Week Seven

Plato, The Apology of Socrates

What is wisdom?

Does the pursuit of wisdom corrupt the young?

Does philosophy compromise religion and social order?

Athens stands as one of the most consequential cities in the history of the world. Its course displays the promise and peril of democracy and the potencies of the Greek polis. During the Archaic period, the Greek innovation of a true alphabet, with vowels, made general literacy a possibility. (Glyphs and cuneiform were too complicated for use beyond a clerical class.) General literacy makes more egalitarian social existence possible, as it enables public transparency, including the promulgation of law codes—which hedge aristocratic caprice and self-assertion. Commerce created new social opportunities. And money (in the form of coinage) helped “rationalize” social life, eroding the solidity of traditional privileges. These forces, which would contribute to the Ionian awakening in philosophy, were at the same time the forces behind an increasing democratization. Philosophy and democracy do not leave immemorial traditions unquestioned. Both grow from the spirit of inquiry, a sense of wonder before everything, including things once thought to be unquestionable social facts.

The way of warfare advanced democratization. Homer recalls a time of hero-kings and their warrior bands, but during the Dark Ages, a new way of fighting developed: the phalanx of the hoplite infantry, in which the citizen body of a Greek polis was deployed in a compact formation of heavily armored, and mutually dependent, soldiers. This mass deployment came with political power. These citizen armies would have served as general assemblies for public deliberation. The Mycenean civilization had king and council (aristocracy): now the assembly, or “the people,” were adding their voice. As the Archaic period wore on, many Greek poleis got rid of their kings. From aristocracy towards increasing egalitarianism: this was the true Herodotean “Western” dynamic. The hoplite victory at Marathon was part of this trend, and the trireme rowers, members of the proletariat, who won the day at Salamis, made the logical completion of the arc irresistible. Athens realized a radical democracy in 462/1, which is the regime that would destroy itself in the Peloponnesian War.

- David Franks