isocrates rhetoric of philosophy

8/14/2019 Isocrates Rhetoric of Philosophy

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Niall Livingstone

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Rhetorica, Vol. XXV, Issue 1, pp. 15–34, ISSN 0734-8584, electronic ISSN 1533-8541. ©2007 by The International Society for the History of Rhetoric. All rights re-served. Please direct all requests for permission to photocopy or reproduce articlecontent through the University of California Press’s Rights and Permissions website,at http://www.ucpressjournals.com/reprintInfo.asp. DOI: RH.2007.25.1.15.

Writing Politics:Isocrates’ Rhetoric of Philosophy

Abstract: Isocrate emploie le mot philosophia en trois sens distincts:

(i) la sagesse pratique commune a tous les hommes; (ii) tout systeme

d’education; (iii) l’education qu’il pratique lui-meme, la seule vraie.Il se sert d’oppositions entre les trois pour cacher un paradoxe: qu’il

veut son propre philosophia a la fois pres de la sagesse quotidienne, et

d’une perfection et valeur unique. Comme les discours chez Thucy-

dide, ses oeuvres ecrites crystallisent la rhetorique quotidienne de

la polis; mais en lui otant son aspect antilogique, elles creent un

logos politikos unifie, harmonieux, bienseant, mais depourvu des

ressources de sa propre critique.

It is a familiar paradox that while Isocrates has since an-tiquity been canonised in the history of rhetoric, he him-self never uses the word rhetorike,1 and instead constantly

refers to his own activity as philosophia. This paradox becomes allthe more interesting against the background of the relatively recentunravelling, in the wake of work by Thomas Cole, Edward Schiappaand others, of received ideas about the early history of rhetoricaltheory, and the growing acceptance of the view that the opposition

between philosophy and rhetoric, and the use of this opposition todefine each as a distinct discipline or practice, are things which weowe above all to Plato.2

1ητορεα, “skill in public speaking,” is used at Against the Sophists 21, andητορικ, “skilled in public speaking,” at Nicocles 8 (cited at Antidosis 256), but ineach case the reference is clearly to a faculty rather than a discipline or art.

2Thomas Cole, The Origins of Rhetoric in Ancient Greece (Baltimore: The Johns Hop-

kins University Press, 1991); Edward Schiappa, “Did Plato coin rhetorike?,” American



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In this light, the well-established opposition between Plato thephilosopher and Isocrates the rhetorician becomes extremely prob-

lematic; as Chloe Balla has said, it is question-begging, “insofar as thedistinction between philosophy and oratory seems to be the productrather than the cause of the opposition.”3 More generally, the under-standing of rhetoric and philosophy as clearly distinct and opposedactivities, so important in the later development of Greek and Ro-man culture and later intellectual history, is all too easily read backinto earlier periods; and it is often unhelpful when we are trying tounderstand the diverse intellectual life, and the range of practicesamong teachers and users of logoi in all the senses of that word,

which characterised the democratic city of Athens. The impulse isall too strong to organise intellectual phenomena of the 5th and 4thcenturies bce under anachronistic “philosophical” and “rhetorical”headings, and to hail particular developments as precursors (or con-versely dismiss them as dead ends) in relation to later disciplinaryparadigms, meanwhile losing sight of their significance in their ownhistorical context.

While accepting the main thrust of Cole’s and Schiappa’s de- bunking of the notion of a pre-Platonic discipline of rhetoric, Harvey

Yunis has provided an important qualification.4

Yunis underlines theextraordinary “rhetorical situation” created in democratic Athens,where functioning as a citizen means engaging in politics, and engag-ing in politics means striving to persuade. Within this situation, evenin the absence of a systematic discipline of rhetoric, a vigorous interestin political eloquence is both inevitable and well-documented. Thepractices of antithetical argument and “antilogy” (opposing speechesside-by-side) are fundamental to democracy, and Yunis shows howtheir elaboration in literary rhetoric creates a medium not just for

demonstration and display of debating strategies, but for criticalreflection. He focuses in particular on Thucydides’ History, a textwhich demands to be read and re-read, and which is punctuated by intense and significant antilogic set-pieces. The written text re-

Journal of Philology 111 (1990): 457-70; Edward Schiappa, The Beginnings of RhetoricalTheory in Classical Greece (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1999).

3Chloe Balla, “Isocrates, Plato, and Aristotle on Rhetoric,” Rhizai 1 (2004): 45-71(p. 53).

4Harvey Yunis, “The Constraints of Democracy and the Rise of the Art of Rhetoric,” in Deborah Boedeker and Kurt A. Raaflaub, eds., Democracy, Empire, andthe Arts in Fifth-Century Athens (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998),223-240. See also Donald Russell’s review of Cole, Journal of Hellenic Studies 112 (1992):185-6.



