True morality according to Socrates is the knowledge of the good. A person can be moral only when he knows what goodness and virtue are.
For Socrates, knowledge and morality are inseparable. “Nothing will force someone who has known good and bad to act differently than knowledge dictates, and the mind is strong enough to help a person.” Any knowledge is good, and any vice is committed from ignorance.
Virtue is knowledge, bad is ignorance. The main virtues are restraint, courage, justice.
About the soul. Man is a soul. The soul refers to the mind, thoughts and behavior. First of all, a person should take care of the soul, not the body. The body serves the soul. The soul is immortal. Death is the reward for life's torments. Death is understood as liberation.

6. Ethics of Socrates. The doctrine of goodness and virtue.

Ethics(from the ancient Greek ethos - character, custom) - a philosophical study of the essence, goals and causes of morality and morality.

Both in the field of theoretical knowledge and in the field of morality, the significance of Socrates lies not only in the content and systematization of the ideas he expressed, but in the method by which they were processed. Socrates instilled in his contemporaries the belief in the existence of an unconditional moral good. Evil can only come from ignorance of good and the path to it. This establishment of an inextricable connection between knowledge of good and good deeds leads Socrates to identify wisdom with virtues, rationality with goodness.

All types of moral good gravitate towards two final authorities: benefit and laws. Violation of unwritten or divine laws entails retribution. The existence of such laws (worship of God, obedience to parents) served as an indication to Socrates that human consciousness is inherent in some kind of higher and universal rationality, the commands of which a person is absolutely obliged to obey.

Socrates' ethics had a religious character. He was convinced of the existence of God as the universal mind, and of the influence of God on all living things.

In matters of ethics, Socrates developed the principles of rationalism, arguing that virtue stems from knowledge and a person who knows what good is will not do evil. Good is also knowledge.

There is nothing stronger than knowledge; it always and in everything overpowers pleasures and everything else.

Every benefit brought by good people is useful.

Socrates declares that all beautiful things (bodies, colors, shapes, sounds, morals) are considered such for some specific purpose, or because they give this or that pleasure.

According to Socrates and Xenophanes, an action is correct only if it is useful for the person performed, being a benefit.

Dialogue between Aristil and Socrates.

A: Do you know, Socrates, anything beautiful?

S: Yes. But the same objects can be both beautiful and ugly, as well as good and bad. What is ugly for running is good for fighting and vice versa.

In a conversation with Euthydemus, Socrates expresses his thoughts, defining good as useful, as corresponding to a certain goal. What is beneficial for one person may be harmful for another.

What is useful is for those to whom it is useful.

Thus, according to Socrates, there is nothing good or bad, useful or harmful in general, just as there is nothing beautiful or ugly in general.

Wisdom is the highest good. And this highest good for Socrates was not only knowledge, but also the realization of virtue, the choice of good. It, the highest good, is not given by chance, but is acquired through knowledge and exercise and follows from the good activity of a person.

Only that life is good, meaningful and virtuous, which is devoted to search, self-knowledge and improvement.

[Virtue is not born from money, but from virtue people have money and all other benefits, both in private and in public life.

Plato. Apology.

Socrates' judgment on moral virtues

Socrates considered the three main virtues to be:

1. Moderation (knowing how to curb passions)

2. Bravery (knowing how to overcome dangers)

3. Justice (knowing how to observe divine and human laws)

Only "noble people" can claim knowledge. And “farmers and other workers are very far from knowing themselves... after all, they know only what is related to the body and serves it... And therefore, if knowing oneself is a sign of rationality, none of these people , cannot be intelligent by virtue of his craft alone.” Worker, artisan, farmer, i.e. knowledge is inaccessible to the entire demos (not to mention slaves).

“... Socrates investigated the moral virtues and was the first to try to give their general definitions (after all, of those who reasoned about nature, only Democritus touched on this a little and in some way gave definitions of hot and cold; and the Pythagoreans - before him - did this for a few things, the definitions of which they summarized to numbers, indicating, for example, what opportunity, or justice, or marriage is). …Two things can rightly be attributed to Socrates—proofs by induction and general definitions: both concern the beginning of knowledge,” wrote Aristotle (“Metaphysics,” XIII, 4).

