counterculture in ancient civilizations

I was randomly thinking the other day whether ancient civilizations really had countercultures. In school it seems they teach us about ancient civilizations as if they were one cohesive society, and when I look at our own culture thats simply not the case. I thought about times throughout history and the Protestant reformation was the only other time that really jumped out at me in terms of counterculture.

I am certain there has always been dissent with individuals but did ancient civilizations like Egypt, Greece, rome, etc have countercultures?

 

The cynics of ancient Greece were kind of a counter culture. I remember reading about Diogenes of Sinope and how he went against conventional values of the time.

The early Christians can also be thought of as a counter culture movement. Going against the traditions of the time.

 

There have always been those opposed to whatever the established order was, but in some civilizations you kept it to yourself and suffered in silence as the penalty for speaking out was prison, death, flogging, etc. Of course, that's still the way it is in some societies today, including some areas of the U.S.A. where the people don't tolerate dissent.

 

Every civilization since the dawn of man has had its counterculture and we judge each civilization based on
how it handles its outcasts.

The Ancient Greeks (welcomed varying points of view)
The Romans (conversion or death)
Stalin (kill all opposition)
Hitler (for the fun of it why not kill the jews)
Pol Pot (kill everyone and their mother)


Hotwater

 

Cultures may also run counter to other cultures. The thing about culture is it is cultivated, it does not exist in absence of this cultivation. It is not supported by reality and therefore requires constant defense.

 

this seems to be a good response, what exactly were the cynics culture at odds with of mainstream greek culture? you don't need to write a paper or anything maybe a paragraph will be fine. Feel free to write as much as you like if you are knowledgeable on the topic tho.

 

Cynics believed in living a life of virture, close to nature with no possesions and rejected the conventional goals of wealth, health, power and fame. The mainstream refered to them as "cynics" which mean "dog-like" mainly because of their indifference to civilized manners.

One of the most famous cynic, Diogenes of Sinopec (~400BC) lived in a bath tub on a street corner, ate raw meat, made love in public and walked around barefoot.

 

so its been 2,500 years and the same viewpoints are being fought.

 

Things have changed, but it seems people haven't.

 

.. I have nothing to add..

 

There are no idle thoughts. You say much.

 

forget 2500, they were already ancient by multiple thousands of years THEN too!

try closer to 8 or 9 thousand years.
yet we COULD stop inflicting the nonsense on each other at any time.
there may even have been times and places where we did.

and there will also very likely come a time, when nature confronts us with the choice, that we stop our careless destruction, or what we will have destroyed will have been ourselves entirely.

 

You can read about the Cynics in the sixth book of Diogenes Laertius (keep in mind that he is not the same person as Diogenes Of Sinope ):
http://classicpersuasion.org/pw/diogenes/
This is a very funny and, alas, viciously underestimated book, but despite its title, it has little to do with philosophy. What it really contains is a vast amount of anecdotes and facts of the ancient Greek life. The philosophers are usually represented there as underground freaks with little concern about the current state of society, their basic intent being the inebriated search after some, specific for each, state of mind. The truth junkies, I would say

There was also a late Greek Cynic called Lucian. A lot of his writings survived, fortunately for us:
http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/luc/fowl/index.htm
The funniest is the Dialogues of the Dead, but if you want something more serious, you can try Hermotimus as well. He is one my favorite writers of all times, and I think that in his satirical endeavors and, I dare say, Rococo-style passages he might be compared with Aldous Huxley.

Actually, whenever you go throughout history, you would almost always find a kind of countercultural or underground movement. One of the most famous and also cherished by the hippies in the 60s is so-called early Taoism, described in the books of Chuang Tzu, Lieh Tzu, and Lao Tzu. Lieh Tzu, for example, dedicated a whole chapter of his book to Yang Thu who reminds me very much of the Greek Cynics.

 

Well there has certainly probably always been underground movements, but I was trying to refer specially to counterculture. I mean a lot of underground movements especially ones based around religion throughout history I would consider more like subcultures. Someone mentioned early Christianity but that still grew out of Judaism and maintained many of the same core values and beliefs. I think the hippie movement initially was completely reactionary to the parent culture, but I was not around either of those times so that may just be perception. I actually think hippie culture and ideals today have become more like a subculture.

 

I've got your point, but even so, the Cynics and the early Taoists are quite countercultural, because they either rejected the previous culture or even culture as such. Some early Christians, usually called the Gnostics, although it is a dubious term, could be considered countercultural as well, because they twisted basic Old Testament myths beyond recognition.

As for the hippies, yes, I think it is a subculture, and probably has been a subculture from the beginning, because, as far as I know, they have always been eager for the roots. They looked for the roots in Taoism, Sufism, the Beat Generation, writers like Hesse and Huxley, etc. But I also wasn't around at the time and therefore can be mistaken.

 

Thanks for the links, I'm pretty busy this week but I am certainly going to look through those thoroughly, probably this weekend or next week.

 

wasnt it Plato that had a counterculture going on? just one of many!

 

its widely accepted that the prophets you learn about in the bible/Torah/Qu'an smoked pot/hash and were pretty out there in a lot of ways.

 

this question is easy to answer.

about 5 years ago, ken goffmans' book entitled, "counterculture through the ages: from abraham to acid house" was published.
very, very, very, well done survey of the history of alternative culture, from 6,000 years ago in ancient china, with taoism down, to the global digital alternative culture of the 1980's and 1990's.
the last chapter in the book deals with where altenative culture may be heading in the 21 st. century.

it is well worth checking out!

 

You may consider the Pythagoreans as one of the earliest Greek countercultural movements. They used to live separately and had some secret practices and teachings. As for Plato, he managed to make their teachings public after buying a book from a Pythagorean named Philolaus. Later other Pythagoreans killed Philolaus for that, or so was the rumour.

Anyway, Plato seems to me a very mainstream philosopher, but of course, his writings have influenced all the subsequent Western culture quite a lot.