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Plato's Statesman and Xenophon's Cyrus

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Plato's Statesman and Xenophon's Cyrus Plato’s Statesman and Xenophon’s Cyrus* Carol Atack This paper examines the relationship between the political thought of Plato and Xenophon, by positioning both as post-Socratic political theorists. It seeks to show that Xenophon and Plato examine similar themes and participate in a shared discourse in their later political thought, and, in particular, that Plato is responding to Xenophon, with the Statesman exploring similar themes to Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, which itself responds to sections of Plato’s Repub- lic. Both writers explore the themes of the shepherd king and the kairos as attributes of the excellent leader, and both use temporality and political ontol- ogy to do so. As a result, Xenophon’s original contributions to fourth-century BCE political theory should be re-evaluated; his account of episodes in Cyrus’ political development shows him to be participating in a specific mid-fourth century BCE political discourse in which theorists, including Isocrates and later Aristotle as well as Xenophon and Plato, explored the virtue of the good leader.1 Such a reading generates a different assessment from that produced by ‘realist’ readings of his work, which treat Xenophon as a utilitarian purveyor of Machi- avellian power politics. It also answers the claims of analytic philosophers such as Gregory Vlastos, who rejected Xenophon’s account of Socrates for its lack of philosophical rigour, by showing that both Xenophon and Plato engaged in the same discussions, at a point when both were keen to show that their political thought has moved on from concepts such as basilikē technē that they associ- ated with Socrates.2 * This paper draws on my doctoral thesis, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. I would like to thank Melina Tamiolaki, Gabriel Danzig, and David Johnson for their com- ments on earlier versions of this paper at the conference and afterwards. 1 As exemplified by readings of the Cyropaedia which position Cyrus as ‘Xenophon’s Prince’, such as Tatum 1989, Newell 1983, and particularly Nadon 2001. However, reading Xenophon as a precursor to Machiavelli may not be the most fruitful approach (cf. Rasmussen 2009), and may fall foul of the danger of prolepsis, identified by JGA Pocock and Quentin Skinner as a weakness of non-contextualist readings of historical political thought (Pocock 2009, Skin- ner 1969: 22–27), also Skinner 2002: 72–79. Although Pocock and Skinner’s Cambridge School methodology has been criticised from a Straussian perspective (e.g., Major 2005), the Straus- sian flavour of much scholarship on the Cyropaedia means that a Cambridge School reading can provide a valuable alternative route to interpreting Xenophon’s arguments. 2 Vlastos 1983, criticised by Morrison 1987, andWood andWood 1986. For more on the contested concept of basilikē technē see n. 20 and 21, and especially Dorion 2004, now also Dorion 2013: © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2018 | doi: 10.1163/9789004369085_021 plato’s statesman and xenophon’s cyrus 511 This reading of Xenophon positions his theories of leadership and kingship within a broader debate on monarchy as a form of political rule that takes place within fourth-century Greek political thought. It shows how both Plato and Xenophon use the topos of single-person rule, with Xenophon’s narrative account in the Cyropaedia addressing many themes that Plato in the States- man explores through more obviously ontological and epistemological enquiry. That both works cover similar theoretical ground has been suggested by sev- eral scholars, each with differing approaches both to these texts and to their political theory (see Ray 1992, Breebaart 1983, and Skemp 1952: 59–61). To these readers, it is apparent that Xenophon’s narrative addresses the same concerns as Plato’s dialogue. By focusing on the presence of these more abstract con- cerns, identified through the appearance of key themes and terms within the narrative of the Cyropaedia, it is possible to develop a reading that acknowl- edges Xenophon as a political theorist and philosopher with complex ideas of his own and a deep engagement with the concerns of his contemporaries.3 When Xenophon is resituated in his intellectual context, it becomes possible to discern the discourse in which he participates and his contribution to it more clearly. Chronology and Context There is no entirely secure, detailed chronology for the works of either Xeno- phon or Plato, but both the Cyropaedia and the Statesman are broadly held to date to the 360s BCE, and they can be read as more-or-less contemporary, and perhaps, overlapping contributions to the same discourse (see Brandwood 1992 147–169. basilikē technē will re-emerge at the end of Plato’s Statesman (Plt. 311c1–2), but as a thoroughly reconceptualised and somewhat mystical process of weaving together good citi- zens into the secure fabric of a unified city. 3 Although this paper is focused on the relationship between the ideas of the Cyropaedia and the Statesman, this relationship also has implications for Aristotle’s use of the Cyropaedia in sections of his Politics; where Kevin Cherry (Cherry 2012) explores in detail the well-known interchange between the Statesman and the Politics, he does not consider Aristotle’s use of Xenophon (cf. Campbell 1867: liv–lvi). But key themes of both the Politics and Nicomachean Ethics, notably geometric mechanisms for distributive justice (e.g., Eth. Nic. 5.3.1131a10–b24, Pol. 3.12.1282b14–1283a3, Xen. Cyr. 2.2.17–28, 2.3.7–16), and the friendship of rulers (Eth. Nic. 8.10.1160b22–32, Pol. 3.16.1287b25–36, Cyr. 8.2.1–4, 13, 19), are explored by Xenophon in the Cyropaedia; see also Tamiolaki’s exploration of the relationship between Plato and Xeno- phon’s thought on friendship in the Lysis and Memorabilia in this volume 433–460..
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