1 Belfiore Introduction Pages From Belfiore Daimonic Art

Introduction: overview of the erotic dialogues
1.1 er os and philosophia

Of the three speeches in the first half of the Phaedrus, the first is delivered
by Phaedrus, who attributes it to Lysias, while the second and third are
given by Socrates. Socrates first speech argues, like Lysias speech, that a
lover is harmful to his beloved, and that a boy should grant his sexual favors
to a man who is not in love instead of to a lover. However, Socrates recants
in his second speech, which praises the lover. At the end of this second
speech, Socrates prays to Eros not to take away the erotic art (erotike
techne) that is essential to his philosophical activities:
This palinode, dear Eros, has been given and offered in payment to you, the most
beautiful and the best I am able to make, especially considering that it had to
be spoken in a somewhat poetic style, for Phaedrus sake. In forgiveness for my
previous words, and in gratitude for these, be kind and gracious, and do not in
anger take away or weaken the erotic art [erotike techne] that you gave me. Allow
me to be held in honor by the beautiful even more than now . . . [And as for Lysias,]
turn him toward philosophy . . . so that his lover here [sc. Phaedrus] may no longer
be of two minds, as he is now, but dedicate his life wholly to eros together with
philosophical words. (257a3b6)1
Eros is also a major theme in the Socratic dialoguesthose in which Socrates
is protagonist of many ancient writers other than Plato. Some characterize
Socrates concern with eros in a positive way. For example, in the Alcibiades
of Aeschines, Socrates claims to have benefited Alcibiades by means of eros
(di t rn).2 In the works of other writers, however, Socrates connection
with eros is represented in a very negative fashion. For example, Phaedos
1 Following Rowe 1988, on 257b6, I read eros, not Eros. Throughout this study I leave eros
untranslated or I translate it as love or passionate desire. On the different senses of the Greek
term see further below I.2.
2 Aeschines, Alcibiades: SSR, frag. VI A53, quoted by Kahn 1996: 21, whose ch. 1 provides an excellent
survey of the theme of eros and philosophy in the Sokratikoi logoi.
1
2 Socrates Daimonic Art
dialogue Zopyrus opposes Socrates erotic tendencies to his devotion to
philosophy. Here, the physiognomist Zopyrus, reading Socrates character
from his physical appearance, states that he is stupid and a womanizer.
Socrates says that Zopyrus is right: these are his natural weaknesses, but he
has overcome them by the study of philosophy.3
In Platos own dialogues, as in the passage from the Phaedrus just quoted,
eros is often associated with philosophy in a positive way. In other passages
and dialogues of Plato, however, eros is opposed to reason and philosophy.
In the Phaedo, Socrates says that eros is among the affections of the body that
impede wisdom (phronesis) and philosophy (64c468c3, especially 66c28).
In the Republic, Cephalus quotes with approval Sophocles characterization
of sex (t frodsia) as a mad master (1.329b8d2), Glaucon agrees that
the pleasures of sex are mad (3.403a46), and Socrates agrees with those
who characterize Eros as a tyrant (9.573a4575a7). According to Timaeus,
eros is among those things that a just person must conquer (Ti. 42a6b2),
and it is one of the terrible and necessary affections of the mortal soul
(69c5d6). In Laws 6.782d10783b1, the Athenian Stranger associates eros
with madness and hybris and says that it is a disease that needs restraint.4
Such passages appear to suggest that a philosopher would need, like the
Socrates of Zopyrus, to attempt to overcome erotic inclinations. How, then,
can Platos Socrates claim, as he does in the Phaedrus, that erotic art is not
only compatible with, but actually necessary to, philosophical activities?
I argue that Plato answers this question in a group of four dialogues:
Alcibiades I, Lysis, Symposium and Phaedrus.5 I refer to these four dialogues
as the erotic dialogues, in part because ordinary eros (desire for sexual or
other objects such as wealth or power) is a central concern in all of them.
The Symposium contains a series of speeches in praise of Eros, followed by
Alcibiades praise of Socrates, his beloved. The Phaedrus begins with three
speeches about the relationship between lover and beloved speeches that
are the subject of subsequent discussions about rhetoric and in the Alcib-
iades I Socrates represents himself as the lover of Alcibiades. Although the
central philosophical concern of the Lysis is the question of what a friend is,
the dramatic framework of this dialogue concerns Socrates demonstration
to Hippothales, a young man in love with Lysis, of how a lover should treat a
3 filosofav skhsin: Rossetti frags. 10 (Alexander of Aphrodisias, De fato 6) and 6 (Cicero, De fato
10). The texts relevant to Zopyrus are collected in Rossetti 1980, and discussed in Blondell 2002: 724,
and Kahn 1996: 11. On Socrates physical appearance see further Chapter 4 at 4.6 and Chapter 6
at 6.3.
4 Bres 1968: 21532 gives a helpful survey of negative attitudes toward eros, in the sense of desire for
sexual pleasure, expressed in Platos dialogues.
5 I take Alcibiades I to be Platos own work, for reasons given in Chapter 1 n.1.
Introduction: overview of the erotic dialogues 3
beloved. Most important, all of these dialogues are erotic in that they depict
Socrates as practicing an art or skill that is itself erotic because it shares
certain characteristics attributed to the daimon Eros in the Symposium. In
all four dialogues, Socrates art enables him, like Eros, to be marvelously
skilled in the philosophical activities of searching for wisdom and beauty,
and of helping others to seek these same objects of eros. A central compo-
nent of the erotic art is Socratic eros: a passionate desire for the wisdom,
beauty and other good things that one recognizes that one lacks.6
Socrates claim to have an erotic art is explicit in his prayer to Eros
in the Phaedrus, quoted above. Here, Socrates states that he has a special
relationship to Eros, the god who has given him erotic art. He also claims
in this passage to have used his art, in the recantation speech he has just
made, to exhort Phaedrus to devote himself to the life Socrates second
speech has represented as best, and to which he himself is devoted: a life
that combines philosophical words with eros (cf. 249a12 and 256a7b1).7
The nature of the erotic art, and of the relationship between eros and
philosophy, is clarified in the Symposium. Socrates teacher, Diotima, says
that eros in a broad, or generic, sense is desire for any of a number of good
things. For example, one kind of eros is desire for wisdom (philosophia:
literally, liking, or love, for wisdom).8 According to Diotima: Wisdom
[sophia] is among the most beautiful things, and eros is concerned with
beauty [or the fine: to kalon], so that it is necessary for Eros to be a
philosopher (204b24). Diotima goes on to substitute the good for the
beautiful (204e13, 205e7206a12), and to define eros as desire for good
things (205d13). According to Diotima, then, philosophy is one kind of
eros, eros for wisdom, something that is not only good, but also among
the most beautiful things.9 This view of philosophy as one kind of eros is
clarified by Diotimas further characterization of Eros, the personification
of eros. Eros is neither god nor mortal, but a great daimon (202d13), who
is not the beloved but the lover (eron: 204c13). He desires to become wise
(sophos: 204a12) because he realizes that he lacks wisdom. Moreover, Eros
is a marvelously skilled plotter and hunter (qhreutv deinv: 203d46) after
the good and the beautiful things he recognizes that he does not possess
6 I am indebted to an anonymous reader for Cambridge University Press for suggesting the helpful
terms ordinary eros and Socratic eros.
7 Some complexities concerning the nature of philosophy in the Phaedrus are discussed in Introduction
to Part III.
8 See 205d18, discussed further below I.2.
9 Cf. Resp. 3.402d6: the most beautiful is the most lovable. The relationship in Symp. between the
good and the beautiful is close but not necessarily identical: see Rowe 1998, on 201c12, 204e12,
206e23. On eros as desire for the good see especially Chapter 1 n.9 and Chapter 2 n.68.
(203d4204c6). Thus, philosophy, as practiced by Eros, is not simply one
kind of eros. It also includes marvelous skill in searching for the objects of
eros.
Socrates concludes his speech with a declaration of his own devotion to
this Eros and to ta erotika, matters with which Eros is concerned:
Diotima spoke and I am persuaded. Being persuaded I attempt to persuade others

that . . . one could not easily acquire a better co-worker for human nature than
Eros. And so I say that every man should honor Eros, and I myself honor ta
erotika and am especially devoted to these matters, and I urge others to be so also.
Both now and always I praise the power and courage of Eros as much as I am
able. (Symp. 212b18)
In this passage, Socrates claims to be especially devoted both to Eros, the

