The Heights of Athenian Domination - Essay Example

? Plato’s Republic (21.09.11) Socrates lived his life during a period when there was a great deal of transition from the heights of Athenian domination till the time such domination declined after Sparta and its allies became victorious over Athens. At this time, Athens was seeking to restore stability in attempts of recovering from the crushing defeat. The public in Athens was doubtful about democracy being an effective form of governance and in this perspective, Socrates, who appeared to be a strong critic of democracy, was defended by many who interpreted his trial as being an outcome of internal political strife. Socrates was outspoken in criticizing the new government and after the Democrats took hold of power, Socrates’ relationship with the oligarchic set up made his enemies to find appropriate reasons to make him face trial. They charged him with corrupting the youth of Athens through immoral ways and in spite of his articulately expressed defense, Socrates was held guilty and condemned to death. In his Apology, Plato has recorded the last days of Socates’ life. Socrates continued to remain staunch and true to his belief system and was unwilling to go back on his past statements. He even refused the offer of exile and willingly ingested the cup of hemlock poison that ended his life. This paper holds that the charges against Socrates did not have strength and that they were primarily a result of the ongoing political strife amongst the varied claimants who wanted to lose no opportunity in claiming positions of authority in the newly established democracy. The defense for Socrates will be substantiated by repeatedly referring to Plato’s Republic because there is considerable circumstantial evidence in this work to steer him clear of the charges of corrupting Athenian youth (p.36). We know that Socrates was charged of corrupting the youth through a few contemporary Greek sources; Plato, Xenophon and the playwright Aristophanes. The Republic was born in Plato’s mind in his early youth while he was hopeful of becoming a politician. At this time he was much impressed with Socrates and became his pupil informally. Following the Peloponnesian war, Athens was ruled for about eight months by the Thirty Tyrants who were an oligarchic and tyrannical power group that tried to enroll Socrates as well as Plato within their group. Although Plato did not give a clear signal, Socrates openly refused to join them and very soon became reputed for adopting anti-democratic ideas. This proved to be very dangerous for Socrates, especially after the taking over of governance by the fundamental democratic set up that had soon over thrown the Thirty Tyrants. Socrates was tried by the newly formed Athenian democracy for having corrupted the youth, introduced new gods and for having adopted and encouraged atheism. He was convicted to death and subsequently executed, of which Plato was a witness. Plato was extremely disillusioned. The Athenians held that in having corrupted the youth Socrates encouraged the young to accompany him on his chosen path. Such developments made the youth of the day to confront the fundamentalist democracy of the period (p.248). In ascertaining whether Socrates had actually corrupted the youth in Athens, this paper relies on Plato’s Republic, which is a thorough analysis of the circumstances that prevailed during the time. In some ways it can be said that Socrates did teach new divinities and in some ways he did not. Socrates was ready to respect the conventional gods such as Athena and Zeus. In fact, all the available evidence indicates that he believed in polytheism. He was in agreement with Hesiod and Homer that these gods had physical characteristics and would always remain alive. However, his images of the gods were more illustrious as compared to the images of the gods that one understands from recitations of Homer and other groups of story tellers and god talkers that were known as muthologoi and theologoi respectively, during the period. Socrates held that the gods were wise, perfect and unknown to moral wrongdoings while being the source of good; but they could not be treated as not being the source of evil amongst mortal human beings. He asserted that unlike mortals, the gods are not envious, do not get angry and do not give messages of false dreams. Above all, he said, they do not rape women. Good people give recognition to the gods as their superiors and masters and comply with their instructions, primarily to remain just and to encourage human virtues (p.249). Plato writes in the Republic that the best example of human life is in terms of the extent to which it is impacted by knowledge, specifically in relation to the meaning people attach with goodness and with the qualities of good human beings. The same is true of the best city and for Plato; philosophers are the most efficient rulers because: They know what is good They do not wish to rule These characteristics were cited by Plato in the Republic in direct reference to the life of Socrates. Plato held that the problems with the present cities are that they are governed by people who are not aware of what is good. They have to also face circumstances whereby there is struggle amongst citizens as all of them want to rule. All these characteristics are inter-related; ignorant people are identified by their desires for achieving wrong objectives such as for honor and money. In turn, this desire makes them to search for political power and authority. Plato categorically held in the Republic that all the current regimes are characterized with such defects, irrespective of whether the rule is by a single individual, by a group or by many. In the Republic, Socrates is never revealed distinguishing amongst the good and bad qualities of these three kinds of governance. This implies that Socrates did not intentionally attempt to create any impression that the forms of government were not working effectively (p.232). At the same time, in part eight and nine of the Republic, Socrates is revealed as saying a lot about the individual characteristics of the faulty regimes (p.215). The accounts are organized in focusing upon the immense appetite the regimes had in terms of corruption, thus showing the extent to which a regime can be defective. Because of the massive appetite for corrupt practices and corrupting power, it is evident how the governance can be made worse. There is specific mention of the fact that rulers never stopped themselves from taking money irrespective of whether it was morally permitted to take it or not. Such collections of money kept growing in private and eventually could not be hidden any longer, to be eventually looted away in revolutions (p.225). It is known that Socrates trial began about four years after democracy was restored in Athens and this fact must be considered from the perspective of events that have already been narrated in this paper. Chrias was the leader of the Dirty Thirty and his deputy was Charmides and they together were at some time associated with Socrates (Apology, 2011). The charges against Socrates and his subsequent trial were initiated with the backing of the reinstated democracy. Although the little known Meletus was the official prosecutor in his trial, it was prompted by Anetus who was amongst the democratic leaders that had gone into exile during the rule of the Dirty Thirty. It is known from the Republic that Socrates had refused to become party to the misdeeds of the Dirty Thirty but the democrats did not like the idea of his staying back in Athens across the entire rule of the Dirty Thirty, because they themselves were forced to go into exile. Although this was not a strong basis to accuse Socrates in court, the charge was substantially strengthened in addition to technically avoiding violation of the amnesty that was granted to Socrates (p.246). It is thus evident that the entire account is deeply impacted by psychology. In the true sense, Socrates had no hand in misguiding youth or leading them astray in discouraging democracy or in corrupting them. The circumstances were created in such ways that the democrats in Athens were looking for opportunities to avenge the perceived distrust that was created by Socrates’ decision to stay back in Athens after its defeat at the hands of the Sparta and subsequent takeover by the Dirty Thirty. Socrates provided people with more illustrious images of god than Homer and other scholars and in asserting his ideas he only aimed at encouraging human virtues amongst people. Works Cited Apology, by Plato, http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/apology.html, Accessed 21 September, 2011. REPUBLIC, by Plato. Translated by GMA Grube, Revised by CDC Reeve. ISBN: 0872201368 ISBN 13: 9780872201361 Edition: 2nd Publisher: HACKETT PUBLISHING COMPANY Publication Date: Nov 01, 1992 Read More