No need whatsoever. — Apollodorus

Are you that so self unaware? You say you have no need to have the last word and yet again and again you have more to say, or, more of the same to say.

I have read some Gerson. I tried to discuss the problem of "instrumental causality". You simply ignored it and moved on to something else, and then something else again, eventually circling back to the same thing again.

Even older than Plato is the distinction between esoteric and exoteric teachings. You point to the exoteric and remain unaware of the esoteric. You pull statements out of context and think they represent the "true teaching". You ignore the arguments and details which point toward something other than what is there for even the most casual reader to see.

Socrates admonishes his interlocutors to "follow the argument where it leads". You have avoided doing this.

So in that general sense, I agree with you and Frank that Plato is not an atheist in any meaningful sense, but neither does that make him 'a theist' in today's sense. — Wayfarer

I agree. Incidentally, when I think of Plato or Platonism, I think Platonism and nothing else. I take Gerson's view (and that of Platonists themselves) that there is only one Platonic or Platonist system (with some variations) stretching from Plato to the present. I am using descriptions like "monistic idealism" exclusively when attempting to explain to others how I classify Platonism.

But I fully agree with Demos. Thanks for the quote.

But true, there are several centuries between Plato and Plotinus. — frank

And yet:

I take Gerson's view (and that of Platonists themselves) that there is only one Platonic or Platonist system (with some variations) stretching from Plato to the present. — Apollodorus

I havent read anything by Gerson, but I'm familiar with the view that Plato is compatible with later Platonists. Plotinus was influenced by Stoicism and Aristotle, so "compatible" definitely doesn't mean identical.

I agree with you that the dialogues stand on their own, but I don't think we can diagnose the metaphysics of either Socrates or Plato based on them.

And that proves what exactly? Of course Platonists see Platonism as essentially one system. "Platonism", "Middle Platonism", "Neoplatonism", etc., are modern concepts that make no sense to Platonists, as shown by Gerson.

As already stated, followers of Plato already referred to themselves as "Platonists" (Platonikoi) in antiquity and it would be absurd to claim that they were something else. Of course there were some variations according to different schools but that doesn't make the Platonism of one historical period a different system to the Platonism of other periods.

And Aristotle himself is, in a way, a Platonist. The thing is, Plato had a lot of different teachings which could be interpreted in different ways. — Metaphysician Undercover

Correct. Plato's own system was far from finalized. Obviously, all the essential features were already in place. But there was some debate within the Academy concerning the exact role of first principles, Forms, Mathematical Numbers, and their relation to one another, etc.

These issues were not completely resolved in Plato's times and had to be worked out later. Eventually, an effort was made to systematize his teachings and at the time of Plotinus the final touches were still in progress. Aristotle certainly improved on some of Plato's ideas and Plotinus used Aristotle for his own fine-tuning.

Even so, something like what Gerson calls "Ur-Platonism" may be identified and all subsequent modifications are essentially in agreement with it. "Neo-Platonism" is a modern concept. Platonists themselves did not call themselves that and would not regard "Neo-Platonism" as a different or "new" system.

A principle is an assumption, an hypothesis. — Fooloso4

I think you are confused.

Socrates says quite clearly, “there is another section in which it advances from its assumption to a beginning or principle that transcends assumption” (510b).

A principle that transcends assumption is an unhypothetical principle, i.e., a self-explicable or auto-explicable first principle.

As already stated, all knowledge and all objects of knowledge are emanations of the Good.

Then the good is not the cause of everything, rather it is the cause of the things that are in a good way, while it is not responsible for the bad things. (Republic 379b) — Fooloso4

And your point is what exactly?

Of course there is no need for the Good "to be responsible for the bad things".

As explained by Plotinus, evil does not exist as a substance or property but instead as a privation of substance, form, and goodness - Plotinus, Enneads, I, 8; O’Brien, D., 1996, “Plotinus on matter and evil,” The Cambridge Companion to Plotinus, L.P. Gerson (ed.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 171–195.

What you fail to understand is that the dialogues are just brief sketches, not encyclopedic works. As Socrates says in the analogy, just as you don't look at the Sun to avoid being blinded, you don't look at the Good but at reason in order to see things. Otherwise said, use your reasoning faculty, don't expect to be spoonfed.

When I was in my early teens, no one at school spoke of “Platonism”. It was always individual authors like Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus. So, when I first read Plato’s dialogues like Timaeus, Symposium, Republic, I was unaware of the existence of a system called “Platonism”. — Apollodorus

We didn't get any education in philosophy in high school, so I wasn't exposed to Plato or Platonism until university.

If we insist that there were major changes, for example, from Plato to Plotinus, we should be able to show what those changes are and to what extent (if at all) they are inconsistent with (a) the text of the dialogues and (b) with how Plato was understood in the interim. — Apollodorus

What I find, is that in Plato's dialogues, Socrates produces unanswered questions. So if Plotinus made some progress toward answering some of those questions, that would constitute a change between Plato and Plotinus.