daimon who provides the greatest benefits for humans, and to ta erotika, and
he urges others to be similarly devoted. Elsewhere in this dialogue Socrates
claims to have an erotic art, just as he does in the Phaedrus, saying that
he is marvelously skilled in ta erotika (deinv t rwtik: 198d12), and
that he knows (pstasqai) nothing other than ta erotika (177d78). In
the Symposium Socrates does not explicitly claim to have been given erotic
art by Eros. However, the claim, unusual for him, to have knowledge,
and his special devotion to the philosopher-daimon whom he himself
resembles suggest that Eros may be his patron here, just as he is in the
Phaedrus.
Although Platos Socrates does not explicitly claim to have erotic art
in the Lysis and Alcibiades I, he is nevertheless characterized as practic-
ing it, especially by being particularly devoted to eros and by exhorting
and advising others in respect to ta erotika. In the Lysis, Socrates rep-
resents himself as devoted from childhood to a particular object of eros
(cw . . . rwtikv): the acquisition of good friends (211e23). He also
states that, although he is inferior in other respects, a god has given him
the ability to recognize lover and beloved (204b8c2). Socrates implic-
itly claims to have an erotic art when he tells Hippothales how some-
one who is wise (sophos) in ta erotika treats a beloved (206a12), and
says that he might be able to give a demonstration of this treatment by
questioning Lysis (206c57, 210e25). He does not need to exhort Hip-
pothales to become devoted to eros, as he exhorts his audience in the
Symposium, for he knows that the young man is already far gone in love
(204b58). In giving his demonstration, however, Socrates is portrayed as
using erotic art to show Hippothales how to become wise concerning ta
erotika.
In Alcibiades I, Socrates is himself in love with a particular individual,
for he claims to be the only lover of Alcibiades soul (131d1e5, 131e1011).
He is so devoted to this object of love that he has closely and continually
observed Alcibiades for many years before speaking to him (103a14, 106e4
9). Socrates erotic art is shown in this dialogue in large part by means of
his unique ability, as the lover of Alcibiades soul, to help the young man
acquire the object of Alcibiades passionate desire: the greatest power in
the city, which, Socrates demonstrates, is conferred not by tyranny, but
by self-knowledge and self-care (105b4, d34, e45, 124a7b6). He exhorts
Alcibiades in respect to ta erotika when he urges the young man to become
as beautiful as possible (131d7) in soul, and says, moreover, that by doing so
Alcibiades will remain Socrates beloved (131d1132a2). Socrates does not
explicitly say that Eros has given him erotic art, but he does claim to have
received divine encouragement to approach Alcibiades (103a4b2, 105e5).
In the Lysis and Alcibiades I, the term philosophia and its cognates play
a much less important role than they do in the Symposium and Phaedrus.
Nevertheless, philosophy in the Lysis and Alcibiades I, as in the Symposium
and Phaedrus, is represented as requiring Socratic eros, a passionate desire to
attain as much wisdom as it is possible for one to attain.10 In the Lysis, those
who philosophize are said to be people who desire (epithumein: 217e79)
one kind of good: wisdom. These people are those who, like Eros in the
Symposium, do not think they know what they in fact do not know (Lys.
218a2b3). That this desire can be passionate is shown by the association
of eros with epithumia (desire) at Lysis 211d7e8, 221b78 and 221e7222a7.
When Socrates uses his erotic art to question his young interlocutors, he
induces aporia (impasse), which leads them to recognize that they lack
wisdom. He thereby encourages them to desire passionately to acquire this
good thing. While the term philosophia and its cognates do not occur in
Alcibiades I,11 in this dialogue also love for wisdom is an important concept.
Socrates uses his erotic art to persuade his beloved, Alcibiades, that the true
object of Alcibiades eros is the power conferred by self-knowledge and self-
care (epimelein), that is, by caring for the soul and striving to know oneself
(for example, 124a7b3). Self-knowledge and self-care, like philosophia in
other dialogues, require a passionate desire (e.g., proqumo: 131d78) to
acquire as much wisdom and virtue as one can.
In each of the four erotic dialogues, then, Socrates is characterized as
practicing what is called in the Phaedrus an erotic art, or skill that
10 Good recent surveys of the vexed question of the possibility of attaining wisdom are provided by
Detel 2003 and Yonezawa 2004: 16. A detailed discussion is beyond the scope of this study.
11 According to Brandwood 1976.
is essential to his philosophical activities.12 It is this erotike techne that
distinguishes Platos Socrates from the sophists, who claim knowledge they
do not have; from ordinary lovers of boys, horses, gold and honor; and
from the Socrates portrayed by other Socratic writers. Platos Socrates is a
uniquely powerful and fascinating figure in large part because of his unique
erotic skill.
There are five components to Socrates art, or skill, emphasized to
different degrees in the erotic dialogues:
(1) Socrates claims to be under the patronage of, or devoted to, Eros and
to ta erotika: the wisdom, beauty, and other good things that are the
objects of the passionate desire (eros) that is the sphere of this god or
daimon.
(2) He recognizes that he himself lacks wisdom and other good things.
(3) Under the influence of eros (see (1)), he has a passionate desire (Socratic
eros) for the wisdom and the other good things he recognizes that he
lacks.
(4) He is marvelously skilled (deinv t rwtik: Symp. 198d12) in the
search for as much wisdom and other good things as he can attain.
(5) As an essential part of the skill he has in pursuing his own search,
Socrates is also marvelously skilled at helping others to acquire erotic
art. That is, Socrates is skilled in helping others to become devoted to
Eros and ta erotika, to recognize their own lack of wisdom and other
good things, to desire these good things passionately, and to become
skilled both in seeking to attain as much of them as they are able, and
in helping others to acquire the erotic art.
These five components are all closely interconnected. The preoccupation
with beauty and other good things associated with Eros (component (1))
induces in Socrates, first, the recognition of his own lack (component (2)),
followed by the desire to repair the lack (component (3)); finally, the desire
and the lack together are complemented (components (4) and (5)) by his
skill in prosecuting his own search, which also includes the skill of enlisting
others in the same search.13
By exhorting others and helping them to recognize their own lack of
wisdom, and to desire passionately the wisdom they lack, as component (5)
requires, Socrates is himself engaging in a passionate striving to attain as
12 Socrates erotike techne differs significantly from lovers hunting by means of gifts that is called erotike
techne in Soph. 222d10e3. I disagree with Balansard 2001: 232 in connecting the two.
13 His skill includes the ability to affect others, but is not limited to this, as suggested by Yunis 2005:
121: Socrates claim to be an erotic expert (rwtikv) . . . refers to his ability to affect men like
Alcibiades, Charmides, and perhaps Phaedrus with his passion for inquiry and philosophy.
much wisdom as possible. The way in which he seeks wisdom is by exam-
ining himself and others by means of question and answer (dialectic), as he
explicitly states, for example, in Alcibiades I 127e47. Dialectic, moreover, is
a non-competitive and mutually beneficial activity that requires, and helps
to create, friendly relationships among interlocutors.14 In helping others to
search for wisdom, Socrates creates or increases the friendly feelings that
are an especially important issue in the Lysis and Phaedrus.15
Socrates art, then, is essentially both philosophical and erotic together,
in that it helps him to seek the wisdom and other good things that are
the objects of his passionate desire. However, philosophy, as Socrates is
represented as practicing it in the erotic dialogues, is not simply one form
of eros.16 Instead, Socratic eros (component (3) above) is one of several
components of the erotic art that allows Socrates, like Eros, to practice
philosophy with marvelous skill. The kind of skill involved in component
(5) also has a dimension more closely connected with ordinary eros for
another person. To help someone else seek wisdom is to benefit and act
as a friend to the person examined, and also can, but does not always,
lead an older partner to become or continue to be the erastes (lover) of an
individual young person who has a beautiful soul. Thus, in Alcibiades I,
Socrates, the erastes of Alcibiades beautiful soul, says that his own love will
not cease as long as Alcibiades goes on improving (131d4132a2). In this
dialogue, Socrates eros for Alcibiades soul helps the young man to become
better.
Socrates art can be characterized as daimonic as well as erotic in that
each of the five components of this art is associated with the characteristics
attributed to the philosopher Eros in the Symposium.17 This daimon, a being
14 On the differences between dialectic and eristic see below n.51 and Chapter 2 n.47.
15 My account, arrived at independently, of Socrates erotic art is similar in some respects to the
characterization given by Scott and Welton 2008 of Socratic philosophy as an art of love (136),
although my approach to this topic is very different (see Preface n.7). However, I disagree in two
major respects with Scott and Weltons views on Socrates erotic art. First (190), they identify
Socrates erotic art with the true art of rhetoric, whose practitioner can explain all it does with
reference to the good of the subject (Grg. 464465a). I argue below (I.3 and Introduction to Part III)
that Socrates erotike techne differs significantly from craft-knowledge of this kind. Second, Scott
and Welton claim that in the Symposium Socrates awareness of his ignorance is inseparable from
some partial recollection of the Forms (186). I believe that this view relies too heavily on material
from dialogues other than the Symposium (see below n.17).
16 On philosophy as a form of eros see Kahn 1987: 967; Nehamas 2007a: 67 and 2007b: esp. 131;
Pakaluk 2004: 108; Ruprecht 1999: 103; Sier 1997: 823; de Strycker and Slings 1994: 64; Wohl
2002: 1601 and n.91, on Grg. 481d35. According to Rowe 2009: 139 eros, properly understood, is
philosophy.
17 The interconnections among Eros, Socrates and philosophy are discussed at length by Scott and
Welton 2008, who argue that philosophy is fundamentally erotic (3). I agree with much of what
neither god nor mortal, but in between both (202d8e1), to whom Socrates
claims to be devoted (212b6), is himself devoted to, and passionately desires,
ta erotika: the beauty, wisdom, and other good things he recognizes that he
lacks (203e4204a7); he is a marvelously skilled hunter after these things
(203d48); and he is the best co-worker for human nature in its striving to
attain wisdom (212b24). Indeed, Socrates is portrayed in these dialogues
as a daimonic figure, who, like Diotimas Eros (Symp. 202d13), is called
daimonion (Alcibiades, at Symp. 219c1). He resembles not only Eros, but
also a satyr, a being who, like Eros, is a daimon.18
1.2 er os , sex and interpersonal love

