Phi 1 Pt 11 Plato Apology & Phaedo

“Apology?” Socrates is quite unrepentant! But this is an “apology” only in the broader sense: an explanation. Plato dramatizes Socrates’ defence at this trial, explaining his life to the Athenians. Law and justice in Athens differed our modern expectations; no formal charge sheet survives, but he was prosecuted for a morals offence and a religious offence.
Socrates begins with the characteristic prooimion: the “aw shucks card.” Next, divide and conquer. He disposes first of the older prejudices (exemplified by Aristophanes’ satire The Clouds). He turns next to the mouthpiece of the triumvirate accusing him, the callow young man Meletus.
On cross-examination he demolishes Meletus. Meletus conflates Socrates with his predecessor Anaxagoras, and declares Socrates an outright atheist. Absurd; like any typical Greek, Socrates believes in the gods, many of them, including his own personal idiosyncratic daimonion. But this is all just obvious. Meletus’ name means “he who cares;” Socrates argues that in his confused way Meletus demonstrates that he cares not one whit for the issues he raises.
Socrates’ trial remains puzzling in certain ways. If not an outright atheist, then what is behind the religious charge? I F Stone suggests he gave insufficient respect to three gods, popular among Athenians: Hephaistos, Zeus Agoraios, and Peitho. Also, if Socrates is a danger to youth, this didn’t start yesterday; it was life-long . Why try him now, aged about 70? Is this payback sub rosa for recent political events (contrary to a formal amnesty)?
Socrates then plays the “veterans’ card,” and the “scripture card.” Why, Socrates, do you not just back down in the face of a death penalty? He cites the Homeric warrior ethic. Would Achilles have backed down? No. He preferred death to dishonor. Socrates has proven his fidelity to the Homeric values; an Athenian “jarhead,” never shirking duty, never fearing death. He calls upon his Athenian judges to be their better Homeric selves. But this appeal to tradition is a bit of a slap in their faces; a tinge of their Spartan enemies.
To the warrior’s disdain for death, he adds a philosopher’s disdain: why fear death as if it were the worst evil? We know nothing of the sort. Indeed “no one knows whether death may not be the greatest good that can happen to man.”
Thus far, Socrates is on a roll: 1) he has disposed of the old prejudices (Aristophanes) 2) he has demolished Meletus; 3) played the veterans’ card; and 4) likewise the scripture card. In so doing, however, he has not been entirely diplomatic: a) he has gotten in some digs against democracy b) has insulted the Upright Citizens c) may not have dispelled, entirely, the religious animus and d) the way he plays the scripture card makes him seem pro-Spartan.
Socrates had full standing as an Athenian citizen, native-born. Yet in many ways he was like a foreigner. He was comparable to the Sophists (who were, as foreigners, suspect); he was idiosyncratic (idios, a private person) whereas an Upright Athenian was demosios, “people-fied;” and he was lakonomanes, “Spartanified” both in his unwashed appearance and in his ascetic (laconic) hardiness.
Next he is going to air some dirty laundry. Under the democracy, I was asked to do an illegal act: to try the admirals from Arginusae as a group. I refused. I was threatened with arrest, but I did not back down from fear of imprisonment or even death. When the oligarchy came to power, I was ordered to arrest Leon the Salaminian so that he might be executed. I refused. Except that the oligarchy soon was overthrown, I might have been put to death for that. This is all well-known.
Is it supposed I corrupted young men? Well, many of them are here in court. Why doesn’t the prosecution call them now as witnesses?
And do not expect me to fall on my knees, now (as some of you here have done) and beg mercy -- or trot out my children in some argumentum ad misericordiam. This is something else unworthy I refuse. Besides to do so would be to ask the jurors to break their sacred oaths to judge by the law -- and then I would be guilty, truly, of irreligion!
To the end, Socrates is undiplomatic. Diplomacy is a virtue of consequentialism, and Socrates takes instead a deontic view. But diplomacy wins in court.
He is convicted -- by a narrow margin. Next the penalty phase: Meletus proposes death, Socrates proposes what he thinks he deserves: free meals at State expense. Or maybe a little fine. The vote is for death, but by a much larger margin.
Socrates gets a few more words before he is led away. He is merely going to die; those who convicted him unjustly have sentenced themselves to wickedness. Takes more than death to kill ideas. As to death, though no one knows, we can conjecture: it is either the Big Sleep; or Rock & Roll Heaven. Win-win. If the latter, I can carry on Philosophy; and there, they won’t put me to death.