5 Isocrates’ Against the Sophists and Plato’s Euthydemus

In the third post on this theme I discussed Cleinias’ reference to the geometricians, astronomers, and mathematicians who deliver ‘things that are‘ (ta onta) they discover to the dialecticians to make use of them, ‘since they themselves do not know how to use them’. I mentioned on that occasion Myles Burnyeat’s seminar on the Euthydemus and suggested that it was this Cleinias’ passage that led Myles to his dating of the Euthydemus after the Republic. Now we come to the second such passage.

At 300d Ctesippus, the lover of Cleinias, scored a point against Dionysodorus. Cleinias was delighted and laughed, so Socrates said to him: ‘Why do you laugh (Ti gelais), Cleinias (ȏ Kleinia), at such solemn and beautiful things (epi spoudaiois houtȏ pragmasin kai kalois;)?’ – Dionysodorus: ‘Have you, Socrates, ever seen anything beautiful (Su gar ȇdȇ ti pȏpot’ eides, ȏ Sȏkrates, kalon pragma)?’ – Socrates: ‘Yes (Egȏge), I have seen many beautiful things (kai polla ge).’ – Dionysodorus: ‘Were they other than the beautiful (Ara hetera onta tou kalou), or the same as the beautiful (ȇ t’auta tȏi kalȏi;)?’ – Socrates: ‘Now I was in a great quandary (K’agȏ en panti egenomȇn), for I did not know what to do (hupo aporias), and I thought (kai hȇgoumȇn) that I was rightly served (dikaia peponthenai) for having opened my mouth (hoti egryxa) …’ (300e1-301a3)

Dionysodorus’ two questions – ‘Have you, Socrates, ever seen anything beautiful? Were they other than the beautiful, or the same as the beautiful?’ – suggest that at the time Plato wrote the dialogue, the Forms, and ‘the beautiful itself’ in particular, considered as distinct from and in contrast to beautiful things (persons, facies, bodies), were widely discussed in philosophic circles. Since Myles could not contemplate the ancient dating of the Phaedrus – in which Plato’s mind is focussed on ‘the beautiful itself’, and which as such provides the key to the Euthydemus – his only way to understanding the present passage was by dating the dialogue after the Republic.

Socrates’ ‘Now I was in a great quandary, for I did not know what to do, and I thought that I was rightly served for having opened my mouth’ points to the passage in the Hippias Major, with which the discussion on the beautiful itself was initiated in that dialogue: ‘Quite lately, my noble friend, when I was condemning as ugly some things in certain compositions (en logois tisi), and praising others as beautiful (kala), somebody threw me into confusion by interrogating me in a most offensive manner, rather to this effect: “You, Socrates, pray how do you know what things are beautiful (kala) and what are ugly (aischra)? Come now, can you tell me what the beautiful is (ti esti to kalon;)?” In my incompetence I was confounded, and could find no proper answer to give him.’ (286c5-d2). But while in the Hippias Major the questions ‘somebody’ (Socrates’ critical self, ‘the son of Sophroniscus’ 298b11) asked Socrates, put him in a quandary into which he fell deeper and deeper – at the end of the dialogue he says: ‘he [i.e. his critical questioner] asks me whether I am not ashamed of my audacity in talking about a beautiful way of life, when questioning makes it evident (phanerȏs exelenchomenos) that concerning the beautiful I do not even know what it is (peri tou kalou hoti oud’ auto touto hoti pote estin oida). “And yet,” he [i.e. his critical self] goes on, “how can you know whose speech is beautiful or the reverse – and this applies to any action whatsoever – when you have no knowledge of beauty (to kalon agnoȏn)? And so long as you are what you are, do you think it is better for you to live rather than be dead’ (oiei soi kreitton einai zȇn mallon ȇ tethnanai;)?”’ (304d5-e3) – in the Euthydemus he emerged from the quandary by pointing to the Forms.

