PLATO’S SYMPOSIUM Explained - NIETZSCHE’S Favorite Classical Work
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 31 พ.ค. 2024
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This lecture is about Nietzsche's lieblingsdichtung, or favorite work, from the time of his graduation at Schulpforta: Plato's Symposium. The Symposium is one of the most popular Platonic dialogues, which considers the topic of love, and the nature of the god Eros, who represents love as a metaphysical or divine force. While those who have only a passing familiarity with Nietzsche may be surprised to hear that the pitiless philosopher was enamored with a conversation about the finer points of love and romance, in fact, Plato's Symposium is rich with insights that had a profound impact on Nietzsche. Central to the conversation in the Symposium is the understanding of the power of love - for love, as with all things the Greeks perceived as forces within the psyche that pushed or motivated mankind, is evidence of a divine influence that grips human beings and makes its will upon us felt.
This guy's voice is soothing. He's got a great voice for a 11 pm radio show
I dont know who else will see it man but keep it up, articulate insight and we'll delivered. Amazing work and many thanks
Seconded!
Third and fourthted!
A voice that one hears so intimately as if one was speaking in your living room as my papa did when I was a child.
Again, thank you.
I feel like beauty is the radiant glow of love. Love is internal and the beauty is external to it. It’s the effect that love causes. When you see beauty, you are really seeing an internal love externalized.
I agree with this. How well put 😂
"as manure contributes to the fragrance of a rose" 🌹😘
01:26:04 🏛 The first four speeches in Plato's Symposium build on each other, gradually forming a more complete view of the god Eros (the god of love).
01:32:44 🌟 Agathon, the host of the party, defines Eros as "the love of the beautiful," focusing on the inner character of Eros rather than its effects on humans.
01:36:14 🧐 Agathon disagrees with Phaedrus, arguing that Eros is not the oldest deity but the youngest among gods, distinguishing between love and necessity.
01:40:23 🌹 Agathon praises Eros as the embodiment of beauty, skill, and creator of all living things, emphasizing the association of love with beauty and goodness.
01:44:56 🤔 Socrates challenges Agathon with questions, establishing that love desires what it lacks, leading to the conclusion that love is directed towards the beautiful and the good.
01:46:49 🤔 Socrates challenges the idea that Eros (love) is good and beautiful, arguing that if Eros seeks what is beautiful, he cannot possess beauty himself.
01:49:11 📜 Socrates appeals to the words of Diatoma, a priestess of Eros, to redefine Eros as a spirit or force that mediates between ignorance and wisdom, rather than a god.
01:54:06 🧠 Diatoma argues that Eros must be a lover of wisdom since wisdom is the most beautiful thing, thereby portraying Eros as a philosopher.
02:05:20 🌟 Nietzsche suggests that Socrates does not reject the speeches of previous speakers but extracts valuable insights from them, creating a cumulative understanding of Eros.
I thoroughly enjoy these readings and ruminations. Your speaking voice and cadence are ideal and allow the listener's mind to completely absorb the material.
I cannot for life of me understand the tiny listenersship. It's a bravura effort and I sincerely thankyou for your superb vocal presentation.
thank you my friend for all the wonderful critique, analysis and insight. I can actually fall asleep to this soothing, friendly voice.... not sure how its possible this page doesn't have half a million subscribers or more.
You're the only one from all my subscriptions whose 'hit the bell' I've hit.
Thank You so much for this episode. I’m searching for some concepts on the Greek tradition and it has been a delight to listen several times to you.
00:00 📜 Love is a challenging topic for philosophy, often viewed as vague and difficult to define in modern times.
02:17 🤔 Modern thinking tends to be dismissive of the mysteries of existence and leans towards materialistic explanations, even for love.
03:44 🧪 Love, in part, has its significance due to its role in human reproduction and social bonds.
06:02 🙏 Pre-modern religious mindset is not about arrogance but accepting truths from tradition in the absence of scientific understanding.
08:33 🌌 Approach Plato's "Symposium" with epistemic humility, allowing love to be mysterious and divine, as the ancient Greeks did.
