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Socratic Justice
By: Impenitent

In the writings of Plato, one is introduced to the philosophic teachings of Socrates. Socrates is famous not for what he knew, but precisely for what he claimed he did not know. There are many dialogues with Socrates and his fellow Athenian citizens and in the vast majority of them, Socrates maintains a position of ignorance when speaking with others about certain ideas. Socrates’ scheme of argument is one in which he raises questions about the positions that the others may hold to be true. During the discussions, Socrates crafts questions in a way that leaves his contemporaries questioning the positions they once held, and leaving the participants as ignorant as Socrates. Some authors have accused Socrates of actually knowing about the subjects discussed even though Socrates maintains his ignorance. Socrates never admits to knowing anything outright, especially before his sentence and execution; however, one may claim that Socrates actually did know, or at the very least believed he knew, right before he took his own life. This paper will examine some of the propositions and ideas that Socrates refuted during the dialogues, e.g. the notions of Justice and Knowledge itself, and compare them with the positions he held at the end of his life. I will argue that Socrates adopted a contradictory sense of Justice at the end of his life in the Apology and Crito that he previously refuted as illogical in the Republic and found himself between obeying the laws of his gods and the laws of men; and this led Socrates to a contradiction of Justice. I will also argue that Socrates adopted certain metaphysical positions about which he could have no knowledge. In the end, I will demonstrate how Socrates killed himself over ideas that he “knew” he could know nothing about.

Socrates argued about the concept of justice at length in the dialogue
entitled the Republic with Thrasymachus, Polemarchus, Cephalus, Glaucon and
Adeimantus. Thrasymachus argued that Justice was nothing but the advantage
of the stronger and that Justice was obedience to laws as given by the stronger.
Socrates argues against Thrasymachus’ position throughout the Republic but at
the end of book I, Socrates concedes:

“As an epicure snatches a taste of every dish which is successively
brought to table, he not having allowed himself time to enjoy the one before,
so have I gone from one subject to another without having discovered what
I sought at first, the nature of justice. I left that enquiry and turned away to
consider whether justice is virtue and wisdom or evil and folly; and when
there arose a further question about the comparative advantages of justice
and injustice, I could not refrain from passing on to that. And the result of
the whole discussion has been that I know nothing at all. For I know not
what justice is, and therefore I am not likely to know whether it is or is not a
virtue, nor can I say whether the just man is happy or unhappy.”

www.constitution.org/pla/repub_01.htm,Translated by Benjamin Jowett.

Here we can see the Socratic method of ignorance at work. Thrasymachus made a claim about the nature and definition of Justice to which Socrates objected. Socrates and the others spoke at length about the issue only to come to the conclusion that Socrates did not know what Justice is. Thrasymachus’ view on Justice was shaken although it was not totally decimated through Socrates’ argument. In order for Socrates to be able to definitively say what Justice “is,” Socrates is required to do more than simply enumerate instances of what Justice is not.
Later in book IV of the Republic, Plato writes that Socrates argued:

”…But in reality justice was such as we were describing, being
concerned however, not with the outward man, but with the inward, which
is the true self and concernment of man: for the just man does not permit
the several elements within him to interfere with one another, or any of
them to do the work of others, --he sets in order his own inner life, and is
his own master and his own law, and at peace with himself; and when he
has bound together the three principles within him, which may be
compared to the higher, lower, and middle notes of the scale, and the
intermediate intervals --when he has bound all these together, and is no
longer many, but has become one entirely temperate and perfectly
adjusted nature, then he proceeds to act, if he has to act, whether in a
matter of property, or in the treatment of the body, or in some affair of
politics or private business; always thinking and calling that which
preserves and co-operates with this harmonious condition, just and good
action, and the knowledge which presides over it, wisdom, and that which
at any time impairs this condition, he will call unjust action, and the opinion
which presides over it ignorance.”

