Republic X

In the first part of Republic 10, Socrates takes up a sustained attack on poetic “imitators,” using Homer as his case example.  He challenges the assumption many people have about writers and poets: that because “a good poet produces fine poetry, he must have knowledge of the things he writes about” (598e).  Socrates first asks a series of questions.  (1) If someone has both the ability to make a thing itself and an image of a thing, would he really bother about making images and “put this at the forefront of his life as the best thing to do?” (599b). The obvious answer here seems to be no.  He would make real things, not images and stories.  Also, (2) wouldn’t someone with such skill be more serious about actual life deeds rather than writing about such deeds, so that he could be “the subject of a eulogy [rather] than the author of one?” (599b) (3) When Homer was alive, Socrates asks whether or not he had a following of people?  Were there people who were compelled to live with him and learn from him? Apparently there were no such reports of Homer, unlike other famous philosophical figures such as Pythagoras. 

Socrates point seems to be that if one truly has the skill of virtue, great deeds, or the good life, one would not busy themselves with simply writing about it, but doing it.  He does allow for an exception: that of a teacher.  A teacher may busy herself with communicating her knowledge to students.  But the proof that one’s teaching is worthwhile can and should be seen in the lives and the communities of those who are following.  If one is a knowledgeable teacher, and not just an imitator, then there should be followers, and these should be affected in a tangible way by one’s teaching.

Socrates attack continues; this time on a slightly different front.  In his first examples and questions, his panegyric was directed at the life of a person with skill – the craftsman – as being informed by knowledge, rather than the imitator.  But now Socrates shows that even the craftsman is not the one who has true knowledge.  The person with true knowledge is the one who uses what the craftsman builds.  The cobbler and the flute-maker take instructions from those who actually ride and play – the horseman and the flute-player (601d-e).  These are the people with true knowledge who tell others what makes a thing good and bad (e.g. good and bad bridals, good and bad flutes).

While I think Socrates criticisms of imitative poetry in Republic X is certainly aimed at the discipline of poetry itself, I think it may be doing more than that.  The obvious point is that we should recognize our love and enjoyment of poetry can be detrimental to living a healthy life of moderation (see 605b).  But I think he also shows us that philosopher can and should turn this same attack on herself, asking the same questions.  “Am I, as a philosopher, only busying myself with words?  What sorts of life deeds am I producing as the product of my philosophy?  How have the lives of those I’ve taught been impacted?”  In Socrates view, the heart of philosophy is about finding the good life for oneself and developing it in others.  This was a Socratic characteristic that Kierkegaard would later pick up on and admire.  Kierkegaard saw acutely the necessity for a connection between one’s lived experience and one’s ideas.  He thought it ludicrous to build up a philosophical “world-system” that one could not oneself inhabit.  I think both Socrates and Kierkegaard are right about this, and it is a challenge to all of us as future teacher and scholars.