Writing Politics 17

moves the dimension of time, and thus the excitement or banal-ity of a potentially endless to-and-fro of refutation; and it presents

these exchanges to a readership for whom the merit of the argu-ments may be more important than the outcome of the debates.Thus Thucydides is able to refine antilogy into “a flexible tool of expression and instruction,”5 something which is less a re-enactmentor display of rhetoric than a distillation both of its power and of its weaknesses.

Yunis’ discussion of Thucydides, to which I will return below,shows that without a systematic and self-conscious discipline of rhetoric there may still be sophisticated reflection on rhetorical prac-

tice (and that unsystematic rhetorical teaching based on set-piecesneed not be merely imitative). It reminds us that while we must be cautious about reading rhetoric as a systematic art or discipline back into texts for which this was not yet a given, we must equallyavoid the mistake of assuming that what is not systematic is thereforehaphazard or unsophisticated.

Isocrates: neither rhetoric nor philosophy

Isocrates’ work has suffered more than most in modern scholarlyestimation for its failure to fit disciplinary categories. What he does isclearly not philosophy with a capital “P” (for Plato), and thereforemust be the other thing, namely rhetoric. This of course was theconsensus of ancient scholars, for whom he takes his place in thelist of the Ten Orators.6 For much modern scholarship, Isocrates hasseemed also an unsatisfactory rhetorician, being neither an activepractitioner (for most of his career) nor a systematic theorist. Thus

for a long time it was only in the history of Greek and Latin prosestyle that his work held a clear and uncontested place. Since the lastdecades of the twentieth century, however, there has been a strongresurgence of interest in Isocrates, still to some extent dominated by the well-established practice of using him as a foil to Plato andAristotle, but also addressing his work from the point of view of modern interests in the construction of political discourse, the nature

5Yunis, “Constraints of Democracy,” p. 238.6As well as in the shorter list of ancient orators influentially discussed by Diony-

sius of Halicarnassus. On the formation of the canon of orators, see I. Worthington,“The Canon of the Ten Attic Orators,” in I. Worthington, ed., Persuasion: Greek Rhetoricin Action (London and New York: Routledge, 1994), 244-63.



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of authorship and authority, and the relationship between authorand text.7

Against this background, it is not a new observation that Isocratesis a problematic case from the point of view of the traditional oppo-sition between rhetoric and philosophy. By way of background tomy own discussion, I refer briefly to two studies, one by StephenHalliwell and the other by Chloe Balla.8 Both present critical re-evaluations of the activity or cultural domain which Isocrates calls

philosophia. Both observe that Isocrates, who consistently denies thateloquence can be imparted by systematic instruction, is problematicas a representative of the category of “rhetorician,” and reach similar

conclusions on other issues: they concur that there are serious prob-lems in identifying Isocrates as a primary target of Plato’s attackson rhetoric, and they find signficant connections between Isocrates’account of persuasive speech and Aristotle’s.9 They reach differentconclusions on Isocrates’ title to be taken seriously as a philosopherin the modern sense of the term (or more generally as a thinker).

7E.g. Christoph Eucken, Isokrates. Seine Positionen in der Auseinandersetzung mit

den zeitgeno ssischen Philosophen (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1983); Sylvia Usener, Isokrates, Pla-ton und ihr Publikum. Ho rer und Leser von Literatur im 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr. (Tu bingen:Gunter Narr Verlag, 1994); Agostino Masaracchia, Isocrate. Retorica e politica (Rome:Gruppo Editoriale Internazionale, 1995); Yun Lee Too, The Rhetoric of Identity inIsocrates. Text, Power, Pedagogy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995); Evan-gelos Alexiou, Ruhm und Ehre: Studien zu Begriffen, Werten und Motivierungen beiIsokrates (Heidelberg: Winter, 1995); Takis Poulakos, Speaking for the Polis: Isocrates’Rhetorical Education (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1997); Niall Liv-ingstone, A Commentary on Isocrates’ Busiris (Leiden: Brill, 2001); Wolfgang Orth,ed., Isokrates. Neue Ansa tze zur Bewertung eines politischen Schriftstellers (Trier: Wis-senschaftlicher Verlag, 2003); Ekaterina V. Haskins, Logos and Power in Isocrates and

Aristotle (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2004); Takis Poulakos andDavid Depew, eds., Isocrates and Civic Education (Austin: University of Texas Press,2004).

8Stephen Halliwell, “Philosophical Rhetoric or Rhetorical Philosophy? TheStrange Case of Isocrates,” in Brenda Deen Schildgen, ed., The Rhetoric Canon (Detroit:Wayne State University Press, 1997), and Balla, “Isocrates, Plato, and Aristotle,” citedin n. 3 above. See also Edward Schiappa, “Isocrates’ Philosophia and ContemporaryPragmatism,” in Steven Mailloux, ed., Rhetoric, Sophistry, Pragmatism (Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1995), 33-60; David M. Timmerman, “Isocrates’ Com-peting Conceptualisation of Philosophy,” Philosophy and Rhetoric 31 (1998): 145-59;Schiappa, Beginnings of Rhetorical Theory, cited in n. 2 above, pp. 162-84.