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.5.iv.html, Translated by Benjamin Jowett

Socrates is arguing that the just man is just because he has internalized what it means to be just. With this internalization of justice, Socrates claims that he is his own law. One could argue that with being his own law, the laws of the state or the gods would not apply. If it were the case that his law was the state or gods law, there would be no conflict; however, an instance can easily be considered in which his (Socrates’) law is totally different from the state’s law, the gods’ law, or both the state’s and the gods’ law.
Socrates argues further about his idea of what justice could be:

“Must not injustice be a strife which arises among the three principles
--a meddlesomeness, and interference, and rising up of a part of the soul
against the whole, an assertion of unlawful authority, which is made by a
rebellious subject against a true prince, of whom he is the natural vassal, --
what is all this confusion and delusion but injustice, and intemperance and
cowardice and ignorance, and every form of vice? …
And if the nature of justice and injustice be known, then the meaning of
acting unjustly and being unjust, or, again, of acting justly, will also be
perfectly clear? … they are like disease and health; being in the soul just
what disease and health are in the body. … Why, I said, that which is
healthy causes health, and that which is unhealthy causes disease. … And
just actions cause justice, and unjust actions cause injustice?”

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.5.iv.html, Translated by Benjamin Jowett

Socrates is arguing that justice can be known in the soul as disease is
known in the body. This of course assumes facts not in evidence, namely the
existence of the soul. A very large portion of Socrates’ philosophy is dependant
upon the soul. Socrates claims that the very notion of justice itself is only
understood via the forms which are only perceived through the disembodied
soul. This leaves Socrates in an uneasy position of making physical claims about metaphysical entities and their relation to the world.
Socrates argues further about the nature of justice and the soul:

“And is not the creation of justice the institution of a natural order
and government of one by another in the parts of the soul, and the
creation of injustice the production of a state of things at variance with the
natural order? … Then virtue is the health and beauty and well-being of
the soul, and vice the disease and weakness and deformity of the same?
… And do not good practices lead to virtue, and evil practices to vice? …
Still our old question of the comparative advantage of justice and injustice
has not been answered: Which is the more profitable, to be just and act
justly and practice virtue, whether seen or unseen of gods and men, or to
be unjust and act unjustly, if only unpunished and unreformed?
In my judgment, Socrates, the question has now become ridiculous. We
know that, when the bodily constitution is gone, life is no longer
endurable, though pampered with all kinds of meats and drinks, and
having all wealth and all power; and shall we be told that when the very
essence of the vital principle is undermined and corrupted, life is still
worth having to a man, if only he be allowed to do whatever he likes with
the single exception that he is not to acquire justice and virtue, or to
escape from injustice and vice; assuming them both to be such as we
have described? “

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.5.iv.html, Translated by Benjamin Jowett

Glaucon is obviously not convinced by Socrates’ arguments about the existence of the soul (as existing beyond the body) at this point, “We know that, when the bodily constitution is gone, life is no longer endurable…” Nor is Glaucon convinced by Socrates’ descriptions of what justice, virtue and vice are according to their benefit or detriment to the man who follows them.

Socrates argues that he cannot know what Justice is, yet he tries to equate Justice with the ideas of health, truth, goodness and virtue. Socrates argues that obedience to the law is the Just thing for a citizen to do. The obvious question arises form Socrates’ categorization, namely how is it that Socrates can make valid equivocations between Justice, which Socrates admits he cannot know, and other lofty ideas which Socrates could not know for exactly the same reasons that he gave for not knowing what indeed Justice is.