And the focus of that way of life, at least within the Academy, was the positive construction of a theoretical framework on the foundation of UP. — Apollodorus

I had to do a Google search to find out what Ur-Platonism is:

;

Here I briefly sketch a hypothetical reconstruction of what I shall call ‘Ur-Platonism’ (UP). This is the general philosophical position that arises from the conjunction of the negations of the philosophical positions explicitly rejected in the dialogues, that is, the philosophical positions on offer in the history of philosophy accessible to Plato himself. — Platonism Versus Naturalism, Lloyd P. Gerson, University of Toronto

I really do not see how a "general philosophical position that arises from the conjunction of the negations
of the philosophical positions explicitly rejected in the dialogues", can be called "a theoretical framework". I think these two are miles apart. A position of skepticism, which rejects philosophical positions, cannot be said to provide a theoretical framework. So any supposed theoretical framework would have to come from some principles other than those found in Plato.

We might say that Aristotle build a theoretical framework on UP, but we wouldn't call Aristotelian metaphysics Platonism, it's Aristotelianism.

There is nothing missing. It is not a syllogism. — Fooloso4

That's what I'm saying, it isn't a syllogism because it doesn't show how you arrive at that conclusion.

So it must be just random and unconnected statements then.

You, on the other hand, use his criticism of those scholars to dismiss other sholars. — Fooloso4

Well, you would say that, wouldn't you?

The fact is that Gerson is not criticizing the scholars, he simply points out that their procedure is flawed.

Maybe this upsets you because their procedure and conclusion sounds very much like your own?

I know enough to criticize their methodology and so does Gerson. Of course you would disagree with the criticism since you are following the same flawed methodology.

I know enough to criticize their methodology and so does Gerson. — Apollodorus

Bullshit! You do not know who they are or anything about their methodologies.

I deny knowing them because I have never read them and they are not cited by the scholars I do read. — Fooloso4

And yet you sound very much like Shorey and other anti-Platonists of the 1930's onward.

Their usual method is to start by taking a dialogue in isolation of other Platonic texts, after which they use terms like "irony", "elenchos", "aporia", "skepticism", etc. to arrive at the most preposterous conclusions designed to demonize Plato and Platonists.

Anyway, if you are not reading scholars like Sedley and Gerson, who are leading in the field, which scholars do you actually read then???

Their usual method is to start by taking a dialogue in isolation of other Platonic texts — Apollodorus

What is it you hope to accomplish by making such false claims?

Above on this same page:

The dialogues form larger wholes. Two or more dialogues are tied together in various ways, by the chronology of events, such as Euthyphro and Apology or extended to include Crito and Phaedo, or by a central question such as with the trilogy Theaetetus, Sophist, and Statesman, or Phaedrus and Symposium on eros. That the dialogues are not independent, however, does not mean that they are not each wholes in themselves. — Fooloso4

Their usual method is to start by taking a dialogue in isolation of other Platonic texts, after which they use terms like "irony", "elenchos", "aporia", "skepticism", etc. to arrive at the most preposterous conclusions designed to demonize Plato and Platonists. — Apollodorus

Do you really find it hard to understand why scholars from different schools would use the same terms that are found in the dialogues?

Anyway, if you are not reading scholars like Sedley and Gerson, who are leading in the field, which scholars do you actually read then??? — Apollodorus

I have mentioned them before. I'll start with Leo Strauss and Jacob Klein, both Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. Their students and students of their students include most notably Seth Benardete, Stanley Rosen, Allan Bloom, Thomas Pangle, Christopher Bruell, Laurence Lampert, Ronna Burger, Charles Griswold, and many others.

None of them "demonize" Plato. He is of central importance to their philosophical work.

Well, Strauss has been accused of many things just as he and others have accused Plato.

However, as stated by R H Crossman, it had become fashionable by the first half of the 20th century "to pull Plato down from his pedestal". Crossman and other Fabian Socialists were at the forefront of this trend.

As Gerson points out, new interpretative procedures emerged in the 1800's and 90's that are fundamentally flawed and lead to absurd conclusions including that Platonic works have no metaphysical or even no philosophical content.

The problem with the esotericism of authors like Strauss is that it can lead to any number of readings that are ultimately incapable of being proved.

In addition to atheism, another "secret teaching" that classicists like G L Dickinson saw in Plato was homoeroticism.

http://www.glbtqarchive.com/literature/dickinson_gl_L.pdf

This may have constituted "secret teaching" in the eyes of late 19th and early 20th century readers, but it is highly unlikely that this is how Plato himself saw it.

And, of course, according to one's political inclinations, some saw Plato as a revolutionary and others as a reactionary - and this is still the case today.

I think this illustrates the danger of imposing modern readings on 4th-century BC texts. We can't simply dismiss more than two millennia of Platonism just because modern worldviews have changed.

"So far, you have presented zero evidence for your claim that the Euthyphro or any other dialogue teaches "atheism".
— Apollodorus

That's because I never said that they do. You have a distorted view of what the Socratic teaching is — Fooloso4

You have already admitted that the dialogues do not teach atheism.

If all Socrates does is ask questions and express opinions, then it cannot be inferred from this that Plato was an atheist.

You seem to be cherry-picking Socrates statements and ignore those where he speaks of the soul's immortality or God in positive terms that do not sound like skepticism and even less like atheism.

You are not simply stating that "Socrates is a skeptic". You are saying he is telling myths or lies, therefore anyone who believes in the metaphysical realities discussed by Socrates is a believer in myths or lies.