9Points of connection and contrast with Aristotle are explored further byDavid Depew, “The Inscription of Isocrates into Aristotle’s Practical Philosophy,”in Poulakos and Depew, Isocrates and Civic Education, pp. 157-85; by Eugene Garver,“Philosophy, Rhetoric, and Civic Education in Aristotle and Isocrates,” in the samecollection, pp. 186-213; and by Haskins, Logos and Power.



Writing Politics 19

Halliwell emphasises Isocrates’ failure explicitly to articulate a ratio-nal basis for the claims he makes for philosophia, but what he ulti-

mately finds most damaging is the fact that Isocrates accords littleimportance to the critique or questioning of his own methods.10 Balla,on the other hand, presents Isocrates as a proto-empiricist, for whomadvances in command of logos are made cumulatively through trialand error, and the only criterion needed is human opinion, doxa,which while lacking absolute certainty, generally tracks the truth;there is thus no need for instruction or eloquence to be grounded inabstract principles.

My own inquiry in this paper follows slightly different lines,

asking in the first instance not what Isocrates’ philosophia isorwhetherit can be identified or made compatible with modern conceptions of philosophy (or rhetoric), but how Isocrates’ texts make use of the term

philosophia itself.11 This will, however, bring us back to the question of the nature, claims and limitations of Isocratean philosophia.

The rhetoric of philosophia

As has been seen, Isocrates’ description of his own work as philosophia (φιλοσοφα) challenges us to reconsider the conceptualcategories we will need in order to understand the intellectual worldof the 4th century bce. It has caused some embarrassment to modernscholarship; it is surprising, for instance, that Yun Lee Too, who hasstriven with great success to understand Isocrates on his own terms(or “in his own write,” as she puts it), regularly refers to him asa “rhetorician” and to what he does as “rhetoric.”12 I aim here toanalyse the range and consistency of Isocrates’ use of the word, and

10“The lack of any conceptual provision for intellectually open self-criticism is, if I am right, the besetting and crippling weakness of the Isocratean agenda.” Halliwell,“Philosophical Rhetoric,” cited in n. 8 above, p. 121.

11Important earlier discussions of Isocrates’ conception of φιλοσοφα (in addi-tion to those cited in n. 7 above) are Hans Wersdorfer, Die φιλοσοφα des Isokratesim Spiegel ihrer Terminologie. Untersuchungen zur fru hattischen Rhetorik und Stillehre(Leipzig: Kommissions-Verlag O. Harassowitz, 1940), and Eino Mikkola, Isokrates:Seine Anschauungen im Lichte seiner Schriften (Helsinki: Annales Academiae ScientiarumFennicae 89, 1954), 193-209.

12Too, Rhetoric of Identity, cited in n. 7 above: see e.g. p. 190 “‘philosophy’ (bywhich he means ‘rhetoric’),” p. 193, and note also the absence of philosophia fromthe index of Greek words on p. 266. Similarly Garver, “Philosophy, Rhetoric,” citedin n. 9 above, seems to take it for granted that philosophy and rhetoric are clearlyestablished categories and that what Isocrates does is rhetoric.



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to present an interpretation of the role it plays in the writer’s self-presentation and engagement with his readers. In what follows I use

“ philosophia” when referring to Isocrates’ use of this Greek word andits cognates, and “philosophy” when referring to philosophy as aconcept in modern English.

I begin with a brief discussion of Against the Sophists, probablythe first published work offering a substantial account of philosophia.13

In this work, Isocrates’ principal objective is to contrast his ownmeasured claims as a teacher, one who gives due weight to naturalability and practice, with the charlatanism of “sophists” who professto sell success on a plate. The first sentence launches the attack:

If everyone who offered education was prepared to tell the truth andmake promises no greater than what they can deliver, they would nothave such a bad reputation among ordinary people (idiotai). But in fact,there are people who are so bold as to make ambitious claims with nothought for the consequences; and they have created a situation wherechoosing idleness seems a more sensible decision than devoting timeto philosophia.

Against the Sophists 114

Too many would-be educators make promises which they can-not keep; the result is that idleness has come to seem a betterchoice than “spending time on philosophia.” This is already inter-esting; the sentence implies that the charlatan educators and theirpupils will be included, in the mind of the general public, in thecategory of “those who spend time on philosophia.” At the sametime, it presents idleness, rhathumia, as the obvious alternative to

philosophia; and the idea that idleness is preferable appears as a para-

dox. Later, both Isocrates’ reasonable claims and the wild claimsof his competitors are identified as claims about the power of philosophia:

13For the date of Against the Sophists, see Antidosis 193; Livingstone, Commentary,cited in n. 6 above, p. 42. The chronology of Isocrates’ works is problematic, and thereare some grounds for thinking of them as a unified corpus within which indicationsof date are themselves a literary trope (Too, Rhetoric of Identity, pp. 41-53), but thisapproach too would place Against the Sophists at the “beginning.”