The daimonic qualities of Socrates art can help to clarify further the sense
in which it is erotic. In the first place, his skill is not erotic in a sexual sense.
As James Davidson points out, the English term erotic has acquired
sexual connotations not present in the Greek terms erotikos and erotika,
which refer instead to love in a broad sense.19 With this difference in
mind, I begin with Diotimas discussion of eros in the Symposium, in which
she first calls attention to the fact that the term eros and its cognates are
used in two senses:
we separate off one kind of eros and apply to it the name which belongs to the
whole; we call it eros, and for the other kinds we use other names. (205b46)
Diotima then defines eros:
To sum up, the whole of desire for good things and for happiness is the supreme
and treacherous eros, to be found in everyone; but those who direct themselves
to it in all sorts of other ways, in business, or in their love of physical exercise, or
in philosophy, are neither said to be in love nor to be lovers, while those who
proceed by giving themselves to just one kind of eros have the name of the whole,
eros and theyre the ones who are in love, and lovers. (205d18)20
they say about the intermediate state of all three entities, although my own interpretation differs
in many respects. In particular, I question their attempt, explained at length in their Appendix,
to fill out the account of Eros given by Diotima in the Symposium by means of psychological and
metaphysical theories drawn from other dialogues.
18 On Socrates resemblance to Eros see Chapter 4 at 4.6; on his satyr-like characteristics see 4.2, 4.6
and Chapter 6 at 6.3.
19 Davidson 2007: 35, who comments further: Socrates is the archetype of the erotikos man because
he is permanently besotted (with knowledge, with handsome young men) and never manages to
achieve a finality, not because he was an erotic philosopher in the modern sense of the term
someone who converses about sex, or who gives lectures wearing fishnet stockings and a red silk
basque (36).
20 Rowes translations, 1998, adapted.
According to Diotima, then, eros has a broad sense, referring to desire
for good things of all kinds, and a more restricted sense, used of only one
kind of desire. Scholars often refer to these two senses of eros as generic
and specific, respectively.21 Diotima gives helpful examples of generic
eros in the passage quoted above, but in characterizing specific eros she
simply refers to the way in which people speak. Although there are many
disagreements about how to interpret Diotimas distinction, most scholars
agree that specific eros in this passage has a sexual component.22
However, Diotimas distinction is not simply one between desires with
and without a sexual component, as Paul Ludwigs recent detailed analysis
of Greek usage helps to show. In Homer, eros does not necessarily refer
to sexual desire, or even to a particularly strong desire, but includes the
desires to eat (e.g., Il. 1.469), weep, dance and make war: Homeric eros
seems to mean mere desire of any kind, for any object or aim, no matter
how mundane, no matter how intense or lacking in intensity.23 According
to Ludwig, then, Diotimas generic eros resembles Homeric eros in referring
to a mere desire of any kind.24 Her specific eros, however, differs from the
Homeric kind of generic eros not only in its association with sexual desire,
but also in being intense and passionate.25 According to Ludwig, there is
also a third category of usage, one transferring (literally or metaphorically)
the passionate intensity of the specific eros to a wider range of objects
found only in generic eros.26 For example, in Aeschylus Agamemnon
3412, Clytemnestra says: Let not an eros first fall upon the army . . . to
ravage what they ought not.27 Ludwigs third category, then, would seem
to include cases comparable to the English use of lust to characterize
passionate desire for such non-sexual objects as power and wealth. In
interpreting individual passages, Ludwig concludes, it is important, but
often difficult, to distinguish sexual from broader uses of eros, and to
determine what degree of passionate intensity is involved.28
What Ludwig calls the transferred sense of eros can help us to under-
stand the sense in which Socratic eros is erotic. Plato often uses the term
eros and cognates to refer to passionate desire for non-sexual objects.
The Laws mentions eros for wealth (831c4, 870a26), and a divine eros
for temperate and just pursuits (711d67). In the Republic Plato writes of
21 For example, Bury 1932: xiii and 106, on 205a; Ferrari 1992: 254; Ludwig 2002: 127 and 1456; Santas
1988: 329.
22 See Ferrari 1992: 254; Rowe 1999a: 243; Santas 1988: 33; Sier 1997: 213.
23 Ludwig 2002: 1246; quotation: 126. In quoting, I preserve Ludwigs use of italics to refer to the
Greek word eros, and his lack of italics in using the modern English word eros (7 n.5).
24 Ibid. 127; cf. 145. 25 Ibid. 127. 26 Ibid. 128. 27 Ibid. 133, his translation. 28 Ibid. 128.
lovers (erastas) of rule (521b4) and of eros for poetry (607e7, 608a5), while
in the Phaedrus Socrates says that his interlocutor, Phaedrus, is in need
of a fellow lover [erastou] of speeches (228c12). In Theaetetus 169b5c2,
Socrates states that he has a strong sickness, consisting in a terrible eros
for discussions. Alcibiades is said to have eros for renown (Alc. I 124b36),
and in the Statesman, the Eleatic Visitor discusses eros for peace (307e56).
The contexts of these passages suggest that the term eros is used by Plato
to indicate an intensity of desire for non-sexual objects that is closer to
sexual passion than to a generic desire for such objects as food.
Especially when Plato uses eros and cognates to refer to love of wisdom
or truth the term is often used of an intense desire that is explicitly compared
to sexual passion. The vision of the lover who arrives at the sight of truth
in the Symposium is described in sexual terms (211e4212a7), as is the lovers
eagerness to see the plain of truth (248b6) in the Phaedrus (251a1252c2).
The Phaedo compares lovers [erastai] of wisdom [phronesis] to lovers of
sexual objects (66e23, 68a28). In the Republic, Socrates characterizes an
eros of reality (490a8b7) by means of an elaborate metaphor of sexual
intercourse and generation that lends sexual overtones to a later passage
in which he speaks of the eros for true philosophia that comes from
some true divine inspiration (499b8c1), and asks if philosophers are not
lovers (erastas) of being and truth (501d12). In the erotic dialogues, then,
Socrates eros for wisdom and other good things is a desire as passionate
as sexual desire. His art is erotic in part because it includes this passionate
desire.
In the erotic dialogues, Plato also uses erotic vocabulary and themes in
adapting for his own purposes Greek conventions concerning interpersonal
love. One especially important convention is that of the erotic-educational
relationship, in which an older lover (erastes) seeks to educate and improve
a younger beloved (eromenos) in exchange for the younger mans sexual
favors. This relationship is reflected especially clearly in the speech of
Pausanias in the Symposium.29 The negative aspects of this convention are
highlighted in the first two speeches of the Phaedrus that attributed to
Lysias, and Socrates first speech. In both speeches, a lover is said to seek
only his own physical pleasure, while harming the object of his lust.30
29 I borrow the phrase erotic-educational relationship from Gill 1999: xv. On Pausanias speech as
exemplifying one kind of Greek love, Athenian love, see Davidson 2007: 41845. In his discussion
of the multiplicity of homoerotic relationships in ancient Greece, Davidson decisively refutes the
view, argued for in Dovers influential study (1989, originally published 1978), that a single kind of
relationship constitutes the norm. Skinner 2005 also calls attention to the great variety of love
relationships in antiquity.
30 See further Chapter 5.
Plato also represents the relationship between erastes and eromenos in a
more positive light, as he uses and adapts the erotic-educational convention
in his portrayal of Socrates throughout the four dialogues. While Socrates
resembles the erastes of convention in being concerned with the education
of beautiful young men, his motives are very different. The Alcibiades I,
which comes closest to representing Socrates in the role of an older erastes
in love with a younger eromenos, whom he educates, also shows how greatly
Socrates differs from the erastes who seeks sexual favors. Socrates says that
he is in love with Alcibiades soul instead of his body, and he does not
use his erotic skill for sexual seduction. He explicitly denies that he seeks
pleasure from physical beauty when he says that he has remained as the
lover of Alcibiades soul, even after the young mans physical bloom has
faded (131c5e11). The Socrates of the erotic dialogues also differs from the
erastes of Pausanias speech in providing another kind of education, one
that does not involve claims to teach. Socrates disclaims wisdom himself
(component (2) of the erotic art), and he seeks to make others aware of their
own lack of wisdom (component (5)). Plato emphasizes this last difference
when his Socrates shows Hippothales in the Lysis that the way to capture
a beloved is not by praising, but by humbling him (206a13, 210e25), and
when Socrates leads Alcibiades to agree that he has long been in a shameful
state without realizing it (Alc. I 127d78). Finally, Socrates differs from
the erastes of Pausanias speech in that he leads others to become lovers
in turn.31 For example, Alcibiades I ends with Socrates suggestion that his
own love may have hatched a new love in Alcibiades (135e13). This love is
both Socratic eros for wisdom and other good things and, in the Alcibiades
I, eros for Socrates himself.
Sexual desire also plays a more positive role in the erotic dialogues than
it does in the Greek erotic-educational convention. Although Socrates
art, and the love he himself has for Alcibiades, are not erotic in a sexual
sense, Socrates nevertheless recognizes that sexual desire need not be mere
lust, but can instead play an important and legitimate role in relationships
between those who search together for wisdom. The lover who has been
initiated into the Lesser Mysteries, which are preparatory to the Greater
Mysteries, experiences sexual desire, which he satisfies at least in part, by
touching . . . the beautiful one, and associating with him (Symp. 209c2
3). In the myth in Socrates second speech in the Phaedrus, the lovers who
occasionally complete the sexual act (diepraxsqhn: 256c45) are said
to be more vulgar and less philosophical than those who refrain from sex.
31 I am indebted to Eugene Garver for pointing this out.

