However, it isn't concerned with someone's doing his own externally, but with what is inside him, with what is truly himself and his own. One who is just does not allow any part of himself to do the work of another part or allow the various classes within him to meddle with each other. He regulates well what is really his own and rules himself. He puts himself in order, is his own friend, and harmonizes the three parts of himself like three limiting notes in a musical scale -- high, low, and middle. He binds together those parts and any others there may be in between, and from having been many things he becomes entirely one, moderate and harmonious.
Plato, Politeia 443c-e
**Last post covered for the most part an explanation of the way in which Plato uses the Allegory of the Cave as a metaphorical version of his more abstract explanations of knowledge in the Divided Line. This post will cover the rest of the paper, which will discuss the idea of The Good, the reasons for the Philosopher-king's decent back into the cave, and the role of the Socratic Teacher.
The prison dwelling of the cave, representative of the visible, introduces the "offspring of the good" as discussed in the analogy of the sun found in book VI as well (Politeia 517b). Though both sight and sensible objects are inherently present in reality, there must be a third thing which causes them to exist. In the face, the firs is the third thing, whose light "yokes together" (from the Greek word "synousia") the prisoner's ability to see with the shadows on the wall and the objects upon the parapet, as well as his own physical form (this comes from the discussion between Socrates and Glaucon in Book VI in which he discusses the sun as that which "yokes together" sight and the things that are seen -- it is also the cause of their existence, and without it, neither the thing seen nor the seer would exist). Keeping in mind that the point of Politeia is to discuss the proper ordering of the soul, it is thus that the soul within the visible can draw conclusions about the visible. However, it cannot yet apprehend beyond particulars. The focus is on opinion, contingent upon particulars that change and can be manipulated. While the soul is ascending toward full disclosure or 'unhiddenness,' it is not yet genuinely liberated, as it is still dependent upon the sensible as the conclusive object of knowledge.
In another dialogue entitled Phaedo, Plato describes the proper orientation of the soul as separated from the body, which he -- metaphorically here -- represents as 'death.' In death, reason itself is unencumbered by the senses which do "not allow it to acquire the truth and wisdom whenever it is associated with it" (Phaedo 65a). Death allows the soul the ability to grasp at reality in its full unhiddenness, "using pure thought alone" to "track down each reality pure and by itself" (Phaedo 66a). This is precisely what occurs in the Allegory of the Cave when the prisoner is freed and his eyes adjust to look at the purest forms (those objects in themselves outside of the cave, in the intelligible realm). Now, the Philosopher-king resides in the most unhidden, "released from the regions of the earth as from a prison" (Phaedo 114c).
The Philosopher-king provides a necessary function for Socrates' 'just constitution of the city' -- itself an image and metaphor, again, for the proper ordering of the soul -- as well. The other classes cannot provide the function of rule, and for reasons that lie within the definition of the Just (for him, Justice in both the city AND the soul, is the harmonic functioning of each class doing that which each is suited for, and no other function which is provided for or allotted to another part). Though the auxiliaries share in some aspect of intelligibility (lying within the second quadrant of the Divided Line, intellect for the object of sense), both the auxiliaries and clearly the working class rely too heavily upon apprehension derived from particulars. Unable to grasp the unified form itself by itself, nor then the Good, these classes would not rule from the foundation of knowledge. In order for the city's constitution to remain a just one, Socrates expresses that it must be the Philosopher-king who comes to rule the city, as he is the one in whom knowledge of the forms and the Good is achieved; thus, he "imitates them" in that they are unified and ordered and "tries to become as like them as he can" (by them, he means the highest forms of conceptual knowledge -- intellect for the sake of intellect -- universals; Politeia 500b-c).
Socrates warns, however, that if given the chance, the Philosopher-king would remain within the purely intelligible outside of the constituted city; therefore, he must be compelled to act (note again the forcible language -- just as the prisoner must be forced up and turned around and dragged, so much the philosopher be 'compelled' to return, enduring the pain of all the transitions of knowledge). This is the only way the city can be, as a whole, Just -- the Philosopher-king must be the one who gives order and governance properly to the city, and does so in relation to the good of which only he is knowledgeable. This produces the best constitution in that it clearly exhibits dimity, while any other would represent "natures and ways of life" that are "merely human" (Politeia 497b). Also, as a lover of learning, he is most able to set himself free, and in so doing is also the one able to guide others to their own liberations. It is for these two reasons -- metaphorically -- that the Philosopher-king must make the descent back into the cave.
