to resist what crushes it. 

II. Exile is not evil

Musonius Rufus’ thoughts are laid down in a series of fragments and letters, the most lengthy collection being a series of Rufus’ discourses preserved by Stobaeus. This collection contains 21 discourses. I will focus on the 9th discourse: on why exile is not an evil thing. 

In this text, Rufus responds to an exiled person who complains to him about his exile. Speaking from his own experience of exile, and armed with his distinct brand of Stoic philosophy, Rufus responds: “how could any sensible person be upset by being in exile?”(44) Exile might seem like a very bad experience, but Rufus invites us to think about it, and realize that in fact even in exile a person is not deprived of the things he needs to live a good life. Exile doesn’t deprive one of water, food, earth, air, or the sun. And neither does it deprive us of companionship with other people. Exile might remove us from the food and land that we are accustomed to, and it might remove us from the people we are accustomed to, but it doesn’t remove us from food and land and neither from people. Rufus speaks: 

“If we are removed from a certain part of the earth and from association with certain people, why is this terrible? Before our exile, we did not use all the earth, nor did we associate with all men?”(44)   

When you think about it, exile is no different from normal life. In normal life we associate only with a small group of people, and we walk on a small part of the earth of which we use a small amount of nourishment. In exile we do exactly the same, just with different people and with a different part of the earth. Concerning these things that are necessary for life, exile is not evil, you only believe it to be so because you are attached to what is familiar. But this attachment that causes you stress is only in your mind, not in the material condition of exile. 

Rufus’ argument is easily understood when it comes to material conditions; earth, food, water, sun, etc. But is it truly so that being refused association with people is this easy to cope with? It is, for in exile we are only exiled from those who would refuse contact with us on the basis of our exile. But true and worthwhile friends are not lost because of exile. On the contrary, we can grow closer to those who share in being exiled, even if they are not physically present. The community of minds who think alike extends beyond matter. Even if there is no community formed on the surface of the earth, there can be a community in life. And for those who are lost, “we are better off being removed from them than associating with them.”(44) 

For Rufus, following Stoic doctrine, the world is the common fatherland of all humans. He here, among other influences, leans on the saying of Euripides that “a noble man has all the earth as his fatherland.” (Euripides fragment 1047, cited in Rufus, 44) As a result, one must not feel oneself exiled when one is removed from one’s fatherland where one lived previously. Every place on the earth is your fatherland, and as such, every place is home. If you believe this, that the world is the common fatherland of man, reason tells us that exile only removes us from a specific city, not from our fatherland. Again, it is the emotional attachment to a specific place that makes us see exile as an evil, but following reason which tells us that the entire world is our home, exile is not an evil. As Rufus says: 

“A reasonable person neither applauds a place nor rejects it because he holds it responsible for his happiness or unhappiness. He relies on himself for his whole well-being, and he considers himself to be a citizen of the city of Zeus which is populated by human beings and gods.” (44)

III. Exile is a good

In what follows, Rufus attempts to show that exile is not only not evil, but that it is in fact good. As he has argued, exile does not deprive us of what we need to live a good life. What exile does do is give us more time and opportunity to learn and do good things, to focus on what matters. In exile one is not dragged into the distractions of excessive socializing, or the need to please politicians. One is also not bothered by those who only seem to be friends, but are in fact not, for exile has acted as a filter that separates true friends from false friends. Distractions are minimized, and one thus has more energy and time to spend on living a good and virtuous life. 

To strengthen his argument, Rufus gives examples of people who benefited greatly from being exiled. Diogenes was transformed from an ordinary pleasure seeker into a philosopher by being exiled. Many others had their health improve by being exiled. In exile, they could no longer indulge in luxurious and soft living. Exile forced their bodies and minds to strengthen: “Exile, by accustoming them to live more austerely, restored their health. Thus, by improving people, exile helps them more than it hurts them with respect to both body and soul.”(45)

Of course, exile will break many. It will break those who are lazy, incompetent, and uninventive when not exiled. But those who are hardworking, industrious, and intelligent when not exiled, will also flourish when exiled. It is thus not exile that creates difficulty for exiles, but it is the nature of the exiled himself that does this. 

