Plato Foretells Our Fears

Plato's philosophy addresses many issues relevant to religion, often criticizing the human flaws attributed to the gods in Greek mythology and favoring reasoning over authority. His ideas significantly influenced early Christian thought, as many early Church Fathers viewed him as a philosophical precursor to Christianity, integrating his concepts into their theological frameworks. Plato's work laid crucial groundwork for the development of Christian theology.

In our fragmented, unstable, and bewildering century, the challenges we face are uniquely modern problems. In Church, people gather afterwards in the hall and lament over their health family issues, and other concerns. Yet, over two thousand years ago, Plato wrestled with questions of truth, justice, power, and the fragility of democracy that remain startlingly relevant today. His great dialogue is also a warning about the vulnerabilities of human societies and as they struggle with aging, emotion, reality, perception, and peace of mind, with faith, morality, ethics and related conflicts. An edited conversation with Plato.

“Now, when we gather, most of us moan, as we long for the lost pleasures of youth and reminisce about love-making, drinking parties and feasts, and whatever goes along with this sort of thing, and we get distressed as though we had been deprived of something important, and that then we lived well but now we are not even alive. Some bewail the contemptuous treatment of old age by their own kin-folk, and so they go on about the amount of trouble old age causes them. But I think, Socrates, that these people are blaming the wrong cause.”

There are groups who meet fairly often, all about the same age, and when they meet, most of them start complaining;

They miss the things they used to enjoy when they were young, and they recall their exploits, and everything connected with those pleasures.

Some complain about the lack of respect shown by their families towards old age, and under this heading they recite a litany of grievances against old age.

• They get upset, as if they’d suffered some great loss.

• Over the weather, politics, health, a golf shot.

• Whereas now, they’re not alive at all. They’re putting the blame in the wrong place.

• Old age is altogether a time of great peace and freedom from that sort of things;

• ‘When our appetites fade, and loosen their grip on us.

• Old age is a final release from a bunch of insane masters.

There is only one thing responsible, and that is not old age, but character.[1] For those who are civilized and contented, then even old age is only a slight burden. Otherwise for those who are not like this- both old age and youth prove hard to cope with. The same applies to those who are not rich, and who find old age hard to bear. In poverty, even the right temperament will not find old age altogether easy, whereas the wrong temperament, even with the aid of wealth, will never be at peace with itself.

“Is the Just man a more useful and better partner than a Builder?”

•  If you have to buy or sell a horse jointly, for a sum of money. In that case, I imagine, someone who knows about horses is more use, isn’t he?

• And for buying or selling a ship, you’d want a shipbuilder or ship’s captain?

In what situation, then, requiring the joint use of silver or gold, is the just man more useful than anyone else? When there’s a need to deposit money, and have it kept safe? In other words, when there’s no need to put it to any use. You just want it to stay where it is? So, it’s when money is useless that justice is useful for dealing with it? And a pruning-knife? When you want to keep it safe, then justice is useful, both in public life and in private life. But when you want to use it, then the art of viticulture is what you want?

In all other examples, justice is useless when it comes to using any of them, and useful only when they are useless?

In that case, my friend, justice might not seem to be of any great importance, if its only use is when things are useless.

In a fight — a boxing match, possibly, or a fight of some other sort - isn’t the person who is cleverest at delivering a blow also the cleverest at guarding against one?’ ‘He certainly is. And with disease? Is the person who is clever at guarding against it also the cleverest at implanting it secretly?’

‘Yes, I think so.’

‘And in warfare, the man who is good at guarding a military camp is also good at deception. He can steal the enemies’ plans, or defeat their undertakings by stealth.’

“Certainly.”

So, whenever someone is clever at guarding something, he will also be clever at stealing it.

“It looks like it.”

So, if the just man is clever at looking after money, he is also clever at stealing it.

“Well, that’s what the argument suggests.”

Then the just man, it seems, has turned out to be a kind of thief.

Thinking of Homer, He praises Autolycus, Odysseus’ grandfather on his mother’s side, and says that In swearing oaths and thieving he surpassed All men. Justice, according to Homer and Simonides, is apparently a kind of art of stealing - but with a view to helping one’s friends and harming one’s enemies.

justice is treating your friends well and your enemies badly.’

The Dilemma Arises: Logic, Good, Bad.

By friends do we mean the people each individual believes to be good?

• Or those who really are good, even if he doesn’t realize it? And the same with enemies?

• Do they often think people are good when they are not, and vice versa?’

• So for these people, are the good their enemies, and the bad their friends?’

• Is it nevertheless just for these people, when this happens, to treat well those who are no good, and to treat the good badly?’

• And the good are just. They’re not the kind of people who do wrong.’

If, according to this argument, it is just to harm those who do no wrong, Then, it must be right to treat the unjust badly, and the just well! when there is great importance, but only if its only use is when things are useless.

As an endnote, our commitment to Faith, well-being, family, friends, and society depend upon our individual character, cognitive premise, and not on our emotions in place of reasoning.

[1] (Character, referring to the complex struggle between emotion, self-concept, expectations, and relationship to mental, cognitive, and ethical traits that define an individual, including honesty, integrity, and moral virtues.)