Nevertheless, these second-best lovers, like the others, win many advantages
through erotic madness (256b7d6).
Another important difference between the conventional erotic-
educational relationship and the educational relationships portrayed in
the erotic dialogues is that the latter may, although they do not always,
involve interpersonal love. What is essential to the common search for
wisdom is not interpersonal eros, but the good will and affection that make
dialectic possible. This is true even in the Alcibiades I (see below 1.4). In
the Symposium, Socrates is concerned with the welfare of Alcibiades, but
he never claims to be in love with him, or to desire sexual favors. Instead,
Socrates spends the night in the arms of the beautiful and willing young
Alcibiades just as though Socrates were a father or an older brother (Symp.
219b3d2). In the Lysis, Socrates helps Hippothales to acquire the erotic
art that can lead him to become liked by his beloved, the beautiful and
noble Lysis (Chapter 2). If Hippothales succeeds in becoming an accepted
lover, he and Lysis may go on to search for wisdom together. His success
will increase interpersonal love, but there is no suggestion that it will lead
to sexual relations. Within the dialogue, moreover, it is the older Socrates
and the younger Lysis and Menexenus who actually engage in the search
for wisdom. These people have good will and affection, but they are not
in love with one another. In Diotimas account of the Lesser Mysteries,
interpersonal love makes it possible for a lover to give birth in beauty
(Symp. 206e5, 208e5209e4). These Lesser Mysteries prepare a lover for
initiation into the Greater Mysteries (210a12), the first stage of which is
love for a particular beautiful body and beautiful soul (210a4c3). However,
this narrative leaves open the extent to which interpersonal love continues
as the lover ascends the ladder toward the vision of beauty itself. Moreover,
the way in which Socrates presents Diotima and her speech encourages
his audience to question and examine her views, without accepting them
as authoritative. The possibility is left open that there are other ways of
searching for wisdom and beauty, in which interpersonal love plays other
roles, or no role at all (Chapter 3).
Interpersonal love is given particular importance and emphasis in the
Phaedrus (Chapters 5 and 6). The myth of the charioteer and horses in
Socrates second speech is a vivid dramatization of the way in which a lover
possessed by erotic madness creates with his beloved the mutual eros and
friendship that allows them to search together for the divine beauty that is
the object of Socratic eros. In this poetical myth, moreover, interpersonal
eros is itself portrayed as a form of Socratic eros, for the physical beauty of
the beloved is a reflection of divine beauty. There are also indications in
this dialogue, however, that Socrates myth, composed so as to appeal to
Phaedrus, does not represent the only way in which the search for divine
beauty can be conducted. Indeed, in the Phaedrus, as in the Symposium
and Lysis, Socrates himself is represented as using his erotic art to search
for wisdom and beauty, together with others for whom he has good will
and affection, without being in love with a particular individual.
1.3 techne
Socrates art, then, is erotic and daimonic in that it has five specific com-
ponents associated with the characteristics of the philosopher-daimon Eros
in the Symposium, who is both philosopher and lover. But in what sense is
it art (techne)?
One answer to this question specifically concerns Socrates use of the
term techne in the Phaedrus. In the passage from his second speech, quoted
at the beginning of this Introduction (257a3b6), Socrates use of the
phrase erotike techne distinguishes his own art from (1) a true techne of
rhetoric (rhetorike), and from (2) an atechnos diatribe, a practice without
art (260e26, 261a7). He says that the true techne of rhetoric is to the soul
what the techne of medicine is to the body. Just as the practitioner of the
art of medicine understands by means of techne the nature of the body,
and how to make it healthy and strong, so the person who has rhetorike
techne must understand the nature of the soul, and know how to produce
persuasion and virtue within in (270b19). The practice without art, on
the other hand, aims at pleasure rather than the good. It is directed toward
pleasing fellow slaves rather than good masters, that is, mortals instead
of gods (273e9274a2), and is used, for example, by experts in seduction
in order to gain physical pleasure. Socrates erotic techne differs from the
atechnos diatribe in not seeking pleasure, and from the true techne in not
being craft-knowledge. It nevertheless resembles true techne in having the
goal of pleasing gods rather than mortals, as indicated by the passage quoted
at the beginning of this Introduction, and of striving, and helping others
to strive, to attain as much craft-knowledge as they can. These similarities
help to explain why Socrates uses the term techne in characterizing his own
erotic art in this dialogue.32
A more general answer to the question about the sense in which Socrates
erotic art is a techne takes into account a range of passages concerning techne
in many dialogues. Socrates frequently uses the term techne to refer to a
32 On these distinctions see further Introduction to Part III.