But you have not demonstrated that this is the case, or even that Socrates is a skeptic. Gerson and other scholars do not believe that Socrates' position, or that of Plato, constitutes skepticism.

As pointed out by Gerson, Platonism was generally accepted by Platonists and scholars alike from antiquity into the 19th century. The Anti-Platonist trend only emerged in the 18oo’s. Some key promoters of this trend are:

Johann Jacob Brucker (Historia Critica Philosophiae, 1742–1744): rejects traditional allegorical interpretations of Plato, but accepts that he taught secret doctrines (without attempting to establish what these were).

Wilhelm Gottlieb Tennemann (History of Philosophy, 1798 - 1819): denies that Plato was a mystic but promotes esotericism and claims to have discovered Plato’s secret teachings.

Friedrich Schleiermacher (Introduction to Plato’s Dialogues, 1804 - 1828): claims that Plato was a metaphysical agnostic, stating that “In the writings of Plato his own peculiar wisdom is either not contained at all, or only in secret allusions which are difficult to find”.

Paul Shorey (What Plato Said, 1933): follows the one-dialogue-at-a-time method of reading, claiming that “the synopsis of any dialogue can be understood without reference to the others”.

Leo Strauss (1930’s): rejects the traditional view that theory should rule over practice; denies the metaphysical content of the dialogues; extends esotericism into concealed meaning, claiming that all philosophers write under political persecution and present an exoteric teaching available to all readers and an esoteric one that only “thoughtful” and “careful” readers can access by “reading between the lines” in order to extract a political message – giving Ben Maimon as example (Persecution and the Art of Writing, 1952).

In addition to the strange concept of (1) philosophers as persecuted through the ages and (2) philosophy being reduceable to political theory concealed in literary works, there are other issues with Strauss.

For example, “Strauss taught that the only natural human good is the philosophic life of the philosophic few, because he claimed "man's desire to know as his highest natural desire." And only the philosophic few have "the philosophic desire." They are the only ones "by nature fit for philosophy." Consequently, the great multitude of human beings who live non-philosophic but moral lives are "mutilated" human beings, who live lives of "human misery, however splendid" or "despair disguised by delusion." (Strauss, "Reason and Revelation," 146, 149, 176; "Progress or Return?," 122; The City and Man, 53-54.)

Oddly, however, Strauss never offered any demonstrative proof of this strange assertion.”

https://darwinianconservatism.blogspot.com/2019/07/does-aristotelian-natural-right-require.html

So, elitism may be added to esotericism and antimetaphysics among Strauss’s many strange teachings. And, of course, even the notion that he is “a careful reader” has been disputed as may be seen from the blog above.

But to revert to Plato.

Strauss may or may not be a “careful reader”, but I do believe that Plato is a careful writer. Everything he writes has a purpose.

If “careful reading” leads to dismissal of a large part of the corpus then there must be something wrong with the reading.

It is generally acknowledged that there is substantial metaphysical and theological content in the Platonic corpus.

For example, in the Timaeus, “The heavenly bodies are divine and move in their various orbits to serve as markers of time: the fixed stars to mark a day/night, the moon to mark the (lunar) month and the sun to mark the year. Time itself came into being with these celestial movements as an “image of eternity.” Individual souls are made up of the residue (and an inferior grade) of the soul stuff of the universe, and are eventually embodied in physical bodies. “

Plato’s Timaeus - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

IMHO we can’t just ignore the many references to God/s in the dialogues and claim that “Plato banished the Gods (or God)”. To do so, is not “careful reading” at all, it is ideologically-motivated distortion.

The neoplatonists are really platonists. Maybe those who got disillusioned with official politics or were more inclined to study and mysticism. — Protagoras

As shown by Gerson and others, some modifications in Platonic philosophy did take place in the course of history, but Platonism (including so-called "Neo-Platonism") is built on core features found in the Platonic corpus and is sufficiently consistent with Plato to qualify as Platonic.

In any case, Straussianism does not demonstrate anti-Platonist claims such as that Plato was an "atheist" or even a "skeptic".

Even as political philosophy, Straussianism has received justified criticism, e.g. :

“The most serious consequences of this [Strauss’s] essentialist political philosophy are: (1) it is egocentric and thus self-refuting as a political philosophy and (2) it is too scholastic a quietism to be directly relevant to political life despite Strauss’s own claim to the contrary” – H. Y. Jung, “Leo Strauss’s Conception of Political Philosophy: A Critique”.

More to the point, Straussianism is not a scientifically valid method of interpretation. It is more like a nihilist belief system based on a set of assumptions that are accepted as a matter of faith and whose conclusions remain unproved.

Tellingly, Straussianism’s central thesis is also its most controversial claim:

“The most controversial claim Strauss made was that philosophers in the past used an “art of writing” to entice potential philosophers to begin a life of inquiry by following the hints the authors gave about their true thoughts and questions” - Catherine H. Zuckert

Where did Strauss get his idea from?

