Apology (Plato)
The Apology is Plato's version of the speech given by Socrates as he defends himself against the charges of being a man "who corrupted the young, did not believe in the gods, and created new deities." Such a speech by the defendant was technically known as an apology. It means to "give an account of" rather than to apologise in a modern sense of the word.
Socrates' accusers Three men brought the charges against Socrates. They were: Anytus, a prominent democrat and almost certainly the leader of the accusers, whom Socrates describes as speaking on behalf of politicians and professional men. Meletus, the chief spokesperson of the accusers and the target of much of Socrates' attack, a fiery man with a beaked nose, and a representative of the poets. Lycon, about whom little is known; he was according to Socrates a representative of the orators. The groups mentioned here can be identified with those whom Socrates questioned, and upset, in the early stages of his quest to find people who possessed knowledge.
The charges against Socrates Socrates summarises the formal charges against him as follows: "Socrates is guilty of corrupting the minds of the young, and of believing in supernatural things of his own invention instead of the gods recognised by the State." However, there was another set of 'charges' against him which Socrates recognised as being more important, and dangerous, because they stemmed from years of gossip and prejudice against him and hence were unanswerable. These so called 'informal charges' Socrates puts into a legalistic form — an 'affidavit', as he calls it: "Socrates is committing an injustice, in that he enquires into things below the earth and in the sky, and makes the weaker argument the stronger, and teaches others to follow his example." Those in fact were the 'charges' levelled in particular against the sophists, teachers who charged for their services, with whom in the popular mind Socrates was wrongly identified.
Part One
Socrates' formal apology
The earliest charges - Socrates begins by insisting that his skill as an orator lies solely in his ability to tell the truth. He goes on to the attack straightaway, claiming that his accusers are liars.
- He deals first with the earliest charges, that which he summarises in the affidavit. These are difficult as there are no real accusers. He denies that he has engaged in the physical speculation of the sort carried out by Anaxagoras, who claimed that the sun was a stone, and the moon a lump of earth — neither heavenly body being divine. He is not the Socrates who features in Aristophanes' Clouds, spouting a great deal of nonsense. Nor has he ever charged for his services; he is not a professional teacher like the sophists. It was Socrates' misfortune to be identified with them; the popular mind was unwilling to make any distinction between the two.
- Socrates angers the court by claiming that his wisdom is limited to a realisation that he in fact knows little. This realisation stemmed from the visition of his friend Chaerephon to the Delphic Oracle seeking to find out if there was anyone wiser than Socrates. The oracle assured Chaerephon that there was nobody wiser. Socrates was puzzled. The god Apollo could not be lying. Socrates embarked on a pilgrimage to determine the 'hidden meaning' behind the oracle's words.
- In the beginning, this pilgrimage involved questioning three main groups: politicians, poets and craftsmen. He found that the politicians knew little, that poets had a source of inspiration beyond themselves because others could explain their poems better than the author, and that while craftsmen possessed knowledge of their particular skill, they felt it gave them the right to claim knowledge in every other area as well.
- Showing up people's lack of knowledge hardly made Socrates popular. This was compounded by the general view that Socrates was playing stupid by pretending not to know the answers when in fact he did. Socrates interpreted his pilgrimage as showing that true wisdom belongs to the gods — that of humans has no or little value.
- This personal obedience to Apollo has had further effects. It dominated his public and personal life, and reduced him to a state of poverty. It resulted in the young men of his circle questioning others.
The formal charges
'Socrates is guilty of corrupting the minds of the young'
Socrates has a three pronged attack against this charge.He asks Meletus whether the youth are corrupted or made better by various classes of Athenian society. Meletus states that every faction improves the youth with the solitary exception of Socrates, which is an obvious absurdity. Socrates then suggests that since Meletus does not have enough interest in the young to find out how the might be improved, he should not have brought such a charge against Socrates.He argues that if he set out to corrupt the young men around him, he would be one of the first to suffer harm at their hands. What sane person would do this? He would be setting up a bad community instead of the good one Meletus admits everyone would prefer.If he did this intentionally, Socrates argues, he could be rightfully accused of acting in an ignorant way. This leaves one possibility, if someone has been corrupted. This is that Socrates acted unintentionally; in which case he should be taken aside by the judges and shown the error of his ways.