09:54 💬 Plato's "Symposium" features speeches about love from various characters and thinkers, offering diverse perspectives on eros.
14:11 📖 It's uncertain whether the events in Plato's "Symposium" truly happened or if they are more of a literary creation by Plato.
16:46 🎭 Nietzsche found great fascination in the diverse characters and thinkers presented in Plato's "Symposium," viewing it as a structured literary composition.
20:03 🤝 Nietzsche's philosophy was influenced by various thinkers, including Plato, but his attachment to Plato was not as intense as it was to other philosophers like Socrates.
21:53 🧐 Plato, unlike some pre-Platonic philosophers, drew on various past philosophical ideas to create his own philosophical structures.
22:35 🤔 Nietzsche may have identified somewhat with Plato as a "grand mix" type of character who assembles various ideas.
23:46 😠 Nietzsche had stronger feelings towards Socrates than Plato, despite acknowledging Plato's importance in Western philosophy.
27:13 📚 Nietzsche admired Socrates as the first genuine philosopher of life and saw Socratic philosophy as practical and focused on ethical implications.
30:56 😃 In Plato's "Symposium," Socrates is portrayed differently than in other dialogues, emphasizing his inspirational and philosophical aspects.
33:00 🍷 The symposium in ancient Greece was a gathering of men where they tested their virtue, wits, and sometimes engaged in competition, often fueled by wine.
40:19 💘 Phaedrus begins the discussion on Eros (love) in Plato's "Symposium," highlighting the importance of having a good lover and the positive influence of love on honorable behavior.
44:24 🌟 Phaedrus views love (eros) as a divine force that compels individuals to virtue and honor, regardless of moral distinctions.
49:24 🌈 Pausianus argues that there are two types of eros: pandemian (physical love) and uranian (spiritual love). He believes uranian love is more noble and lasting.
01:01:37 🌿 Eryximachus, a physician, expands the concept of eros to encompass all of nature, describing it as a force that affects the health and balance of biological and natural systems.
01:05:11 💉 Eryximachus sees medicine as the art of managing the "erotics" of the body, making things inimical (opposite) work together and promoting love and unity within the body.
Please note that the timestamps are approximate and may vary slightly in the actual video.
01:05:52 🌡 Phaedrus discusses love as a force that motivates people to die for each other, sparking the symposium's discourse on eros.
01:12:02 🕊 Eric Semakis broadens the concept of eros to encompass the entire physical world and distinguishes between good and bad types of love.
01:13:27 🌌 Aristophanes provides an origin myth for romantic love, emphasizing the desire for wholeness and togetherness even beyond death.
Thank you so much for this video. Very insightful
I'm greek but it took me so long to realise that play-doh is Platonas.
I can only my applause to the chorus. Superb. Thank you.
This was wonderful, thank you.
Great work! Thank you.
Wonderful. Btw, I also love the artwork. I found myself examining different parts of it throughout the podcast. Do you (or anyone) know who the artist is?
Episode art: Marcello Bacciarelli - Alcibiades Being Taught by Socrates (1776-77)
An interesting beginning. I very much agree with your view of modern views on love. I would add that some people are joining it up in a spiritual sense.
Love is where we first ecounter our prejudice, where we learn love isn’t our weakness for perfect skin or some surface perfection.
Then one might realise they have no idea what love is, how its supposed to feel nor the way it comes and goes.
great listening material
Love your voice. Please read books to us! First time on your channel. Thanks for your time and work!
Aristophanes was sort of mocked by Plato in this Magnum Opus because of his play called clouds. I guess because of criticism of Socrates in clouds. Aristophanes tried to present him as sophist ☺️ in his play very funny by way.
Actually in the context of Plato. When it’s lover and the loved- it’s Erastes and Eramanos: Erastes is always the older male lover, while the Eramanos is the younger “boyfriend”. Because of the arguments in the symposium it’s shown that the younger is always a boy, a young boy who needs the older lover to teach him virtue, politics etc etc in return for sexual gratification from the younger. According to plato via Pausanias, if it’s between a man and a woman, the ‘love’ is common, I.e basic relationship based on physical attraction. While the common love can also be between two men, it’s more likely to be attributing to be between man and woman. While elsewhere in the symposium man and woman have relations to procreate. Throughout the symposium, the most common theme is that love should be for love of the mind and for the goal to pursue wisdom and virtue. Small distinction of the mistaking loved and lover seems small but actually bleeds a lot into how someone analyses the symposium. It has to be with the context of plato in mind.
