Seneca on the Efficacy of Prayer

The Stoics claim everything to be subjected to fate, yet they also speak of man’s freedom. The latter, however, is of a kind that is quite alien to what we normally associate with this word. Hence the following quote from Oedipus’ mother in Seneca’s play: “Fate’s is that fault of thine: by fate no one is made guilty” (Oed. 1019, trans. F. J. Miller). Apart from the question of personal responsibility such a conception of fate implies, we can wonder about the efficacy of prayer in a Stoic worldview, given that human freedom to act does not in the slightest way interfere with the eternally ordered course of things. There is more: fate being rational, no rational being would ever even want anything in that fated course of events to be altered; both the wise man and the gods, who differ but in duration, freely obey that course of things they indeed choose as being not only necessary but utterly perfect. Being rational, as Seneca puts it, is less a matter of obeying God than one of agreeing with him (Epist. 96.2). Why then does Seneca argue against the Epicureans, insisting that the gods may reward us with their gifts if we duly pray to them (Ben. 4.4.2)? Quite to the contrary, he says in his Natural questions, fate resembles a river never altering its course, however devout the prayers of those asking for a change are (Q.N. 2.35‐6). Rituals and prayers have thus no efficacy whatsoever outside the dreams of a disturbed man’s mind (ibid. 33.1). And yet, he adds, “there are dispensations the immortal gods left suspended”, which means that it is inappropriate to simply pretend that every single thing will just happen whether or not we pray for its realization: there are things that come to be, but under the specific condition that prayers be uttered. Having said this, Seneca promises to deal with the issue later on. That promise he did not keep though, or, if he did, what he had to say about it has not come down to us. What could Seneca actually have taught on the issue at stake here? I will suggest an answer to that question, drawing from both the Roman philosopher’s own work and that of his most famous commentator in the early seventeenth century, Justus Lipsius.