Who Is Socrates Rejection Of Alcibiades In Plato's...

Socrates’ rejection of Alcibiades in Plato’s Symposium clearly demonstrates the former’s understanding of the art of love as presented to him by Diotima. Diotima outlines the art of love in a very particular way, laying out its origins, its characteristic properties, and its relation to the Form of Beauty. Socrates rejection seamlessly aligns with this description and demonstrates all of these essential concepts. The result is that Socrates ends up deity of sorts, endowed with wisdom unpossessed by any other mortal during his time. Plato undoubtedly uses this alignment as a linguistic device to establish Socrates as the physical embodiment of Love. It must be noted the broader, more general use of the word love is presented interchangeably with its physical embodiment Love in the Symposium. I will be laying out the origins and essential characteristics of the art of love, being sure to distinguish between the ambiguous use of love/Love before then highlighting how in each case, Socrates’ rejection of Alcibiades aligns with the properties.

Diotima’s account begins with the origins of Love and its role in matters of god and mortals. The first conclusion she and Socrates reach is that Love is neither beautiful nor good, but also neither ugly nor bad (Sym. 202a). This is because, according to Socrates, all gods are …show more content…
Those who are pregnant in body gain immortality by producing heirs. Those who are pregnant in soul are impregnated with wisdom and virtue and give birth by sharing these ideas with others (208e). One who is pregnant in the soul will seek out others who are similar and will aim to create bonds with younger men in order to share this wisdom—for it is more gratifying that the physical expression of love. She focuses on this second kind of reproduction and considers it better because words endure longer than do people

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Who Is Socrates Rejection Of Alcibiades In Plato's Symposium