Rational Spirituality and Divine Virtue in Plato

Michael Lafargue

Description

Michael LaFargue presents an important and accessible aspect of Plato's legacy largely overlooked today: a variety of personal spirituality based on reason and centered on virtue. Plato's Virtue-Forms are transcendent in their goodness, ideals that Platonists can use to improve character and become like God so far as is humanly possible. LaFargue constructs a model of inductive Socratic reasoning capable of acquiring knowledge of these perfect Virtue-Forms, then scales back claims about these Forms to what can be supported by this kind of reasoning. This is a critical theory, but also a pluralistic one that accommodates modern cultural diversity. A how-to chapter provides detailed descriptions of the rules of Socratic reasoning basic to this spirituality, which any interested individual can practice today. LaFargue supports his interpretation by a close reading of the Greek text of key passages in Plato's dialogues. The work also undertakes a broader philosophical consideration, discussing the philosophical foundations proposed for this Platonism in relation to the thought of G. E. Moore, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Martin Heidegger, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Richard Rorty.
Preface
Introduction

1. Overview

2. The Objectivity of the Good

3. Limits

4. Elaborations

5. Rules of Socratic Method

6. Text and Commentary (1): Concrete Reality and Abstract Forms in the Republic

7. Text and Commentary (2): Plato’s Ideal Philosopher

8. Implications and Examples

9. (Mis-)Categorizing Plato

Appendix Sample Paper Assignment for a College Course

Works Cited
Index

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Éthique et morale
• Philosophie de la religion
• Philosophie antique
• Ethique et morale
• Ancient philosophy
• Philosophy of religion
• Ethics in religion

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 28 avril 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781438460260
• Langue: English