Where am I wrong in thinking that love is plain and simply the feeling that we get when we like something very, very much. Its opposite, hate, is when we dislike something very, very much. Am I wrong in feeling that we over complicate this word?
Plato reacquaints me with the pleasures of philosophy the modern or postmodern have so effectively leeched out.
I think that it is entirely possible for the good to desire the good, the beautiful, to desire the beautiful,. Even that desire is the suffering of want at some basic level too, the thirst to be more. better, perfected and whole even.
Eros, love, desiring the beauty of the other, is transformative more than the suffering that is the shadow that Eros leaves behind.
Yaweh hungered for Jerusalem thusly. Eros is a seeker of beauty in the darkest of places too, to see the beauty in the fallen, the tenacity of the foolish, the relentlessness of life even in the smallest place. Eros seeks those who desire to be seen to be beautiful.
Being loved is transformative. Giving love fulfills the meaning of beauty and wisdom .
I’m curious what all the differences Socrates and Plato have as far as their influence in philosophy and their own character and ideas of virtue
This is one of the most difficult questions in the history of philosophy: somehow separating Socrates and Plato.
There are a few indications, mainly from sources other than Plato, about Socrates, such as Xenophon’s Symposium. Sparing the rigorous philological questions, I can give you N’s answer: Plato systematized Socrates, and combined him with Pythagorean and Heraclitean notions, perhaps even with Egyptian philosophy/wisdom schools. Socrates is purely the “mystagogue of science”, the spirit of dialectic whose instinct is to question/critique, whereas his intellect is creative - N says this is the reverse of the norm before Socrates, that the Greek aristocrats felt their instinct to be their creative force and their intellect to be that which discerns/criticizes. Plato, in combining Socrates with Pythagoras, produces a system of the Forms, draws on the idea of the immortal soul, and sees the ultimate form of the good as God. Whereas Socratism was one among many schools, Platonism becomes the foremost school of philosophy, becoming dominant over all Western thought through the influence of Aristotle.
@@untimelyreflections excellent summary
Thank youuuu
I think the ending is important is of creative genius . It is the living of the abstract forms presented as intellect by the others .
I read the symposium a week ago and came across your analysis through Nietzsche yesterday .
I have concluded it is best to read Plato and other authors on their own without after the fact outside in dismantling of the work . Especially Nietzsche who’s game as the antichrist is to befriend you than once on the inside run off and oppose you by inverting your works .
Nietzsche tried to personify Socrates and Christ though as the opposite ( Antichrist) .His identification with the archetype led to him suffering from an inflated ego . He is a disease not a healer .
I am surprised, if you are a philosopher, that you don’t see where Nietzsche building upon previous speakers concepts is coming from .
The best definition of love I have ever heard is "to recognise oneself in the other"
The best definition I heard is that love is the willful humiliation of oneself before another. The sacrifice of one's self-interests for another.
Love is a verb.
@@kikicarter788 Love can be both a noun and a verb. As a noun, it represents a deep affection or strong feeling of care and attachment. As a verb, it signifies the action of showing affection, care, or attachment toward someone or something.
Is socrates holding a mouth piece pf a horse's reigns?? For temperance?? Self control?
Could represent a youthful EROS and an old EROS. Young dumb full of chum and a wounded healer or shaman, wise old man. A lover of philosophy.
Love, in ancient Turtle Island and Anawak (todays Americas), was an energy or force that emanates from within us, its cultivated like other virtues within you and doesn’t come from outside of you, or a “god” in the western sense. In other words, it’s not a thing that you’re imbued with from an outside force.
Noticed something interesting @41:00
“Chaos was first” etc etc.
Ancient Native to the “Americas” philosophy, at least 3-4k years old says -
Movement is first, then light then wind/breath, etc etc. It’s depicted in their hieroglyphics and some books that survived invasion.