Socrates continued: ‘… but all the same (homȏs de), I replied that they [i.e. many beautiful things] are different from the beauty itself (hetera ephȇn autou ge tou kalou), but that each of them has some beauty present with it (parestin mentoi hekastȏi autȏn kallos ti).’ – Dionysodorus: ‘So if there’s a cow present with you (Ean oun paragenȇtai soi bous), are you a cow (bous ei), and because I am now present with you (kai hoti nun egȏ soi pareimi), are you Dionysodorus (Dionusodȏros ei;)? – Socrates: ‘God forbid (Euphȇmei touto ge)!’ – Dionysodorus: ‘But in what way (Alla tina tropon), when one thing is present with another (heterou heterȏi paragenomenou), will one thing be another (to heteron heteron an eiȇ;)?’ – Socrates: ‘Is that your impasse (Ara touto aporeis;)?’ – Dionysodorus: ‘For how can I be not in an impasse (Pȏs gar ouk aporȏ), I and all other people (kai egȏ kai hoi alloi hapantes anthrȏpoi), about the non-existent (ho mȇ esti)?’ (301a3-b4)

Declaring ‘the beautiful itself’ to be non-existent,  Dionysodorus expressed the view of Isocrates, for whom ‘the beautiful itself’ and the other ‘beings that truly are’ (ta onta ontȏs) – such as justice, its very self (autȇ dikaiosunȇ), and temperance/self-control (sȏphrosunȇ), which in the Phaedrus are known by ‘knowledge which is in what really is’ (tȇn en tȏi ho estin on ontȏs epistȇmȇn ousan, 247d-e) – were non-existent. If one does not accept the ancient dating of the Phaedrus, the only possibility to read Dionysodorus’ attack without distorting the text is by dating the Euthydemus after the Republic. But the Euthydemus cannot be dated after the Republic, for the ideal state stands on the idea of unity of philosophy and politics, whereas in the Euthydemus they are set apart as two separate disciplines.

Burnyeat’s seminar, in which he attempted to date the Euthydemus after the Republic, took place in the early eighties. The Euthydemus was published among Plato’s Early Socratic dialogues in 1987 (in Penguin Classics), which indicates that Burnyeat’s dating had been rejected. But since the ancient dating of the Phaedrus could not be even discussed, let alone accepted, the only way to deal with the given passage was to distort it. Waterfield writes in the introduction to it:

‘Many commentators read into this section a background of Plato’s theory of forms, according to which fineness [to kalon] is a form with an existence independent of any particulars that might be fine [kala]. There is no suggestion of this in the passage. (Op. cit. p. 366)

Let us therefore see again the introductory exchange between Dionysodorus and Socrates. Ctesippus scored a point against Dionysodorus; Cleinias was delighted and laughed. Socrates wanted to put some balm on Dionysodorus’ pain and said to Cleinias: ‘Why do you laugh at such solemn and beautiful things (epi spoudaiois houtȏ pragmasin kai kalois;)?’ Dionysodorus decided to heal his wound by attacking Socrates: ‘Have you, Socrates, ever seen anything beautiful (Su gar ȇdȇ ti pȏpot’ eides, ȏ Sȏkrates, kalon pragma)?’ – Socrates: ‘Yes (Egȏge), I have seen many beautiful things (kai polla ge).’ – Dionysodorus: ‘Were they other than the beautiful (Ara hetera onta tou kalou), or the same as the beautiful (ȇ t’auta tȏi kalȏi;)?’ – Socrates: ‘Now I was in a great quandary (K’agȏ en panti egenomȇn), for I did not know what to do (hupo aporias), and I thought (kai hȇgoumȇn) that I was rightly served (dikaia peponthenai) for having opened my mouth (hoti egryxa) …’ (300e1-301a3)

Socrates’ getting ‘in a great quandary’ emphasizes the importance of the distinction between ‘the beautiful’ and many things that are beautiful. His words ‘I did not know what to do, and I thought that I was rightly served for having opened my mouth …’, viewed in connection with Dionysodorus’ two questions, indicate that Plato supposed that his readers, and Isocrates in particular, were well acquainted with the Hippias Major.

Waterfield continues: ‘we may be on the ground of Socrates’ search for universals as objects of definition, but we need not suppose even this.’

We are not ‘on the ground of Socrates’ search for universals as objects of definition’; there is no indication of any such search in the Euthydemus.

Socrates continued: ‘… but all the same, I replied that they [i.e. many beautiful things] are different from the beautiful itself [Waterfields ‘fineness itself’], but that each of them has some beauty present with it (parestin mentoi hekastȏi autȏn kallos ti, 301a3-4)).’

Waterfield remarked: ‘The metaphor of presence was perfectly acceptable even in non-philosophic Greek: ‘Fear is present to them’ is periphrastic for ‘They are afraid’. We are simply seeing two Greeks using their language, one to produce confusion, the other to try to defend common sense.’