14ε πντε θελον ο παιδεειν πιχειροντε ληθ λγειν κα µ µεζου ποιεσθαιτ ποσχσει ν µελλον πιτελεν, οκ ν κακ κουον π τν διωτν ννδ ο τολµντε λαν περισκπτω λαζονεεσθαι πεποικασιν στε δοκεν µεινονβουλεεσθαι το αθυµεν αρουµνου τν περ τν φιλοσοφαν διατριβντων.



Writing Politics 21

It would be worth more to me than a great deal of wealth, if philosophiawere as powerful as they say; I might find myself no more deficient in

this respect than others, and not be the smallest beneficiary. Against the Sophists 1115

and in a famous passage, one of Isocrates’ most explicitly pro-grammatic statements, philosophia is identified with paideusis, edu-cation:

Perhaps it is wrong for me to denounce others without putting forwardmy own opinion as well. I think all sensible people would agree thatmany who have pursued philosophia have remained undistinguished

(idiotai), while others who have never spent time with any sophisthave become adept in speaking and in public affairs. This is becausethe faculties for speaking, and for all other action, develop in thosewho are naturally endowed and who have trained themselves throughpractice. (15) Education makes such people more expert and increasestheir facility for invention; it teaches them to grasp more readily whatthey previously came upon haphazardly. It cannot turn those in whomnatural ability is lacking into excellent debaters or speechmakers, butit can help them make progress, and equip them with a more informedoutlook on many subjects.

Against the Sophists 14-1516

Isocrates identifies the proper outcome of philosophia with the abilityto use logos and perform as a citizen, legein kai politeuesthai. Abil-ity in logoi, as in all other activities, depends on natural ability andpractice. Education will make the able “more skilled” (tekhnikoteroi:it is not clear exactly what this means, but presumably it involvesknowledge of ideai or eide, see below and n. 18), and improve

15γ δ πρ πολλν µν ν χρηµτων τιµησµην τηλικοτον δνασθαι τνφιλοσοφαν σον οτοι λγουσιν σω γρ οκ ν µε πλεστον πελεφθηµεν, οδ’ν λχιστον µρο πελασαµεν ατ.

16ε δ δε µ µνον κατηγορεν τν λλων λλ κα τν µαυτο δηλσαι δινοιαν,γοµαι πντα ν µοι το ε φρονοντα συνειπεν τι πολλο µν τν φιλοσοφησντωνδιται διετλεσαν ντε, λλοι δ τινε οδεν πποτε συγγενµενοι τν σοφιστν καλγειν κα πολιτεεσθαι δεινο γεγνασιν. α µν γρ δυνµει κα τν λγων κα τνλλων ργων πντων ν το εφυσιν γγγνονται κα το περ τ µπειρα γεγυµ-

νασµνοι (15) δ παδευσι το µν τοιοτου τεχνικωτρου κα πρ τ ζητεν

επορωτρου ποησεν ο γρ νν ντυγχνουσι πλανµενοι, τατ ξ τοιµοτρουλαµβνειν ατο δδαξεν, το δ καταδεεστραν τν φσιν χοντα γωνιστ µνγαθο λγων ποιητ οκ ν ποτελσειεν, ατο δ ατν προαγγοι κα πρπολλ φρονιµωτρου διακεσθαι ποισειεν.



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their facility for finding material. It will not turn the less ableinto successful competitors (in verbal contests) or composers of lo-

goi, but it will help them make progress and give them “a moreinformed outlook on many subjects.” Thus far, the emphasis isvery much on the modest quality of Isocrates’ claims philosophia.The account now becomes, by Isocrates’ standards, almost techni-cal:

Having gone this far, I would like to express my views on this subjectevenmoreclearly.WhatIsayis,thattoacquireaknowledgeoftheformalelements from which all the speeches we deliver or compose are derivedis not a particularly hard task, provided one puts oneself in the hands of

instructors who know something about the subject, as opposed to thosewho make easy promises; but to choose the correct elements for eachpractical circumstance, to combine them with one another and organisethem suitably; not to miss the opportunities offered by the occasion, andmoreover to embellish the whole speech with appropriate reasoning,and maintain a rhythmical and musical use of words – (17) this is whatrequires much practice, and is a task for a bold and imaginative mind( psykhe andrike kai doxastike). Thepupil, in addition to having the requirednatural talent, must learn the types of speeches, and exercise himself intheir uses; while the teacher must be able to present the types with such

precision as to omit nothing that can be taught, and beyond that, hemust present himself as such an example (18) that those who receive hismark and are able to imitate him will instantly be seen to have a greaterfreshness and charm in their speech. When all these conditions are inplace, the practitioners of philosophia will be fully-formed; if any of thethings I have mentioned is missing, it is inevitable that the students will