kind of craft-knowledge that is, in the characterization of Julia Annas: (1)
teachable, (2) demands a complete understanding of the relevant field,
and (3) requires that the person with skill be able to give an account
[logon didonai] of what it is that she is expert in [and] . . . can explain why
she is doing what she is doing.33 As an example of (2), Annas states that
an understanding of French requires knowledge of grammar, syntax and
vocabulary. She argues that this requirement can be seen as an expansion
of the demand, already seen, that our understanding of a subject matter
should unify the various beliefs that we have about that subject matter.34
For example, [u]ntil we understand what it is that we understand bravery
to be, we will not understand why we recognize the examples of bravery
that we do.35 Or, [i]n the case of the productive skills, exercise of the skill
produces a unified object whose organization reflects the experts unified
grasp of her skill and its requirements.36 Other scholars have also given
good accounts of techne in Platos dialogues.37 However, that of Annas best
fits Socrates characterization of techne in the Phaedrus. As I will argue in
the Introduction to Part III, those who have rhetorical techne are said to
be able (1) to teach their skill to others (e.g., 266c25, 271b15); (2) to
understand their subject as a whole, by practicing collection and division,
and by understanding the nature of the soul to which particular speeches are
suited (277b5c6); and (3) to give an account of their skill, by explaining
the causes why one speech is able to persuade and another one is not
(271b45), and by submitting their work to questioning and examination
(278c47).
In the erotic dialogues, Socrates sometimes expresses strong convictions
and even claims knowledge about ta erotika, but he sincerely denies that
his art has any of these characteristics of craft-knowledge. He says that
33 Annas 2001: 244. As examples of teachability, Annas cites (n.20) Meno 89eff. (which refers to doctors,
cobblers and pipe players), and Prt. 319eff. (see the entire discussion at 319a320c, with the examples
of house and ship building: 319b5c1). As an example of (3), she cites (n.22) Grg. 465a and 501a,
which give medicine as an example.
34 Annas 2001: 244. 35 Ibid. 241, discussing Lach. 191ce.
36 Ibid. 244 n.21, citing Grg. 503d504b. In this passage, painters, builders and doctors are said to
arrange things according to a certain order, and to compel one part to be suitable and fitting to
another, so that the whole is composed as an arranged and ordered thing (503e4504a4).
37 Other helpful accounts of the criteria for techne include those of Brickhouse and Smith 1994:
57, whose first three criteria are essentially the same as those of Annas; Reeve 1989: 3745, who
states (39) that craft-knowledge is explanatory, teachable, and luck-independent; Woodruff
1990, who lists as necessary conditions teachability, specialisation, and completeness (702).
Roochnik 1996 provides a helpful survey that includes (1788) pre-Platonic criteria for techne. Less
useful is Balansard 2001, whose bibliography does not cite Brickhouse and Smith 1994, Reeve 1989,
Roochnik 1996, or Woodruff 1990, and who draws from Phdr. 269a13ff. the unwarranted inference
that authentic poetry is said to be a techne (12830, 139).
Diotima taught (ddaxen) him about ta erotika (Symp. 201d5), but that he
himself only tries to persuade others (212b23). In the Lysis, he responds
to Hippothales request for advice about how a lover can become liked by
a beloved by saying that this is not an easy thing to tell (epen), that is,
to give an account of, but claims that he might perhaps be able to give
a demonstration (epideixis) by talking to Lysis (206b9c7). And in the
Phaedrus, he attributes his techne not to an understanding of ta erotika that
he has acquired by his own efforts, but to a divine gift (257a79), which is
also the source for his knowledge (oda) that Hippothales is in love (Lys.
204b7c2).38
One important way in which Socrates erotic art differs from craft-
knowledge is that an important aspect of erotic art is recognition of ones
own lack of wisdom (component (2) of the erotic art).39 In the erotic
dialogues, Socrates is represented as recognizing that he lacks wisdom in two
important respects. First, in two passages he explicitly states that he knows
nothing except ta erotika: Symposium 177d78 (cf. the spurious Theages
128b16) and Lysis 204b8c2, where Socrates claims to be inferior and
useless in matters other than the ability to recognize lover and beloved.40
Socrates avowals of ignorance in other passages in the four dialogues also
suggest that he knows only about ta erotika, and that his knowledge fails
him in other respects. In the Lysis, for example, Socrates says that he does
not know how to acquire the good friend, the possession of which is the
object of his eros (212a46), and he is in fact unable to say who or what
the friend is (222e67) that is the object of his search in this dialogue. In
Alcibiades I, he states that he and Alcibiades need self-care more than all
other people, and that he does not differ from Alcibiades in his own need
for education and self-care (124b10d5). The Socrates of the Symposium
claims that his own wisdom (sophia) is inferior and questionable, like a
dream (175e24), and he warns Alcibiades that he, Socrates, may be worth
nothing (219a12). In the Phaedrus, Socrates says that only a god should be
called wise (sophos); a human can be, at most, only a lover of wisdom
38 On divine inspiration cf. Resp. 499b8c1. I will argue that the kind of knowledge Socrates claims
to have been given by a divine source is true belief. On support from divine sources for Socrates
beliefs see Brickhouse and Smith 1994: 189201, and 1989: 1057; Forster 2007.
39 A discussion of the many complex and controversial epistemological issues surrounding the status of
the kinds of knowledge Socrates claims and disclaims in the dialogues generally is beyond the scope
of this study. However, I agree with Benson 2000: 168 about the impossibility of determining the
precise nature of the knowledge Socrates disavows in the early dialogues. Helpful surveys of the
controversy surrounding Socrates claims to and disclaimers of knowledge are provided by Forster
2007; Reeve 1989: 5362; Wolfsdorf 2004a; Yonezawa 1995.
40 Insightful interpretations of Socrates claim to know ta erotika include those of Blondell 2006; Detel
2003; Roochnik 1987 and 1996: 23351; Scott and Welton 2008. See also Chapter 4 at 4.6 and n.81.
(philosophon: 278d36). In this dialogue, when Socrates says that he spoke
at length because of his own longing (pq) for things seen in a former
life (250c78), he implies that he, like the fallen souls in his speech, has
forgotten the truth he once glimpsed.
Another way in which Socrates recognizes his own lack of wisdom
is by claiming to have only limited knowledge even of ta erotika; that
is, he does not have the complete understanding of the relevant field
which would be required by craft-knowledge, according to Julia Annas
characterization quoted above. Specifically, he claims to have only the
kind of skill that is gained from his own personal experience.41 This skill,
however, is not the kind of empeiria (experience) disparaged in the Gorgias,
by means of which cookery, for example, aims at producing pleasure,
without the use of reason, and without having considered the nature or
cause of pleasure (Grg. 501a3b1).42 Socrates art instead includes, but is
not limited to, the use of reason to consider what the natures and causes
of things might be, and to arrive at the conclusion that he lacks knowledge
about these matters.43 His ability to recognize his own lack of wisdom
(component (2) of the erotic art) is gained from his experience, as are the
four other components of this art. Socrates has experience in being devoted
to the daimon Eros or to ta erotika (component (1)), and in passionately
desiring to attain as much as he can of wisdom and other good things
(component (3)). His experience in searching for the wisdom he realizes
he lacks (component (4)) is represented in two different ways in the erotic
dialogues. First, the dialogues make frequent use of a pun on eran (to
love) and erotan (to question) in order to emphasize Socrates use of
human reasoning to examine and question (erotan) others.44 In so doing,
he strives, together with the people he questions, to attain the object of his
eros; that is, to become as wise and good as it is possible for him to become
(for example, Alc. 1 127e57). Second, Socrates searches by using certain
41 Cf. English adjective expert (from the Latin experior, to try or experience), used of someone
who has tried or experienced something: see Oxford English Dictionary Online, s.v. expert, adj
(accessed September 12, 2011).
42 Brickhouse and Smith 1994: 9 correctly deny that this kind of empeiria is necessary or sufficient for
the use of the elenchus.
43 See Resp. 9.582a45, where Plato writes that we judge by means of empeiria, phronesis and reason.
This passage was drawn to my attention by Frank 2007: 460.
44 Griswold 1986: 116, notes that Socrates erotic art ([Phdr.] 257a78) is the dialectical rhetoric that uses
the power of questioning to lead the soul to insights (emphasis in original); Reeve 2006a: 135 writes
of [t]he identification of the craft of love with that of asking questions, and Roochnik 1987: 128
states that the paradigmatic form of philosophical discourse is the question, which itself is erotic in
structure. I hold that the art of questioning is an important aspect of erotic art, but not identical
with it. On the connection between loving (eran) and questioning (erotan) see below, 2.3.4 and n.93.
god-given abilities, which do not depend on reasoning, to attain true belief.
He claims, for example, to have a god-given ability to recognize lovers and
beloveds (Lys. 204b7c2, discussed further in Chapter 2). Socrates also has
experience in exhorting others to acquire erotic art (component (5)). An
important aspect of his exhortation of others involves leading them to
recognize that they lack wisdom.45 In giving his demonstration of how to
produce friendliness in a beloved, Socrates leads Lysis to agree that Lysis
lacks wisdom (phronein) and needs a teacher (210d48). Moreover, the
Lysis ends in aporia about what the friend is (222e17). In the Alcibiades I,
Socrates shows his ambitious young beloved that he, Alcibiades, lacks self-
knowledge and needs to care for himself (for example, at 124b79, 127d6
8), while in the Symposium, Socrates induces Agathon to agree that he did
not know what he was talking about when he gave his speech about Eros
(201b1112), and he leads Alcibiades to be ashamed of his own deficiencies
(216a4b3). In the Phaedrus, Socrates shows his young interlocutor that the
speech of Phaedrus beloved, Lysias, is inferior in both content and style
(234c6235a8, 263d5264e3), thus implying that Phaedrus did not know
what he was talking about when he expressed admiration for it.
Socrates erotic art, then, is not craft-knowledge, but is instead erotic or
daimonic in that it, like its possessor, the daimon Eros in the Symposium,
is always in a state in between wisdom and ignorance.46 A passage in the
Cratylus (397d10398c4) supports interpreting this daimonic state as a kind
of skill that is based on experience rather than on knowledge of the truth.
Socrates begins his discussion of daimones, and heroes, and daimonic
humans47 by quoting Hesiods account of the daimones as the golden race
of humans who, after their death, become guardians of mortals. Hesiod,
he says, named them daimonas because they were wise [phronimoi] and
experienced [daemones] (398b67).48 In Homer, daemon means skilled,
experienced, and the verb dao means to acquire practical knowledge of
or skill in.49 This connection of daimon with daemon is appropriate to the
Eros of the Symposium. As the son of Resource (Poros: 203b3), Eros is a
schemer after the beautiful and good, courageous, impetuous, and intense,
a marvelously skilled hunter, always weaving new devices, both passionate
for wisdom and resourceful in looking for it, philosophizing through all his
45 This aspect of Socrates use of dialectic is well analyzed by Frede 1992: 210.
46 Cf. Roochnik 1996: 23940, Scott and Welton 2008.
47 My translation of 397d9e1 includes the words bracketed by Duke et al. 1995.
48 At 397e12398a2, Socrates quotes Hesiod, Op. 1213, with slight variations from our texts. On the
Cra. passage see Clay 1972 and 2000: 519; West 1979: 1534.
49 Cunliffe 1963.
life, a marvelously skilled magician, sorcerer, and sophist.50 Socrates, like
Eros, is daimonic in that he recognizes his own lack of wisdom, and has the
kind of art that allows him to be a marvelously skilled hunter for wisdom.
Like the daimones of the Cratylus, he is daemon, skilled or experienced.
1.4 setting and characterization

Two dramatic elements that contribute to Platos representation of Socrates
successful and friendly use of his erotic art are the settings of the erotic
dialogues and the characterization of his interlocutors. These dialogues are
not set in a public place, such as the Lyceum, which is the setting of the
Euthydemus, or the entrance to the law courts, where the Euthyphro takes
place, but in a private or secluded location. Such a setting is conducive to
conversations with younger people, who are, from the beginning, friendly
and sympathetic toward Socrates. Absent are adult antagonists like the
sophists, who engage in eristic (contentious) competition.51
In the Alcibiades I, Socrates is alone with Alcibiades, a young man who
is not quite twenty years old, being just past the bloom of adolescence
(131e11) and soon to address the Assembly for the first time (105a7b1).52 We
are not told exactly where they are, but Socrates stresses the fact that they
are alone (118b5).53 Alcibiades is sympathetic to Socrates from the beginning
of the dialogue, saying that he would have approached Socrates if Socrates
had not first approached him (104c7d3). He is sometimes exasperated by
Socrates questioning (for example, at 114d7, where he calls Socrates hubris-
tic), but is always friendly and cooperative. In the Lysis, Socrates is alone
with a group of boys and young men (203a35, 207a1) in a wrestling school
(palaistra: 204a2). Their distance from the adults with whom these young
people often associate is emphasized by the fact that the only adults who
appear are slave attendants (pedagogues), who are characterized as drunken
barbarians and whose removal by force of Lysis and Menexenus puts an
end to all conversation (223a1b3).54 All of the interlocutors are friendly
toward Socrates: Hippothales invites him to enter the palaistra (203b34);
Lysis is eager to listen to the conversation (207a56); Menexenus comes
to sit down beside Socrates and willingly answers the latters questions
50 Symp. 203d48: Rowes translation, 1998, adapted.