The dialogues of Plato’s Socrates were written in almost the opposite order of that of Socrates’ life. The works of Plato that are considered early for Plato include the Apology, and Crito. Yet it is in these two works in which one finds Socrates at the end of his life. The chronological Socrates has developed his philosophy throughout his life by the time he arrives at the Apology and Crito, and the Republic took place in the life of Socrates a bit earlier than those two even though they are penned by Plato in an opposite chronological situation. This being said, Socrates seems confused about the nature of Justice in the Republic; however, as we will see in Socratic dialogues that occurred towards the end of Socrates’ life, Socrates does claim that Justice is one thing, and in another dialogue, Socrates claims that Justice is totally different.
Socrates did not know what Justice is when he was speaking in the Republic; yet by the time Socrates is put on trial for corrupting the youth of Athens, Socrates argues clearly that he does have an idea of what Justice is exactly. During Socrates’ trial as related in the Apology, Socrates claims the following:

“…And this is the point in which, as I think, I am superior to men in
general, and in which I might perhaps fancy myself wiser than other men,
- that whereas I know but little of the world below, I do not suppose that I
know: but I do know that injustice and disobedience to a better, whether
God or man, is evil and dishonorable, and I will never fear or avoid a
possible good rather than a certain evil. And therefore if you let me go
now, and reject the counsels of Anytus, who said that if I were not put to
death I ought not to have been prosecuted, and that if I escape now, your
sons will all be utterly ruined by listening to my words - if you say to me,
Socrates, this time we will not mind Anytus, and will let you off, but upon
one condition, that are to inquire and speculate in this way any more, and
that if you are caught doing this again you shall die; - if this was the
condition on which you let me go, I should reply: Men of Athens, I honor
and love you; but I shall obey God rather than you, and while I have life
and strength I shall never cease from the practice and teaching of
philosophy…”

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/apology.html, Translated by Benjamin Jowett

In this instance, Socrates plainly states that he finds obeying the laws of his gods as more Just than obeying the laws of the state. In this example, Socrates is claiming that obeying the laws of men may lead Socrates into a contradictory conflict with obeying the laws of god, especially since Socrates argued earlier that obeying the laws of the gods is the Just thing to do. Yet, in Crito Socrates clearly argues the opposite position, that it is in fact more Just to follow the laws of men:

“…Has a philosopher like you failed to discover that our country is
more to be valued and higher and holier far than mother or father or any
ancestor, and more to be regarded in the eyes of the gods and of men of
understanding? … And when we are punished by her, whether with
imprisonment or stripes, the punishment is to be endured in silence; and if
she leads us to wounds or death in battle, thither we follow as is right;
neither may anyone yield or retreat or leave his rank, but whether in battle
or in a court of law, or in any other place, he must do what his city and his
country order him; or he must change their view of what is just… What
answer shall we make to this, Crito? Do the laws speak truly, or do they
Not?”

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/crito.html, Translated by Benjamin Jowett

Socrates is clearly arguing that the state not only has the power to command the citizens of the state, but that it is the Just thing for citizens to follow the commands of the state regardless of the consequences to the citizen. Socrates elevates the power that the state has over the actions of a Just man to a higher level of just obedience than parents or even the gods. Socrates does claim that the state may be persuaded to change its opinion of what justice is however which raises an interesting question: if the justice of the state is so fluid that it may be changed on the whims of an influenced jury or judge, what gives it a higher position than justice as regards parents or gods?
Socrates continues his argument:

“Then the laws will say: "Consider, Socrates, if this is true, that in
your present attempt you are going to do us wrong. For, after having
brought you into the world, and nurtured and educated you, and given
you and every other citizen a share in every good that we had to give, we
further proclaim and give the right to every Athenian, that if he does not
like us when he has come of age and has seen the ways of the city, and
made our acquaintance, he may go where he pleases and take his goods
with him; and none of us laws will forbid him or interfere with him. Any of
you who does not like us and the city, and who wants to go to a colony or
to any other city, may go where he likes, and take his goods with him. But
he who has experience of the manner in which we order justice and
administer the State, and still remains, has entered into an implied
contract that he will do as we command him. And he who disobeys us is,
as we maintain, thrice wrong: first, because in disobeying us he is
disobeying his parents; secondly, because we are the authors of his
education; thirdly, because he has made an agreement with us that he will
duly obey our commands; and he neither obeys them nor convinces us
that our commands are wrong; and we do not rudely impose them, but
give him the alternative of obeying or convincing us; that is what we offer
and he does neither. These are the sort of accusations to which, as we
were saying, you, Socrates, will be exposed if you accomplish your
intentions; you, above all other Athenians."…

