About the ἱροὶ λόγοι which he keeps back, see cap. 51, 61, 62, 81, 170, &c.
[13] Aristoph. Nubes, 905-1080.
[14] Aristoph. Nubes, 994-1333-1444. Xenophon, Mem. i. 2, 49. Σωκράτης — τοὺς πατέρας προπηλακίζειν ἐδίδασκε (accusation by Melêtus).
Dramatic moral set forth by Aristophanes against Sokrates and the freethinkers, is here retorted by Plato against the orthodox champion.
Now in the dialogue here before us, Plato retorts this attack. Euthyphron possesses in the fullest measure the virtues of a believer. He believes not only all that orthodox Athenians usually believed respecting the Gods, but more besides.[15] His faith is so implicit, that he proclaims it as accurate knowledge, and carries it into practice with full confidence; reproaching other orthodox persons with inconsistency and short-coming, and disregarding the judgment of the multitude, as Sokrates does in the Kriton.[16] Euthyphron stands forward as the champion of the Gods, determined not to leave unpunished the man who has committed impiety, let him be who he may.[17] These lofty religious pretensions impel him, with full persuasion of right, to indict his own father for homicide, under the circumstances above described. Now in the eyes of the Athenian public, there could hardly be any act more abhorrent, than that of a man thus invoking upon his father the severest penalties of law. It would probably be not less abhorrent than that of a son beating his own father. When therefore we read, in the Nubes of Aristophanes, the dramatic moral set forth against Sokrates, “See the consequences to which free-thinking and the new system of education lead[18] — the son Pheidippides beating his own father, and justifying the action as right, by citing the violence of Zeus towards his father Kronus” — we may take the Platonic Euthyphron as an antithesis to this moral, propounded by a defender of Sokrates, “See the consequences to which consistent orthodoxy and implicit faith conduct. The son Euthyphron indicts his own father for homicide; he vindicates the step as conformable to the proceedings of the gods; he even prides himself on it as championship on their behalf, such as all religious men ought to approve.”[19]
[15] Plato, Euthyphron, c. 6, p. 6 B. καὶ ἔτι γε τούτων θαυμασιώτερα, ἃ οἱ πολλοὶ οὐκ ἴσασιν.
Euthyphron belonged to the class described in Euripides, Hippol. 45:—
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Ὅσοι μεν οὖν γραφάς τε τῶν παλαιτέρων Ἔχοισιν, αὐτοί τ’ εἰσὶν ἐν μούσαις ἀεί, Ἴσασιν, &c. |
Compare also Euripid. Herakleidæ, 404.
[16] Plato, Euthyphron, c. 4, p. 5 A; c. 6, p. 6 A.