Some of my favorite hermits of Western antiquity had “attitude.” What is “attitude”? — surliness, crankiness, anti-social behavior? This “attitude” would fit the stereotype of the hermit being annoying — to society at the least, on the edge of mental instability at most.
But plenty of surly and antisocial people are not hermits. Indeed, the definition of the true hermit includes a deeper self-motive: religious, philosophical, spiritual. While motive does not define “attitude” nor escape the stereotype, the historical hermits have never been socially combative, uncharitable, or obnoxious; they are not recluses shunning people, and have been able to converse civilly and affectionately as needed. But the true hermit also does not coddle hypocrisy.
Diogenes of Sinope, a contemporary of Socrates and Plato, lived in ancient Athens in public places, eating, sleeping, even relieving himself in public — a modern “homeless” person, haranguing the wealthy passersby with choice philosophical advice, “Socrates gone mad,” Plato said of him. Because his behavior was excoriated by the nobler people of the marketplace, who also could not stand his critiques, Diogenes was called a dog, which translates to a “cynic,” hence he is attributed founder of the philosophical school of Cynicism.
One day Alexander the Great and his company was in the vicinity, and Alexander thought to amuse himself by provoking Diogenes. He rode up to him and started a conversation, asking many questions. Diogenes said nothing. Exasperated, Alexander finally asked, “Diogenes, what do you want of me?” We can imagine Diogenes shading his eyes with his hand. “For you to go away. You are blocking the sunlight,” came the reply.
Attitude. A certain inappropriateness, dismissiveness, yet a certain restraint while delivering a withering response. Diogenes is not per se a hermit, but the values he holds closest are a preliminary, a basic ethos. After all, Alexander asked of Diogenes what he wanted. Diogenes replies that basically he wants nothing, not only for his personal needs, no riches, goods, or title, but especially nothing from a vain and powerful man. A man of power whom the hermit disdains but finds not relevant enough to be critiqued, argued with, or given the light of day.
Nietzsche presents a Diogenes-like figure in his little vignette of the madman in the marketplace. In the marketplace, the Athenian agora, the rich and well-born are chatting, trading, bargaining, puffing up their reputations, exchanging gossip. A madman at the edge of the crowd, disheveled, muttering, carrying a lantern, approaches. The madman demands to know why everything is business as usual when, in fact, the big news is out: God is dead! The movers and shakers are amused, and taunt the madman, telling him that, no, God is on holiday, gone to sleep, gotten himself lost, is hiding. The madman shouts that no, God is dead, and you, (corrupt loafers!) have killed him! Now what will you do? What water can wash the blood from your hands? Do you not smell the purification already?
But the crowd is merely uncomfortably silenced. The madman looks around, looks at each of them. No, they don’t know. They don’t realize. The news has not reached them, like the light from an imploding star that has not yet reached the Earth. The madman smashes the lantern to the ground. No, he says, I have come too early. And with that he turns and walks away.
Nietzsche’s Diogenes fits the philosopher’s own interests, of course: the grand question that if modern culture has killed the ethical import of God (an import to which they never lived up and used hypocritically), will they now become gods, substitutes for power, for morals? But the hermit always divines a larger tableau to time, nature, and culture, a tableau not discerned by the people who carry on their small circumspect lives and pursue the demands of society and the marketplace. Diogenes fits the sense of attitude that the hermits don’t necessarily reveal -— and certainly not with such flamboyance. But that is their trajectory, as we shall see.
Next: the desert hermits.