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Socrates on Death
betaboy
Veteran
The other thread on death made me think.....
What did Socrates mean by: Death is not a defeat. Death is the cure.
The old fart sounded like me, that's for sure, lol.
Share your insights.
2
Comments
if I'm not mistaken he, and the ancient greeks, believed in some form of reincarnation. It could be related to that.
or it could be related to the concept that when you get over your fear of death, you begin to truly live.
From a philosophical point of view, it could mean that you don't live life to be defeated in the end. You live life knowing that everything has a purpose. Just a guess.
I'm not sure Socrates said that.
Death is the cure sounds nonsensical surely?
His last words to Crito before he died after being sentenced to death and made to drink poison were: "Crito, we owe a rooster to Asclepius. Please, don't forget to pay the debt." This has been interpreted in a number of ways, one being 'death is the cure' based on Asclepius being the god of medicine and healing, and the cure being the soul's freedom from the body. Others, such as myself, see it as Socrates being a type of martyr for justice.
Before his sentence was carried out, Socrates had the chance to escape but refused. One reason for his refusal may be tied into his argument in Gorgias that it's far worse to commit an injustice than to suffer one. Injustice, in Socrates' mind, is a disease of the soul; and taking into consideration all his dialogues regarding the immortality of the soul (e.g., Phaedo) and the judgments they receive after death (e.g., Gorgias), by committing the injustice of putting Socrates, an innocent man, to death, the Athenian citizens in charge of the state are ultimately harming themselves, not Socrates; his death being one last philosophical lesson, adhering to both Athenian law and the higher ideal of Justice.
Moreover, Socrates argues that sometimes, people can benefit and learn from their punishments and be improved (both in this life and the next) when their souls are curable of their evil, although the greater the crime, the greater and longer their punishment, with incurable souls who have committed the worst crimes being forever condemned to suffer for their injustice as examples "in the prison-house of the world below, a spectacle and a warning to all unrighteous men who come thither." So from this point of view, losing Socrates can be seen as Athens' punishment.
This, I think, makes it clear that the Athenian Assembly destroyed and condemned themselves in the act of sentencing Socrates to death (a great injustice) — who himself had no fear of the afterlife or the fate of his soul therein — despite his repeated attempts to teach them philosophy and show them the error of their ways. So his words to Crito may also be seen in this light, referring to death as a type of spiritual/philosophical cure for both himself and Athens.
That's my two cents, at any rate.