51 Coventry 1990: 17484 provides a good discussion of the difference between dialectic and eristic.
52 Denyer 2001: 94, on 105a7, notes that citizens could address the Assembly at age twenty.
53 Cf. Forde 1987: 222.
54 The adult trainer who interrupts the conversation at 207d23 remains off stage and sends an
unidentified person to summon Menexenus.
(207a7c12). The Phaedrus is set in the countryside, outside the city of
Athens and its crowds of bystanders (230c6d5).55 Moreover, Socrates is
alone with the younger Phaedrus, a sympathetic interlocutor who shares
Socrates love of speeches like a fellow Corybant (228b7).56 Phaedrus is
in fact characterized, toward the beginning of the dialogue, as another
self in Socrates statement: If I do not know Phaedrus I have also forgot-
ten myself (228a56, cf. 236c46). In the story narrated by Apollodorus
in the Symposium, Socrates is at first alone in the street with his lover or
fan (erastes), Aristodemus (174b14), and is afterwards an invited guest at
the house of Agathon. The symposiasts create further privacy by sending
the aulos (pipe) player away at the beginning of the dialogue (176e69).
Moreover, before telling the story of his attempted seduction of Socrates,
Alcibiades orders the servants to shut their ears (218b57).57 In this narra-
tive, Alcibiades repeatedly stresses that he was alone with Socrates (mnov
mn: 217b34, cf. 217d7e1) when the events occurred. Socrates has a
large number of sympathetic interlocutors in the Symposium. According to
Alcibiades, all of the guests named in the dialogue share with Socrates a
philosophical madness and Bacchic frenzy and have been bitten by philo-
sophical words that seize upon a young and noble soul and make it do and
say anything at all. Alcibiades specifically mentions Phaedrus, Agathon,
Eryximachus, Pausanias, Aristodemus and Aristophanes, and says that he
himself experiences these same things (217e6218b5). The symposiasts also
share Socrates interest in eros (177d6e3). Not all of them are young, but
one of Socrates main interlocutors, Agathon, is a youth (neaniskos: 198a2),
and Alcibiades tells a story about the relationship that he had as a young
man with Socrates. The symposiasts compete in praising Eros, but they
do so as friends, and Socrates does not subject them to the harsher treat-
ment he reserves for the sophists in other dialogues. The only elenchus
(cross-examination) narrated, that with Agathon, ends in a friendly way,
for Socrates addresses the young man as beloved (201c8).
Socrates is able to use his erotic art successfully in large part because
of these private settings and young, sympathetic interlocutors. In contrast
to dialogues in which Socrates does not succeed in changing his inter-
locutors minds, in these four dialogues, he is represented as producing,
55 On the setting of the dialogue see the excellent discussion of Ferrari 1987: 136.
56 Phaedrus explicitly states that they are alone in a deserted place and that he is younger than Socrates
(smn d mnw n rhm . . . g ka neterov: 236c8d1). According to Nails 2002: 232 Phaedrus
is in his mid-twenties.
57 Nails, 2006: 204 rightly notes, however, that there are some indications that the conversation is
overheard by non-participants: women and slaves.
at least temporarily, positive changes in others. His success is shown, in
part, by the eros or friendly feelings he arouses in his interlocutors. At
the end of the Alcibiades I, Alcibiades says that he will be Socrates atten-
dant (pedagogue) and begin to study justice. Socrates then speculates that
his own eros may have hatched a new eros in the young man (135d7e3).
Although Socrates expresses fears about his own future and that of Alci-
biades, he also states that he does not distrust Alcibiades nature (135e68).
The Lysis ends in aporia (impasse) about what the friend is, but within
this dialogue Socrates successfully demonstrates to Hippothales his ability
to create friendliness in a beloved (206c47 with 210e15). Lysis, the sub-
ject of the demonstration, is humbled by Socrates. Far from being angry,
however, Lysis addresses him in a friendly manner (211a3). By the end of
the dialogue, all of the interlocutors give the impression of being friends
with one another (223b57). In the Symposium, Agathon yields gracefully
to Socrates criticisms of his speech about Eros. When, in the final scene,
he gets up to sit next to Socrates in order to be praised by him, Agathon
clearly indicates that he does not object to receiving more of the same
kind of critical treatment (223a35). Alcibiades in this dialogue is benefited
at least temporarily by his association with Socrates, for he feels shame
and agrees with all that the philosopher says (215e7216b6). Moreover, the
behavior of Socrates that Alcibiades calls hybris (219c5) leads him to fall in
love with Socrates (222b34, c23), and Alcibiades warns Agathon against
doing so also (222b47).58 In the Phaedrus, Socrates interlocutor, Phae-
drus, seconds his prayer to Eros (sunecomai: 257b7) that both Phaedrus
and Lysias may turn their lives toward eros and philosophical words. At the
end of the dialogue, Phaedrus joins in another prayer made by Socrates,
this time to Pan, and remarks that friends have possessions in common
(279c67).
This is not to deny that Socrates success, as the examples just noted
make clear, is also due to his ability to arouse emotions very different from
friendliness. In showing his interlocutors that they lack the wisdom and
other good things they think they have, Socrates gives them a beneficial
humbling that is necessary for the removal of false beliefs and for the arousal
of love for wisdom.59 He acts, moreover, in ways that sometimes appear
to his interlocutors to be offensive, or even hubristic. In the Symposium,
58 I leave untranslated the Greek term hybris (often rendered as insolence) because its meaning is
controversial. See detailed discussion in Chapter 4 at 4.2.
59 Cf. the end of the Apology (41e142a2), where Socrates asks the jurors to give his sons the same
punishment Socrates has given the Athenians, if his sons appear to care more for wealth or anything
else than for virtue. On the beneficial effects of shame see further Chapter 1 at 1.2 and n.23.
both Agathon and Alcibiades tell Socrates: You are hubristic (bristv
e: 175e7, 215b7). Alcibiades compares the man to an hubristic satyr and
his words to the skin of an hubristic satyr (215b38, 221e24). Even though
they occur in a friendly and playful atmosphere, these accusations of hybris
highlight an important aspect of Socrates use of erotic skill in helping
others to acquire it also: his ability, like that of the daimonic satyr, to
arouse shame. Indeed, Alcibiades says that Socrates is the only one who
can cause him to feel shame (Symp. 216a8b3). Socrates gives Alcibiades a
similar humbling in Alcibiades I by, for example, showing the young man
that he knows even less than the women of his adversaries (124a57), and
that he is in the most shameful state (127d68). As a result, Alcibiades
says, just as he does in the Symposium: You are hubristic (Alc. I 114d7).
The humbling of Lysis in the company of his friends could also be seen as
offensive, and it makes Lysis lover, Hippothales, very uncomfortable (Lys.
210e56). In the Phaedrus, Socrates speaks disrespectfully of a speech that
was much admired by Phaedrus, thereby in effect showing the young man
that he did not know what he was talking about when he admired this
speech (234c6235a8).
Thus, my focus on Socrates erotic art helps to explain some puzzling
features of Platos Socrates. In the erotic dialogues, at least, Socrates is more
successful in persuading others, and more friendly towards them, than he
is often represented as being by those scholars who emphasize his use of
the harsh elenchus against adversaries.60 His friendliness, however, does
not prevent him from arousing painful emotions in those who require the
beneficial humbling that is conducive to their recognition of their own lack
of wisdom.
Not only does the youth of Socrates interlocutors contribute to his
comparative success in the erotic dialogues, it also helps us to understand
the emphasis on eros in these dialogues, as the next section will argue.
1.5 the erotic dialogues in context

In other dialogues also, Socrates practice of philosophy is represented as
having characteristics similar to those portrayed in the erotic quartet. He
is devoted to divine matters; he desires to attain the wisdom he recognizes
he lacks, and he helps others to do the same. Eros, however, has a much less
prominent role in other dialogues, nor is Socrates represented as practicing
an erotic art. While the emphasis on eros in the erotic dialogues increases
60 For examples see Preface nn.1215.