The older “American” philosophy is closer to the “bigbang” theory claimed by science today, than the Socratic and Platonic version, some which were extracted from already ancient writings in their libraries.
The symbolism used in ancient Turtle Island are forces of nature and not gods as defined by today’s western mind. Plato would have understood that and seen them as symbols referencing ideas, qualities, and forces in nature, unlike todays western mind that takes a literal idea of a god, and that each symbol is/was a god. Confusing a way of communicating with a pantheon.
Creation here was always a mystery, and it counties to be. The questions raised here were not so much from where and why and for what purpose anything exists, they were focused more on how to live, how to flower and produce beautiful sights, sounds and scents, in order leave beautiful memories to be remembered by, because the only after life we have is the one we leave behind.
One of the similarities is that humanity had to be remade, except that here, each version is better and not worse.
37:22
Beauty. I am doing an ode to Eros... ironically. 😏😎⚡⚡💪🏻
I think it's evident that Plato was immensely important/influential upon Nietzsche, especially at the level of professional jealousy. The same can be said with Plato's relation to Homer. I doubt there would have been the Nietzsche we know without a Plato as so much of his work is either an expansion or opposition to him. I'm not discounting his other influences or his own unique genius and, of course, we can say the same about every other thinker in terms of developments of earlier ones.
What about the ECONOMIST By Xenophon, and the Clouds by Aristophanes?
what about them?
@@socialswine3656 The authors were eyewitnesses of Socrates.
@@socialswine3656 The authors knew Socrates.
What is Eros? Plato don't hurt me, don't hurt me...
I'm sorry I couldn't resist.
The one that cherish dost perish
Yet that flower groweth
Whom dost reap but smells it's
Perfume
It's a shame we didn't get to hear Socrates' reaction to this drunken love confession by one of Greece's most elegabile bachelors. Evidently they worked it out and Alchabieties got let down since we don't see them leaving together.
Maybe he ended up completely fulfilled romantically just being able to converse with his beloved until dawn, and that was better than any physical lovemaking in Plato's eyes.
Idk what the guy saw in Socrates to be honest. He's such a sassy brat sometimes. Big turn off personally, but hey, Eros has a strange way of doing things. 🤷🏻♀️
Great plot for a novel.
Sam Sulek?!?!?!
Yes there is the higher and lower form of love.. however whatever kind it is it is needful to produce children.. and to stay together as mother and father for the children to raise them to adults and beyond..
🧡
I would like to emphazise the fact that we may know a lot more about the physical world than the ancient Greeks. But still we know very little. For instance we do not know what so called energy is, we do not know why there is something rather than nothing, we do not know how life originated and after all we even do not know what life itself is. What we do in science is describing phenomena. That is all we do. And describing is not explaining in the proper sense
“Describing is not explaining” is a great way to put it, and I believe that is also the contention of Hegel: to describe something is not to know it.
Yes, indeed, amateurs analyze and professionals interpret.
I think ancients were just as Dunning-Krueger as us - only they had less evidence and fewer good tools.
Your voice is like a velvet. Is this your voice or you have a narrater?
But, what have you learned, gleaned. What are your ideaa?
aristophanes describes quantum entanglement
Was Wittgenstein the ultimate conservative of current language?
