Note:Nietzsche is difficult to understand. These writings are an attempt for myself to become better acquainted with his concepts. It is also a space for others to learn and converse in the subject matter. I don't have a degree in philosophy; most of my knowledge is the result of self-study. If you find something incorrect or inaccurate with my interpretations, please comment and we can learn together.
How malicious philosophers can be! I know of nothing more stinging than the joke Epicurus took the liberty of making on Plato and the Platonists; he called them Dionysiokolakes.
Epicurus (341–270 B.C.E.) was an Ancient Greek philosopher who founded Epicureanism, a philosophy directly challenging Platonism. Prior to Epicurus, Plato (428-348 B.C.E) gained wide recognition for his Theory for Forms, which argues that the physical world is an imperfect representation of the true essence of things (the forms). Epicurus blatantly denied this idea, and instead espoused on a radical materialist conception of the world, arguing that universe only consisted of two things: matter and void.
Epicurus and Plato disagreed on many topics, including the role of politics. Plato wrote an entire treatise (The Republic) on the idealist government and led a political life that was recognized highly within political communities. Epicurus disregarded politics altogether, insisting the best life is one led in ones own private commune.
In its original sense, and on the face of it, the word signifies "Flatterers of Dionysius"—consequently, tyrants' accessories and lick-spittles; besides this, however, it is as much as to say, "They are all ACTORS, there is nothing genuine about them" (for Dionysiokolax was a popular name for an actor). And the latter is really the malignant reproach that Epicurus cast upon Plato: he was annoyed by the grandiose manner, the mise en scene style of which Plato and his scholars were masters—of which Epicurus was not a He, the old school-teacher of Samos, who sat concealed in his little garden at Athens, and wrote three hundred books, perhaps out of rage and ambitious envy of Plato, who knows! Greece took a hundred years to find out who the garden-god Epicurus really was. Did she ever find out?
Nietzsche proposes that Epicurus may have led a life he did out of envy and resentment towards Plato. Epicurus' failings to gain the recognition on the scale of Plato pushed him to retreat from city-life altogether. And in his retreat, he wrote almost 300 books against Platonism!
The “garden at Athens” refers to the place where Epicurus and his followers met to discuss philosophy. Unlike Plato and Aristotle, who met in the city center, Epicurus and his followers met in a private, isolated space outside the city where they practiced philosophy and led somewhat hedonistic lifestyles.
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