From the book
Stobaeus, Volume II
John Stobaeus · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordAvoidance in fear names the movement away associated with anticipated evil, distinguished from the action terminology of aphormē and from any claim that the anticipated object really is evil.
- In StobaeusFear’s cause is an opinion with motivating freshness: an evil is thought to approach, and the person takes it as something that genuinely demands avoidance rather than merely distant consideration.
- In this editionKeep the opinion and its active force in view, and distinguish this fear-related avoidance from an impulse away from action described with a different Greek term elsewhere.
- A place to readChapter 7 · Excerpt 10b · Passage 2 Read fear’s brief definition together with its stated cause, noticing that approaching evil and the need to avoid it belong to the opinion that stimulates the response.
- English renderings
- avoidance; aversion; shunning
Meaning
Ekklisis is avoidance or shunning. In the definition of fear it is qualified as disobedient to reason, and must be distinguished from aphormē, the action-related aversion opposed to impulse.
Use in the book
Fear is an ekklisis arising from the opinion that an evil is approaching and should really be avoided. Its motivating freshness is an active evaluative force, not simply the date an opinion was formed. The passage does not give a complete independent account of every kind of avoidance. It gives a particular passionate movement with a cognitive cause. The separate discussion of aphormē concerns thought moving away in the sphere of not acting. English “aversion” may cover both, but the Greek terms remain different.
The definition and causal explanation work together. Fear is classified as aversion disobedient to reason; the following sentence identifies the opinion that gives it this direction. The feared evil is approaching rather than simply remembered, and the belief still has the freshness that moves the person toward avoidance. Freshness here describes the opinion’s stimulating force, not a measured interval since the event. The report explains what the agent takes the situation to demand. It does not, by describing that belief, endorse the judgment that the approaching thing is truly evil.
“Fear is aversion disobedient to reason.” (Chapter 7 · Excerpt 10b · Passage 2).
Places to read
- Chapter 7 · Excerpt 10b · Passage 22Fear is avoidance disobedient to reason.
- Chapter 7 · Excerpt 9 · Passage 22Aphormē is separately opposed to rational impulse.
Translation in this edition
“Avoidance” is a distinguishing gloss although the edition uses “aversion” in the fear definition.
ἔκκλισιν
Attested. Chapter 7 · Excerpt 10b · Passage 2; Wachsmuth II, printed p. 90.
Φόβον δ’ εἶναι ἔκκλισιν ἀπειθῆ λόγῳ, αἴτιον δ’ αὐτοῦ τὸ δοξάζειν κακὸν ἐπιφέρεσθαι,
Source note
Wachsmuth, volume II, printed pp. 87, 90. The dictionary form is justified by transmitted ἔκκλισιν.