Isa Ta Hamartemata: The Stoic Doctrine “All Errors are Equal”

In the Paradoxa Stoicorum (111. 22) Cicero says that

peccata : vitium : : recte facto : virtus. 

The equivalent Greek expressions which Cicero is translating are

hamartemata : kakia : : katorthomata : arete.

Thus, a hamartema is a manifestation or consequence of a vicious disposition. It is, says Stobaeus, “something done contrary to right reason or something omitted that should have been done by a rational animal.”^[1] Curiously, Stobaeus’s list of hamartemata includes more than wicked deeds. It also includes such things as “being distressed” and “being terri­fied.” So it would seem that the concept of hamartema is broad enough to include affective states (pathe) as well as actions and activities.^[2] Actually, the association of affective states and actions as two kinds of hamartemata is not sur­prising, for as Aristotle notes—and the Stoics were able stu­dents of Aristotle—affective states and actions constitute the substance of moral behavior.^[3] Specifically, an action is the fruit of an affective response, or as we might say, the latter stages of that response. Thus, a hamartema may be mani­fested at the beginning or at the end of a continuous process.

A hamartema contravenes right reason, the principle of universal order,^[4] and since our rational natures are “parts of the whole,” it contravenes our natures as welI.^[5] How then is right reason supposed to be contravened?

It is well to begin by noting the etymological connection between the Greek words orthos (“straight” or “right”) and katorthoma (“right response”). A katorthoma is the rational expression of arete. The metaphor concealed in the abstract word katorthoma is that of a straight path along which someone goes, a path presumably leading to a particular goal. Any deviation from this path will result in a failure to reach the goal. Here is perhaps a hint concerning the cor­rect understanding of the doctrine that isa ta hamartemata (“all hamartemata are equal”). If one sets out on a journey to a city along a path which deviates from the correct path by only a few degrees, one is nevertheless on the wrong path as much as if he had gone in the opposite direction. The reader will of course realize that the words “as much as” beg the very question at issue. It is enough for the moment that we begin to see the Stoic strategy reflected in their use of language.

The contravening of right reason must involve falsity of some sort. Galen, in his work On the Diagnosis of Partic­ular Affective States and ‘Hamartemata’, says that hamartemata arise from “false belief.^[6] Elsewhere in the same work he adds, “the origin of many hamartemata is the ‘false grasp’ of the goal of one’s life.”^[7] According to Chrysippus, every affective state is itself, or follows from, a false, or at least a wicked judgment.^[8]

We must distinguish carefully the falsity that is alluded to by both Galen and Chrysippus from another kind of fal­sity, that is, miscalculation. For example, if in the distance I see a figure moving towards me and I mistake Smith for Jones, my false belief is not against right reason, for circumstance might justify such a belief. If I miscalculate my strength when I judge the likelihood of my being able to save a drowning man, my miscalculation is not a hamartema. As Stobaeus puts it, there is a difference between saying something that is in fact false and saying it knowingly with the intention to deceive.^[9] ‘Objective falsity,’ as we might call it, is not at issue. Although the Stoic sage may do the former, he will never do the latter. Literally, he is not able to commit a hamartema.^[10] So, whatever the falsity is, it is not a falsity merely in fact.

Such a distinction between a hamartema and error in fact is perhaps not quite adequate. After all, might not the false grasp of the goal of one’s life be just as blameless as the falsity of an innocent or unavoidable miscalculation? The Stoic answer is “no” because the source of the falsity is dif­ferent in each case. The fool’s faIse grasp of the goaI of life is an error caused, not by anything external to him, but by a willful denial of his own nature. There are no mitigating circumstances because, even in the most extreme situations, he is free to constrict his desires into one rational principle. Thus, if it is true that the fool errs habitually, it is also true that his conversion is within his power at any moment. Strictly speaking, a man who had lost the ability for such a conversion would no longer be a rational animal.

The permanent disposition of the sage flowers forth only in katorthomata, that of the fool only in hamartemata. But the katorthomata and hamartemata are not the dispositions themselves. Nor are they even particular affective states or actions considered in themselves.^[11] For example, a particular act of suicide is neither necessarily a katorthoma nor a hamartema, for it can be either, depending on the circumstances. Furthermore, following Stoic reasoning, an act of suicide, even though it is based on an error in fact, say, about the likelihood of future debilitation or disgrace, may nevertheless be a katorthoma; that is, it may be done according to right reason. Similarly, another act of suicide, even though it is accompanied by a correct assessment of the likelihood of future debilitation or disgrace, may be a hamartema, if the act is not based on that assessment, but rather on what amounts to a denial of right reason. For example, the real reason might be that the man is weary of life and the assessment of future ill tidings is just an excuse. Or perhaps he would be debilitated by the illness, but he ought not to allow himself to be. In either case, right reason is undermined.