The line between the spiritual processes inherent in man and the material world, already outlined by the previous development of Greek philosophy (in the teachings of Pythagoras, the Sophists, etc.), was more clearly outlined by Socrates: he emphasized the uniqueness of consciousness in comparison with material existence and was one of the first to deeply reveal the sphere of the spiritual as an independent reality, proclaiming it as something no less reliable than the existence of the perceived world (monism)[

In matters of ethics, Socrates developed the principles of rationalism, arguing that virtue stems from knowledge, and a person who knows what good is will not act badly. After all, goodness is also knowledge, so a culture of intelligence can make people kind.

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43) “KNOWLEDGE IS THE CHIEF VIRTUE” (SOCRATES)

The words belonging to the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates reveal the essence of his attitude to the concept of the moral purpose of man.

Socrates says that “there is only one good - knowledge and only one evil - ignorance. Wealth and nobility do not bring any dignity - on the contrary, they bring only bad things.”

From these words it follows that Socrates did not see the dependence of a person’s mental abilities on his material and class status. According to the philosopher, every individual is capable of achieving success in life, relying only on his own knowledge, acquired through efforts in learning, through his own life experience and work, but not with the help of money, connections, or noble origin.

Socrates considered this interpretation to be true, and he devoted his teachings to this, thereby helping many people understand themselves and achieve success in life. He himself, already an old man, learned to play the lyre and said: “Isn’t it decent to learn what you didn’t know?”

Socrates is characterized by a deep, thoughtful, rationally balanced adherence to his own moral principles. This desire to always remain oneself most obviously affected the philosopher’s choice of life path and determined the direction of his ideas and teachings.

The first undoubted position of Socrates' ethics is the recognition of the traditional connection between the concepts of good and virtue and the concepts of benefit and happiness, traditional for ancient social consciousness. All people strive for pleasure and benefit and avoid suffering. But people do not always know what exactly is pleasure or pain for them. According to Socrates, a person needs knowledge in order to make the right choice between pleasure and pain, between abundant and insignificant, between greater and less.

This position of Socrates requires the individual to have a conscious and responsible attitude towards the value content of his life. The ancient Greek philosopher puts the concepts of virtue and knowledge on the same level and considers reason as a force that drives the behavior of an individual and is a form of his moral freedom and independence. And morality is a product of reflection, according to Socrates, who argued: “...I am not able to obey anything that is in me, except for the conviction that, after careful examination, seems to me the best.” With these words, the philosopher reveals the meaning of his understanding of virtue as the ability of a subject to always be guided by a consciously acquired conviction and to resist the false opinion of others, no matter who they are and no matter how many there are. Thus, in the famous statement of Socrates “Virtue is knowledge” hides the idea of ​​​​obligatory moral independence (moral emancipation) of each individual person.

According to Socrates, a person becomes moral only when his moral beliefs are recognized by him as true and correct. And only by becoming knowledge does virtue become virtue. But people are far from virtue in their behavior, and this is undoubted proof that they do not know it. And knowledge is knowledge when its truth does not depend on anything. Therefore, according to Socrates, people are not given the ability to know nature, since this knowledge is available only to God. The only thing a person can know is himself, and this is his good.

Thus, Socrates’ motto “know thyself” is both an elevation of man and a definition of the boundaries of the knowledge available to him: knowledge of the good is practically achievable, since it expresses the most intimate for the individual. And ethical morality contains the value meaning of actions and behavior that a member of society should follow.

Next, Socrates deduces another thesis, according to which a person who consciously does evil knows what virtue is, which means he is better than that individual who commits evil unconsciously and has no concept of virtue. But at the same time a contradiction arises, since intentional evil cannot actually exist. Moreover, this idea is incompatible with the original basis of Socratic ethics about the good, which is identical to benefit and pleasure. Therefore, Socrates, arguing that conscious evil (injustice) is better than unconscious, adds: “If it is possible.” It follows from this that only good can be realized consciously.

Socrates' formula about virtue as knowledge should be understood in the literal sense: virtue has a general nature that goes beyond the boundaries of each individual. All virtues are varieties of knowledge (meaning courage, justice, etc.), therefore the spiritual activity of the individual should be aimed exclusively at the search for adequate ethical knowledge, because knowledge decides the whole matter. Following virtue, honesty and justice, according to Socrates, is the real happiness and benefit of a person. Morality for him is a force standing above a person, setting the meaning of his activities. Therefore, the Socratic method is intended to help correct moral consciousness, which gives a distorted idea of ​​the truly valuable attitudes in life.

