The Judgment of the Dead  -Part 1

The Meaning of Life and Death

We continue with Eric Voegelin's account of the Gorgias. The soul of a man must be purified of injustice either here and now or after death. The myth explains the necessary process of purgation.

The transfer of authority from Athens to Plato is the climax of the Gorgias. The meaning of the transfer and the source of the new authority, however, still need some clarification. Let us recall what is at stake. The transfer of authority means that the authority of Athens, as the public organization of a people in history, is inval­idated and superseded by a new public authority manifest in the person of Plato. That is revolution.

And it is even more than an ordinary revolution in which new political forces enter the struggle for power in competition with the older ones. Plato's revolution is a radical call for spiritual regeneration. The people of Athens has lost its soul. The representative of Athenian democracy, Callicles, is existentially disordered; the great men of Athenian history are the corruptors of their country; the law courts of Athens can kill a man physically but their sentence has no moral authority of pun­ishment.

The fundamental raison d'etre of a people, that it goes its way through history in partnership with God, has disappeared; there is no reason why Athens should exist, considering what she is. The Gorgias is the death sentence over Athens.

HISTORIC PRESERVATION

A REMEMBRANCE OF FIRST PRINCIPLES

                    by Jack D. Elliott, Jr.

I.   Introduction

The greatest potential of historic preservation isn’t merely in temporarily saving a vast potpourri of old buildings and sites from the inexorable ravages of time. Instead, in recalling the significance of the past, we potentially dip into a great reservoir of personal and collective experience. The term significance — or meaning — recalls the symbolic dimensions of the past where words and images, good and evil, facts and mystery interplay in memory. This stands in contrast to the modern, narrower emphasis on the empirical and material.

Despite the current focus on preserving old things and information, an occasionally recalled intuition hints that preservation is about more. Richard Moe writes that historic places help us understand “who we are, where we came from, and what is the legacy that shapes . . . us.” Or a preservation film similarly tells us that historic places ask the questions: “Who are we? Where do we come from? And, where are we going?”

 Political Corruption:

The Man who Dares to Resist

We continue with Voegelin's account of the Gorgias. Pathos is the precondition for Philia; it is better to strive for philia and lose one's life than to live on as an advocate or agent of the tyrant.

In the present context we have to concentrate on the existential enmity between Callicles and Socrates-Plato and on the critical analysis of political corruption. Above all, Socrates now resumes the issue of communication in a more radical manner. Only if the soul is well ordered can it be called lawful (nomimos) (504D); and only if it has the right order (nomos) is it capable of entering into communion (koinonia) (507E).

The pathos is no more than a precondition for community; in order to actualize it, the Eros must be oriented toward the Good (agathon) and the disturbing passions must be restrained by Sophrosyne. If the lusts are unrestrained, man will lead the life of a robber (lestes). Such a man cannot be the friend (prosphiles) of God or other men, for he is incapable of communion, and who is incapable of communion is incapable of friendship (philia) (507E). Friendship, philia, is Plato's term for the state of existential community.

Philia is the existential bond among men; and it is the bond as well between Heaven and Earth, man and God. Because philia and order pervade everything, the universe is called kosmos (order) and not disorder or license (akosmia, akolasia) (508A).

 Socrates confronts the Smug Insider:

Exposing the Inversion of Existence 

We continue with Voegelin's account of the Gorgias. Socrates now faces the assault of Callicles, who offers his hedonistic existentialism: justice is the success of the stronger;  the life of luxury, license and freedom is happiness.

[There is more] to the resistance of Callicles than the fear of a Socratic popular success. The situation of the dialogue is not that of an assembly of the people. Members of the ruling class are among themselves. In such company the propositions of Socrates are in bad taste.

It is the same complaint as that of Polus. But while Polus was indignant because Socrates did not conduct himself en canaille, Callicles protests that Socrates does not conduct himself as a gentleman of the superior type. The subsequent remarks of Callicles have, therefore, in spite of their threatening undertone, the character of a not altogether unfriendly admonition to Socrates to mend his ways.¹

 The Nature of Pathos:

Reaching the hearts of the corrupt 

In Voegelin's account of the Gorgias, Socrates has refuted the old sophist, Gorgias, and his pupil, Polus. They are mainly interested in advancing themselves through skillful argument. But the third man, Callicles, is interested in power — and will kill for it.

The violent reaction comes from the activist, from Callicles, the enlightened politician. He has followed the course of the debate with increasing astonishment and wrath and now he asks Chaerephon [a pupil of Socrates present during the discussion] whether Socrates is in earnest about these things or whether he is joking. Being assured that he is in earnest, he turns on Socrates: If that were true, would not the whole of human life be turned upside down; and would we not do in everything the very opposite of what we ought to be doing? (481C).

Callicles has rightly sensed the revolution in the words of Socrates. This is not a mere intellectual game. If Socrates is right, then the society as represented by the politician Callicles is wrong. And since the wrong goes to the spiritual core of human existence, the society would be corrupt to the point that it can no longer have a claim to the loyalty of man. The existence of the society in history is at stake. The battle has now reached the real enemy, the public representative of the corrupt order. And Callicles does not hesitate to join battle.