[Sidenote: _Euthyphro._]
[Sidenote: INTRODUCTION.]
In the Meno, Anytus had parted from Socrates with the significant
words: ‘That in any city, and particularly in the city of Athens, it is
easier to do men harm than to do them good’ (94 E); and Socrates was
anticipating another opportunity of talking with him (99 E). In the
Euthyphro, Socrates is awaiting his trial for impiety. But before the
trial begins, Plato would like to put the world on their trial, and
convince them of ignorance in that very matter touching which Socrates is
accused. An incident which may perhaps really have occurred in the family
of Euthyphro, a learned Athenian diviner and soothsayer, furnishes the
occasion of the discussion.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: ANALYSIS.]
This Euthyphro and Socrates are represented as meeting in the
porch of the King Archon. (Cp. Theaet. sub fin.) Both have =Steph.= 2
legal business in hand. Socrates is defendant in a suit for impiety
which Meletus has brought against him (it is remarked by the 3
way that he is not a likely man himself to have brought a suit
against another); and Euthyphro too is plaintiff in an action for
murder, which he has brought against his own father. The latter 4
has originated in the following manner:—A poor dependant of
the family had slain one of their domestic slaves in Naxos. The
guilty person was bound and thrown into a ditch by the command
of Euthyphro’s father, who sent to the interpreters of religion
at Athens to ask what should be done with him. Before the
messenger came back the criminal had died from hunger and
exposure.
[Sidenote: _Analysis 5-9._]
This is the origin of the charge of murder which Euthyphro
brings against his father. Socrates is confident that before he
could have undertaken the responsibility of such a prosecution,
he must have been perfectly informed of the nature of piety and 5
impiety; and as he is going to be tried for impiety himself, he
thinks that he cannot do better than learn of Euthyphro (who will
be admitted by everybody, including the judges, to be an unimpeachable
authority) what piety is, and what is impiety. What
then is piety?
Euthyphro, who, in the abundance of his knowledge, is very
willing to undertake all the responsibility, replies: That piety is
doing as I do, prosecuting your father (if he is guilty) on a charge
of murder; doing as the gods do—as Zeus did to Cronos, and
Cronos to Uranus.
Socrates has a dislike to these tales of mythology, and he fancies 6
that this dislike of his may be the reason why he is charged with
impiety. ‘Are they really true?’ ‘Yes, they are;’ and Euthyphro
will gladly tell Socrates some more of them. But Socrates
would like first of all to have a more satisfactory answer to the
question, ‘What is piety?’ ‘Doing as I do, charging a father with
murder,’ may be a single instance of piety, but can hardly be
regarded as a general definition.
Euthyphro replies, that ‘Piety is what is dear to the gods, 7
and impiety is what is not dear to them.’ But may there not
be differences of opinion, as among men, so also among the
gods? Especially, about good and evil, which have no fixed
rule; and these are precisely the sort of differences which
give rise to quarrels. And therefore what may be dear to one 8
god may not be dear to another, and the same action may
be both pious and impious; e. g. your chastisement of your
father, Euthyphro, may be dear or pleasing to Zeus (who inflicted
a similar chastisement on his own father), but not
equally pleasing to Cronos or Uranus (who suffered at the
hands of their sons).
Euthyphro answers that there is no difference of opinion, either
among gods or men, as to the propriety of punishing a murderer.
Yes, rejoins Socrates, when they know him to be a murderer; but
you are assuming the point at issue. If all the circumstances of
the case are considered, are you able to show that your father 9
was guilty of murder, or that all the gods are agreed in approving
of our prosecution of him? And must you not allow that what
is hated by one god may be liked by another? Waiving this last,
however, Socrates proposes to amend the definition, and say that
‘what all the gods love is pious, and what they all hate is impious.’
To this Euthyphro agrees.