dramatic interest, it also serves crucial philosophical purposes. Comparison
with another quartet, the trial and death dialogues (the Apology, Euthyphro,
Crito and Phaedo) helps to clarify what these purposes are. In the erotic
quartet, Socrates practice of philosophy is represented as the education of
passionate young men for a life devoted to Socratic eros for wisdom. In the
trial and death dialogues, in contrast, philosophy is a preparation for death
of older people, and of Socrates in particular as he nears death.
Three thematic aspects of the erotic dialogues are especially important
for an understanding of the emphasis on eros in this quartet as a whole.
First, as discussed above (I.2 and I.4), all four are concerned with education
of the young. In this context, it is appropriate for Socrates to use and adapt
the erotic-educational conventions of his social and literary culture. Each
dialogue makes use of these conventions, partly in order to appeal both
to Socrates young interlocutors and to Platos own audience, and partly
in order to highlight the contrast between the ordinary eros of convention
and Socratic eros.
Second, Plato makes use of the traditional association of eros with mys-
tical initiation in representing Socratic education as an initiation into the
mysteries of Socratic eros.61 The initiatory role of eros is explicit in Dio-
timas speech in the Symposium. According to this account, initiation into
the Lesser Mysteries, in which ordinary eros plays an essential role (208e
209e), is necessary preparation for initiation into the Greater Mysteries
of eros for true beauty (209e5212a7: Chapter 3 at 3.3.3). In the Phaedrus
also, when he uses the language of the Mysteries in the myth of his second
speech, Socrates portrays eros as a madness and enthusiasm accompanying
mystic initiation (248a257a: Chapter 5 at 5.3 and Chapter 6). As in the
Symposium, ordinary eros is represented as contributing to an initiation
that leads a lover toward Socratic eros for true beauty. Although the Lysis
and Alcibiades I do not use mystical terminology, Socrates activities in
these dialogues may nevertheless be considered initiatory in that the edu-
cation with which they are concerned helps young men to begin to live
the same kind of life that is described in the language of the Mysteries in
the Phaedrus: a life turned toward eros together with philosophical words
(Phdr. 257b6), in which lover and beloved are also friends (255b67, 256c7).
In the erotic dialogues, then, Plato adapts erotic-educational conventions
and religious traditions very effectively so as to represent Socrates art as
61 Eros and initiation: Seaford 1994: 2845, citing Soph. Aj. 6856 and 693 (frix rwti), Eur. Bacch.
813, and Platos Phdr. 251a. Philosophy as initiation: Morgan 1990 and 1992: esp. 235.
including the proper guidance of ordinary eros so that it becomes a power-
ful and positive motivational force in the search for the wisdom and beauty
that are the objects of Socratic eros. As Socrates says, there is no better
helper than Eros for human nature (Symp. 212b24).
Third, Socrates interlocutors in the erotic dialogues are passionate by
nature and deeply concerned with ordinary eros. These young men, unlike
the sophists in other dialogues, are capable of being motivated by ordi-
nary eros to strive to acquire Socratic eros for beauty and wisdom. It is
Alcibiades eros to acquire the greatest power, a power that he at first
mistakenly believes to be renown and tyranny (Alc. I 105c34, 124b46,
134e8135b5), that makes it possible for him to acquire eros for what is
truly the greatest power, namely, the power conferred by wisdom in the
form of self-knowledge and self-care. In the Symposium, Alcibiades pre-
occupation with ordinary eros is evident in his attempt to seduce Socrates
(217a219d), in the theme of his sexual jealousy of Socrates (213cd, 222c
223a), and in Aristodemus statement that Alcibiades still seems to be in
love with Socrates (222c23). This is so, even as Alcibiades description
of his own strong emotional reactions to Socrates philosophical words
(215e216c, 218a27) suggests that his passionate nature makes it possible
for him to be drawn, however temporarily, toward Socratic eros. Agathon,
who benefits greatly from his association with Socrates, is characterized by
Eryximachus as, like Socrates, marvelously skilled in ta erotika (Symp.
193e5). The young poets speech demonstrates his skill in praising an Eros
who is the patron of many activities, including the composition of love
poetry (196d6e6), that are erotic in the ordinary sense. The first two
speeches in the Phaedrus are evidence of the interest of both Socrates and
his interlocutor in ordinary eros. At the end of his second speech, Socrates
claims to have used erotike techne (257a78) in an attempt to lead Phaedrus
from his interest in ordinary eros to a life motivated by Socratic eros, just as
the lover within his speech is led by erotic enthusiasm from love of physical
beauty in this world to love of heavenly beauty. In the Lysis, Hippothales
eros for Lysis drives the dramatic action, in which Socrates demonstrates
his erotic skill by showing how a lover can become liked by his beloved
(206b9c7) if the two engage in the common search for the wisdom that
is the object of Socratic eros.
In the trial and death dialogues, in contrast, Socrates and his interlocutors
are preoccupied not with eros but with death. This difference is especially
evident in the use of initiation language in the Phaedo, where Socrates
compares true philosophers to initiates into the Mysteries who prepare
for a better afterlife (69d3e3, 81a89).62 The other three dialogues may
also be said to represent Socratic philosophy as a kind of initiation, in
a non-mystical sense, that prepares one to face death courageously. This
training for death (Phd. 81a12) emphasizes the avoidance of wrongdoing
rather than the passionate striving toward the objects of Socratic eros. These
different philosophical purposes of the two quartets help to explain why
eros is all but absent from the trial and death dialogues.
Socrates makes his defense in the Apology by emphasizing his lack of
wisdom about divine matters, his pious obedience to the divine, and the
ways in which he has benefited others. He thus resembles the Socrates
of the erotic dialogues in many respects. However, the absence of eros
from this dialogue corresponds to a notable difference in his philosophical
purposes.63 Socrates represents himself as devoted to a god very different
from the daimon Eros: Apollo, the god of the oracle, who is associated not
with passionate striving toward beauty and wisdom, but with the restraint
that comes from knowing ones own limits.64 Socrates is also obedient to his
daimonion, the divine voice that, like Apollo, urges restraint, and that may
in fact be the sign of Apollo.65 Unlike the daimon Eros in the Symposium,
who provides the impetus that moves lovers toward the objects of eros
(Symp. 203d48), the daimonion is a divine voice that always turns him
away (apotropei) from doing something wrong, and never turns him toward
(protrepei) anything (Ap. 31c8d4). Socrates claims, as he does in the erotic
dialogues, to lack wisdom of the kind only a god has (19b4c6, 20d9e2,
21b45, 23a5), and instead to possess a kind of human wisdom (20d79) that
consists in knowing that a human being is worth nothing with respect to
wisdom (21d48, 23b24). However, Socrates is not represented as eagerly
striving for the wisdom and beauty that he recognizes that he lacks, but
as searching more narrowly to discover what the oracle means (21b27,
e5), in obedience to Apollo (23b4c1, 29a4, 29d34, 30a57). This search
is not passionate striving, but a labor (pnouv: 22a68), undertaken
with great reluctance (mgiv pnu: 21b8), that has aroused hatred and
enmity (21de, 23a, 23e24a, 28ab) instead of the mutual philia Socrates
62 I am concerned here only with the fact that Plato uses the language of initiation in the Phaedo,
and am unable to consider many controversial issues. See Bussanich 2006; McPherran 1996: esp.
26871; Morgan 1990: 5579 and 1992; Peterson 2011: ch. 6.
63 Eros and cognates do not appear in the Apology.
64 The presence of Apollo is also felt in the Phaedo, in which the gods festival delays Socrates execution
(58bc), and Socrates calls himself the servant of Apollo (85a9b5), to whom he composes a hymn
(61b23). On the association of Apollo with Socrates see McPherran 1996: 166, 21718, 2269;
Morgan 1992: 231; Reeve 1989: 2837.
65 Bussanich 2006: 203; McPherran 1996: 137, 140.
common search creates in the erotic dialogues. Socrates represents himself
as skilled in, or at least uniquely fitted to conduct, this search when he
says that he himself is a gift from the god that cannot easily be replaced
(30d6e6). Socrates benefits others by means of his search, specifically by
helping them to recognize their own lack of wisdom and to be ashamed of
placing higher value on things that are in fact of lesser value (29d730c2).
In so doing, however, he does not represent himself as educating the young,
but as serving the god and providing the greatest good to the city (36c4).
In describing his obedience to Apollo, Socrates appropriately character-
izes himself not as an erotic, but as an heroic figure, explicitly comparing
himself to Homers Achilles (Ap. 28c1d4). Socrates avoids wrongdoing by
thinking little of death and danger, and placing the highest value on the
affairs of the god (21e24, 28b6c1), on justice (32e25), and on remaining
at the post where the god placed him (28e429a2). He cares nothing for
death, and everything about doing whatever he can to avoid acting unjustly
or impiously (32d14). An attitude more consistent with an erotic striving
toward what is both good and pleasant, appears, significantly, only after
the verdict, when Socrates looks fearlessly toward death and the possibility
of an afterlife. He then says that the greatest good for a human being in
