Abstract

Epicurus and the Stoa had a lot in common in their epistemologies. In particular, they both recognized the so-called prolepsis as a criterion of truth. Epicurus and Zeno had different epistemological agendas: the core of Zeno’s epistemology was the phantasia kataleptike, while prolepsis was at the centre of Epicurus’ epistemology. But Chrysippus, in some contexts, recognized katalepsis and prolepsis as two complementary criteria. Chrysippus obviously borrowed prolepsis from the Epicureans, while, in the second generation of Hellenistic philosophers, Cleanthes had elaborated is own views on the ennoia of the gods. How did the two schools conceived prolepsis? What do they have in common and how and to which extent do they differ or influence each other? And what does it mean that prolepseis are emphutoi or innatae? The chapter draws a comparison of the views of the two schools, following the chronological development of the prolepsis and the criterion of truth between Epicurus and the founders of the Stoic school (Zeno, Cleanthes, Chrysippus) in order to answer to these questions. The prolepsis plays a role in Stoic ethics but is complemented the oikeiosis argument, that does not only imply stored conceptions but protai hormai (first impulses). Meanwhile we do not apprehend the gods by a prolepsis, but by a demonstration. It is central to the Epicurean prolepsis of the gods that we conceive that they are everlasting and happy through an ‘analogy by enlargement’ with the timespan and the happiness of men. This is a sign that the Stoics had changed the kind of confidence they wanted to put in prolepsis.