Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:04:32.917Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Socratic Philosophy and the Cleitophon

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2009

Mark Kremer
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In the Cleitophon, Cleitophon abandons Socrates because he could not provide an art of justice that would bring an end to strife by eliminating cities, families, and the love of one's own on which they depend. Cleitophon's disappointment in reason prepares us for the misology of his legal positivism in the Republic. Although Socrates does not refute Cleitophon, Plato points to the deficiencies of art and legal positivism by pointing to poetic foils. By pointing to the poetic, Plato shows what is sound in poetry and the city informed by it, and, therewith, what they share with Socrates despite their ultimate differences. By not having his Socrates succumb to the promises of art and the irrational conformism of legal positivism, and by pointing to the humane learning of the poets, Plato opens a window on to the meaning of Socratic wisdom and the Socratic life.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Review of Politics , Volume 62 , Issue 3 , Summer 2000 , pp. 479 - 502
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 2000

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Roochnik, David, “The Riddle of the Cleitophon,” Ancient Philosophy 4 (1984): 132–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Blits, Jan, “Socratic Teaching and Justice: Plato's Cleitophon,” Interpretation 13 (1985): 321–34Google Scholar; Orwin, Clifford, “On the Cleitophon,” in The Roots of Political Philosophy, ed. Pangle, Thomas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987)Google Scholar. See especially Roochnik (pp. 132–38) and Blits (pp. 321–2) for a discussion of the scholarship and its inadequacies. See Pangle, (Roots, pp. 1–20)Google Scholar for a defense of the authenticity and maturity of the shorter dialogues. Bruell, Christopher, On the Socratic Education: An Introduction to the Shorter Platonic Dialogues (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999).Google Scholar

2 Bruell (On the Socratic Education) does not discuss the movement from art to legal positivism because he is of the opinion that one cannot determine which dialogue comes first. See note 20 below.

3 Blits, (“Socratic Teaching and Justice,” p.322)Google Scholar understands the impersonal opening of the dialogue as a parody of the just man who has forgotten his own good in speech. Orwin's interpretation of Socrates' impersonal address as an imitation of a legal indictment is more persuasive to me because it explains the dramatic structure of the dialogue. The dialogue as a whole imitates a trial with Socrates as accuser and Cleitophon as the defendant making the final speech before judgement.

4 Translations are mine unless otherwise noted. I have used the 1989 Oxford Classical Library edition.

5 Orwin says that Cleitophon recites Socrates speech verbatim and that this is the only time that Socrates addresses all human beings indiscriminately (“On the Clietophon,” p. 121). Orwin also questions Socrates' sincerity in this speech because of its uncharacteristic neglect for the soul. Although Orwin recognizes that the neglect of the soul also characterizes Cleitophon, Orwin fails to consider whether or not the speeches are misrepresentations of Socrates. Orwin, therefore, fails to grasp the pattern of the dialogue which consists of Cleitophon's characteristic misunderstandings.

6 I think that Roochnik did not go far enough in making clear what Cleitophon hoped for from Socrates. He says that Cleitophon turned to “reason and discourse to achieve happiness” (“Riddle of the Cleitophon,” p. 141; The Tragedy of Reason [New York: Routledge, 1990], p. 105Google Scholar), but I think this is too vague in light of Cleitophon's expressed expectations.

7 Cropsey, Joseph, Plato's World (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), pp. 65–68Google Scholar, discusses the implications of the contradictions between the gods.

8 It is fitting that Cleitophon is a foil to Polemarchus in the Republic (Orwin, , “On the Cleitophon,” p. 118Google Scholar). Polemarchus is an advocate of that aspect of justice that is patriotism, whereas Cleitophon asserts the authority of law as such.

9 Blits examines the order of Cleitophon's just society and compares it to the Socratic order. He argues that the realm of opinion is missing, as well as phenomena related to spiritedness (“Socratic Teaching and Justice,” p. 329). Saxonhouse, Arlene, “The Tyranny of Reason in the World of the Polis,” American Political Science Review 82 (1988)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, also distinguishes between Socrates' reason and the kind of abstract reason that is despotic.

10 In the Republic (425e8–10), Socrates also says that those who live worthless lives for both themselves and society would be better dead, and he suggests that they ought to kill themselves rather than to adopt half measures. But Socrates does not expect this to happen and he recognizes the necessity for a warrior class to guard against both internal and external threats.

