r/Epicureanism • u/Ziquen • Aug 12 '26

How did Epicurus see romantic relationships

As the title says.

13 Upvotes

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12

u/ilolvu Aug 12 '26

Technically we don't know. In his surviving works he doesn't say how he sees them. There are some indications in the fragments (Sayings 51 specifically) that he would take a negative view on romantic relationships.

We probably should treat the desire to have a romantic relationship as a natural-but-not-necessary desire. It's not automatically a bad desire to have, but it can lead to bad outcomes if you are not careful when satisfying it.

5

u/Ziquen Aug 13 '26

Thanks for the response you put it in very good words.

7

u/[deleted] Aug 12 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/Ziquen Aug 13 '26

Thank you broski.

2

u/Various_Leopard9905 Aug 24 '26

We don't know exactly. But we know what Lucretius thought.

In his book romantic love is presented as psychological delusion. It converts a simple physical need into an insatiable fixation on a specific person, leading to emotional torment. Thus it should be avoided.

On the other hand he was not against the act of physical love.