Hegeler Institute
PLATO'S "EUTHYPHRO": An Analysis and Commentary
Author(s): P. T. Geach
Source: The Monist, Vol. 50, No. 3, Philosophy of Plato (July, 1966), pp. 369-382
Published by: Hegeler Institute
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27901650 .
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PLATO'S EUTHYPHRO
An Analysis and Commentary
to read
Euthyphro might well be given to undergraduates
are
training. The arguments
early in their philosophical
apparently
on to
some
as
I
lead
but
of
shall
show,
them,
naturally
simple,
The
thorny problems of modern philosophy. Another benefit that could
is that the reader may
be gained from reading the Euthyphro
learn to be forewarned against some common fallacies and debat
ing tricks inmoral disputes.
We may pass rapidly over the pages in which the stage is set
for the discussion
(2a-3e). Socrates and Euthyphro meet outside
the office of the King Archon, where each has to "put in an appear
ance" respecting a legal action. Socrates tells Euthyphro how he is
for impiety. Euthyphro
is pained but not sur
being prosecuted
own speeches in the Ecclesia
are ridiculed when he
his
prised;
divine
speaks of things divine; no doubt Socrates' well-known
sign has roused popular prejudice.
some reluctance, if we may
With
judge by the form of his
answers
an
will
think me crazy.-It's
("I'm prosecuting.-People
old man; he won't fly away. -It's my own father. -For murder"),
Euthyphro tells Socrates what his own cause is. Socrates is naturally
astounded:
surely then the victim must be some other member of
the family, or Euthyphro would never have started the prosecution
(3e-4b).
Euthyphro replies that whether the victim belongs to your own
family or not does not really matter; what matters is whether the
man was wrongfully killed. Then he tells the story.The man who
died was a dependent of Euthyphro, a farm labourer on the family
estate in Naxos.
In a drunken brawl he quarreled with and
one
killed
of the household
slaves. Euthyphro's father after having
the killer tied up and thrown in a ditch, sent off to ask the authorities
in Athens what was to be done-and
It was no concern of his
his mind.
then put the matter out of
if the fellow died. Before an
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370
THE
MONIST
answer came back from the mainland,
the prisoner had in fact
felt he could
died from hunger, cold and his bonds. Euthyphro
not sit at his father's fireside and table as if nothing had happened;
to the indignation of all his family, he thought himself obliged to
prosecute his father; only so could he or his father be made clean
of blood-guiltiness. The
family protested that in fact the father
man was himself
had not murdered
anybody; even if he had, the
a killer and not worth considering; anyhow, it is impious for a son
to prosecute his own father. This only shows, says Euthyphro, how
little his relatives understood piety and impiety (4b-e).
Since the attitude of Euthyphro's
relatives in the matter was
likely to be shared by others and since Euthyphro knew that his
own religious attitude attracted derision rather than respect, we
may suppose Euthyphro to be well aware that his father would not
in fact be in any serious legal danger;
the prosecution
is just a
sort
commentators
of
What
Some
call
it
gesture.
gesture?
supersti
tion: even an accidental death-and
this is practically the case in
hand!-would
bring on the man who caused it a contagious defile
to
is going through the proper motions
ment, and Euthyphro
this away from the house. Others, just like Euthyphro's
such a fuss, especially
relatives, morally condemn him for making
own
father involved.
with his
An unprejudiced
is not repre
reading shows that Euthyphro
sented as merely superstitious about a ritual contamination; what
upset Euthyphro was the way his father "was heedless and made
cleanse
far Euthyphro was
little of the man, even if he should die." How
a
from making
fuss about nothing comes out in the fact that in
a number of civilized jurisdictions a man who acted like
quite
a
Euthyphro's father would be held guilty of serious crime.
an earnest and
as
is
represented
Euthyphro
simple believer in
traditional religion of the Hellenes. To him, therefore, the
case may well have seemed a religious
of a poor man's
of
the
Zeus
duty:
Suppliant was there to hear the cry of the poor
man with none to help him, and to punish those who walked
in
blind pride. Moreover, Euthyphro says, had not Zeus himself pun
ished his own father's wicked deeds?