All of Socrates' conversations lead to the conclusion that virtue is knowledge, but no one has this knowledge. Consequently, we must tirelessly seek moral truth and strive for knowledge, since to know about virtue means to already be good. And at the same time, knowledge turns out to be a path of moral elevation and personal improvement.

The search for moral truth led Socrates to a number of conclusions important for human life. Firstly, morality (moral behavior) is a measure of the humanity of any deed, since it is recognized that a person is better and more important than what he does. The philosopher urges “not to worry about your affairs before and more than about yourself...”. It follows, secondly, that the soul is more important than the body, which means that the path to virtue and the acquisition of knowledge has neither age nor any other boundaries. Thirdly, the philosopher’s lifestyle presupposes recognition of the superiority of the common good over the individual. In this, Socrates is a convinced moralist who seeks to subordinate the life of individuals to moral motives and believes that for this it is enough to transform their way of thinking.

Socrates Nersesyants Vladik Sumbatovich

VIRTUE IS KNOWLEDGE

VIRTUE IS KNOWLEDGE

At the center of all Socratic philosophizing are questions about moral virtues, the moral qualities of a person. In essence, the teaching of Socrates is a moral philosophy, ethics. His theory of knowledge and epistemology are also ethically oriented. The moral and ethical meaning of the human search for truth and the acquisition of knowledge is predetermined by the fact that the origins of both knowledge and morality go back, according to Socrates, to the gods. The measure of human virtue is the measure of his communion with divine wisdom, and the process of cognition takes on the character of a moral action, a moral act. The path of knowledge outlined by Socrates is his school of virtue.

True knowledge - knowledge through concepts - is accessible, according to the Socratic concept, only to a few, sages, philosophers. But not all wisdom is available to them, but only a small part of it. Wisdom is knowledge, but man cannot know everything. “...It is impossible for a person,” Socrates said, to be wise in everything. Therefore, whatever one knows, in that he is wise” (Ibid., IV, VI, 8).

But this human wisdom, according to Socrates, is worth little compared to divine wisdom. And ordinary, unenlightened opinion means very little in this regard. “...Personally, he,” writes Xenophon about Socrates, “put all human considerations at nothing before the definition of the gods” (Ibid., 1, III, 4).

Socrates' thesis about the wisdom of a person's knowledge of the boundaries of his knowledge and ignorance - “I know that I know nothing” - precisely fixes the relationship of human knowledge to the divine mind. This position had, as it were, two faces: derogatory-modest - in its appeal to divine knowledge, critical-ironic - to human knowledge. The philosopher stands between God and people, wisdom and ignorance. Already Pythagoras, whom Socrates follows in this case, called himself a philosopher, and not a sage, since only God is wise, but not man. Philosophy as the love of wisdom in the Socratic interpretation appears as the love of divine wisdom. From this it is clear why Socrates did not miss the opportunity to certify his philosophizing as a feasible service to the gods.

Knowledge is divine, and only it elevates a person and likens him to the gods. Most people, Socrates believed, shun knowledge and are guided by random desires and changeable feelings. “The majority,” he said, “believes that knowledge does not have power and cannot lead and command: that is why (people) do not think about it. Despite the fact that knowledge is often inherent in a person, they believe that not knowing controls, but something else: sometimes passion, sometimes pleasure, sometimes sorrow, sometimes love, and more often fear. They think of knowledge just like a slave: everyone drags it in his own direction" (Plato. Protagoras, 352 b-). With).

In contrast to this majority opinion, Socrates defended the principle of the universal dominance of reason - in nature, in the individual and in human society as a whole. In nature, this manifests itself as harmony and expediency throughout the entire universe; in the individual as the dominion of the rational soul over the natural and irrational body; in society - as the dominance of reasonable laws and regulations, as the rule of the knowledgeable. Ignoring this and deviating from the right path are, according to Socrates, a consequence of ignorance.