be correspondingly deficient. Against the Sophists 16-1817

17βολοµαι δ πειδ περ ε τοτο προλθον, τι σαφστερον επεν περ ατν.φηµ γρ γ τν µν δεν, ξ ν το λγου παντα κα λγοµεν κα συντθεµεν,λαβεν τν πιστµην οκ εναι τν πνυ χαλεπν, ν τι ατν παραδιδ µ το αδωπισχνουµνοι λλ το εδσιν τι περ ατν τ δ τοτων φ κστω τν πραγµτων δε προελσθαι κα µεξασθαι πρ λλλα κα τξασθαι κατ τρπον, τι δ τνκαιρν µ διαµαρτεν λλ κα το νθυµµασι πρεπντω λον τν λγον καταποικλαικα το νµασιν ερθµω κα µουσικ επεν, (17) τατα δ πολλ πιµελεα δεσθαικα ψυχ νδρικ κα δοξαστικ ργον εναι, κα δεν τν µν µαθητν, πρ τ τνφσιν χειν οαν χρ, τ µν εδη τ τν λγων µαθεν, περ δ τ χρσει ατνγυµνασθναι, τν δ διδσκαλον τ µν οτω κριβ ον τ εναι διελθεν στε µηδντν διδακτν παραλιπεν, περ δ τν λοιπν τοιοτον ατν παρδειγµα παρασχεν (18)στε το κτυπωθντα κα µιµσασθαι δυναµνου εθ νθηρτερον κα χαριστεροντν λλων φανεσθαι λγοντα. κα τοτων µν πντων συµπεσντων τελεω ξουσιν οφιλοσοφοντε καθ δ ν λλειφθ τι τν ερηµνων, νγκη τατη χερον διακεσθαιτο πλησιζοντα.



Writing Politics 23

The basic components of logoi, here identified as ideai,18 are rela-tively easy to learn; the challenge is to choose, combine and ar-

range these ideai appropriately, to find the right ones for the rightmoment (kairos), to give the logos a suitable argumentative colour,and to deploy words in a measured and melodious way. This re-quires practice, natural ability (“a manly and doxastic soul”), plusthe right level of commitment from both student and teacher. Afinal twist is added at the end of the discourse, when Isocrates con-fronts head-on the question of the teachability of virtue or excellence,arete:

Those who are willing to obey the commands of philosophy mightfar sooner be advantaged in respect of decency of character than of skill in speaking. And let no-one imagine me to be saying that moralgoodness (dikaiosune) can be taught: I believe that there is absolutely notechnique (tekhne) with the ability to instil temperance (sophrosune) andmoral goodness in those who are naturally ill-endowed in respect of virtue (arete); but I think that the cultivation of political discourse cando more than anything else to assist by providing encouragement andtraining.

Against the Sophists 2119

For those who are ready to “obey the orders” of philosophia, it willsooner help them towards decency of character, epieikeia, than to-wards rhetoreia, the skills of a public speaker. This strong soundingclaim is quickly qualified: it is not to say that morality is teachable,natural virtue being indispensable: all the same, “practice in politicallogoi” can do more than anything else to provide encouragement andtraining (askesis) in this respect.

In these passages from Against the Sophists we can identify three

ways of using the term philosophia which, I will argue, are crucial toan understanding of how the term functions throughout Isocrates’work. Firstly, philosophia is intellectual exertion and self-improvement

18On the semi-technical terms δα and εδο in Isocrates (roughly, “elements” of rhetorical composition), see Robert N. Gaines, “Isocrates, Ep. 6.8,” Hermes 118 (1990):165-70; Robert G. Sullivan, “Eidos/ idea in Isocrates,” Philosophy and Rhetoric 34 (2001):79-92 (esp. 89-90).

19κατοι το βουλοµνου πειθαρχεν το π τ φιλοσοφα τατη προστατ-τοµνοι πολ ν θττον πρ πιεκειαν πρ ητορεαν φελσειεν. κα µηδεοσθω µε λγειν στιν δικαιοσνη διδακτν λω µν γρ οδεµαν γοµαι τοιατηνεναι τχνην, τι το κακ πεφυκσιν πρ ρετν σωφροσνην ν κα δικαιοσνηνµποισειεν ο µν λλ συµπαρακελεσασθα γε κα συνασκσαι µλιστ ν οµαι τντν λγων τν πολιτικν πιµλειαν.



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of an obvious, commonsense kind: something in preference to whichit would obviously be mad to choose rhathumia. Secondly, it denotes

formal educational (or would-be educational) activities of all kinds,including both what Isocrates does himself and a range of ques-tionable practices ascribed to his rivals. But thirdly, there is also a

philosophia – the philosophia which is outlined in §§ 15-18, and cred-ited with limited powers of moral improvement in § 21 – which risesabove these rival versions: an authentic philosophia of which Isocratesis the champion and a lonely, if not unique, practitioner.