the old
defence
Euthyphro's genuine belief in the old legend is something Soc
rates finds it hard to stomach (5e-6c), but he does not try to shake it.
in
Instead, he adopts a line of argument that we find paralleled
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PLATO'S
EUTHYPHRO
371
dialogues. If Euthyphro really knows that his own action is
must not just
pious, then he must be able to say what is pious; he
own
or again the
like
his
of
action
actions,
give examples
pious
but
"what
kind
of thing it
of
say
sacrilegious robbery,
punishment
and
is thatmakes whatever is pious to be pious"
(5d
6d).
the vexed questions whether
need not here enter upon
We
language like the piece I have just translated (6d 10-11) is meant
to imply a full-blown theory of Forms, and whether we are to
many
ascribe such a theory to the historical Socrates. Let us rather con
centrate on two assumptions Socrates makes:
(A) that if you know
a
are
term
'T*
you must "know what
you
given
correctly predicating
it is to be T," in the sense of being able to give a general criterion
for a thing's being T;
(B) that it is no use to try and arrive at
'T*
of
the meaning
by giving examples of things that are T.
(B)
can already give a general account
from
in fact follows
(A). If you
of what 'T* means,
then you need no examples to arrive at the
on
the other hand you lack such a general ac
meaning of 'T'; if
count, then, by assumption
(A), you cannot know that any examples
of things that are T are genuine ones, for you do not know when
you are predicating 'T* correctly.
comes
The
thinking-as I take it to be-that
style of mistaken
these two assumptions may well be called
from accepting
the
Socratic fallacy, for its locus classicus is the Socratic dialogues.
Its
influence has, I think, been greater even than that of the theory
of Forms; certainly people can fall into it independently of any
theory of Forms. I have myself heard a philosopher refuse to allow
that a proper name is a word in a sentence unless a "rigorous
definition" of 'word* could be produced;
again, if someone re
are certainly not even alive, still less able to
marks that machines
to define 'alive'. Both
think and reason, he may be challenged
these controversial moves are clear examples of the Socratic fallacy;
and neither originates from any belief in Forms.
Let us be clear that this is a fallacy, and nothing better. It has
stimulated philosophical
enquiry, but still it is a fallacy. We
know heaps of things without being able to define the terms in
which we express our knowledge. Formal definitions are only one
way of elucidating terms; a set of examples may in a given case be
more useful than a formal definition.
We can indeed see in advance why a Socratic dialogue so often
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372
THE
MONIST
of a term *T\
the meaning
ends in complete failure to elucidate
If the parties to a discussion are agreed, broadly speaking, about
the application of a term, then they can set out to find a criterion
On
the
it that shall yield the agreed application.
for applying
other hand, if they are agreed on the criterion for applying the
term, then they can see whether this criterion justifies predicating
*T9 of a given example. But if there is no initial agreement either
on examples of things that certainly are T or on criteria for predi
cating 'T*, then the discussion is bound to be abortive; the parties
to it cannot know what they are about-they
do not even know
the same by saying <rP. Any profit
whether each of them means
they gain from the discussion will be per accidens; per se the dis
cussion is futile.
How harmful the rejection of examples may be we see from the
Theaetetus. Theaetetus,
asked what knowledge
is, gives some in
stances of knowledge-geometry
and shoemaking and the various
crafts. Socrates objects that these are only examples, and he wants
to know just what knowledge is.To give examples, each of which is
the knowledge of so-and-so, is to miss the point-as
though, asked
what clay was, one mentioned
brickmaker's
clay, and
potter's clay,
so on
course
of
But
is
any
knowledge of
knowledge
(146d-147a).
so-and-so; and a correct definition would have to run "Knowledge
of
so-and-so
is
.
.
.
