Similarities Between Euthyphro And Apology

After a critical reading of all three of these texts, it becomes apparent that there is a clear hierarchy of the different forms of justice. In Sophocles’ Antigone, it is shown that in society it is often the ideal of human justice that is put into action, but to people divine justice would often take precedence. This idea is echoed in Plato’s Euthyphro and Apology where this human (or political) justice is eventually put into actions, while this theoretical higher form of justice – philosophical – is brushed aside. While it may not be the most relevant of these forms of justice, it is shown again and again that human/political justice will almost always be in opposition to forms of justice that supersede humanities ideals. This aforementioned

While Antigone advocates the importance of divine justice taking precedence, Creon demands that human law and justice are to be followed. This interaction is paralleled in Plato’s Apology in that the individuals who judge Socrates put political justice in a higher regard than the true form of justice. This opposition to other forms of justice seems inherent in both human and political justice as it is an entirely subjective form of the idea. Both of these concepts are rooted firmly in an individuals’ beliefs as opposed to any actual idea of justice. Since they are both relatively arbitrary in that they differ from person to person, state to state, etc. they would be at the bottom of this justice hierarchy. As Antigone

In the case of Antigone, although the human punishment was doled out, a sort of divine punishment was given to Creon with his family committing suicide and his people likely turning on him. In the latter case, while Socrates was sentenced to death, his teachings continued on and the ideal he argued for could never truly be killed as ideas is all they were, while human justice is ever changing and thus