[Sidenote: _Analysis 9-15._]
Socrates proceeds to analyze the new form of the definition. 10
He shows that in other cases the act precedes the state; e. g.
the act of being carried, loved, &c. precedes the state of being
carried, loved, &c., and therefore that which is dear to the gods is
dear to the gods because it is first loved of them, not loved of
them because it is dear to them. But the pious or holy is loved
by the gods because it is pious or holy, which is equivalent to
saying, that it is loved by them because it is dear to them. Here
then appears to be a contradiction,—Euthyphro has been giving an 11
attribute or accident of piety only, and not the essence. Euthyphro
acknowledges himself that his explanations seem to walk away
or go round in a circle, like the moving figures of Daedalus,
the ancestor of Socrates, who has communicated his art to his
descendants.
Socrates, who is desirous of stimulating the indolent intelligence 12
of Euthyphro, raises the question in another manner: ‘Is all the
pious just?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Is all the just pious?’ ‘No.’ ‘Then what
part of justice is piety?’ Euthyphro replies that piety is that
part of justice which ‘attends’ to the gods, as there is another
part of justice which ‘attends’ to men. But what is the meaning 13
of ‘attending’ to the gods? The word ‘attending,’ when applied
to dogs, horses, and men, implies that in some way they are made
better. But how do pious or holy acts make the gods any better?
Euthyphro explains that he means by pious acts, acts of service
or ministration. Yes; but the ministrations of the husbandman,
the physician, and the builder have an end. To what end do
we serve the gods, and what do we help them to accomplish? 14
Euthyphro replies, that all these difficult questions cannot be
resolved in a short time; and he would rather say simply that
piety is knowing how to please the gods in word and deed, by
prayers and sacrifices. In other words, says Socrates, piety is ‘a
science of asking and giving’—asking what we want and giving 15
what they want; in short, a mode of doing business between gods
and men. But although they are the givers of all good, how can
we give them any good in return? ‘Nay, but we give them
honour.’ Then we give them not what is beneficial, but what is
pleasing or dear to them; and this is the point which has been
already disproved.
[Sidenote: _Religion of the letter and of the spirit._]
Socrates, although weary of the subterfuges and evasions of
Euthyphro, remains unshaken in his conviction that he must know
the nature of piety, or he would never have prosecuted his old
father. He is still hoping that he will condescend to instruct him.
But Euthyphro is in a hurry and cannot stay. And Socrates’ last 16
hope of knowing the nature of piety before he is prosecuted for
impiety has disappeared. As in the Euthydemus the irony is
carried on to the end.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: INTRODUCTION.]
The Euthyphro is manifestly designed to contrast the real nature of piety
and impiety with the popular conceptions of them. But when the popular
conceptions of them have been overthrown, Socrates does not offer any
definition of his own: as in the Laches and Lysis, he prepares the way
for an answer to the question which he has raised; but true to his own
character, refuses to answer himself.
Euthyphro is a religionist, and is elsewhere spoken of, if he be the
same person, as the author of a philosophy of names, by whose ‘prancing
steeds’ Socrates in the Cratylus is carried away (p. 396). He has the
conceit and self-confidence of a Sophist; no doubt that he is right in
prosecuting his father has ever entered into his mind. Like a Sophist
too, he is incapable either of framing a general definition or of
following the course of an argument. His wrong-headedness, one-sidedness,
narrowness, positiveness, are characteristic of his priestly office. His
failure to apprehend an argument may be compared to a similar defect
which is observable in the rhapsode Ion. But he is not a bad man, and he
is friendly to Socrates, whose familiar sign he recognizes with interest.
Though unable to follow him he is very willing to be led by him, and
eagerly catches at any suggestion which saves him from the trouble of
thinking. Moreover he is the enemy of Meletus, who, as he says, is
availing himself of the popular dislike to innovations in religion in
order to injure Socrates; at the same time he is amusingly confident
that he has weapons in his own armoury which would be more than a match
for him. He is quite sincere in his prosecution of his father, who has
accidentally been guilty of homicide, and is not wholly free from blame.
To purge away the crime appears to him in the light of a duty, whoever
may be the criminal.
