Stobaeus, Volume II

Name: Stobaeus, Volume II
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.

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Stobaeus, Volume IIBook II Chapter 7 · II.7.24.5–II.7.24.6

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Book II Chapter 7 · II.7.24.5–II.7.24.6

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Ancient Greek

p. 506

Παραμονὴ ἐν τῷ βίῳ καὶ τὰ νόμιμα

II.7.24.5

καὶ καθόλου τὴν ἀρετὴν ἀσκοῦντα καὶ μενεῖν ἐν τῷ βίῳ, καὶ πάλιν, εἰ δέοι ποτὲ δι’ ἀνάγκας, ἀπαλλαγήσεσθαι, ταφῆς προνοήσαντα κατὰ νόμον καὶ τὸ πάτριον ἔθος καὶ τῶν ἄλλων, ὅσα τοῖς κατοιχομένοις ἐπιτελεῖν ὅσιον.

Τρεῖς ἰδέαι βίων

II.7.24.6

Βίων δὲ τριττὰς ἰδέας εἶναι, πρακτικόν, θεωρητικόν, σύνθετον ἐξ ἀμφοῖν. Τὸν μὲν γὰρ ἀπολαυστικὸν ἥττονα ἢ κατ’ ἄνθρωπον εἶναι, προκρίνεσθαι δὲ τῶν ἄλλων τὸν θεωρητικόν.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 7

p. 507

Remaining in Life and the Customary Rites

II.7.24.5

And in general, practicing virtue, he will remain in life; yet, if it should ever be necessary because of constraints, he will depart from it,⁶⁸⁶ having made provision for burial in accordance with law and ancestral custom and for the other things that it is pious to perform for the departed.⁶⁸⁷

Three Forms of Life

II.7.24.6

There are three forms of life: the practical, the contemplative, and the life composed of both.⁶⁸⁸ For the life of enjoyment falls below what befits a human being, while of the other lives the contemplative is preferred.⁶⁸⁹

686.The conditional εἰ δέοι ποτὲ δι’ ἀνάγκας is retained: if it should ever be necessary because of constraints. In this contrast, ἀπαλλαγήσεσθαι means to depart from life. The printed μενεῖν is a future infinitive, giving he will remain, alongside the future of departing; Wachsmuth’s apparatus records the transmitted present μένειν. No particular necessity or manner of departure is specified.

687.The provision concerns both burial and the other observances owed to the dead. Κατὰ νόμον καὶ τὸ πάτριον ἔθος specifies law and ancestral custom, while ὅσιον means pious or religiously proper. Τοῖς κατοιχομένοις means the departed or the dead. The sentence presents the arrangements as having been made before departure.

688.All three forms remain, including the composite life. Πρακτικός concerns activity or action, and θεωρητικός contemplation. The source’s ἰδέαι are forms or kinds in this classification, without an express reference to separately existing Platonic Forms.

689.The life of enjoyment, ἀπολαυστικός, is placed below the human standard rather than counted among the three forms just named. The comparative preference for contemplation is retained. This judgment concerns a way of life organized around enjoyment; it does not itself state that every pleasure is vicious.

About This Reading Edition

The complete surviving text of Stobaeus’s second book, through II.46.22, in Ancient Greek and English, with an introduction and 1,541 explanatory notes. All forty-six chapter headings remain, including the notices for chapters whose texts are missing.

Historical Text and Translation

Greek: Curt Wachsmuth, Ioannis Stobaei Anthologii libri duo priores, volumen II (Berlin: Weidmann, 1884), printed p. 1 and pp. 3–264. The supplied edition preserves consequential editorial signs, reconstructed joins, qualified attributions, and missing-text notices. English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes: Diotimos Editions, 2026.

About Diotimos Editions

This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.

Rights

Stobaeus’s ancient Greek work and Wachsmuth’s 1884 edition are in the public domain. The supplied English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes are published with the site owner’s authorization.