The sage acts always and acts everywhere as reason dictates. There is in him a perfect identity between what he thinks is right and what he wants to do. His life is built up of katorthomata which arise from desires permeated perfectly by impersonal reason. The fool, which is to say most people, may from time to time excogitate the dictates of rational behavior, but he looks upon these as alien, and his fidelity to them is at best desultory. Generally, what he wants to do is far removed from what he thinks he ought to do. Thus, the false belief from which he suffers habitually is, in a sense, a false belief concerning the proper connec­tion of reason and desire. His hamartemata spring from a self-perceived gap between reason and desire. We must add, though, that he does not necessarily perceive this gap as a bad thing. The fool’s every response to life is a hamartema because he acts in the wrong spirit. In the sage, desire is not an additional “factor” in the determination of a course of action.^[12] Desire is thoroughly “rationalized.”

With the above explanation of hamartema in mind, the doctrine that isa ta hamartemata will perhaps begin to appear as something other than a scrap of sophistry deservedly vil­ified by the Stoics’ incredulous contemporaries.^[13]

First, we must be clear that the doctrine is not intended to imply that someone who commits one kind of hamartema—say, lying—is likely to commit another—say, murder.^[14] The characters of the liar and the murderer may be quite different, even though they are both fools and equally guilty of abandoning the rational conduct of their lives.^[15] The difference between the two resides in their par­ticular dispositions.^[16] From this it follows, of course, that the appropriate punishment, insofar as it is remedial, will differ for each. Conceivably, again assuming that punishment is remedial, punishment for the liar will be greater than for the murderer, because he is more inured in his vicious­ ness.

Every hamartema is in principle misconceived because it is the manifestation of reason gone astray. Thus, to say that hamartemata are not equal is as pointless as affirming that one falsehood is more false than another.^[17] The numbers 5 and 6 are equally false answers to the question, what is the sum of 2 + 2? Of course, we might, for pedagogical reasons, say that one answer is “better” than another. It is incorrect, though, to think that just because 5 is quantita­tively “closer” to 4 than is 6 that “5” is an answer less false than “6”. Indeed, the pupil who answers “6” may be “closer” to the truth in the sense that he has a better grasp of mathematical principles. But his relative grasp of mathematical principles is no measure of the truth of his answer. Just so, each hamartema is “off the mark” because it bears the sign of the disruption of reason and desire in the soul of the fool. A sage follows the dictates of reason, the same reason that ensures that one effect necessarily follows one cause.^[18] Thus, his every act is a katorthoma. Desire in him is perfectly “in line” with reason, so that it follows “down along” (kata) the straight path automatically, once reason has revealed it to him. Reason in him makes action and motion flow from his calculations the way an effect flows from a cause, necessarily and unequivocally.

Even if one wished to claim that, in some sense, hamartemata are unequal, this would be at best a trivialization, in view of the enormous difference between sage and fool, a difference greater than that between one fool and any other. Thus, the Stoic doctrine undoubtedly has behind it an exhortative function as well as a philosophical argument about reason and desire. It is a doctrine intended to shock. It is intended to stress the ideal character of the sage. The sage is a man who can, for example, look upon his own suffering or death with equanimity. Anything short of this heroic behavior is error. To insist upon various shades of error is, from the point of view of the sage, just what a fool might be expected to do.

In this light, the famous Stoic dictum “live in agreement with nature” should be seen more clearly. To live in agree­ment with nature is to follow reason with perfect purity of heart. “Consentiens cum ratione et perpetua constantia,” as Cicero puts it. To follow reason only occasionally is irrational and so no devotion to reason at all. The very act of looking upon the demands of reason as an alternative amongst motives for action is to have shown a kind of mau­vaise foi. Undoubtedly, the stringent requirement for Stoic sanctity is why the sage is so rare. Although his kind of life is difficult to attain, it is not impossible. But how can one mired in an endless succession of hamartemata ever hope to achieve the self-mastery of the sage?