dude... we ARE ones - I noticed the derision you withheld quoting the fantastical eulogy of the 'division of Man' and want to address that latent urge - it is really, physically true that the foremost sentience creatures which grew into Mankind reproduced asexually by living in the ground as what we now call fungus, and the cleft of di-vision is first how Man learned to See for what things are instead of only by what is felt of them.... and now in these times of holographic imagery via computers and such we should return our efforts to looking inward at this 'knowing' of things by what is felt of them - of Gods as active agents imbuing us with 'feelings' like one lichen may come to 'know' Light and the touches of different things, and so 'love' Light that it wishes to 'know' it better, and mayhap even surround itself with sacrificial decay for a greater share of its rays, or build monuments for itself to always harken the beauty of such a feeling, and grow into it
does the bull need the sow because it lacks cowness? does not goodness beget goodness? I have heard some decorate with this term, but I ask that you redress your wisest notions of what being a 'good man' truly means... if wisdom is good, then surely so too is that which loves it 'goodly' and/or, perhaps more correctly, the act of loving it goodly
dude think of it like the 'Hero' aspect of Nature - the naturally-selected, so to speak, who not by mere virtue of selection but active 'eros' (in the spiritual sense - like the love of life, the presence of self-possessed presence) applies fully to the task of Living and accomplishes it
"questionable?" (not clearly honest, honorable, or wise)
Well that was different. You don't think that Plato is totally ripping Aristophanes apart, especially for his portrayal of his beloved Socrates as a Sophist in his play 'The Clouds'? From the get go he identifies him as a bronze man, a swine, a drunk and a womaniser. A contemptible man only capable of being enraptured by the body and all that's wrong with drama/poetry. It's a hilarious takedown. You've carefully read the Republic sure?
Skeptical or lazy?
Aristophanes shitbombs the whole discussion imo
I feel like human sexuality tends to be selfish and lacks actual “love” which is reproducing
Really enjoyable explications and you have a great radio voice. However, none of it relates to the most pressing philosophical issue of the day: the epistemic collapse from within of Western culture from the onslaught of post modern/critical theory. It’s the modern - and I would argue categorically more dangerous and threatening - equivalent of the death of God. I imagine that would be Nietzsche’s leviathan if he was alive today. I’d love to hear what you have to say…
Who do you think started the postmodern critique?
Greece was not homosexual.
Growing tired of these tryhard trad accounts attacking strawmen out of their own insecurity. Go be rabble somewhere else, I don’t care about your silly culture war.
Yes indeed, empty seeds.
Greeks did not practice homosexuality, they denounced it as an abomination. You’re thinking of Romans.
No, we did. But in things like that one must always have to consider that it's a different society from today, a completely different universe and we didn't mean homosexuality in the same way we do today. For example, in today's world we tend to associate homosexuality with something not so manly, with someone who behaves like a woman, who is leftist etc.. On the other hand, for us Greeks in the past, homosexuality had the meaning of heroism and war and bravery, and adoration of Power of Beauty of Power that we Greeks see beauty and the beautiful sex in men and NOT in woman as in today society, (has to do with the harmony of the mens body and the strength of it in the meaning also of a spiritual virtue, a virtue of life, had also to do with a kind of civilizational racism of not going with other races that are not greek, a sense of supremacist community and nation and of the same genus and ancestry, and was not so modern "leftist" in all its characteristics. The same on the opposite with the homosexuality of woman, the lesbianism. It is also often associated with knowledge and spiritual initiation and spirit of freedom and a "revolutionary" spirit (as war has to do with the spirit of freedom in ancient greece very much, today is the same in our national phsyche of ppl). So, it's a different universe
There are, of course, tendencies and people who condemn homosexuality in ancient Greece, but it does not mean that this is what prevails. Homosexuality was very widespread in ancient Greece and they do not consider it as an "ubnormality" It is not a social taboo
In general there are far more "progressivsts" in that subject from today's western societies. But as I said they mean homosexuality inside a whole different civilizational paradigm that of course has some common characteristics with today society (and in large portion of it because of the influence of Greece in the creation of the western world) but on the same time they are very different.
These characteristics also exist in today's Greek society, but in a latent way. Let's say, from ancient times until today, the Greek psyche has a hidden intense misogyny. Of course, due to the diversity of the Greek spirit and culture, its "dialectical" and contradictory character, at the same time there is also an admiration for the female sex. But in general there is this hidden "misogyny" but not in the sense of a "patriarchy". This phenomenon is based on another. The Greeks considered and still consider in a not so conscious way as I said, that the male gender has a "superiority". And this love-hate relationship is based on the fact that we considered the male sex to be the beautiful one and not the female. We thought that the female is ugly. We also thought and still think, that in the female gender there is something to do with the spirit, that the woman represents a cunning and a deception that our ancient ancestors called Metis. This Metis scared the Greeks a lot and created a fear of awe in a spot that was sometimes sacred and sometimes associated with something unholy
This Metis has to do (see for example in Parmenides) with how Greeks see "Nature" - Physis. Physis is the Αλήθεια - alitheia ("truth" ). Alitheia ("truth") in ancient greek and modern Greek also (we use exactly the same word), means that that does not fall in oblivion. That wich does not fall in oblivion for ancient Greeks is Physis, the "light of existence", but Physis is also deseptive as a woman. So "truth" - alitheia is not associated only with Cosmic Harmony and Order and Logos ("logic"- its a poor or wrong translation but anyway) but also with "deception" with the illusiotative, the misleading, the "wrong", the not "rational" or "right" "scientifically". So, this is the deeper reason or one of them that Greeks felt a kind of hidden "terror" for the female, because he has some characteristics as "Nature" - Physis that they adored as the "Supreme Principle" of all things.
