Socrates vs. Sophists: Impact on Athenian Politics
Consequences of the Sophists in Athenian Politics
After the victory over the Persians in the Medic Wars, under the military leadership of Pericles, the Athenian lower classes saw their access to politics increase, perhaps as a reward for their invaluable contribution to the Athenian army, hitherto reserved for members of the aristocracy. The Athenian city-state was characterized by direct democracy. While it is true that civil and political rights were restricted, the discussion of the affairs of the polis was part of the daily life of the Athenians, for whom politics, far from being a matter of specialists or professionals, represented something essential in their lives.
The Sophists were a group of scholars who, in exchange for large fees, engaged in teaching the young Athenians who required their services skills to work professionally in politics. Their teachings included knowledge of laws, history, and philosophy, but focused especially on the arts related to public speaking, such as rhetoric and dialectics.
The consequence of the Sophist movement was threefold:
- Professionalized politics, turning it into a skilled trade.
- Exalted the economic and social elite oligarchy, as the disciples of the Sophists belonged to the wealthy.
- Turned language into a political tool and instrument of domination, forgetting its primary objectives, which were the pursuit of justice and truth.
Socrates: Life and Philosophy
Socrates was born in Athens in the year 470 BCE. Characteristics of his understanding and practice are maieutics, dialogue, and irony. His irony is often expressed in a modest attitude. An exemplary citizen, he was accused of impiety and sentenced to death in the year 399 BCE. Socrates was a character belonging to the philosophical and cultural environment of the Sophists, whom he vigorously fought. He shared with them his interest in man, moral and political issues, linking them to the problem of language.
He differed fundamentally from them in three aspects:
- He did not charge for his teachings.
- For Socrates, the only valid method was dialogue.
- His anti-relativist attitude and his theory regarding moral intellectualism.
Socrates Against the Moral Relativism of the Sophists
Relativism, a general attitude of the Sophists, was thus set for moral concepts. Socrates was not satisfied with this relativism. Indeed, Socrates thought, if everyone understood “good” and “just” as something different…
Moral Intellectualism
It is therefore necessary to define precisely the concepts to re-establish communication and to enable dialogue on moral and political issues. The Greeks used to distinguish two broad areas of knowledge: theoretical knowledge (merely contemplative knowledge) and practical knowledge (aimed at action). Practical knowledge could, in turn, be knowledge aimed at producing (poiesis) objects (technical knowledge) and knowledge aimed at action, to regulate behavior (praxis), both individual and social (political-moral knowledge). The relationship between these types of knowledge was discussed very differently by the Greek philosophers. Socrates, in turn, always took the knowledge of production, the technical, as a model for his theory of moral knowledge.