True, the gods in Socrates’ concept remain the source of all knowledge, but in the process of Socratic rationalization, the very status of the gods essentially changes: from mythological creatures they are largely transformed into categories of philosophy and theory of knowledge. But such a philosophical rationalization of the gods in the then conditions of the dominance of mythological ideas had to inevitably remain superficial and limited: philosophy coexisted with myth for a long time, using its arsenal, rationalizing and modifying its ideas. One might even say that for quite a long time ancient philosophy was a kind of rationalistically stylized mythology. This is clearly evidenced by the views of not only Socrates and his philosophical predecessors, but also the position of such a famous follower as Plato, in whose work the further rationalization of myth is accompanied by philosophical myth-making,

True knowledge, according to Socrates, comes from God and leads to him. These are the conditions and boundaries of possible and permissible autonomy of human cognition. Socrates clearly outlined the only correct, in his opinion, direction of human effort - knowledge and action on the basis of knowledge.

This Socratic concept of knowledge and cognition differs significantly from the then widespread traditional mythological faith, which rejected all vain speculation about the gods, and from the fashionable position of the Sophists with their skeptical attitude towards the gods and the subjectivization of truth, the denial of objective criteria of human knowledge and socio-political behavior. The situation between the traditionalists and the newly-minted sophist sages is very characteristic of the teachings of Socrates and affected his entire fate: the traditionalists considered him a sophist and eventually achieved his condemnation; the sophists saw in him, rather, a traditionalist critical of them.

The position of the Sophists, who relied on sensory knowledge, was in principle as unacceptable for Socrates as the approach of Anaxagoras. The interpretation of individual sensation as a criterion of truth seemed even more absurd to him. Such views were developed, in particular, by the famous head of the Sophists, Protagoras, with whom Socrates met and talked. “The measure of all things,” Protagoras asserted, “is man; those that exist are that they exist, and those that do not exist that they do not exist” (Plato. Theaetetus, 152). Since the gods did not represent a fact of sensory knowledge, Protagoras, without directly denying their existence, skeptically remarked: “About the gods I cannot say either that they exist or that they do not exist.”

Agreeing with Protagoras that the sensation of each individual person, as well as of every other living being, has an individual and unique character, Socrates, at the same time, reasonably objected to reducing all knowledge to sensation and to replacing objective truth with subjective feelings and ideas . “Those words of his,” Socrates says about Protagoras, “that the way something seems to everyone, that is how it is, I really like. But I am surprised at the beginning of this saying: why doesn’t he say at the beginning of his “Truth” that the measure of all things is a pig, or a cynocephalus, or something even more absurd among those that have sensations, so that the beginning of the speech would be all the more magnificent and arrogant, proving that we marvel at him almost like a god for his wisdom, and In terms of his intelligence, he is no higher than a tadpole, much less any of the people" (Ibid., 161 e).

Socrates correctly notes that such a relativization of truth, the denial of its objective and universally valid criteria, generally deprives any search for truth and disputes about it. Each person, knowing and ignorant, thanks only to his sensation, becomes the measure of his wisdom, and all of them quickly turn into sages. “How can one not say here,” Socrates notes, “that with these words Protagoras is currying favor with the people” (Ibid., 161 e). Indeed, Protagoras’ epistemological position is characterized by a kind of democracy: what everyone possesses is interpreted as truth, not as a result of knowledge, but as its starting point. On this issue, Socrates takes the opposite position, going back to the intellectual aristocracy of Heraclitus and sharply contrasting the few “knowers” ​​with the many “ignorant”, the wise men with the “crowd”, etc.

Naturally, such differences were not limited only to the sphere of epistemology, but were clearly reflected in the socio-political sphere. Later we will see that Socrates saw the main drawback of the democratic organization of city life in the rule of “ignorant”, i.e., incompetent officials.

Contrasting true knowledge with the vain fluidity of subjective feelings and opinions, Socrates proceeded from the fact that the measure of all things, in the language of Protagoras, is not man, but God. Therefore, the true path of human knowledge consists, according to Socrates, in understanding the divine wisdom that governs all affairs. Therefore, in Socrates, the measure of things ultimately turns out to be man, but Socrates means the mind and knowledge of man (man as a thinking being), while Protagoras means the sensations and feelings of man (man as a sensual being).

The harmony of the universe, predetermined and permeated by the divine mind, serves as a prerequisite for the rational, purposeful and purposeful earthly activity of man and his virtuous life. Knowledge about man, the forms of his individual, social and political life, his soul and body, vices and virtues and knowledge about the world as a whole are, according to Socrates, not different knowledge, but only different parts of a single knowledge about the divine truth of existence. Therefore, approaching this true knowledge is a goal not only for a specifically philosophical search for truth, but also the life duty of every person striving for a reasonable and virtuous life. Philosophical, and any other knowledge with such a convergence of knowledge and virtue, epistemology and ethics appears as a guide for a person, showing him the necessary guidelines in life.

