Diogenes’ attitude to sensual pleasure has been for a long time the object of cheap muckraking among laymen, as well as the cause of interpretational variety among the scholar authorities. In the present paper we propose several interpretative options offered by the doxographical records of Diogenes’ attitudes to human sexuality. The author identifies and compares two types of asceticism: the radical on one side and eudaimonistic or hedonistic on the other, which he further refers to as the „Oriental“ and „Greek“ respectively. It is argued, that Diogenes’ position may be classified as moderate, hedonistic asceticism, which is characteristic also for the Greek culture in general. The author also tries to prove that the specific Diogenes’ notion of justice as well as his public masturbation is fully compatible with his historically highly probable attitude to hedonistic asceticism.
The paper questions the modern approach to ancient philosophy as a linear movement from mythos to logos. It analyses the circumstances of „the beginning“ of ancient philosophical thinking. It tempts to see the whole movement of the pre-Socratic philosophy as a literary undercurrent of the Homeric schools, the Homeridae. The allegorical interpretation of the Homeric poems is crucial for this type of argumentation. This interpretation goes back to their very origins. The emphasis is put on the resemblances between the cyclic eposes Ilias and Odyssey and early pre-Socratic philosophies, namely those of Xenophanes, Heraclitus, Pythagoras and the Milesian School. It is argued, that in physical and ethical conceptions of these philosophers, many traces of Homeric world-view can be unveiled. Therefore, it seems viable to suppose that some allegoric interpretations of Homer´s poems pre-existed as a theoretical background behind these philosophical theories.
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