Extrait

Rational Spirituality and Divine Virtue in Plato
Rational Spirituality and Divine Virtue in Plato
A Modern Interpretation and Philosophical Defense of Platonism
Michael LaFargue
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 2016 State University of New York
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No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
www.sunypress.edu
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Marketing, Kate R. Seburyamo
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: LaFargue, Michael.
Title: Rational spirituality and divine virtue in Plato : a modern interpretation and philosophical defense of Platonism / Michael LaFargue.
Description: Albany : State University of New York Press, 2016. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015017382 | ISBN 9781438460253 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781438460260 (e-book)
Subjects: LCSH: Plato. | Platonists. | Virtue.
Classification: LCC B395 .L3155 2016 | DDC 184—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015017382
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This book is dedicated to my wife and dearest companion, Hilda
Contents Preface Introduction Chapter One Overview Chapter Two The Objectivity of the Good Chapter Three Limits Chapter Four Elaborations Chapter Five Rules of Socratic Method Chapter Six Text and Commentary (1): Concrete Reality and Abstract Forms in the Republic Chapter Seven Text and Commentary (2): Plato’s Ideal Philosopher Chapter Eight Implications and Examples Chapter Nine (Mis-)Categorizing Plato Appendix Sample Paper Assignment for a College Course Works Cited Index
Preface
S hortly after I began university teaching in 1978, I was assigned to teach a course initially called Socrates, Jesus, and Buddha (which later morphed into Buddha, Jesus, Plato). This course title was taken from a book by Karl Jaspers, and its breadth is a credit to the breadth of vision of Richard Horsley, the then Chair of the Study of Religion program at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. One of my main aims early on was to teach students to think well, so I began immediately trying to derive from Plato’s writings a method of Socratic reasoning that I could teach students to actually practice (rather than only write about ). This also suited the place of this course as a Sophomore seminar in the General Education program at UMass Boston.
I taught this course nearly every semester for about thirty-five years. This is the context in which I developed the main ideas presented in this book. My own interest in fundamental philosophical issues led me to develop many facets of the present book beyond what I tried to teach in the classroom. I had earlier learned the art of close reading and contextual interpretation of ancient Greek texts in many seminars with Dieter Georgi. And of course I am grateful for general support by many faculty colleagues and friends at UMass Boston. But most of all I have to give credit to the hundreds of students over all those years who struggled with me to try to understand the thinking of Socrates and Plato, and what we might learn from them that is still valuable today.
Introduction
T he late classics scholar Pierre Hadot argued that in the ancient world, living a certain way of life was central to what it meant to be a philosopher. Hadot introduces one collection of his essays (2004, 2–3) by contrasting the impression that most students have of philosophy today “because of the exigencies of university teaching,” with ancient concepts of what it mean to “be a philosopher.” In this ancient concept, being a philosopher
… demands from the individual a total change of lifestyle and conversion of one’s entire being … This existential option … implies a certain vision of the world, and the task of philosophical discourse will therefore be to reveal and rationally justify this existential option, as well as this representation of the world.
The present book argues that these remarks are eminently true of Plato’s conception of his ideal philosopher, as is most evident in his picture of the true philosopher in the Republic , Books 5–7. Here the most crucial characteristic of a Platonist philosopher is not specialized expertise in inquiry and argument. Rather, philosophical reasoning is to be pressed into the service of formulating “divine” virtue-ideals, transcending ordinary social standards in the perfection of their goodness. And this project of rational thought about virtue is not complete until the philosopher manages to mold his own character on the model of these perfect virtue-ideals he has thus conceived in his mind, “becoming as god-like as is possible to man.”
This book places this virtue-centered picture of the ideal philosopher at the center of Plato’s thought, and shows what Plato’s thought looks like when configured around this center. This results in a configuration and interpretation of major themes in Plato’s thought fundamentally different from what prevails in the literature today. I also try to show here that, oddly enough, what I will call Platonist otherworldly “ spirituality ” is capable of being given a thoroughly rational foundation, something that cannot be said about many “philosophical doctrines” associated with Platonism today.
Platonist Spirituality versus “Platonist Metaphysics”
One way of illustrating the results of this approach to Plato interpretation is to contrast it with approaches centered around Plato’s alleged “metaphysics.” Basic to the meaning of “metaphysics” here is the assumption that metaphysics is a theory about the nature of reality. Metaphysical interpretations, beginning already with Aristotle, interpret Platonic Forms as central elements of a theory about the constitution of reality in general (see accounts in Ross 142–244; Fine 44–65).
Consider horses, for instance. Central to Aristotle’s account of Platonism is the doctrine that there exists something called “Horse Itself” (the Platonic Form of Horse), existing alongside and in addition to all individual horses ( Metaphysics III, 2, 997b, 5–12, see also XIII, 4, 1078b, 34–36). This theory not only lacks any plausible rational basis (Aristotle ridicules it); holding it has no direct impact on changing the life of the philosopher.
I focus here instead on Plato’s theory of Virtue -Forms. Virtue-Forms are not elements in the constitution of reality in general. They are rather ideal models (“paradigms” Plato calls them) that the philosopher develops in order to have models to model his own character on, in a process of long-term self-transformation. Ethical flawlessness is the main characteristic that Platonic Virtue-Forms need, if they are to serve this function as paradigmatic models. This is because modeling oneself on a flawed model might just make one a more flawed person, rather than a more ethically admirable person. A flawed standard of virtue is not a good measure to measure oneself by, because as Plato says ( Republic 504c), “what is imperfect is not a measure of anything” ( ateles … oudenos metron ).
Flawless Platonic Virtue-Forms are ideals of moral excellence to strive for. As ideals, they do not “exist” at all in the world of concrete realities. In Plato’s thought, nothing in the world of concrete reality—concrete individuals, concrete behavior, and concretely conceived rules for behavior—is completely flawless. As he pictures it, everything in this concrete world “over here” consists in a changing mixture of what is good and not good. Plato imagines ( Theaetetus 176a–c) another world “over there,” populated by “divine” Platonic Virtue-Forms. These are the focus of attention and ultimate concern for the Platonist philosopher, whose central aim in life is to “become like God,” so far as is possible to man, by becoming as virtuous as possible, this in turn by modeling himself on these ideal models. This gives Platonism its “otherworldly” character.
Michel Foucault (1988), following up on Hadot’s ideas, has now given us an extensive collection of excerpts and discussions of many later Greek and Roman philosophers, showing the central part that “care of oneself” ( heautou epimeleisthai , cura sui ) played in their concept of “the philosophical life.” More specifically, Julia Annas (1999, 52–71) has recently drawn attention to the important role that “becoming like God” played in the thought of the Middle-Platonist thinker Alcinous (2nd century AD). And as Frantisek Novotny’s comprehensive history of Platonism shows, Platonism of this kind was a primary basis for a good deal of otherworldly spirituality in medieval Jewish, Christian, and Islamic thought, well into the early Renaissance.
Rational Foundations
Spirituality is, however, a rather suspect topic among many philosophers and critical thinkers today. The term spirituality is often associated today with religious mystics, or with “New Age” thinkers, two groups not noted for their emphasis on critical reasoning. Plato, however, clearly was devoted to critical reasoning. One thing I hope to show in this book is that the main thing Plato has to offer us today is a completely reason-based spirituality. This is also one of the main ways in which I hope to supplement the work of Hadot, which treats this topic of rational foundations only in a very general way.
One thing necessary for this project of providing Platonist spirituality with a rational foundation is establishing a clear connection between “Socratic” reasoning methods, on the one hand, and knowledge of Platonic Virtue-Forms, on the other. In Plato’s so-called Socratic dialo