," with
the
"so-and-so"
occurring
over
again
in the definiens. Moreover,
the definition "Knowledge
is sense
at
once
have
been
could
dismissed
by looking to
perception"
of
Theaetetus'
knowledge.
examples
I am sure that imbuing a mind with the Socratic fallacy is quite
us suppose, starts
likely to be morally harmful. Socrates, let
chatting
with an ingenuous youth and says he has been puzzled
about
what injustice is. The youth says "Well, that's easy; swindling is
unjust." Socrates asks him what swindling is; no, examples will not
do-a
formal definition is required. Failing that, we don't know, do
or that it is
what
we?,
swindling is,
unjust. The dialogue, we may
in
the
usual
The
ends
suppose,
aporia.
ingenuous youth decides
that perhaps swindling is not unjust; he turns to ways of villainy,
and ends as one of the Thirty Tyrants. After all, a number of
Socrates' young men did end that way.
Pressed for a formal definition, then, Euthyphro comes out with
this one: "The pious is what is liked by the Gods,
the impious
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PLATO'S
EUTHYPHRO
373
what is not liked" (6d 10). As in English, so in Greek, we must
not take the negative word in the second clause for a bare nega
'disliked*.
tion: 'not liked*, here, =
The next argument Socrates uses has force only ad hominem;
it explicitly depends on Euthyphro's traditionalist belief that stories
about the quarrels of the Gods are literally true.What
then, Soc
rates asks, do men quarrel about? For questions of fact-account
are agreed decision
proce
ancy, measurement,
weighing-there
dures. It is precisely questions of fair or unfair, right or wrong,
and lead to quarrels. If, then, the Gods do
that are undecidable
quarrel, presumably they too quarrel about such questions; actions
that one God thinks just another thinks unjust, and so they quarrel.
and thus
Thus one and the same action may be both God-loved,
we
assume
if
and thus impious. Moreover,
pious, and God-hated,
the truth of the traditional stories, different Gods may be expected
to view with very different eyes acts like Euthyphro's:
the chastise
ment of parents. Euthyphro's appeal to the example of Zeus is thus
neatly turned against him (7b-8b).
This passage is of some historical interest; it may well be the
inWestern
first appearance
philosophy of the distinction between
factual questions, forwhich there is a definite and accepted decision
no such pro
procedure, and moral questions, for which there is
cedure. To my mind, this distinction is none the better for being
an old one.
It very often happens
that people who have no relevant dis
agreement about what ought to be done in given circumstances
nevertheless quarrel bitterly, even go to law, because they disagree
about the facts of the case. And of course they need not be irration
theremay be no
ally ignoring some well known decision procedure;
such procedure. The only eye-witnesses of an incident may griev
ously differ as to what happened, because men's observation and
memory are both fallible; there is then no agreed decision proce
dure to settle the matter once for all. It is mere thoughtlessness
when a modern writer tells us that any purely factual premise of
moral reasoning must admit of "definite tests (not themselves in
for determining its truth or falsity."
volving evaluation)
So much for the decidability of factual questions; what about the
of moral questions? Socrates just asserts this-or at
undecidability
least wins Euthyphro's assent to it by leading questions. There are
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374
THE
to defend the position by prominent
not space to discuss. We ought in
I
have
philosophers,
extent
case
to
the
that
of moral
both
notice
any
disagreement
within and between civilized societies is often grossly exaggerated.
no commonwealth will hold to
As we may learn from Hobbes,
a
moral
of
without
deal
consensus; if everyone made
great
gether
many
moral
arguments
now
MONIST
used
which
and, as
up his own morality by "free decision"
man
was
did
which
that
right in his
Judges, every
would
Between
societies, too,
disintegrate.
society
deal of moral
consensus, covered by the phrase
in the Book of
own eyes, then
there is a great
'the comity of
to
often
do
lead
disagreements
enmity and conflict;
not be rationally
from
this
that
could
who
but people
conclude
they
as
as
if the savage people of America should deny
resolved "argue
ill,
there were any principle of reason so to build a house as to last as
they never saw any so well built"
long as the materials, because
(Leviathan, c. 30).
