Vegetarian Philosophers – List of Vegetarian Thinkers

Jan 31, 2011 Thais Campos

Philosophical Vegetarianism - Public Domain

Plato, Plotinus, Pythagoras, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, Plutarch, Marsilio Ficino, Giordano Bruno, Leonardo da Vinci and many other thinkers were vegetarians!

Some of the greatest thinkers in the world adopted a vegetarian diet for many different reasons. Here is a list of philosophers who did not eat meat and why they chose to be vegetarians.

Was Plato a Vegetarian?

Much has been debated about Plato's vegetarianism, but little is known about it. Although some say that there are no evidences that indicate that Plato might have been a vegetarian, in The Republic, Plato describes an ideal state in which the guardian class should not eat meat under the argument that it was much more rational to choose a diet that would be less harmful to the environment and to the spirit.

Platonic philosophy defended that the act of eating – like any other behavior – should be done consciously, that is, people should have the power to choose between good and bad, morally right and morally wrong, harmful and harmless, instead of allowing the senses to determine what they are going to eat.

Plato's philosophical vegetarianism influenced those who came after him to abstain from eating meat, including (but not limited to) these great thinkers:

• Plotinus – philosopher and founder of Neoplatonism,
• Theophrastus – the successor of Aristotle,
• Plutarch – Greek thinker who wrote On the Eating of the Flesh,
• Porphyry – philosopher and author of On Abstinence From Animal Food, and;
• Xenokrates – school head of the Platonic Academy.

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Since one of my degrees is in philosophy, I found this very interesting. Hope you will too. If you want to see the rest of the article, simply click on the link.