That's the reason by the way, (we are "off the topic" now - well maybe not so - but it is interesting to mention it) why in Christianity, is the only monotheism that God is incarnated, i.e takes the flesh and bones, the nature of a human. It's because of the paganistic umanistic - anthropocentric "alchemical" elements of Hellenic culture, that passed throught the Hellenistic era in the regions where was Greek cities in today Palestine and today Israel, and after and created this "new" religion that most of its characteristics are greek paganistic and not Hebrew even if it's a kind of "monotheism" too. But this is another big discussion, that can not be done now here.
Homosexual relationships were not very common or accepted in ancient greece, this is a common historical misconception. Homosexuality was illegal and commonly derided, although it of course existed there as it does anywhere.
Yea, hearing that remark here at some point caught me off guard, since several notable Greeks including Plato and Aristotle are on record calling it out as unnatural
Plato's characters in the Symposium note that Athens belongs to the group of cities where it is legal. Xenophon also says that in most cities it is legal. Herodotus says that the Persians learned it from the Greeks. Plutarch and Aeschines say that the lawgiver Solon gave it a special privilege in Greek law by forbidding it to slaves, and that he wrote homosexual poetry.
I do also remember that plato later goes on to denounce homo stuff tho. I dont remmeber where tho. Anyway Im not saying it didnt exist, just that its more complicated than "the greeks/romans wuz gay". There were times when it was explicitly illegal and times when it was legal in both rome and greece. Similiar to our own time. And there were times when it was legal but generally a social taboo. There were times when it was less tabboo for the upperclass for complex social reasons I dont wanna get it to, but still derided and seen as degenerate by other more "old fashioned" folks. There were physicians who at different times came up with different theories of why men are homosexual, similiar to our own time. I remember physician one arguing it was due to being sexually messed with as children. I wish I remembered the name of these two physicians who writings on it survived but i would have to look it up, sorry for no sources.@@CanadianPolybius
@@user-fd8fe9hk9q Actually if anything it was the old fashioned folks (Aristophanes, Theognis, etc.) who tended to approve of it and it was radical social critics like Plato who tended to disapprove of it. There were complex social rules governing it in places like Athens, but it was not taboo in itself. That would be like saying heterosexuality is taboo because Victorians had lots of social prohibitions around it. The medical texts you're talking about are specifically referring to males who enjoy being penetrated, not males who are attracted to other males.
@@CanadianPolybius I'll have to look into it again to give a really good response. From what I remember there was two physicians whose writing survive and I remember them clearly being against, but maybe misremembering. My impression is that they didn't even have the idea of "being gay" in the way that we have and definitely didn't see it as the same as being straight "love is love" type thing, although one of the physicians I mentioned did speculate that the men are born that way. And he wasn't saying that in a good way. I will also look up Aristophanes and Theognis too while I'm at it. I also read Greeks at one point used the name of a nearby city as an insult specifically because that nearby city was too homo for them, or at least homo in a way they didn't approve of. These things only remain in fragments so it's hard to tell.
A sexual relation between men is perverse.. it doesn't add anything to the equation.. we should know that sexuality does not even foster a closeness or love.. it is great for friendship.. but sex needs to be channeled between man and woman to establish and secure a family and children.
This is intellectually sloppy.
So is this comment
You really have a gift for deflating great works of literature.Thats why I stopped listening.