“Recent works on Strauss have emphasized the way Strauss’s readings in al-Farabi and Maimonides influenced his “exoteric writing” thesis” – B. A. Wurgaft

Having borrowed his idea from Maimonides and al-Farabi (who lived in Muslim-occupied Spain), Strauss applied this to his reading of Plato:

“Having discovered the idea of esoteric writing in his study of Maimonides, Strauss arrived at a very novel reading of Plato. When reflecting on the esoteric writing style of Plato, instead of focusing on the confrontation between philosophy and revealed religion, Strauss found a tension between open philosophical inquiry and the needs of a closed political community … This tension between political life and philosophy led Plato to use the dialogue form, embellished by myths, as his distinctive mode of speech” - G B Smith

What else does this tell us aside from implying that Plato’s main interest in life was politics?

“Strauss leaves us with a picture of Plato, as a questioning skeptic, which points forward to the modern interpreter rather than backward. Strauss’s publicized turning back to antiquity was largely about reading eighteenth-century rationalism back into ancient texts” – Paul Gottfried

So, Strauss’s methodology does not seem to be quite kosher?

“Straussianism, from the founder onward, is dubious as a methodology” – Paul Gottfried

In fact, Strauss’s methodology is not only dubious but it fails to answer any philosophical questions whatsoever:

“[Strauss] has laid out the modern crisis so boldly and analyzed its main forms so thoroughly and he has taught us how to read the classic texts to grasp the problem of natural right. Yet, just when the issues are joined so forcefully, he fails to give an answer …. In Natural Right and History Strauss argues that classical natural right is superior to modern natural rights, but he nowhere shows how classic natural right is anything more than rhetoric … Nowhere does Strauss provide solutions to, or show how Plato or Aristotle provided solutions to, fundamental epistemological problems found in Plato's own work. Nowhere does he engage Aristotle's metaphysics or biology in search of natural right, in the way that Aristotle himself might have done. Nowhere does he seriously engage the nature of the physical cosmos. On his own view, philosophy must aspire to and thus assume a comprehensive account of the whole. But to invoke the whole--a cosmos--immediately raises the question of the grounds on which we can assume that whole to be intelligible. Such a move, of course, leads to classic natural theology, which Strauss studiously ignores … as a teaching about wisdom, about the very highest things, the Straussian secret is ultimately a check drawn on an empty account” – Richard Sherlock

So Strauss’s project is more rhetoric than philosophy. Not surprisingly, his work has been largely ignored by scholars:

“[Strauss’s] books and papers are freely available on the side of the Atlantic from which I write, but Strauss has no discernible influence in Britain at all” – M. F. Burnyeat

“Strauss’s works on Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, to a significant degree, have been ignored by the scholarly community” – Gregory Bruce Smith

So, what is Straussianism for?

“What most (albeit not all) Straussians do in academic positions is try to enforce political dogmas, partly by getting rid of critics and installing fellow-Straussians ….” – Paul Gottfried

Does this mean that Straussianism is a kind of academic cult with a political agenda?

“He [Strauss] alone among eminent refugee intellectuals succeeded in attracting a brilliant galaxy of disciples who created an academic cult around his teaching” – Lewis Coser

“I submit in all seriousness that surrender of the critical intellect is the price of initiation into the world of Leo Strauss’s ideas” – M. F. Burnyeat

So, is Strauss a philosopher at all?

In Strauss’s own words, “We cannot be philosophers, but we can love philosophy; we can try to philosophize.”

Here are some of Strauss’s pseudo-philosophical techniques and statements:

He begins with an inference from literary form. Plato wrote dialogues, i.e., dramas in prose. Therefore, the utterances of Socrates or any other character in a Platonic dialogue are like the utterances of Macbeth: they do not necessarily express the thought of the author. Like Shakespeare, “Plato conceals his opinions.”

Strauss paraphrases the text in tedious detail - or so it appears to the uninitiated reader - occasionally remarking that a certain statement is not clear; he notes that the text is silent about a certain matter; he wonders whether such and such can really be the case. With a series of scarcely perceptible nudges he gradually insinuates that the text is insinuating something quite different from what the words say.
For example, he attempts to show that Plato’s Republic means the opposite of what it means (and sometimes the opposite of what he himself says it means, vide supra, Ferrari).

He simply pronounces Plato’s Theory of Forms “utterly incredible”.

He offers no evidence for the accuracy of his readings.

Readers have to accept Strauss’s account of “the wisdom of the ancients” as correct, by believing that “the considerate few have imperturbably conveyed to their readers an eloquence of articulate silences and pregnant indications.”

By way of “answers”, he keeps repeating the mantra “we are prisoners of our opinions”.

So, it appears that Strauss’s claim that Plato and other philosophers used rhetorical stratagems including self-contradiction and hyperboles, to convey a secret meaning, applies in the first instance to Strauss himself.

But, whilst Plato allegedly uses rhetoric to say things he does not appear to be saying, Strauss often says little in order to say nothing: thirteen out of the fifteen chapters of his last book, Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy do not deal with works by Plato!

- Burnyeat, “Sphinx Without a Secret”

Having suggested that Plato’s works are motivated by political concerns, Strauss says that the Laws is Plato’s “most political” work and that “it may be said to be his only political work.”

“In the chapter on Book Nine [of the Laws, Strauss indicates that Book 10 is philosophic because it takes up “the problem of the gods,” but when he turns to Book 10 he does not specifically identify the problem that he has in mind.”

