the significance of alcibiades’ speech in plato’s symposium：阿西比底斯的演讲在柏拉图的研讨会的意义.pdfVIP

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ALCIBIADES’ SPEECH IN PLATO’S SYMPOSIUM A common construal of Plato’s theory of love might be summed up as follows: love is a desire, arising from a lack or deficiency within the lover, to possess the Good forever, where the Good is understood as an eternal, unchanging Idea or Form existing in some transcendental realm of eternal essences. Because this love is characterized as a desire rooted in need, critics have sometimes seen it as appetitive and thus egocentric. (Nygren) In the convenient language of C. S. Lewis, it is a need love rather than a gift love. Other critics have argued that because the object of Platonic eros is a transcendent Form, Plato failed to understand the love of persons. Persons, the argument runs, can only be loved as means to the end of attaining of the Good. (Vlastos and Singer) I wish to offer a reading of the Symposium that responds both of these criticisms. Let’s begin by following Plato’s analysis of love as it unfolds in Diotima’s instructions to the young Socrates. Through a succession of steps, Socrates learns that love is of beautiful things, that the lover desires they become his, that beautiful things are also good, that possessing such things will make one happy, and, finally, that the lover wishes that they, and indeed the Good itself, be his forever. (206A) It might appear at this point that a complete theory of love has been presented, summed up in Diotima’s formula: “In a word then, love is wanting to possess the good forever.” (206A) What more need be said? But just here the theory takes a surprising turn. Diotima asks Socrates, “What is the real purpose of love? Can you say?” (206B) Rather than giving either of the obvious answers--happiness or possessing the Good forever--Socrates responds: “If I could [say], . . . I wouldn’t be your student, filled with admiration for your wisdom, and trying to learn these very things.” (