[Sidenote: _The three definitions of piety._]
Thus begins the contrast between the religion of the letter, or of the
narrow and unenlightened conscience, and the higher notion of religion
which Socrates vainly endeavours to elicit from him. ‘Piety is doing as
I do’ is the idea of religion which first occurs to him, and to many
others who do not say what they think with equal frankness. For men are
not easily persuaded that any other religion is better than their own;
or that other nations, e. g. the Greeks in the time of Socrates, were
equally serious in their religious beliefs and difficulties. The chief
difference between us and them is, that they were slowly learning what
we are in process of forgetting. Greek mythology hardly admitted of the
distinction between accidental homicide and murder: that the pollution
of blood was the same in both cases is also the feeling of the Athenian
diviner. He had not as yet learned the lesson, which philosophy was
teaching, that Homer and Hesiod, if not banished from the state, or
whipped out of the assembly, as Heracleitus more rudely proposed, at any
rate were not to be appealed to as authorities in religion; and he is
ready to defend his conduct by the examples of the gods. These are the
very tales which Socrates cannot abide; and his dislike of them, as he
suspects, has branded him with the reputation of impiety. Here is one
answer to the question, ‘Why Socrates was put to death,’ suggested by the
way. Another is conveyed in the words, ‘The Athenians do not care about
any man being thought wise until he begins to make other men wise; and
then for some reason or other they are angry:’ which may be said to be
the rule of popular toleration in most other countries, and not at Athens
only. In the course of the argument (7 A, B) Socrates remarks that the
controversial nature of morals and religion arises out of the difficulty
of verifying them. There is no measure or standard to which they can be
referred.
The next definition, ‘Piety is that which is loved of the gods,’ is
shipwrecked on a refined distinction between the state and the act,
corresponding respectively to the adjective (φίλον) and the participle
(φιλούμενον), or rather perhaps to the participle and the verb
(φιλούμενον and φιλεῖται). The act is prior to the state (as in Aristotle
the ἐνέργεια precedes the δύναμις); and the state of being loved is
preceded by the act of being loved. But piety or holiness is preceded
by the act of being pious, not by the act of being loved; and therefore
piety and the state of being loved are different. Through such subtleties
of dialectic Socrates is working his way into a deeper region of thought
and feeling. He means to say that the words ‘loved of the gods’ express
an attribute only, and not the essence of piety.
[Sidenote: _Genuineness of the Dialogue._]
Then follows the third and last definition, ‘Piety is a part of
justice.’ Thus far Socrates has proceeded in placing religion on a
moral foundation. He is seeking to realize the harmony of religion and
morality, which the great poets Æschylus, Sophocles, and Pindar had
unconsciously anticipated, and which is the universal want of all men.
To this the soothsayer adds the ceremonial element, ‘attending upon the
gods.’ When further interrogated by Socrates as to the nature of this
‘attention to the gods,’ he replies, that piety is an affair of business,
a science of giving and asking, and the like. Socrates points out the
anthropomorphism of these notions. (Cp. Symp. 202 E; Rep. ii. 365 E;
Statesman 290 C, D.) But when we expect him to go on and show that the
true service of the gods is the service of the spirit and the cooperation
with them in all things true and good, he stops short; this was a lesson
which the soothsayer could not have been made to understand, and which
every one must learn for himself.
There seem to be altogether three aims or interests in this little
Dialogue: (1) the dialectical development of the idea of piety; (2) the
antithesis of true and false religion, which is carried to a certain
extent only; (3) the defence of Socrates.
[Sidenote: _Date of the Dialogue._]
The subtle connection with the Apology and the Crito; the holding back of
the conclusion, as in the Charmides, Lysis, Laches, Protagoras, and other
Dialogues; and deep insight into the religious world; the dramatic power
and play of the two characters; the inimitable irony, are reasons for
believing that the Euthyphro is a genuine Platonic writing. The spirit
in which the popular representations of mythology are denounced recalls
Republic II (378 ff.) The virtue of piety has been already mentioned
as one of five in the Protagoras, but is not reckoned among the four
cardinal virtues of Republic IV (428 ff.). The figure of Daedalus (15 C)
has occurred in the Meno (97 D); that of Proteus (15 D) in the Euthydemus
(288 B) and Io (541 E). The kingly science has already appeared in the
Euthydemus, and will reappear in the Republic and Statesman. But neither
from these nor any other indications of similarity or difference, and
still less from arguments respecting the suitableness of this little work
to aid Socrates at the time of his trial or the reverse, can any evidence
of the date be obtained.