There
is a reason why moral arguments often are inconclusive
and lead only to quarrels: namely, people may start a moral dis
are not
initially
putation when, as regards one of the key terms, they
in agreement either on a class of instances to which it applies or on
criteria for applying it. I remarked just now that in that case dis
nations'. Moral
to get at cross purposes. But of
putants are pretty well bound
course such frustration of the purpose of discussion may come about
for any sort of term, not just for an ethical term. In general, people
cannot even use a term to express disagreement unless they are
agreed on a lot of the judgments theywould express with that term;
for example, people cannot even disagree about an historical char
to refer to one identifiable per
acter, because they will not manage
son, unless they would agree on a good deal of what to say about
is no reason to think things are otherwise for a term
him. There
'T9 whose meaning
is "evaluative";
unless people have a great deal
consensus about judging actions to be T,
of moral
they cannot
?T9 to express moral
disagreement. Recent moral
too much attention to moral dis
far
devoted
have
philosophers
situations and the alleged freedom to
agreements and perplexing
a
make up
morality for yourself; if instead they had concentrated
sensibly use
on moral consensus, we might
that a lot better.
We
ought not,
by now understand
the rationale
then, to be impressed by the argument
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of
Socrates
PLATO'S
EUTHYPHRO
375
are not neces
presents; it limps on both legs. Factual questions
not been shown to be
have
moral
decidable;
questions
sarily
essentially undecidable.
All the same, weak as his position is on this abstract issue, Soc
if Greek
rates has a strong case ad hominem against Euthyphro;
stories were literally true, as Euthyphro believes, then it would be
all too likely that the Gods would take opposite sides about Euthy
not attempt to defend himself on
phro's action. Euthyphro does
Socrates does not press the attack
and
weak
his
this,
really
point;
further home.
will agree that
Euthyphro protests, however, that all the Gods
makes
short work of
Socrates
must
be
wrongful homicide
punished.
or
that
homicide
is to be
will
this: everybody, God
man,
agree
That
is just
punished if it is wrongful; but when is it wrongful?
where disagreements arise (7b-e).
illustrates a trap into which
This short passage of the dialogue
an unwary man of decent principles may fall when arguing with an
says that wrongful
adversary who knows his business. Euthyphro
to
Socrates
and
and
God
odious
man;
is
gets him in one
killing
move by saying: What killing is wrongful? In our time, we should
likely have A saying that the act he protests against is wrong
because it ismurder; his adversary B will then extract from him an
the word is a legal term of art-is
admission that murder-unless
so
A
that
said no more than that the act
has
just wrongful killing;
is wrong because it is wrong. This move by Socrates, or by a con
temporary B, ismerely eristic; worthwhile discussion can only start
if that feature of the act which Euthyphro, or A, really is objecting
to is brought out into the open and carefully considered.
Socrates has no intention of doing any such thing. Instead
a man been wrong
(9a-b) he appeals to popular prejudices. Has
a serf,who killed somebody's slave, was tied
when
he
killed
is
fully
more
to die first" before the
up by the slave's master, and "happened
master could ask the authorities what to do with him? Ought a son
all the Gods
to prosecute his own father over such a man? Will
agree that the killing iswrongful and the prosecution righteous?
cause is just, if
Euthyphro says he could make it plain that his
"I
suppose you find me
only the judge would hear his reasons;
does not ask what
slower of understanding,"
says Socrates-and
reasons
he
in
be.
effect: "I give you
Instead,
says
may
Euthyphro's
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376
THE
MONIST
the point
that all the Gods hate what your father did; I waive
about one God's hating what another God
loves; if you like, say
that the pious is what all the Gods love and the impious is what all
the Gods hate, so as to be sure that the same act is not both pious
so, will your account of piety and impiety
impious. Even
stand?" (9c-e).
The next stage of the dialogue
purports to refute the
(10a-llb)
thesis that pious is the same as loved by the Gods, regardless of
'all the Gods' or 'some Gods'. The gen
whether "the Gods" means
and
eral scheme of the argument is plain. Euthyphro is got to agree that
the following pair of propositions is true:
is pious is loved by the Gods because it is pious
(1) What
is God-loved because it is loved by the
What
is God-loved
(2)
Gods
and the following pair false:
is loved by the Gods because it is God
is God-loved
(3) What
loved
is pious is pious because it is loved by theGods.
(4) What
Now we get (3) from (1) by putting 'God-loved'
instead of
reverse
so
the
from
and
substitution;
by
(2)
(3) and
(4)
'pious',
and pious were the same;
(4) ought both to be true if God-loved
"but in fact it is quite the opposite," so GodAoved and pious cannot
be the same.
