Justice in Plato’s Eutyphro

• In Event: The Ancient Conception of the Good

Abstract

At first glance, Plato’s Euthyphro appears to be entirely devoted to an examination of the
holy. Careful consideration of the dialogue’s setting and opening conversation paint a different
picture. I argue that by placing the dialogue in front of a lawcourt and by distinguishing Socrates
and Euthyphro based on their relationship to that court, Plato encourages his reader to consider
the role that justice plays in the dialogue as a whole. With this consideration in mind, I examine
places where Euthyphro’s statements about the holy are plainly interwoven with his opinions
about justice. I find that these statements are of particular interest to Socrates and that much of
his approach over the course of the conversation can be understood as an effort to clarify the
relationship between Euthyphro’s opinions about justice and the holy. More generally, I explore
what light the conversation in Euthyphro casts on the aim of Socrates’ dialectic or his
conversational art. Euthyphro, after all, claims to have divine knowledge, a knowledge that
Socrates elsewhere claims not to have. By the end of the dialogue, however, Socrates is not
persuaded that Euthyphro has this knowledge and even Euthyphro himself appears shaken. I
argue that Socrates observes an intractable confusion in Euthyphro’s opinions about justice, a
confusion that shapes Euthyphro’s opinions about—and hence experience of—the holy.
Ultimately, however, I conclude with more questions than answers, though questions that serve
to clarify problems at the core of Socrates’ human wisdom.

Author

• Benjamin Morgan, Boston College