“Strauss says that the Laws is Plato’s most pious work without identifying what makes it most pious and without explaining if there is any connection between its political character and its surpassing piety” – Mark J. Lutz, “On Leo Strauss’s The Argument and the Action of Plato’s Laws”, Brill’s Companion to Leo Strauss’ Writings on Classical Political Thought

For the above reasons, Straussianism’s credibility and authority among scholars of Plato is close to zero.

Far from refuting the Platonists' position, Straussianism's reading of Plato actually reinforces it, showing it to be more consistent and more faithful to the original texts.

That is a more "Straussian" perspective than I take. The esoteric versus exoteric argument relates to political arguments about an "intellectual" aristocracy. Strauss also is not a "secularist" that in your other writings are identified as "Marxist." — Valentinus

Well, I've been accused of being an "evangelist", "Christian Neo-Platonist", and many other things which are totally untrue. So, I'm not the only one doing that.

Besides, it seems that you haven't followed the discussion. I was citing Solmsen who I believe is a more reliable scholar than Strauss.

Solmsen shows how the emergence of an intellectual class in Plato’s time had resulted in religious beliefs becoming a subject of philosophical discussion.

But the trend to question religion was accompanied by an opposite trend (in addition to allegorical interpretations) to present arguments and theories as a theoretical foundation for theology, thus not to deconstruct religion but to reinforce it with the help of reason. — Apollodorus

I don't understand your passion to have the last word on the subject. If the meaning has been completely worked out, there is no need to read texts themselves. It is like an Hegelian synthesis that puts the pin into the last butterfly of a species. When you see an argument, the first thing you do is google who is against it. It is all dead for you. — Valentinus

I have no such passion whatsoever. It is an ongoing discussion, isn't it???

Yes, I did google Strauss after Fooloso4 claimed he is a leading scholar of Plato whom he follows and after noticing that he is not mentioned by other scholars like Gerson.

Fooloso4 is accusing me of reading Plato through "Neo-Platonist" eyes, but he appeals to Strauss who looks at Plato through the eyes of al-Farabi and Ben Maimon.

And Fooloso4 did suggest that Socrates was an atheist and that Plato "banished the Gods":

In the Republic he banishes the gods from the just city and replaces them with Forms — Fooloso4

This is not true. Plato only banishes poets and artists who make irreverent references about the Gods. This isn't the same as "banishing the Gods". Plato certainly doesn't banish God. So, if anything, he replaces the Gods with one supreme and transcendent Deity. But he does believe in heavenly bodies as Gods, so he doesn't banish God or Gods as such. As Solmsen and others point out, Plato is a religious reformer, not an atheist.

Aristotle, in De Anima, argued that thinking in general (which includes knowledge as one kind of thinking) cannot be a property of a body; it cannot, as he put it, 'be blended with a body'. This is because in thinking, the intelligible object or form is present in the intellect, and thinking itself is the identification of the intellect with this intelligible. Among other things, this means that you could not think if materialism is true… . Thinking is not something that is, in principle, like sensing or perceiving; this is because thinking is a universalising activity. This is what this means: when you think, you see - mentally see - a form which could not, in principle, be identical with a particular - including a particular neurological element, a circuit, or a state of a circuit, or a synapse, and so on. This is so because the object of thinking is universal, or the mind is operating universally.

….the fact that in thinking, your mind is identical with the form that it thinks, means (for Aristotle and for all Platonists) that since the form 'thought' is detached from matter, 'mind' is immaterial too. — Lloyd Gerson, Platonism vs Naturalism

Much of Thomas Aquinas' writing is dialectical in form. The emphasis on 'salvation by faith alone' came with Protestant fideism. — Wayfarer

Correct. I think Aquinas is a very good example of how Christianity faithfully preserved Plato’s core teachings for many centuries. Although some seek to argue that Christianity represents a distortion of Plato (as well as of Judaism), this is contradicted by the objective examination of historical facts.

As Lloyd Gerson has pointed out, if you were to ask any moderately well-educated person in antiquity what the goal of life is according to the teachings of Plato, they would answer “to become godlike as far as possible”.

Becoming a godlike immortal had long been a feature of Greek mythology which abounded in the offspring of Gods and mortals. Among these we find Hercules, himself the son of Zeus, who had joined the Gods in Olympus after death.

Among philosophers like Pythagoras, this became the goal or telos of philosophical life. Plato and Socrates were merely prominent propagators of this tradition.

Thus Socrates says:

Therefore we ought to try to escape from earth to the dwelling of the Gods as quickly as we can; and to escape is to become like God, so far as this is possible; and to become like God is to become righteous and holy and wise (Theaetetus 176a – b).

That this was an actual Platonic teaching is suggested among other things by the fact that the desire to become godlike is found in King Phillip II of Macedon and his son Alexander the Great who had been instructed in philosophy by Plato’s pupil Aristotle. Phillip had already announced his wish to be treated as godlike or isotheos. Alexander himself followed in his father’s steps and declared himself a God: following his conquest of Egypt, he adopted the pharaonic title of “Son of God Re” and became “Son of Zeus” to the Greeks.