The highest manifestation of divine care for people is human intelligence. “They,” Socrates says about the gods, “put in us reason, through which we judge objects of sensation and, by transmitting them to memory, we learn what is useful and how, and in general come up with means to enjoy what is useful and avoid what is harmful. They gave us the ability to transmit , through which, precisely through the word, we endow each other with everything good, form societies, make laws and enjoy public life" (Xenophon. Memoirs of Socrates, IV, III, 11-12).

In earthly life, a person does not directly see the image of God, but it is enough for him that he sees the deeds of the gods. God, Socrates notes, “is visible in his great deeds, but how he rules over all this is beyond knowledge” (Ibid., IV, III, 13). The divine principle in man, his rational soul, is also invisible, although it is she who rules the body and actions of man. “Concerning the human soul, which more than anything else in man participates in the deity, it is known,” Socrates believes, “that it reigns in us, but we do not see it either. Thinking about all this, a person should not be contemptuous of the invisible; on the contrary, one must recognize his actions in phenomena and honor the divine power" (Ibid., IV, III, 14). Moreover, the gods should be honored in the way that has developed in a given society, as is accepted in the corresponding policy. Here Socrates adhered to the position of the Delphic oracle, who, to the question “How to please the gods?” answered: “According to city charters,” i.e., in accordance with established police customs and procedures. Everywhere it was customary to please the gods “to the best of our ability,” to the best of everyone’s ability.

Man, according to Socrates, would be completely devoid of reason and knowledge if he, along with the mortal body, did not have an immortal soul. It is thanks to the divine soul that man becomes familiar with divine knowledge: like is known by like. In addition, the soul is the keeper of the knowledge it previously acquired in eternal wanderings in this and that world; human knowledge is, in essence, the soul’s recollection of previous knowledge. However, the significance of the soul in Socrates’ teaching is not exhausted by such an epistemological role. The position on the immortality of the soul occupies a leading place in the moral philosophy of Socrates, defining the meaning and goals of human existence in the world, his life and death.

In Socrates' time, Orphic and Pythagorean ideas were widespread about the languor of the immortal soul in the prison of the mortal body, its liberation with the death of the body and migrations, about the punishment or reward of the soul at the afterlife judgment for its earthly path, etc. In Socrates' interpretation, such ideas, having undergone a certain dampening and philosophical transformation, they serve to determine the place and purpose of man in the teleological chain of world connections. The immortal soul residing in a mortal body unites the earthly and heavenly, natural and divine aspects of human existence into one whole. The immortality of the soul, according to Socrates, clearly shows that only a rational and virtuous life is appropriate and corresponds to the divine harmony of the universe and its providential goals.

In view of the universal worldwide connection of the phenomena of virtue II, the vices of individual people affect not only themselves, the good of their family, friends, native city, but also the fate of all future generations, the entire cosmic order of things. Thus, questions about human virtues and vices, good and evil, justice and injustice turn out to be not only personal and not just social, but universal, universal and eternal. Conscious adherence to the reason of being - despite all the obstacles encountered - is a clear, albeit difficult, life duty of a person to himself, his environment, the polis, future generations and the gods.

Socrates' moral philosophy comes from clarity and determination of how one should live. Therefore, a person in it does not stand in a painful and dark situation of ethical choice. One can even say that Socrates does not leave a person a moral choice: the choice is predetermined by knowledge, since virtue is knowledge, and vices and evil are created out of ignorance, ignorance.

The absence of immortality of the soul, Socrates notes, would be a happy find for bad people: with the death of the soul, they would easily get rid of their inherent depravity. But the soul is immortal, and, therefore, man’s responsibility for his deeds is inevitable.

Being immortal, the soul, according to Socrates, is at the same time subject to both improvement and corruption - depending on the earthly lifestyle of those who receive it in their eternal migrations from this world to the afterlife (Hades) and returns back. “When a person dies,” explains Socrates, “his genius, which he inherited during his lifetime, takes the deceased to a special place where everyone, having passed the trial, must gather to go to Hades with the leader who is entrusted with delivering them from here.” there. Having met the fate that they should, and having spent the period that they should stay, they return here under the guidance of Another leader, and this is repeated again and again after long periods of time" (Plato. Phaedo, 107 e).

