Thoughts on Republic Book I: The Thrasymahcus

The commentary of Strauss, Brann and Bloom on the Republic is so good that it will be enough just to keep up with these, and so I have postponed trying to comment on this first book and so the whole of the Republic, but it must be done- along with a great deal more Greek! Strauss spends about one third of his writing and teaching on the Republic on getting these opening sections. Harry Jaffa has suggested that the Republic is the greatest or best of all books, and this seems true outside the Bible, or for human books, as well as those that are universally received according to the study of nature, which is the same for all. While certain particular books of the Bible and some as those of Homer and Shakespeare might be considered, the Republic is the one book that might head most lists of the best of the great books and first in education.

So like one in an exam or leading a class, forced to say something, I will try anyway to write a reading of Book I, taking out the best items from my bags collected periodically over 40 years. As one teacher promised long ago when I was very confused about the text, a stable reading does emerge. As said regarding the allegorical line, the reading of the text, of city and soul, fits in to the education, as Plato replaces Homeric poetry with political philosophy as the highest study.

As evident in the allusion of the first words, "I went down to Piraeus with Glaucon," the Republic opens as it ends, on the threshold of Hades, Where Socrates will be shown doing what Hercules did regarding during his 12th labor regarding Theseus when he freed the Athenian founder from Hades during his descent, as a side work in his 12th labor to bring up the 3 headed dog of Hades (Brann, Music, p. 1). So the beginning is read in light of the Allegory of the Cave and myth of Ur at the end. Brann describes the ring construction of the Republic surrounding the center, where upon getting the principle, there is a flourish or peak in the description of the philosophic life, through the images of sun, line and cave. His work as a favor to Plato was to cure Glaucon of political ambition. Why this work shows what justice is would be the question of the dialogue Republic.

That the opening is a mime of the political problem and wisdom and consent is what is said ( ). Socrates is going up from Piraeus when when Polem-archus, whose name means something like "war lord," in a group that includes Adeimantus the brother of Glaucon and Niceratus and others, playfully orders Socrates and Glaucon to wait. Polemarchus then orders Socrates and Glaucon to remain "here," which would be in The Piraeus, saying, "either prove stronger than these men or stay here." Compulsion. This mime of the relations of philosopher and city continues as Thrasymachus insists that Socrates pay money, and Socrates pleads poverty, Plato offers to pay for him (Apology ; ). As Bloom notes, it is after Polemarchus grabs the cloak of Socrates a second time that the highest sections of the discussion occur ( ; Bloom ).

Socrates asks if there is not another possibility- that he persuade them to "let us go." Polemarchus answers:

Could you really persuade us if we won't listen?

Wisdom cannot rule if it is not allowed to speak or if the polity otherwise simply will not listen. Glaucon agrees for the two of them that there is no way to persuade if they will not listen. The impasse is broken and turns openly comic when Adeimantus turns to the persuasion of the philosopher, asking "Is it possible that you do not know that at sunset there will be a torch race on horseback in honor of the goddess?"

It is said from Xenophon (Mem. III. 6) that it is for the sake of Glaucon that the discussion in Republic is undertaken, as a favor to Plato, to cure Glaucon of political ambition, and that Glaucon is about 20 at the time. One wonders where Alcibiades might be, here 5 years before the Symposium but 7 years after the Alcibiades (Zuckert, p. 9). Did Socrates fail to cure Alcibiades of Alexandrian ambition? But by the time the philosophic life appears, it is clear that the ends once sought have paled, and the city described in speech cannot exist anywhere. A higher center of self interest has emerged, and this is what shows that justice and self interest coincide- if it cannot quite be shown that the just man on the rack is happy. The tyrants life and the tyranny sought beneath the desires even of the common descent humans souls has been exposed as the greatest misery.

Cephalus: Commentators suggest that C. had been dead 30 years at the time of the dramatic date of the dialogue.

Cephalus: Telling the truth and paying what is owed- Theory and practice, why twofold? And to some, some truths are not owed! Republic Book I, the first definition of Justice, from the threshold! And why is the question raised of Polemarchus not raised regarding the first definition: One could be mistaken about the truth and about what one owes, just as we are mistaken about who is a friend and an enemy and about our own interests- so if mistaken, justice would be saying what is false and neglecting what one truly owes? Justice then will require knowledge of the truth and what is owed, and the truth may not be what is owed to everyone.