Waterfield does not give the Greek for ‘Fear is present to them’, and I cannot think of the place he refers to. But he could have referred to Aristophanes’ paresti chairein (Ploutos 638’) which says literally ‘it is present to rejoice’, as ‘a periphrasis’ for ‘we can rejoice’. ‘The metaphor of presence as being perfectly acceptable even in non-philosophic Greek’ sheds light on Socrates’ metaphysical use of ‘the presence’: ‘the presence of the beautiful with beautiful things’ seen as the cause of their being beautiful. But to dismiss on this account Socrates’ words, and his following exchange with Dionysodorus, as ‘two Greeks using their language’ is a hermeneutic travesty.

Let us see the exchange. Dionysodorus reposted: ‘So if there’s a cow present with you (Ean oun paragenȇtai soi bous), are you a cow (bous ei), and because I am now present with you (kai hoti nun egȏ soi pareimi), are you Dionysodorus (Dionusodȏros ei;)? – Socrates: ‘God forbid (Euphȇmei touto ge)!’ – Dionysodorus: ‘But in what way (Alla tina tropon), when one thing is present with another (heterou heterȏi paragenomenou), will one thing be another (to heteron heteron an eiȇ;)?’

Clearly, although Socrates’ use of paresti was rooted in non-philosophic Greek, it was a bold step, which Dionysodorus ridicules accordingly. When Socrates discussed ‘the beautiful’ in its relation to beautiful things in the Hippias Major, he asked for a definition of ‘the beautiful’ instead of simply pointing to its presence with beautiful things. He asked Hippias: ‘Aren’t all beautiful things beautiful because of the beautiful (Ara ta kala panta tȏi kalȏi esti kala;)? … Tell me (Eipe dȇ), what is this (ti esti touto), the beautiful (to kalon;)?’ What he arrived at as a definition was each time something different form ‘the beautiful’; that’s why he couldn’t but get into a deeper and deeper quandary.

Waterfield continues: ‘It is Dionysodorus who first mentions the abstract entity ‘fineness’ [to kalon], not Socrates, so we should not suppose that this is a Platonic form.’

On the ancient dating the Phaedrus with its focus on ‘the beautiful itself’ (auto to kallos) was in the hands of readers for more than ten years when Plato wrote the Euthydemus. Waterfield’s remark has any sense only as an argument against someone who might contemplate the Euthydemus as the first dialogue in which Plato introduced the Forms. But that would completely disregard the fact that Dionysodorus ridicules the very notion of ‘the beautiful’ as an entity existing as separate from beautiful things.

Waterfield continues: ‘Socrates uses the phrase “fineness itself” at 301a to pinpoint or isolate fineness, not in any metaphysically significant sense.’

Dionysodorus’ intention to get Socrates into a quandary with his question concerning ‘the beautiful’, and Socrates’ seeing himself in a quandary, indicates that ‘the beautiful itself’, (auto to kalon, Waterfields ‘the fineness itself’), is here used by Socrates in its pregnant, metaphysical sense.

Dionysodorus: ‘But in what way, when one thing is present with another, will one thing be another?’ – Socrates: ‘Is that your impasse (Ara touto aporeis;)?’ – Dionusodorus: ‘For how can I be not in an impasse (Pȏs gar ouk aporȏ), I and all other people (kai egȏ kai hoi alloi hapantes anthrȏpoi), about the non-existent (ho mȇ esti)?’ (301a3-b4)

Waterfield translates this passage as follows. Dionysodorus: ‘But how can A’s presence to B turn B into A, when they are different?’ – Socrates: ‘Do you find that puzzling?’ – Dionysodorus: ‘Of course I do. Not only I but everyone else finds impossibilities puzzling.’

Waterfield translated Dionysodorus’ Pȏs gar ouk aporȏ ‘Of course I do [find that puzzling]’. To translate aporȏ as ‘I find that puzzling’ is fine in many contexts, but not here. Here it must be taken in its original meaning ‘there is not a way for me to go on’. ‘Impasse’ only partially expresses this meaning, for it suggests an unsurmountable obstacle that bars any further progress, which is wrong in the given context. Dionysodorus says that he of course cannot find any road in that which is non-existent (ho mȇ esti); he does not view ‘the beautiful itself’ as one of the puzzling impossibilities, he simply maintains that it does not exist.