To begin with the first of these senses: philosophia and its cognatesare frequently used in a broad sense of intellectual effort and com-

mitment to progress and self-improvement. The verb philosophein iscoupled, for instance, with verbs implying effort and concentration,such as ponein and skopein;20 conversely, it is placed in antithesis withidleness and neglect, rhathumia and ameleia.21 Related to this are anumber of passages where philosophein and its cognates are used of the process of composing or working on a logos.22 Philosophia is also,for Isocrates as for Plato, the “care of the soul,” psykhes epimeleia.In Isocrates’ ironic praise of the Egyptians in Busiris, they are cred-ited with inventing medicine for the body and philosophia for the

soul, while in Antidosis, philosophia is similarly paired with gymnastictraining.23

Secondly, philosophia is used to refer to diverse intellectual andeducational practices, including some of which Isocrates is critical orcontemptuous. This category includes passages in Against the Sophistsalready discussed, references in Helen and elsewhere to “eristics,”slighting references to odd (possibly Platonic) educational regimesin Busiris and elsewhere, and passages such as To Nicocles 50-1, where

20φιλοσοφεν κα πονεν: Panegyricus 186, Evagoras 78, Antidosis 247 (πνω καφιλοσοφα), 285, Panathenaicus 11, and compare [Isocrates?] To Demonicus 40 πειρ τµν σµατι εναι φιλπονο, τ δ ψυχ φιλσοφο. φιλοσοφεν κα σκοπεν/ σκψασθαι,Panegyricus 6, Peace 116. Note also To Nicocles 6 µπειρα µτιθι κα φιλοσοφα, Peace5 µελετν κα φιλοσοφεν, and similar formulations such as Evagoras 8 ν τ ζητεν καφροντζειν κα βουλεεσθαι τ πλεστον το χρνου διτριβεν. On this use of φιλοσοφα,see Mikkola, Isokrates, cited in n. 11 above, pp. 202-3.

21E.g. Against the Sophists 1, Philip 29.22E.g. Helen 66, Busiris 48, Panegyricus 6, Nicocles 1, 9, Evagoras 8.23ψυχ πιµλεια: Against the Sophists 8, Evagoras 10, Antidosis 181 and 304; cf.

[Isocrates?] To Demonicus 6, and Plato Apology 29e, Phaedo 107c, Laws 807c. Paired withmedicine, Busiris 22. Paired with παιδοτριβικ: Antidosis 181. Cf. Eucken, Isokrates,cited in n. 6 above, p. 15: “Schließlich kann ... ein von Schulmethoden unabhangiges,in einzelnen Menschen oder in der Kultur wirkendes Bildungsstreben ‘Philosophie’heißen.”



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the Sophists 14-18 is cited at Antidosis 194). In 184-5, he pursues thealready-mentioned analogy between physical exercise for the body

and philosophia as exercise for the mind (n. 22 above): students learnthe ideai of logoi, practise their use and grow accustomed to exertingthemselves, gain a surer grasp of what they have learned, and thus“grow closer in their estimation of what the occasion demands.” 27

Practice is everything because knowledge of changing situations isimpossible; but consistent attention and reflection on events will leadto a higher rate of success. Similarly at Panegyricus 10, the writer im-plicitly puts himself forward as the one best able to speak about“ philosophia concerning logoi” ( περ το λγου φιλοσοφα). At

Panathenaicus 9, embarking on another defence of his life’s work,he refers to it as “the philosophia I have chosen” (τν φιλοσοφαν, νπροειλµην). At Antidosis 271, denying that human beings can everhave certain knowledge of the right course of action, he defines assophoi those who “are able for the most part to hit the mark of what is best with their opinions,” and as philosophoi those who “spend theirtime in activities which will secure them such understanding as soonas possible.”28

This tripartite division of Isocrates’ use of philosophia is undoubt-

edly over-schematic, especially when we are dealing with a writer solittle enamoured of abstract definitions and fixed systems, and it willnot be helpful in explicating every passage where the word occurs. Itcould also be extended to take in paideia “education” and its cognates,often used almost interchangeably with philosophia. It does, however,enable us to identify a significant persuasive and promotional strat-egy. To recap: first, philosophia is part of the life of every intelligentthinking person: the basic exercise of intellectual energy, reflection before action, and mental self-improvement. Second, it is a term for

the attempts of Isocrates and others to organise these impulses intoa programme of education: for specialist practices, innovative andin noisy competition with one another, which set those who engagein them apart from ordinary citizens or idiotai. Third, it is also theright form of education, Isocrates’ own. Isocrates makes effective andsubtle use of the first two as foils to the third. Comparison betweencommonsense philosophia and the philosophia of the other specialists

27 Antidosis 184 να... τν καιρν γγυτρω τα δξαι γνωνται. The analogy withphysical training is developed further in 209-12.

28σφου µν νοµζω το τα δξαι πιτυγχνειν π τ πολ το βελτστουδυναµνου, φιλοσφου δ το ν τοτοι διατρβοντα, ξ ν τχιστα λψονται τντοιατην φρνησιν.



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which in Panegyricus is central to her claim for leadership of theGreek world), Isocrates takes it out of the polis arena, turning delib-

eration into discourse, dialogue into monologue. Yun Lee Too hascharacterised Isocrates’ ideological rejection of oral performance infavour of writing as “the politics of the small voice,” constructinga textual voice of quiet authority in contrast with the shouting of the “new politicians” or demagogues.36 But through his claims for

philosophia, Isocrates also presents this textual voice as the highestrefinement of the public discourse of the democratic city.