this life is to converse about virtue (38a23), and that doing so in Hades
would be a great good, something not unpleasant, and an immeasurable
blessing (41c34). In living the philosophical life that has prepared him
to face death courageously, Socrates has also prepared himself to receive
blessings in the afterlife, if in fact the soul goes to another place after death
(40c610).
In the Euthyphro, Socrates search for wisdom is represented as moti-
vated not by Socratic eros, but by fear of acting impiously. Indeed, eros and
cognates are absent, as in the Apology, from discussions about the search
for wisdom.66 Socrates tells Euthyphro that Meletus has indicted Socrates
on the charge of corrupting the young by inventing new gods (3a9b4).
Socrates is well aware of the dangers to which this charge exposes him (3c6
e4). He shows no fear of death, however, but is instead deeply concerned, as
he has always been, with knowing about divine matters (5a67). What he
fears is acting impiously, through ignorance of these matters (15e516a4). To
avoid this great evil, Socrates claims that he desires (epithumo: 5c5) to learn
from Euthyphro.67 Euthyphro, Socrates says, clearly has knowledge about
66 It is disputed whether or not cognates of eros occur, at 14c4, in the context of a general remark
about leading and following. Duke et al. 1995 read rwtnta . . . rwtwmn; Burnet 1924, on
14c3 defends rnta . . . rwmn.
67 See also 5a39, 11e34, 12e15, 14b8c3, 14d46, 15c1116a4.
what is holy, because he has no fear (o fob) of doing something impious
when he prosecutes his own father (4e48). If he did not have this knowl-
edge, Socrates says, fear (deisav) of the gods and shame before humans
would have prevented him from taking the risk of doing something wrong
(15d48). Although his motivation differs, Socrates has characteristics that
are similar to those in the erotic dialogues. He is devoted to learning about
divine matters so as to avoid acting impiously. He also recognizes that
he lacks wisdom about divine matters, and he desires to obtain this wis-
dom (sophia: 14d4). In attempting to learn, Socrates uses the question and
answer method, in which he claims to have skill. When Euthyphro com-
plains that Euthyphro does not know how to say what he means, and that
Socrates makes Euthyphros statements move around (11b68), Socrates
replies that he must, then, be more marvelously skilled (deinoteros . . . ten
technen) than his ancestor Daedalus (11d34). Socrates uses his skill in a
vain attempt to help Euthyphro recognize that Euthyphro lacks wisdom
about what is holy, and so to experience fear and shame at the possibility
of wrongdoing.
In the Crito, Socrates friend Crito arrives at the prison to bring Socrates
the news that his death is imminent and to persuade him to flee (43c544c5).
This dialogue represents Socrates as using his reason to make a courageous
decision to avoid acting unjustly. He says that one should value living well
rather than merely living (48b45), and that death and suffering are of no
concern compared with doing injustice (48d36; cf. 54b35). In contrast to
the pain and grief of Crito, Socrates remains calm and fearless in the face
of death (43b3c8). He claims to revere and honor those arguments he has
followed in the past, arguments that have always persuaded him to obey
the reasoning that appears best to him. He cannot, he says, cast out these
arguments in his present circumstances, through fear of death (46b3c6).
Specifically, Socrates listens to and obeys the arguments telling him that it
is best to obey the laws of his country (50a54e), who are his parents and
masters (50e24). In so doing, Socrates indicates that he acts in obedience
to the divine, for he characterizes his country and its laws (51a25) as having
divine qualities, being more honored and revered and holy than father and
mother, in the eyes of gods and humans (51a9b4). The dialogue concludes:
Let us act in this way, since the god leads us in this way (54e12). The
Crito shows Socrates using his accustomed question and answer method,
when he answers the questions put to him by the Laws (50c910), and
persuades Crito that it would be unjust to escape.
Socrates, then, is portrayed in the Crito as devoted to the divine, in
that he obeys the laws of his country, which have divine qualities. His
recognition of his own lack of wisdom about justice and other virtues,
and his search for wisdom about matters that do not directly concern his
present crisis, are not issues in this short and sharply focused dialogue.
Socrates is also portrayed as placing the highest value on avoiding injustice
and obeying the laws, as skilled in searching for what justice is in his present
circumstances, and as helping Crito to value acting justly, and to search
for what justice is by means of reasoning. Eros is never mentioned in this
dialogue concerned not with Socrates eager pursuit of wisdom and beauty,
but with his decision to turn away from doing injustice, even in the face
of death.68
In the Phaedo, Socrates companion, Phaedo, narrates the death of this
man whose practice of philosophy has prepared him to die fearlessly and
nobly (58e45). Socrates spends his last hours in philosophical conversa-
tion, just as he has done all his life. He notes that the topics of discussion,
death and the afterlife, are appropriate (prpei: 61e1; cf. 70b10c2) for
this occasion. The Phaedo, however, is exceptional among the trial and
death dialogues in using erotic terminology to refer to love for wisdom.
The argument shows, Socrates says, that only after death might we be
able to obtain that which we desire [piqumomn] and that of which we
say we are lovers [erastai]: wisdom [phronesis] (66e24). It would be very
illogical, he says, if the true philosophers, those who practice dying,
should fear to go where there is hope of obtaining that which they have
loved [rwn] throughout life and what they have loved [rwn] is wis-
dom (67e568a2). Someone truly loving [rn] wisdom, he says, and
who hopes to find it nowhere else than in Hades, will not grieve when he
dies (68a7b6).69
One explanation for this exceptional use of erotic vocabulary is that,
in the Phaedo, philosophy is explicitly compared to initiation into the
Mysteries, just as it is in the Phaedrus and Symposium, and, as noted
above, eros is associated with the Mysteries. The one who has practiced
philosophy correctly, Socrates says, is like the initiate into the Mystery
rites (teletas) who is described at Phaedo 69c3d3. This philosopher is not
profane and uninitiated (mhtov ka tlestov), but, being purified
(kekaqarmnov) and initiated (tetelesmnov), will dwell with the gods
after arriving in Hades. The account of eros and initiation in the Phaedo,
however, differs significantly from that of the Symposium and Phaedrus. In
the Phaedo, the initiate prepares not for a life devoted to eros together with
philosophical words (bon: Phdr. 257b6), but for death. Moreover, the eros
for physical beauty that is portrayed very positively in the erotic dialogues,
68 As is the case in the Apology, eros and cognates do not occur in the Crito.
69 Cognates of eros are also used in this dialogue to refer to ordinary eros associated with the body
(66c2, 81a7, b3), and to lovers reminded of their beloveds (73d6).
as preparatory to initiation into Socratic eros for true beauty, is represented
in the Phaedo as a hindrance to attaining the wisdom that is achieved only
by separation, or purification, of the soul from the human body (64c
69e), which fills us with (ordinary) eros, desire and fear, and thus prevents
us from hunting for the truth (66c14). The characteristics of Socrates
practice of philosophy in the Phaedo differ from their counterparts in the
erotic dialogues in large part because of this difference in the way in which
Socratic eros is represented. In the Phaedo, Socrates expresses and enacts his
devotion to the search for wisdom, a divine good that can be obtained, if
anywhere, only among the gods in Hades. He does not emphasize his own
lack of wisdom, but his statement that there is no hope of obtaining wisdom
anywhere else than in Hades (67e568b5) makes it clear that he recognizes
that he now lacks it, as does his exhortation to his interlocutors to examine
more closely the first assumptions of his arguments (107b46). Socrates
also has a passionate desire, called eros, to obtain wisdom of the kind that
results from purification of the soul from the body. He demonstrates his
skill in searching for wisdom by his use of the question and answer method
(78d12) to present a number of arguments for immortality. Socrates also
helps others, by argument and exhortation, to share his own devotion to
and desire for wisdom so as to do everything so as to participate in virtue
and wisdom in life (114c78), and thus to have hope of gaining a better
afterlife as well (107c1d5).
As he nears death, Socrates and his interlocutors turn away from life in
this world. He no longer needs a daimonic, erotic art that mediates, like
the daimon Eros, between mortals and gods, for he now speaks of the hope
of going to live not with mortals and daimones, but with gods, who do not
desire the wisdom they already possess (see Symp. 204a12, Lys. 218a24).

1 Belfiore Introduction Pages From Belfiore Daimonic Art

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1 Belfiore Introduction Pages From Belfiore Daimonic Art

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Introduction: overview of the erotic dialogues

1.1 er os and philosophia

Diotima spoke and I am persuaded. Being persuaded I attempt to persuade others

In this passage, Socrates claims to be especially devoted both to Eros, the

1.2 er os , sex and interpersonal love

31 I am indebted to Eugene Garver for pointing this out.

32 On these distinctions see further Introduction to Part III.

1.4 setting and characterization

50 Symp. 203d48: Rowes translation, 1998, adapted.

1.5 the erotic dialogues in context

60 For examples see Preface nn.1215.

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