The Euthydemus is narrated by Socrates. For simplicity, I have reproduced chosen passages from the dialogue as directly spoken by the interlocutors. For the most part it works well, but in doing so I cut out an important part of Socrates’ sentence at 301b1-2, which stands in full as follows (in Waterfield’s translation): ‘”Do you find that puzzling?” I asked – my desire for their cleverness was now leading me to try to copy the two visitors.’ Waterfield comments: ‘’Why does Socrates cast himself as a sophist at 301b? Chiefly he means no more than that he is taking over the sophist’s role as questioner. It is also noticeable, however, that his solution to Dionysodorus’ dilemma really does no more than reassert the original proposition that fineness is both different from fine things and yet may have some relation to them. So perhaps Socrates casts himself as a sophist because he is about to obfuscate the issue to some extent and avoid the lengthy metaphysical discussion that a proper response would entail.’

Waterfield’s claim that Socrates’ solution to Dionysodorus’ dilemma does no more than ‘reassert the original proposition that fineness is both different from fine things and yet may have some relation to them’ misrepresents ‘Socrates’ solution’. For Socrates’ claim that ‘many beautiful things ‘are different from the beautiful itself (hetera autou ge tou kalou [Waterfields ‘fineness itself’]), but that each of them has some beauty present with it (parestin mentoi hekastȏi autȏn kallos ti),’ clearly suggests that many beautiful things have some beauty present to them thanks to the presence of ‘the beautiful itself’.

‘Socrates’ solution’ recalls the discussion that Socrates held with his friends on his last day in prison. Socrates: ‘It seems to me (phainetai gar moi) that if anything else is beautiful (ei ti estin allo kalon) besides the beautiful itself (plȇn auto to kalon) … nothing else makes it beautiful (ouk allo ti poiei auto kalon) except the beautiful itself, whether by its presence or communion (ȇ hȇ ekeinou tou kalou eite parousia eite koinȏnia, Phaedo 100c4-d6, transl. David Gallop).’

I do not mean that ‘Socrates’ solution’ in the Euthydemus recalls the Phaedo; I mean that it recalls the discussion Socrates held with his friends on his last day. As Plato informs us, there were a number of friends present with Socrates on the occasion (Phaedo 59b-c); their philosophic discussion on that day was undoubtedly widely discussed.

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I believe that Plato wrote the Phaedo in Sicily during his year-long first stay with Dionysius II, and that he read it to his disciples after returning to Athens.  Diogenes says that ‘when Plato read the dialogue On the Soul [i.e. the Phaedo] Aristotle alone stayed to the end (touton monon parameinai Platȏni anagignȏskonti ton Peri psuchȇs); the rest of the audience got up and went away (tous d’allous anastȇnai pantas, III.37)’. The incident reminds me of a story in Herodotus that when Phrynichus staged ‘The capture of Miletus’ (Milȇtou halȏsis), the Athenians, deeply pained by the capture of Miletus by the Persians, fell into tears watching it, fined the author a thousand drachmas, and prohibited it ever to be produced again (VI.21). 

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Waterfield continues, and ends his introductory comment, as follows: ‘There is a certain similarity between Dionysodorus’ assault at the notion of presence and an argument put into the mouth of Parmenides against Plato’s theory of forms at Pramenides 130e-131c, as Sprague (1967) points out. But this should not induce us to think that Platonic forms are relevant to this passage (or that Plato saw the arguments of Parmenides as less than damaging to his theory): Plato probably realized later that this argument, in origin a sophism, could be turned against his theory.’

The awareness that there are certain similarities (not just one similarity) between Parmenides’ arguments in the Parmenides and Dionysodorus’ arguments in the Euthydemus acquires its proper significance if we realize that in the former Parmenides puts forward arguments against young Socrates’ theory of forms, not against Plato’s theory of Forms (see ‘Plato’s defence of the Forms in the Parmenides’ on my website), and that Dionysodorus in the latter attacks Plato’s theory of Forms. In my view, Socrates’ defence of the Forms in the Euthydemus recalls the remark with which Parmenides concluded his arguments against Socrates’ forms in the Parmenides. I do not mean that it recalls the Parmenides; I mean that it recalls the actual discussion between the old Parmenides and the very young Socrates. At the beginning of the dialogue Plato indicates that the discussion was well known in the philosophic circles and much talked about. Cephalus with his friends came from Clazomenae in Asia Minor to listen to the report of that discussion; for his friends, deeply interested in philosophy (mala philosophoi), had heard that Adeimantus’ and Glaucon’s (i.e. Plato’s) half-brother (Antiphon) learned the arguments from Pythodorus, who was present at the discussion, and remembers them well. Adeimantus confirmed that what they had heard was true: ‘when Antiphon was young he used to rehearse them diligently (meirakoin gar ȏn autous eu mala diemeletȇsen, 126a6-7)