The principle underlying the argument appears to be the Leib
that two expressions for the same thing must be
nizian principle
that a change from truth
salva veritate-so
mutually
replaceable
to falsehood upon such replacement must mean
that we have not
two expressions for the same thing. Of course it would be anach
ronistic to see here a formulation of the Leibnizian
principle; but
to discern a use of the principle; any more
it is not anachronistic
than it is anachronistic to call an argument a syllogism in Barbara
when it antedates even Aristotle, let alone Peter of Spain. Though
some forms of argument have been invented by logicians, many
existed before there was any science of logic; and this is no bar to
ex post facto.
logical classification of them
The validity of arguments using Leibniz's
is one of
principle
recent
most
the
It is
discussion.
thorny points in
philosophical
well known both that such arguments are liable to break down in
contexts that are not securely extensional, and that propositions
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PLATO'S
377
EUTHYPHRO
contexts. Indeed, the
'because* give us non-extensional
a
as
man
X on a given occa
used
of
by
expressions,
following pair
sion, need not be propositions agreeing in truth-value:
man who had
(5) I hit him because he was the
just hit me
was
I
him
he
father
hit
because
my
(6)
even if the term 'father of X* were coextensive with the term 'man
formed with
who had just hit X
(on the occasion
in question)
*. So the truth of
(1) and (2) and the falsehoodof (3) and (4) would perhaps not
that pious actions and men are not the
allow of our concluding
same classes as God-loved
actions and men; as the truth of (5) and
falsehood of (6) do not warrant us in concluding that theman who
had just hit the speaker was other than his father.
A reader may be inclined at this point to make Mill's distinc
tion: what the argument does validly derive from its premises is
that 'God-loved* and 'pious* have a different connotation, even if
they denote the same men and actions. But have we the right to
ascribe any such distinction to Plato? I doubt if any such distinction
is anywhere even clearly exemplified, let along formally expounded.
more Platonic
language, the reader might suggest that
Using
are
and
God-loved
pious
supposed to be different Forms. But surely,
for Plato, there could not be a Form God-loved. Rather,
the view
we are meant to adopt is that 'loved by all the Gods', unlike
'pious',
answers to no Form whatsoever. Being God-loved
is something that
the pious "has done to it"; there is no reason to suppose that
'God-loved' expresses what something is, in that sense of 'what so
and-so is9which would mean, for Plato, that we are laying hold of
a Form.
It is possible that the present argument is supposed
to prove
that the two terms 'God-loved* and 'pious* differ in application;
for at the end of the dialogue Euthyphro is supposed to have contra
dicted his own previous admission by saying that pious acts are dear
to the Gods, loved by the Gods
(15a-c). If what the present argu
to prove were what some would express
ment is meant
nowadays
this criticism of
by saying that two terms differ in connotation,
Euthyphro by Socrates would be an unfair debating trick. But we
need not impute deliberate unfairness; we need only suppose that
at this stage in philosophical
thought the different kinds of differ
ence in meaning were not well sorted out. We
could scarcely be
confident that they are really well sorted out even today.
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378
THE
MONIST
Let us now look at the way the premises of the argument are
reached. It is accepted by Euthyphro without demur that (1) is
true and (4) false. The
truth of (2) and the falsehood of (3) are
deduced by a tricky argument, relating to passive verbs in general.
terms of art; they
Plato of course could not use a grammarian's
the
have spoiled
existed when he wrote, and it would
to
to
if
introduce
them
had
make
he
has
existed.
So
they
dialogue
Socrates convey the general principle to Euthyphro by a series of
examples; from these, Euthyphro ismeant to get the application of
the principle to the verb 'to love* in particular.
Here we come up against a linguistic obstacle. Taking
*</>
pass.'
hardly
as representing the ordinary inflected third-person singular passive
of a verb, and '< ed' as representing the passive particle of the same
verb, we may say that what Plato gives us are a series of examples in
are contrasted:
which these two propositions
it is < ed
A
because
thing cj>pass,
(7)
<
A
pass.