11 Orwin, (“On the Ceitophon,” p. 123)Google Scholar has a different interpretation of the implications of Cleitophon's assertion that one's eyes and ears be enslaved to the artisans. The fact that only oneself can use one's eyes and ears, that the senses belong to oneself through the individuation of the body, means that the artisans cannot use the eyes and ears of others. Orwin takes the problem of the individuation of the body to be a suggestion about the problem of using the soul, that the artisans would not be able to use the soul of others and that the soul is not something used. While this is correct, it seems to me that it does not address the problem of the body in relation to justice. If the body is one's own and cannot be shared, then the only way to establish a political common good is to eliminate the body, or atleast to make the attachment to one's own life minimal, both of which Cleitophon recommends. He replaces education with suicide, and he makes life a breathing death.

12 It is worth comparing the extremes that Cleitophon is willing to go to for the sake of harmony to the steps contemporary education has taken for the same goal. To what extent does relativism destroy inwardness and self-consciousness by forbidding one to make judgements? Is mindless conformism the necessary consequence of the contemporary education towards harmony?

13 Italics are mine.

14 Orwin (“On the Ceitophon”) argues that gymnastics represents an alternative that is not developed in the dialogue, and that gymnastics is analogous to philosophy. Gymnastics is the exercise of one's body for the body itself (health), whereas philosophy is the exercise of the soul, or a part of the soul, for the health of the soul. This analogy is correct but does not adequately explain the differences between medicine and gymnastics, especially in a context where gymnastics is the more appropriate example. Gymnastics does not expressly attempt to cure sickness, and is more akin to beauty than is medicine. The example of medicine as an art to perfect the body raises the whole question of the limitations of art, and points directly to Prometheus. Furthermore, gymnastics is connected to virtue in that it is meant to be part of an education in courage, whereas medicine has no relation to education in virtue. Cleitophon looks at the art of the body that is more removed from the soul.

15 Blits (“Socratic Teaching and Justice”)is the only one who tries to interpret the meaning of the comparison of Socrates to a deus ex machina. He says that it refers to Socrates disappearing without giving an account of what he said. This is consistent with Cleitophon's depiction of Socrates as good at exhorting, but bad at explaining. This interpretation does not, however, investigate the relation between tragedy and art, especially in light of the clear references to Prometheus Bound and the Seven Against Thebes.

16 Translated by Bloom, Allan (“On the Ion,” in The Roots of Political Philosophy, ed. Pangle, Thomas [Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987], p. 390).Google Scholar

17 Strauss, Leo, Liberalism Ancient and Modern (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989), pp. 41–43Google Scholar, argues that the Prometheus Bound shows the limitation of the arts in comparison to wisdom. He corrects Nietzsche (The Birth of Tragedy, trans. Kaufman, Walter [New York: Vintage Books, 1967], pp. 70–71Google Scholar), who thought that Prometheus was an image of Aeschylus' wisdom.

18 Bruell, (On the Socratic Education, p. 198)Google Scholar argues that Cleitophon's slight reveals his impressive awareness that what usually passes for friendship, and especially friendships within cities, is of questionable goodness. But what is so insightful about that? This is the opinion of Thrasymachus and the many, as well as the others examining the companion. Furthermore, the goodness of friendship was questioned with respect to children and animals and must be understood in that context. Cleitophon's rejection shows less an impressive awareness than an impressive obtuseness. Cleitophon thinks that the companion does not believe his own definition because the definition is too exclusive—it excludes children and animals from friendship, not to mention citizens. The companion, whom Bruell takes to be the intellectual inferior to Cleitophon, has the impressive awareness. He distinguishes real friendship from what normally passes for friendship whereas Cleitophon and the others do not.

19 Bruell (ibid., p. 196) thinks that Cleitophon's belief in the success of his refutation is fully warranted. Bruell does not take into account that the so-called refutation shows a lack of awareness between the mechanical arts and philosophy and thereby reveals the limitations of Cleitophon's awareness. Bruell's discussion as a whole fails to look into the limitations of knowledge as art.

20 Bruell, (On the Socratic Education, pp. 192–93)Google Scholar says that it is not clear whether or not the Republic precedes the Cleitophon. He asserts that those who have attempted to place the Cleitophon first did so from false hope (the hope to hear a defense of justice in response to Cleitophon) rather than sound evidence. But Bruell himself admits that in the Cleitophon, the relation between Cleitophon and Thrasymachus is unclear (p.196). Certainly the relation is unclear to Socrates who speaks of it on the basis of hearsay, and whose opening accusatory statement invites clarification. Socrates' treatment of Cleitophon in the Cleitophon would make no sense had Socrates seen with his own eyes the relation between Cleitophon and Thrasymachus that takes place in the Republic. Furthermore, the movement of Cleitophon's soul only makes sense by placing the Cleitophon first.

