Plato's Use Of Rhetoric

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Throughout history, there have been numerous approaches and opinions as to the uses of rhetoric and how it is ethically applied. Being such a valuable tool, scholars have debated continuously throughout time to determine the right way to use and think about rhetoric- often times having completely different stances and not budging. In this paper, we are specifically looking at three philosophers, all respected in their time and still studied today, and trying to explain their approaches to rhetoric and how they see it best used. Plato, Isocrates and Aristotle each give distinct standpoints on the matter, they not only challenge but also break down any pre-existing notions about rhetoric. This brings us to the second aspect of this paper, relating …show more content…
Being an Athenian teacher, and student of Socrates, he shared a lot of the same criticisms of rhetoric that his teacher did- not necessarily agreeing with the sophists at all. In fact, most of Platos work regarding rhetoric is viewed as a direct attack on the sophists. In his two writings, Gorgias and Phaedrus, Plato used dialogue between characters to uncover thoughts and truths about rhetoric. Essentially, Plato’s biggest problem with the sophists and their approach to rhetoric, is the fact that they merely saw it as a means of persuasion and basis to build laws and justice upon. This brought him to his studies of what he called “arts” and “sham-arts”. The uses of rhetoric he noted with the sophists were “sham-arts”, for example make-up and cookery as opposed to gymnastics and medicine (regarding the body). In the same way he looked at “sham-arts” of the soul which would be sophistic and rhetoric, where the arts would be legislation and justice. Plato was entirely concerned with truth, and to him the sophists used rhetoric to blur the truth, by really only teaching or pushing opinion. Plato made it very clear, that rhetoric deals only with persuasion which can stray from the truth, while philosophy seeks the pure …show more content…
He founded the school of Athens and developed the use of a curriculum. He wanted to get rid of the flash in speeches that had become popular with the sophist, and focus on the facts. Isocrates believed that is was important to respond to the past and critique the present sophist rhetoric. He noted that sophist teachers claimed to know everything and often engaged in paradoxes. However he often straddled the line between benefits of the sophists and their approach to logos. Because of his focus on trait theory he believed that human nature was pre-formed. Isocrates also believed that students must recognize the nature of the orator and the amount of work required to study below them. The study relates to personal improvement and the reputation of Athens, if you are speaking and you are Athenian then you are representing
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