Aristotle’s political theory that regarded the ideal king as a paternal ruler likened to Father Zeus, blended with the metaphysical theory of the philosophers and became part of Greek and later Roman culture.

By the time of Jesus, the political concept of the ruler as a deity as well as the philosophical goal of the deification of man was well-established. Unsurprisingly, the latter appears as a central teaching of the Christian Gospels:

“But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God” (John 1:12).
“He called them gods, unto whom the word of God came” (John 10:35).
“The people who are right with God will shine like the sun in their Father's kingdom” (Matthew 13: 43).
“So try to be like God, because you are his own dear children” (Ephesians 5:1).

Christianity, especially in the east, preserved the political and administrative system of the Roman Empire and the emperor, though not a deity, remained a sacred representative of divine authority on earth. But Christianity also preserved Graeco-Roman culture with particular emphasis on the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle which represented the highest intellectual achievement of the classical era. Plato’s Academy at Athens continued to function till 529 CE and philosophy was taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria and at the University of Constantinople (from 425 CE to 1453 CE).

The Platonic concept of deification or theosis remained central to the teachings of the Greek Orthodox Church as can be seen from the writings of lead theologians and scholars like Maximos the Confessor (580 – 662 CE):

The soul’s salvation is the consummation of faith (cf. 1 Pet. 1:9). This consummation is the revelation of what has been believed. Revelation is the inexpressible interpenetration of the believer with the object of belief and takes place according to each believer’s degree of faith (cf. Rom. 12:6). Through that interpenetration the believer finally returns to his origin. This return is the fulfilment of desire. Fulfilment of desire is ever-active repose in the object of desire. Such repose is eternal uninterrupted enjoyment of this object. Enjoyment of this kind entails participation in supra-natural divine realities. This participation consists in the participant becoming like that in which he participates. Such likeness involves, so far as this is possible, an identity with respect to energy between the participant and that in which he participates by virtue of the likeness. This identity with respect to energy constitutes the deification of the saints. Deification, briefly, is the encompassing and fulfilment of all times and ages, and of all that exists in either. This encompassing and fulfilment is the union, in the person granted salvation, of his real authentic origin with his real authentic consummation. This union presupposes a transcending of all that by nature is essentially limited by an origin and a consummation. Such transcendence is effected by the almighty and more than powerful energy of god, acting in a direct and infinite manner in the person found worthy of this transcendence. The action of this divine energy bestows a more than ineffable pleasure and joy on him in whom the unutterable and unfathomable union with the divine is accomplished. This, in the nature of things, cannot be perceived, conceived or expressed.

– St Maximos the Confessor, Various Texts on Theology, the Divine Economy, and Virtue and Vice

What emerges from this is a process of faithful preservation of Platonic teachings rather than “distortion,” and Aquinas as a philosopher and theologian who accords great importance to the concept of deification, is a prime example and representative of this process.

If anything, the “distortion” is the work of Protestantism which has inspired and fuelled the anti-Platonist movement that emerged in the 1800’s and 1900’s.

By the way, Fraenkel sounds like an interesting author. “Philosophical Religion From Plato To Spinoza” would definitely be my kind of book. I think people tend to forget the close historical and intellectual links between religion and philosophy and regard them as mutually incompatible fields, which in my view is a mistake.

I believe that this type of conception is promoted by atheists who approach this issue with a bias which encourages them to unreasonably reject the requirement of agency. — Metaphysician Undercover

Good point. Simmias’ theory of the soul as harmony is just a materialist proposition with a “Pythagorean” twist. It seemingly resembles the view attributed to some Pythagoreans, but there is no evidence to link it with an actual theory that makes exactly the same claims.

As observed by Sedley and Long, “no reliable source explicitly attributes to Philolaus the thesis that soul is an attunement”.

According to H. B. Gottschalk, the theory is actually Plato’s own creation. We need to recall that Plato’s main object here is to test his theories of Forms and Recollection and Simmias’ thesis presents a convenient opportunity to refute the views held by the materialists of the time.

H. B. Gottschalk, Soul as Harmonia – JSTOR

Socrates refers to it ironically at 77d-e and Cebes himself laughs at it just as Socrates smiles when Simmias presents his argument:

However, I think you and Simmias would like to carry on this discussion still further. You have the childish fear that when the soul goes out from the body the wind will really blow it away and scatter it, especially if a man happens to die in a high wind and not in calm weather.
And Cebes laughed and said, “Assume that we have that fear, Socrates, and try to convince us”

As shown by Lloyd Gerson, the whole Platonic project is based on an anti-materialist position. Plato believes in non-material intelligence and assumes an intelligent agency as ultimate cause.

So I think the issue of agency is an interesting one especially as at 86c Simmias generalizes his theory to include all the harmoniai found “in all the products of craftsmen.”

This reminds the careful reader of Plato’s Craftsman or Maker of the Cosmos ....

I don't agree with the use of that word 'theistic' in this context. — Wayfarer

I tend to use "theistic" in the sense of "not atheistic" and "spiritual", if you will.

Gerson defines Platonism as consisting of antimaterialist, antimechanist, antinominalist, antirelativist, and antiskeptic elements that predate Plato but were brought together and systematized by Plato and later Platonists.