At the trial in Hades, souls are sentenced to various grave punishments in accordance with their earthly offenses, and for good deeds they receive rewards according to their deserts. The purpose of afterlife punishment is to correct and cleanse the soul so that it can return to the earthly world again. If the fair judges of Hades - the mythological kings and heroes (Minos, Rhadamanthus, Aeacus, Triptolemus) - find that certain souls, burdened by what they did in earthly life, are completely corrupted and incorrigible, for example, the souls of sacrilege, malicious murderers of many people, etc. . etc., then such souls are forever cast into the gloomy Tartarus - a place similar to Christian hell. The souls of people who have committed serious, yet redeemable crimes (for example, the souls of murderers who repented while still alive, etc.) are thrown into Tartarus only for a while, until they beg forgiveness from their victims.

In addition to the incorrigible souls eternally imprisoned with Tartarus, the souls of those who spent their earthly life especially wisely, lightly and beautifully no longer return to earth. These are the souls of philosophers, pure and perfect. After the trial in Hades, they gain access “to the country of supreme purity, located above that earth, and settle there” to live henceforth “completely incorporeal” (Ibid., 114 c).

Space, according to Socrates, serves as the habitat of the gods. This is where, judging by his story, the souls of philosophers are sent. Their reward, therefore, consists in the fact that their souls are released from the eternal cycle and transmigration of souls, finally getting rid of the need for new bodily reincarnations and the torments associated with this. Only for a true philosopher, among whom Socrates, of course, included himself, death means the end of torment and the beginning of an eternal blissful life. This is, according to Socrates, the achievement of immortality accessible to mortal man. The souls of other people will suffer until they become purer, more perfect, more moderate, more reasonable. The main thing on this path of getting rid of torment is caring for the soul: neglecting bodily pleasures, which are more likely to cause harm than good, and decorating the soul with genuine virtues and the fruits of knowledge - truth, justice, freedom, courage, temperance.

Doubting certain particulars and details of the legend about afterlife punishment and reward, Socrates at the same time firmly believed in the truth of the meaning and essence of this myth as a whole. The entire lifestyle of Socrates, his conscious readiness for death both on the battlefield and in court leaves no doubt about this.

As can be seen from Socrates' speech at the trial, he hopes that after his execution his soul will meet the souls of such famous people as Orpheus, Musaeus, Hesiod, Homer, Palamedes, Ajax, Agamemnon, Odysseus and others. Socrates imagined the blissful life of his soul as interesting conversations with the souls of the local inhabitants and testing them for wisdom. This, according to Socrates, will be unspeakable bliss and for this reason he has nothing to fear death and cling to life. “In any case,” Socrates said with obvious reproach to his earthly judges and accusers, “they don’t execute people there for this” (Plato. Apology of Socrates, 41 p.).

The earthly life of a true philosopher is only a proper preparation for the blissful outcome. “Those who are truly devoted to philosophy,” notes Socrates, are, in essence, busy with only one thing - dying and death” (Plato. Phaedo, 64). By “dying and death” here we mean the difficult earthly life of a philosopher as a worthy preparation to future immortality. And on this path it is not the poor in spirit who achieve bliss, but only the strong in spirit, the philosophers.

Socrates' passionate philosophical impulse to the blessed fields in the next world turned into spiritual immortality in this world: earthly affairs have an earthly outcome.

The philosopher is the main character of Socrates' ethics. But the matter, of course, does not end there. The educational pathos of Socratic philosophy had a wide range of addressees. The path to virtue through knowledge and access to wisdom is open in principle to everyone. In this regard, no one is deprived, as Socrates believed, of the care of the omnipresent gods, who “give man instructions about everything human” (Xenophon. Memoirs of Socrates, 1, 1, 19). These divine instructions - various kinds of signs, voices, visions, miracles, prophecies, visible or heard in dreams and in reality - keep a person on the right path, as if correcting his own cognitive efforts. Among such signs from above is the demon of Socrates himself, to whose warning voice he always listened. Socrates' accusers, when they said that he was introducing new deities, had this particular demon in mind.

