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Plato's Republic And Justice
Justice is ultimately an unknowable concept, if we accept Plato's ideas of 'form' or the essential nature of concepts. In the Republic, Plato presents several intelligent and well-thought-out discussions about the nature of justice. He refutes the arguments that justice is simply rewarding friends, or asserting the interests of the strong. He ultimately concludes that the goal of life is the pursuit of what is just, and that a just life makes man happy. However, if we accept Plato's ideal of the 'form', or essential nature of a concept, it is thereby impossible to truly understand the concept of justice. The best that we, or even the brilliant and inquisitive Plato can attempt, is to achieve a clear representation of the ideal or 'form' of justice.
In Plato's Republic, he provides a challenging discussion of the nature of justice and injustice. In Book One, Socrates contemplates the nature of justice with the aging Cephalus, Polemarchus who is Cephalus' son, and Threasymachus, a sophist. By Book Two, Plato's brothers challenge Socrates to convince them of some of his ideas about justice, namely that an unjust life filled with wealth, power, and fame is no preferable to a just life without these things. In this book, Plato's brothers consider...
Ultimately, their discussion reveals a great deal about the foundations of justice and injustice.
In Book 1, Plato presents one of the most basic of the views about justice. He notes, "As concerning justice, what is it? --to speak the truth and to pay your debts -- no more than this" (Plato, The Republic). Ultimately, he continues, writing "then justice is the art which gives good to friends and evil to enemies" (Plato, The Republic). Through the words of Sophocles, Plato eventually dismisses this first definition of justice, positing that the just man is simply a thief.
Eventually, Plato (through the voice of Thrasymachus) argues that justice is essentially asserting the interests of the stronger. "I believe that Periander or Perdiccas or Xerxes or Ismenias the Theban, or some other rich and mighty man, who had a great opinion of his own power, was the first to say that justice is 'doing good to your friends and harm to your enemies" (Plato, The Republic). Thrasymachus notes fiercely that injustice benefits the ruler completely, while Sophocles argues that true rule is just, thus offering unity, harmony and strength.…
Works Cited
Magee, Bryan. 2001. The Great Philosophers: An Introduction to Western Philosophy. Oxford University Press.
Plato. The Republic. Translated by Benjamin Jowett. 11 March 2004. http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.html
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