Another important fact to bear in mind is that Plato does have a theology. However, Plato's theology and "theism" are of a particular form in that they are based on a hierarchy of metaphysical entities or realities from the Gods officially worshiped at Athens (the Olympic Gods), to the cosmic Gods (Sun, Moon, etc.) to the Good or the One. Plato's supreme deity has two aspects, an anthropomorphic one represented by the Maker of the Cosmos and a higher, non-anthropomorphic one, represented by the Good/the One.

The goal of Platonism is knowledge which in its highest form is self-knowledge, self-realization, or self-recognition in which the conscious self or soul realizes its identity with the Universal Consciousness which is ultimate reality.

The process that leads to the highest state consists of three basic phases or stages (1) purification, (2) illumination, and (3) deification or unification.

There are several methods or paths of achieving this: (1) philosophy proper based on intellectual training and contemplation (theoria), (2) religious and devotional practices (theourgia), and (3) the mystery traditions (mysteria).

Depending on the individual's psychological makeup and stage of intellectual and spiritual development, any one of the above paths may be more suitable or effective than the others. In ideal circumstances, a qualified teacher or guide assigns the philosopher to one path or the other. But all three ultimately lead to the same goal and may even be used concomitantly with one another.

It follows that though to some Platonists "God" or the supreme principle is pure universal consciousness or something that is indescribable, unfathomable, etc., to others it may be the Maker of the Universe, or indeed, one of the cosmic Gods such as the Sun. This is why it is rather difficult to describe Platonism as "not theistic" particularly in view of the fact that Plato's works are very much about divine realities. But we must, of course, understand "theistic" in the Platonic sense.

Whilst it is true that we live in a "secular" world with strong anti-theistic tendencies, we must, as far as possible, try to understand Platonism on its own terms. But this is just my opinion.

If what matters most according to the correspondence theory of truth, is the accurate portrayal of a particular or general 'state of affairs' - through language - of reality... — Shawn

Regarding 'correspondence'.

According to correspondence theory, truth consists in the agreement of our thought with reality. This view seems to conform rather closely to our ordinary common sense usage when we speak of truth. The flaws in the definition arise when we ask what is meant by "agreement" or "correspondence" of ideas and objects, beliefs and facts, thought and reality. In order to test the truth of an idea or belief we must presumably compare it with the reality in some sense.

But In order to make the comparison, we must know what it is that we are comparing, namely, the belief on the one hand and the reality on the other. But if we already know the reality, why do we need to make a comparison? And if we don't know the reality, how can we make a comparison?

Also, the making of the comparison is itself a fact about which we have a belief. We have to believe that the belief about the comparison is true. How do we know that our belief in this agreement is "true"? This leads to an infinite regress, leaving us with no assurance of true belief.

Randall, J. & Buchler, J.; Philosophy: An Introduction. p133 (Cribbed from an old forum post.)

then what does mathematics correspond to in reality according to the mind's eye? — Shawn

I think the original rationalist philosophers argued that, because mathematical truths are known directly, i.e. not mediated by sensory perception, then they qualify as a higher form of knowledge than statements concerning things in the sensory domain, such knowledge always being mediated by the senses.

Aristotle, in De Anima, argued that thinking in general (which includes knowledge as one kind of thinking) cannot be a property of a body; it cannot, as he put it, 'be blended with a body'. This is because in thinking, the intelligible object or form is present in the intellect, and thinking itself is the identification of the intellect with this intelligible. Among other things, this means that you could not think if materialism is true… . Thinking is not something that is, in principle, like sensing or perceiving; this is because thinking is a universalising activity. This is what this means: when you think, you see - mentally see - a form which could not, in principle, be identical with a particular - including a particular neurological element, a circuit, or a state of a circuit, or a synapse, and so on. This is so because the object of thinking is universal, or the mind is operating universally.

….the fact that in thinking, your mind is identical with the form that it thinks, means (for Aristotle and for all Platonists) that since the form 'thought' is detached from matter, 'mind' is immaterial too. — Lloyd Gerson, Platonism vs Naturalism

But it also means that the faculty which sees mathematical facts, is of a higher order than the senses. Which is in many ways preserved to this day in science, for instance Galileo's declaration that 'the book of nature is written in mathematics'. Although there is also the view that current physics has itself become lost in math.

But, at any rate, in terms of history of ideas, the Platonist view is that the intellect (nous) is what is able to grasp the forms and reasons of things, through reason and mathematical intuition. This kind of idea has fallen out of favour in modern thought, due to the predominance of nominalism, which rejects any such conception. But there are still platonists in the modern world, including Kurt Godel, and probably also Roger Penrose.

Hmmm ... Very interesting.

As a matter of fact, when I said "alter ego" I did not mean it literally. But now that you point it out, it must be said that:

You and Foolo joined the forum at the same time.

You hold identical beliefs.

You share the same anti-Platonist (and anti-Christian) commitment.

You use identical language and arguments.

Both of you have mysteriously studied Strauss, a non-entity in the field that few people have heard of, but have never heard of top scholars like Gerson and Sedley, etc.

And you always attack Foolo’s interlocutors when he can’t extricate himself from his own nonsense ….