The arsenal of ancient mantika (guessing the will of the gods), which became widespread and enjoyed great authority, was quite extensive. It included, in particular, fortune telling by symbols, the flight of birds, human voices, the entrails of a sacrificial animal, etc. For himself, Socrates, apparently, did not resort to mantle, being content with the inner voice of his demon. He also took into account the predictions of oracles, among which he especially revered the oracle of the Delphic Temple, where he usually advised those who doubted the outcome of this or that planned important matter to turn. But even with the help of mantics, oracle broadcasts, etc., one cannot know everything. There are many unknowns in human and divine affairs, especially regarding the future. So, the sower does not know who will reap the harvest, the one who built the house does not know who will live in it, etc. And those who do not see anything divine in all this are mad, Socrates believed.

Man, it is true, cannot completely overcome the veil of divine mystery and uncertainty, but what is available to him is sufficient for moral life. Keeping the gods in mind and focusing on human affairs is the core meaning of Socrates' call to virtuous knowledge. “They are also mad,” he said,” Xenophon writes about Socrates, “who ask the gods about what the gods gave people to distinguish by learning, for example, if someone asked whether it is better to take for horses a person who knows how to hold the reins or who does not; or whether it is better to take on a ship who knows how to steer a ship or who does not know how; or what can be known by counting, or measuring, or weighing. He believed that those who ask the gods about this are acting criminally, and said that what the gods have taught to do should be studied, and what is unknown to man should be tried. learn from the gods through mantika, since the gods reveal if they are merciful to whom" (Ibid., 1, 1, 9).

Thus, a person himself should research and study how to become a skilled carpenter, blacksmith, farmer, accountant, housekeeper, helmsman, military leader, etc. The practically necessary knowledge and skill in such matters is available to a person without vain appeal to the gods and mantles . In this area of ​​technical knowledge and practical skill, the main role is played, according to Socrates, by a person’s own cognitive efforts. Mantika, he said, “is needed by those who intend to live well in their home or city” (Ibid., 1, 1, 7). But even here, in the sphere of moral life (in the family, polis, etc.), a person’s behavior must be based both on the instructions of the mantle and on the knowledge he himself has acquired. Ethical virtue as a whole and its various parts and manifestations - for example, virtues such as piety, wisdom, prudence, courage, justice, etc., represent knowledge that ensures the choice of good and rejection of evil. The regulating role of knowledge, according to Socrates, is unconditional and absolute: “... there is nothing stronger than knowledge, it always and in everything overpowers both pleasures and everything else” (Plato. Protagoras, 357 pp.). Therefore, evil is created, according to Socrates, out of ignorance, lack of knowledge. An evil act is the result of a misunderstanding of what true good is, and not the result of a rational choice of evil; in other words, willful evil is impossible.

Based precisely on this understanding of the connection between ignorance and evil, Socrates, regarding his prosecution for the allegedly intentional moral corruption of young men, objected to his accuser Meletus in court as follows: “But either I do not spoil, or if I spoil, it is unintentionally; thus, you come out with a lie in both cases. If I damage unintentionally, then for such unintentional offenses one should not be summoned here, but privately instruct and admonish. After all, it is clear that, having understood everything, I will stop doing what I do unintentionally. You avoided me, did not want to teach me, and summoned me here, where, according to the law, those who need punishment and not teaching should be brought" (Plato. Apology of Socrates, 26).

Socratic ethics is to a significant extent characterized by the rapprochement between ignorance and madness, characteristic of ancient ideas, and the attitude towards crime as an act of a madman. True, Socrates still, in principle, distinguished ignorance from madness. On this occasion, Xenophon writes: “Madness, he said, is the opposite of knowledge, but he did not consider ignorance to be madness. He recognized self-knowledge, affirmation of the unknown and self-delusion as concepts very close to madness. People, he said, do not recognize madness in those who are mistaken in what is unknown to the masses; they attribute him to those who are mistaken in matters known to the masses" (Xenophon. Memoirs of Socrates, III, IX, 6).

In relation to good as the result of action based on knowledge, evil is a misunderstanding, a consequence of offenses committed out of ignorance. Consequently, good and evil, according to Socrates’ concept, are not two different and autonomous principles, as is the case, for example, in the teachings of Zoroaster about the struggle between light and darkness or in the Christian doctrine about the struggle between God and the devil. For Socrates, good and evil are a consequence of the presence or absence of the same principle, namely knowledge. Only under the guidance and direction of the mind are health, strength, beauty, wealth, courage, generosity, etc., used for good; otherwise they will not bring benefit, but harm.