(8)
thing is ed because it </>
'
The successive interpretations of '< are 'to carry', 'to drive', 'to see',
and finally 'to love'. But as regards the first two, it is extraordinarily
to make out what the point is. In Greek, the expressions I
pass.' and 'is < ed' are of course
schematically represented as l<f>
are
different; but in English both
naturally rendered by the ordi
nary present-tense passive form. One might
try using the plain
passive for the '< pass.' form and a periphrastic expression for the
'is < ed' form; for example, one would get some such pair as this:
hard
have
(9) A thing is carried because carried iswhat it is.
(10) Because a thing is carried, carried iswhat it is.
But this is just whistling in the dark; we just do not know how
Plato conceived
the difference between the forms I provisionally
translate 'so-and-so is carried' and harried
is what so-and-so is',
nor why it is
to
that
be
obvious
supposed
(10) is true and (9) is
false.
Fortunately there is no need for us to try and solve this problem;
for the supposed parity of reasoning between 'carried' and 'loved'
to treat both as examples of
just does not exist. Socrates is made
"what things have done to them." We get the same assimilation in
the Sophist
(248d-e), where the Eleatic Stranger argues that being
known is something the Forms "have done to them" (the same
Greek verb is used as in the Euthyphro)
and they therefore are
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PLATO'S
379
EUTHYPHRO
not wholly changeless. But this assimilation
is certainly wrong;
transitive verbs, verbs like 'know', 'love*
among grammatically
and 'see' are logically quite different from verbs
expressing that
or
is
shifted
altered.
something
We
need not try to delineate
this difference, which has been
the theme of much recent philosophical writing. It will be
enough
to concentrate on the
peculiar use of 'because* in one of the prem
ises of themain argument:
is pious is loved by the Gods because it is pious.
(lia) What
The conjunction
'because', and the corresponding word in Greek,
occur in a lot of logically different sorts of
propositions. To avoid
confusion, I shall slightly rephrase (lia) :
(llb)
What
is pious
is loved by the Gods
in respect of being
pious.
This way of speaking-that
something is the object of an attitude
in respect of this or that characteristic-is
one that I owe to Mc
Nature
vol.
Section
ii,
of Existence,
Taggart
(The
465). Following
close in his footsteps, I shall try to show the difference between
propositions like (llb) and ordinary causal propositions.
The most obvious difference is that a person can have an attitude
towards something in respect of its being X when the
thing is not
X but ismistakenly regarded by him as
being X; I may e.g. admire
a man in respect of his courage when he was in fact a
great coward
-and
then his courage cannot be a cause or part-cause of my
admiration. What
is a cause or part-cause of my admiration
is his
me
to be courageous; which is
believed
different
being
by
quite
from his being courageous, even if he is. And I
certainly do not
admire people
in respect of this
believed by
characteristic-being
that is not a char
myself, rightly or wrongly, to be courageous;
acteristic I find admirable. No
doubt
the Gods would
never
falsely believe a man to be pious who was in fact impious; but we
could still draw the distinction-the Gods would love him in
respect
of his piety, not in respect of his being known to the Gods as a
pious
man; that would only be the cause of the Gods' loving him, not the
characteristic in respect of which they loved him.
Let us now rephrase (3) in the same style:
(12) What isGod-loved is lovedby theGods in respectof being
God-loved.
If (llb)
is true,as Euthyphro surelywishes to say, and (12) is
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380
THE
MONIST
false, then 'pious* and 'God-loved* must somehow differ in mean
ing-in fact, theremust be a big difference. And surely (12) is false;
nobody, God or man, can love a thing simply for, in respect of,
can fear a thing simply
being loved by himself. Similarly, nobody
to
if
Church
the
its
fearful
him;
for
approves the Bible for
being
mean 'approved
cannot
then
'being inspired*
simply
being inspired,
so
The
illustrated by
in
and
the
Church';
general.
principle
by
the falsehood of (12) does seem to be both sound and sufficient to
serve as a premise in the way Plato intended. Failing a rigorous
account of verbs of attitude
(intentional verbs, as they are now
sometimes called), we cannot quite clearly see the rationale of this
a sound principle.
