A Critical Review of Natural Law in the Practical Philosophy of the Ancient Greece

Scholars of the first period of the ancient Greece used to consider natural law as a universal, eternal, and unique law. It was taken to be the most basic source for deciding about the best criteria for human life. Epistemological problems of the Sophists left a lasting effect on the philosophical ideas of the next generations which led to a debate about the credibility of natural law. Greek philosophers who believed in rational judgments as firm basis for human knowledge defended natural law phenomenon, and Stoics, who had a great role in the development of the debate over natural law, interpreted it as “living according to nature”.The present article has a critical approach to the idea of natural law as depicted in Ancient Greece. The critiques are divided into two categories: a) general critiques which include all ancient Greek philosophers such as: the conceptual ambiguity, uncertainty in the instances, and doubt about the term “natural law” in that period; b) Specific critiques which targets individual thinkers.