Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Justice in ancient Greece
Ancient greek justice system
Ancient greek justice system
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
The apology is a form of speech that was addressed to a jury of some 500 Athenians by Socrates in his defense. He was accused with the charge of corrupting the youth and refused in believing in the gods of the state. He starts his speech by addressing the old accuser first. He claims that many before Meletus over the years had accused him. He says that while Meletus is the reason why he is there today, it is the multitude of the voice of old accusers that will get him convicted. People say that he makes outlandish claims and that he corrupts the youth. Also, that he refuses to believe in the gods of the state. He claimed that he knew nothing and that he lacks the ability to instruct the youth on how to make a weak argument stronger. Socrates …show more content…
He makes two points one that no man would wish evil up his self. He knows that if he does evil then in return that evil will come back to him. So, to say that he is intentionally corrupting the youth is absurd. But if he does corrupt the youth its unintentional and therefore doesn’t need to be brought to court but needs to be cautioned privately. Meletus is still insistent on his accusations. So, he goes on to make his second point that Meletus is contradicting his own accusations by saying that he corrupts the youth by teaching them things like virtue, wisdom, and pertaining to divinities but to teach anything pertaining to gods he must acknowledge the gods in some way. But Meletus accused him of not acknowledging the gods of the state. So, therefor Meletus must be lying. He says that Meletus doesn’t care about the youth of the Athens but has a grudge against him and that’s why he wants him dead.
He goes on to compare himself to a gadfly. I didn’t know what a gadfly was, so I had to research. He says that what he does is to wake up the people of Athens from their slumber and that he will not stop even on the pain of death because it’s good for them. He goes on to make the point that if he really is corrupting the youth then why is it that the relatives of that very youth come to his defense showing that Meletus is
In “The Apology,” Socrates represents himself in his own trial. He boldly questions the morality of the people of court. In this report, I will be analyzing portions of “The Apology” in order to reveal the intellectuality of this text within this time frame. I will only discuss bits of “The Apology“ on account that it is a lengthy piece. However, before discussing the speech it is important to set the scene. Socrates was born in 469 B.C.E. and lived to 399 B.C.E. (Nails, 2014). What we do know about him is second-hand knowledge, or recounts from his former students, Plato and Xenophon (“Plato and Socrates”). Nevertheless, his legacy has influenced philosophy and continues to do so.
In the Melian Dialogue, it describes the negotiation between the people of Athens and the people of Melos. The people of Melos wants their independence and the Athenians who wanted to invade and expand their territory. “Because you would have the advantage of submitting before suffering the worst, and we should gain by not destroying you”. The Athenians were giving the Melian leadership an ultimatum. They could surrender or the Athenians would take over. “While the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must”. The Athenians are demonstrating dictatorial actions on the Melians. There is also evidence in that again in the Athenian dialogue. “Of the gods we believe, and of men we know, that by a necessary law of their nature they rule wherever they can. All we do is to make use of it, knowing that you and everybody else, having the same power as we have would do the same as we do”. The Athenians believe that it is their right to take over the Melians and any country they would like to control because they
Socrates is an evil doer, and a curious person, who searches into things under earth and in heaven, and he makes the worse appear the better cause; and he teaches the aforesaid doctrines to others.” (Plato). Socrates then questions him again about whether or not he alleges that he corrupts the youth intentionally or unintentionally. Meletus’ reply was that he did it intentionally.
Plato's The Apology is an account of the speech. Socrates makes at the trial in which he is charged with not recognizing the gods recognized by the state, inventing new gods, and corrupting the youth of Athens. For the most part, Socrates speaks in a very plain, conversational manner. He explains that he has no experience with the law courts and that he will instead speak in the manner to which he is accustomed with honesty and directness. Socrates then proceeds to interrogate Meletus, the man primarily responsible for bringing Socrates before the jury. He strongly attacks Meletus for wasting the court¡¦s time on such absurd charges. He then argues that if he corrupted the young he did so unknowingly since Socrates believes that one never deliberately acts wrongly. If Socrates neither did not corrupt the young nor did so unknowingly, then in both cases he should not be brought to trial. The other charge is the charge of impiety. This is when Socrates finds an inconsistency in Meletus¡¦ belief that Socrates is impious. If he didn¡¦t believe in any gods then it would be inconsistent to say that he believed in spiritual things, as gods are a form of a spiritual thing. He continues to argue against the charges, often asking and answering his own questions as if he were speaking in a conversation with one of his friends. He says that once a man has found his passion in life it would be wrong of him to take into account the risk of life or death that such a passion might involve.
Plato’s “Defense of Socrates” follows the trial of Socrates for charges of corruption of the youth. His accuser, Meletus, claims he is doing so by teaching the youth of Athens of a separate spirituality from that which was widely accepted.
...ust have had more of the things that the gods cared about. The Melians would have been hard pressed to argue that they had more favor amongst the gods than the Athenians, because anything of virtue that they could claim to have had, the Athenians could claimed to have had but more or better. The Melian argument then that they were favored by the gods and therefore must remain free is inconsistent. If Athens and Melos went to battle against each other, the gods, if they favored anyone, would favor Athens.
During Socrates’ life on earth, he challenged traditional thinking in an honest, down to earth way and set the fundamentals of modern western philosophy. However, meletus, a young, egotistical person with the goal to destroy Socrates’ life for “corrupting the yout,” condemned him to death. Conversely, Meletus was actually the person who corrupted the youth for two obvious reasons; he is ignorant and careless.
