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Plato's Dialogues #2

Phaedo

plato eva brann peter kalkavage eric salem

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This is an English translation of one of Plato's great dialogues of Socrates talking about death, dying, and the soul due to his impending execution. Included is an introduction and glossary of key terms.

Focus Philosophical Library translations are close to and are non-interpretative of the original text, with the notes and a glossary intending to provide the reader with some sense of the terms and the concepts as they were understood by Plato’s immediate audience.

120 pages, Paperback

First published January 1,-0380
Series
Plato/s Dialogues
Literary awards
جائزة الدولة التشجيعية في الفلسفة لعام, 

This edition

Format
120 pages, Paperback
Published
September 1, 1998 by Focus
ISBN
9780941051699
ASIN
0941051692
Language
English

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About the author

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plato

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Plato (Greek: Πλάτων), born Aristocles (c. 427 – 348 BC), was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the written dialogue and dialectic forms. He raised problems for what became all the major areas of both theoretical philosophy and practical philosophy, and was the founder of the Platonic Academy, a philosophical school in Athens where Plato taught the doctrines that would later become known as Platonism.
Plato's most famous contribution is the theory of forms (or ideas), which has been interpreted as advancing a solution to what is now known as the problem of universals. He was decisively influenced by the pre-Socratic thinkers Pythagoras, Heraclitus, and Parmenides, although much of what is known about them is derived from Plato himself.
Along with his teacher Socrates, and Aristotle, his student, Plato is a central figure in the history of philosophy. Plato's entire body of work is believed to have survived intact for over 2,400 years—unlike that of nearly all of his contemporaries. Although their popularity has fluctuated, they have consistently been read and studied through the ages. Through Neoplatonism, he also greatly influenced both Christian and Islamic philosophy. In modern times, Alfred North Whitehead famously said: "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato."

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Profile Image for Kimberly .
Umezono
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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interesting take on the relationship between the body and the soul; the body nails the soul, it is a disease which is a hindrance for the attainment of that which is pure and eternal !! (the symbolic meaning of Socrate’s last sentence still puzzles me though; he infers that life is a disease whilst having preached an optimistic attitude towards it his whole life)
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shacklesburst
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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What the hell happened here? Socrates went from talking about if the soul continues to exist after the body dies to his own version of Journey to the Center of the Earth.

And what shitty friends, I’m sure Socrates would have much preferred to have that young lad he was eyeing at the gym spend time with him on his last day of life rather than talking about fucking odd and even numbers.
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Ash_Sri
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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Socrates' last discussion before being executed as recorded by Plato from the perspective of Socrates' former students, Phaedo...
The discussion expounds on the afterlife and the soul's immortality to which he presents four arguments:
1. Argument from Opposites - i.e. a perpetual cycle of life and death, when we die we do not stay dead, but come back to life after a time.
2. Theory of Recollection - i.e. learning is actually recollecting what is already known
3. Argument from Affinity - i.e. there is a distinction between things which are immaterial, invisible, and immortal such as the soul, and things which are material, visible, and perishable such as the body. Therefore the soul is immortal and survives death.
4. Form of Life - i.e. all things possess qualities which prove that they are part of some unchanging and invisible form. This Form of Life is a property of the soul, therefore the soul is anything but alive.
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fernyxferny
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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Μονίμως ξεχνιέμαι και δεν ανεβάζω τα βιβλία στο goodreads όταν τα τελειώνω ή δεν ανεβάζω τις κριτικές στην ώρα μου.
Τέλος πάντων.

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mizu_girl
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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Lovely read.
Philosophical Drama, story of Socrates before his death.
So descriptively he had explained the virtue of Death with several enumerations.
I guess, each line one can takes as a quote of this book.
So amazing book and Highly recommended to all readers.

Some of Finest Quotes are
"I am afraid that other people do not realize that the one aim of those who practice philosophy in the proper manner is to practice for dying and death." (Socrates)
"For whenever it attempts to examine anything with the body, it is clearly deceived by it." (Socrates)
"when men are interrogated in the right manner, they always give the right answer of their own accord, and they could not do this if they did not possess the knowledge and the right explanation inside them." (Cebes)
"These equal things and the Equal itself are therefore not the same?" (Socrates)
"Then before we began to see or hear or otherwise perceive, we must have possessed knowledge of the Equal itself if we were about to refer our sense perceptions of equal objects to it, and realized that all of them were eager to be like it, but were inferior." (Socrates)
"If then one wished to know the cause of each thing, why it comes to be or perishes or exists, one had to find what was the best way for it to be or to be acted upon, or to act." (Socrates)
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Deadman_Nikki
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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This book consists of a long conversation between the soon-to-be-executed Socrates and some of his erudite friends. It is quite a beautiful meditation on the nature of death, and the immortality of the soul.
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hamliet
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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I'll admit it presents traditional presuppositions in a clear, direct way. And it admits itself based on pure speculation: "Of course no reasonable person ought to insist that the facts are exactly as I have described them, but that either this or something very like it is a true account of our souls and their future habitation" (114d).

But then we get the wholesale assumptions about life's proper order:

"When soul and body are both in the same place, nature teaches the one to serve and be subject, the other to rule and govern. In this relation, which do you think resembles the divine and which the mortal part? Don't you think that it is the nature of the divine to rule and direct, and that of the mortal to be subject and serve?" (80a)
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Chiibi
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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Il n'était pas inutile de relire ce dialogue, habituellement présenté avec "l'Apologie de Socrate" et "Criton". Ce dialogue est l'un des plus célèbre du fameux philosophe athénien. Il relate la mort de Socrate, condamné à boire la ciguë par un jugement l'ayant accusé d'impiété et de corruption de la jeunesse. Profitant d'un sursis dû à un pèlerinage commémorant l'époque de Thésée, ses amis le retrouvent dans sa prison, et profitent des derniers instants en sa compagnie pour philosopher sur la mort. Si Platon évoque le thème de l'immortalité de l'âme, et de son jugement après la mort en fonction de la moralité des actes accompli lors de la vie (en particulier dans la lettre VII), il n'est nulle part aussi complet qu'en ce dialogue sur le sujet. Voilà donc où ce mythe égyptien devient fameux. Sans doute les gentils furent préparés par ce texte à l'adoption de la chrétienté, sans doute la chrétienté a t elle été aussi inspirée par ces mythes. Même en restant sceptique aux idées avancées par Socrate, tout à fait à rebours de l'empirisme, il est impossible de rester insensible à la beauté du texte, et à la finesse, à l'honnêteté et au courage de cet homme remarquable, qui meure comme il a vécu.
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