If I were where Socrates is, I would heartily agree that character is the one thing we can do something about that makes old age and all things more bearable- and there would be no dialogue! Socrates constructs a definition of justice out of what is said by Cephalus-

Strauss (p. 68) notes that Socrates...limits the conversation to justice as distinguished from piety," or here abstracts from piety.

The word justice enters the Republic where Cephalus is concerned that those who have committed injustice will pay the price in Hades (330d; 328b2). I remember being amused that the Greeks did indeed see the afterlife in relation to justice, as this appears no where else in the Greek writers, or is much more vague in Homer than in either Plato or Egypt. The Greeks have Hades and the Elysian fields (end of book VII) which are as if a part or section of Hades, like the bosom of Abraham (Luke 17) yet recognize that only Tiresius is aware there, and only Hercules has gone to live among the gods on Olympus instead of being confined to Hades Odessey 11.; ). One notes again that certain elements in Greek Socratic philosophy are present only in Socrates and the Bible.

Polemarchus: Ask AI: "How is the history related to the role of Polemarchus in the Republic?"

1) "The entire dialogue of the Republic takes place at Polemarchus’s home in the Piraeus (the port of Athens). The Irony: In the opening scene, Polemarchus playfully "forces" Socrates to stay at his house by joking about his superior numbers ("Do you see how many we are? ... Either prove stronger than these men or stay here").

The Historical Reality: A few years later, the Thirty Tyrants would use literal force and superior numbers to invade that very same house, arrest Polemarchus, and confiscate his wealth. The peaceful, hospitable home becomes a crime scene of state-sponsored theft and murder."

Moses! Friends and enemies ignores the difference between foreign and domestic faction! No one raises the question of partisan political differences in book I? Every time we read these works, we see something new.

that "the just man harms no one" comes out of nowhere, and is immediately received as a superior thought, obvious once spoken. It is based on the assumption that justice is good, and arts are not able to cause the opposites of their ends- guardianship to produce thievery, etc. "Do no harm" is a summary of the Hippocratic oath in medicine, if it does not simply say that- and this more than anything else is the basis of professional ethics in medicine and psychiatry. It may be that that is stated nowhere so clearly as here in the Republic. Socrates does not quite teach "love one another," the neighbor as well as the enemy, but does teach do no harm- with the peculiar Socratic twist resulting from the principle that no one is harmed if not made more unjust, and punishment then is good for people, but no one does injustice or becomes worse knowingly, since justice is the specific virtue of a man or human virtue.

Thrasymachus

Ezekiel 34:2-3 “Woe to you shepherds of Israel who only take care of yourselves! Should not shepherds take care of the flock? You eat the curds, clothe yourselves with the wool and slaughter the choice animals, but you do not take care of the flock.”

I have not been satisfied with my ability to answer the argument about shepherds in Book I- though I would be a wool shepherd instead. Like Wallace on Wallace and Gromit. There are limits to analogies. Socrates treats the question by separating the architectonic art of money making from the practice of the arts in the precise sense, given the evasion of Thrasymachus of the argument about errors.

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” (John 10:11)

Greater love has no man than this: that he lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:13

You are my friends if ...love one another.

336d: Thrasymachus will himself say that justice is a kind of advantage- one of the answers he attempts to forbid.

Unless they pay him- Thrasymachus seriously thinks he is professional teacher working here for free- not like Socrates, theoretical for it's own sake and so willing to pay people to listen.

Thrasymachus does not appeal explicitly to nature- he is a sophist and not a natural philosopher- but these are the effect of natural philosophy on the city. Calicles does appeal to nature, in the first use ever in print of the phrase "natural nomos-" a deliberate contradiction (Strauss NRH III, ). When Glaucon restores the argument of Thrasymachus, there is the explicit appeal to nature, and this is the question- is justice in itself good by nature.

The natural philosophers undermine the faith in justice by uncovering the bodily nature- the people no longer believe that justice and fortunes coincide. To show that justice is dear to intelligence, this higher center of self interest must appear- the philosopher.

Thrasymachus wants to say both that justice as conventionally conceived is really underneath, the interest of the stronger, AND that the interest of the stronger- tyranny- is just. The survival of the fittest- or the rule of the strongest- tyranny- is justified because law is already that way anyway.

To have more, ( ) or to acquire, is an important word here, and we see in common sense that the just man does not seek to have more at the expense of others in general, let alone other just men, while the unjust will be at faction with one another since in the end they will seek their own advantage at the other's expense, and justice will win, or at least have this chance.