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/crito.html, Translated by Benjamin Jowett

Clearly, Socrates is arguing that one must always obey the commands or laws of one's city for it is the view of the city that the commands it gives are Just. In the Republic, Socrates argues that he does not know what Justice is. Later in the Apology, Socrates argues that he does know what Justice is (via simple deduction) and that Justice is following the laws and commands that the god(s) prescribe. Surprisingly, in Crito, Socrates claims that he knows what Justice is and that Justice is following the laws and commands of the state. If Socrates had maintained his skeptical position as exercised in the Republic, perhaps he would have been able to live a bit longer.

With Socrates’ contradictory positions on the concept of Justice illustrated, I would like to now focus on parts of Plato’s philosophy that have no empirically justificatory evidences. Plato claimed that true knowledge was only attainable through the forms. These forms are not sensible. Yet to these forms, all physically ascertainable (those that are perceived directly through the senses) characteristics are attributed, for example a red cube partakes in the form of red as well as the form of cube as well as a myriad of other forms. Plato argued that there was one overarching idea behind each form and that instances of the particulars reflecting properties of said form could be vastly different. The form of courage (for instance as talked about in class) could be realized in the instance of a soldier on the battlefield, or just as validly realized in the instance of a single mother struggling to survive in one of America’s ghettos. They are dramatically different examples but both share in the form of courage.

The existence of these forms is supposed to support the existence of a disembodied human soul. It is only through this disembodied human soul that the forms are apparent. One’s soul exists prior to birth and during this prior existence, the soul is exposed to the knowledge of the forms. Socrates argues that his soul will continue after his death and that is why he is not afraid to commit suicide for the “Just” people of Athens. Socrates does not really believe that he is going to go out of existence when he dies. There is no empirical evidence to back up these claims by Socrates, but nonetheless, Socrates drank his hemlock and crossed over into death. Socrates argued that doing the will of his god was Justice. Socrates argued that he would continue to teach and discuss philosophy as following the will of his god. Socrates argued that doing the will of the state was Justice and Socrates argued he would and actually did end his life on behalf of the state.

The conflict was unsatisfactorily resolved. Socrates was unjust towards his god’s commands. Socrates did stop teaching and discussing philosophy through the will of Socrates because it was Socrates who willingly drank the poison. This action was Just in the eyes of the state, yet unjust in the eyes of his god. (There are better ways to avoid the horns of a dilemma than self destruction.)

Perhaps ironically, Thrasymachus could be considered correct in his argument that Justice was nothing but advantage of the stronger. If Socrates had the mental strength to convince the judge and jury of Athens that he was in fact correct and that the city was unjust, his strength would have prevailed. As a demonstration of the power of the city over Socrates, Socrates ended his own life. In a sense, via the power of the city, Thrasymachus was shown to be correct.

A different view of Justice that Socrates considered, the internalized view of Justice, perhaps can be used as well. Socrates would have had to adopt one of the views of Justice and internalize it, which he did. If Socrates had adopted the view of Justice as suggested by the gods, Socrates would have remained as a teacher of philosophy and not killed himself. Socrates’ adoption of the city’s view of Justice allowed him to commit suicide.