Various concerns can be raised about the nature of the Philosopher-king's task. Glaucon first gives voice to one in Book IV; he questions Socrates' description, asking:
How would you defend yourself, Socrates, he said, if someone told you that you aren't making these men very happy and that it's their own fault? The city really belongs to them, yet they derive no good from it... But one might well say that your guardians are simply settled in the city like mercenaries and that all they do is watch over it. (Politeia 419a)
Socrates answers that the constitution's goal is to "be fashioning the happy city, not picking out a few happy people and putting them in it" (Politeia 420b-c). Thus, in terms of the image of the city, it is not the individual that is the aim (and by extension of the metaphor, not the aim to please one aspect of the soul over others), but the whole, unified city. He seems to suggest here that the happiness of the Philosopher-king is entirely irrelevant in and of itself, though he also mentions that he would not be surprised if he were to be happy as he is, in this situation (that is, of returning to the cave to act as the liberator, Socratic teacher, and leader of the city -- of which he means, this is part of the souls duty, and as Aristotle suggests in his works of metaphysics, that a happy soul is one that is fulfilling it's purpose -- so here, the purpose is to bring order and intellect to the rest of the soul, and in doing this, must be happy).
In fact, the "yoking" of the sensible and intelligible within the soul is the reason it must necessarily participate in the activity of the cave, in both the human and the divine, and cannot forsake one for the other. Properly, man will be driven to grasp "everything both divine and human as a whole" (Politeia 486a) as he should be lame in "loving one half of it, and hating the other" (Politeia 5535d). However, he must maintain proper orientation toward them; he must constantly be aware to maintain the governance of reason while still experiencing the sensible, keeping in mind that he is surrounded by hiddenness, and that the appearance of particulars are just that -- particulars; he must refrain from confusing the two knowledges, and must be aware that even in the necessity of particulars, that particulars do not give the whole of knowledge and are only a stepping stone to the intelligible.
All man can do, then, is be ordered as best "as a human being can" (Politeia 500c-d). He will continually deal with the difficulty of misinterpreting images and forms, always between the two in risk of confusion. However, once his eyes do become accustomed, because he has seen the forms outside the cave and can grasp them by intelligible means again, he will have an easier time discerning the images in the cave -- the particulars -- from true things themselves by themselves, the universals. So long as he maintains the use of reason and understanding of the Good, he will not be tempted by the images of the cave, nor the honors or desires of the prisoners. This person can be called the human philosopher -- one whose eros drives him toward knowledge. He comes to use of reason in discerning that there is intelligibility of things, that the intelligibility causes there to be things, and that he must order his soul in such a way as to follow as best he can the paradigm of truth. Throughout the process, the human philosopher not only comes to some knowledge of the things, the reality, around him; he also comes to knowledge of the self.
Each and every soul has the ability to learn, as reason is a necessary part of it. However, it cannot be reason alone that is reoriented in light of what it discovers of the Good -- it must "like an eye that cannot be turned around from darkness to light without turning the whole body," be "turned around" in all aspects (Politeia 518c-d). In order to do so, he has to come to self-knowledge, so that he may properly understand the orientation of the soul in relation to itself as well as the orientation of his whole self towards truth and goodness. So far, the discussion has focused on the stages of the ascent to knowledge and its product; it must also be discussed what kinds of things, in fact, bring about the 'turns' within and outside the cave, causing the movements of becoming toward actualization.
Intitially, when the prisoner is first encountered in the cave, Socrates alludes to the state of ignorance; but upon the first motion, or 'turn,' the prisoner is initiated into the process of becoming -- the role of the soul that "strives toward being" (Tschemplik in his work, Knowledge of Self-knowledge in Plato's Theaetetus). It is through this motion that learning can occur. In Phaedo Plato describes the learning process as recollection, in which the soul recalls the universals which are present in relation to the eternality of the soul. However, recollection deals simply with the potential of learning things, which does not necessarily contain the knowledge of things; rather, knowledge must be accessed by a different method, which is reflected by the ascent from the cave, and further discusses in another of his dialogues, Theaetetus. What it does show is that persons possess knowledge, inherently, and the process of coming to know the already knowable is "necessarily self-reflexive" in that "what we can know is a necessary part of the question what can be known in general" (Sedley in his work The Midwife of Platonism).