This question brings to the fore the problem of prokope or moral progress, one which concerned both the Stoics and their critics. The Stoic description of how moral progress occurs is that the aspirant begins by mimicking the sage, partaking, as it were, of the simulacra et effigies of katorthormata. Gradually, the disruption of his reason and desire is healed so that, finally, the man “identifies” himself with his rational faculty. Irrational desire withers from disuse as the training of the aspirant proceeds. Thus, it can be said of two fools that one is closer to sagehood than another, although both are equally guilty and miserable. Still, to describe the process is not to explain how it begins. Why should the fool ever want to be anything else?

The Stoics had no clear answer to this question, although it cannot be said that they failed where their predecessors succeeded. We can, however, easily imagine the Stoics replying in a way that is consistent with their basic principles.

The reason that governs the universe is present in every man, sage or fool. The rational life is something always attainable, not by becoming something different, but by becoming what we already are. Thus, a moral conversion involves something like recognition or recollection. Just as the cloak of the beloved, to use Plato’s example, can remind one of the beloved, so the words and actions of the sage can remind one of what he himself can be, indeed, of what he himself truly is: a rational man. And the irrational impulses that previously seemed so indispensable and personal appear as alien and pointless.

II

Let us return to Cicero’s Paradoxa Stoicorum where there is a striking phrase concerning the origin of the Stoic doctrine. In the preface to the work (section 4) Cicero calls all of the Stoic Paradoxes maxime Socratica. It is, of course, well known that the Stoics proudly claimed a Socratic heritage. Still, it is surprising to learn that the paradox isa ta hamartemata was thought to be “Socratic in the highest degree.” Certainly, none of the dialogues contains explicitly such a doctrine. Subsequently, in the course of the discussion of the paradox Cicero alludes to an argument in support of the paradox, adding that Socrates argued in the same way (Ill, 22-23). That argument, although not entirely perspicuous, is basically that katorthomata are equal (and therefore hamartemata are equal) because virtues are equal. And to say that virtues are equal is just to say that they are a unity. Now here we do have a doctrine that is genuinely Socratic.^[19]

In the Protagoras Socrates, in a series of arguments, tries to show that the virtues—justice, piety, temperance, wisdom, and courage—are a unity. What this means pre­cisely is a matter of considerable dispute. For our purposes what is important is the way in which the Stoics themselves understood the doctrine. To say that virtue is a unity is to say that virtue is identical with “a single knowledge” of good and evil.^[20] He who has this knowledge will necessarily act according to it when called upon to do so. That is, he will act temperately, courageously, and so on.

If Cicero is correct in his supposition of Socratic origin, further light is shed on the Stoic doctrine isa ta hamartemata, for the moral psychology underlying that doc­trine is identical with that which leads Socrates to argue for a doctrine closely related to that of the unity of virtue: The doctrine of the impossibility of incontinence or akrasia.^[21] This doctrine rests upon the claim that the soul is a substantial unity, which means that there can be only one principle of action, and that principle is reason. Therefore, since the goal of any action is the achievement of what is rationally desired, it is impossible for anyone to act other than according to what he perceives as being in his best interests. An act of akrasia would be, per impossibile, just such an act.

There is very little in the remains of the Old Stoa concerning akrasia, and what there is is, unfortunately, entirely unilluminating. Nevertheless, the Socratic, monistic psychology of the Old Stoa is well documented.^[22] This psychology and its Socratic lineage present an acute problem concerning the Stoic understanding of the paradox isa ta hamartemata. If every response is a rational response and if the fool and the sage do not differ because one does and one does not calculate correctly concerning the appropriate response, then the precise meaning of hamartema begins to evanesce. The fool is not a fool, as we have seen, because his reasoning arrives at the wrong conclusion but because somehow he reasons in the wrong way. How is this diso­ rientation of reason, as we may call it, to be understood?