=Reasons behind this charge= - Socrates' anti-democratic views, his criticisms of 'lottery debate', were widely disliked and could be seen as having a negative effect on young men with whom he came into contact. His friendship with prominent conservatives with oligarchical tendencies like Alcibiades and Critias made him very unpopular. Unlike many Athenians, especially those with strong democratic beliefs, Socrates did not leave the city during the 18-month rule of the Thirty Tyrants at the end of the Peloponnesian War. The charges can be views as basically political in nature, and what would have been seen as his tolerant attitude to the Spartan-imposed oligarchy (Critias was one of the tyrants) was the last straw for many Athenians.
- However, Socrates could not be charged with specific political offences because the assembly had charged an amnesty against such charges as a result of the bloodletting that had occurred when democracy was restored. So the accusers, led by Anytus who had played a prominent part in restoration of democracy, were forced to find a different language in which to couch the charges.
- In his search for universally valid definitions of moral truths, Socrates' close scrutiny of the widely held communal values of the average Athenian could be seen as undermining and discrediting these values.
- The young men with wealthy fathers and plenty of leisure who formed Socrates' circle, would in their turn question others. Many would see this as a bad influence that Socrates had on the young.
- In Aristophanes' play Clouds one of the characters is corrupted by Socrates' teaching. Socrates singles out this play as having a strong influence on the way many people viewed him.
- This accusation was levelled against many sophists, because of their emphasis on teaching relative, not absolute, values that the high fees that some of them charged. Many could not make a distinction between Socrates and the sophists.
'Socrates is guilty of believing in supernatural things of his own invention, instead of the gods recognised by the State' - Socrates begins his defence by backing Meletus into a corner. Meletus argues that Socrates is actually an atheist: he believes in no gods at all. In doing so Meletus, as Socrates points out, contradicts the wording of the charge.
- This allows Socrates greater room to attack Meletus. All he has to do is prove he believes in one divine being at least, and the revised charge will be disproved. He does this through analogy. Does anyone, he asks, believe in human activities without believing in humans? In equine matters without believing in horses? In musical activites but not in musicians? Similarly, no one believes in divine activities without believing in divine beings. Obviously, if Socrates is being accused of believing and teaching supernatural things, he must believe in supernatural beings, and not be an atheist. Also, while he does not mention it, Socrates is referring to his daimon, a negative or checking impulse which bars him from certain courses of action. This, treated with suspicion, is linked by Socrates to Apollo.
=Reasons behind this charge= - In his youth Socrates had studied in the school of Anaxagoras which was concerned with the study of the world rather than with moral values. Anaxagoras himself had faced charges of impiety when he declared that the sun and moon were not gods, but fled Athens before he could come to court. No doubt people remembers Socrates' youthful connections with Anaxagoras' teachings.
- Socrates' claims to a daimon were treated with suspicion by many Athenians. Such a claim was not part of their religious attitudes.
- At the beginning of the Peloponnesian War, the Delphic Oracle declared that the Spartans would win the war against Athens. The proviso was that the Spartans must use careful strategies; that advice no doubt would have been given to the Athenians had they asked first! Many Athenians, however, would have been mistrustful of this 'enemy' oracle.
- In Aristophanes' Clouds, Socrates is depicted as being an atheist. In 5th century Athens, atheists were regarded with suspicion as destroyers of traditional moral standards.
- Shortly before the start of the war, one of its leaders, Alcibiades, was recalled to Athens on a charge of desecrating the religious statues known as herms common in Athens. As a friend of his, Socrates would have come under suspicion.
- Socrates had expressed reservations about some of the gorier stories of the gods.
Other considerations - Socrates repeats his claim that it will not be the formal charges which will destroy him, but rather the gossip and slander. He is not afraid of death, because he is more concerned about whether he is acting rightly or wrongly. Further, Socrates argues, those who fear death are showing their ignorance: death may be a great blessing, but many people fear it as an evil when they cannot possibly know it to be such. Again Socrates points out that his wisdom lies in the fact that he is aware that he does not know.
- Socrates states clearly that a lawful superior, whether human or divine, should be obeyed. If there is a clash between the two, however, divine authority should take precedence. "Gentlemen, I am your grateful and devoted servant, but I owe a greater obedience to God that to you; and as long as I draw breath and have my faculties I shall never stop practising philosophy." Since Socrates has interpreted the Delphic Oracle as singling him out to spur his fellow Athenians to a greater awareness of moral goodness and truth, he will not stop questioning and arguing should the people forbid him to do so, even if they were to withdraw the charges. Nor will he stop questioning his fellow citizens. "Are you now ashamed that you give your attention to acquiring as much money as possible, and similarly with reputation and honour, and give no attention or thought to truth and understanding and the perfection of your soul?"