Once the first movement is made within the cave, the soul lies between ignorance and knowledge. This middle ground provided the point from which the inquiry and ascent to knowledge begins. Perception becomes correlated with intelligibility, and upon observing things, triggers the love and thirst for more understanding. However, both Socrates and Theaetetus in the dialogue Theaetetus come to the conclusion that this preliminary turn, the internal dialogue and self-examination of the thinker alone, is not sufficient enough to produce knowledge -- the prisoner cannot unshackle himself, and must be forced from the cave into the light. Therefore, there is a need for a 'facilitator' -- the role of the already-enlightened Philosopher-king -- which also comes to be known in philosophy for years to come as the "Socratic Teacher."
Socrates, in the dialogue, describes himself as such a facilitator, likening himself to a midwife over the state of the soul (instead of a midwife who facilitates in physical birth of the body; this, instead is helping others to give birth to their own ideas). Consistent with the idea of recollection, the midwife (or henceforth, the Socratic Teacher) does not give knowledge; the idea or knowledge 'given birth to' is still the idea of the thinker, and the Socratic Teacher simply aids in its 'delivery.' Thus, the Socratic Teacher himself is best when serving as a reflective to the learner, and is not someone who himself forces ideas and uses them as a comparison tool -- the focus is simply on his commitment to allowing the self-reflection of the learner to naturally occur. The violent ascent from the cave, particularly, highlights the need for the other in the process of education and learning. The other is not responsible for placing new knowledge into the prisoner; he is only responsible in leading the prisoner from the cave. What the prisoner 'gives birth to' is that which is already within him -- the reaction to the aporia (see our discussions previously of the term from our readings in Out of the Silent Planet) he experiences upon the first turn within the cave (and again, upon reaching the cave's opening). The ascent out of the cave represents the dialectical testing of his knowledge of the cave over and against what he will come to see in the forms themselves. In the process, he will eventually decide the worth of his prior knowledge, which then aids in defining the self -- either in the case of knowledge of knowledge, or in the case of knowledge of his ignorance.
The descent of the Philosopher can be explored within these same terms. Knowledge itself is not a static and stable thing -- yet, it is not the things known, the forms, that are changing as they are eternal and unchanging by their very definition; rather, it is the knower who is constantly in the state of becoming. As man desires the immortal, namely in knowledge (for Plato, particularly of the Good), he attempts to be as like it as he can be: he attempts to appear immortal, and does this be continually replenishing knowledge "all over again" (Plato's dialogue, Symposium 198d). The illusion of continuity -- of being "outside the cave" -- is then the constant human endeavor of studying the knowledge that is "leaving us, because forgetting is the departure of knowledge, while studying puts back a fresh memory in place of what went away, thereby preserving a piece of knowledge, so that it seems to be the same" (Symposium 207e-208a). Thus, the return to the cave is inevitable; it is man's forgetting of the knowledge that forces the descent. He must continually make the ascent, with the aid of a Socratic Teacher (as he acts as one for others as well), as dictated by man's constant striving toward the actuality of the divine, which is itself beyond intelligibility. Thus, the real knowledge man comes to is this continual pursuit of knowledge and self-knowledge, which is one of the goals of human philosophy: one must strive for renewed self-knowledge with each and every new birth of ideas and judgments, upon rediscovery of knowledge of things and ideas and the world and the self -- whether they be knowledge of knowledge, or knowledge of one's ignorance.
Despire not being able to live as a fully intelligible, divine being, man need not feel as if he is caught in a Sisyphean task of forever-becoming-and-never-reaching. The process, even when resulting in knowledge of our own ignorance, is not a fruitless or pointless endeavor. It is a positive self-knowledge in that "we shall be less inclined to think we know things which we don't know at all" (Theaetetus 187c). Living as pure intelligibility, in fact, would not be conducive to human living -- it would not be beneficial for the philosopher to remain outside his duties toward the cave or the city, nor would it be beneficial in the soul of reason to be disconnected from its duty towards the lower functions of appetite. To make a human attempt to live in pure intelligibility, while impossible, would be to neglect all other aspects of the soul which would not disappear as a result -- the physical human elements will still be present. It is for the same reason that the soul should not focus on the appetitive desire alone, that the soul should not focus on reason along -- this would not qualify it as just, nor as good, but rather ad dysfunctional, incomplete, and inhuman. Instead, all parts must be in proper balanced proportioned in order to be what Plato calls "beautiful" and "good." It is for this reason that man cannot metaphorically remain outside the cave for longer than necessary to recollect the ideas of truth, beauty, and goodness, of the reality in which he lives. He must always return to govern himself in such a way as to maintain order and consistency within himself, and avoid internal conflict, contradiction, and war.
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