Platos Republic Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Platos Republic - Essay Example 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 Socr ates 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 ha ving 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 mo re 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,