- In an highly inflammatory section of the Apology, Socrates claims that no greater good has happened to Athens that his concern for his fellow citizens, that wealth is a consequence of goodness (and not the other way round), that God does not permit a better man to be harmed by a worse, and that, in the strongest statement he gives of his task, he is a stinging fly and the state a lazy horse "and all day long I never cease to settle here, there and everywhere, rousing, persuading and reproving every one of you."
- As further evidence of his task, Socrates reminds the court of his daimon which he sees as a supernatural experience. He recognises this as partly behind the charge of believing in invented beings. Again Socrates makes no concession to his situation. He would have been well aware that many if not most in the courtroom would have viewed this with utmost suspicion.
- Socrates claims to never have been a teacher, in the sense of imparting knowledge to others. He cannot therefore be held responsible if any citizen turns bad. If he has corrupted anyone, why have they not come forward to be witnesses? Or if they do not realise that they have been corrupted, why have their relatives not stepped forward on their behalf? Many relatives of the young men associated with him, Socrates points out, are presently in the courtroom to support him.
- Socrates concludes this part of the Apology by reminding the jurors that he will not resort to the usual emotive tricks and arguments. He will not break down in tears, nor will he produce his three sons in the hope of swaying the jurors. He does not fear death; nor will he act in a way contrary to his religious duty. He will rely solely on sound argument and the truth to present his case.
The verdict
Socrates is found guilty: 280 jurymen voted against him; 221 voted for him.
Part Two
The punishment speech In this section of the Apology, Socrates antagonises the court even further. He points out that the vote was comparatively close: had only 30 more voted for him, he would have been found innocent. He engages in some dark humour by suggesting that Meletus be fined for not meeting the statutory one-fifth of the votes (in order to avoid frivolous cases coming to court, plaintiffs were fined heavily if the jurors' votes did not reach this number in a case where the defendant won). Since there were 501 jurymen, the prosecution had to gain at least 100 of the jurors' votes. Taken by itself however Meletus' vote (as representing one-third of the prosecution case) numbered only 93 or 94. Regardless of the number of plaintiffs, it was their case that had to reach the requisite one-fifth. Not only that — the prosecutors had won! Socrates' alternative punishment did not make him any more popular. He first proposes, as a benefactor to Athens, free meals in the Prytaneum, one of the important buildings which housed members of the Council. This was an honour reserved for athletes and other prominent citizens.Socrates considers imprisonment and banishment before settling on a fine of 100 drachmae, presumably on the basis that money meant nothing to him. This was a small sum when weighed against the punishment proposed by the proescutors and gave the jury little choice but to vote for the death penalty. Socrates' supporters immediately increased the amount to 3000 drachmae, but in the eyes of the jury was not an alternative.
Part Three
The speech after the death sentence Socrates' punishment speech angered the jurors. 360 voted for the death penalty; only 141 voted for a fine of 3000 drachmae. Now Socrates has to respond to the verdict. He first addresses those who voted for death. He claims that it is not a lack of arguments that has resulted in his condemnation, but rather his unwillingness to stoop to the usual emotive appeals expected of any defendant facing death. Again he insists that the prospect of death does not absolve one from following the path of goodness and truth. Socrates prophesises that younger and harsher critics will follow him and submit them to an even more telling examination of their lives. To those who voted for his acquittal, Socrates gives them encouragement: He says that his daimon did not stop him from conducting his defence in the way that he did as a sign that it was the right thing to do. As a consequence, death must be a blessing. Either it is an annihilation or a migration to another place to meet souls of famous people such as as Hesiod and Homer and heroes like Odysseus. With these, Socrates can continue his task of questioning. Socrates concludes his Apology with the claim that he bears no grudge against those who accused and condemned him, and in a remarkable show of trust asks them to look after his three sons as they grow up, ensuring that they put goodness before selfish interests.
See also Trial of Socrates Apology of Socrates by Xenophon Other texts of Plato's first Tetralogy:
External links Project Gutenberg has English translations of Plato's Apology of Socrates:* Translated by by Benjamin Jowett* Bundled with Plato's Crito and Phaedo, translated by Henry Cary, introduced by Edward Brooks jr.
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