principle; all the same, it surely is
The remainder of the dialogue
is of less interest. Socrates gets
over to Euthyphro, with some difficulty, the idea that though any
thing pious is just, it does not follow that everything just is pious;
he does this by the "You might as well say" technique familiar
might as well say that if all shame is fear,
that if everything odd is a number, every
sort of
number is odd
thus get the question: What
(12a-d). We
are
replies: Those which concern the
pious? Euthyphro
just acts
service of the Gods rather than men (12e).
to understand
Socrates professes himself unable
this answer.
or
Huntsmen
look after, hounds, drovers look after cattle,
serve,
to readers of Alice-you
all fear is shame, or
and so on; presumably
this consists in helpful actions, actions that
are for the betterment of that which is served. Then
is piety aimed
at the betterment of the Gods? Euthyphro of course protests that
this is not at all the kind of service he meant; rather, we serve the
Gods as slaves theirmasters (13a-d).
Socrates does not reject this answer, but raises further questions
it. The work of a subordinate
is ordered to the particular
end of his master; for a doctor the servant's work will be directed
towards health, for a shipwright towards voyaging, for an architect
then is the magnificent work of
towards building, and so on. What
the Gods in which we play a subordinate role as their servants? Or
at least, what is the chief end of this work, as victory is the gen
about
eral's
chief end and winning
(13e-14a).
food from the soil is the farmer's?
and we
Euthyphro cannot answer this question;
that he is not logically committed to doing so. If men
should notice
are the slaves
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PLATO'S
EUTHYPHRO
381
of the Gods, then by obeying them men will fulfil the Gods' ends,
whatever these may be; but men can know that without knowing
in what particular the Gods' ends are. "The servant knowe th not
what his lord doth"; and Euthyphro would account himself only a
servant, not a friend, of the Gods.
Instead of answering the question, then, Euthyphro states which
specially constitute giving the Gods their due: prayers and
sacrifices and the like. The answer is seriously meant, and deserves
to be taken seriously if any theological discourse does. We may
the virtue of "religion" is the part of justice
notice that forAquinas
that gives to God what is specially due to him, and that he con
actions
as Euthyphro
ceives the characteristic acts of "religion"
does.
that can be raised about
There
are, of course, serious objections
the rationale of acts like prayer and sacrifice. Socrates raises none
of these; his retort is, as commentators say, "playful." At that rate,
a skill of bargaining with the Gods
("If you choose
piety would be
to call it that," Euthyphro interjects), and the bargain is a bad one
for the Gods, since only we and not they are benefited (14b-15a).
Euthyphro says, as he has said before, that of course our pious
acts cannot benefit the Gods; they are acts of honour and courtesy
(charis) that please the Gods. At this point Socrates charges him
with going back to the old rejected explanation
of pious acts as
acts that the Gods love. The charge, as I said, need not be deliber
ately sophistical, but at least is far from having been logically made
to stick.We may see this quite simply ifwe use the Mactaggartian
apparatus of 'in respect of that I introduced just now. Though
the Gods cannot be pleased by an act in respect of its being pleasing
to the Gods, they logically could be pleased by an act in respect of
its being intended to be pleasing to them, as human parents are by
the acts of their children. And Euthyphro's act in prosecuting his
father could be pleasing to the Gods both as an act of human
justice
and as an act of piety; both in respect of its avenging a poor
man's wrong, and in respect of its being intended to please
the
Gods.
Socrates presses Euthyphro to try again to define piety;
surely
not have ventured, without
knowing what piety is, to
to
Euthyphro has to listen again to Socrates' appeals
conventional
the
class
prejudices-including
prejudice
against a
he would
. . . Here
"serf fellow." But he has heard
enough, and says he is too busy for
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382
THE MONIST
seem to agree that the dialogue
I should prefer to think that,
for
Socrates.
victory
was not to be led
Mr.
language,
Right-Mind
from
the straight path.
a-wandering
P. T. GEACH
OF
BIRMINGHAM
UNIVERSITY
further talk. The
ends with a moral
to use Bunyan's
commentators
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