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The Piety of Thought in Plato's Republic, Book 1 Author(S): Darrell Dobbs Source: the American Political Science Review, Vol The Piety of Thought in Plato's Republic, Book 1 Author(s): Darrell Dobbs Source: The American Political Science Review, Vol. 88, No. 3 (Sep., 1994), pp. 668-683 Published by: American Political Science Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2944802 Accessed: 10/12/2010 23:53 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. 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American Political Science Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The American Political Science Review. http://www.jstor.org American Political Science Review Vol. 88, No. 3 September 1994 THEPIETY OF THOUGHT IN PLATO'SREPUBLIC, BOOK 1 DARRELL DOBBS Marquette University n the opening sentence of the Republic, Socrates recounts his intention to combine the operations of piety and theoretical speculation. Nevertheless, many readers regard Cephalus' subsequent abandonment of rational inquiry to perform certain sacred rites as a definitive indication of Plato's opinion that piety and philosophy are fundamentally incompatible. Ifind this interpretation untenable inasmuch as it depends upon the misidentification of Cephalus as the dialogue's representative of piety. I suggest that the true nature and philosophical significance of piety are indicated instead in Socrates' conversation with Cephalus' son, Polemarchus. As this conversation unfolds, Polemarchus' pious inclinations culminate in a perception of the dearness of the unknown good. Inspired by this piety, Socrates and Polemarchus defend the conventional paragon Simonides and, at the same time, launch a truly philosophical inquiry into justice. lato's Republic is reputed to be one among a in the art of dialectic, invites us to call such divisions handful of the greatest works ever written on eidetic or ponderableparts in order to distinguish them the theme of social justice and personal happi- from the mere pieces into which any whole may be ness. Yet if we should wish to verify this judgment, thoughtlessly-or even methodically-broken (States- and to derive the benefit of its insight for ourselves, man 262c8-263bll). we would confront an extraordinary challenge in the In such passages Plato encourages the practice of complexity and sheer size of the work. This challenge dialectical analysis upon his own writings. But on might seem to outrun every endeavor, for the better what basis may we undertake the dialectical task of acquainted one becomes with the Republic, the more dividing Plato's Republic into ponderable parts? time-consuming becomes the consideration of any Clearly, some grasp of the dialogue as a whole is given section of it. The pace of successive readings required before one can reasonably venture upon such tends to slow. Eventually one opens the text only to a division. But whence comes this division-initiating ponder at length the significance of a single phrase or understanding of the whole? Surely, it cannot origi- dramatic event. Such a meditation can be exquisitely nate in a concentrated study of ponderable parts, for pleasant. But what is there to prevent so closely this begs the question of which parts are correctly focused a study from losing its bearings? How might identified as ponderable. Neither can it derive from the student keep from losing sight of the forest for the blind trust in the judgment of more experienced trees? students, for this begs the question of the basis of the It would be incongruous, to say the least, were a more experienced student's understanding. The only professional academic to deny the relevance of this escape from this impasse lies in the possibility that dilemma to the study of Plato's Republic. For it is the the understanding needed to guide the division of achievement of synopsis (the capacity to see simulta- the dialogue into ponderable parts is somehow acces- neously both the forest and the trees) that the Republic sible even to the novice upon an initial reading of the submits as evidence of a dialectical nature and thus as entire work.2 The contours of the very surface of the testimony of one's being qualified to undertake ad- work might then be said to reveal its natural articu- vanced studies in the first place (537b8-c7).' So it is lations. Leo Strauss put it well when he declared in incumbent upon every reader, when approaching the case of such a work that "the problem inherent in this dialogue, to consider how the forester's dilemma the surface of things, and only in the surface of things, might be resolved. Now, Socrates himself offers a key is the heart of things" (1958, 13). to the resolution of this dilemma in his remarks on Plato employs his luminous poetic talent accord- the art of writing (Phaedrus264c2-266cl). In a properly ingly, to epitomize the profoundest themes of his constructed composition, he maintains, one finds philosophical compositions. One of his customary something like the integrity of a living body. Where devices in this undertaking is the ethological mime, such integrity obtains, the natural articulations or the representation of an action in which all pretense joints of a composition mark off segments that are is stripped away and an interlocutor reveals himself intelligible precisely as parts of a whole. We may say, both in character and in thought (see Klein 1965, 18). then, that the very divisions that call for detailed The first example of such a mimesis in the Republic study also summon, at the same time, a recollection reaches a climax early in book 1, with the departure of of the whole. By concentrating attention on such Cephalus. The importance of Cephalus' departure is divisions, the student is able to think and to talk further highlighted by its conspicuous reversal of the about the most minute textual details in a wholly dialogue's dramatic momentum. In the beginning, nonreductive manner. Plato's Eleatic Stranger, expert Socrates and Glaucon are together. These two are 668 American Political Science Review Vol. 88, No. 3 soon joined by Polemarchus, Adeimantus, Niceratus, Republicof a concern for the relationship of piety and and some others. This ensemble then makes its way inquiry. In the dialogue's opening sentence, Socrates to Polemarchus' house, where await Lysias, Euthy- reports his own intention of combining these diver- demus, Thrasymachus, Charmantides, Cleitophon, gent operations. To appreciate the full significance of and Cephalus, the father of Polemarchus. A conver- this remark, however, we must keep in mind that the sation is presently launched concerning the nature of Republic is, in form, a narrated dialogue-and a justice. Although this conversation continues into the particular kind of narrated dialogue at that. Plato early hours of the morning, not a single member of assigns the role of narrator in the Republicto Socrates. the congregation is said to depart, except for Ceph- In this role, Socrates reports not only what he and alus. Cephalus abandons the inquiry in its infancy. others said and did on the preceding day but also The old man departs because, as he says, "the time is what he thought then and what he thinks now, with come when I must tend to the sacred things" (331d7). the benefit of hindsight, of those words and deeds. Cephalus' departure surely stands as one of the So Plato puts Socrates forward as a uniquely author- most striking dramatic events in the dialogue. As itative commentator on the conversation reported in such, it invites comparison with the violent eruption the Republic. Nevertheless, even in his narration of Thrasymachus, who hurls himself at Socrates and Socrates leaves many things unexplained. For exam- Polemarchus "like a wild beast" (336b5-6). But the ple, the occasion of his recapitulation of the previous antagonism represented by Thrasymachus' outburst day's doings is not itself described. Nor is there any is composed in the course of the conversation. indication of the existence (much less the identity) of Socrates later states that he and Thrasymachus have any auditor or auditors. Socrates, to all appearances, become friends, though they were not even enemies is talking to himself. Of course, we readers are the before (498c6-dl). Cephalus' departure, on the other intended audience-ultimately. But within the frame hand, is final. He never returns. So if even Thrasy- of the dialogue, Socrates addresses his rehearsal to no machus (the sometime champion of might over right) one but himself. The reader evidently is witness to an can be reconciled to Socrates, it would seem that exercise in personal recollection, a soliloquy.5 Now a Cephalus' complete break with Socrates and the soliloquy is a speech spoken with a level of candor community of inquiry must portend an issue of not to be expected in the public discourse of a considerable importance.
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