Plutarch: A Greek Philosopher

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Plutarch was a historian from Chaeronea, which was a Greek area of Boetia and lived in the time of C.46-120. Plutarch is known in history for being a famous writer who started his studies somewhere around the age of twenty under Ammonius who was a Platonist philosopher in Athens. It is not known what Plutarch studied under his mentor Ammonius but it is thought that maybe Ammonius influenced Plutarch in his religious ways.
Plutarch spent so much time in Athens that he became a Citizen of Athens, some even say he served as governor of Greece but this hasn’t been confirmed. Plutarch travelled frequently, and because of this it is widely thought that his family was well off to support his touring abroad. Amongst the places Plutarch traveled to were; Sparta, Corinth, Rome, and Alexandria but he mainly preferred to stay close by in his hometown of Chaeronea and Delphi. It is thought that Plutarch chose to live close to his family because he highly regarded the family circle, plus he had great religious interests in Delphi. Plutarch spent much time in Delphi serving as a priest amongst other things.
During this time, the world around Plutarch contained several schools of philosophy, with their ideas swirling around in the Hellenistic society but most of them seemed to draw their inspiration in some form from the philosopher Plato even though they would never admit to such.
Plutarch openly sided with Plato’s school, in their thinking that life needs justice and can bring happiness to the world. Plutarch wrote out in some of his writings against the other schools of philosophy called Stoics and Epicureans. Plutarch felt that the Stoics and Epicureans based their philosophy on a false theory of human natures and reality. Plutarch wrote h...

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...riters, even though no evidence has been found of the other philosopher’s works. Some may say that these are just jealous whispers. In the future most forgot about Plutarch but his work endured by emperor’s using his quotes, philosophers and school texts.
It appears that modern historians gleaned from Plutarch style of writing giving the people a new way to look into history and to understand it better. Plutarch’s material has lost touch with the twenty-first century but the famous ideas of Greek and Romans still come through his works.

Works Cited

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plutarch/ http://www.usu.edu/ploutarchos/plutbib.htm http://what-when-how.com/literature/plutarch-literature/ http://www.rwe.org/complete-works/x-lectures-a-biographical-sketches/plutarch.html http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/465201/Plutarch/5797/Reputation-and-influence

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