Another interesting idea about doing the Just thing while one may is found in Socrates’ last words. While Socrates decided to obey the Justice of the city as opposed to the Justice of his gods, Socrates’ last request was arguably in deference to the Justice of the gods. One could argue that paying back any debts one owes is a Just thing to do. If the debt was to the state, paying back that debt would be Just in the eyes of the state. If the debt was to a god, paying back the debt would be Just in the eyes of the god. While Socrates defied his god’s Justice by not continuing to teach philosophy to the people of Athens; Socrates obeyed his god’s Justice by having Crito pay back the debt of a “cock to Asclepios”

Could it have been the case that Socrates was simply showing fidelity to the city of Athens as opposed to performing the will of the city as an exercise of Justice? Socrates did argue extensively about the duty one owes the state and that it would be the Just thing to fulfill those duties. It could appear that Socrates’ fidelity to the city of Athens was the reason for his deciding to act as the city wished, but Socrates himself argues that he is acting out of a sense of Justice. Justice in the eyes of the city is almost synonymous with fidelity to the commands of the city. The difference being that it is possible to influence or change the mind of the city as regards to Justice and fidelity would simply be rote action with no appeal for change.

It could have been the case that Socrates was showing infidelity to his gods. Socrates is plainly choosing to obey the will or Justice of the city as opposed to obeying the laws of the gods. The conflict between the two arbiters of Justice is considerable. In acting to obey the Justice of the god, Socrates would have been required to continue living and teaching in Athens. In acting to obey the Justice of the city, Socrates was required to end his existence. Of course the entire question of what Justice is could be larger in scope than simply following the rules or laws of whichever potentate one happens to prefer. Socrates does indeed follow the Justice of the state with his suicidal act; yet Socrates can also be shown to be following, albeit to a much lesser degree, the Justice of the gods.

Socrates never fully developed his eternal soul’s relation post mortem to the gods. One would think that when one is existing in the realm of the forms in an incorporeal state, that one would have almost direct access to the gods. Socrates could easily have found out that he was following the wrong Justice entirely. That the form of Justice that he was expected to follow was the Justice of the gods rather than the Justice of the state. Once Socrates had thrown off his mortal coil, the Justice of the state could no longer apply for the simple reason that the state is a material thing and post mortem existence would have to be immaterial. Which Justice to follow for Socrates was a very important question. Perhaps Socrates did follow both to a small degree, but to end his existence as he did leaves Socrates committed to the notion that the Justice of the state is the more important than the Justice of the gods.

Socrates knew that he could know nothing. Socrates did argue that Justice was unknowable. Socrates argued that Justice was in fact knowable and that it was following the will and commands of god. Socrates also argued that Justice was in fact knowable and that it was following the will and commands of the state. When the idea of courage is examined one finds courage in many different acts and these acts are not contradictory in nature. An act that is contradictory to courage is not courage; however, it appears that when faced with contradictory positions of Justice, Socrates adopts them both and claims them both equally Just. Socrates held three views of Justice that contradicted each other, although it could be argued that Socrates actually only held the one view as valid or correct because that was the only one he followed in practice. That Justice is following the commands of the state.

The idea of Justice that Socrates denied was simply the will of the stronger or “might makes right” argument proposed by Thrasymachus. If Socrates had the strength of will to follow the Justice prescribed by his god, he would have remained alive (at least until he died by other causes.) If the state didn’t have the strength to condemn Socrates to death, he would have been spared. In the end, Socrates killed himself because he submitted to the power and strength of the Justice or will of the stronger. Although he vociferously objected to Thrasymachus’ claims, Socrates submitted himself to the more powerful entity that he thought was Justice.

Did Socrates “know” that the state’s decision was in fact Justice? Socrates’ admission that he knows nothing rings hollow upon witnessing Socrates’ action on the “knowledge” he possesses. Socrates acted in a way that followed exactly what the state prescribed for reasons that the state was in fact the arbiter of Justice. The Justice of Socrates’ god was not as important or knowledgeable to Socrates as evidenced in Socrates’ disregarding actions concerning the laws and commands of said god. But perhaps there was a sliver of Justice to the gods in the actions of Socrates. Socrates did arrange for a debt to be paid to the god Asclepios and paying debts can be considered to be a Just thing to do; however, in an act of irreverence to the Justice of Socrates’ god, Socrates imbibed of the hemlock potion and became …

Article Source: http://journal.ilovephilosophy.com

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