In the chapter discussed earlier, Yunis shows how Thucydides’crystallised versions of antilogic debates transform rhetorical dis-

course by removing the dimension of time and transforming thecompetitive situation into something like a dialectical one. The writ-ten speeches which articulate the philosophia of Isocrates, gesturing atperformance while rejecting it, crystallise debate in a comparable butsignificantly different manner. They are aberrant, by the standardsof both democratic debate and early rhetorical practice, in that theyare (with important qualifications, one of which will be discussed below) essentially monologic. This may be connected with Isocrates’political commitment to homonoia, unity of purpose, as a precondi-

tion for his panhellenic agenda; but more fundamentally, it reflectshis conviction that good logos tends towards the truth; thus there willnot, in general, be two equally valid sides to the same questions. Theresult is a “philosophised” version of politikos logos, the discourse of citizenship, in which the process of decision-making recedes into the background, and debates are replaced by idealised representationsof speeches giving the best possible advice.

Thucydides, in line with his commitment to creating a workof timeless value rather than something for immediate agonistic

performance (1.22), transforms antilogic debates by removing themfrom their agonistic setting and freezing them in time. Instead of waiting eagerly to see how one speaker’s argument trumps another’s,his readers are made to see the tenuousness of these momentaryvictories; the unresolved tensions and things unsaid; the dangersof moral equivocation, the threat of devaluation of ethical terms,and the risk that verbal dexterity may mask, rather than illuminate,the exercise of power. Isocrates’ textual transformation of politicaldebate is rather different. For Thucydides, part of the power of the

written text is its ability to freeze the deliberative process and holdit up for analysis. For Isocrates, written speeches open up an iterative

36Too, Rhetoric of Identity, cited in n. 6 above, pp. 74-112.



Writing Politics 31

process, a process of re-writing, in which the competition betweenspeakers or writers is not a competition between opposing points

of view, but a competition in the shared endeavour of doing justiceto the requirements of the situation and the merits of the subject athand. Since all worthwhile discourse aims at what is best, antilogyis not merely unnecessary, but pointless; speeches on great subjectsare provisional because of their potential, not to be answered, butto be outdone.37 Isocrates abstracts and appropriates logos politikosfrom popular common sense and live political performance, not bycriticising it or subjecting it to a critique or by redefining it accordingto systematic principles, but simply by transferring it to the realm

of writing – and to the guardianship of those who have the leisureto refine it, through reading and rewriting, to its highest degree.By creating an adaptable, self-confident Hellenic political dis-

course which takes “commonsense” ethical values for granted, Iso-crates inaugurates the tradition of Hellenic paideia, and thus, indi-rectly, the later humanist culture built on Greco-Roman models, withthe ideal of culture as a mutually respectful exchange between (elite)individuals united by their commitment to the edifying and civil-ising power of logos. On the other hand, in abandoning antilogy in

the name of consensus and homonoia, he also anticipates situations inthe modern world where the transition from public or parliamentarydebate to monologic communication in the mass media risks creat-ing an overweeningly confident, unitary political discourse in whichdissent and critique are easily marginalised as irrational or absurd.

Panathenaicus : a dialectical coda?

Panathenaicus is Isocrates’ last work (or, if we follow Yun LeeToo’s reading of the corpus, the work which rhetorically places itself at the end of his career). Near the start, we are told how someof Isocrates’ pupils recounted to him an incident in the Lyceumwhere some “common sophists” ended a popular epideixis on thepoetry of Homer and Hesiod by accusing Isocrates of despising allsuch activities, and indeed of rejecting all forms of philosophia and

paideia except his own; their comments win some approval from thecrowd in attendance (18-9). At first, he says, he was distressed and

thrown into confusion by this evidence of how he is misjudged (20).He soon rallies, however, with a confident reassertion of his own

37E.g. Panegyricus 5.



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educational views (26-32), making use once again of the threefoldsenses of philosophia discussed above (though here the term used is

paideia). So far is he from despising the ancestral forms of educationthat he even commends the paideia that has been established inthe present generation (meaning “geometry, astrology, and so-callederistic dialogues,” 26). He has nothing against them, to the extent thatthese are broadly harmless pastimes for the young; but, as he makesclear in 30-2, these activities which call themselves paideia are notthe real thing; the title of “educated people,” pepaideumenoi, belongsexclusively to those who have had the benefit of proper Isocratean

paideia.38

This confident self-assertion near the start of Panathenaicus is ininteresting counterpoint with the less confident note struck at the end.Having made Athens’ case against Sparta for the leadership of theGreek world, Isocrates’ concludes his speech with an extraordinarydramatisation of the process of its own completion (200-65). Hepresents himself revising the unfinished speech in the company of a few pupils; their verdict is that all that is needed is a conclusion. Hedecides, however, to put it to a further test by summoning anotherformer pupil who is known as an admirer of Sparta; this pupil’s

contribution will be, ostensibly, to check the speech for factual errors(200). The Laconising pupil duly reads it and commends it, butcomplains that whatever else they may have done, the Spartans atleast deserve gratitude for inventing the best social system (“formsof conduct,” epitedeumata) and demonstrating it to the rest of Greece(202). After an exchange in which he is reprimanded by Isocrates(203-28), the Laconiser is silenced. Isocrates is applauded by his otherpupils, but he himself is left in distress and confusion – just as he wasearlier by his pupils’ account of the sophists’ remarks in the Lyceum

