University of Pennsylvania Museum Publications The Neoplatonic Socrates

Today the name Socrates invokes a powerful idealization of wisdom and nobility that would surprise many of his contemporaries, who excoriated the philosopher for corrupting youth. The problem of who Socrates "really" was—the true history of his activities and beliefs—has long been thought insoluble, and most recent Socratic studies have instead focused on reconstructing his legacy and tracing his ideas through other philosophical traditions. But this scholarship has neglected to examine closely a period of philosophy that has much to reveal about what Socrates stood for and how he taught: the Neoplatonic tradition of the first six centuries C.E., which at times decried or denied his importance yet relied on his methods.In The Neoplatonic Socrates, leading scholars in classics and philosophy address this gap by examining Neoplatonic attitudes toward the Socratic method, Socratic love, Socrates's divine mission and moral example, and the much-debated issue of moral rectitude. Collectively, they demonstrate the importance of Socrates for the majority of Neoplatonists, a point that has often been questioned owing to the comparative neglect of surviving commentaries on the Alcibiades, Gorgias, Phaedo, and Phaedrus, in favor of dialogues dealing explicitly with metaphysical issues. Supplemented with a contextualizing introduction and a substantial appendix detailing where evidence for Socrates can be found in the extant literature, The Neoplatonic Socrates makes a clear case for the significant place Socrates held in the education and philosophy of late antiquity.Contributors: Crystal Addey, James M. Ambury, John F. Finamore, Michael Griffin, Marilynn Lawrence, Danielle A. Layne, Christina-Panagiota Manolea, François Renaud, Geert Roskam, Harold Tarrant. Review "This volume, full of scholarly, well-written, and helpful articles, is a must for those interested in Socratic and Platonic studies, ancient hermeneutics and ethics, Neoplatonism, and the critical history of ancient philosophy."—Journal of the History of Philosophy"An invaluable contribution to Neoplatonic studies. Through the eyes of later Neoplatonists and in an appropriate scholarly and rigorous manner, it reconsiders and frequently challenges current trends in the study of the Socratic problem and the role of Socrates in the Platonic tradition. [Even though] the volume is centered on later Neoplatonic thinkers, the various essays also encourage a reexamination of the reception of Socrates in Middle Platonists and early Neoplatonists such as Plutarch, Plotinus and Porphyry, and they may well trigger a rethinking of our own image of Socrates."—Bryn Mawr Classical Review"A welcome addition to growing scholarly interests in Neoplatonism and Socratic studies. These essays open up the fascinating world of how later Platonists read the dialogues and allow us to glimpse the Socratic dialogues in a way that defamiliarizes them, yielding a substantially new view of Socrates from prevailing modern analytic tendencies."—Sara Ahbel-Rappe, University of Michigan From the Author Danielle A. Layne teaches philosophy at Gonzaga University. Harold Tarrant is Conjoint Professor of Classics at the University of Newcastle, Australia, and author of Plato's First Interpreters. About the Author Danielle A. Layne teaches philosophy at Gonzaga University. Harold Tarrant is Conjoint Professor of Classics at the University of Newcastle, Australia, and author of Plato's First Interpreters. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Introduction Danielle A. Layne and Harold TarrantOr how, before this, could we examine anything else, either of the things that are or of those that come to be when we have heard Socrates himself say: "It seems ridiculous of me to consider the properties of other beings, when I do not know myself"? —Proclus, in Alc. 6.12 (tr. O'Neill, modified)In one of the most romantic dialogues of his corpus