“For example,” Socrates explained, “courage, when it has nothing to do with reason, but is similar to simple audacity: does a person, if he is bold not by reason, not suffer harm, and if he is courageous by reason, will he not benefit? Isn’t it the same with prudence and understanding? With intelligence, both education and upbringing bring benefit, but without intelligence, harm. In a word, does everything that the soul strives for and what it endures end happily if it is controlled. reason, and unfortunately - if it is recklessness? So, if virtue is something that dwells in the soul, and if, moreover, it cannot but be useful, then it means that it is reason: after all, everything that concerns the soul is itself. in itself, it is neither useful nor harmful, but becomes harmful or useful due to reason or through recklessness. In accordance with this reasoning, virtue, since it is useful, is nothing other than reason" (Plato. Meno, 88 b-c) .

But can virtue be taught? It would seem that, based on the definition of virtue as knowledge, this question should be answered unequivocally in the affirmative. However, Socrates, after a thorough discussion of this topic, comes to a negative conclusion: virtue cannot be taught (Ibid., 94 e). This is the case because Socrates distinguishes between knowledge and opinion. Strictly speaking, knowledge and, therefore, virtue, according to Socrates, is divine reason, accessible, and even then not completely, only to philosophical clarification in concepts.

Usually people only imagine that they know, and their opinions in most cases are not much different from simple ignorance. But there are, Socrates notes, true opinions that are, as it were, between knowledge and ignorance. An opinion, if true, leads to right action and virtuous conduct. True opinion, like knowledge, guides a person, directs him to the right goal and keeps him within the boundaries of virtue. Such a true opinion and the virtue corresponding to it are available to man, and he can learn it under the necessary conditions. But true opinions, like any opinion in general, due to their sensual nature, are very changeable, fluid and transitory. “...True opinions,” explained Socrates, “also, while they remain with us, are a very good thing and do a lot of good; but they do not want to stay with us for a long time, they disappear from the soul of a person and therefore are not so valuable while he has them.” will not bind with a judgment about the reasons... Being bound, opinions become, firstly, knowledge and, secondly, stable. That is why knowledge is more valuable than correct opinion and differs from correct opinion in that it is connected” (Ibid., 98). Such binding of true opinion occurs thanks to the concept, which gives opinion the character of knowledge. But this is accessible only to philosophers, which predetermines Socrates’ justification for the right of philosophy to guide human, including polis, affairs.

Even the most famous statesmen, such as Themistocles, Aristides, Pericles, Thucydides, had, according to Socrates, only correct opinion, but not knowledge; and their virtue was not the result of actual knowledge, but rather a divine inheritance. In this sense, Socrates calls such politicians divine and inspired and likens them to soothsayers and seers. “And if,” he notes, “it is not thanks to knowledge, then only thanks to correct opinions that statesmen lead their cities along the right path; in their minds they are not at all different from soothsayers and divinely inspired seers: after all, they, in a frenzy, speak the truth, and very often , but they themselves do not know what they are saying" (Ibid., 99 p.).

That is why, Socrates believed, these politicians were unable to teach the virtue to which they themselves, even their own children, were introduced by God’s gift. Socrates is rather inclined to recognize the Sophists, in particular Protagoras, Gorgias, Prodicus, as teachers of virtue, if virtue in the sense as he understood it could be taught through training and education. Apparently, the Sophists, according to the Socratic concept, teach, at best, true opinion, but not knowledge. But even with this they bring, from the point of view of Socrates, great benefit,

Socrates did not share the prejudices of his compatriots against the sophists, who were usually accused of deceiving gullible parents and corrupting the youth. He held the view that it is not the sophists and their private speeches that destroy young men, but the very nature of Athenian political life, the prevailing morals and opinions, and the management of city affairs by people ignorant of knowledge and virtue.

From his own experience, Socrates knew well the value of widespread gossip about the Sophists. And while disagreeing with the sophists, he did not forget that a much larger gap lay between him and those who ran the affairs of the Athenian polis: Socrates’ thesis about “virtue is knowledge” cast doubt on both the virtue and the knowledge of his fellow citizens. From the book Tao - the way of water

by Watts Alan