Very brief thoughts:
(a) It's nice to begin with such familiar material.
(b) The substance of the court case--that is, the story of what Euthyphro's father did--is even more complicated than I recalled.
(c) I'd remembered that Socrates says that the subjects we get hostile when we disagree about are justice, beauty, and the good; I hadn't remembered that he says that this is (in part?) because in other cases we can simply resort to measurement (7c). I wonder if anything interesting can be said comparing this to the discussion of the metretic art at Protagoras 356a-357c?
Happy reading.
3b: One statement of just what Socrates was charged with: "... [Meletus] says that I am a maker of gods, and on the ground that I create new gods while not believing in the old gods, he has indicted me for their sake, as he puts it."
ReplyDelete3b: A mention of Socrates' divine sign. Any idea just how many times the sign is mentioned?
3d: Socrates talks about the impression that people have, that he talks to all and sundry, and does not even take a fee. A similar charge is made by Antiphon the sophist, in Xenophon, I think--there, Socrates denies the charge, and argues that it is sophists who speak too freely, as they have to talk to whoever pays them, whereas Socrates can pick and choose.
6a: Euthyphro argues that Zeus, too, punished his father for wrongdoing. Socrates then suggests that these sorts of claims about the gods he finds hard to accept. -- A first hint of S's view that there is a standard of good independent of the actions and dictates of the god?
6b: Socrates denies that he has knowledge of divine affairs, and says that E must have full knowledge. (Who is the god of friendship to whom S refers?)
6d: S seeks "the form itself that makes all pious actions pious" (cf. 5d).
7a: First def.: "what is dear to the gods is pious".
These are good notes. Unfortunately I can't help too much with what you ask. I think it's plausible that Socrates' comment at 6a at least anticipates his later view about the god-independence of the good. No idea how many times the divine sign is mentioned.
ReplyDeleteOne small, additional set of questions (from the contributor who nearly fell off the wagon on the first day):
ReplyDeleteSocrates says that "everything that is to be *impious* presents us with one form or appearance insofar as it is impious," and the goes on to ask Euthyphro, "What is the pious *and what the impious*, do you say?" (5d).
(1) How many other dialogues start out with the challenge to define both a virtue *and its opposite*?
(2) What would justify Socrates in lumping together piety and impiety as equally the sorts of things that have a single form or appearance? Even if Euthyphro accepts that there is a single definition for piety, why should he accept that impiety also has a single definition? (Couldn't there be many ways of going wrong?)
(3) I can get my head around the sense in which "what is dear to the gods" (7a) picks out something like a "single form" of piety. But it's somewhat less obvious to me that a negative property, like "what is not [dear to the gods]," picks out a "single form" for impiety - especially if this "form" is supposed to *make* impious actions impious. ...?
(4) I wonder how Euthyphro's challenge to provide *two* definitions at once (one of piety, one of impiety) might affect the rest of the dialogue (?)
Also: thanks to both of you for your comments so far! This is going to be fun ...
ReplyDeleteJust checking in to say that I will be reading along with y'all, and I caught myself up. I don't have any comments or questions on these pages. I'm looking forward to this.
ReplyDelete"3b: A mention of Socrates' divine sign. Any idea just how many times the sign is mentioned?"
ReplyDeleteHere it is again at _Apology_ 31c-d.