To appreciate fuIly the Stoic position, it is necessary to understand that, for the Stoics, nature is thoroughly rational and that “living according to nature” and “living the rational life” are equivalent.^[23] For our problem, the relevant consequence of the unity and universality of reason as understood by the Stoics is that the idea of idiosyncratic reasons or reasoning is nonsense. There can no more be idiosyncratic reasoning than there can be idiosyn­cratic truths. And since the supreme good for man is living the life of reason, the practical application of their doctrine concerning reason is the unity and universality of goodness. For the Stoics, an idiosyncratic good has no more meaning than an idiosyncratic truth. What this amounts to is the necessary identity of “good for x” and “good simpliciter.” If some response is rational, that is, good, it is universally and unqualifiedly so. It can never be bad for one man that something is good for another any more than that what is true in one place could be anything else but true in another. A fool is a man who reasons in a deficient way, but not because he disobeys the laws of logic. His practical rea­soning is warped in principle by an assumption, likely to be unnoticed by himself, that “good for me” and “good simpli­citer” are not necessarily identical. For example, a fool might reason as follows: “I can, on this occasion, either pursue the satisfaction of my own desires or fulfill my civic duties. Perhaps I can avoid the latter. Or perhaps, if I perform the latter, I shall reap rewards which I also desire.” And so on. Whatever he decides to do, even if it is the performance of his civic duties—that is, even if he does what in fact the sage does—he will commit a hamartema. For he will have reasoned on the principle that his own good and the good of everyone else are two distinct “factors” to be weighed. Even one who put the good of others before the good itself would be making a similar mistake. The Stoics’ frequently repeated assertion of both the prima facie duty of self-preservation and the duty of civic responsibility pro­ vides counterweights to two different sorts of hamartemata. A fool is someone who says, “True (good) for me, but not true (good)” or “True (good), but not true (good) for me.” It is almost incidental that such reasoning produces one kind of hamartema rather than another. A sage, on the other hand, although he is neither omniscient nor infallible, acts always and everywhere as reason dictates. The difference between the sage and the fool is roughly the difference between one man who prays “Thy will be done” and another who prays for sunshine on his picnic.

Undoubtedly, there is an affective dimension to this doctrine which is particularly relevant to the question of conversion. It should be noted that the Stoics were inclined to identify wickedness with madness and, notoriously, to recommend the suppression or even extirpation of emotions.^[24] It should be clear from what has been said why the fool should be thought mad. He reasons from a disposition inim­ical to rationality. That emotions, or at least the emotions of all but the sage, should be thought counter to the life lived according to nature follows from the fact that emotions are false judgments contrary to reason.^[25] A man who, say, grieves, has made a judgment fundamentally counter to reason. He has judged his good and the good of the whole as different, even as opposed. The conversion of such a man cannot be thought of simply as assent to an argument about the unity and universality of reason and goodness. Certainly, there must be a change of heart as well, and the Stoics tried to convey this in their stories about some of the remarkable conversions made to the Stoic way of life. Nev­ertheless, it must not be supposed that the convert becomes a sage immediately upon his conversion, if he does at all. For in most men the partially affective process of “identification” of one’s self with reason and the concomitant alteration of responses is never perfect. Even the sage, as the Stoics said, bears the “scars” of his former profligacy.

The paradox isa ta hamartemata expresses what is per­ haps the inevitable outcome of Socratic moral psychology. Plato takes a different path precisely because he rejects the monistic psychology of the Protagoras. Plato’s tripartition of the soul and subsequent recognition of the phenomenon of akrasia allow him to speak of grades of wickedness and moral decline.^[26] Interestingly enough, the Middle Stoa, as a result of their rejection of a monistic psychology in favor of Platonic tripartition, apparently abandoned adherence to the paradox isa ta hamartemata. ^[27]

This abandonment of their predecessors’ psychology certainly indicates a strain in the reasoning behind the par­adox. How can reason be irrational? Must there not be an additional faculty present to account for the irrationality underlying the actions of the fool? Evidently, this is what the Middle Stoa thought, despite their unwillingness to make of this a body-soul dualism, as does Plato. Yet neither the dualism of Plato nor the materialistic partitioning of the soul in the Middle Stoa will satisfy anyone who conceives of the disobedience of an angelic intelligence as a paradigmatic hamartema. The association of the Stoic paradox with inti­mations of the diabolic is not intended offhandedly. If the fool does not say “Evil be thou my good,” he does say “The good is not good” and “The true is not true.“ It is unfor­tunate that the Stoic psychology is imbedded in an arcane cosmology which can no longer command the attention of more than a small band of scholars. Yet to suppose that that psychology and the moral doctrines with which it is associ­ated are not based on independent insights into human nature would be a serious mistake, a mistake similar to that of supposing that Plato’s psychology is a mere corollary of his politics. Even if the Stoic cosmology no longer impels assent, or even much interest, the psychological doctrines have a life of their own and a distinctive contribution to make in the shaping of our understanding of hamartia.