Notes and Comments on Phaedo -- 5

8 June 2023

Notes and Comments on Phaedo – 5

Continuing with my series of posts on Phaedo; I am using the translation by Harold North Fowler from the Loeb Classical Library:

“Here Cebes interrupted and said, ‘By Zeus, Socrates, I am glad you reminded me.  Several others have asked about the poems you have composed, the metrical versions of Aesop’s fables and the hymn to Apollo, and Evenus asked me the day before yesterday why you who never wrote any poetry before, composed these verses after you came to prison.  Now, if you care that I should be able to answer Evenus when he asks me again – and I know he will ask me – tell me what to say.’

“’Then tell him, Cebes,’ said he, ‘the truth, that I composed these verses not because I wished to rival him or his poems, for I knew that would not be easy, but because I wished to test the meaning of certain dreams, and to make sure that I was neglecting no duty in case their repeated commands meant that I must cultivate the Muses in this way.  They were something like this.  The same dream came to me often in my past life, sometimes in one form and sometimes in another, but always saying the same thing: “Socrates,” it said, “make music and work at it.”  And I formerly thought it was urging and encouraging me to do what I was doing already and that just as people encourage runners by cheering, so that dream was encouraging me to do what I was doing, that is, to make music, because philosophy was the greatest kind of music and I was working at that.  But now, after the trial and while the festival of the god delayed my execution, I thought, in case the repeated dream really meant to tell me to make this which is ordinarily called music, I ought to do so and not to disobey.  For I thought it was safer not to go hence before making sure that I had done what I ought, by obeying the dream and composing verses.  So first I composed a hymn to the god whose festival it was; and after the god, considering that a poet, if he is really to be a poet, must compose myths and not speeches, since I was not a maker of myths, I took the myths of Aesop, which I had at hand and knew, and turned into verse the first I came upon.  So tell Evenus that, Cebes, and bid him farewell, and tell him, if he is wise, to come after me as quickly as he can.  I, it seems, am going to-day; for that is the order of the Athenians.’”

(Ibid, pages 211 – 213)

1.  One of the intriguing things about Socrates, as depicted in the Dialogues, is how Socrates seems to reside in many dimensions of experience.  In addition to waking reality, Socrates is shown as someone who interacts with the dream realm.  Socrates is also shown falling into contemplative trances.  Socrates is also at ease with the realm of myth and allegory.  This has the impact of relativizing waking realm experience, depicting the waking realm as only one realm in which human beings act and live their lives. 

2.  Evenus appears in two other dialogues: Phaedrus and Apology.  In the Apology Evenus is praised by Socrates for charging very little for his philosophical teachings, “five minae”, in contrast to the Sophists who charge a high price.  (Ibid, page 79)  Evenus is quoted in Aristotle’s Nicomachean and Eudemian Ethics.  Evidently Evenus was well known both as a philosopher and a poet.

‘Evenus’ is also the name of a river god.  That Evenus was a Prince who failed in recovering his abducted daughter.  Having failed he threw himself into a river in Aetolia.  Since then the river was named for him as he was transformed into the god of the river.  I’m not familiar enough with this myth to connect it with the Phaedo.  There is the obvious similarity between the death of King Aegeus and the Prince in this story; since both of them died by throwing themselves into bodies of water.  The connection might be that Evenus is brought into the discussion that immediately follows about the philosopher’s attitude towards death with a specific focus on the ethics of suicide.  I will discuss this more in my next post which will contain that discussion.

3.  It is worth contemplating that Socrates refers to philosophy as “the greatest kind of music.”  I think this fits in well with Socrates’ ease with allegory, myth, and altered states of consciousness such as the dream state and contemplative trances.  In a way, we can think of music as an altered state of mind.  The key here, I think, is that music is meaningful, but it is neither true nor false in the way that declarative discursive statements are.  Musical statements transcend true and false; they are other than true or false.  This is also true of dreams and their interpretation.  That is why Socrates is unpacking this repeated dream he has had, even during the last days of his life.  And that is why is writing a hymn to Apollo and poetic renditions of Aesop’s fables (fables are a kind of waking dream.) 

I think this helps us understand why allegories play such a prominent part in the Dialogues; because allegories are, in some ways, reminiscent of dreams and music.  As I have in other posts, my view is that reason in Plato’s dialogues has the function of unpacking the meaning of the allegories that appear in the dialogues.  In other words, reason is there as a servant to the allegorical and symbolic, rather than allegories illustrating the process of reasoning.

4.  This quote ends with Socrates humorously suggesting the Evenus ‘quickly’ follow him, meaning follow Socrates into the afterlife.  This is a good example of the equanimity that Socrates has in his situation.  Those around Socrates are distraught and pulled by strong emotions.  But Socrates himself is not perturbed, secure in his understanding of the afterlife and his own destiny.