How to Think about God: An Ancient Guide for Believers and Nonbelievers

Marcus Tullius Cicero

Published by Princeton University Press 2019

How to Think about God

An Ancient Guide for Believers and Nonbelievers

Marcus Tullius Cicero
Translated by: Philip Freeman

In the series Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780691197449

Overview
Contents

About this book

A new translation of selections from famed Roman orator and statesman Cicero’s The Nature of the Gods and the Dream of Scipio.

A vivid and accessible new translation of Cicero's influential Stoic writings on the divine

Most ancient Romans were deeply religious and their world was overflowing with gods—from Jupiter, Minerva, and Mars to countless local divinities, household gods, and ancestral spirits. One of the most influential Roman perspectives on religion came from a nonreligious belief system that is finding new adherents even today: Stoicism. How did the Stoics think about religion? In How to Think about God, Philip Freeman presents vivid new translations of Cicero's On the Nature of the Gods and The Dream of Scipio. In these brief works, Cicero offers a Stoic view of belief, divinity, and human immortality, giving eloquent expression to the religious ideas of one of the most popular schools of Roman and Greek philosophy.

On the Nature of the Gods and The Dream of Scipio are Cicero's best-known and most important writings on religion, and they have profoundly shaped Christian and non-Christian thought for more than two thousand years, influencing such luminaries as Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Dante, and Thomas Jefferson. These works reveal many of the religious aspects of Stoicism, including an understanding of the universe as a materialistic yet continuous and living whole in which both the gods and a supreme God are essential elements.

Featuring an introduction, suggestions for further reading, and the original Latin on facing pages, How to Think about God is a compelling guide to the Stoic view of the divine.

Author / Editor information

Philip Freeman is the author of more than twenty books on the ancient world, including the Cicero translations How to Be a Friend, How to Grow Old, and How to Run a Country (all Princeton). He holds the Fletcher Jones Chair as a Professor of Humanities at Pepperdine University and lives in Malibu, California.

Reviews

"From Stoic arguments for pantheism to the music of the heavenly spheres, this fine volume of the incomparable Cicero offers a fascinating exploration of ancient philosophical thinking about the divinity of the universe and the immortality of the soul."—John Sellars, author of Hellenistic Philosophy

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Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	v
INTRODUCTION Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
ON THE NATURE OF THE GODS (2.1–44) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
THE DREAM OF SCIPIO Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	95
NOTES Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	141
FURTHER READING Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	151