IV. Exile, Reputation, Freedom

A fear tied to the fear of exile is the fear of gaining a bad reputation. This is of no concern for Rufus. For everyone knows that people judge cases wrongly, and that many are exiled for the wrong reasons. Good men are exiled, all the while being judged badly. But why would one care for the judgements of idiots? If you know you did the right thing by nature, no other judgement matters. And besides this, it is even possible to get a better reputation from being exiled. People will respect your resolve, and in time, will congratulate you for your exile. 

Perhaps the worst perceived evil of exile is the way in which it silences your freedom of speech. 

“not saying what one thinks- this is the condition of a slave.” (Euripides, Phoenician Women, 392, cited in Rufus 47)

By having your freedom of speech silenced in exile, you are reduced to the condition of a slave. Not only your body is chained, but that most precious expression of your individuality: your voice, is chained too. For Rufus however, exile in itself never silences freedom of speech. One never stops saying what one thinks because one is an exile, one refrains from saying what one thinks because one fears one will suffer pain, ridicule, or punishment for saying what one thinks. Fear of being exiled silences people, not being exiled in itself. The latter only refuses your voice to have an audience, but it can never effectively silence your voice. Only fear can do so. Even censorship, brought about by exile or other means, never takes away your freedom of speech, this is only possible when you choose to be silent out of fear. And is this situation, the perceived silencing of your freedom of speech brought about by exile, any different than if you were not exiled? Isn’t it so that also in normal life in society, people refrain from saying what they think out of fear for what will happen? Out of fear for what others might think? Exile is no different from normal life in society: “By Zeus, it is not exile but fear that silences people.” (47) If anything, exile makes it easier to say what one thinks, for there are fewer people listening, fewer people to be afraid of. 

In what remains of the fragment, Rufus talks about his own experience of exile and how he convinced himself to not be bothered by it:

“Have I been robbed of free speech? Have I had the power of saying what I think taken away from me? Have you or anyone else seen me crouching before anyone because I am an exile, or have you seen me thinking that my condition is worse than before?” (48)

As his prior examination showed, exile does not deprive one of what is most necessary and beneficial to the flourishing of life: the ability to say what one thinks and to act on it. Rufus uses himself as the living example of this. Exile might deprive one of certain things, but it never deprives him of what is good: “courage, justice, self-control, wisdom.” (48) It is the presence of these qualities that makes a man good and worthy of praise, and their absence that makes a man bad and worthy of shame. But whatever might be taken from you by being exiled, the power to exercise these virtues is never taken, for this power has nothing to do with whatever circumstance you might find yourself in. As these powers can still be exercised in exile, the man who is exiled is never prevented from growing as an individual, from growing in virtue. Likewise, the man who does not possess these qualities, and who chooses to dwell in vice, is also able to grow more evil in exile. So what is to be feared? Not exile, but vice. In exile or elsewhere, it is vice and not exile, that harms a soul. “You must work on freeing yourself from vice rather than from exile.”(48) 

Of course, all of these things are easier said than done. Musonius Rufus knew this, and this is why he recommends practice. He himself would repeat these teachings to himself so often that they became ingrained in his soul. Practice, so that they do not remain mere theory, but are given life through practice. 

The magnificence of Stoic teachings like those of Rufus lies in their simplicity. When all is said and done, you are either in exile justly or unjustly. You are either in exile because you deserve it, or you are in exile because you do not deserve it. If the former is the case, why would you be upset for what is done to you, if it is done justly? And if the latter is the case, why would you suffer because of the evil of the people who sent you into exile? You must fight them, by showing their wickedness and correcting it. But if this is not effective, and you are sent into exile anyhow, why would you torment yourself because something happened to you because you did the right thing? 

Sources:

Musonius Rufus, Lectures and Sayings. Translated with an introduction by Cynthia King. 2011.