How did you come to that thought? Do you have any explanation for that belief or thought or conviction? Just a feeling? Guess? Personal experience? Inductive or deductive reasoning? If there were such things as general mind, then again where is it? — Corvus

That all of our individual minds also form part of a collective consciousness. Jung's idea of a collective unconscious. The Buddhist doctrine of ālāyavijñāna, the 'storehouse consciousness'. That there is a kind of 'species consciousness' - a form of consciousness common to h. sapiens, mediated by culture and history. Unity of mankind. That kind of thing. But it's very important not to reify it as 'the One Mind', as something objectively real. It's not something we can objectify. (There was a popular 1960's book about Tibetan Buddhism 'liberation through knowing the One Mind', but it was by a Californian theosophist who never set foot in Tibet. Such ideas are very easily misconstrued.)

Good summary but there's a point that it doesn't pick up on.

when you think, you see - mentally see - a form which could not, in principle, be identical with a particular - including a particular neurological element, a circuit, or a state of a circuit, or a synapse, and so on. This is so because the object of thinking is universal, or the mind is operating universally.

….the fact that in thinking, your mind is identical with the form that it thinks, means (for Aristotle and for all Platonists) that since the form 'thought' is detached from matter, 'mind' is immaterial too. — Lloyd Gerson, Platonism V Naturalism

That is something brought out in Aquinas' epistemology also.

What do you find in Parmenides that addresses these questions? — Fooloso4

Not in Parmenides, but in the dialogue, The Parmenides, which is almost wholly concerned with the nature of the forms and possible objections to it. I'm just working through Jowett's intro and translation, which is the edition contained in the Kindle version.

The tradition assumes the former, but recent scholarship points to their affinity. — Fooloso4

Lloyd Gerson maintains that Aristotle was a 'dissident Platonist'. One of his books is 'Aristotle and other Platonists'.' He aims to show that the twentieth-century view that Aristotle started out as a Platonist and ended up as an anti-Platonist is seriously flawed.' Indeed 'hyle' was an Aristotelian term, I believe it actually meant 'lumber' or 'timber', being that which something is made from, but I don't know if that detracts from the general point.

In any case, leaving aside those questions of provenance, the basic intuition of the rational intellect as 'that which perceives the forms' (i.e. the principles or essences) and the senses as 'that which sees the material body', makes sense as a philosophical theory (or it does to me anyway). So the outline is that 'the soul' is both the principle of unity of the body (Phaedrus 246d–e) and the faculty of rational judgement. It is identified with the immortal aspect of the human (in e.g. the Phaedo).

Why were America’s top bankers and industrialists sponsoring anti-Platonist academics? — Apollodorus


I'm not at all convinced by that line of argument. As I said before, I think it's part of the much broader 'culture war' between scientific secularism and religious belief, or even anything that can be so construed. Lloyd Gerson analyses that in his work on 'Platonism and Naturalism': — Wayfarer

When you say "it's part of the much broader 'culture war' between scientific secularism and religious belief", do you include the rhetoric being used by Apollodorus as part of a larger story or reject it? Being unpersuaded is very different from rejection. What Apollodorus is proposing is a cultural war against what allows us to have this conversation.

Let's be clear about what he is claiming: — Fooloso4

I am claiming exactly what Gerson is claiming, i.e. that there is an anti-Platonist movement led by academics with a political agenda. Strauss is a political scientist with a keen interest in politics as can be gathered from the press and from his own statements:

Let me explain: as political scientists we are interested in political phenomena. But we must also be interested, simultaneously, in the political as political

The rest of my claims are from mainstream sources like Wikipedia as per the links provided.

Platonism is a battlefield for leftists and rightists? That doesn't sound very likely. — frank

I never said it was.

Gerson says that "Platonism is philosophy and anti-Platonism is antiphilosophy" and that there is a growing anti-Platonist trend, which I tend to agree with.

But some academics like to see Plato as a "counter-revolutionary" and his Republic as a "handbook for aspiring dictators". Popper claimed that the Republic was the founding text for totalitarianism.

The truth of the matter is that the only time Plato got involved in politics was in Sicily after which he gave up on seeing the kind of intrigues active politics entailed. Dictatorship was totally against his personality and character.

Morosophos’ argument may be “ad populum”, but the “populum” he cites are respected scholars, interpreters and translators. — Leghorn

They may or may not be "respected". It is still ad populum and it doesn't make it right. There are lots of "respected" people that hold unsound opinions ....

Your argument, however, is purely ad hominem: anyone who thinks Plato believed the rulers ought to lie to the people is an anti-Platonist or Straussian, or pro-tyrannical. — Leghorn

That is YOUR interpretation of my argument. In reality, what I am saying is that some people use Plato's "noble lie" to argue that Plato's whole teaching is based on lies and on dictatorial tendencies/ambitions, etc. as Popper does (see Open Society and Its Enemies).

And it is Gerson, a highly respected scholar, who affirms that there is an anti-Platonist trend that started in the 1800's, as stated in my previous posts.

I think it is legitimate to call someone "anti-Platonist" when they claim that Plato is a "liar", a "dictator", that his dialogues "have no metaphysical or even philosophical content", etc.

Would you call Popper a pro-Platonist?