21 Nichols, Mary, Socrates and the Political Community (Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1987), p. 49Google Scholar and Roochnik, (The Tragedy of Reason, p. 106Google Scholar) argue that Thrasymachus' desire to give his opinion about justice was motivated by gain, rather than from any real anger towards Socrates.

22 Benardete, Seth, Socretes' Second Sailing (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989), p. 23Google Scholar, makes the argument that Thrasymachus' position combines the unerring aspect of Cleitophon's opinion with the idea of the advantage of the stronger.

23 I think that Roochnik's description of Cleitophon as relativist (“The Riddle of the Cleitophon,” pp. 41–44; The Tragedy of Reason, pp. 105–107) does not adequately address his respect for the law. While it is true that Cleitophon cannot recognize one standard of justice, it is also true that he recognizes one standard of justice—that justice is law, and that law is what the rulers believe to be to their advantage. His position is contradictory. He is clearly inclined towards the irrational, but he is not a pure relativist. In a Platonic dialogue, it is always important to think about the reasons why someone holds on to a contradictory opinion. Cleitophon could avoid the contradiction inherent to legal positivism by distinguishing between law and nature, but he is incapable of this distinction. He stands by the law and this marks his limitation.

24 Cleitophon and Cephalus belong together in an important respect. Both stand in the way of the quest for the best regime by nature. The latter thinks justice is established by the authority of the gods and the former thinks that justice is a matter of arbitrary convention. The one believes that he knows and the other believes that there is nothing to know.

25 In the Republic, Socrates is willing to eliminate the family but only so that the city will contain the unity of the family; citizens will call one another brother and sister and they will believe in autochthony. Aristophanes also subordinates the family to the common good in the Assembly of Women, but whereas Aristophanes shows that such subordination leads to sterility, Socrates shows that it leads to philosophy. So although Aristophanes and Plato are in agreement about the need to articulate the relation of man to eternity, they have different understandings of nature or the divine in relation to the city (Kremer, Mark, “Aristophones' Criticism of Egalitarianism: An Interpretation of the Assembly of the Women,” Interpretation 22 [1994]: 273 n.5).Google Scholar

26 Dobbs, Darrell, “Piety in Plato's Republic,” American Political Science Review 88 (1996): 86Google Scholar, argues that removing the exercise of punishment from the family to the city is almost a civil religion among the Greek tragedians.

27 Orwin, (“On the Cleitophon,” p. 131)Google Scholar shows that Cleitophon needs a clear answer to the question of justice, whereas Socrates can only present problems. Perhaps this is because Cleitophon wants to perform a duty that will bring an end to suffering, whereas Socrates sees no possibility of eliminating suffering. It is possible that Cleitophon turns away from the gods and moral education, because he finds meaning, or the overcoming of mortality, in the conflict free society. In this respect, it would be worth comparing Cleitophon to Marx. It would also be worth comparing Cleitophon's transition from art to legal positivism to the transition of the Marxists and Stalinists to post-modernism. Did they too have disappointed hopes that ended with the irrational command for conformity?

28 Lest one fall into the comfort of thinking that the Republic follows the Cleitophon, Bruell warns the reader not to think that the second definition is the true definition and that it is the one definitive of the Republic (On the Socratic Education, p. 197). Bruell goes even further and states that while we can be certain that the first definition is “the original and clearly Socratic answer” (ibid., p.197), the second answer might be just a response to an interlocutor and therefore by implication might be just a comforting answer. But could one not as easily say that the first answer is the conventional answer? Bruell then argues that Cleitophon rejects the first definition, and then states that the task is to figure out why. But it is more apparent that Cleitophon is perturbed by the contradiction and the fact that the meaning of benefaction in the second definition has no satisfactory substance for him. Bruell does not follow Cleitophon's simple lead—that Socrates has two conflicting definitions of justice. Certainly the second answer can be said to be a clearly Socratic answer as it is the one consistent with the Socratic teaching that virtue is knowledge and that vice is ignorance. In the Republic, the two definitions clearly stand in contradiction. One should not conclude from the contradiction that Socrates lives a contradictory existence or that he held to a contradictory opinion. It simply means that there is an irreconcilable difference between the city and man. Socrates can accept this contradiction whereas Cleitophon can neither accept it, nor understand it. Cleitophon hopes that Socrates might have a noncontradictory answer that he is unwilling to share.