Parmenides closes his arguments against the young Socrates’ forms as follows: ‘These difficulties (Tauta mentoi) and many more still in addition (kai eti alla pros toutois panu polla) necessarily hold of the characters (anankaion echein ta eidȇ), if these characteristics of things that are exist (ei eisin hautai hai ideai tȏn ontȏn), and one is to distinguish each character as something by itself (kai horieitai tis auto ti hekaston eidos). The result is that the hearer is perplexed (hȏste aporein te ton akouonta) and contends (kai amphisbȇtein) that they do not exist (hȏs oute esti tauta), and that even if their existence is conceded (ei te hoti malista eiȇ), they are necessarily unknowable by human nature (pollȇ anankȇ auta einai tȇi anthrȏpinȇi phusei agnȏsta). In saying this (kai tauta legonta), he thinks he is saying something significant (dokein te ti legein) and (kai), as we just remarked (ho arti elegomen), it’s astonishingly hard to convince him to the contrary (thaumastȏs hȏs dusanapeiston einai). Only a man of considerable natural gifts (kia andros panu men euphuous) will be able to understand (tou dunȇsomenou mathein) that there is a certain kind of each thing (hȏs esti ti genos hekastou), a nature and reality alone by itself (kai ousia autȇ kath’ hautȇn), and it will take a man more remarkable still (eti de thaumastoterou) to discover it (tou heurȇsontos) and be able to instruct someone else (kai allon dunȇsomenou didaxai) who has examined all these difficulties with sufficient care (tauta panta hikanȏs dieukrinȇsamenon).’ – Socrates: ‘I agree with you (Sunchȏrȏ soi). You are saying very much what I think too (panu gar moi kata noun legeis).’ – Parmenides: ‘Nevertheless (Alla mentoi), if in light of all the present difficulties and others like them, Socrates, one will not allow that there are characters of things that are (ei ge tis dȇ, ȏ Sȏkrates, au mȇ easei eidȇ tȏn ontȏn einai, eis panta ta nundȇ kai alla toiauta apoblepsas), and refuses to distinguish as something a character of each single thing (mȇde ti horieitai eidos henos hekastou), he even will not have anything to which to turn his mind (oude hopoi trepsei tȇn dianoian hexei), since he will not allow (mȇ eȏn) that there is a characteristic, ever the same, of each of the things that are (idean tȏn ontȏn hekastou tȇn autȇn aei einai); and so (kai houtȏs) he will utterly destroy the power and significance of thought and discourse (tȇn tou dialegesthai dunamin pantapasi diaphtherei). (134e9-135c2, translation R.E. Allen)

When Dionusodȏrus declared ‘the beautiful itself’ and other Forms (301a8-9) to be non-existent (ho mȇ esti, 301b4), Socrates asked: ‘What do you mean (Ti legeis), Dionysodorus (ȏ Dionusodȏre)? Is not the beautiful beautiful (ou to kalon kalon estin), and the hideous hideous (kai to aischron aischron;)?’ – Dionysodorus: ‘If it so appears to me.’ – Socrates: ‘And does it appear so to you (Oukoun dokei;)?’ – Dionusodorus: ‘Very much so (Panu ge).’ – Socrates: ‘And is not, as well, the same the same (Oukoun kai to t’auton t’auton), and the other other (kai to heteron heteron;)? For surely the other is not the same (ou gar dȇpou to ge heteron t’auton). I should think that even a child will hardly deny the other to be other (all’ oud an paida ȏimȇn touto aporȇsai, hȏs ou to heteron heteron estin). But Dionysodorus (All’, ȏ Dionusodȏre), you must have let this fall aside on purpose (touto men hekȏn parȇkas), for in other respects (epei ta alla), you seem to me (moi dokeite), like craftsmen who accomplish all their tasks (hȏsper hoi dȇmiourgoi hois hekasta prosȇkei apergazesthai), to have worked out the art of discussion beautifully (kai humeis to dialegesthai pankalȏs apergazesthai).’ (301b5-c5)

The eristic performance of Dionysodorus and Euthydemus should be read in light of Parmenides’ ‘if one will not allow that there are Forms of things that are (ei ge tis dȇ mȇ easei eidȇ tȏn ontȏn einai), he will utterly destroy the power and significance of thought and discourse (tȇn tou dialegesthai dunamin pantapasi diaphtherei).