In the Apology, Socrates examines the charges brought against him by Meletus and tries to prove that they are false. The first charge brought against him is that he was corrupting the youth. Socrates responds to this by asking Meletus in his opinion, how Socrates was corrupting the youth. Meletus says that Socrates was teaching the youth to go against the government. Socrates asks if there was anyone who was beneficial for the youth. Meletus says that the council, jury, assembly, even the general public was beneficial to the youth and that Socrates was the only person corrupting them. Socrates claims that it was impossible for the one person to be capable of corrupting the youth when they had so many to show them in the right direction.
In the opening of The Apology, Socrates informed the jurors how he intends to address them, what they should pay attention to in his remarks, and what he sees as his greatest obstacle in gaining an acquittal. How does he intend to address the jury? Socrates’ approach towards addressing the jury is way different than what you would see a normal defendant doing. Socrates does not stand in front of the jury and beg that he doesn’t get charged. Instead, Socrates believes that you shouldn’t have to cry and beg for the right to live in court if the defendant has done nothing wrong. The first thing that he says when speaking to the jury was to basically hear him out, and listen to even if he started to talk in his language of habit. He then said they should excuse that because he is seventy years old and has never appeared in court. “I must beg of you to grant me one favor, If you hear me using the same words in my defense which I have been in habit of using, and which most of you may have heard in the agora, and at the table of the money-changers, or anywhere else, I would ask you to not be surprised at this, and bot to interrupt me (Dover p. 19).”
Socrates reacts to the cost that he is responsible for corrupting the youngsters, in two methods. The first way tries to reveal that Meletus’ cost is “frivolous” on the causes that it does not comply with possible illustrations of how animals become damaged. Under asking from Socrates, Meletus allows that all of individuals of Athens except Socrates conserve the youngsters of Athens; Socrates alone corrupts them. Yet this is implausible, Socrates indicates, for in some instances of crime, such as the crime of horse by bad entrepreneurs, the opposite is the situation, with only one or a individuals gaining them, and a lot of individuals corrupting them.
When asked if there’s anyone in the world who would knowingly choose to be harmed, Meletus replies with “Of course not.”, yet he still insists that Socrates intentionally corrupts the youth (p. 56). Socrates knows that those who are wicked will not only cause harm to strangers, but also will cause harm to those who are close to them (p. 56). Socrates is close to those he teaches and does not want to bring harm to himself (p. 56). Therefore, Socrates would never intentionally corrupt the youth (p.56). Socrates goes on to argue that even if he was unwillingly corrupting the youth of Athens, Meletus’ charges would still hold no real value as it would be an involuntary misdemeanor (p. 56).When somebody unknowingly commits a crime they aren’t summoned to court, they are taken aside and made to see the error of their ways (p. 56). So why was Socrates dragged to court? If someone had tried to enlighten Socrates, and had helped him to see that what he was doing was wrong, then he would have stopped doing that which was unintentional (p. 56). Socrates concludes this part of his argument by stating that no one had tried to enlighten him and by once again questioning why he was brought to court, when court is intended for people who need to be punished, not for people who need to be enlightened (p.
In his examination of Meletus, Socrates makes three main points: 1) Meletus has accused Socrates of being the only corrupter, while everyone else improves the youth. Socrates then uses an analogy: a horse trainer is to horses as an improver is to the youth. The point is that there is only one improver, not many. 2) If Socrates corrupts the youth, either it is intentional or unintentional. No one would corrupt his neighbor intentionally, because he would harm himself in the process. If the corruption was unintentional, then the court is not the place to resolve the problem. The other possibility is that he does not corrupt them at all. 3) In frustration, Meletus accuses Socrates of being "a complete atheist," at the same time he claims Socrates teaches new gods. Thus, Meletus contradicts himself. Socrates argues that fear of death is foolish, because it is not known if death is a good or an evil, thus there is no reason to fear death.
Therefore, it is less likely the youth have been corrupted by Socrates than by some larger group of people (educators, council members, jurymen etc.). Socrates was also put on trial for being an Atheist. In the argument Socrates has with Meletus, Socrates gets Meletus to admit that Socrates is an Atheist and a theist. Considering that both of these practices are totally incompatible, and Meletus admits to both of theses, maybe Meletus does not really understand what he is accusing Socrates of. I understand that back then not believing in religion was considered a crime but to actually sentence someone to death for being different is totally uncalled for.
The charges against Socrates were brought upon him by a man names Meletus. Meletus was a young man that Socrates did not know very well. These charges brought on by Meletus caused the indictment of Socrates. One of the charges in the affidavit written by Meletus against Socrates is that he is "corrupting the youth." Another charge that is brought upon Socrates is that of he is making up new Gods and disregarding the old Gods the Athenians believe in. These were the charges brought on Socrates.
In the Apology Socrates is presenting his case before the jury due to an accusation on three accounts: not recognizing the gods recognized by the state, inventing new deities, and corrupting the youth of Athens. He presents his “defense” however in contrast to the scholarly definition of the term. He instead informs the jury of his philosophies and converses with them, stating that he must be wiser than ... ... middle of paper ... ... wisest, and justest, and best of all the men whom I have ever known” (118a).