(232-3, cf. 20); so much so, that he considers destroying what he haswritten (232). Instead of doing so, he summons another meeting of his pupils, including the Laconiser. When the speech has once again been read and applauded, the other pupils talk amongst themselvesabout what they have heard, but the Laconiser speaks privately toIsocrates, taking a line very different from his earlier criticism. Hehas realised, he says, that the present gathering is a test of the pupils’

philosophia. Isocrates has constructed an ambiguous speech (logous

38Note how the attack on “eristics” and mathematical sciences saves Isocratesfrom having to articulate in detail the relation between “ancestral” paideia and his own.Compare 33-4, where discussion of the educational value of poetry is disingenuouslypostponed “for another occasion.”



Writing Politics 33

amphibolous, 240), and those who read carefully will understand thatit is by no means simple, but full of subtlety and instructive falsehood

(246); it contrives to praise both cities – Athens at the level of populardoxa, Sparta in the estimation of those who try to get to the truth (261).He should therefore not destroy it, but publish it, in the interests of “those who truly practise philosophia” (262, cf. 260).

The pupil’s speech is the first occasion in Isocrates’ oeuvre where philosophia has been qualified by a cognate of alethes “true” (here theadverbial phrase hos alethos “in the true sense,” “genuinely”). Thedestructive effect is extremely interesting. Gone is the straightfor-ward relationship between Isocrates’ philosophia and common sense,

doxa, what everyone thinks. A fourth sense of philosophia opens up before us, as we are presented with a distinction between Isocratean philosophia as it appears on the surface, and Isocratean philosophiaas correctly understood by those in the know. Isocrates’ voice, thepolished textual voice embodying and perfecting popular wisdom,is fractured, seen to be ambiguous and to demand interpretation;and this need for interpretation inaugurates not a public, populardebate where common sense may be the arbiter, but a contest forauthority among a coterie of the elite. The pupil concludes by saying

that publication of the speech will confound Isocrates’ critics, whodo not realise that he surpasses them more than Homer surpassesthe other epic poets. This points back ironically to the scene at 18-19, where the Lyceum sophists’ attack on Isocrates was prefaced byan incompetent exposition of the poetry of Homer and Hesiod, andsuggests once again that the inevitable penalty of communicating“beneath the surface,” and thus of requiring interpretation, is both to be exploited by others and to be misunderstood.39

Here, at the very end of Isocrates’ career (or corpus), we find

some recognition of the limits of his project of sublimating popu-lar philosophia into a harmonious, ethically admirable prose versionof logos politikos. The subversive comments are, of course, put inthe voice of a mere pupil (and a Laconiser); in “his own” voice,Isocrates does not pronounce a verdict, but allows the pupil “to re-main in the state in which he has put himself” (265), an enigmaticacceptance of the limits of the pedagogical relationship. The dialogue between Isocrates and his pupil could be read as demonstrating that,contrary to the Lyceum sophists’ prejudice, Isocratean philosophia is

capable of embracing differently valid points of view. The pupil reads

39For a less pessimistic interpretation of the “polysemy” of Panathenaicus 260-5,see Too, Rhetoric of Identity, cited in n. 6 above, pp. 68-73.



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Panathenaicus as transcending antilogy, praising Athens for the Athe-nians and Sparta for the Spartans – which in each case may be the best

way of enlisting them to the panhellenic cultural and political pro-gramme, and therefore the best thing for the practitioner of philosophiato do. Another interesting effect of the dialogue is that it makes theIsocratean corpus end (setting aside the biographical-programmaticconclusion in paragraphs 266-72) in a kind of classroom scene, andone in which the figure of Isocrates himself steps back from pedagogi-calandauthorialcontrol.ThismaybeawayofsuggestingthatitisnotIsocrates’ written works themselves, but the practices they exemplify,that should stand as an example for future educational practice. At

the close of the speech, in the long final sentence (272), the confidentIsocratean voice reasserts itself, commending this speech to hearerswho recognise that “instructive and artistic speeches,” which criticisefaults and aim at the truth, are better than those which aim to please.But it is hard not to feel that we are left with a note of doubt as well;an uncomfortable awareness, perhaps, that a system of political andeducational discourse which has only one voice lacks the ability toexamine, or to justify, its own premises.

isocrates rhetoric of philosophy

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